Argentinian President Javier Milei and US President Donald Trump shake hands during a February 22, 2025 meeting in Washington, DC.
(Photo by White House)
Oct 27, 2025
President Donald Trump on Monday took credit after his political ally, Argentine President Javier Milei, scored a major victory in his country’s midterm elections following Trump’s decision to bail out the South American country’s struggling economy.
According to BBC, Milei’s La Libertad Avanza party on Sunday won 41% of the vote, helping it secure more than half of contested Senate seats and just under half of contested lower-house seats.
While speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump boasted of his administration’s efforts to help Milei secure a victory that will help him push through his radical right-wing austerity agenda that had previously been kept in check by opposition parties, which had overturned his vetos on laws that aimed to increase funding for state universities, people with disabilities, and children’s healthcare.
“He was a big victor, and he had a lot of help from us,” Trump said, referring to Milei. “He had a lot of help. I gave him an endorsement, a very strong endorsement.”
The Trump administration last month initiated a $20 billion bailout for Argentina intended to stabilize the country’s currency, which has seen its value plummet to dangerous lows over the last several months. In addition, Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent have orchestrated another $20 billion bailout with private funds to support the nation’s beleaguered economy.
The bailouts have come as Trump has refused to use emergency funds to ensure that Americans who rely on food assistance can feed their families next month, as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is set to go unfunded due to the US government shutdown.
Trump emphasized that the bailout was entirely contingent on Milei’s political success in the midterm elections, and that it would be rescinded if his party fared poorly.
“If he loses, we’re not going to be generous with Argentina,” Trump said earlier this month.
Milei’s political future appeared much more tenuous just one month ago, when his party lost Buenos Aires provincial elections in what some political observers believed were an ill omen for this month’s midterms. Milei had also been rocked corruption scandals, including an alleged bribery scheme involving his sister, Karina Milei.
Matt Stoller, researcher at the American Economic Liberties Project, directly linked Trump’s coercion campaign to Milei’s political success.
“It turns out that Argentine voters would prefer Trump give them dollars for free than have another financial crisis,” he wrote on X. “Six weeks ago, Milei lost Buenos Aires by 14%. Today he won it. I wonder what changed.”
Stoller rejected a Wall Street Journal analysis claiming Argentinian voters, who are struggling with high unemployment numbers and surging prices on essentials, embraced “a free-market revolution” by voting for Milei.
“The reason for a massive swing to Milei in six weeks was Trump’s offer of free dollars vs. the prospect of economic collapse,” he said. “Nothing to do with free markets. A blatant lie.”
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, The U.S. is on a fast track to authoritarianism like nothing I've ever seen. Meanwhile, corporate news outlets are utterly capitulating to Trump, twisting their coverage to avoid drawing his ire while lining up to stuff cash in his pockets. That's why I believe that Common Dreams is doing the best and most consequential reporting that we've ever done. Our small but mighty team is a progressive reporting powerhouse, covering the news every day that the corporate media never will. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. And to ignite change for the common good. Now here's the key piece that I want all our readers to understand: None of this would be possible without your financial support. That's not just some fundraising cliche. It's the absolute and literal truth. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. Will you donate now to help power the nonprofit, independent reporting of Common Dreams? Thank you for being a vital member of our community. Together, we can keep independent journalism alive when it’s needed most. - Craig Brown, Co-founder |
|
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
President Donald Trump on Monday took credit after his political ally, Argentine President Javier Milei, scored a major victory in his country’s midterm elections following Trump’s decision to bail out the South American country’s struggling economy.
According to BBC, Milei’s La Libertad Avanza party on Sunday won 41% of the vote, helping it secure more than half of contested Senate seats and just under half of contested lower-house seats.
While speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump boasted of his administration’s efforts to help Milei secure a victory that will help him push through his radical right-wing austerity agenda that had previously been kept in check by opposition parties, which had overturned his vetos on laws that aimed to increase funding for state universities, people with disabilities, and children’s healthcare.
“He was a big victor, and he had a lot of help from us,” Trump said, referring to Milei. “He had a lot of help. I gave him an endorsement, a very strong endorsement.”
Trump: "In Argentina, I want to congratulate the victor. And he had a lot of help from us." pic.twitter.com/vG3pamNuEe
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 27, 2025
The Trump administration last month initiated a $20 billion bailout for Argentina intended to stabilize the country’s currency, which has seen its value plummet to dangerous lows over the last several months. In addition, Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent have orchestrated another $20 billion bailout with private funds to support the nation’s beleaguered economy.
The bailouts have come as Trump has refused to use emergency funds to ensure that Americans who rely on food assistance can feed their families next month, as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is set to go unfunded due to the US government shutdown.
Trump emphasized that the bailout was entirely contingent on Milei’s political success in the midterm elections, and that it would be rescinded if his party fared poorly.
“If he loses, we’re not going to be generous with Argentina,” Trump said earlier this month.
“If he loses, we will not be generous with Argentina.”
- Trump warns Argentina’s voters that U.S. financial backing, now at $20b and potentially rising to $40b, depends on Milei’s party’s performance in the upcoming midterm elections @atrupar pic.twitter.com/zpuiFuuYWi
— The Intellectualist (@highbrow_nobrow) October 16, 2025
Milei’s political future appeared much more tenuous just one month ago, when his party lost Buenos Aires provincial elections in what some political observers believed were an ill omen for this month’s midterms. Milei had also been rocked corruption scandals, including an alleged bribery scheme involving his sister, Karina Milei.
Matt Stoller, researcher at the American Economic Liberties Project, directly linked Trump’s coercion campaign to Milei’s political success.
“It turns out that Argentine voters would prefer Trump give them dollars for free than have another financial crisis,” he wrote on X. “Six weeks ago, Milei lost Buenos Aires by 14%. Today he won it. I wonder what changed.”
Stoller rejected a Wall Street Journal analysis claiming Argentinian voters, who are struggling with high unemployment numbers and surging prices on essentials, embraced “a free-market revolution” by voting for Milei.
“The reason for a massive swing to Milei in six weeks was Trump’s offer of free dollars vs. the prospect of economic collapse,” he said. “Nothing to do with free markets. A blatant lie.”
From Your Site Articles
- ‘So Much for America First’: Trump Admin Says Argentina Bailout Doubling to $40 Billion ›
- Trump Admin Responds to Milei’s Failed Libertarian Policies With a US Taxpayer Bailout for Argentina ›
- Sanders Rips Trump for Finding ‘$40 Billion to Bail Out Argentina’ While Cutting Off Food Aid in US ›
Related Articles Around the Web
President Donald Trump on Monday took credit after his political ally, Argentine President Javier Milei, scored a major victory in his country’s midterm elections following Trump’s decision to bail out the South American country’s struggling economy.
According to BBC, Milei’s La Libertad Avanza party on Sunday won 41% of the vote, helping it secure more than half of contested Senate seats and just under half of contested lower-house seats.
While speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump boasted of his administration’s efforts to help Milei secure a victory that will help him push through his radical right-wing austerity agenda that had previously been kept in check by opposition parties, which had overturned his vetos on laws that aimed to increase funding for state universities, people with disabilities, and children’s healthcare.
“He was a big victor, and he had a lot of help from us,” Trump said, referring to Milei. “He had a lot of help. I gave him an endorsement, a very strong endorsement.”
Trump: "In Argentina, I want to congratulate the victor. And he had a lot of help from us." pic.twitter.com/vG3pamNuEe
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 27, 2025
The Trump administration last month initiated a $20 billion bailout for Argentina intended to stabilize the country’s currency, which has seen its value plummet to dangerous lows over the last several months. In addition, Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent have orchestrated another $20 billion bailout with private funds to support the nation’s beleaguered economy.
The bailouts have come as Trump has refused to use emergency funds to ensure that Americans who rely on food assistance can feed their families next month, as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is set to go unfunded due to the US government shutdown.
Trump emphasized that the bailout was entirely contingent on Milei’s political success in the midterm elections, and that it would be rescinded if his party fared poorly.
“If he loses, we’re not going to be generous with Argentina,” Trump said earlier this month.
“If he loses, we will not be generous with Argentina.”
- Trump warns Argentina’s voters that U.S. financial backing, now at $20b and potentially rising to $40b, depends on Milei’s party’s performance in the upcoming midterm elections @atrupar pic.twitter.com/zpuiFuuYWi
— The Intellectualist (@highbrow_nobrow) October 16, 2025
Milei’s political future appeared much more tenuous just one month ago, when his party lost Buenos Aires provincial elections in what some political observers believed were an ill omen for this month’s midterms. Milei had also been rocked corruption scandals, including an alleged bribery scheme involving his sister, Karina Milei.
Matt Stoller, researcher at the American Economic Liberties Project, directly linked Trump’s coercion campaign to Milei’s political success.
“It turns out that Argentine voters would prefer Trump give them dollars for free than have another financial crisis,” he wrote on X. “Six weeks ago, Milei lost Buenos Aires by 14%. Today he won it. I wonder what changed.”
Stoller rejected a Wall Street Journal analysis claiming Argentinian voters, who are struggling with high unemployment numbers and surging prices on essentials, embraced “a free-market revolution” by voting for Milei.
“The reason for a massive swing to Milei in six weeks was Trump’s offer of free dollars vs. the prospect of economic collapse,” he said. “Nothing to do with free markets. A blatant lie.”
From Your Site Articles
- ‘So Much for America First’: Trump Admin Says Argentina Bailout Doubling to $40 Billion ›
- Trump Admin Responds to Milei’s Failed Libertarian Policies With a US Taxpayer Bailout for Argentina ›
- Sanders Rips Trump for Finding ‘$40 Billion to Bail Out Argentina’ While Cutting Off Food Aid in US ›
Related Articles Around the Web
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.
LATEST NEWS
ICE’s ‘Frightening’ Facial Recognition App is Scanning US Citizens Without Their Consent
“An ICE officer may ignore evidence of American citizenship—including a birth certificate—if the app says the person is an alien,” said the ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee.
Nov 01, 2025
Immigration agents are using facial recognition software as "definitive" evidence to determine immigration status and is collecting data from US citizens without their consent. In some cases, agents may detain US citizens, including ones who can provide their birth certificates, if the app says they are in the country illegally.
These are a few of the findings from a series of articles published this past week by 404 Media, which has obtained documents and video evidence showing that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents are using a smartphone app in the field during immigration stops, scanning the faces of people on the street to verify their citizenship.
The report found that agents frequently conduct stops that "seem to have little justification beyond the color of someone’s skin... then look up more information on that person, including their identity and potentially their immigration status."
While it is not clear what application the agencies are using, 404 previously reported that ICE is using an app called Mobile Fortify that allows ICE to simply point a camera at a person on the street. The photos are then compared with a bank of more than 200 million images and dozens of government databases to determine info about the person, including their name, date of birth, nationality, and information about their immigration status.
On Friday, 404 published an internal document from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) which stated that "ICE does not provide the opportunity for individuals to decline or consent to the collection and use of biometric data/photograph collection." The document also states that the image of any face that agents scan, including those of US citizens, will be stored for 15 years.
The outlet identified several videos that have been posted to social media of immigration officials using the technology.
In one, taken in Chicago, armed agents in sunglasses and face coverings are shown accosting a pair of Hispanic teenagers on bicycles, asking where they are from. The 16-year-old boy who filmed the encounter said he is "from here"—an American citizen—but that he only has a school ID on him. The officer tells the boy he'll be allowed to leave if he'll "do a facial." The other officer then snaps a photo of him with a phone camera and asks his name.
In another video, also in Chicago, agents are shown surrounding a driver, who declines to show his ID. Without asking, one officer points his phone at the man. "I’m an American citizen, so leave me alone,” the driver says. "Alright, we just got to verify that,” the officer responds.
Even if the people approached in these videos had produced identification proving their citizenship, there's no guarantee that agents would have accepted it, especially if the app gave them information to the contrary.
On Wednesday, ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), told 404 that ICE agents will even trust the app's results over a person's government documents.
“ICE officials have told us that an apparent biometric match by Mobile Fortify is a ‘definitive’ determination of a person’s status and that an ICE officer may ignore evidence of American citizenship—including a birth certificate—if the app says the person is an alien,” he said.
This is despite the fact that, as Nathan Freed Wessler, deputy director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, told 404, “face recognition technology is notoriously unreliable, frequently generating false matches and resulting in a number of known wrongful arrests across the country."
Thompson said: "ICE using a mobile biometrics app in ways its developers at CBP never intended or tested is a frightening, repugnant, and unconstitutional attack on Americans’ rights and freedoms.”
According to an investigation published in October by ProPublica, more than 170 US citizens have been detained by immigration agents, often in squalid conditions, since President Donald Trump returned to office in January. In many of these cases, these individuals have been detained because agents wrongly claimed the documents proving their citizenship are false.
During a press conference this week, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem denied this reality, stating that "no American citizens have been arrested or detained" as part of Trump's "mass deportation" crusade.
"We focus on those who are here illegally," she said.
But as DHS's internal document explains, facial recognition software is necessary in the first place because "ICE agents do not know an individual's citizenship at the time of the initial encounter."
David Bier, the director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute, explains that the use of such technology suggests that ICE's operations are not "highly targeted raids," as it likes to portray, but instead "random fishing expeditions."
Despite Court Rulings, Trump Refuses to Pay Out Food Stamp Benefits to Tens of Millions
“The administration has chosen to hold food for more than forty million vulnerable people hostage to try to force Democrats to capitulate without negotiations,” says one Georgetown law professor.
Nov 01, 2025
Two federal judges have said the Trump administration cannot use the government shutdown to suspend food assistance for 42 million Americans. But hours into Saturday, when payments were due to be disbursed, President Donald Trump appears to be defying the ruling, potentially leaving millions unable to afford this month's grocery bills.
A pair of federal judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island ruled Friday that the Department of Agriculture's (USDA) freeze on benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps, was unlawful and that the department must use money from a contingency fund of $6 billion to pay for at least a portion of the roughly $8 billion meant to be disbursed this month.
“There is no doubt that the six billion dollars in contingency funds are appropriated funds that are without a doubt necessary to carry out the program’s operation,” said US District Judge McConnell of Rhode Island in his oral ruling. “The shutdown of the government through funding doesn’t do away with SNAP. It just does away with the funding of it. There could be no greater necessity than the prohibition across the board of funds for the program’s operations.”
McConnell added: “There is no doubt, and it is beyond argument, that irreparable harm will begin to occur if it hasn’t already occurred in the terror it has caused some people about the availability of funding for food for their family."
SNAP benefits are available to people whose monthly incomes fall below 130% of the federal poverty line. More than 1 in 8 Americans rely on the program, and 39% of them are children. According to USDA research, cited by the Washington Post, those who receive SNAP benefits rely on it for 63% of their groceries, with the poorest, who make below 50% of the poverty line, relying on it for as much as 80%.
McConnell shot down the administration's contention that the contingency funds may be needed for some other hypothetical emergency in the future, saying "It’s clear that when compared to the millions of people that will go without funds for food versus the agency’s desire not to use contingency funds in case there’s a hurricane need, the balances of those equities clearly goes on the side of ensuring that people are fed."
While the judge in Massachusetts, Indira Talwani, ruled that Trump merely had to use the contingency funds to fund as much of the program as possible, McConnell went further, saying that in addition, they had to tap other sources of funding to disburse benefits in full, and do so "as soon as possible." Both judges gave the administration until Monday to provide updates on how it planned to follow the ruling.
However, after the ruling on Friday, Trump insisted on social media that "government lawyers do not think we have the legal authority to pay SNAP with certain monies we have available, and now two courts have issued conflicting opinions on what we can and cannot do."
He added: "I do NOT want Americans to go hungry just because the Radical Democrats refuse to do the right thing and REOPEN THE GOVERNMENT. Therefore, I have instructed our lawyers to ask the Court to clarify how we can legally fund SNAP as soon as possible."
Attorney and activist Miles Mogulescu pointed out in Common Dreams that, "until a few days ago, even the Trump administration agreed that these funds should be used to continue SNAP funding during the shutdown."
On September 30, the day before the shutdown began, the USDA posted a 55-page "Lapse of Funding" plan to its website, which plainly stated that if the government were to shut down, "the department will continue operations related to... core nutrition safety net programs.”
But this week, USDA abruptly deleted the file and posted a new memo that concocted a new legal reality out of whole cloth, stating that “due to Congressional Democrats’ refusal to pass a clean continuing resolution (CR), approximately 42 million individuals will not receive SNAP benefits come November 1st.”
As Mogulescu notes: "The new memo cited absolutely no law supporting its position. Instead, it made up a rule claiming that the 'contingency fund is not available to support FY 2026 regular benefits, because the appropriation for regular benefits no longer exist.'"
Sharon Parrott, the president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, who previously served as an official in the White House Office of Management, said last week that it's "unequivocally false" that the administration's hands are tied.
"I know from experience that the federal government has the authority and the tools it needs during a shutdown to get these SNAP funds to families," Parrott said. "Even at this late date, the professionals at the Department of Agriculture and in states can make this happen. And, to state the obvious, benefits that are a couple of days delayed are far more help to families than going without any help at all."
She added: "The administration itself admits these reserves are available for use. It could have, and should have, taken steps weeks ago to be ready to use these funds. Instead, it may choose not to use them in an effort to gain political advantage."
In hopes of pressuring Democrats to abandon their demands that Congress extend a critical Affordable Care Act tax credit and prevent health insurance premiums from skyrocketing for more than 20 million Americans, Republicans have sought to use the shutdown to inflict maximum pain on voters.
Trump has attempted to carry out mass layoffs of government workers, which have been halted by a federal judge. Meanwhile, his director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, has stripped funding from energy and transportation infrastructure projects aimed at blue states and cities.
"Terminating SNAP is a choice, and an overtly unlawful one at that," says David Super, a constitutional law professor at Georgetown University. "The administration has chosen to hold food for more than forty million vulnerable people hostage to try to force Democrats to capitulate without negotiations.”
Judge Blocks Trump From Requiring Proof of Citizenship on Federal Voting Form
“Trump’s attempt to impose a documentary proof of citizenship requirement on the federal voter registration form is an unconstitutional power grab,” said one plaintiff in the case.
Oct 31, 2025
A federal judge on Friday permanently blocked part of President Donald Trump's executive order requiring proof of US citizenship on federal voter registration forms, a ruling hailed by one plaintiff in the case as "a clear victory for our democracy."
Siding with Democratic and civil liberties groups that sued the administration over Trump's March edict mandating a US passport, REAL ID-compliant document, military identification, or similar proof in order to register to vote in federal elections, Senior US District Judge for the District of Columbia Colleen Kollar-Kotelly found the directive to be an unconstitutional violation of the separation of powers.
“Because our Constitution assigns responsibility for election regulation to the states and to Congress, this court holds that the president lacks the authority to direct such changes," Kollar-Kotelly, an appointee of former President Bill Clinton, wrote in her 81-page ruling.
"The Constitution addresses two types of power over federal elections: First, the power to determine who is qualified to vote, and second, the power to regulate federal election procedures," she continued. "In both spheres, the Constitution vests authority first in the states. In matters of election procedures, the Constitution assigns Congress the power to preempt State regulations."
"By contrast," Kollar-Kotelly added, "the Constitution assigns no direct role to the president in either domain."
This is the second time Kollar-Kotelly has ruled against Trump's proof-of-citizenship order. In April, she issued a temporary injunction blocking key portions of the directive.
"The president doesn't have the authority to change election procedures just because he wants to."
"The court upheld what we've long known: The president doesn't have the authority to change election procedures just because he wants to," the ACLU said on social media.
Sophia Lin Lakin of the ACLU, a plaintiff in the case, welcomed the decision as “a clear victory for our democracy."
"President Trump’s attempt to impose a documentary proof of citizenship requirement on the federal voter registration form is an unconstitutional power grab," she added.
Campaign Legal Center president Trevor Potter said in a statement: "This federal court ruling reaffirms that no president has the authority to control our election systems and processes. The Constitution gives the states and Congress—not the president—the responsibility and authority to regulate our elections."
"We are glad that this core principle of separation of powers has been upheld and celebrate this decision, which will ensure that the president cannot singlehandedly impose barriers on voter registration that would prevent millions of Americans from making their voices heard in our elections," Potter added.
‘It Does Not Have to Be This Way’: Child Hunger Set to Surge as Trump Withholds SNAP Funds
Two federal courts ruled Friday that the White House must release contingency food assistance funds, but officials have suggested they will not comply with the orders.
Oct 31, 2025
Though two federal judges ruled on Friday that the Trump administration must use contingency funds to continue providing food assistance that 42 million Americans rely on, White House officials have signaled they won't comply with the court orders even as advocates warn the lapse in nutrition aid funding will cause an unprecedented child hunger crisis that families are unprepared to withstand.
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is planning to freeze payments to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program on Saturday as the government shutdown reaches the one-month mark, claiming it can no longer fund SNAP and cannot tap $5 billion in contingency funds that would allow recipients to collect at least partial benefits in November.
President Donald Trump said Thursday that his administration is "going to get it done," regarding the funding of SNAP, but offered no details on his plans to keep the nation's largest anti-hunger program funded, and his agriculture secretary, Brooke Rollins, would not commit on Friday to release the funds if ordered to do so.
"We're looking at all the options," Rollins told CNN before federal judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island ordered the administration to fund the program.
The White House and Republicans in Congress have claimed the only way to fund SNAP is for Democratic lawmakers to vote for a continuing resolution proposed by the GOP to keep government funding at current levels; Democrats have refused to sign on to the resolution because it would allow healthcare subsidies under the Affordable Care Act to expire.
The administration previously said it would use the SNAP contingency funds before reversing course last week. A document detailing the contingency plan disappeared from the USDA's website this week. The White House's claims prompted two lawsuits filed by Democrat-led states and cities as well as nonprofit groups that demanded the funding be released.
On Thursday evening, US Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) addressed her followers on the social media platform X about the impending hunger emergency, emphasizing that the loss of SNAP benefits for 42 million Americans—39% of whom are children—is compounding a child poverty crisis that has grown since 2021 due to Republicans' refusal to extend pandemic-era programs like the enhanced child tax credit.
"One in eight kids in America lives in poverty in 2024," said Jayapal. "Sixty-one percent of these kids—that's about 6 million kids— have at least one parent who is employed. So it's not that people are not working, they're working, but they're not earning enough."
"I just want to be really clear that it is a policy choice to have people who are hungry, to have people who are poor," she said.
Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach, an economist at Georgetown University, told The Washington Post that the loss of benefits for millions of children, elderly, and disabled people all at once is "unprecedented."
“We’ve never seen the elderly and children removed from the program in this sort of way,” Schanzenbach told the Post. “It really is hard to predict something of this magnitude."
A Thursday report by the economic justice group Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) emphasized that the impending child hunger crisis comes four months after Republicans passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which slashed food assistance by shifting some of the cost of SNAP to the states from the federal government, expanding work requirements, and ending adjustments to benefits to keep pace with food inflation.
Meanwhile, the law is projected to increase the incomes of the wealthiest 20% of US households by 3.7% while reducing the incomes of the poorest 20% of Americans by an average of 3.8%.
Now, said ATF, "they're gonna let hard-working Americans go hungry so billionaires can get richer."
At Time on Thursday, Stephanie Land, author of Class: A Memoir of Motherhood, Hunger, and Higher Education, wrote that "the cruelty is the point" of the Trump administration's refusal to ensure the 61-year-old program, established by Democratic former President Lyndon B. Johnson, doesn't lapse for the first time in its history.
"Once, when we lost most of our food stamp benefit, I mentally catalogued every can and box of food in the cupboards, and how long the milk we had would last," wrote Land. "They’d kicked me, the mother of a recently-turned 6-year-old, off of food stamps because I didn’t meet the work requirement of 20 hours a week. I hadn’t known that my daughter’s age had qualified me to not have to meet that requirement, and without warning, the funds I carefully budgeted for food were gone."
"It didn’t matter that I was a full-time student and worked 10-15 hours a week," she continued. "This letter from my local government office said it wasn’t sufficient to meet their stamp of approval. In their opinion, I wasn’t working enough to deserve to eat. My value, my dignity as a human being, was completely dependent on my ability to work, as if nothing else about me awarded me the ability to feel satiated by food."
"Whether the current administration decides to continue to fund SNAP in November or not, the intended damage has already been done. The fear of losing means for food, shelter, and healthcare is the point," Land added. "Programs referred to as a 'safety net' are anything but when they can be removed with a thoughtless, vague message, or scribble from a permanent marker. It’s about control to gain compliance, and our most vulnerable populations will struggle to keep up."
On Thursday, the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) expressed hope that the president's recent statement saying the White House will ensure people obtain their benefits will "trigger the administration to use its authority and precedent to prevent disruptions in food assistance."
"The issue at hand is not political. It is about ensuring that parents can put food on the table, older adults on fixed incomes can meet their nutritional needs, and children continue to receive the meals they rely on. SNAP is one of the most effective tools for reducing hunger and supporting local economies," said the group.
"Swift and transparent action is needed," FRAC added, "to restore stability, maintain public confidence, and ensure that our state partners, local economies and grocers, and the millions of children, older adults, people with disabilities, and veterans who participate in SNAP are not left bearing the consequences of federal inaction."
Immigration Agents Cause Chaos In Chicago Suburb as New Report Documents ‘Pattern of Extreme Brutality’
“Our message for ICE is simple: Get the hell out,” said Evanston, Illinois Mayor Daniel Biss.
Oct 31, 2025
Officials in Evanston, Illinois are accusing federal immigration officials of "deliberately causing chaos" in their city during a Friday operation that led to angry protests from local residents.
As reported by Fox 32 Chicago, Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss and other local leaders held a news conference on Friday afternoon to denounce actions earlier in the day by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials.
"Our message for ICE is simple: Get the hell out of Evanston," Biss said during the conference.
In a social media post ahead of the press conference, Biss, who is currently a candidate for US Senate, described the agents' actions as "monstrous" and vowed that he would "continue to track the movement of federal agents in and around Evanston and ensure that the Evanston Police Department is responding in the appropriate fashion."
As of this writing, it is unclear how the incident involving the immigration officials in Evanston began, although witness Jose Marin told local publication Evanston Now that agents on Friday morning had deliberately caused a car crash in the area near the Chute Elementary School, and then proceeded to detain the vehicle's passengers.
Videos taken after the crash posted by Chicago Tribune investigative reporter Gregory Royal Pratt and by Evanston Now reporter Matthew Eadie show several people in the area angrily confronting law enforcement officials as they were in the process of detaining the passengers.
“You a criminal!” Evanston residents angrily confront immigration agents pic.twitter.com/t7jVaC4czq
— Gregory Royal Pratt (@royalpratt) October 31, 2025
Another video of ICE grabbing at least two people after a crash on Oakton/Asbury in Evanston
Witnesses say at least three were arrested by Feds pic.twitter.com/DStgCrKWTA
— Matthew Eadie (@mattheweadie22) October 31, 2025
The operation in Evanston came on the same day that Bellingcat published a report documenting what has been described as "a pattern of extreme brutality" being carried out by immigration enforcement officials in Illinois.
Specifically, the publication examined social media videos of immigration enforcement actions taken between October 9 to October 27, and found "multiple examples of force and riot control weapons being used" in apparent violation of a judge's temporary restraining order that banned such weapons except in cases where federal officers are in immediate danger.
"In total, we found seven [instances] that appeared to show the use of riot control weapons when there was seemingly no apparent immediate threat by protesters and no audible warnings given," Bellingcat reported. "Nineteen showed use of force, such as tackling people to the ground when they were not visibly resisting. Another seven showed agents ordering or threatening people to leave public places. Some of the events identified showed incidents that appeared to fall into more than one of these categories."
Report Offers Easy Path for States to Make Tax Code Fairer by Targeting the Rich
“For too long, our tax systems have favored wealth over work,” said the report’s co-author. “State wealth proceeds taxes would take a major step toward correcting that imbalance.”
Oct 31, 2025
Taxing the passive proceeds of extreme wealth—including capital gains and stock dividends—is an easy way for states to generate billions of dollars in revenue, reduce inequality, and boost fairness in tax systems, according to a report published Thursday.
The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) report shows how state-level wealth proceeds taxes of just 4% on profits generated by means including capital gains, dividends, and passive business income could raise more than $45 billion a year in revenue nationwide, while an enhanced version of such a levy would generate $57 billion annually.
According to the report, approximately three-quarters of such revenue would come from households with annual incomes exceeding $1 million—and only 4.4% of US taxpayers would owe anything at all.
Wealth inequality gets worse when working households pay more in taxes than wealthy owners.States have a simple way to address this problem and raise much-needed revenue.It's well past time for a Wealth Proceeds Tax.
[image or embed]
— ITEP (@itep.org) October 30, 2025 at 10:44 AM
Other key findings of the report include:
- A state wealth proceeds tax would help correct an imbalance in which most of the income generated by passive wealth currently faces effective federal tax rates roughly 40% lower than wages and salaries;
- A wealth proceeds tax is easy to implement—states can piggyback on federal filings, minimizing administrative costs for both taxpayers and state revenue agencies; and
- For a successful example of a wealth proceeds tax, look to Minnesota.
In 2023, Minnesota became the first state to enact a law piggybacking a wealth proceeds tax on the federal net investment income tax (NIIT), a levy on certain earnings from high-income individuals, estates, and trusts. Minnesota's 1% tax only applies to such wealth exceeding $1 million and is expected to raise more than $60 million in revenue in 2026.
Other states, while not having a wealth proceeds tax, apply higher levies on certain types of proceeds. Massachusetts, for example, imposes a short-term capital gains that is 3.5% higher than the ordinary state income tax rate, while Maryland enacted a 2% levy on short- and long-term capital gains for households earning more than $350,000 annually.
“States have an untapped opportunity to tax extremely wealthy families," ITEP senior analyst and report co-author Sarah Austin said in a statement. “The federal government already defines what counts as wealth-derived income, so states can easily adapt that framework to make their tax codes fairer and more robust.”
The report's other author, ITEP research director Carl Davis, said: "For too long, our tax systems have favored wealth over work. State wealth proceeds taxes would take a major step toward correcting that imbalance.”
With Food Aid Suspended for Millions of Families, Trump Brags of ‘Statuary Marble’ Bathroom Makeover
“He’s a psychopath, humanly incapable of caring about anyone or anything but himself,” one critic said of Trump.
Oct 31, 2025
As millions of families across the US are about to lose their access to food aid over the weekend, President Donald Trump on Friday decided to show off photos of a White House bathroom that he boasted had been refurbished in "highly polished, statuary marble."
Trump posted photos of the bathroom on his Truth Social platform, and he explained that he decided to remodel it because he was dissatisfied with the "art deco green tile style" that had been implemented during a previous renovation, which he described as "totally inappropriate for the Lincoln Era."
"I did it in black and white polished Statuary marble," Trump continued. "This was very appropriate for the time of Abraham Lincoln and, in fact, could be the marble that was originally there!"
Trump's critics were quick to pan the remodeled bathroom, especially since it came at a time when Americans are suffering from numerous policies the president and the Republican Party are enacting, including tariffs that are raising the cost of food and clothing; expiring subsidies for Americans who buy health insurance through Affordable Care Act exchanges; and cuts to Medicaid and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance (SNAP) programs in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
"Sure, you might not be able to eat or go to the doctor, but check out how nice Trump's new marble shitter is," remarked independent journalist Aaron Rupar on Bluesky.
Joe Walsh, a former Republican congressman who has become a critic of Trump, ripped the president for displaying such tone deafness in the middle of a federal government shutdown.
"Government still shutdown, Americans not getting paid, food assistance for low-income families and children about to be cut off, and this is what he cares about," he wrote on X. "He’s a psychopath, humanly incapable of caring about anyone or anything but himself."
Don Moynihan, a political scientist at the University of Michigan, expressed extreme skepticism that the White House bathroom during Abraham Lincoln's tenure was decked out in marble and gold.
"Fact check based on no research but with a high degree of confidence: This is not the marble that was originally in the Lincoln Bedroom," he wrote. "It is more likely to the be retrieved from a Trump casino before it was demolished."
Fashion critic Derek Guy, meanwhile, mostly left politics out of his criticisms of the remodeled bathroom, instead simply observing that "White House renovations are currently being spearheaded by someone with famously bad interior design taste."
Earlier this month, Trump sparked outrage when he demolished the entire East Wing of the White House to make way for a massive White House ballroom financed by donations from some of America’s wealthiest corporations—including several with government contracts and interests in deregulation—such as Apple, Lockheed Martin, Microsoft, Meta, Google, Amazon, and Palantir.
Khanna Warns Any Trump Attack on Venezuela Would Be ‘Blatantly Unconstitutional’
“Congress must speak up now to stop another endless, regime-change war,” said Democratic US Rep. Ro Khanna.
Oct 31, 2025
US Rep. Ro Khanna on Friday demanded urgent congressional action to avert "another endless, regime-change war" amid reports that President Donald Trump is weighing military strikes inside Venezuela.
Such strikes, warned Khanna (D-Calif.), would be "blatantly unconstitutional."
"The United States Congress must speak up and stop this," Khanna said in a video posted to social media. "No president, according to the Constitution, has the authority to strike another country without Congress' approval. And the American people have voted against regime change and endless wars."
Watch:
Trump is getting ready to launch strikes inside Venezuela per the @WSJ & @MiamiHerald.
This is blatantly unconstitutional.
Congress must speak up now to stop another endless, regime-change war. @RepThomasMassie @RandPaul. pic.twitter.com/LrnPPUVZaU
— Ro Khanna (@RoKhanna) October 31, 2025
Khanna's remarks came in response to reporting by the Miami Herald and the Wall Street Journal on internal Trump administration discussions regarding possible airstrike targets inside Venezuela.
The Herald reported early Friday that the administration "has made the decision to attack military installations inside Venezuela and the strikes could come at any moment." The Journal, in a story published Thursday, was more reserved, reporting that the administration "has identified targets in Venezuela that include military facilities used to smuggle drugs," but adding that "the president hasn't made a final decision on ordering land strikes."
Citing unnamed US officials familiar with the matter, the Journal reported that "the targets would send a clear message to Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro that it is time to step down."
Following the reports, the White House denied that Trump has finalized plans for a military strike on Venezuela. Trump himself told reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday that he has not made a final decision, signaling his belief he has the authority to do so if he chooses.
Last week, the president said publicly that land strikes are "going to be next" following his illegal, deadly strikes on boats in waters off Central and South America.
Trump has said he would not seek approval from Congress before attacking Venezuela directly.
"The American people oppose being dragged into yet another endless war, this time in Venezuela, and our constitutional order demands deliberation by the U.S. Congress—period."
A potentially imminent, unauthorized US attack on Venezuela and the administration's accelerating military buildup in the Caribbean have thus far drawn vocal opposition from just a fraction of the lawmakers on Capitol Hill, currently embroiled in a shutdown fight.
Just three senators—Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.), and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.)—are listed as official backers of a resolution aimed at preventing Trump from attacking Venezuela without congressional authorization. Other senators, including Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), have spoken out against Trump's belligerence toward Venezuela.
"Trump is illegally threatening war with Venezuela—after killing more than 50 people in unauthorized strikes at sea," Sanders wrote in a social media post on Friday. "The Constitution is clear: Only Congress can declare war. Congress must defend the law and end Trump's militarism."
Dylan Williams, vice president of government affairs at the Center for International Policy, wrote Friday that "most Americans oppose overthrowing Venezuela's leaders by force—and an even larger majority oppose invading."
"Call your senators and tell them to vote for S.J.Res.90 to block Trump's unauthorized use of military force," Williams added. "The Capitol switchboard can connect you to your senators' offices at 202-224-3121."
A similar resolution led by Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) in the US House has just over 30 cosponsors.
Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.) announced his support for the House resolution on Thursday, saying in a statement that "Trump does not have the legal authority to launch military strikes inside Venezuela without a specific authorization by Congress."
"I am deeply troubled by reports that suggest this administration believes otherwise," said Neguse. "Any unilateral directive to send Americans into war is not only reckless, but illegal and an affront to the House of Representatives' powers under Article I of our Constitution."
"The American people oppose being dragged into yet another endless war, this time in Venezuela, and our constitutional order demands deliberation by the U.S. Congress—period," Neguse added.
‘No Question’ More People Will End Up With Fake Insurance If ACA Subsidies Expire: Expert
“This is what happens when we design systems for insurance companies instead of humans.”
Oct 31, 2025
Time on Thursday published reporting about "how fake health insurance is luring people in," and along with sharing stories of Americans tricked into paying for plans that aren't compliant with the Affordable Care Act, the article features an expert's warning that more could be fooled if Congress lets ACA subsidies expire.
The ongoing federal government shutdown stems from congressional Democrats' efforts to reverse recent GOP cuts to Medicaid and extend the ACA tax credits, which set to expire at the end of the year. Open enrollment for 2026 plans sold on ACA marketplaces starts Saturday, and Americans who buy insurance through these platforms now face the looming end of subsidies and substantial monthly premium hikes.
"Confusion about navigating insurance writ large and the Affordable Care Act marketplace in particular has led many people to end up with plans that they think are health insurance which in fact are not health insurance," Time reported. "They mistakenly click away from healthcare.gov, the website where people are supposed to sign up for ACA-compliant plans, and end up on a site with a misleading name."
ACA plans are required to cover 10 essential benefits, the outlet detailed, but consumers who leave the official website may instead sign up for short-term plans that don't span the full year, fixed indemnity plans that pay a small amount for certain services, or "healthcare sharing ministries, in which people pitch in for other peoples' medical costs, but which sometimes do not cover preexisting conditions."
Claire Heyison, senior policy analyst for health insurance and marketplace policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, told Time that "there's no question that more people will end up with these kinds of plans if the premium tax credits are not extended."
According to the outlet:
These non-insurance products "have increasingly been marketed in ways that make them look similar to health insurance," Heyison says. To stir further confusion, some even deploy common insurance terms like PPO (preferred provider organization) or co-pay in their terms and conditions. But people will pay a price for using them, Heyison says, because they can charge higher premiums than ACA-compliant plans, deny coverage based on preexisting conditions, impose annual or lifetime limits on coverage, and exclude benefits like prescription drug coverage or maternity care.
Often, the websites where people end up buying non-ACA compliant insurance have the names and logos of insurers on them. Sometimes, they are lead-generation sites... that ask for a person's name and phone number and then share that information with brokers who get a commission for signing up people for plans, whether they are health insurance or not.
To avoid paying for misleading plans, Heyison advised spending a few days researching before buying anything, steering clear of companies that offer a gift for signing up, and asking for documents detailing coverage to review before payment.
On the heels of Time's reporting and the eve of open enrollment, Data for Progress and Groundwork Collaborative published polling that makes clear Americans across the political spectrum are worried about skyrocketing health insurance premiums.
The pollsters found that 75% of voters are "somewhat" or "very" concerned about the spikes, including 83% of Democrats, 78% of Independents, and 66% of Republicans. While the overall figure was the same as last week, the share who said they were very concerned rose from 45% to 47%.
As the second-longest shutdown ever drags on, 57% of respondents said they don't believe that President Donald Trump and Republican majorities in both chambers of Congress are focused on lowering healthcare costs for people like them and their families. More broadly, 52% also did not agree that Trump and GOP lawmakers "are fighting on behalf of" people like them.
A plurality of voters (42%) said that Trump and congressional Republicans deserve most of the blame for rising premiums, while 27% blamed both parties equally, and just a quarter put most of the responsibility on elected Democrats.
"While President Trump focuses on the moodboard for his gilded ballroom and House Republicans refuse to show up for work in Washington, a ticking time bomb is strapped to working families’ pocketbooks," said Elizabeth Pancotti, Groundwork Collaborative's managing director of policy and advocacy, in a Friday statement.
Pointing to the Trump administration's legally dubious decision not to keep funding the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program during the shutdown, she added that "healthcare premiums are set to double and food assistance benefits are on the brink of collapse in a matter of hours, and voters know exactly who's to blame."
A Secretive Program Has Let Cops Spend Hundreds of Millions on Weapons of War, Report Shows
“Our tax dollars are being weaponized against us,” said the head of the Center for International Policy.
Oct 31, 2025
State and local governments have spent hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars helping cops wage “war” against their own residents under a secretive and opaque program that allows the police to purchase discounted military-style equipment from the federal government.
Over the past three decades, the obscure 1122 Program has let states and cities equip local cops with everything from armored vehicles to military grade rifles to video surveillance tech, according to a report published Thursday by Women for Weapons Trade Transparency, part of the Center for International Policy.
Using open records requests, which were necessary due to the lack of any standardized auditing or record-keeping system for the program, the group obtained over $126 million worth of purchasing data across 13 states, four cities, and two counties since the program's creation in 1994. Based on these figures, they projected the total spending across all 50 states was likely in the "upper hundreds of millions of dollars."
“The 1122 Program diverts public money from essential community needs and public goods into military-style equipment for local police,” said Rosie Khan, the co-founder of Women for Weapons Trade Transparency. “The $126.87 million spent on militarized police equipment and surveillance technology could have instead provided housing support for 10,000+ people for a year, supplied 43 million school meals, or repaired roads and bridges in dozens of communities.”
Congress created the 1122 Program at the height of the War on Drugs, authorizing it under the 1994 National Defense Authorization Act to provide police departments with equipment to carry out counter-drug operations. It was not the first program of its kind, but followed in the footsteps of the more widely known 1033 Program, which has funneled over $7 billion of excess military equipment to police departments.
But there are a few critical differences: 1033 is subject to rigorous federal record-keeping, while 1122 has no such requirement. And unlike 1033, which transfers equipment that was already purchased but not needed, 1122 allows states and cities to spend money to purchase new equipment.
The program's scope ballooned dramatically in 2009 after another NDAA added "homeland security" and "emergency response" missions to its purview. As the report explains, "no regulatory mechanisms are ensuring that equipment is used for counter-drug, homeland security, or emergency response purposes. In fact, the scope of these missions was never defined."
Increasingly, it has been used to provide police with equipment that has often been deployed against protesters, including $6.2 million for weapons, weapons training, and riot gear. Among the equipment purchased in this category was pepper spray, batons, gas masks, and riot shields.
By far, the largest expenditures under the program have been the more than $85 million spent on various armored trucks, vans, and sedans.
Police departments have spent an additional $6 million to purchase at least 16 Lenco BearCats, which cost around $300,000 apiece. These were among the military vehicles used by police to suppress the racial justice protests following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police in 2020.
As recently as October 3, 2025, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers were documented aboard a Bearcat in full military garb and menacing protesters with sniper rifles outside the notorious immigrant detention facility in Broadview, Illinois.
In July, Los Angeles ICE agents were filmed using a vehicle to run over multiple protesters who attempted to block their path.
Another $9.6 million was spent on surveillance equipment, including license plate readers, video and audio recording devices, and subscriptions to spying software that uses sophisticated facial recognition and social media monitoring technology to track people's movements and associations.
The report highlights the increasing use of this technology by college police departments, like Northern Virginia Community College, which spent over $2.7 million on surveillance tech through 1122. College police departments have used this sort of technology to go after student protesters and activists, especially amid last year's nationwide explosion of pro-Palestine demonstrations across campuses.
At Yale, which has made "surveillance cameras, drones, and social media tracking... standard tools in the police department's arsenal," one student was apprehended last year and charged with a felony for removing an American flag from its pole using the school's surveillance system.
The report's authors call for Congress to sunset the 1122 Program and direct its funding toward "a version of public safety that prioritizes care, accountability, and community well-being rather than militarized force."
“Lawmakers, including federal and state legislators and city council representatives," it says, "must act with the urgency that this moment requires to prevent a catastrophically violent takeover of civil society by police, federal agents, and corporations profiting from exponentially increasing surveillance, criminalization, and brute force.”
They note the increasing urgency to end the program under President Donald Trump, who—on the first day of his second term—reversed an executive order from former President Joe Biden that restricted the sale of some of the most aggressive weaponry to local police forces.
“Local police have been given more avenues to arm themselves with military-style equipment during an era of heightened arrests, forced removals, and crackdowns on free speech. These disturbing political shifts have undermined the crucial work of coalitions for police accountability," the report says.
Nancy Okail, president and CEO of the Center for International Policy said: "Our tax dollars are being weaponized against us under the guise of ‘domestic terrorism.'”
"As talk of a ‘war from within’ grows louder," she says, the new report "exposes how this rhetoric fuels real assaults on democracy and civil rights.”
‘Scarier Than Halloween Costumes’: Trump Policies Blamed for Jacking Up Candy Prices
“From the grocery aisles to the doctor’s office, Trump’s economic circus keeps jacking up costs and squeezing household budgets.”
Oct 31, 2025
President Donald Trump's economic policies have put a damper on this year's Halloween festivities, as his tariffs on imported chocolate in particular have helped jack up the price of candy.
CNBC reported on Friday that data from research firm Circana and the US Bureau of Labor Statistics show that chocolate prices in the US have jumped by 30% over the last year since Trump began slapping hefty tariffs on foreign goods, including staple products such as cocoa, coffee, and bananas that cannot be grown at sufficient scale in the US.
The increased cost of chocolate has now been passed on to consumers in the form of higher candy prices, according to a joint study released this week by The Century Foundation and Groundwork Collaborative.
According to the organizations' analysis, candy prices as a whole have gone up by just under 11% over the last year, which is more than triple the current overall rate of inflation.
Unsurprisingly, the analysis showed that these increases were particularly severe in candies that had significant chocolate inputs, as it found that "variety packs from Hershey’s (maker of KitKats, Twizzlers, Reeses, and Heath bars) are up 22%, while variety packs from Mars (maker of Milky Way, M&Ms, Three Musketeers, and Skittles) are up 12%."
The analysis also cited recent quotes from the CEOs of retail giants Target and Walmart indicating the president's tariffs were having a major impact on US consumers. Target CEO Brian Cornell, for instance, said on a recent earnings call that the tariffs had created a "challenging and highly uncertain" environment, while Walmart CEO Doug McMillon said that "costs increase each week" thanks to Trump's trade wars.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) used the organizations' study to rip the president for raising the price of Halloween candy in a video posted on social media.
"Do you remember when Donald Trump told American families to cut back on buying kids' dolls?" she asked, in reference to Trump earlier this year suggesting parents buy fewer toys for their children after his tariffs on imports raised their costs. "Well now he's making candy more expensive too, just in time for Halloween."
Donald Trump's jacked up candy prices — just in time for Halloween. pic.twitter.com/f3glomQbUK
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) October 31, 2025
The American Federation of Teachers, whose members have likely experienced the increased cost candy first hand, also took a shot at Trump's economic policies while posting a graph illustrating The Century Foundation and Groundwork Collaborative's study.
"The only thing scarier than Halloween costumes? The rising price of candy from Trump's tariffs," the union wrote on X.
Alex Jacquez, chief of policy and advocacy at Groundwork Collaborative, said that the increase in Halloween candy prices was just one source of pressure facing US families as a result of Trump's economic policies.
In particular, Jacquez pointed to the cuts to the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) and Medicaid in the Republican Party's One Big Beautiful Bill Act, as well as the GOP's inaction on extending tax credits for buying health insurance, as major pain points.
"While inflation eats through paychecks and House Republicans hide in plain sight, working families are slammed by soaring healthcare premiums, frozen food assistance, and rising bills," he said. "From the grocery aisles to the doctor’s office, Trump’s economic circus keeps jacking up costs and squeezing household budgets."
Classified US Report Finds ‘Many Hundreds’ of Alleged Israeli Human Rights Violations in Gaza
The long backlog and a reporting protocol developed especially for Israel are likely to keep Israeli forces from being held accountable, said officials.
Oct 31, 2025
Progressive lawmakers and rights groups have long warned that by arming the Israel Defense Forces and providing the IDF with more than $21 billion, the US has violated its own laws barring the government from sending military aid to countries accused of human rights abuses and of blocking humanitarian relief.
On Thursday, a classified report by the US State Department detailed for the first time the federal government's own acknowledgment of the scale of alleged human rights abuses that the IDF has committed in Gaza since it began bombarding the exclave in October 2023.
The Office of the Inspector General's document, reported on by the Washington Post, which spoke to US officials about it, also detailed how allegations of human rights abuses against the Israeli military are made harder to prove by a vetting process that is only afforded to Israel—not other countries accused of violations.
The US officials said the long backlog of "many hundreds" of possible violations of the Leahy Laws, which bar US military assistance from going to units credibly accused of human rights abuses, would likely take years to review—calling into question whether the IDF will ever be held accountable for them.
"The lesson here is that if you commit genocide and war crimes, do as much as possible because then it becomes difficult to investigate everything," said journalist and Northwestern University professor Marc Owen Jones grimly in response to the Post's report.
The government report was described by the Post days after the State Department dismantled a website used to report human rights violations by foreign militaries that receive US aid, which was established in 2022 to ensure the US was in compliance with the Leahy Laws.
The Biden administration flagged at least two 2024 attacks by Israeli forces—one that killed seven World Central Kitchen aid workers and one known as the "flour massacre," in which more than 100 Palestinians were killed and nearly 800 were injured as they tried to get flour from aid trucks—as ones that may have used US weapons, signaling that continuing US aid to Israel would break the Leahy Laws.
“To date, the US has not withheld any assistance to any Israeli unit despite clear evidence."
A report by Amnesty International last year focused on several IDF attacks on civilian infrastructure—which killed nearly 100 people including 42 children—in which Israel used bombs and other weapons made by US companies such as Boeing.But just a week after the Amnesty analysis, the Biden administration told Congress in a mandated report that it was "not able to reach definitive conclusions" on whether Israel had used US-supplied weapons in attacks such as the one on the World Central Kitchen workers.
After the report of the new analysis, said University of Maryland professor Shibley Telhami, former President Joe Biden and former Secretary of State Antony Blinken "cannot hide from responsibility" after they persistently defended and funded Israel's attacks on Gaza.
But along with the long backlog of potential human rights abuses, the so-called Israel Leahy Vetting Forum, which dates back to 2020, is likely to prevent the State Department from reviewing the allegations against the IDF.
The government's protocol for reviewing allegations against Israel differs from that of other countries; a US working group is required to “come to a consensus on whether a gross violation of human rights has occurred," with representatives of the US Embassy in Jerusalem among those who participate in the working group.
“To date, the US has not withheld any assistance to any Israeli unit despite clear evidence,” Josh Paul, a former State Department official who resigned in the early weeks of Israel's war on Gaza over the Biden administration's military support, told the Post.
Shahed Ghoreishi, a former State Department communications official who was fired earlier this year after pushing for the agency to condemn ethnic cleansing and other abuses in Gaza, said it was "predictable" that the State Department declined to answer questions from the Post about the inspector general's report.
"There may be nothing that can excuse the brushing of crimes under the rug," said Ghoreishi, "but ducking questions and hoping it goes away (including no more State Department press briefings) is an abdication of responsibility to the American people."
The inspector general's report was compiled days before Israel and Hamas reached a ceasefire agreement earlier this month; the deal is still formally in place, but Israel has continued carrying out strikes, killing more than 800 Palestinians since it was signed.
‘There Is No Ceasefire’ Say Gazans as Israeli Strikes Kill, Wound Hundreds
“The occupation targets whoever it wants, stopping and resuming the genocide every few days as if playing with our lives,” said one young woman from Gaza.
Oct 31, 2025
More than 800 Palestinians have been killed or wounded since the October 10 truce between Israel and Hamas, leaving many residents of the still-embattled, still-starved strip to question whether there is actually any "ceasefire" at all.
“There is no ceasefire,” Hala, a 20-year-old woman who was awakened from her sleep Tuesday when an Israeli missile struck her neighbor's home, told The Intercept on Thursday. "The occupation targets whoever it wants, stopping and resuming the genocide every few days as if playing with our lives.”
Hala was looking forward to her upcoming wedding. But the Israeli attack killed her fiancé's cousin, his wife, and all but one of their children. The wedding has now been postponed.
The slain relatives were among the at least 104 Palestinians killed by Israeli strikes on Tuesday, according to the Gaza Health Ministry—whose casualty figures have been deemed accurate by Israeli military officials and a likely undercount by multiple peer-reviewed studies.
The Israel Defense Forces claimed Tuesday's attacks targeted "dozens of key terrorists," however IDF officials provided details on just 26 suspected militants. The Gaza Health Ministry said 46 children and 20 women were among those killed by the Israeli strikes.
“There is no doubt this is an attack on civilians,” Dr. Morten Rostrup, a physician with Doctors Without Borders working at al-Aqsa Hospital in Gaza City, told The Intercept. “Do we really call this a ceasefire?”
The Gaza Health Ministry says at least 211 people have been killed and 597 others wounded since the truce went into effect on October 10.
Since the Gaza genocide began in response to the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, Israeli forces have killed at least 68,519 Palestinians and wounded over 170,300 others. Around 9,500 Palestinians remain missing and feared dead and buried beneath rubble. Leaked classified IDF documents suggest that over 80% of slain Palestinians were civilians.
Gaza officials say Israeli forces have violated the ceasefire at least 125 times. Meanwhile, Israel has cited relatively minor violations of the truce by Hamas, which have resulted in only a handful of Israeli casualties, as justification for the resumption of strikes that have left hundreds dead and wounded.
Still, US President Donald Trump—whose administration played a key role in brokering the truce—insists that the ceasefire is holding.
“I think none of us should be surprised that Israel has continued breaking the ceasefire,” Tariq Kenney-Shawa, a US policy fellow at New York-based Al-Shabaka, The Palestinian Policy Network, told The Intercept.
"It very much still fits into the Trump administration’s bigger picture, because as long as they can kind of say that there is a quote-unquote ‘ceasefire’ in effect, as long as they can say, ‘At least it’s better than before,’ that enables the US and the rest of the international community to let up on the pressure on Israel and to return to business as usual," added Kenney-Shawa, who is Palestinian and whose family is from Gaza.
Khaled Elgindy, a visiting scholar at Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, said, "For Trump and for the Israelis, what matters is the appearance of a ceasefire."
New Lawsuit Details ‘Horrific and Inhumane Conditions’ in ICE Broadview Facility
“Community members are being kidnapped off the streets, packed in hold cells, denied food, medical care, and basic necessities, and forced to sign away their legal rights,” said the lead attorney for the case.
Oct 31, 2025
A few weeks after a federal judge sided with journalists and protesters attacked by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement outside of an ICE building in the Chicago suburb Broadview, detainees on Friday sued over "deplorable and inhumane conditions" inside the "de facto immigration detention facility right outside the city limits."
"Huge numbers of people are being arrested and detained" as part of President Donald Trump's "massive and inhumane immigration enforcement operation in the Chicago area—Operation Midway Blitz," notes the class action complaint, filed in the Northern District of Illinois by the ACLU of Illinois, MacArthur Justice Center, and Chicago office of the law firm Eimer Stahl.
Like plaintiffs Pablo Moreno Gonzalez and Felipe Agustin Zamacona, most immigrants targeted in the operation have been brought to the Broadview facility. There, the complaint states, federal defendants "have created a black box in which to disappear people from the US justice and immigration systems," and they "are perpetrating mass constitutional violations."
The suit names not only ICE and key agency leaders—Acting Director Todd Lyons, Enforcement and Removal Operations Executive Associate Director Marcos Charles, and Interim Chicago Field Office Director Samuel Olson—but also the US Department of Homeland Security, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, Customs and Border Protection, and CBP Commander-at-Large Greg Bovino.
"DHS personnel have denied access to counsel, legislators, and journalists so that the harsh and deteriorating conditions at the facility can be shielded from public view," said ACLU of Illinois legal director Kevin Fee in a statement. "These conditions are unconstitutional and threaten to coerce people into sacrificing their rights without the benefit of legal advice and a full airing of their legal defenses."
Echoing recent reporting by Chicago journalists, the filing features several anecdotes from attorneys and people who have been detained in Broadview, where "there is blood, other bodily fluids, and hair in the sinks and on the walls," and holding rooms are "infested with cockroaches, centipedes, and spiders."
"This is a vicious abuse of power and gross violation of basic human rights by ICE and the Department of Homeland Security."
One person quoted in the complaint said that immigrants at Broadview were confined in cells "like a pile of fish," while another said that "they treated us like animals, or worse than animals, because no one treats their pets like that."
In September, Fredy Cazarez Gonzalez was "held in a small room with hundreds of people" and "forced to lay down near the toilet, where there was urine on the ground," the filing says. He "was unable to shower for the five days he was at Broadview. Officers did not give him any soap, toothpaste, a toothbrush, or anything else to clean himself with."
Juan Gabriel Aguirre Alvarez "saw a man get sick and vomit in and around the toilet in his holding room. The officers did not provide medical care, nor did they clean up the vomit," the document details. "On the final night that Aguirre Alvarez was detained at Broadview, another man in the room defecated in his pants. The man's soiled pants were placed in the garbage. No staff members came to clean it up, so it was left there the entire night and smelled terrible."
"Jose Guerrero Pozos was detained with some individuals who were diabetic, but they received the same food—a small amount of bread—as all the other detainees, which can lead to dangerous and uncontrolled surges in blood sugar," according to the complaint.
The details alleged in the suit get pretty lurid. Per multiple declarations, detainees are forced to sleep on the floor, amid "urine and dirty water" caused by clogged toilets. The suit also claims there are cameras pointed at the toilets, causing detainees anxiety and concern over sexual abuse.
[image or embed]
— Dave Byrnes (@djbyrnes1.bsky.social) October 31, 2025 at 10:02 AM
Alexa Van Brunt, director of the MacArthur Justice Center's Illinois office and lead counsel on the suit, stressed in a statement that "everyone, no matter their legal status, has the right to access counsel and to not be subject to horrific and inhumane conditions."
"Community members are being kidnapped off the streets, packed in hold cells, denied food, medical care, and basic necessities, and forced to sign away their legal rights," she said. "This is a vicious abuse of power and gross violation of basic human rights by ICE and the Department of Homeland Security. It must end now."
Chicago, the third-largest US city, has been a primary target of Trump's immigration crackdown and his attempt to deploy National Guard troops—the latter of which is before the US Supreme Court after being blocked by a federal judge in response to a suit filed by the Democrat-led city and state.
However, "the conditions at Broadview are not an anomaly," the complaint highlights. "Similar overcrowding, unsanitary conditions, lack of basic hygiene, insufficient food and water, inadequate sleeping conditions, substandard medical care, and extreme restrictions on attorney-client communications are pervasive at immigration facilities in New York, Baltimore, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Alexandria, and other cities throughout the country."
"Incommunicado detention is not tolerated in our democracy. Defendants have an obligation under the US Constitution and federal law to provide the people they detain with due process and to treat them with basic decency," the filing declares, imploring the district court to "order defendants to stop flouting the law inside Broadview."
UN Human Rights Chief Says Trump Must Halt ‘Extrajudicial Killing’ in International Waters
“None of the individuals on the targeted boats appeared to pose an imminent threat to the lives of others or otherwise justified the use of lethal armed force against them under international law,” said Volker Türk.
Oct 31, 2025
The United Nations' top human rights official said Friday that US President Donald Trump's deadly strikes on boats in international waters in recent weeks amount to "extrajudicial killing" that must stop immediately, remarks that came as the White House appeared poised to expand the unlawful military campaign to targets inside Venezuela.
Volker Türk, the UN high commissioner for human rights, said of the administration's boat strikes that "these attacks—and their mounting human cost—are unacceptable."
"The US must halt such attacks and take all measures necessary to prevent the extrajudicial killing of people aboard these boats, whatever the criminal conduct alleged against them," said Türk, noting that the administration has not substantiated its claim that those killed by the strikes in waters off Central and South America were smuggling drugs.
The Trump administration has also kept secret a US Justice Department memo purportedly outlining an internal legal justification for the deadly strikes.
Türk noted that "countering the serious issue of illicit trafficking of drugs across international borders is—as has long been agreed among states—a law-enforcement matter, governed by the careful limits on lethal force set out in international human rights law."
"Under international human rights law, the intentional use of lethal force is only permissible as a last resort against individuals who pose an imminent threat to life," said the UN human rights chief. "Based on the very sparse information provided publicly by the US authorities, none of the individuals on the targeted boats appeared to pose an imminent threat to the lives of others or otherwise justified the use of lethal armed force against them under international law."
The Trump administration's strikes have killed more than 60 people thus far. At least one of the targeted vessels appeared to have turned around before the US military bombed it, killing 11 people.
Türk's statement came as the Miami Herald reported that the Trump administration "has made the decision to attack military installations inside Venezuela and the strikes could come at any moment."
Trump has said publicly that land strikes inside Venezuela would be the next phase of the military assault, which he has described as a "war" on drug cartels. The president has not yet received—or even sought—congressional authorization for any of the military actions taken in the Caribbean and Pacific.
In a statement last week, a group of UN experts denounced the Trump administration's strikes and belligerent posturing toward Venezuela as "an extremely dangerous escalation with grave implications for peace and security in the Caribbean region."
"The long history of external interventions in Latin America must not be repeated,” the experts said.
Trump Administration Has ‘Made the Decision to Attack Military Installations Inside Venezuela’: Report
“Trump’s military buildup in the Caribbean isn’t about ‘drugs,’ it’s about oil, power, and regime change,” said on critic of potential strikes in Venezuela.
Oct 31, 2025
Two reports claim that the Trump administration is poised to launch strikes against military targets inside Venezuela.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday night that the administration is preparing to attack a variety of targets inside Venezuela, including "ports and airports controlled by the military that are allegedly used to traffic drugs, including naval facilities and airstrips."
Reports from the US government and the United Nations have not identified Venezuela as a significant source of drugs that enter the United States, and the country plays virtually no role in the trafficking of fentanyl, the primary cause of drug overdoses in the US.
While the WSJ report said that the administration had not yet decided to carry out the operations against Venezuela, the Miami Herald reported on Friday morning that the administration "has made the decision to attack military installations inside Venezuela and the strikes could come at any moment."
A source who spoke with the Miami Herald didn't explicitly say that Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro would be the target of these actions, but they nonetheless hinted that the goal was to weaken his grip on power.
"Maduro is about to find himself trapped and might soon discover that he cannot flee the country even if he decided to,” the source said. “What’s worse for him, there is now more than one general willing to capture and hand him over, fully aware that one thing is to talk about death, and another to see it coming."
While the Trump administration has accused Maduro of leading an international drug trafficking organization called the Cartel de los Soles, some experts have expressed extreme skepticism of this claim.
Phil Gunson, analyst at the International Crisis Group think tank, said in an interview with Agence Presse-France earlier this year that he doubts that so-called "Cartel de los Soles" even exists, and noted that "direct, incontrovertible evidence has never been presented" to show otherwise.
Earlier this year, the administration attempted to tie Maduro to another gang, Tren de Aragua, despite US intelligence agencies rejecting the notion that the street gang had government connections.
Launching strikes on Venezuelan soil would mark a major escalation in the administration's military campaign targeting purported drug traffickers, which so far has consisted of drone strikes against boats in international waters that many legal experts have described as a campaign of extrajudicial murder.
Dozens of political leaders throughout Latin America earlier this month condemned the administration's attacks on the purported drug boats, and they warned that they could just be the start of a regime change war reminiscent of the coups carried out by the US government in the last century that installed military dictatorships throughout the region.
"We have lived this nightmare before,” they emphasized in a joint letter. “US military interventions of the 20th century brought dictatorships, disappearances, and decades of trauma to our nations. We know the terrible cost of allowing foreign powers to wage war on our continent. We cannot—we will not—allow history to repeat itself.”
Medea Benjamin, cofounder of anti-war group CodePink, accused the Trump administration of using a fight against alleged drug trafficking as a false pretext to seize Venezuela's vast oil reserves.
"Trump’s military buildup in the Caribbean isn’t about 'drugs,' it’s about oil, power, and regime change," she wrote in a post on X. "Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world, that’s why they’re escalating toward war."
Dems Failed to Scrap Filibuster Under Biden. Now Trump Wants ‘Nuclear Option’ to End Shutdown
“I hate to say I told you so but... I fucking told you so,” wrote progressive journalist Mehdi Hasan, who repeatedly urged Senate Democrats to end the filibuster during Joe Biden’s presidency.
Oct 31, 2025
US President Donald Trump late Thursday urged Senate Republicans to scrap the legislative filibuster to end the prolonged government shutdown without Democratic support—the kind of scenario progressives warned about when imploring Democrats to eliminate the 60-vote threshold during former President Joe Biden's term.
In an all-caps post to Truth Social, Trump wrote that "THE CHOICE IS CLEAR—INITIATE THE 'NUCLEAR OPTION,' GET RID OF THE FILIBUSTER AND, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!"
Trump noted Democrats' failure to terminate the filibuster when they controlled Congress under Biden, pointing specifically to the central role that Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema—both of whom have since left office and the Democratic Party—played in obstructing filibuster reform.
"Just a short while ago, the Democrats, while in power, fought for three years to do this, but were unable to pull it off because of Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. Never have the Democrats fought so hard to do something because they knew the tremendous strength that terminating the Filibuster would give them," Trump wrote. "Now I want to do it in order to take advantage of the Democrats."
With the filibuster intact, 60 votes are required to pass most legislation in the Senate. Republicans currently hold 53 Senate seats.
Progressives warned repeatedly during Biden's presidency that Republicans wouldn't hesitate to scrap the filibuster in the future should the 60-vote threshold become a severe hindrance to their agenda. Abolishing the legislative filibuster to end the shutdown would clear the way for other Republican policy proposals to get through the Senate with simple-majority support.
"I spent the entire Biden presidency warning idiotic establishment Senate Dems and Biden who opposed getting rid of the filibuster that Trump and the GOP would come back to power and do it themselves," journalist Mehdi Hasan wrote Thursday in response to the president's demands. "I hate to say I told you so but... I fucking told you so."
Adam Jentleson, former chief of staff for Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) and a vocal advocate of ending the filibuster, noted that "it's pretty easy" to initiate the "nuclear option" on the filibuster "because despite everything, the Senate is a majority rule institution, per the Founders' design."
"The rule that overrides all other rules is that a majority of senators can vote at any time to change the rules—including getting rid of the filibuster, which the Founders abhorred anyway," Jentleson wrote late Thursday. "They could do it tomorrow! No preparation needed."
Trump's demand comes as millions of people across the US are set to lose federal nutrition assistance due to the shutdown and the administration's illegal refusal to tap emergency funds to pay out the benefits.
Millions of Americans are also facing the prospect of skyrocketing health insurance premiums as Trump and congressional Republicans decline to support extending Affordable Care Act subsidies that are set to expire at the end of the year.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said earlier this month that he would oppose scrapping the filibuster to end the shutdown, but he could change his position amid Trump's pressure campaign.
One progressive, Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), has called for a filibuster carveout that would allow senators to keep the government open with a simple-majority vote.
"I've been consistent on this," Khanna said in an interview in early October. "I said this when Biden was president, and I'm now saying it when Trump's president."
Trump Ripped for ‘Absurdly Low’ and ‘Racist’ Refugee Cap Prioritizing White South Africans
“Let’s call this what it is—white supremacy disguised as refugee policy,” said the head of the Haitian Bridge Alliance.
Oct 30, 2025
After months of reporting, President Donald Trump's administration on Thursday officially announced that it is restricting the number of refugees for this fiscal year to 7,500, with most spots going to white South Africans—a policy swiftly denounced by human rights advocates and Democrats in Congress.
"This decision doesn't just lower the refugee admissions ceiling. It lowers our moral standing," said Krish O'Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of Global Refuge. "For more than four decades, the US refugee program has been a lifeline for families fleeing war, persecution, and repression. At a time of crisis in countries ranging from Afghanistan to Venezuela to Sudan and beyond, concentrating the vast majority of admissions on one group undermines the program's purpose as well as its credibility."
The Trump administration's notice in the Federal Register doesn't mention any groups besides Afrikaners, white descendants of Europeans who subjected South Africa's majority Black population to a system of apartheid for decades. Multiple rich Trump backers—including Tesla CEO Elon Musk, venture capitalist David Sacks, and Palantir founder Peter Thiel—spent time in the country during those years.
The 7,500 cap, initially reported earlier this month, is a significant drop from both the 40,000 limit that was previously reported as under consideration by the Republican administration, and the more than 100,000 allowed under former Democratic President Joe Biden.
Four congressional Democrats who serve as ranking members on related committees—Reps. Jamie Raskin (Md.) and Pramila Jayapal (Wash.), along with Sens. Dick Durbin (Ill.) and Alex Padilla (Calif.)—issued a joint statement condemning the new cap, which they noted is "an astonishing 94% cut over last year and the lowest level in our nation's history."
"To add insult to injury, the administration is skipping over the tens of thousands of refugees who have been waiting in line for years in dire circumstances to come to the United States, and it is instead prioritizing a single privileged racial group—white South African Afrikaners—for these severely limited slots," they said. "This bizarre presidential determination is not only morally indefensible, it is illegal and invalid."
The four lawmakers continued:
The administration has brazenly ignored the statutory requirement to consult with the House and Senate Judiciary Committees before setting the annual refugee admissions ceiling. That process exists to ensure that decisions of such great consequence reflect our nation's values, our humanitarian commitments, and the rule of law, not the racial preferences or political whims of any one president.
The reason for this evasion is evident: The administration knows it cannot defend its egregious policy before Congress or the American people. While nearly 130,000 vetted, approved refugees—men, women, and children fleeing persecution and violence—wait in limbo after being promised a chance at safety, Donald Trump is looking to turn refugee admissions into another political giveaway for his pet projects and infatuations.
We reject this announcement as both unlawful and contrary to America's longstanding commitment to offer refuge to the persecuted. To twist our refugee policy into a partisan straightjacket is to betray both our legal obligations and our moral identity as a nation.
"Let's call this what it is—white supremacy disguised as refugee policy," declared Guerline Jozef, executive director of Haitian Bridge Alliance. "At a time when Black refugees from Haiti, Sudan, the Congo, and Cameroon are drowning at sea, languishing in detention, or being deported to death, the US government has decided to open its arms to those who already enjoy global privilege. This is not just immoral—it's anti-Blackness codified into federal policy."
This week alone, Hurricane Melissa killed more than 20 people in Haiti, and health officials said that the Rapid Support Forces, which are fighting against Sudan's government, killed over 1,500 people—including more than 460 systematically slaughtered at a maternity hospital—in the city of el-Fasher.
"We reject the idea that whiteness equates to worthiness," Jozef said of Trump's new refugee plan. She also took aim at the president's broader anti-immigrant policy, which has included deporting hundreds of people to El Salvador's so-called Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).
"From Del Rio to Lampedusa, Black migrants and other immigrants of color have been criminalized, beaten, caged, and disappeared in CECOT camp in El Salvador—while their humanity is debated like a policy variable," she said. "This moment demands our humanity, our resistance, not silence."
Amy Fischer, Amnesty International USA's director for refugee and migrant rights, also tied Thursday's announcement to the broader agenda of the president—who, during his first term, faced global condemnation for policies including the forcible separation of families at the southern border.
"Setting this cap at such an absurdly low number and prioritizing white Afrikaners is a racist move that will turn the US's back on tens of thousands of people around the world who are fleeing persecution, violence, and human rights abuses," said Fischer. "Refugees have a human right to protection, and the international community—including the United States—has a responsibility to uphold that right."
"This announcement is yet another attack by the Trump administration on refugees and immigrants, showing disregard for international systems meant to protect human rights," she added. "The Trump administration must reverse course and ensure a fair, humane, and rights-based refugee admissions determination."
The announcement came just days after Trump's nominee to be ambassador to South Africa, far-right media critic Brent Bozell, faced intense criticism for refusing to say whether he would support or oppose repealing laws allowing Black Americans to vote during his Senate confirmation hearing.
Most Popular
We cover the issues the corporate media never will.
Please support our journalism.
