Trump Obstructed Justice. Period.

Another big development late this afternoon, reported by Michael S. Schmidt at the New York Times: Comey Memo Says Trump Asked Him to End Flynn Investigation. (Emphasis mine.)

[Donald] Trump asked the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, to shut down the federal investigation into Mr. Trump's former national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, in an Oval Office meeting in February, according to a memo Mr. Comey wrote shortly after the meeting.

"I hope you can let this go," the president told Mr. Comey, according to the memo.

The existence of Mr. Trump's request is the clearest evidence that the president has tried to directly influence the Justice Department and F.B.I. investigation into links between Mr. Trump's associates and Russia.

Mr. Comey wrote the memo detailing his conversation with the president immediately after the meeting, which took place the day after Mr. Flynn resigned, according to two people who read the memo. The memo was part of a paper trail Mr. Comey created documenting what he perceived as the president's improper efforts to influence a continuing investigation. An F.B.I. agent's contemporaneous notes are widely held up in court as credible evidence of conversations.

A source has confirmed the Times' reporting to NBC News.

During the same meeting, Trump reportedly also "began the discussion by condemning leaks to the news media, saying that Mr. Comey should consider putting reporters in prison for publishing classified information"—because he is a gross authoritarian with contempt for our democratic norms, in addition to being a scofflaw who tried to obstruct a federal investigation.

The White House immediately issued a denial, on which Politico's Shane Goldmacher noted "no one at the White House" was willing to put their name.

They can issue denials from here to eternity, but the fact is that Comey was taking detailed notes because he already felt as though Trump were trying to influence the investigation. That means there's probably even more where this came from.

It also means that Comey's firing should now rightly be viewed (if it weren't already) as a punitive measure because Comey wouldn't indulge Trump's request to "let this go," which then itself becomes another instance of obstruction.

It was textbook obstruction of an investigation. This is the time when anyone who cares about this nation calls for impeachment proceedings.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) May 16, 2017

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We Resist: Day 97

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

* * *

Here are some things in the news today:

As I mentioned earlier, Trump's order to restrict federal funding to sanctuary cities was blocked by a California judge who "issued a nationwide injunction on Tuesday blocking enforcement of Trump's executive order targeting cities and counties across the US that have pledged to be a safe haven to the country's 11 million undocumented immigrants."

Naturally, the White House was not happy about it. They issued a gobsmacking statement (aptly described by the Atlantic's Matt Ford as reading "more like a Breitbart column than a professional response"), which is shocking even by the rock-bottom garbage standards this administration has set (emphasis mine):

Statement on Sanctuary Cities Ruling

Today, the rule of law suffered another blow, as an unelected judge unilaterally rewrote immigration policy for our Nation. Federal law explicitly states that "a Federal, State or Local government entity or official may not prohibit, or in any way restrict, any government entity or official from sending to, or receiving from, the Immigration and Naturalization Service information regarding the citizenship or immigration status, lawful or unlawful, of any individual." 8 U.S.C. 1373(a). That means, according to Congress, a city that prohibits its officials from providing information to federal immigration authorities — a sanctuary city — is violating the law. Sanctuary cities, like San Francisco, block their jails from turning over criminal aliens to Federal authorities for deportation. These cities are engaged in the dangerous and unlawful nullification of Federal law in an attempt to erase our borders.

Once again, a single district judge — this time in San Francisco — has ignored Federal immigration law to set a new immigration policy for the entire country. This decision occurred in the same sanctuary city that released the 5-time deported illegal immigrant who gunned down innocent Kate Steinle in her father's arms. San Francisco, and cities like it, are putting the well-being of criminal aliens before the safety of our citizens, and those city officials who authored these policies have the blood of dead Americans on their hands. This San Francisco judge's erroneous ruling is a gift to the criminal gang and cartel element in our country, empowering the worst kind of human trafficking and sex trafficking, and putting thousands of innocent lives at risk.

This case is yet one more example of egregious overreach by a single, unelected district judge. Today's ruling undermines faith in our legal system and raises serious questions about circuit shopping. But we are confident we will ultimately prevail in the Supreme Court, just as we will prevail in our lawful efforts to impose immigration restrictions necessary to keep terrorists out of the United States.

In the meantime, we will pursue all legal remedies to the sanctuary city threat that imperils our citizens, and continue our efforts to ramp up enforcement to remove the criminal and gang element from our country. Ultimately, this is a fight between sovereignty and open borders, between the rule of law and lawlessness, and between hardworking Americans and those who would undermine their safety and freedom.

Fucking WOW. There is a lot of disturbing stuff there, but the White House releasing a statement saying that a judge's ruling "undermines faith in our legal system" because that ruling went against their attempts to enshrine unconstitutional bigotry, is terrifying. This is the behavior of despots.

And, in addition to Trump being an authoritarian nightmare, he is also an embarrassing ignoramus.

Donald Trump is the President of the United States, and he doesn't even understand how the courts work. JFC.

* * *

Speaking of anti-democratic regimes, this massive piece at Politico by Ben Schreckinger and Hadas Gold on "Trump's Fake War on the Fake News" is really something. There is an awful lot to process, and I recommend reading the whole thing in its entirety, but I want to highlight this bit:

On top of the sloppiness, there is the lying. One veteran White House correspondent said he was warned by a transition official to be wary of good color emanating from the Trump camp on background. "They will screw with you," the correspondent was told. "They will feed you things that are not true."

Bannon, it is worth noting, is a devoted reader of the "neoreactionary" internet philosopher Curtis Yarvin, an advocate of the strategic benefits of spreading misinformation. But two people close to the administration say that White House staffers do much of their lying for sport, rather than to further any larger agenda.

"They all lie," said a conservative journalist with close ties to the West Wing, who described an informal contest to smuggle the biggest whoppers into print. "It's a game to them."

A conservative activist close to the administration said a member of the White House communications team recently divulged the same to him over drinks. According to the activist, the staffer described the attitude inside the press shop toward lying to reporters as: "They'll print what they want anyways, so we may as well have fun."

@TurtleTears Unreal. Just bragging about waging a disinformation campaign.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) April 26, 2017

Seethe.

* * *

Robbie Gramer at Foreign Policy: Rex Tillerson Spurns Africa in Botched Meeting with African Union Chief.

Just months into office, the Trump administration has rattled allies and partners in North America, Europe, and Asia. Now you can add Africa to that list.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson invited the chairperson of the African Union to Washington for a meeting, then backed out on him at the last minute, infuriating African diplomats, several sources tell Foreign Policy.

Tillerson invited African Union (AU) Commission Chairperson Moussa Faki to Washington the week of April 17, after Faki ended meetings at the United Nations in New York. Several sources close to the matter say Faki scheduled his trip to Washington on April 19 and 20 while waiting for the details to be sorted out. But then Tillerson's office went radio silent for several days, and left the head of the 55-nation bloc in the lurch and fuming, the sources said.

Tillerson's team eventually got back to Faki's entourage as he was about to depart New York and offered a meeting with lower-level State Department officials, but Faki cancelled his Washington visit entirely.

Oh my goddddddd. If Tillerson had only "backed out" on Faki, that would be bad enough. But to ignore him for days, only to then offer a meeting with Tillerson's flunkies? Horribly insulting. This is the antithesis of diplomacy.

* * *

Juliet Eilperin at the Washington Post: Zinke to Review More Than 2 Dozen National Monuments 'to Make Sure the People Have a Voice'. Yeah, that's just as chilling as it sounds. "Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said Tuesday evening that [Donald] Trump has authorized him to review any national monument created since Jan. 1, 1996, that spans at least 100,000 acres 'to make sure the people have a voice' in which lands receive the highest level of federal protection. ...The secretary praised the Antiquities Act but suggested that some of Trump's predecessors had stretched its meaning in recent years to put 'millions of acres' of land and sea off limits to development. 'By and large, the Antiquities Act and the monuments that we've protected have done a great service to the public,' he said, although citizens in Western states 'would probably say it's abused. My position is, I'm going to be looking into it and evaluating it on a legal basis.'"

David Nather at Axios: Trump Administration Won't Promise to Keep Making Insurer Payments. "The Affordable Care Act insurer payments are in trouble again, as Office of Management and Budget director Mick Mulvaney is reportedly not promising that the Trump administration will make the payments next month. He told House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi last night that the administration hasn't decided whether to pay insurers for the cost-sharing reduction subsidies they have to provide to low-income ACA customers, according to an aide familiar with the conversation."

Lisa Rein at the Washington Post: Slow Pace of Trump Nominations Leaves Cabinet Agencies 'Stuck' in Staffing Limbo. "Trump's Cabinet secretaries are growing exasperated at how slowly the White House is moving to fill hundreds of top-tier posts, warning that the vacancies are hobbling efforts to oversee agency operations and promote the president's agenda, according to administration officials, lawmakers and lobbyists. The Senate has confirmed 26 of Trump's picks for his Cabinet and other top posts. But for 530 other vacant senior-level jobs requiring Senate confirmation, the president has advanced just 37 nominees, according to data tracked by The Washington Post and the nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service's Center for Presidential Transition. These posts include the deputy secretaries and undersecretaries, chief financial officers, ambassadors, general counsels, and heads of smaller agencies who run the government day-to-day."

[Content Note: Death penalty] Jessica Mason Pieklo at Rewire: With His First Vote, Gorsuch Has Already Changed the Supreme Court. "Late Thursday night, Gorsuch cast the deciding vote that would put to death eight men in Arkansas over the course of 11 days. Within minutes of the Court releasing a series of orders denying a stay of the planned executions, Arkansas executed Ledell Lee, a Black man who maintained his innocence and claimed his attorney was drunk during his trial." Sob.

Yessenia Funes at Colorlines: Two Recent Climate Change Studies Paint a Grim Picture. "Researchers at Stanford University released a study online yesterday (April 24), which was published in this week's issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. This first-of-its-kind study examines how climate change is impacting extreme weather events around the world. ...The Arctic Council's Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme published the Snow, Water, Ice, and Permafrost in the Arctic (SWIPA) assessment today (April 25). In two decades, the Arctic Ocean may see ice-free summers, according to the report."

Dominic Rushe at the Guardian: Trump's Plan to Overturn Net Neutrality Rules to Face 'a Tsunami of Resistance'. Let's fucking hope so! "Trump's newly appointed Federal Communications Commission chairman Ajit Pai is set to address internet regulation at a speech in Washington later today. Pai has vowed to 'fire up the weed-whacker' and cut Obama-era rules meant to enforce an open internet where all traffic is treated equally online—the so-called Net Neutrality rules."

[CN: Violent homophobia; eliminationism] Adam Rhodes at Towleroad: More Than 30 Men Arrested for 'Sodomy' in Iran Face Death Penalty if Convicted: Reports. "More than 30 men were arrested after a private party in the Bahadoran region of Isfahan, Iran was raided by the police, Iranian Railroad for Queer Refugees reported Thursday. Their charges are sodomy, drinking alcohol and using psychedelic drugs and they face the death penalty if found guilty. The men, between the ages of 16 and 30, the Canadian charity reports, were rounded up late April 13 amid gunshots and beatings from police." Global LGBTQ rights is one of the areas where many lives will be lost because too many people believed Trump was "good on gay rights," and didn't care that Hillary Clinton has centered LGBTQ rights in her foreign policy approach for more than a decade. This makes me ill.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

Shut Up!

We Resist: Day 92

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

* * *

Here are some things in the news today:

Franco Ordoñez and Anita Kumar: Secret Meeting at Mar-a-Lago Raises Questions About Colombia Peace and Trump.

Donald Trump quietly met a pair of former Colombian presidents last weekend at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, thrusting his administration into an ugly power struggle in Latin America that threatens to undermine the country's controversial peace agreement with rebel leaders.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos is expected to push Trump to support the peace accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia at their first meeting at the White House next month. He wants the Trump administration and Congress to maintain the $450 million in foreign aid promised by former President Barack Obama to implement the plan to end Latin America's longest armed conflict.

The meeting between Trump and the former presidents, Álvaro Uribe and Andrés Pastrana – Colombia news media have reported it was arranged by an influential U.S. critic of the plan, Republican U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida – was not on the president's schedule and was not disclosed to reporters who traveled with him to Palm Beach.

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer initially declined to answer questions about the meeting, leading to a rash of speculation in Colombian media. Colombian newspapers, websites and radio stations debated the meeting’s significance — and whether it actually had happened. "I don't have anything for you at this time," Spicer said Wednesday when asked.

The White House later confirmed the meeting to McClatchy but downplayed its significance, saying it was a mere coincidence that both former leaders opposed to the peace pact were at the president's club. Aides to Rubio declined to comment.

"They were there with a member from the club and briefly said hello when the president walked past them," spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said. "There wasn't anything beyond a quick hello."

But the leaders' own comments contradict the White House's characterization.

In a tweet following the meeting, Pastrana thanked Trump for the "cordial and very frank conversation" about problems in Colombia and the region.

So, not only did Trump hold this secret meeting, at his deeply problematic private estate, but then his spokesperson straight-up lied about it. This is aggressively unacceptable—and it will barely get a passing mention in the political press, because there is so much other shit swirling around in Trump's tornado of chaos.

* * *

Kenneth P. Vogel at Politico: Trump Lawyer: 'No Right' to Protest at Rallies. "Donald Trump's lawyers argued in a Thursday court filing that protesters 'have no right' to 'express dissenting views' at his campaign rallies because such protests infringed on his First Amendment rights. ...Trump's lawyers also argue that he had every right to call for the removal the protesters since they 'obviously interfered with the Trump campaign's First Amendment right' by 'vigorously expressing their disdain for Mr. Trump,' including by chanting and holding up signs depicting Trump's face on the body of a pig, among other anti-Trump messages. 'Of course, protesters have their own First Amendment right to express dissenting views, but they have no right to do so as part of the campaign rally of the political candidates they oppose,' Trump's lawyers wrote." Absolutely chilling.

[Content Note: Video may autoplay at link] Nick Penzenstadler, Steve Reilly, and John Kelly at USA Today: Trump Condos Worth $250 Million Pose Potential Conflict. "USA TODAY spent four months cataloging every property Trump's companies own across the country. Reporters found that Trump's companies are sitting on at least $250 million of individual properties in the USA alone. Property records show Trump's trust and his companies own at least 422 luxury condos and penthouses from New York City to Las Vegas, 12 mansion lots on bluffs overlooking his golf course on the Pacific Ocean, and dozens more smaller pieces of real estate. The properties range in value from about $200,000 to $35 million each. Unlike developments where Trump licenses his name to a separate developer for a flat fee, profits from selling individual properties directly owned by his companies ultimately enrich him personally."

Margaret Hartmann at New York Mag: The U.S. May Be Preparing to Charge WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange. "On Thursday afternoon, the Washington Post reported that federal prosecutors are considering whether to bring criminal charges against members of WikiLeaks, while CNN said they have already prepared charges against Assange. As CNN explained, the Obama administration had decided to hold off on prosecuting Assange because they could not figure out how to go after him without targeting mainstream outlets that publish classified information."

(I have no love for Assange, who is currently hiding out in the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid rape charges in Sweden, but I do have serious questions about whether the Trump administration is orchestrating this as part of their war on the free press, to set a dangerous precedent regarding publication of classified info, as well as whether they have an interest in getting Assange out of reach of European Union officials who may have questions for him about Russian collusion.)

Taegan Goddard at Political Wire: U.S. Moves Towards Imposing Steel Tariffs. "'The U.S. has set the stage for a global showdown over steel, launching a national security investigation that could lead to sweeping tariffs on steel imports in what would be the first significant act of economic protectionism by [Donald] Trump,' the Financial Times reports. 'The decision to use a 1962 law allowing the US government to limit imports that threaten its security readiness is intended to deliver on Mr Trump's campaign promises to bolster heavy industry and 'put new American steel into the spine of this country'… But it risks setting off trade tensions with China just days after Mr Trump avoided another conflict by backing down on a promise to label Beijing a currency manipulator, citing in part its help in dealing with North Korea.'"

[CN: Transphobia; homophobia] Sheri Swokowski at the Washington Post: Trump's Anti-LGBT Army Secretary Nominee Thinks Veterans Like Me Have 'a Disease'. "Like Mark Green—[Donald] Trump's nominee for secretary of the Army—I served my country in uniform. I was proud to be an infantry officer and retired honorably after 34 years. But as a transgender member of the military, I hid my authentic self for decades to continue serving the country I love. Unlike Green, I was forced to serve in silence the entire time, but I won't be silent now. I respect his Iraq War service as an Army flight surgeon, but the disrespect—the bigotry—he's shown over and over toward the LGBT community, including LGBT service members, doesn't reflect the spirit or direction of the military I know. Rather, his selection reflects poorly on the president and our armed forces. He's the wrong choice to be Army secretary."

[CN: War on agency; disablism] Sharona Coutts at Rewire: Trump Administration at Odds with Scientists and Advocates. "Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Tom Price is connected to the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, an extreme libertarian doctors group that espouses many of the lies about abortion safety long rejected by the medical and scientific communities. In the current edition of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, the group once again lends support to the myth that abortion causes breast cancer, calling induced abortion 'conducive to breast cancer.' In the past, the group has taken outlandish positions on many issues, falsely claiming that unauthorized immigrants caused an outbreak of leprosy in the United States; that vaccines are linked to autism; and casting doubt over whether HIV causes AIDS."

[CN: Nativism] Ed Pilkington at the Guardian: Torn Apart: The American Families Hit by Trump's Immigration Crackdown. "'Bad hombres.' Those are the people Donald Trump says he is targeting for deportation under his immigration policy—the people he calls 'illegal aliens,' the gangbangers, violent criminals, and drug dealers who threaten public safety and undermine national security. But a very different pattern is emerging on the ground. In communities from Maryland to California and Oregon, immigration lawyers are reporting that individuals are being picked up with minimal or no criminal records who pose no risk at all to anyone. More than 90% of removal proceedings initiated in the first two months of the Trump administration have been against people who have committed no crime at all other than to be living in the country without permission."

[CN: Homophobia] Michael Fitzgerald at Towleroad: Family Research Council: Gay Witches Are Secretly Running Washington, D.C. "Hate group the Family Research Council (FRC) has come out with some awful nonsense over the years but group 'senior fellow' Robert Maginnis has possibly reached maximum stupid by suggesting that Washington, D.C., is run by evil gay witches." I wish!

[CN: Environmental racism] Yessenia Funes at Colorlines: Montana Tribes Want Keystone XL away from Their Drinking Water. "The 1,179-mile long pipeline is set to cross west of the reservation on the Missouri River—the same body of water the Sioux people fought to protect against the Dakota Access Pipeline. The Fort Peck Indian Reservation's only source of fresh water, from an intake plant, sits downstream. People on the reservation used to pull groundwater from their own wells. ...'Oh, what the hell, just do it to the Indians: I'm afraid that's just a lot of people's attitudes,' said Margaret Abbott, who lives on the reservation, to Rolling Stone."

[CN: Video may autoplay at link] Mark Hensch at the Hill: RNC Raises Record-Setting $41.5M Haul. "The Republican National Committee on Friday announced it raised $41.5 million in the first three months of 2017, its strongest-ever total for the first quarter following a presidential race. 'Our record-setting fundraising pace has been fueled by grassroots enthusiasm for [Donald] Trump and the Republican Party,' RNC Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel said in a statement."

In other words: Republicans are definitely okay with all of the horrors detailed above, and in all the previous daily installments of this series. In fact, not only are they okay with it; they're forking over record amounts of cash to keep the hits coming. Sob.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

Shut Up!

This Man Is the President of the United States

Time magazine's latest cover story is about Donald Trump being a liar. That's not the way they're putting it, but it's the way they should be—and it's definitely the way I'm putting it. They way they put it is "the way he has handled truth and falsehood in his career." Sure.

In conjunction with their cover story, [CN: video may autoplay at link] their Washington Bureau Chief, Michael Scherer, did an interview with Trump. It is...something.

Throughout the entirety of the interview, Trump is exactly who we already know him to be, and yet simultaneously somehow even worse.

He brags relentlessly about being "right," even about things he was not even remotely right about. (Was he getting paid $5 by Nigel Farage every time he said the word Brexit?) And naturally he never admits to being wrong about anything.

Which is why I wonder: What is the point of giving him this platform? You know he's never going to admit to being wrong, so, going in, you know what you're handing him is a visible platform for more lying.

The decision to do and publish this interview strikes me primarily as evidence that the media continues to believe there's something "more" to Trump. No, there isn't. There's even less.

Anyway. Three pieces I want to highlight (the interviewer's words are in bold):

1. Trump is always right, the media is garbage, everything is a competition, and he is going to win.

I tend to be right. I'm an instinctual person, I happen to be a person that knows how life works. I said I was going to win the election, I won the election, in fact I was number one the entire route, in the primaries, from the day I announced, I was number one. And the New York Times and CNN and all of them, they did these polls, which were extremely bad and they turned out to be totally wrong, and my polls showed I was going to win. We thought we were going to win the night of the election.

So when you…

And then TIME magazine, which treats me horribly, but obviously I sell, I assume this is going to be a cover too, have I set the record? I guess, right? Covers, nobody's had more covers.

I think Richard Nixon still has you beat. But he was in office for longer, so give yourself time.

Okay good. I'm sure I'll win.

Kudos to Scherer for that dig which Trump didn't even recognize. But here is another reason to ask whyyyyyyy even indulge this guy? Every media outlet, aside from Fox News and Breitbart, has to know by now he'll talk shit about them and they'll be obliged to print it. And that he'll tell enormous lies and they'll be obliged to print them. This isn't actually helpful.

2. Trump won, so nothing else matters.

Hey look, in the mean time, I guess, I can't be doing so badly, because I'm president, and you're not. You know. Say hello to everybody okay?

Thank you very much, Mr. President.

That's how the interview ends—with Trump declaring that he's the president and you're not. Fuck off. Which is not the first time he's used "I won" to end a conversation about accountabililty.

3. As promised, Trump is going to put in "his own people" and fix all this business of people trying to hold him accountable.

But isn't there, it strikes me there is still an issue of credibility. If the intelligence community came out and said, we have determined that so and so is the leaker here, but you are saying to me now, that you don't believe the intelligence community when they say your tweet was wrong.

I'm not saying—no, I'm not blaming. First of all, I put Mike Pompeo in. I put Senator Dan Coats in. These are great people. I think they are great people and they are going to, I have a lot of confidence in them. So hopefully things will straighten out.

This is just the President of the United States saying that he's installing intelligence officials whose primary qualification is loyalty, in order to "straighten out" the problem of being investigated for potentially treasonous activities. Cool.

And such breathtakingly despotic behavior has already become so routine in 60 days that it won't even warrant major headlines.

Open Wide...

Shut Up!

This Is a Real Thing That Happened at Today's White House Press Briefing

As you may recall, over the weekend, Donald Trump took to Twitter to accuse President Obama of having broken the law by ordering Trump Tower wiretapped during the election.

His exact words were: "Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!"

Since then, Trump has provided no evidence to back up his accusation, and his various spokespeople and surrogates have claimed, incredibly, that Trump was just seeking an investigation into the possibility, despite the fact we can all read his words and see he was levying a serious charge.

At today's White House Press Briefing, Press Secretary Sean Spicer was asked about this untenable bullshit, and his response was expectedly ludicrous.

Surreal exchange here re: Trump's claim Obama wiretapped him: pic.twitter.com/w3aiIa7nOk

— Tom Namako (@TomNamako) March 7, 2017

REPORTER (a young Black woman, whose name I don't know offhand): Two quick questions. So, just to follow up on the follow-up: So does the White House feel that it's appropriate— You say that you want it to be adjudicated by the Congressional committees, but the president made declarative statements on Twitter, so I guess— Is the White House position that the president can make declarative statements about a former president basically committing a crime, and then the Congressional committees should look into that and basically prove it? I mean—

[crosstalk]

SPICER: I take issue with— It's not a question of "prove it." I— As I said now five times to the follow-up to the follow-up, that it's not a question of "prove it." It's that they have the resources and the clearances and the staff to fully and thoroughly and comprehensively investigate this, and then issue a report as to, as to what their findings are.

REPORTER: So, but, but President Trump's Twitter statement shouldn't be taken at face value about what—

SPICER: Sure it should. Of course it— I mean, why—? No. I, I— There's nothing, as I mentioned to Jim, it's not that he's walking anything back or regretting— He's just saying that they have the appropriate venue and capabilities to review this.

So, just to be abundantly clear: The White House position is that Donald Trump has the right to say whatever the fuck he wants to say on his Twitter account, including levying utterly unsubstantiable charges against a former president, and then it's up to Congress to investigate it on the taxpayer dime and write a report determining the veracity (or lack thereof) of whatever random dogshit Trump said.

Sure. Apart from everything else that's wrong with that, that is a position that allows for an incredible abuse of power. JFC.

Open Wide...

Shut Up!

"I don't understand why they don't want me."

[Content Note: Nativism; anti-immigrationism.]

On Wednesday, I linked to the story of 22-year-old Daniela Vargas, an undocumented immigrant who was brought to the United States at age 7 and had been protected under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, who was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) hours after speaking at an immigrant rights event.

Vargas' DACA status expired in November, and she was not able to submit a new application to extend it until February, because it took her some time to save the $495 application fee. Her application was received February 10, but she was arrested anyway, because it has not yet been processed.

That Vargas, who did not make the choice to enter the country and is abiding by the rules as best and as quickly as she can, has been detained, when Donald Trump is busily saying garbage like his deportation force will focus on "bad dudes," is appalling. And now her attorney has been told she will be deported.

On Wednesday, a spokesman for ICE said Vargas would go through court proceedings to determine whether she is eligible for some type of relief, adding that the agency would take no further action until those proceedings were completed.

But Abby Peterson, Vargas' attorney, said ICE agents told her on Thursday that they would instead pursue immediate deportation without a court hearing or bond because Vargas entered the country through the visa waiver program, which allows certain foreign nationals to enter the U.S. for under 90 days without a visa. (Argentina was previously part of the program, although it no longer is.) Individuals who use the visa waiver program have no right to a hearing or to contest their removal unless they are seeking asylum.

Vargas, who is currently in detention awaiting her fate, released this heartbreaking statement:

I don't understand why they don't want me. I'm doing the best I can. I mean I can't help that I was brought here but I don't know anything else besides being here and I didn't realize that until I was in a holding cell last night for 5 hours. I was brought here. I didn't choose to be here. And when I was brought here, I had to learn a whole new country and leave behind the one that I did know. And I barely knew that one.

I feel, I strongly feel that I belong here and I strongly feel that I should be given a chance to be here and do something good and work in this economy. There's so much that I can bring to the table, so much, like I can even teach music, I'm an excellent trumpet player you can ask my mom about any of that. I'm great with math, I speak Spanish. You know, there's a lot of stuff that I can do for this country that they're not allowing me to do. I've even tried to join the military, and I can't do that. But, I mean that's not the point, the whole point is that I would do anything for this country.

Daniela Vargas is more a patriot than anyone currently inhabiting the White House and at least half of the U.S. Congress. I strongly feel that she should be given a chance to be here, too.

Fuck anyone who thinks otherwise. I take up space in solidarity with Daniela Vargas, and all the other valuable members of U.S. society who are in a similar situation, for lack of a piece of a paper.

That piece of paper doesn't make you a patriot. Which has never been more clear.

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Shut Up!

"Is this remotely constitutional? I think it isn't."

At the Atlantic, Garrett Epps has a follow-up with additional legal clarification on the story about which I wrote last Thursday, regarding passengers being asked for ID after deplaning from a domestic flight. (Another update was previously posted here.)

Writes Epps:

After days of research, I can find no legal authority for ICE or CBP to require passengers to show identification on an entirely domestic fight.

...I asked two experts whether I had missed some general exception to the Fourth Amendment for passengers on a domestic flight. After all, passengers on flights entering the U.S. from other countries can expect to be asked for ID, and even searched. Barry Friedman, the Jacob D. Fuchsberg professor of law and affiliated professor of politics at New York University, is the author of Unwarranted: Policing Without Permission, a new book-length study of intrusive police investigation and search practices. "Is this remotely constitutional?" he asked. "I think it isn't. We all know generally the government can't come up and demand to see identification." Officers need to have statutory authority to search and reasonable suspicion that the person to be searched has violated the law, he said. Andre Segura, senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union's Immigrants' Rights Project, told me that "I'm not aware of any aviation exception" for domestic passengers.

An ID check is a "search" under the law. Passengers on the JFK flight were not "seeking admission"—the flight originated in the U.S. CBP officials told the public after the fact that they were looking for a specific individual believed to be on board. A search for a specific individual cannot include every person on a plane, regardless of sex, race, and age. That is a general paper check of the kind familiar to anyone who has traveled in an authoritarian country. As Segura told me, "We do not live in a 'show me your papers' society."

...It's quite legal for law enforcement to ask for "voluntary" cooperation. Anyone who follows criminal-procedure cases, however, knows that "voluntary" in legalese does not mean what ordinary people think it means. ...Passengers deplaning after a long flight might reasonably fear they will be "detained" if they anger the law enforcement figure blocking their exit. That officer is under no obligation to tell them they can refuse.

There is much more, and I encourage you to head over and read the whole thing.

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Breaking: WH Excludes CNN, NYT, BBC, and Others from Presser

After an afternoon address at CPAC in whcih Donald Trump renewed his attacks on American journalism and unnamed press sources, the White House excluded a number of news organizations from its press gaggle.

According to a report from Michael M. Grymbaum at the New York Times:

Organizations allowed in included Breitbart News, the One America News Network and The Washington Times, all with conservative leanings. Journalists from ABC, CBS, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, and Fox News also attended.

Reporters from Time magazine and The Associated Press, who were set to be allowed in to the briefing, chose not to attend in protest of the White House’s actions.

Jordan Fabian at The Hill reports:

Among the outlets not permitted to cover the gaggle were news organizations that President Trump has singled out for criticism, including CNN.

The New York Times, The Hill, Politico, BuzzFeed, the Daily Mail, BBC, the Los Angeles Times and the New York Daily News were among the other news organizations not permitted to attend.

Among other things, I note that the BBC is not even an American press outlet. It is, in fact, the journalism arm of the public service broadcaster of one of the United States' closest allies.

CNN's PR tweeted the following response:

CNN was blocked from WH @PressSec's media gaggle today. This is our response: pic.twitter.com/8SfY2uYKEI

— CNN Communications (@CNNPR) February 24, 2017

Of the non-propaganda outlets in attendance, I hope the first question is: "Why did you exclude those organizations?" And when the question is stonewalled, I hope the next question is "Why did you exclude those organizations?" And so on.

It goes without saying, but: this is not what free and open democracy looks like. This is what it looks like to slide into authoritarian dictatorship.

Please feel free to update in comments.

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What He Meant Was "Militarized"

As I mentioned earlier, this morning Donald Trump referred to his administration's deportatation enforcement as a "military operation."

"We're getting really bad dudes out of this country. And it's a military operation because what has been allowed to come into our country," he said.

Later in the day, Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly said the complete opposite.

BREAKING: US Homeland Security Secretary Kelly vows `no mass deportations,' no use of US military in immigration enforcement.

— The Associated Press (@AP) February 23, 2017

Naturally, during today's White House Press Briefing, Sean Spicer was asked about the contradiction, and his answer was typically absurd and mendacious:

Sean Spicer explains Trump's use of the term "military operation" to describe deportations https://t.co/TF5wH3jD92 https://t.co/YoIFVjSZEF

— CNN (@CNN) February 23, 2017

REPORTER: The president said today that the deportations taking place under his watch are a military operation; Secretary Kelly said the military won't be involved in deportations. Did the president misspeak?

SPICER: Yeah, so, I'll take the latter first: The president was using that as an adjective—it's happening with precision. And in a manner in which it's being done very, very clearly. I think we made it clear in the past, and Secretary Kelly reiterated it, what kind of operation this was. But the president was clearly describing the manner in which this was being done. And so, just to be clear on his use of that phrase— And I think the way it's being done, by all accounts, is being done with very much, very, a high degree of precision and in a flawless manner in terms of making sure that the orders are carried out and it's done in a very streamlined and efficient manner.

Yikes.

So, this is bullshit. That's clearly (to use one of Spicer's favorite words) not at all what Trump was saying. He literally said "it's a military operation because what has been allowed to come into our country."

That is: The undocumented immigrants who have come to the U.S. are such dangerous people that it has obliged us to use military strength to remove them.

Which becomes even more clear in his statement immediately thereafter: "You see what's happening at the border. When you see gang violence that you've read about like never before, and all of the things, much of that is people who are here illegally. And they're rough, and they're tough, but they're not tough like our people, so we're getting them out."

Trump was clearly not talking about military precision. He was talking about heightened aggression, which is why his immigration memos included "the hiring of an additional 10,000 ICE agents [and the] expansion of detention facilities."

The word for which Trump was searching was militarized, which is exactly what it happening, irrespective of whether the actual U.S. military is employed in deportations.

And that is very troubling indeed.

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This Is Very Concerning

Last night, passengers on a domestic flight from San Francisco to New York disembarked, only to be greeted by customs agents demanding to see their "documents."

My flight from SFO to JFK. We were told we couldn't disembark without showing our "documents." pic.twitter.com/9ugQspTqeX

— Anne Garrett (@annediego) February 23, 2017

These are customs agents forcibly checking the ID of every passenger deplaning from Delta flight 1583 tonight at JFK. A domestic flight. pic.twitter.com/fHMgyzCjo5

— Britton Taylor (@brittontaylor) February 23, 2017

can someone on here with more followers than me RT this:
this is a very close friend of mine. customs checking IDs at JFK, flight fr SFO pic.twitter.com/NpfzjO2t2g

— kitty sparkle pants (@jenannie) February 23, 2017

Anne Garrett, who is a video editor for Vice, further commented: "They had to explain what they meant by documents bc everyone was so confused."

This is not normal.

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Trump Media Survey: Democrats Are Not Americans

A "Media Accountability Survey" that the Trump Make America Great Again Committee* released last week has been widely critiqued as "phenomenally biased."

In addition to that, watch carefully as to how the survey packages who is and isn't an American.

In the introductory message to the survey, Trump invites people to share their opinions about media dishonesty and bias, saying, "you - the American people - are our last line of defense against the media's hit jobs." The way to fight back, the message claims, is for people to take the survey and helping get "truths to the American voter."

This email was just released by President Trump. Unreal. pic.twitter.com/ahfb4PQWoc

— dylan (@dyllyp) February 16, 2017

Later, as it became apparent that some folks who aren't Trump supporters were taking the survey too, a follow-up message was sent.

Follow up from yesterday's Media Accountability Survey: Trump didn't receive favorable results, so now he's calling his own poll rigged. pic.twitter.com/PSdAouexr3

— dylan (@dyllyp) February 18, 2017

While the first message said that he needed "you - the American people" to take the survey, the second message complained that "thousands of Democrats have taken" the survey "to sabotage the results."  Trump then says he needs the "IMMEDIATE" help of his supporters to take the survey, the implications being that Democrats do not belong in the category "you - the American people" and that, if we take the survey, the survey is therefore rigged.

So, two things:

(A) That is not how valid and reliable surveys are done.

(B)  Notice how this "rigged" claim echoes his made-up claim about how millions of "illegal ballots" are the reason he lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton. We have a Republican president who is supposed to be a public servant for the entire country, but who has already launched his 2020 presidential campaign and who doesn't seem to care about the opinions of a significant portion of the populace. More than that, he seems to view anyone who doesn't support him as un-American.

That? Is not normal or okay.

In light of this situation, I hereby move that we've had our fill of New York Times think pieces about how liberals are only helping Trump by calling this stuff out and not being sufficiently nice to Trump supporters.  I refuse to let Trump supporters live happily ever after when they've voted for this oppressive shit-show.


*The Trump Make America Great Again Committee is a joint fundraising committee authorized by and composed of Donald J. Trump for President, Inc. and the Republican National Committee.

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Abuser-in-Chief

Earlier this afternoon, Donald Trump gave a press conference, which was incredible (and not in a good way) from start to finish. There is not yet an available transcript, but here is the video, and I live-tweeted the presser and Storified those tweets.

This, however, is the long and the short of it:

That press conference was an exhibition of abuse. Bigotry, insults, gaslighting, lies, manipulation, threats, self-aggrandizing, silencing.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) February 16, 2017

Not that this is a surprise to anyone in this space, but surprise isn't the issue. It's just another demonstration, a very public one, of the abusive and authoritarian behavior that was abundantly clear throughout Trump's campaign, starting on Day One.

We are being governed (or not, as the case may be) by a brutally abusive bully, who has not, as many of his contemptible defenders suggested he would if elected, "pivoted" or "dialed it back" or whatever words they used to suggest that Trump would magically morph into a reasonable person once he was emboldened by the unrivaled power of the office of the U.S. presidency.

He is worse than ever, specifically because of being so empowered.

The worst thing anyone can give to an abuser is more power, more control, and less accountability.

But her emails...

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"We have at most a year to defend the Republic, perhaps less."

[Content Note: Authoritarianism; white supremacy; anti-Semitism.]

Go read this entire interview with Timothy Snyder, a professor of history at Yale. It's so, so important.

[H/T to Leah McElrath.]

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Quote of the Day

"I found myself explaining that, in addition to the Constitution, the United States is bound by international treaties. I explained that there are fundamental human rights that belong to everyone and apply in all countries in the world, including the United States, and that my work covers both."—Hina Shamsi, Director of the ACLU National Security Project, in an essay about how distressingly different her travel abroad has been since Trump's executive order banning Muslims from seven countries.

The person to whom she found herself explaining these facts was a Customs and Border Protection officer.

I strongly encourage you to read the whole thing.

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Today in Creeping Authoritarianism

Donald Trump spent the weekend using his personal Twitter publicly trying to undermine the judiciary, because he doesn't like that judges have, quite rightly, put a stop to his unconstitutional Muslim ban.

Across a series of six tweets over two days, he wrote: "The opinion of this so-called judge, which essentially takes law-enforcement away from our country, is ridiculous and will be overturned! What is our country coming to when a judge can halt a Homeland Security travel ban and anyone, even with bad intentions, can come into U.S.? Because the ban was lifted by a judge, many very bad and dangerous people may be pouring into our country. A terrible decision. The judge opens up our country to potential terrorists and others that do not have our best interests at heart. Bad people are very happy! Just cannot believe a judge would put our country in such peril. If something happens blame him and court system. People pouring in. Bad! I have instructed Homeland Security to check people coming into our country VERY CAREFULLY. The courts are making the job very difficult!"

He has utter contempt for the rule of law. He does not respect checks and balances. He is dangerously indifferent to putting a target on any judge's back by publicly lambasting his or her decision and saying they should be "blamed" for doing their job.

And, as with every other tyrannical move he makes, this was eminently predictable, given his attack on Judge Curiel during the campaign.

Meanwhile, Vice-President Mike Pence—who, as I've been saying, is just as authoritarian as Trump—defended Trump's tirade against the judiciary, saying: "The president of the United States has every right to criticize the other two branches of government." As if what Trump did was merely "criticism."

This morning, Trump pivoted from an attack on the judiciary to an(other) attack on the media, saying across two tweets: "Any negative polls are fake news, just like the CNN, ABC, NBC polls in the election. Sorry, people want border security and extreme vetting. I call my own shots, largely based on an accumulation of data, and everyone knows it. Some FAKE NEWS media, in order to marginalize, lies!"

He has utter contempt for the role of the press. He does not respect the need for transparency and accountability. He regards the press as his opposition and actively encourages his supporters to be misinformed.

This, too, was a feature of his presidential campaign.

Also note: He is proclaiming what "people want," and saying that what they want is increased militarization and policy rooted in bigotry. This is another indication of an authoritarian: Using "the people's will" to justify oppressive, anti-democratic policy.

This is all deeply troubling.

And I feel extremely angry that the media—and, frankly, lots of progressives—treated Trump like a bit of fun entertainment for a year-and-a-half, while treating everyone who was raising giant red flags about this guy like hysterical lunatics, and now have the unmitigated fucking temerity to regard his assault on this nation's democratic institutions as a surprise.

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I Write Letters

Dear Democrats Who Are Voting for Any or All of Trump's Nominees:

If you're voting for Trump's nominees in a bid to get reelected, what would we be reelecting you to do exactly?

Because the Number One thing we need Democrats to do right now is resist Trump. And if you can't do that in order to save your seat, then why should we want to reelect you? So a Republican can't get elected? The thing is, if you're appeasing fascism, well, it doesn't make a whole lof of difference whether it's you or a Republican in that seat.

I mean, this isn't "I have to compromise on a protected lands bill to oblige my conservative hunting constituents." This is about fascism or not fascism.

Everyone is watching Trump Co. tear through democratic norms like a bear eating a salmon, but is sure we're gonna have elections in 2 years.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) February 1, 2017

The point is: We have to fight like hell to make sure we keep our democracy. Abetting w/ eye toward reelection will only hasten erosion.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) February 1, 2017

If you don't resist like hell now, I believe there's very little chance of anything even resembling free and fair elections in two years, at the rate Trump Co. is relentlessly dismantling our systems, norms, and rights.

He's already invoked the specter of martial law in Chicago, and it's extremely rare that suspended elections do not attend the institution of martial law in authoritarian regimes.

In the best case scenario, he's building a Cabinet and judiciary profoundly hostile to voting rights.

We can't be looking to elections as a guaranteed curative, for a whole lot of reasons. (Not least of which is the fact that Democrats can win 3 million more votes in a presidential election and still lose.)

Reelection should be the last thing in your heads right now—except insofar as you should be calculating that, two years from now, Trump will look even worse, and any Democrat who supported him along that contemptible path will be voted out on their asses. If we still have the option.

So, please, I beg you: Resist. With everything you've got.

Sincerely,
Liss

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This Is Very, Very Alarming

[Content Note: White supremacy; misogyny; terrorism.]

Julia Edwards Ainsley, Dustin Volz, and Kristina Cooke at Reuters: "Exclusive: Trump to focus counter-extremism program solely on Islam—sources."

The Trump administration wants to revamp and rename a U.S. government program designed to counter all violent ideologies so that it focuses solely on Islamist extremism, five people briefed on the matter told Reuters.

The program, "Countering Violent Extremism," or CVE, would be changed to "Countering Islamic Extremism" or "Countering Radical Islamic Extremism," the sources said, and would no longer target groups such as white supremacists who have also carried out bombings and shootings in the United States.

Now, this proposal is still under review. There is a chance it may not happen. But that five sources told Reuters it was being considered at all is deeply troubling.

White supremacists and affiliated violent ideologies—including MRAs and anti-choice terrorists—have, over the course of this nation's history, been a much graver danger than jihadists.

Just across the border in Québec this week, six Muslims were killed at their mosque by Alexandre Bissonnette, a white man who was "someone who made frequent extreme comments in social media denigrating refugees and feminism."

So, a white supremacist and misogynist attacked Muslims, but Trump wants to focus on jihadists.

The thing is, even when Muslim men have committed public acts of violence, the thing they all share in common, along with Bissonnette, is a hatred of women.

I have been writing in this space for years about expressed misogyny and domestic violence as a precursor to mass violence, public shootings, and acts of terror.

Elliot Rodger. Ben Moynihan. Marc Lépine. Seung-Hui Cho. George Sodini. Anders Behring Breivik. Jaylen Fryburg. Mark Dorch. Christopher Harper-Mercer. All of these men had expressed a resentment of and hatred for women.

December 2012: Adam Lanza goes on a killing spree at an elementary school. He started his rampage by killing his mother.

April 2013: Tamerlan Tsarnaev, one of the brothers who bombed the Boston Marathon, is reported to have been arrested for domestic violence against his girlfriend several years before the bombing.

February 2015: Cedric Ford goes on a shooting spree, wounding 14 people and killing three others across multiple sites after being "served a protection from abuse order just hours before the first shooting."

June 2015: Dylann Roof justifies his mass murder of parishioners at the AME church in Charleston by asserting his ownership of white women.

November 2015: Robert Dear shoots at a Planned Parenthood facility, killing three people. He has a history of anti-choice vandalism, stalking, peeping, and domestic violence.

June 2016: Omar Mateen goes on a deadly shooting spree at Pulse Nightclub in Orlando. He has a history of domestic violence, including against an ex-wife whose parents had to physically extricate her from the marriage.

July 2016: Micah Xavier Johnson ambushes police and kills five officers. He was discharged from military service for sexual harassment.

July 2016: Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel goes on a violent rampage in Nice on Bastille Day, after his wife threw him out of the house and filed for divorce. A neighbor said: "He kept to himself but would always rant about his wife. He had marital problems and would tell people in the local cafe."

Which is not even the complete list of misogynist mass killers, nor a comprehensive accounting of the incidents of mass violence committed by people with a history of domestic violence.

When the Huffington Post analyzed five years of data on mass shootings, they found "that a majority of these mass shootings were related to domestic violence. In 57 percent of the incidents, a family member or an intimate partner was among the victims."

And that is just mass shootings directly related to domestic violence. If any incident in which the perpetrator had any history of domestic violence were included, the number would shoot up exponentially.

"The pattern," wrote Pamela Shifman and Salamishah Tillet in the New York Times last year, "is striking. Men who are eventually arrested for violent acts often began with attacks against their girlfriends and wives. In many cases, the charges of domestic violence were not taken seriously or were dismissed."

This is the reality of mass violence:

Christian men. Muslim men. White men. Men of color. Men who kill civilians. Men who kill cops. White supremacist men. Anti-choice men.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) July 17, 2016

They slap various ideologies over their acts of heinous violence. But there's virtually always a history of hatred and harm of women.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) July 17, 2016

We wring our hands and wonder how we can stop this violence, as if there's not an OBVIOUS COMMON THREAD we diligently endeavor to ignore.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) July 17, 2016

If Trump has any real interest in addressing violence committed against the citizens of this country, then he would not diminish focus on white supremacy and he would further increase focus on domestic violence as a precursor to mass violence.

But of course he doesn't. He just wants to do harm to Muslim people, and demonizes them in order to do it.

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Trump's Rampage Continues

[Content Note: Islamophobia; homophobia; war.]

Last night, Trump fired acting Attorney General Sally Yates, after Yates "ordered Justice Department lawyers not to defend his immigration order temporarily banning entry into the United States for citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees from around the world. In a news release, the White House said Yates had 'betrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States.' Trump named in her place Dana Boente, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Boente said he would enforce the president's directive until he was replaced by Trump's attorney general nominee, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala)."

Sally Yates was a career prosecutor for more than 2 decades & prosecuted Olympic bomber prior to being named Deputy AG. She exits DOJ a hero

— Brian Fallon (@brianefallon) January 31, 2017

To be totally clear: Yates was doing the job she swore an oath to do—defend the U.S. Constitution. And, in response, Trump called it a "betrayal" and fired her.

Then, Trump fired acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Daniel Ragsdale, and replaced him with Thomas Homan. "By promoting Homan, who most recently led the arm of ICE that enforces detentions and deportations, the Trump administration signaled its intent to place a greater emphasis on the harsh enforcement measures that Homan carried out."

Both Yates and Ragsdale were "placeholders" as acting heads, but the ubiquitous argument that their temporary status renders this irrelevant is absolutely wrong. Trump did not merely remove them because their finite leadership was finished, but to make way for people who will more faithfully and aggressively execute his unconstitutional Muslim ban.

"This isn't fascism." Sure. I guess. In the same way a single cobblestone isn't the entire street.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) January 31, 2017

Trump fired both acting AG & acting ICE director. He accused AG of "betrayal" for following court order. This is a purge. It is not normal.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) January 31, 2017

Meanwhile comes news that several House Judiciary Committee aides helped the Trump administration draft the Islamophobic executive order, but did so after signing nondisclosure agreements, and then failed to inform the Republican committee chair and party leadership. This is extraordinary. Someone in the Trump administration (my guess is Pence) convinced Congressional staffers to work in secret to draft an unconstitutional Muslim ban. That is incredibly alarming.

Republicans are not happy about it, but are they going to do anything about it? Someone (my guess is Bannon) is working very hard to sow discord with Republican legislators, but he may be underestimating how craven they actually are. Either way, whether by fissures in the party or unfathomable fealty, the Trump authoritarians are going to get what they want, and no one in the GOP seems inclined to stop them.

In other news: "Trump is taking aim at one of the federal government's main agencies for climate change research—the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration—and NOAA employees are girding for drastic changes in how they conduct science and report it to the public. Trump has appointed a leading denier of climate change, Kenneth Haapala of the Heartland Institute, to serve on the administration team handling appointments for the U.S. Department of Commerce, the federal agency that oversees NOAA." This is so, so dangerous.

Further: Trump has announced he will "keep the Obama administration protections extended to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender workers, a statement said, apparently responding to reports that the orders would be reversed." That is a relief, but a very minimal one. As I noted yesterday, Congressional Republicans are preparing the "First Amendment Defense Act," which is a heinous anti-LGBT bill, and none of us should have any faith at all that Trump won't sign it when it lands on his desk.

And more: "Trump's top trade adviser accuses Germany of currency exploitation." Unreal. "Germany is using a 'grossly undervalued' euro to 'exploit' the US and its EU partners, Donald Trump's top trade adviser has said in comments that are likely to trigger alarm in Europe's largest economy. Peter Navarro, the head of Mr Trump's new National Trade Council, told the Financial Times the euro was like an 'implicit Deutsche Mark' whose low valuation gave Germany an advantage over its main trading partners. His views suggest the new administration is focusing on currency as part of its hard-charging approach on trade ties. In a departure from past US policy, Mr Navarro also called Germany one of the main hurdles to an American trade deal with the EU and declared talks with the bloc over a US-EU agreement, known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, dead." This is just incredibly worrying.

And finally: "Battle Rages Amid East Ukraine's Bloodiest Fighting in Weeks." By way of reminder, Trump and Putin had a phone call over the weekend, and casualties have starkly increased in the interceding days.

@MalcolmNance Putin laid down the law to Trump last Saturday. pic.twitter.com/peB6wNETds

— Michael Joyce (@MJoyce2244) January 31, 2017

This is all very, very bad.

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Trump Continues to Aggressively Pursue Authoritarian White Supremacist Agenda

[Content Note: White supremacy; nativism; Islamophobia; anti-Semitism.]

Donald Trump was busy this weekend. He spoke with Vladimir Putin by phone, which barely warranted mention in the media because of everything else he was doing destroying the country.

He removed the Director of National Intelligence and the Chair of the Joint Chiefs as automatic National Security Council Principals Committee members, and established Steve Bannon as a member of the Principals Committee. This is an utterly alarming politicization of the NSC.

He tweeted about the media, again, suggesting someone with money should buy the New York Times and run it in a way that favors him—which, as Ryan Lizza observed, "is what dictators do. They try to silence independent outlets by encouraging rich friends to buy or close them. We are in a scary place."

And he signed an executive order banning new visas for citizens from seven majority Muslim countries: Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya, and Somalia, which will have far-reaching effects "well beyond preventing newcomers from" those countries:

It's also expected to have substantial effects on hundreds of thousands of people from these countries who already live in the U.S. under green cards or on temporary student or employee visas.

Since the order's travel ban applies to all "aliens" — a term that encompasses anyone who isn't an American citizen — it could bar those with current visas or even green cards from returning to the U.S. from trips abroad, said Stephen Legomsky, a former chief counsel to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services under President Obama.

"It's extraordinarily cruel," he said.

It's also flatly unconstitutional, as Trump has made clear [CN: video may autoplay] that Christian refugees will be given priority over Muslims. To underscore the point, he tweeted Sunday morning:

Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017

This, despite the fact that most of ISIS' victims are Muslim.

Within hours of Trump signing the Muslim ban he threatened throughout his campaign, ISIS starting using Trump's order in recruitment propaganda.

A mosque in Texas went up in flames. People were stopped and detained at airports, including Iraqis who had worked with the U.S. military, risking their lives to do so.

Protesters descended on airports across the United States, demanding that the refugees and immigrants who were being detained be allowed into the country. Legal aides showed up to assist. Elected Democrats joined protesters at the airports.

The ACLU filed a suit on behalf of two Iraqi men who were en route to the U.S. when Trump signed his disgusting executive order banning them. A federal court granted a stay.

And, in response, the Department of Homeland Security issued a statement making plain they have no intention of respecting the court's ruling. Such a flagrant disregard for the court is, as Imani Gandy noted, a feature of totalitarianism.

Checks and balances are also only as good as an administration is willing to respect them.

* * *

As I noted on Twitter, it's critical to understand that Muslim refugees being targeted have already been thoroughly vetted. Many have risked their lives aiding the U.S. Many/most of the people being denied are not just immigrants (although that, too) but refugees. In many cases, their homes are GONE.

Many undocumented people coming to the U.S. via our southern border, targeted by Trump's wall, are fleeing violence and seeking refuge. They, too, are refugees. Trump has cast Muslim refugees as potential terrorists who want to harm us, and Latinx refugees as rapists who want to harm us. Let's be very clear about that: People seeking refuge from violence are being cast as violent threats by the U.S. president.

And let's further be clear that this isn't just about "immigration." Trump is the son of an immigrant and the husband of an immigrant. This is very specifically about brown people who are seeking asylum from harm. And they're being cast as dangerous. Why would that be? Because this is an opening salvo in a vast white supremacist agenda. See also Trump's attacks on Chicago and Philly as uniquely dangerous. Trump is projecting onto people or color and/or religious minorities the INTENT TO HARM that is a central feature of his own agenda.

It's not just the ban or the wall or the threat of martial law in diverse cities. It's that he is justifying them with assertions of danger. The tactic is designed to: 1. Other. 2. Erode empathy for the Other. 3. Create fear of the Other. 4. Engender hatred of the Other. The ban is AWFUL on its own. But it is only the foundation for a strategy of division that will lead to things worse than we have conjured. And it's critical to view all of these things as part of that complex strategy.

* * *

Meanwhile, on Sunday's Meet the Press, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus was asked by Chuck Todd why a White House statement on Holocaust Remembrance Day failed to mention Jews. And Priebus' answer was taken straight from the Holocaust deniers' playbook.

.@Reince responds to @chucktodd on why White House didn't mention Jews in a statement commemorating the Holocaust pic.twitter.com/F43BytYZ3A

— Axios (@axios) January 29, 2017

CHUCK TODD: There was an issue with— On Friday, the White House put out a statement on Holocaust Remembrance Day. And there wasn't a mention of Jews in the statement of any, of the victims of the Holocaust, that a majority of them were Jewish. Many of us thought it was an error. You guys were there early. And then it turns out it was not. John Podhoretz, a conservative columnist from Commentary magazine wrote this: "The Final Solution was aimed solely at the Jews. The Holocaust was about the Jews. There is no 'proud' way to offer a remembrance of the Holocaust that does not reflect that simple, awful world historical fact. To universalize it to, quote, 'All those who suffered,' is to scrub the Holocaust of its meaning." Mr. Priebus, do you understand why many Jews were offended by the White House's decision not to note that the Holocaust was about eradicating the Jews?

REINCE PRIEBUS: Well, I recognize, in fact, obviously that that was what the Holocaust was about. And it's a horrible event. And obviously a miserable time in history that we remember here at the White House and certainly will never forget the Jewish people that suffered in World War II. And obviously still incredible wounds that remain in a time in history that was of great, incredible, horrific magnitude. And everyone's heart here is impacted by the memory of that terrible time. And so, for the record, that's the case. And—

TODD: Do you regret—

PRIEBUS: —certainly we don't mean—

TODD: —does the president regret not—

PRIEBUS: —any ill-will to anybody.

TODD: Do you regret—

PRIEBUS: I don't about regret. It's just— No.

TODD: —the statement?

PRIEBUS: There's no—

TODD: There's no regret not acknowledging the pain that—

PRIEBUS: We acknowledge it. We acknowledge the—

TODD: But you didn't—

PRIEBUS: —horrible time of the Holocaust.

TODD: —but why whitewash—

PRIEBUS: —and what it meant for history, and so.

TODD: —but why white-wash Jews from that statement?

PRIEBUS: I'm not white-washing anything, Chuck. I just told—

TODD: The statement did.

PRIEBUS: —you that it was horrible. And, well, I'm telling you now that that's the way we feel about it. And it's a terrible time in history. And obviously I think you know that President Trump has dear family members that are Jewish. And there was no harm or ill-will or offense intended by any of that.

TODD: But you— So you don't— But you don't regret the statement? You don't regret the words that were chosen in the statement and the words—

PRIEBUS: I don't regret the words, Chuck.

TODD: —that were not included?

PRIEBUS: I'm trying to clear it up for you. I mean, everyone's suffering in the Holocaust, including obviously all of the Jewish people affected and the miserable genocide that occurred, is something that we consider to be extraordinarily sad and something that can never be forgotten and something that if we could wipe it off of the history books we could. But we can't. And it's terrible. I mean, I don't know what more to tell you.

Following Priebus on Meet the Press was Senator Tim Kaine, who, quite rightly, called this out as Holocaust denialism as he also drew the crucial connection between Trump's anti-Muslim executive order being issued on the same day: "I think all of these things are happening together. When you have the chief political advisor in the White House, Steve Bannon, who is connected with a news organization that traffics in white supremacy and anti-Semitism and they put out a Holocaust statement that omits any mention of Jews... The final solution was about the slaughter of Jews. We have to remember this. This is what Holocaust denial is. It's either to deny that it happened or many Holocaust deniers acknowledge, 'Oh yeah people were killed. But it was a lot of innocent people. Jews weren't targeted.' The fact that they did that and imposed this religious test against Muslims in the executive orders on the same day, this is not a coincidence."

Unfortunately, Kaine then went on to talk about how Democrats would potentially work with Trump on issues like infrastructure: "Eight years ago Democrats and President Obama made a major investment in the infrastructure in this country. No Republicans supported it. But Democrats did it and it helped the country. And if President Trump wants to do that, we'll work with him on it. Hopefully maybe a Republican will vote for it this time. So we're not closing the door on doing what's right for the good of the country. But right now we think this administration poses a real threat to our reputation, our values and our people. And we're going to battle."

Okay. Whew. So here's the thing, though:

Any Democrat considering working with Trump on ANYTHING needs to watch this segment. This is what you will be normalizing. https://t.co/6ePNDrhqyd

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) January 29, 2017

["This segment" refers to the above Priebus segment on Meet the Press.]

You can't object to an administration engaging in Holocaust denial and launching a Crusade, then agree to work with them on infrastructure.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) January 29, 2017

This is a time for unilateral obstructionism. You can't tease apart X policy from the overarching agenda of authoritarian white supremacy.

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) January 29, 2017

Most of us have been part of conversations over the course of our lives about what we would have done during the rise of fascism and white supremacy in other nations. Well, it's not a hypothetical anymore. This is the moment you have to decide what you're going to do.

There is no neutral. There is only resistance or complicity. Make your choice.

Open Wide...

Shut Up!