02b U.S. Politics – Progressive

Senate Republicans manage to unstick immigration funding bill– www.politico.com

pgnewser June 4, 2026 0

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Senate Republicans launched debate on their party-line immigration enforcement bill Wednesday — a major step after nearly two weeks of delay — but they are facing lingering internal concerns over a proposed “Anti-Weaponization Fund” that could still scuttle the legislation.

Senators voted 53-46 on party lines to advance the bill, which would provide roughly $70 billion for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other Department of Homeland Security agencies.

An updated bill released Wednesday omits $1 billion in Secret Service security funding that had been included in an earlier draft and could have been used for President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom project. POLITICO first reported the decision to drop the funding last month.

It also strips out Justice Department funding unrelated to the controversial settlement fund — a move that GOP leaders made in hopes of making it harder to include language restricting or eliminating the fund. Top Republicans have warned that adding such language could threaten to tank the overall bill.

“Right now, the goal is to get the base bill across the finish line, and so hopefully all of our members who have amendment ideas will … keep in mind the need that we’ve got to keep the bill together and make sure we’ve got 50 votes for it at the end,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said.

Judge unseals Fulton County elections case seeking to shield ID info from DOJ, county says – WSBTV.com

pgnewser June 2, 2026 0

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The court has granted Fulton County’s request to unseal their case against the Department of Justice, who issued a subpoena seeking the identity information of everyone associated with the 2020 election.

That’s according to a statement released Sunday from Robb Pits, chairman of the Board of Commissioners of Fulton County.

The county filed a motion to quash to keep the DOJ from enforcing the subpoena.

“The recent decision to unseal means that you will be able to follow future developments because the public and media now have access to the docket and the documents filed in the case,” Pitts said.

The subpoena comes after the FBI in January went to a Fulton County elections warehouse and seized ballots and other documents from the 2020 election, which Georgia’s certified totals showed Trump lost in the state to Biden by 11,779 votes out of nearly 5 million cast…

Trump is facing a new inflation warning from the bond market, adding to his midterm challenges– abcnews.com

pgnewser June 2, 2026 0

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WASHINGTON — The world is getting more uptight about lending money to President Donald Trump’s government — causing interest rates to climb in ways that are worsening affordability pressures, hampering economic growth and creating a new risk for Republicans in November’s midterm elections.

The energy price spike triggered by the Iran war has seeped into the price of bonds that help fund the U.S. government. Interest rates on a 10-year U.S. Treasury note are topping 4.44%, up from 3.95% before the war started at the end of February. Average mortgage rates have climbed to their highest levels in nine months, while auto sales are slumping.

Judge says NPS can't revoke DC protest permit over '86 47' flag– thehill.com

pgnewser June 2, 2026 0

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A federal judge temporarily blocked the National Park Service (NPS) on Monday from revoking a permit for a 24/7 anti-Trump protest in the nation’s capital over the display of an “86 47” flag. The Secret Service regards the statement as a potential call for violence against the president, and court documents show federal officers ordered the flag be taken down last week after…

DOJ’s ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund’ backtrack fails to calm Senate Republicans– www.politico.com

pgnewser June 2, 2026 0

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The Justice Department took a small step back Monday from its controversial $1.8 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund.” It wasn’t nearly enough to quell the furor on Capitol Hill.

Republican senators, including some top leaders, said a DOJ statement that it would “abide by” a federal judge’s recent ruling to temporarily halt any payouts did not do enough to clear the intraparty concerns that have thrown the GOP’s immigration enforcement bill into limbo.

Instead they nudged President Donald Trump to make a more explicit move to renounce the fund, which could be used to pay participants in the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021, and other Trump political allies that have been subject to federal prosecution.

South Africa and Afrikaners reject US claims of humanitarian crisis for white people– www.euronews.com

pgnewser May 28, 2026 0

South Africa and Afrikaners reject US claims of humanitarian crisis for white people– www.euronews.com
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The South African government and advocacy groups for the country’s Afrikaner white minority rejected on Wednesday the Trump administration’s position that there’s a humanitarian emergency affecting white people in South Africa.

The argument served as the administration’s rationale for raising the US refugee cap, but only for white Afrikaners.

The Trump administration said on Tuesday that it will admit an additional 10,000 white South Africans into the US as refugees this year, increasing its annual quota, but blocking people from other countries from entering through the programme.

CNN Backs New Jersey Dems’ Performative Grandstanding at ICE Facility– www.newsbusters.org

pgnewser May 27, 2026 0

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Over the holiday weekend, New Jersey Democrat politicians gathered outside Newark’s Delaney Hall, which ICE has been using as a detention facility for over a decade. CNN showed video on Tuesday morning’s The Situation Room of several prominent Democrat politicians. Included in their highlight reel was New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill, Senator Andy Kim, and Representative Robert Menendez, who spoke to cameras outside the facility amid swarms of protesters performing the modern Democrat’s favorite pastime as they clashed with officers and attempted to block vehicles coming in or out.

These particular protests were spurred by unsubstantiated “reports of rough conditions like rotten food and a hunger strike by detainees,” according to co-host Pamela Brown.

University of Iowa students must take Intellectual Freedom classes whether they want to or not– boingboing.net

pgnewser May 27, 2026 0

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The Center for Intellectual Freedom is a comically-named educational institution established by Iowa’s conservative legislature to counter the liberal indoctrination of traditional education. Few students have availed themselves of its “top-tier scholarship,” though, though, leaving commissars with a numbers problem. A solution is at hand: force University of Iowa students to take classes there if they want to graduate.

Republican lawmakers added a provision to a massive budget bill during a 35-hour legislative session requiring University of Iowa students to complete at least six credit hours from the center to earn an undergraduate degree. The bill now heads to Gov. Kim Reynolds’ desk.

The center opened in the spring semester, having been allocated $1m in funding with millions more to come, but enrollment is “dismal”. A report impressed upon its readers the need to require students to take the courses if they are to bother. The bill doesn’t become law until Gov. Kim Reynolds signs it; she may also veto it or use a line-item veto to strip the requirement.

The center launched two one-credit hour classes in late March. Numbers from the University’s website show one class has just 8 of 32 seats filled, and the other has 11 of 32 seats filled. Ben Murrey of the nonprofit research group Common Sense Institute, which the center hired to analyze demand and student interest, said he is not surprised by the low turnout. … “it’s remarkable that they got really any enrollment at all.”

US has deported thousands of Cubans and Venezuelans to danger in Mexico, Human Rights Watch says– abcnews.com

pgnewser May 27, 2026 0

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MEXICO CITY — The Trump administration has deported nearly 13,000 Cubans, Venezuelans and other nationals to Mexico, where they are vulnerable to cartel violence in an unfamiliar country, a report by Human Rights Watch released Wednesday said.

While Mexico has accepted these types of deportations for years, the deportees under the Trump administration are older and have lived in the U.S. for longer than in the past, making it more difficult for them to find work and increasing the urgency of the need for medical care.

The report, which is based on more than 50 interviews in the southern Mexican cities Tapachula and Villahermosa, comes as U.S. President Donald Trump has expanded immigration enforcement to carry out his mass deportation plan.

Why Conservatives Are Trying to Kill the Voting Rights Act – Mother Jones– www.motherjones.com

pgnewser May 27, 2026 0

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A woman casts her ballot at a polling station in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on November 3, 2024.Kamil KrzaczynskI/AFP/Getty

Get your news from a source that’s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.

The Voting Rights Act is widely considered one of the most effective laws in prohibiting racial discrimination in voting. One of its key provisions has long allowed states to take race into account when drawing voting maps to ensure that nonwhite voters have electoral power. But earlier this year, the Supreme Court narrowed that provision. In her dissent, Justice Elena Kagan described the court’s decision as the “now-completed demolition of the Voting Rights Act.”

Senate Republicans battle over future of parliamentarian– thehill.com

pgnewser May 27, 2026 0

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Some Senate Republican aides say there is growing support within the Senate GOP conference for ousting the parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, after she ruled against a proposal to provide $1 billion for the White House ballroom, a move that would drastically change how the upper chamber operates. The ruling infuriated President Trump, who claimed last week…

Irish councilor proposes tiny statue of mosquito blamed for killing invader Oliver Cromwell– boingboing.net

pgnewser May 27, 2026 0

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A Green Party councillor in Cork wants the Irish city to honor the mosquito blamed for killing Oliver Cromwell, the English Lord Protector whose conquest of Ireland made him a reviled figure there. Oliver Moran tabled the motion at a Cork City Council meeting on May 12, proposing what he describes as the world’s smallest public statue, to be mounted on an empty plinth outside City Hall.

The motion reads:

STATUE TO THE MOSQUITO OR MIDGE THAT BIT OLIVER CROMWELL

‘That Cork City Council will erect a statue to the mosquito or midge that bit Oliver Cromwell during his siege of the city, later causing his death through ‘Cork fever’ (malaria); and that this statue shall be the ‘world’s smallest public statue’.’

Democrat Endorses Susan Collins In Maine Senate Race– crooksandliars.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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No, Jake Auchincloss did not mouth the words “I support Susan Collins and go vote for her instead,” but that’s essentially what he did yesterday with his appearance on CNN. Bad-mouthing the presumptive Democratic nominee in a Senate seat that the Democrats absolutely need to gain control of the U.S. Senate is beyond stupid. Still, it’s always worth reminding ourselves that Republicans don’t have a monopoly on stupid politicians. Almost, but not quite.

Source: Mediaite

Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) trashed his party’s presumptive nominee for U.S. Senate in Maine, Graham Platner, on Monday, calling the Democratic candidate’s Nazi tattoo scandal and his claims about it “personally disqualifying.”

The controversy stems from a report last year that Platner had a tattoo on his chest of a Nazi SS “Totenkopf” symbol. Platner has since covered the tattoo and denied knowingly displaying Nazi imagery, saying he got the tattoo with fellow Marines during a trip to Croatia in 2007 and did not understand its meaning at the time.

Auchincloss had previously become one of the first elected Democrats to publicly urge Platner to abandon the Senate contest against incumbent Republican Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) after the tattoo controversy surfaced.

US Senate won’t take up ICE funding bill amid row over Trump’s ballroom, which president defends as ‘very good expenditure’ – live | US news– www.theguardian.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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A bid to restore funding to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and border patrol has been derailed by rows over a $1bn proposal for security measures tied to Donald Trump’s White House ballroom and controversial plans to create a $1.8bn “anti-weaponization” fund.

The US Senate will not pass the $70bn legislation ahead of a 1 June deadline set by the US president, Republican senators told reporters on Thursday, as lawmakers leave Washington for the Memorial Day recess.

It comes amid backlash from members of Trump’s own party against an attempt to latch funding for his ballroom project on to the immigration bill.

The plan prompted intense anxiety among congressional Republicans, who feared diverting taxpayer dollars toward Trump’s “East Wing modernization project” amid mounting cost of living concerns across the US would risk alienating voters ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Some Senate Republicans have also expressed concerns about a plan, announced on Monday, to create a secretive $1.776bn fund – which critics have argued is essentially a slush fund – to compensate Trump allies as part of an agreement in which the president and his sons dropped a $10bn long-shot lawsuit against the US Internal Revenue Service.

Media’s Sick Report About Tulsi Gabbard’s Departure Rapidly Debunked– trendingpoliticsnews.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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In a sharp rebuttal to media speculation, the Trump administration has pushed back against claims that Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard was ousted from her position amid internal tensions.

The controversy erupted on May 22, following Gabbard’s announcement of her resignation, which she attributed entirely to a personal family crisis. Major outlets, including Reuters, highlighted both her stated reasons and anonymous sourcing suggesting deeper White House dissatisfaction.

The Reuters report detailed Gabbard’s resignation as Trump’s top intelligence official, noting her public explanation tied to her husband’s health. However, the article prominently featured an anonymous source familiar with the situation who asserted that “Gabbard had been forced out by the White House.”

The source claimed the administration had grown unhappy with Gabbard over several months, citing issues such as the activities of her Director’s Initiatives Group task force and perceived frictions on national security matters, including aspects of U.S. policy toward Iran.

Reuters noted that the White House initially did not respond to requests for comment on the forced-out narrative, fueling immediate online debate and criticism of media coverage.

California Chemical Explosion Could Reach Arizona, Expert Warns– crooksandliars.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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For days, officials in Garden Grove, California, have warned a chemical plant is “literally on the edge of exploding” as firefighters work to cool a tank filled with about 7,000 gallons of methyl methacrylate, a toxic chemical used in making plastics. Garden Grove is about 350 miles west of Phoenix and roughly 250 miles from Yuma.

Fire crews have been working through the weekend, using sprinklers and hose lines to cool the tank and reduce pressure. Officials said Sunday morning that an overnight operation provided new information that allowed them to adjust their strategy. Crews also identified what officials described as a potential crack that could relieve some of the pressure building inside the tank, but they said the situation still remains dangerous.

Nancy Mace Defames SPLC: ‘Every Single One Of Them Should Go To Jail’– crooksandliars.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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After the Southern Poverty Law Center gets the DOJ’s sham fraud indictment tossed out of court, they should sue every one of these liars for defamation. As we’ve already discussed here, Republicans hate them because they expose the white supremacists and neo-Nazis that make up so much of their base, so now they’re trying to destroy them by pretending they’re sponsoring hatred rather than going undercover to expose it.

Rep. Nancy Mace made an appearance on Fox’s Saturday in America with Kayleigh McEnany this weekend and was asked by guest host Jonathan Hunt what she thought of the accusations against the SPLC, and Mace spewed lots of lies and venom and demanded that the people running the organization be tossed in prison.

New York Times Leaves Out Huge Chunk Of New Gun Owner’s Story To Preach Anti-2A Message– dailycaller.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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Earlier in 2026 a sub-Reddit called “r/liberalgunowners,” saw one user provide an update after describing a harrowing incident at home – but a New York Times columnist elected to leave out a large part of the story to deliver an anti-gun ownership spiel.

In the screenshot of the initial post on Reddit posted on X on March 2, according to BizPacReview, the user explained how his partner had purchased a Glock pistol “for self-defense as the federal government does fascist things in our community.” The Reddit user apparently provided additional updates later in the thread, based on another screenshot posted on X.

Trump’s Justice Department scrubs its website of news releases about Jan. 6 defendants– abcnews.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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The Department of Justice is acknowledging it’s removed from its website news releases about criminal cases related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot

WASHINGTON — The Department of Justice is acknowledging it has removed from its website news releases about criminal cases related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, calling the information about the prosecutions “partisan propaganda.”

The purge of news releases documenting criminal charges, convictions and sentencings is the latest step by the Trump administration to dramatically rewrite the history of the assault on the Capitol, when hundreds of supporters of Republican President Donald Trump stormed the building in an effort to halt the congressional certification of his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.

Trump's midterm retribution crusade crescendos with Massie primary defeat: Key takeways– thehill.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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President Trump’s retribution crusade reached a crescendo Tuesday when the president’s endorsee, Ed Gallrein, prevailed in the GOP primary to unseat Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), extending his winning streak against Republicans who have defied him. Massie, a libertarian-leaning lawmaker whose opposition to key Trump priorities has long drawn the president’s ire, is the latest victim of Trump’s revenge campaign after…

Sunny Hostin Says 2020 BLM Riots Were Not That Bad, Claims Jan. 6 Was Far Worse– www.louderwithcrowder.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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Can you name one good thing the BLM movement has done for the Black community? No? I didn’t think so. You certainly can, however, name many bad things this movement and people involved in it have done that have been disastrous towards the Black community. This is why it is disingenuous for Sunny Hostin to imply this “uprising” has done anything beneficial for Black people.

According to Sunny Hostin, “there is no compassion between the Black Lives Matter movement and Jan. 6.” And in that regard, she is correct. There is no comparison. However, she justified this stance by claiming there was “very limited destruction of property and violence” during the “uprising of this movement.” This is incorrect because these riots caused the largest insurance claim in American history, while the amount of damage caused by Jan. 6 rioters was less than $3 million. While both numbers should be closer to $0, as Hostin said, it is comparing apples to oranges.

Senate Democrat pepper sprayed at protest outside ICE detention facility in New Jersey– thehill.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) on Monday was pepper-sprayed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers while demonstrators gathered outside an immigration detention facility in Newark, N.J. Videos circulated online of mutual aid volunteers pouring water into Kim’s eyes while he held an ice pack in his hand. One video showed Kim speaking directly to ICE…

Pentagon Leadership Debate Pete Hegseth Anti-Woke Push Criticized by Panel– www.newsbusters.org

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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The focus of Friday’s Washington Week in Review journalist roundtable (which aired on the eve of Memorial Day weekend) was the Department of Defense, especially on Secretary of War Pete Hegseth’s war against wokeism, which the panel disapproved of, especially New York Times national security correspondent Helene Cooper, who all but accused Hegseth and the Trump Administration of racism and sexism.

Helene Cooper, National Security Correspondent, The New York Times: Well, that’s a great question, Jeff. I think I would start first with just he’s instilled an atmosphere of fear, which is pervasive now throughout the Pentagon, just because he has fired or threatened to fire or forced to retire just so many of the top brass….