Progressive Watch

Secular Student Alliance says Charlie Kirk free speech law is ‘dehumanizing’– www.thecollegefix.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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A new free speech law named after slain Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk is “dehumanizing,” according to the Secular Student Alliance.

The bill, which will go into effect on July 1, seeks to protect free speech on campus and punish unruly disruptions of speakers. Republican Governor Bill Lee signed the law on May 5.

“What this law actually does is protect invited speakers – no matter how extreme or dehumanizing their views – while making it riskier for students to push back,” the Secular Student Alliance stated in a news release sent to The College Fix prior to the signing of the bill.

Democrats Face Intense Backlash Over ‘Divisive’ Memorial Day Post– trendingpoliticsnews.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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The Democratic Party and the Democratic National Committee is facing intense backlash over a Memorial Day post that leveraged the deaths of U.S. service members killed in the Iran conflict in a partisan attack against President Donald Trump.

The post in question featured photographs of the fallen service members and included text that read, in part, “We honor the American heroes who made the ultimate sacrifice in Trump’s war with Iran” or similar phrasing such as “REMEMBERING THE AMERICANS WHO HAVE DIED IN TRUMP’S WAR WITH IRAN.” It was shared on platforms including X and Facebook under a number of official Democratic Party accounts.

The message drew backlash from a range of individuals, including veterans, political figures from both parties, and members of the public. Critics argued that framing the deaths in explicitly partisan terms on Memorial Day, a holiday traditionally dedicated to solemn remembrance of fallen service members without political attribution, was inappropriate.

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…

NJ agitators clash with federal agents, construct barricades outside Delaney Hall ICE facility | The Post Millennial– thepostmillennial.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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Some agitators were also seen digging up cement bricks from outside the building for use in the barricades.

Agitators on Monday clashed with ICE agents outside of New Jersey’s Delaney Hall, with agitators being seen constructing reinforced barricades at the facility’s entrance and exit.

Agents were seen in footage from Freedom News TV’s Oliya Scootercaster deploying pepper spray on agitators outside of the building as they attempted to move the crowd back. Agents appeared to take some people into custody.

Agitators were seen constructing barricades using building materials from a nearby dumpster. Some were also seen digging up cement bricks from outside the building for use in the barricades.

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….

Woke mob defeats Trump’s team—3 times– www.dailykos.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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It’s extremely suboptimal that the only way the constitutional order is being preserved these days is by masses of plaintiffs filing lawsuit after lawsuit against the administration’s flagrantly illegal conduct. While the administration has fought nearly everything tooth and nail, a few settlements have slipped through.

President Donald Trump has relentlessly attacked diversity and wokeness, words that mean whatever Trump wants them to mean on any given day. But sometimes, woke wins, and the administration has no choice but to knuckle under, settle, and cut its losses.

These sorts of victories are few and far between these days, given that conservatives on the Supreme Court make a habit of giving Trump whatever he wants, giving him very little incentive to settle cases. But hey, we’ll take it.

AOC Calls on Leftists to Go to Red States to Fight Conservatives: ‘It’s Time to Pull Up’– slaynews.com

pgnewser May 26, 2026 0

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Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) is facing sharp criticism from conservatives after delivering a fiery speech in Alabama, urging northern progressives to travel to red states and become more involved in political battles across the South.

The New York congresswoman made the remarks during the “All Roads Lead to The South” rally in Montgomery.

She argued that major political and civil rights struggles remain underway in southern states and called on activists from across the country to join those efforts.

Her comments quickly sparked a wave of backlash online, with critics accusing the progressive lawmaker of promoting division and unnecessarily escalating regional political tensions.

Far-Left Academics Wrote Scientific Advisory Guide For Judges– thefederalist.com

pgnewser May 15, 2026 0

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The Federal Judicial Center (FJC) casts itself as an ostensibly nonpartisan research agency that provides “objective information and education” to America’s judicial system. So, why did it permit major Democrat donors — several of whom openly espouse radical leftist views — to author part of an FJC manual advising judges on scientific matters before the bench?

The new discovery comes as part of The Federalist’s investigation into the taxpayer-funded FJC. The federal agency has come under fire in recent years following reports about left-wing climate activists’ growing bid to influence federal judges on environmental-related cases through the Federal Judicial Center.

Just last week, The Federalist revealed how the authors of a since-retracted “Reference Guide on Climate Science” contained in the FJC’s latest Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence are radical leftists. This reporting came months after it was discovered that the climate section of the manual — which advises federal judges in their assessment of science-related matters in cases — was littered with citations and footnotes to left-wing climate advocates.

Gavin Newsom’s Former Chief of Staff Pleads GUILTY in Massive Fraud Scheme– wltreport.com

pgnewser May 15, 2026 0

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Well, what do you know?

Yet another Democrat has just admitted to carrying out a major fraud scheme.

This time, it’s California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s former Chief of Staff, Dana Williamson.

Last November, Williamson was charged alongside nearly two dozen other co-conspirators for partaking in a $225K plot to siphon funds from a dormant political campaign for Democrat Xavier Becerra.

On Thursday, she plead guilty to three felony charges in exchange for taking a plea deal.

China Humiliated Trump And Now He’s In A Damage Control Frenzy– www.politicususa.com

pgnewser May 15, 2026 0

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The Trump/Xi meetings in China were private. It appears that there were no big breakthroughs and “wins” for Trump to bring back to the United States.

Trump tried to flatter the Chinese leader, who responded with threats about Taiwan.

The Trump trip, where he took a bunch of the world’s richest CEOs with him, appears to have been a total bust on all fronts. Republicans were hoping that Trump would have another one of his fake deals with China to announce that would help to get farmers who are being devastated by the president’s toxic combo of war and tariffs off their backs, but there was no big announcement.

Purge the Courts, VA Progressives Say – bellwetherintel.com

pgnewser May 13, 2026 0

After the Virginia Supreme Court threw out a new congressional district map that eliminated four GOP seats, progressives want to purge the court and replace it with more loyal progressives. The plan is to lower the mandatory retirement age of judges to below the youngest member of the VA Supreme Court so they can put progressive activists in to take their place.

Go Deeper

42% of Democrats Think Butler Assassination Attempt on Trump was Staged– legalinsurrection.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 1

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A newly released NewsGuard/YouGov poll found that nearly one-quarter of respondents believe the assassination attempt targeting President Donald Trump and members of his cabinet at last month’s White House Correspondents’ Association dinner was staged. 45% believed it was real, and 32% were unsure.

Broken down by party affiliation, 34% of Democrats said they believed the incident was staged, compared with 23% of independents and 13% of Republicans.

The national survey of 1,000 Americans was conducted by YouGov from April 28 to May 4. It was commissioned and published by NewsGuard, a company that rates online media outlets for reliability.

Agiators Track Kash Patel to Funeral, Protest at Hotel– www.dailysignal.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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Agitators shouted “fascist” and obscenities over the weekend outside a Portland, Oregon, hotel where they believed FBI Director Kash Patel was staying, according to Fox 12 Oregon and several posts on social media. Patel was reportedly attending a friend’s funeral.

The agitators gathered outside the Sentinel Hotel in downtown Portland. Some of the videos were posted on social media on Saturday; others were posted on Sunday.

The View Puts Targets on VA Supreme Court’s Back With Fact-Free Meltdowns – RedState– redstate.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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Even if it wasn’t obvious before, it’s certainly been abundantly clear since the start of President Trump’s second term in office that Democrats have no qualms whatsoever about fanning the flames using outright lies and purposeful deception to the point it spurs their outrage mobs to take violent action in the name of  “democracy” and “social justice.”

 

Law school ‘democracy’ scholar: Remove Virginia judges who voted down redistricting– www.thecollegefix.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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Idea criticized by legal scholars

Democrats should push through legislation to lower the mandatory retirement age of Virginia Supreme Court in order to remove justices who ruled a gerrymandered map unconstitutional, a “democracy” scholar argued.

Quinn Yeargain, who uses “they/them/theirs” pronouns and whose real name is Tyler, made the argument on Saturday. Yeargain is the “1855 Professor of Law of Democracy” at Michigan State University, according to the scholar’s faculty website.

Writing at Downballot, Yeargain said Democrats should lower the retirement age to 54, outwardly saying the goal would be to remove the youngest justice who made what the professor considers the wrong decision.

In Approving Alabama Gerrymander, the Roberts Court Shows Its Naked Political Bias – Mother Jones– www.motherjones.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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A protest sign outside Alabama’s statehouse on May 7.Kim Chandler/AP

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

In a stunning act of political partisanship, the Roberts Court on Monday night discarded its own precedents to green-light a last-ditch effort by Alabama to use a gerrymandered congressional map for the 2026 midterms. The move, which comes less than two weeks after the court destroyed the Voting Rights Act in Louisiana v. Callais, will reduce Black representation.

Monday’s 6-3 order, divided along partisan lines, shows how Republican-controlled states can use the high court’s April 29 Callais decision as carte-blanche to shut Black representatives out of Congress. In Alabama’s case, precedent, court doctrine, and a damning lower-court ruling stood in the way of the state throwing out its current map containing two majority-Black congressional districts represented by Democrats. Monday night’s decision of the Republican-appointed justices to toss all that aside shows how the court has not only unleashed a new wave of racial and partisan gerrymandering, but is sweeping away any obstacles so that Republicans nab as many seats as possible this November—enough to potentially prevent Democrats from retaking the House.

“There’s something bizarre going on with the court making choices that seem to very heavily benefit one party.”

Teen thugs on e-bikes allegedly gang up on man, kick and stomp him, hit him in face with glass bottle — but just 1 arrested– www.theblaze.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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A large group of teenagers on e-bikes allegedly ganged up on a man who was riding a scooter with his wife on the boardwalk in Huntington Beach, California, over the weekend — and kicked and stomped him and hit him in the face with a glass bottle, KTLA-TV reported.

The Huntington Beach Police Department confirmed to KTLA that a report was taken in connection with the incident, which occurred around 8 p.m. Saturday in the area of 103 Pacific Coast Highway.

‘Come here on Friday night, on Saturday night. … It’s chaos; it’s terror.’

Is the U.S. in a new era of political violence? Experts say it’s complicated– www.scientificamerican.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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A cluster of high-profile political attacks in the U.S. spotlight the nation’s extreme divisions—but they don’t necessarily signal a broader uptick in politically inspired brutality, experts say.

Politicians, pundits and ordinary Americans are increasingly worried about political violence. The latest round of concern was sparked on April 25, when a 31-year-old man stormed the Washington Hilton hotel in Washington, D.C., during the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, where President Donald Trump was in attendance. Secret Service agents arrested the armed man before he could get to the ballroom where the event was being held. He has since been charged with attempted assassination of the president—which would represent the third serious attempt on Trump’s life since 2024. The man has pled not guilty to this and related charges.

On Redistricting, Will Virginia Democrats Surrender, or Get Creative?– www.thenation.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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Democrats must stop conceding that the only answer for various racist voting laws is that Democrats just have to vote more and harder and better.

We try to keep despair out of these pages, tough as the times are. That’s why I didn’t write about Friday’s Virginia Supreme Court’s decision striking down new voter-approved congressional maps for extremely dubious reasons (read Virginia political expert Carolyn Fiddler’s awesome explanation of the ruling here).

Coming after the Supreme Court (of the United States) decision invalidating Louisiana’s congressional maps for taking race into account, the Bayou State’s immediately postponing upcoming elections as a result, and Tennessee’s swift move to use the SCOTUS ruling to wipe a majority-Black congressional district literally off the political map, last week was the worst for voting rights since the court’s 2013 Shelby v. Holder ruling struck down two vital sections of the Voting Rights Act. I admit to not seeing much light down this tunnel that afternoon.

Capitalism’s Long Revolution | The Nation– www.thenation.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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No one agrees on when, where, or how capitalism began, or whether it had a beginning at all, but everyone agrees that capitalism, the word, first appeared in the 19th century. Capital and capitalist slipped into use, unnoticed and unremarked, in the 13th and 17th centuries. Capitalism burst through the barricades of political argument in the 1830s, announcing immediately the hostility of its user. “Long live capital!” cried the French socialist Louis Blanc in 1839. “Long may we go on to attack capitalism, its mortal enemy, with even more intensity.” As much as the word named something, so did it identify its speaker—as a worker, a radical, a hater.

If capital was viewed as a thing and capitalists as people, capitalism was something else. Blanc described it as an act, the taking of collective wealth and turning it into individual or private profit. Proudhon claimed it was a citadel, casting medieval and military shadows across the land. Despite his obvious interest and extensive writing on the subject, Marx steered clear of the term.

Donald Trump Heads To China With Xi Jinping Holding The Upper Hand– www.ndtv.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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US President Donald Trump will arrive in China from May 13 to May 15 for a closely watched state visit that could shape the next phase of relations between Washington and Beijing. The trip marks the first visit by a sitting American president to China in nearly a decade and the first since Trump’s own 2017 visit during his first term.

Despite years of harsh rhetoric on China, Trump has continued to publicly praise Chinese President Xi Jinping. Just last week, he described Xi as a “good man” and a “smart man” with whom he has “a very good relationship”.

But behind the warm language lies mounting pressure. The summit comes at a moment when Washington is struggling to convert its military and economic power into diplomatic outcomes, particularly in the Middle East.

The Trump-Xi Summit Could Be a Positive Paradigm Shift • Stimson Center– www.stimson.org

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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When Donald Trump visits Beijing this week, the focus of think tankers and pundits will largely be on what the policy outcomes will be, and there is a tendency to lean towards the negative. Will China deepen the trade war? Will Trump bristle at Xi’s stance on the war against Iran?

But for the trajectory of the relationship between China and the United States, the summit could play a constructive role, facilitating a peaceful recognition of the shift in power dynamics between the two countries and globally. Perceptions in both countries of one another, and of the role each seeks to play in the world, will be shaped by the art of the summitry and what the meeting between the two leaders conveys.

Historically, high-profile summits have proven to be important turning points in U.S. foreign policy by mediating enduring tensions in bilateral relations. The 1959 US-Soviet summit humanized the Soviet Union and Nikita Khrushchev in the eyes of some Americans. The 1972 Nixon visit to China allowed pro-rapprochement sentiment to emerge and circulate in American public discourse, contributing to ongoing discussions and debates on diplomatic normalization for years following the summit. The 1985-87 US-Soviet summits between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev were crucial for transforming bilateral distrust into trust.

Confident in China’s power, Xi is ready to host an unpredictable Trump – The Washington Post– news.google.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

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  1. Confident in China’s power, Xi is ready to host an unpredictable Trump  The Washington Post
  2. As Trump Heads to Beijing, China Is ‘Locked and Loaded’ for a Fight  The New York Times
  3. US standoff with Iran deepens and strait remains closed after Trump rejects latest proposal  AP News
  4. Trump and China’s Xi set for talks spanning Iran, nuclear, trade and AI  Reuters
  5. Iran, China and AI collide in Trump’s legacy-defining week  Axios

 

PA SCOTUS Judge Nixes Dems over Israel – americanistpress.com

pgnewser May 12, 2026 0

Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice David Wecht has announced his intentions to leave the Democrat Party. He accused them of being antisemitic. He stated, “… acquiescence to Jew-hatred is now disturbingly common among activists, leaders and even many elected officials in the Democratic Party. I can no longer abide this. So, I won’t. I am no longer registered with any political party,”

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Democrats Move To Remove and Replace the Virginia Supreme Court– gellerreport.com

pgnewser May 11, 2026 0

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Democrats want to rewrite the Virginia Constitution because the State Supreme Court rejected their unconstitutional maps.

The New York Times reports that Hakeem Jeffries and top Democrats in D.C. are considering asking Virginia legislators and Governor Spanberger to pass legislation to “retire” the members of the Supreme Court and then replace them en masse.

New York Times: The conversation reflected the desperation and fury that have gripped the party after the state Supreme Court struck down a favorable map that had been ratified by voters. The most dramatic idea they discussed — which would involve an unusual gambit to replace the entire state Supreme Court, with a goal of reinstating their gerrymandered map — drew mixed reactions on the call, said the people, and it was not clear that it would even be viable, or palatable to Gov. Abigail Spanberger and Democrats in the Virginia General Assembly. (NYT).

CBS journalists are terrified of MAGA-friendly management– www.dailykos.com

pgnewser May 11, 2026 0

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As star correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi’s future at “60 Minutes” remains unclear, journalists at the legendary news show are being careful not to offend their new boss.

Following Bari Weiss’ controversial hiring as CBS News’ editor in chief, compliance is the name of the game.

Attribution: APSharyn Alfonsi attends the CBS 2019 upfront at The Plaza on May 15, 2019, in New York.

A source close to the “60 Minutes” staff told Daily Kos the editorial team is hesitant to pick up the phone or answer texts from people critical of new management.

The nervousness isn’t unfounded. Alfonsi’s time with CBS has come into question after she openly spoke against Weiss and the editorial decisions coming from the top.