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Category: Uncategorized Page 1 of 96
by Tony Wikrent
Crossing the U.S. Border? Here’s How to Protect Yourself
Nikita Mazurov, Matt Sledge, March 29, 2025 [The Intercept]
Searches of phones and other electronics are on the rise for those entering the U.S. Take these steps to help secure your devices.
Managing Unexpected ICE Visits: Best Practices for Employers
March 19, 2025 [IndustryWeek]
Rep. Jaimie Raskin’s request for you to file FOIA with DOGE
Trump not violating any law
‘He who saves his Country does not violate any Law’
‘We’re Not Stopping’: Trump Border Czar Vows to Ignore Judges
[The Daily Beast, via MSN 03-18-2025]
The Biggest Scandal of the Second Trump Term Isn’t “Signalgate”
Alex Shephard, March 28, 2025 [The New Republic]
The national security chat debacle certainly merits attention. But the Trump administration is now blatantly disappearing students and others who are in the country legally…. Masked agents snatching legal residents off the streets and disappearing them—not so long ago, this would be unthinkable in the United States. Now it is not only a regular occurrence but something that the Trump administration boasts about….
By removing the authors of innocuous op-eds, Rubio seems to believe that he can surgically smother the opinions they were expressing. At the same time, this purge allows the administration to systematically attack higher education. Already, the administration has used student protests to attack a number of colleges and universities and to withhold hundreds of millions in federal funding from several. Allegations of antisemitism—and a list of demands that are more or less impossible to fully meet—are being used as a Trojan horse to withhold funding and to attack other sources of revenue. Many schools rely heavily on foreign students, who often pay full tuition. The Trump administration’s crackdown, even if it were to somehow stop today, has already seriously jeopardized that. Who would send their child to study in America in such a climate? Especially knowing their child could be swept off the street and flown to a detention facility?
Joyce Vance, March 26, 2025 [Civil Discourse]
Why use Signal in the first place when American leaders have some of the most secure communications technology in the world available to them? Is it just for convenience? If so, that’s sloppy, and they should be committing to do better, not arguing over whether the information was classified or not. (But if it looks like a duck…)
The truth is that by going to Signal, they avoided leaving a paper trail. No annoying records that could be unearthed down the road. Remember Trump’s first impeachment? It came about in large part because after the call where he threatened Ukraine’s president with withholding security aid if he wouldn’t announce his country was investigating Joe Biden for financial misconduct, records of the call were buried inside a classified information system where they didn’t belong. That was what got the ball rolling. It was about trying to hide records of an official call that everyone knew was wrong.
As far as we know at this point, there was nothing improper about the attack on the Houthis. So why were high-ranking members of the Trump administration communicating off the books? How pervasive is the practice, and who knows/authorizes it? We are a government of the people. Transparency isn’t optional. There are rules about public records that have to be followed, and this president who likes to operate in secret and at the margins of our laws has frequently tried to skirt them.
by Tony Wikrent
Managing Unexpected ICE Visits: Best Practices for Employers
March 19, 2025 [IndustryWeek]
Trump not violating any law
‘He who saves his Country does not violate any Law’
‘We’re Not Stopping’: Trump Border Czar Vows to Ignore Judges
[The Daily Beast, via MSN 03-18-2025]
Iran-Contra Paved the Way for Trump to Defy Democratic Norms
Sam Lebovic, March 7, 2025 [Bloomberg]
… In The Breach: Iran-Contra and the Assault on American Democracy (The University of North Carolina Press, March 4), Alan McPherson argues convincingly that Iran-Contra should be plotted not as a minor sideshow in the Cold War’s final act, nor as a case study in flawed national-security policymaking, but as a key moment in the collapse of democratic norms.
McPherson was inspired to return to the improvised, personalized diplomacy of the affair while watching the first impeachment of Donald Trump in 2019. But his argument has become even more compelling in the first weeks of Trump 2.0. In McPherson’s telling, Iran-Contra was an assault on democratic governance by an extremist executive branch. The results — corruption, deception, willful illegality, lack of accountability — are starting to look familiar….Defying Congress and the law required operating in secrecy, which also meant sidelining the federal bureaucracy. Policy was conducted instead by a small cluster of officials close to the White House, who delegated key tasks to a coterie of allies who weren’t elected, some of whom weren’t even really part of the government. McPherson is particularly good at highlighting the corruption that flourished in such a freewheeling environment. Weapons sales to Iran were managed by a small firm known, appropriately, as “The Enterprise” — operating for profit, its owners marked up the price of the missiles and decided to pay themselves millions of dollars in commission….This was all part of a radical revision of the role of the presidency. Lawyers in the Reagan administration embraced what is known as the Unitary Executive Theory — a reading of the Constitution in which the president has sole and complete authority over the executive branch. That meant sidelining Congress and ending the independence of the bureaucracy. Edwin Meese, Reagan’s second attorney general — who would resign in 1988 amid corruption allegations — believed “the entire system of independent agencies may be unconstitutional.” Iran-Contra was a perfect illustration of the theory in practice: Congress could be ignored, and policy would run through the White House….…In a 1992 article in The Nation, playwright Steve Tesich saw Iran-Contra as a prime instance of what he dubbed a newly emerging “post-truth” society: “President Reagan perceived correctly that the public really didn’t want to know the truth. So he lied to us, but he didn’t have to work hard at it.” The title of the piece was “A Government of Lies.”….But McPherson is right to suggest that Iran-Contra is prologue to our present. The scandals presented an opportunity to send a clear signal that democracy had no tolerance for this kind of politics. The opposite happened. In 1992 Ted Draper, author of one of the first comprehensive histories of the scandals, concluded that “if ever the constitutional democracy of the United States is overthrown, we now have a better idea of how this is likely to be done.” Indeed, Iran-Contra taught politicians lessons — that one could find much room for maneuvers in the inner workings of the government, that the law was flexible, that there would be no consequences if you pushed the envelope or lied about what you were doing.
Nick Miroff and Jonathan Lemire, March 19, 2025 [The Atlantic]
During the first Trump administration, when Stephen Miller’s immigration policy proposals hit obstacles in federal court, rumors would circulate about his plans to dust off arcane presidential powers. Government lawyers were wary of overreach; officials in the West Wing and at the Department of Homeland Security would sometimes snicker….Miller’s approach is different this time. He has unleashed an everything-at-once policy storm modeled after the MAGA guru Stephen K. Bannon’s “flood the zone” formula. Drawing on policy ideas worked up in conservative think tanks during the four years between Trump’s terms, Miller’s plan has been to fire off so many different proposals that some inevitably find a friendly court ruling, three administration officials told us….Three months after leaving the White House, in April 2021, Miller co-founded a Trump-aligned think tank, the America First Legal Foundation, that he fashioned as a right-wing counter to the American Civil Liberties Union. The group’s lawyers filed scores of lawsuits against the Biden administration and U.S. companies. They also provided legal firepower to Texas Governor Greg Abbott and other Republican officials launching state-level immigration crackdowns….
[TW: Democrats, “the left,” and many independents don’t appear to realize or understand that the Trump regime is looking for, even relishing, confrontation with the courts.]
With Orders, Investigations and Innuendo, Trump and G.O.P. Aim to Cripple the Left
Kenneth P. Vogel and Shane Goldmacher, March 19, 2025 [New York Times]
The president and his allies in Congress are targeting the financial, digital and legal machinery that powers the Democratic Party and much of the progressive political world….
…A small group of White House officials has been working to identify targets and vulnerabilities inside the Democratic ecosystem, taking stock of previous efforts to investigate them, according to two people familiar with the group’s work who requested anonymity to describe it.Scott Walter, president of the conservative watchdog group Capital Research Center, which monitors liberal money in politics, recently briefed senior White House officials on a range of donors, nonprofit groups and fund-raising techniques. The White House group is said to be exploring what more can be done within the law….Some of the president’s allies have welcomed the moves as payback for Democratic congressional investigations of Mr. Trump and Republican political networks.“Democrats ran breathless investigations of Republican dark money for years, and I hope that this is a concerted effort to go after the left’s dark money,” said Mike Davis, a former Republican congressional aide who founded a group using what he calls brass-knuckle tactics to assail Mr. Trump’s critics….
Trump picks his next Big Law target
[Politico, via Wall Street on Parade, March 17, 2025]
President Donald Trump continued his retaliatory spree against major law firms on Friday, signing an executive order targeting New York firm Paul, Weiss days after a judge ruled that major parts of a similar order were unconstitutional.
Trump’s new order seeks to suspend the security clearances of attorneys with the firm and limit their access to government buildings, ability to get federal jobs and receive money from federal contracts….
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By Tony Wikrent
Jaime Raskin Asks Us To Help Make A FOIA Tsunami
Beryl Stone, March 11, 2025 [DailyKos]
From Raskin:
Today I filed a formal demand for access to my personal data obtained by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and Elon Musk. I encourage all U.S. citizens to join me in doing the same.
Elon Musk should have been more careful in what he wished for, Carol. DOGE recently dodged lawsuits about its seizure of citizens’ personal data by telling courts that it is a legitimate government agency entitled to extract this information. What Elon Musk apparently did not realize is that this statement triggers DOGE’s obligation to comply with citizen demands to see and—if need be—correct their personal information under the Privacy Act. It also allows every citizen to find out what other agencies or outside parties have been made privy to our information.Last night, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued an injunction commanding DOGE to comply with citizen requests under the Freedom of Information Act. FOIA encompasses the Federal Privacy Act of 1974, which entitles any citizen to access personal information held in any U.S. government records system.By visiting the link on my website HERE, you can fill out the Privacy Act request form and mail it in directly to DOGE. This newly recognized federal agency, which has been systematically accessing government computer data systems, now has an obligation to respond to specific information demands from any of the 340 million U.S. citizens who exercise their legal right to defend their privacy and establish the security of their personal information.
Trump not violating any law
‘He who saves his Country does not violate any Law’
Trump Orders US Military to Plan Invasion of Panama to Seize Canal: Report
Brett Wilkins, March 13, 2025 [CommonDreams]
U.S. officials familiar with the planning said options for “reclaiming” the vital waterway include close cooperation with Panama’s military and, absent that, possible war.
Legal Fight Underway as Trump Invokes Alien Enemies Act of 1798 for Deportations
Jessica Corbett, March 15, 2025 [CommonDreams]
DHS Official Explicitly Equates Protest to Terrorism in ‘Stunning’ Interview
Julia Conley, March 13, 2025 [CommonDreams]
Trump visits Justice Department for speech that breaks all norms
Perry Stein, Jeremy Roebuck, Derek Hawkins, March 14, 2025 [Washington Post, via msn.com]
DHS has begun performing polygraph tests on employees to find leakers
[NBC News, via Naked Capitalism 03-10-2025]
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By Tony Wikrent
Men DOGEbags at Work
Understanding Trump’s War on Research Funding & The Future
[Pandemic Accountability Project, via Naked Capitalism 03-05-2025]
…The gutting of federal funding for scientific & medical research completely destroys America’s position as a global science leader – sending a clear signal to the best and brightest in other countries who now no longer have a reason to immigrate here. China is being handed the rest of the century on a silver platter, along with the rest of BRICS, whilst America regresses into an irrelevant, backwater shithole that is the world’s laughingstock….
As the Obama-Biden Administration wasted the 2010s foolishly letting themselves be bamboozled by Silicon Valley, who flagrantly broke the laws governing industries such as taxis and hospitality by deciding that having an app and calling yourself a tech company meant you could do whatever you want, the economy would be fundamentally reshaped in a siege on what remained of labor protections. The result was a significant transfer of power to a few select billionaires over the American economy….
The National Institute of Health’s (NIH) process to disperse funding, while imperfect, empowered scientists to pursue research that may lead to significant medical and scientific breakthroughs – free from corporate meddling. The justification for the slashing of federal research funding that Vinay Prasad is currently cheerleading is that the American taxpayer shouldn’t be paying for “useless” studies, and that only wealthy interests, such as corporations or tech billionaires, should be able to dictate to scientists what they research. It is in fact much closer towards a regression towards feudalism, forcing our best and brightest to instead placate the whims of the wealthy nobles whose patronage becomes essential as a source of research funding….
What we are witnessing is a significant transfer of power, humiliating hardworking scientists and forcing them to grovel before the ownership class, so they can relish in exploiting America’s brightest minds for profit. Scientists, understand this: Your corporate boss will own the intellectual property of your research, and will be the only one to profit from it – not you – leaving you out to dry with nothing but crumbs. This is the vision of “economic growth” that Trump, Elon, and their billionaire friends share for America. Of course, the current business mindset of short-term infinite growth at all costs (line go up) is completely incompatible with how scientific development actually functions. As Reddit user “throwawayainteasy” explains:
“Some of the most important scientific breakthroughs are things that we won’t really understand the value of until 10-20 years from now or more…No for-profit company would fund the first 20 steps in that process, because there’s no clear path to profitability until the end. That’s why governments across the world are the primary funders of pure research.”
We Found Elon Musk’s DOGE Email Address and We’re Fighting to Reveal His Messages
Shawn Musgrave, March 6 2025 [The Intercept]
FOIA works best when requests are as specific as possible. The U.S. government sometimes plays games with journalists, researchers, and other watchdogs, rejecting asks it considers too vague — such as requests for correspondence that fail to include an official’s government email address.
That’s why The Intercept is publishing Musk’s government email address.
According to a source, Musk has been assigned the email address erm71@who.eop.gov. The email address reflects his attachment to the White House Office, the Executive Office of the President, and, apparently, Musk’s full initials plus his birth year, 1971. This differs from the standard format for EOP emails, which typically include the staffer’s full first and last name.
The Intercept has already filed more than a dozen FOIA requests for Musk’s emails using this information.
[TW: I sent two questions directly to Musk: “Why do you want to kill us?” And, “How many injunctions and court rulings are needed until you understand you are violating the law? Either you respect the rule of law or you don’t. Calling for the impeachment of judges who make rulings you don’t like only solidifies the conclusion you are an authoritarian bully intent on destroying the rule of law in the United States.” ]
Leaked List Shows DOGE Is Lawyering Up
Shawn Musgrave, March 5 2025 [The Intercept]
A list of DOGE staffers reviewed by The Intercept shows Elon Musk’s quasi-agency has brought in at least four more attorneys.
[Vox, via Naked Capitalism 03-07-2025]
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