Politics

What really made the latest jobs report concerning, however, was the downward revision of previous months' gains, which the BLS described as "larger than normal." The number of jobs added in May was revised downward from 144,000 to 19,000, while the number of jobs added in June was revised downward from 147,000 to 14,000. Taken together, this means that the economy has added an average of just 35,000 jobs per month over the last three months.

New York Times chief economics correspondent Ben Casselman described the downward revisions as "a very significant sign of weakening" and he noted that healthcare and social assistance jobs accounted for nearly all of last month's gains.

"If it hadn't been for that sector, employment would have fallen slightly," he observed on Bluesky.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), now the best-funded federal law enforcement agency in the United States, is embarking on a plan to drastically expand its detention infrastructure. But considering the $45 billion it’s been given for the job, the agency’s vision for its new facilities seems startlingly low-tech.

In July, the Wall Street Journal got its hands on internal government documents revealing that ICE wants to incarcerate more immigrants in tents, or “hardened soft-sided facilities.” The administration hopes to erect thousands of these tents “as quickly as possible to expand detention capacity…at US military bases and adjoining bricks-and-mortar ICE jails,” the Journal reported. Officials say they like this approach, at least for now, because they can quickly set up tons of beds in a few new locations rather than finding space at existing facilities here and there.

A “flash” OIG audit report published earlier this month warned that OPM’s new health insurance program covering about 2 million Postal employees, annuitants and their family members, is facing “critical resource issues,” just a few months ahead of this year’s Open Season. That’s in light of the workforce losses and restructuring that have taken place at the agency under the Trump administration.

The July 2 report found that OPM currently has just three employees out of the 11 total positions it determined it would need to manage the PSHB program’s central enrollment platform, which all PSHB participants must use to enroll and make changes to their health insurance.

They may resemble other ATMs, but officials are increasingly warning about the potential for fraud with the expanding fleet of cryptocurrency ATMs popping up across the country.

The National Consumers League says the largely unregulated machines have become favored by scammers for their anonymity and irreversibility — once a user transfers or deposits funds, that money is essentially gone.

The FTC says consumers should contact banks or other institutions directly about any account issues. And it warns consumers not to believe anyone who says they must use a crypto ATM to address a financial problem.

“Real businesses and government agencies will never do that — anyone who does is a scammer,” the agency said.

U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth of the District of Columbia gave the administration until Aug. 13 to explain how it will get VOA working again. The outlet that dates back to World War II has been largely dark since March.

Lamberth said the administration needs to show what it is doing with the $260 million Congress appropriated for VOA’s operations this year.

The U.S. Justice Department this week dropped an antitrust case against a company represented by the lobbying firm that employed Pam Bondi before her confirmation as attorney general earlier this year.

American Express Global Business Travel (Amex GBT) has paid the lobbying giant Ballard Partners hundreds of thousands of dollars this year to pressure Bondi's Justice Department on "antitrust issues," according to federal disclosures.

Thousands of license applications by U.S. companies to export goods and technology around the globe, including to China, are in limbo because turmoil at the agency in charge of approving them has left it nearly paralyzed, two sources said.

Frustration is growing within U.S. industry.

“We’re seeing whole sectors where there is no movement or indication if or when licenses will be issued," including license applications for semiconductor manufacturing equipment worth billions of dollars, said Sean Stein, president of the US-China Business Council.

While the clock is ticking on license applications, “Chinese companies are exploring and doing deals with suppliers in China and other countries,” he said. “The longer we have the delay, the more market share we're going to lose."

There are no ICE detention centers in Hawaii, so the federal government has placed immigrants in prisons. ICE in February signed an agreement with the Federal Bureau of Prisons—part of the Justice Department—to reserve space for ICE detainees, according to the Honolulu Civil Beat, which reported residents from out of state being transferred to Hawaii as early as June.

Immigration lawyers in Hawaii told the Civil Beat that they are concerned residents of other states are not getting effective counsel in Hawaii; even if they had a lawyer, it’s difficult to stay in touch thousands of miles away, they told the Civil Beat.

"In a way, it is a backdoor way for privatizing Social Security," the billionaire former hedge fund manager said of the accounts. "Social Security is a defined benefit plan paid out—that to the extent that if all of a sudden these accounts grow, and you have in the hundreds of thousands of dollars for your retirement, that's a game-changer."

The order, signed on Wednesday, comes into force on 29 August and broadens earlier presidential action that specifically targeted cheap products from China and Hong Kong to now cover the rest of the world.

The de minimis exemption had allowed goods valued at $800 or less to enter the US without paying any tariffs. US consumers relied on the exemption to buy cheap clothes and household items from online commerce sites like Shein and Temu.

The White House says the global exemption was being used to "evade tariffs and funnel deadly synthetic opioids" to the US.

Twelve Democratic members of Congress sued the Trump administration on Wednesday, accusing immigration officials of blocking their access to detention facilities housing noncitizens.

In a complaint filed in Washington, D.C., federal court, the House lawmakers challenged a new Department of Homeland Security policy requiring seven days' notice for visits, and deeming some facilities including Immigration and Customs Enforcement field offices "off-limits for congressional oversight."

"Such blatant disregard for both the law and the constitutional order by the Trump administration warrants a serious and decisive response," Neguse said in a statement. His Colorado district includes Boulder and other Denver suburbs.

The defendants include DHS, ICE, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and acting ICE director Todd Lyons.

Brown University will pay $50 million to Rhode Island workforce development organizations in a deal with the Trump administration that restores lost federal research funding and ends investigations into alleged discrimination, officials said Wednesday.

The university also agreed to several concessions in line with President Donald Trump's political agenda. Brown will adopt the government's definition of "male" and "female," for example, and must remove any consideration of race from the admissions process.

Since the start of President Donald Trump's second term, his administration has approved around $12 billion in arms sales to Israel and lifted a Biden-era block on the delivery of 2,000-pound bombs that Israeli forces have used to commit atrocities against Palestinians.

Earlier this year, Sanders led an unsuccessful effort to block the Trump administration's sale of nearly $9 billion in weapons to the Israeli government. Just 14 senators, all Democrats, backed the resolutions.

But there are some indications that support for blocking arms sales could grow as the starvation crisis that Israel has imposed on Gaza intensifies. Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), who did not support the resolutions Sanders tried to pass in April, said earlier this week that he would vote for "an end to any United States support whatsoever" for Israel "until there is a demonstrable change in the direction of Israeli policy."

Top Senate Democrat says he expects justice department to respond to Epstein demand by 15 August

“We’re invoking federal law and using our authority as a check on the executive to compel transparency,” Schumer said.

“Today’s letter matters. It’s not a stunt, it’s not symbolic, it’s a formal exercise of congressional power under federal law, and we expect an answer from DOJ by August the 15th. That’s what accountability looks like. This is what oversight looks like, and this is what keeping your promises to the American people look like.”

He noted that both Bondi and Donald Trump had previously said they want the case file’s released:

“There are enormous ethical and legal concerns,” said Lawrence Gostin, a Georgetown University law professor who specializes in public health. “Patients across America should be very worried that their medical records are going to be used in ways that harm them and their families.”

Officials at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, in charge of maintaining the system, have said patients will need to opt in for the sharing of their medical records and data, which will be kept secure.

Officials say patients will benefit from a system that lets them quickly call up their own records without the hallmark difficulties, such as requiring the use of fax machines to share documents, that have prevented them from doing so in the past.

“We have the tools and information available now to empower patients to improve their outcomes and their healthcare experience,” Dr. Mehmet Oz, the administrator for CMS, said in a statement Wednesday.

U.S. health officials are warning Americans about the risks of an opioid-related ingredient increasingly added to energy drinks, gummies and supplements sold at gas stations and convenience stores, recommending a nationwide ban.

The chemical, known as 7- hydroxymitragynine, is a component of kratom, a plant native to Southeast Asia that has gained popularity in the U.S. as an unapproved treatment for pain, anxiety and drug dependence.

In recent months, dietary supplement companies that sell kratom have been urging the Food and Drug Administration to crack down on the products containing 7-OH, portraying it as a dangerously concentrated, synthetic form of the original ingredient.

The FDA action “is not focused on natural kratom leaf products," according to a statement Tuesday by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The Texas Legislature released a new congressional map Wednesday morning detailing Republicans’ plans to dramatically expand their foothold in the state at the urging of President Donald Trump.

The new maps aim to help Republicans pick up five additional seats in next year’s midterm elections, putting Texas at the center of a Republican campaign to retain control of the U.S. House in 2026, according to a Hearst Newspapers analysis.

The biggest proposed changes are in Houston, the Dallas-area, Austin and South Texas, where several districts currently held by Democrats are remade to be more favorable to Republican candidates or combined together. Under the proposal, millions of Texas voters will now end up with new congressional representation.

The Guardian’s review of records found:

• Out of nine “assault” and “impeding” felony cases the justice department filed immediately after the start of the protests and promoted by the attorney general, Pam Bondi, prosecutors dismissed seven of them soon after filing the charges.
• In reports that led to the detention and prosecution of at least five demonstrators, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents made false statements about the sequence of events and misrepresented incidents captured on video.
• One DHS agent accused a protester of shoving an officer, when footage appeared to show the opposite: the officer forcefully pushed the protester.
• One indictment named the wrong defendant, a stunning error that has jeopardized one of the government’s most high-profile cases.

“When I see felonies dismissed, that tells me either the federal officers have filed affidavits that are not truthful and that has been uncovered, or US attorneys reviewing the cases realize the evidence does not support the charges,” said Cristine Soto DeBerry, a former California state prosecutor who is now director of Prosecutors Alliance Action, a criminal justice reform group.

According to reporting from The Wrap, an FCC “ombudsman” would work directly with New Paramount’s president, Jeff Shell, to review “any complaints of bias or other concerns” regarding CBS News, a subsidiary under Paramount.

Paramount also agreed to eliminate its diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, including scrapping all DEI messaging from its internal training programs and removing DEI objectives in its compensation plans.

This move comes after the company announced the cancellation of The Late Show only a few days after the eponymous host critiqued the network’s recent settlement with the president. Earlier this month, Paramount agreed to cough up $16 million to Trump after the president sued the network for allegedly unfairly editing an interview with Kamala Harris, an accusation that many legal experts have called “baseless.”

"I never had the privilege of going to his island, and I did turn it down," Trump said. "In one of my very good moments, I turned it down. I didn't want to go to his island."

"He did something that was inappropriate," President Trump said on Monday. "He hired help. And I said don't ever do that again. He stole people that worked for me. I said don't ever do that again. He did it again, and I threw him out of the place."

The “place” Trump was referring to was Mar-a-Lago, his members-only club in Florida.

Edit: Not going to make a separate post, but he also said this:

Donald Trump Says His Name May Have Been Planted in Jeffrey Epstein Files

"Now, they can easily put something in the files that's a phony. As an example, Christopher Steele, wrote a book, we call the 'fake news dossier.' The whole thing was a fake. The whole thing was a fake. They can put things in the file that was a fake. Those files were run by sick, sick people."

Source

After years of legal maneuvering, the company agreed to plead guilty to the conspiracy charge in July 2024 in order to avoid a criminal trial. Under the plea bargain’s terms, Boeing would pay nearly $2.5 billion to airlines, families of crash victims, and the government, plus accept three years of monitoring from an independent safety consultant. That agreement was thrown out by a federal judge in December, and a trial date was set for June 2025.

Two weeks later, the DOJ agreed to drop the charges against Boeing completely. Instead of pleading guilty, Boeing would now just be liable for a reduced monetary penalty of around $1.2 billion: $235 million in new fines, plus $445 million into a fund for the families of the 737 MAX crash victims. It would also have to invest $455 million to enhance its “compliance and safety programs,” part of which would pay for an “independent compliance consultant” for two years of oversight. It avoided a felony charge, and more importantly, it was allowed to continue self-auditing its own products.

Forgoing a government salary may seem like a noble choice, and in some cases it can be. But it can also be a way to take advantage of loopholes in our government ethics laws. Under 18 U.S.C. § 209, most government employees are prohibited from earning money from non-governmental sources. This is a commonsense ethics law that helps prevent conflicts of interest and corruption opportunities that arise when a government employee has private business ties. But the law creates exceptions from some ethics rules for Special Government Employees and other employees who are not taking a salary from the government. This means that if a White House employee forgoes their salary, they can earn outside income while working in powerful roles.

During Trump’s first term, this loophole enabled Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump to work in the White House while earning millions from outside sources, creating massive conflicts of interest. While Jared and Ivanka may not officially be serving in the White House this term, it seems like others in the Trump Administration have followed their lead by not accepting a White House salary and potentially continuing to earn non-governmental income, creating potential conflicts of interest.

A federal judge on Monday ruled Planned Parenthood clinics nationwide must continue to be reimbursed for Medicaid funding as the nation’s largest abortion provider fights President Donald Trump’s administration over efforts to defund the organization in his signature tax legislation.

The new order replaces a previous edict handed down by U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston last week. Talwani initially granted a preliminary injunction specifically blocking the government from cutting Medicaid payments to Planned Parenthood members that didn’t provide abortion care or didn’t meet a threshold of at least $800,000 in Medicaid reimbursements in a given year.

The Herald/Times reviewed a list of roughly 750 immigrants who were either detained at Alligator Alcatraz or scheduled to be detained there in its first two weeks, and found that 86 had been flown to immigration facilities in either Louisiana or Texas. At least 156 detainees had been transferred to other detention centers in Florida.

The data only captures a moment in time, and does not include people who were detained at the facility after July 12. The Herald/Times could not review the data to determine whether anyone was deported, as those held at Alligator Alcatraz do not show up in the ICE database tracking detainees’ whereabouts.