"The fact that Trump is adorning his office with gold and doubling his net worth is all the proof you need that he was perfectly content to say whatever he needed to say on the campaign trail to manipulate his fans. But now that he's got what he needs from them, he's done helping them."

Apparently Trump is now sending the FBI to the homes of innocent protestors, in part to find out who is behind the "criminal conspiracy" arranging these protests. The real reason is obviously the chilling effect on free speech for those attending. www.rawstory.com/fbi-protest/

I hope voters make them pay for all of Trump’s corruption, incompetence, lies and malfeasance. It is only made possible by the acquiescence and cowardice of Republicans in Congress, so they are the ones who should be held accountable for all of it in the short term.

There are no circumstances where human beings should be without food. There are no qualifications that make someone undeserving of access to food. If you are a human being, you should get food. I don’t care about ability, job status, legal status, or anything else. If people are hungry, feed them.

NEW: House Judiciary's Jamie Raskin is echoing Jack Smith's demand for public hearings: "I am now calling on you to accept Mr. Smith's offer to testify at a public hearing so the American people can all hear directly from him on the matters we will be questioning him about." tinyurl.com/yrmrdr3t

Former special counsel Jack Smith is requesting that Congress and the Justice Department allow him to testify publicly, according to a new letter he sent to the leaders of the House and Senate Judiciary committees.

In 1980, Trump promised to preserve Art Deco sculptures on the stylish 1929 Bonwit Teller department store, which was being demolished to make way for his vulgar Trump Tower. He lied. He destroyed them. In 2025, Trump promised to preserve the East Wing. He lied. He destroyed it. (John Baron👀)

🚨BREAKING: New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) escalated her defense against what she calls a politically driven prosecution, signaling plans to challenge both the conduct and the legitimacy of the federal prosecutor leading the case against her. www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/...

Louisiana has refused to reconsider the convictions of 1,000+ mostly Black men sentenced by split juries, despite the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2020 that such convictions are unconstitutional and based on an inherently racist law. By @richardawebster.bsky.social

BREAKING: A Trump-appointed judge in Texas just threw out a GOP lawsuit that attempted to block California’s new congressional redistricting plan — ruling the plaintiff had no standing to sue over another state’s election laws.

Over the past few days, cattle ranchers and agricultural groups have been sounding the alarm that a plan to import more foreign beef would hurt struggling ranchers.

"This is a situation where the executive branch is all working toward his will. It is completely subordinated to him in a way that not any congressional law—or perhaps even court order—can staunch." trib.al/XWkKznM

BREAKING: Jack Smith is requesting that Congress and the Justice Dept. let him testify in public. In new letters to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, Smith says he wants to testify "in open hearings" because of "the many mischaracterizations" around his investigations.

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he’s backing off a planned surge of federal agents into San Francisco after speaking to the mayor, as protesters gathered outside a U.S. Coast Guard base where they were located. https://to.pbs.org/3Wl4NPb

One of the big mistakes that the Founders made was to assume that the President would be a mature adult who felt a responsibility to his fellow citizens and the nation.

Perspective: The White House has about 55,000 sq ft of floor space (132 rooms, 35 bathrooms, six levels). The new ballroom is planned to span 90,000 sq ft at an updated cost of $300M —5.5× larger than the White House itself at a cost of nearly 8× Mar-a-Lago’s $40M Grand Ballroom

Democracy requires decency. Our democracy is devolving because we neglected to demand common decency of the most powerful individual in our country; the President.

Ohio Book Award for Non-Fiction. My little talk and conversation with Ashley Bethard. The whole ceremony is here; my bit begins at 2:17:40. ohiochannel.org/video/ohioan...

He doesn’t plan on leaving. We will kick him out.

Oh wow: "During the fracas, a federal agent fired a pepper round that struck a (UCC) clergyman, Jorge Bautista, near the chin. The impact caked his face and clothing in orange powder. Bautista said the agent shot him in the face from about 5 feet away." "'I’m in a lot of pain,'" Bautista texted…"

We needed to see what was before our eyes in 2016. This is why I wrote "Road to Unfreedom." www.inquirer.com/columnists/a...

Reporter: The president had initially said that this project wouldn't interfere with or touch the current structure. Leavitt: If you look at the renderings, it's very clear the east wing was going to be modernized. Reporter: But modernizing and tearing down are two different things.

And:

If republicans are fine with this, is there any reason why he couldn't just... knock down the lincoln memorial? or the vietnam wall? What else might he want to do to arlington cemetary besides putting his big weird french arch with gold dingleberries in front of it? www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddo...

He does not have the authority to tear it down or put up anything new. All presidents are *temporary* residents or would be if this country cared about the Constitution or the law.

This is the scene when CJ ran out of the press room, mad at herself and yelling to give her a minute. Leavitt is too dumb to even realize what she said.

President Trump shares renderings of White House ballroom as demolition of the entire East Wing begins.

President Trump is demolishing the East Wing to make room for a ballroom. His administration says he's continuing a presidential legacy of White House renovations, but this is the biggest in decades.

Jeffries on a death threat made against him by a pardoned J6 criminal: "Not a single Republican has reached out to me since that incident occurred, and that's no surprise because they cannot defend the fact that Donald Trump pardoned hundreds of violent felons who brutally beat police officers."

He’s just gonna keep going and take down the whole White House, isn’t he

I am still waiting to see the videos of corporate employers of illegal immigrants zip tied and thrown into vans. Oh, that’s a civil offense you say, punishable instead through some fines? So is being an illegal immigrant.

Whoever is the next Democratic presidential candidate should vow to tear down the hideous ballroom and rebuild the Rose Garden, I bet there are a lot of votes in that

Today, Mike Johnson will keep the House adjourned for the 80th day out of the last 92. The senate has been working, so this is not about the shutdown. It is about avoiding a vote to release the Epstein files.

Merkley: "What we've seen is that democracies no longer die bc men w/guns go in and take it over. Instead, it's electeds who erode the separation of power. If you have a rubber-stamp Congress & courts that deliver more power to the executive, suddenly you have an authoritarian state. It's here now."

He is so, so close to getting it.

All of the pilfering, vandalism, and outright death caused by DOGE cuts, and all of the thefts from the future by illegally stopping research grants, didn't save a penny, Trump spent the money and more on corruption and incompetent ICE goons.

5/ The other group Trump is prioritizing? Members of the German political party AfD, who the White House says are being “targeted” for their views. This is a neo-Nazi party that defended the SS. You think I'm making this up? I'm not.

Trump's supporters say we call his policies "racist" too casually. But let me tell the story of a new policy - about to be unveiled - that is racist on its face. 1/ A short thread on Trump's reported new "whites only" refugee policy. It's truly vile.

The email that said the career resource program for women would no longer be part of Google was terse and followed months of eroding support. But the deletion of years of Women Techmakers’ work came as a significant shock to its members. https://cnn.it/42Sl2qF

The Art of the Deal.

After bullying federal prosecutors into dropping criminal cases against him, President Trump is now trying to pay himself back $230 million in taxpayer dollars. So we're investigating all records related to payments by the DOJ and the Treasury Dept to President Trump. We will expose the truth.

It's egregiously racist of Andrew Cuomo to insinuate Zohran Mamdani would cheer for another 9/11-like attack on New York City, and I have to question the moral fiber of any elected official supporting Cuomo who stays silent in response to his remarks. Find your integrity.

the ghost of liberace is all "whew tone it down gurl"

Just disgusting.

“Trump apparently doesn’t intend to allow for the defeat of the incumbent administration, and a peaceful transfer of power, in Nov. 2028. But we’ll be allowed to watch Trump celebrating his triumph over the old republic in his palatial new ballroom.” open.substack.com/pub/thebulwa...

Given the incompetence of Trump as a real estate developer, I assume it won’t be done by 2028. What I do not assume is that it will actually be a ballroom.