Politics

Friends,

The resistance is becoming an uprising.

Last Saturday, more than 7 million of us poured into the streets to reject Trump’s dictatorship. That’s more than 2 percent of the adult population of the United States.

Historical studies suggest that 3.5 percent of a population engaged in sustained nonviolent resistance can topple even the most brutal dictatorships — such as Chile under Pinochet and Serbia under Milosevic.

Which means we’re almost there.

Other evidence of the backlash is all around us. Seven of the nine universities Trump selected to join his extortion compact — offering preferential treatment for federal funds in exchange for a pledge to support his agenda — have rejected it.

Most major airports have refused to show Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s propaganda video attacking Democrats for the government shutdown.

Almost all of America’s news outlets have refused to sign Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s media loyalty oath.

Trump’s destruction of the East Wing of the White House (after promising he wouldn’t) and posting an AI video of himself shitting on America is causing even loyal Trumpers to worry he’s losing his marbles.

I believe future generations will look back on this scourge and see not just what was destroyed but also what was born.

Even prior to Trump, American democracy was deeply flawed. The moneyed interests were drowning out everyone else. Inequality was reaching record levels. Corruption — legalized bribery through campaign contributions — was the norm. The bottom 90 percent were getting nowhere because the system was rigged against them.

Many of you are now sowing the seeds of fundamental reform.

Whether it’s demonstrating as you did last Saturday, appearing at Republican town halls, jamming the Capitol and White House switchboards, generating mountains of emails and letters, protecting the vulnerable in your communities, or going door-to-door for candidates like Zohran Mamdani, your activism is paying off.

The backlash against Trump is growing. His approval rating has sunk to a level not seen since Richard Nixon last sat in the White House, according to the latest Gallup poll, out Wednesday.

These are terrible times — the worst I’ve lived through, and I’ve lived through some bad ones. (Remember 1968? Nixon’s enemies list? Anyone old enough to recall Joe McCarthy’s communist witch hunts?)

But as long as we are alive, as long as we are resolved, as long as we are taking action to stop the worst of this, as long as we are trying to make America and the world even a bit better — have no doubt: We will triumph.

This story may be characterized as Corporate Power is Protected as defined in The 14 Characteristics of Fascism

This story may be characterized as Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights as defined in The 14 Characteristics of Fascism

The Department of Homeland Security has sent unaccompanied immigrant teenagers $5,000 fines for illegally entering the United States, according to youth advocates and fine notices reviewed by New York Focus and The Intercept.

Roughly 10 teenagers in New York, ages 14 to 17, received the fine in mid-October, said Meena Shah, managing director of the Legal Services Center at The Door, a New York City-based nonprofit that serves young people. At least one teenager in Michigan has received the fine too, according to the teen’s lawyer. New York Focus and The Intercept reviewed copies of the fine notices delivered in both New York and Michigan.

The fine is one of several new financial penalties for immigrants created by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that President Donald Trump signed in July. The federal government is issuing the fines under a section of the law titled “Inadmissible alien apprehension fee,” which is set at $5,000 and can be applied to people apprehended between official ports of entry. Homeland Security’s application of the fine hasn’t been previously reported.

Shah and Ana Raquel Devereaux, the attorney representing the teenager in Michigan, both said the kids are living in shelters overseen by the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement, or ORR, which takes custody of unaccompanied immigrant children while they wait to be released to an adult sponsor.

Devereaux, who works for the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, pointed out that kids in government custody have no ability to work.

“It’s really about creating fear,” Devereaux said. “There’s no way that a child in this situation would be able to pay this, and the penalties are so severe.”

Minors in Texas and Pennsylvania have received the fines too, according to a staff member at a national nonprofit who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the nonprofit’s leadership fears being targeted by the Trump administration.

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The fine is one of several ways the Trump administration has sought in recent weeks to pressure minors who entered the U.S. alone to return to their home countries. Over Labor Day weekend, the government attempted to deport dozens of unaccompanied Guatemalan children who were in ORR custody; kids were loaded onto planes before a judge halted the plan. In early October, the government said it was offering $2,500 to unaccompanied minors 14 years and older who agree to leave the country.

The notices reviewed by New York Focus and The Intercept state that “Payment in full is due now” and list an array of potential consequences for failure to pay, including collection litigation and negative impacts on their immigration cases. Fines that aren’t paid in full will accrue interest, the notices say.

“They’re trying to pressure and coerce these young people into taking voluntary departure,” Shah said. “These are the stressors you’re putting very young kids under.”

Border Patrol teased the apprehension fee in a September 24 Facebook post, which included a megaphone emoji and said anyone 14 years or older could be fined. Money collected from the fines will be credited to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to the text of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

Other fees created by the new law include $100 to apply for asylum, plus $100 every year the application is pending; $550 for asylum-seekers to apply for a work permit; and $5,000 for anyone ordered removed in absentia and then arrested by ICE. Lack of clarity over exactly how and when to pay the $100 fees recently sparked panic among asylum-seekers in New York and a flood of misinformation and potential scams, New York Focus recently reported.

In response to questions about the $5,000 fee being applied to minors, the Department of Homeland Security referred New York Focus and The Intercept to a press release about a different fee of $1,000 for immigrants paroled into the U.S. The agency did not respond to follow-up questions.

Supporters of the fine argue that it will incentivize people to cross at legal entry points rather than traverse dangerous desert terrain and take up Customs and Border Protection resources. Andrew Arthur, a fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank that advocates for restrictions on immigration, said he understood the argument that a teenager won’t be able to pay a $5,000 fine, but said their parents or relatives would then be on the hook.

“This isn’t, you know, ‘We want to punish 14-year-old kids,’” Arthur said. “This is, ‘We want to discourage parents from paying smugglers to bring their kids to the United States.’” [

It’s unclear how many immigrants have received the $5,000 fine. Several attorneys who work with unaccompanied minors in New York and other states told New York Focus they’d heard about the fines secondhand but hadn’t seen any cases personally. All of the cases New York Focus and The Intercept were able to verify involved teenagers in ORR custody, but advocates said they had heard of minors outside of federal custody receiving the fines.

Under Trump, the number of unaccompanied children crossing the border and entering ORR custody has plummeted. In September, about 2,000 kids were in ORR custody on average, down from more than 6,000 last October.

Theo Liebmann, a law professor at Hofstra University who runs a legal clinic for immigrant youth, said unaccompanied kids in ORR custody are particularly vulnerable because they often don’t have lawyers, having recently arrived in the U.S.

Liebmann, who doesn’t have any clients who have received the fine, said it appeared to be an effort to “go after the kids who are especially defenseless and won’t be able to understand how to look at this threat, how real this threat is, and what they can do in response.”

An archaeologist who spent years documenting the recovery of ancient artifacts looted by ISIS in Syria and Iraq is shocked by Trump’s wanton destruction.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is trying to force Meta to unmask the identity of the people behind Facebook and Instagram accounts that post about Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity, arrests, and sightings by claiming the owners of the account are in violation of a law about the “importation of merchandise.” Lawyers fighting the case say the move is “wildly outside the scope of statutory authority,” and say that DHS has not even indicated what merchandise the accounts, called Montcowatch, are supposedly importing.

“There is no conceivable connection between the ‘MontCo Community Watch’ Facebook or Instagram accounts and the importation of any merchandise, nor is there any indicated on the face of the Summonses. DHS has no authority to issue these summonses,” lawyers with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) wrote in a court filing this month. There is no indication on either the Instagram or Facebook account that the accounts are selling any type of merchandise, according to 404 Media’s review of the accounts. “The Summonses include no substantiating allegations nor any mention of a specific crime or potential customs violation that might trigger an inquiry under the cited statute,” the lawyers add.

A judge temporarily blocked DHS from unmasking the owners last week.

“The court now orders Meta [...] not to produce any documents or information in response to the summonses at issue here without further order of the Court,” the judge wrote in a filing. The move to demand data from Meta about the identities of the accounts while citing a customs statute shows the lengths to which DHS is willing to go to attempt to shut down and identify people who are posting about ICE’s activities.

Montcowatch is, as the name implies, focused on ICE activity in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. Its Instagram posts are usually titled “Montco ICE alert” and include details such as where suspected ICE agents and vehicles were spotted, where suspected agents made arrests, or information about people who were detained. “10/20/25 Eagleville,” one post starts. “Suspected dentention [sic] near Ollies on Ridge Pike sometime before 7:50 am. 3 Agents and 3 Vehicles were observed.”

The Instagram account has been posting since June, and also posts information about peoples’ legal rights to film law enforcement. It also tells people to not intervene or block ICE. None of the posts currently available on the Instagram account could reasonably be described as doxing or harassing ICE officials.

On September 11, DHS demanded Meta provide identifying details on the owners of the Montcowatch accounts, according to court records. That includes IP addresses used to access the account, phone numbers on file, and email addresses, the court records add. DHS cited a law “focused on customs investigations relating to merchandise,” according to a filing from the ACLU that pushed to have the demands thrown out.

“The statute at issue here, 19 U.S.C. § 1509, confers limited authority to DHS in customs investigations to seek records related to the importation of merchandise, including the assessment of customs duties,” the ACLU wrote. “Identifying anonymous social media users critical of DHS is not a legitimate purpose, and it is not relevant to customs enforcement.” As the ACLU notes, a cursory look at the accounts shows they are “not engaged in commerce.” The court record points to an 2017 Office of the Inspector General report which says Customs and Border Protection (CBP) “regularly” tried much the same thing with its own legal demands, and specifically around the identity of an anonymous Twitter user.

“Movant now files this urgent motion to protect their identity from being exposed to a government agency that is apparently targeting their ‘community watch’ Facebook and Instagram accounts for doing nothing more than exercising their rights to free speech and association,” those lawyers and others wrote last week.

“Movant’s social media pages lawfully criticize and publicize DHS and the government agents who Movant views as wreaking havoc in the Montgomery County community by shining a light on that conduct to raise community members’ awareness,” they added.

The judge has not yet ruled on the ACLU’s motion to quash the demands altogether. This is a temporary blockage while that case continues.

The Montocowatch case follows other instances in which DHS has tried to compel Meta to identify the owners of similar accounts. Last month a judge temporarily blocked a subpoena that was aiming to unmask Instagram accounts that named a Border Patrol agent, The Intercept reported.

Earlier this month Meta took down a Facebook page that published ICE sightings in Chicago. The move came in direct response to pressure from the Department of Justice.

Both Apple and Google have removed apps that people use to warn others about ICE sightings. Those removals also included an app called Eyes Up that was focused more on preserving videos of ICE abuses. Apple’s moves also came after direct pressure from the Department of Justice.

Montcowatch directed a request for comment to the ACLU of Pennsylvania, which did not immediately respond.

Photo: Lindsey Nicholson/Universal Images Group/Getty Images

For much of the country, excluding federal employees, the government-shutdown crisis gripping Congress has been a distant battle between politicians indulging in their usual partisan squabbles. No matter who they blame for the shutdown, regular people don’t appear to be that engaged. An Economist-YouGov survey released earlier this week showed about three-fourths of Americans saying the shutdown has affected them “a little” or “not at all.”

That’s about to change. Yes, some effects of the shutdown will gradually manifest themselves, particularly the missed paychecks for federal employees (e.g., active military servicemembers) who haven’t been protected by questionably legal diversion of funds by the Trump administration. But on November 1, assuming (as is wise) that the shutdown doesn’t somehow end before then, a double whammy is going to strike large swaths of the country. First, SNAP benefits are going to run out in at least half the country, as Politico reports:

Millions of low-income Americans will lose access to food aid on Nov. 1, when half of states plan to cut off benefits due to the government shutdown.

Twenty-five states told POLITICO that they are issuing notices informing participants of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — the nation’s largest anti-hunger initiative — that they won’t receive checks next month. Those states include California, Alabama, Arkansas, Hawaii, Indiana, Mississippi and New Jersey. Others didn’t respond to requests for comment in time for publication.

USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service recently told every state that they’d need to hold off on distributing benefits until further notice, according to multiple state agencies.

And it could quickly get worse:

Under SNAP, which serves more than 42 million people, families receive an average of $187.20 per month to pay for groceries. The pause in benefits would kick in just before the Thanksgiving holiday and add further strain on food banks and pantries during a typically busy season.

Second, November 1 marks the beginning of “open enrollment” season for the 24 million Americans, many of them middle class, who get their health insurance via Obamacare’s private-sector marketplace. Most of them will get a nasty shock when they realize (a) premiums are going up by double-digit percentages in most places and (b) their out-of-pocket costs will more than double on average if the “enhanced premium subsidies” for these policies enacted in 2021 expire at the end of the year. Congressional Democrats are, of course, demanding some action be taken to extend these subsidies before they supply the votes necessary to reopen the federal government, while Republicans have said they won’t negotiate over the subsidies until the government is reopened. But what probably seemed like an abstract argument until now is going to be a very big “kitchen-table issue” once people realize they may need to pay more than twice as much for the sketchy but essential health-insurance coverage Obamacare provides. And as with the SNAP cuts, the impact could quickly be compounded over time, since many healthier people will likely go without insurance, making the risk pool for Obamacare policies shakier and the costs more expensive.

The other thing that’s going to happen on or soon after November 1 is Donald Trump’s claim that the shutdown just affects “Democrat things” will be exposed as not only cruel but completely inaccurate. OMB director Russell Vought has added to the pain of the shutdown in blue cities and states with selective shutdowns of programs and projects. But as Toluse Olorunnipa explains at The Atlantic, “the pain for the president’s supporters will increase significantly if the lapse in government funding continues into November”:

Farmers, a key constituency for Trump, are among those getting hurt. The Department of Agriculture halted crucial farm aid just as planning for the 2026 planting season was getting under way. Furloughs and mass layoffs, meanwhile, have decimated a small-business-lending program popular in rural communities. Federal subsidies keeping small-town airports afloat are scheduled to run out within days. And despite what Trump might suggest, the majority of the federal employees who are currently going without a paycheck live outside of the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area. Trump-friendly West Virginia, for instance, has among the highest number of government workers per capita in the country.

The above-mentioned Obamacare subsidy expiration will also create some specific red-state carnage, since reliance on Obamacare markets for health insurance is significantly greater in those red states that refused the Affordable Care Act’s optional Medicaid expansion.

So how will the November developments affect the battle in Congress? Clearly, heat on Republicans to negotiate over the Obamacare subsidies is going to increase significantly with both sides anxiously waiting to see if a very disengaged Trump notices the political risk and imposes a deal on his Obamacare-hating troops. If that doesn’t happen, though, some Democrats may conclude they’ve achieved a political victory by pinning higher health-care costs (both the Obamacare premium spike and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s Medicaid cuts) on the GOP, and can now vote to reopen the government.

In other words, it’s unclear the standoff will be resolved soon, but it is clear Americans will start paying a lot more attention to it.

This story fits the Fraudulent Elections characteristic of fascism as defined in The 14 Characteristics of Fascism

This story fits the Fraudulent Elections characteristic of fascism as defined in The 14 Characteristics of Fascism

The GOP-controlled North Carolina legislature, which has already gone to extreme lengths to undermine the will of the voters, is set to pass a new Trump-inspired gerrymandered congressional map this week that is expected to give Republicans one additional seat heading into the midterms. It will make one of the most gerrymandered states in the country even more gerrymandered, likely giving Republicans nearly 80 percent of US House seats in an otherwise closely divided swing state where Trump won 51 percent of the vote in 2024. The state senate passed the bill on Tuesday in near record time, with the state house to follow shortly thereafter.

The map targets the district of Democratic US House Rep. Don Davis, which has been represented by a Black member of Congress for more than three decades, shifting it from a district that Trump won by 3 points in 2024 to 12 points under the new lines. To make the district more Republican, majority-Black counties in eastern North Carolina’s Black Belt, including Davis’ home county, would be moved out of the district and replaced with majority-white counties that favor Trump.

“In the 2024 election with record voter turnout, NC’s First Congressional District elected both President Trump and me,” Davis said in a statement on Tuesday. “Since the start of this new term, my office has received 46,616 messages from constituents of different political parties, including those unaffiliated, expressing a range of opinions, views, and requests. Not a single one of them included a request for a new congressional map redrawing eastern North Carolina. Clearly, this new congressional map is beyond the pale.”

“Instead of nibbling at the margins of participation, today’s strategies are about cheating outright.”

The new map continues the trend of Republicans eliminating the seats of Democrats of color in their unprecedented bid to redraw districts in as many controlled states as possible in advance of the midterms; Missouri’s congressional gerrymanderer dismantled the district of Black Democrat Emanuel Cleaver while Texas’ map, which launched the GOP’s mid-decade redistricting frenzy, seeks to remove three Hispanic Democrats and one Black Democrat from office.

“Instead of nibbling at the margins of participation, today’s strategies are about cheating outright,” said Melissa Price Kromm, executive director of the pro-democracy group North Carolina For the People Action.

Republican leaders in North Carolina have openly admitted that they drew the new map to placate Trump, with reports alleging that Senate Majority Leader Phil Berger spearheaded the effort in exchange for Trump’s endorsement in his contested primary. “We are doing everything we can to protect President Trump’s agenda, which means safeguarding Republican control of Congress,” Berger said.

North Carolina has been ground zero for Republican gerrymandering schemes for more than a decade. The maps passed by North Carolina Republicans after the 2020 census were struck down by the Democratic majority on the North Carolina Supreme Court, leading to an even split in the state’s congressional delegation for the 2022 elections. But after Republicans won a majority on the state supreme court in that election, they overturned the court ruling blocking the gerrymandered map, allowing Republicans to pass a new gerrymander that gave the party three new seats in the 2024 election, which helped the GOP retain control of the US House.

“We would have been in the majority if North Carolina hadn’t egregiously redistricted and eliminated three Democratic seats,” House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) said after the election.

That map, which earned an F from the Princeton Gerrymandering Project, attempted to oust Davis, a former Air Force captain and member of the state senate from 2013 to 2023, shifting his district from a Democratic advantage to narrowly favoring Republicans, but he survived in 2024, winning by two points even as Trump carried his district. A federal lawsuit alleges that his current district, which has been represented by a Black member of Congress since 1992, was drawn by Republicans to dilute Black voting strength.

But now Republicans are redoubling their efforts to oust Davis, turning an F map into an F-. “Racist maps make racist reps!” protesters at the North Carolina capitol chanted before the state senate passed the bill. (In 2023, the legislature snuck in a provision to the state budget shielding redistricting records from public view, which could make it harder to challenge the new gerrymander in court.)

“They want to lock in that no Democrat, especially no Black Democrat, can ever win again,” former Democratic Rep. Eva Clayton, who represented the first district from 1992 to 2003, as the first Black woman elected to Congress from North Carolina, said on Tuesday.

It was a case originating in North Carolina that led to the Supreme Court effectively greenlighting extreme partisan gerrymandering in 2019, which has allowed Trump and his Republican allies to redraw districts for partisan advantage in state after state this year.

In 2016, a federal court ruled that two of the state’s congressional districts were illegally racially gerrymandered. When Republicans, under the guidance of the late GOP redistricting godfather Tom Hofeller, redrew the congressional maps, legislative leaders openly admitted their top goal was to maintain a partisan advantage. “I propose that we draw the maps to give a partisan advantage to 10 Republicans and three Democrats, because I do not believe it’s possible to draw a map with 11 Republicans and two Democrats,” said GOP state Rep. David Lewis, who oversaw the redistricting process. He conceded: “I acknowledge freely that this would be a political gerrymander, which is not against the law.”

The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, with Chief Justice John Roberts holding in Rucho v. Common Cause that partisan gerrymandered claims couldn’t be brought in federal court—a decision that turbocharged gerrymandering across the country.

Roberts claimed that the Rucho decision did not bar efforts to outlaw racial gerrymandering. But the Supreme Court just heard arguments in a case that could end the Voting Rights Act’s ability to stop racial gerrymandering as well, which would kill the last remaining protection of the landmark civil rights law. Such a ruling could jeopardize majority-minority districts across the country, shifting up to 19 seats to the GOP.

North Carolina Republicans have long been at the forefront of GOP efforts to undermine democracy. The legislature convened a lame-duck session after the 2024 election that was supposed to focus on hurricane relief but instead stripped the state’s Democratic governor, Josh Stein, of the power to appoint a majority of members to the state and county election boards. The new state board is now controlled by Republicans with a long history of limiting access to the ballot who could use their authority to close polling places, cut early voting hours, and contest election outcomes. Already, a North Carolina Republican state supreme court justice, Jefferson Griffin, spent seven months trying to overturn the victory of his Democratic opponent Allison Riggs following the 2024 election.

“They’re abusing their power to take away the people’s power, the voters’ power, because they’re trying to decide for the voters who their congressperson is,” said Stein, who does not have the power to veto the redistricting bill.

Now, the GOP’s toxic attempt to oust a Black Democrat in North Carolina is a disturbing preview of what a post-Voting Rights Act America will look like.