politics

Summary

Elon Musk called for arrests after posting a video on X showing a confrontation between women and a Tesla Cybertruck driver.

In the video, a woman pointed at the vehicle, prompting the driver to yell threats while the crowd chanted "Shame!"

Another woman called the driver a Nazi.

Musk claimed the incident was part of broader attacks and urged authorities to arrest those funding such actions, saying targeting only “puppets and paid foot-soldiers” would not stop the violence.

cross-posted from: https://fedia.io/m/Resist/t/1987061

The Republican Office of New Mexico's headquarters in Albuquerque was intentionally set on fire in an act of arson.

If you know something about how this happened, no you don't.

Summary

Donald Trump condemned a vandalism attack at his Scottish golf course by activists, calling the perpetrators “terrorists” and demanding they be “treated harshly.”

The March 8 incident at Trump Turnberry included red paint, anti-Trump graffiti, and messages like “Gaza is not 4 sale.”

Police charged a 33-year-old man and arrested two others. Palestine Action claimed responsibility, citing U.S. complicity in Gaza’s destruction.

Activists criticized the leaders for focusing on property damage while Gaza faces ongoing bombardment.

Summary

Elon Musk gave away two $1 million checks in Wisconsin ahead of a key state Supreme Court election, prompting backlash after one winner was revealed as Nicholas Jacobs, chair of the Wisconsin College Republicans.

Critics called the giveaway “rigged,” fueling suspicion about Musk’s political motives.

Though Musk claimed the money wasn’t tied to voting, his deleted post initially suggested it rewarded voters. Wisconsin law bans vote-motivating payments.

Musk has invested nearly $20 million to support conservative candidate Brad Schimel.

This is why Democrats lose.

Democrats are furious. And they want their leaders to get mad, too.

“I wish you’d be angry,” a constituent told representative Gil Cisneros, a Democrat of California, at a recent town hall. At an event in Minnesota featuring a panel of Democratic attorneys general, an activist voiced a similar sentiment: “Get angry, man,” punctuating the message with a profanity.

The anger roiling the party, slow to build, is now a forceful current coursing through the electorate and pulling in Americans terrified that the country is descending into authoritarianism. Democrats – with no leader to guide them and little power to wield in Washington – are scrambling to harness the sudden fury.

At rallies, town halls and protests, voters are venting their fury with Donald Trump and his empowerment of Elon Musk’s full-frontal assault on federal agencies, stoking what progressive activists believe are the embers of a populist backlash against the president – and the Democratic leaders they believe are not meeting the moment.

It was the town hall that wasn’t supposed to happen.

For the better part of two hours Friday night, pissed-off Hoosiers jeered, chanted, and booed at Rep. Victoria Spartz, R-Ind., one of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency’s most fervent supporters in Congress.

It was a case in point for why senior Republican leaders have advised their members against holding such events at all.

Spartz, however, is often at odds with House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. She plowed through the taunts as a crowd outside shouted, “Do your job!” Inside, the crowd roared in anger at mentions of Elon Musk and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Brian Jonasen, an Air Force veteran who has helped organize protests at the Indiana Statehouse, said, “The one thing we hope that maybe she takes back with her is that the people are mad. They are angry.”

Thr problem is that there is supposed to be criminal prosecution for this felony so the courts won't entertain request for an injunction over it. Meanwhile the responsible authorities aren't willing to arrest and prosecute.

If you’re running the security directorate of a hostile nation, savor this moment. It’s never been easier to steal secrets from the United States government. Can you even call it stealing when it’s this simple? The Trump administration has unlocked the vault doors, fired half of the security guards and asked the rest to roll pennies. Walk right in. Take what you want. This is the golden age.

Hundreds of international students in the US are getting an email from the US Department of State (DOS) asking them to self-deport owing to campus activism. Immigration attorneys’ contacted by TOI affirmed this development and added a few Indian students may also be at the receiving end of such emails – for something as innocuous as sharing a social media post.

It is not just international students who physically participated in campus activism but also those who shared or liked ‘anti-national’ posts that are the target of these emails, said an immigration attorney.

This crackdown is based on social-media reviews being conducted by DOS (which includes Consulate officials). Thus, even new student applications be it for an F (academic study visa), M (vocational study visa) or J (exchange visa) will also come under such social media scrutiny.

Applicants will be denied the opportunity to study in the US.

Summary:

Public health experts and other critics on Wednesday condemned the Trump administration's decision to cut off funding to the global vaccine alliance Gavi, which the organization estimates could result in the deaths of over 1 million children.

"Abhorrent. Evil. Indefensible," Atlantic staff writer Clint Smith said on social media in response to exclusive reporting from The New York Times, which obtained documents including a 281-page spreadsheet that "the skeletal remains" of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) sent to Congress on Monday.

The leaked materials detail 898 awards that the Trump administration plans to continue and 5,341 it intends to end. A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department, which runs the gutted USAID, confirmed the list is accurate and said that "each award terminated was reviewed individually for alignment with agency and administration priorities."

The United States contributes 13% of Gavi's budget and the terminated grant was worth $2.6 billion through 2030, according to the Times. Citing the alliance, the newspaper noted that cutting off U.S. funds "may mean 75 million children do not receive routine vaccinations in the next five years, with more than 1.2 million children dying as a result."

And why ldiot America is totally and utterly fucked.

Possibly, here is a lawyer's take on it:

https://cornerstonelaw.us/22nd-amendment-doesnt-say-think-says/

I am not a lawyer. But this might be a clue:

"perhaps the Nation could call on a former two-term President by electing him as Vice President even with the knowledge that the plan all along was for the President to resign immediately upon taking Office."

Summary

JD Vance angered senior Republicans after questioning Trump’s directive to strike the Houthis in Yemen during a Signal chat with top officials.

Some GOP lawmakers viewed Vance’s objections—framed as anti-European and pro-MAGA—as an attempt to obstruct Trump’s decision.

The Trump administration is escalating military actions, including deploying B-2 bombers, carriers, and missile systems, signaling a sustained campaign.

Critics fear entanglement similar to Iraq.

…

Summary

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. plans to eliminate the Office of Infectious Disease and HIV/AIDS Policy (OIDP) and dissolve the Office of Minority Health as part of a broader HHS restructuring that will cut 20,000 positions.

OIDP, key to vaccine promotion and HIV prevention, oversees programs like the national vaccine strategy and “Ending the HIV Epidemic.”

Its functions may be absorbed into a new agency, the Administration for a Healthy America (AHA).

The move raises concerns about public health impacts, especially amid declining vaccination rates.

Excerpt:

Ranjani Srinivasan was busy talking to an adviser at Columbia University when the federal agents first came to her door. The day before she’d got an unexpected email that her student visa had been canceled, and she was trying to get information.

“It was my roommate who heard the knock and immediately recognized (it as) law enforcement,” Srinivasan told CNN. “She asked them ‘Do you have a warrant?’ And they had to say ‘No.’”

“I was stunned and scared,” she said. “I remember telling the adviser ‘ICE is at my door and you’re telling me I’m fine? Do something.’”

They returned another day, also without a warrant, Srinivasan said. Matters escalated when they came a third time, with a judge’s permission to enter the Columbia apartment. By then she had already left the country.

The biggest question for Srinivasan is why they came at all.

Srinivasan had renewed her student visa just a few months earlier, being granted permission for another five years in the United States — more than enough time to complete her PhD in urban planning. She was no stranger to immigration rules, having won a Fulbright scholarship to Harvard University for her master’s degree and then returning to her native India for the requisite two years after.

Her dream acceptance at Columbia’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation coincided with the beginning of the Covid pandemic, so she started her studies in Chennai, India, before making it to New York City.

By last month, the end of her doctorate was almost in sight, she was grading papers for the students she was teaching and fretting over a deadline for a journal. Far from her mind was a night almost a year before when she got caught up in a crowd.

That evening in April 2024 she’d been trying to get back to her university apartment from a staff picnic when she was swept up in a police operation against a crowd protesting Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza, she said.

Srinivasan had only just returned to the US, having been away from Columbia since before the war began and generated passionate protests. “We didn’t really know what was going to happen that day,” she said. “The whole perimeter of the neighborhood had been barricaded.” Unable to prove she lived there, she wasn’t allowed to go to her street, so she ended up circling the neighborhood, looking for a way through, she told CNN.

“They kept shifting the barricades, and then I think around 200 cops descended, and they kind of charged at us. It was absolute confusion. People were screaming, falling, people were running out of the way,” she said. Too small to force her way through the melee, she ended up in a large group of people detained by the police.

She said she was held with the crowd for several hours but never fingerprinted or booked for an arrest. She was given two pink-colored summonses by the New York Police Department — one for obstructing pedestrian traffic and the other for failure to disperse — before being released. A lawyer working pro bono for a number of the students got the summonses dismissed even before she had to appear in court. That means there should be no record against her, and as far as Srinivasan was concerned, she could forget the whole thing.

She did not report the dismissed summonses on her visa renewal.

When asked why Srinivasan’s visa was revoked, the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement “these citations were not disclosed.”

That was never mentioned to Srinivasan when she was told her visa had been taken away.

Summary

Federal funding cuts under Trump, including a $500 million program for food banks to buy local produce, are hitting rural communities like Rainelle, West Virginia, especially hard.

Dairy producer Trey Yates lost a key contract with Mountaineer Food Bank, threatening his business. Similar stories emerged from other small farmers relying on USDA grants now eliminated.

West Virginia, where Trump won 70% of the vote, relies on federal funds for over half its state budget.

Critics warn cuts will deepen poverty, strain schools, and devastate local agriculture-dependent economies.