Sunday, March 23, 2025

Republicans Take Stand Against Reported Trump Admin Plan

 https://www.newsweek.com/trump-administration-warned-top-republicans-over-possible-nato-move-2048065

The top two Republican lawmakers overseeing the Pentagon in Congress issued a rare joint statement Wednesday, voicing concern over a potential shake-up in U.S. military leadership by the Trump administration.

The pair issued a joint-statement on Wednesday, referencing media reports suggesting the administration is considering changes such as relinquishing the U.S. role as NATO's Supreme Allied Commander Europe and cancelling plans to modernize U.S. Forces Japan to try and meet its goals.

Trump exaggerates trade deficits, his 2024 vote total, Ukraine aid, border crossings and fentanyl deaths

 https://edition.cnn.com/2025/03/21/politics/fact-check-trump-oval-office-remarks/index.html

President Donald Trump made at least nine false claims in his Friday remarks to reporters in the Oval Office – including a series of wildly exaggerated statistics on a variety of topics.

Trump used inaccurate figures for the number of votes he received in the 2024 presidential election, US aid to Ukraine, the number of migrants who entered the US during the Biden administration, the US trade deficits with China and Canada, and annual US fentanyl deaths.

He also wrongly declared, again, that Honda announced it is building a new factory in Indiana. He repeated his years-old baseless claim that NATO would no longer have existed if not for his first presidency. He told his familiar unsubstantiated story about large numbers of migrants having come from jails in “the Congo” and elsewhere. And he once more discussed Canada’s dairy tariffs without mentioning a critical fact about them.

Saturday, March 22, 2025

Law firm Paul Weiss agrees to deal with Trump, prompting criticism - Mob tactics

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/03/21/paul-weiss-trump-executive-action/ 

Paul Weiss, a prominent law firm that has often represented Democratic clients and causes, is facing widespread criticism online from the legal community after agreeing to provide $40 million in pro bono legal services to the Trump administration to avoid a retaliatory executive order targeting its lawyers and clients

Trump said he didn’t sign the Alien Enemies Act proclamation. So who — or what — did?

 https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/03/22/trump-deportations-autopen/

President Donald Trump told reporters Friday evening that he did not sign the controversial proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act to quickly deport migrants his administration says are violent gang members from Venezuela.

So what did happen? Did Trump misspeak? Is he trying to deflect responsibility for a decision under heavy legal scrutiny by suggesting he was merely following through on an idea proposed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio? And if he didn’t sign it, who — or what — did?

“I don’t know when it was signed, because I didn’t sign it,” Trump said on the South Lawn of the White House as he prepared to leave for his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. “Other people handled it. But Marco Rubio’s done a great job. And he wanted them out, and we go along with that. We want to get criminals out of our country.”

Trump’s signature appears on the digital image of the proclamation available for viewing with the Federal Register, the government repository of official documents. And White House Communications Director Steven Cheung said late Friday that Trump did personally sign the proclamation.

Missile from Yemen intercepted outside Israeli territory

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/405737

 Sirens were sounded on Friday evening, just after 10:30 p.m., in localities across central Israel, Judea, Samaria, Jerusalem and the Shfela regions, following a launch from Yemen.

The IDF Spokesperson’s Unit confirmed that a missile launched from Yemen was intercepted by the IAF prior to crossing into Israeli territory.

Trump Takes Cold Revenge by Stripping Security Clearance From Biden, Harris, and Clinton

 https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-takes-cold-revenge-by-stripping-security-clearance-from-biden-harris-clinton-more/

President Donald Trump has stripped security clearance from a group that includes former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former Vice President Kamala Harris, former President Joe Biden, and “any other member of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s family.”

The removals—an act of revenge against a broad swath of Trump’s most dire enemies—were made official in a memo signed by the president late on Friday night, according to The New York Times.

Trump Claims He Didn’t Sign Deportation Order He Definitely Signed

 https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-claims-he-didnt-sign-deportation-order-he-definitely-signed/

President Donald Trump is pointing fingers again.

This time, he’s claiming he didn’t actually sign an order on Friday invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to deport suspected members of Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua without questioning.

“I don’t know when it was signed because I didn’t sign it,” Trump told reporters Friday, according to The Hill. “Other people handled it.”

Hours after Trump made his remarks, the White House released a statement saying that the president “was obviously referring to the original Alien Enemies Act that was signed back in 1798.”

But they said the “recent Executive Order was personally signed by President Trump” to deport “these heinous criminals.”

Trump deflects on deportation order invoking Alien Enemies Act: ‘Other people handled it’

 https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5208799-donald-trump-deportation-flights-alien-enemies-act/?tbref=hp

President Trump on Friday deflected when asked if he signed the order to invoke the Alien Enemies Act, an 18th-century wartime law, to deport Venezuelan migrants allegedly linked to the Tren de Aragua gang.

“We want to get criminals out of our country number one. I don’t know when it was signed, because I didn’t sign it,” Trump told reporters before departing the White House on Friday. “Other people handled it.”

Trump Toys With the Supreme Court

 https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-supreme-court-john-roberts-james-boasberg-95419a99?mod=hp_opin_pos_1

Taunting John Roberts is a lousy strategy to persuade the Justices.

President Trump downplayed Chief Justice John Roberts’s statement Tuesday in defense of the judiciary, but the President had better be careful. The White House strategy of bashing judges and jamming the Supreme Court could backfire in spectacular fashion.

Guessing the thinking at the High Court is a fraught exercise. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned about the Chief Justice in his nearly two decades at the Court it’s that he hates being dragged into political fights. He prizes the reputation of the Court as a neutral arbiter of the law and protector of the Constitution.

For Vladimir Putin, Russia’s position in the world is personal. Here’s what he really wants

 https://edition.cnn.com/2025/03/22/europe/russia-putin-ultimate-goals-ukraine-intl-cmd/index.html

US President Donald Trump said he thinks Vladimir Putin wants peace. Ukraine and its European allies don’t believe he does, while the Russian leader himself said he wants peace but then refused to sign up to it when presented with the option.

What Putin really wants, though, is much, much bigger.

The Russian president has made no secret of the fact that he believes Ukraine should not exist as an independent state and he has repeatedly said he wants NATO to shrink back to its Cold War-era size.

But more than anything, he wants to see a new global order — and he wants Russia to play the starring role in it.

Friday, March 21, 2025

Holocaust remembrance pages removed in Pentagon’s DEI purge

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/405702

In a February 26 memo titled “digital content refresh”, Pentagon leadership was directed to “remove all DoD news and feature articles, photos, and videos that promote Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI).” More than 24,000 articles could potentially be removed, according to a database obtained by CNN.

Also caught in the net of the anti-DEI purge are articles focused on race, gender and LGBTQ experiences, as well as others on topics such as cancer awareness, suicide prevention and sexual assault. An article on Jackie Robinson, who served in the military and is widely admired for breaking baseball’s color line, was removed and has been reinstated.

Also removed was an article on Bea Arthur, the Jewish “Golden Girls” star who served in the Marines during World War II.

Beyond Saks’ story, at least two more pages documenting Holocaust remembrance were also removed. One page, titled “A Cadet’s Perspective: Holocaust Days of Remembrance,” described a cadet’s experience visiting concentration camps a decade ago and the ways they informed his experience in the US Air Force Academy.

Another page stripped from the Pentagon’s platforms commemorated Holocaust Remembrance Week and told readers to not forget the importance of religious diversity:

In a statement, Pentagon Press Secretary John Ullyot — who referred to DEI initiatives as “Woke cultural Marxism” — said pages that had inadvertently been removed would be reinstated but did not detail if or when the Holocaust-related articles would go back up.

Inside Trump’s Lightning-Fast Deportation of Venezuelans to a Salvadoran Prison

 https://www.wsj.com/world/americas/inside-trumps-lightning-fast-deportation-of-venezuelans-to-a-salvadoran-prison-4ac3f408?mod=hp_lead_pos9

Planes of migrants were in the air just hours after the president invoked wartime authority. Families say innocent people were swept up in the rush.

Musk Set to Receive Top-Secret Briefing on U.S. War Plans for China

 https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/musk-to-receive-top-secret-briefing-on-u-s-war-plans-for-china-922eafdf?mod=hp_lead_pos1

The Trump adviser is expected to get a look at the Pentagon blueprint despite his companies’ financial stakes in China and defense contracts

Elon Musk is scheduled to receive a briefing Friday on the U.S. military’s top-secret war plans for China, according to two U.S. officials, giving the wealthy businessman and presidential adviser insight into one of the Pentagon’s most closely guarded operational blueprints.

Elon Musk Threatens Pentagon Leakers After China War Story

 https://www.newsweek.com/elon-musk-threatens-pentagon-leakers-after-china-war-story-2048345

Elon Musk threatened Pentagon staff who leaked what he called "false information" to the New York Times over a story saying he will receive a briefing about highly sensitive American military plans for any potential war with China.

But The Wall Street Journal also later reported that Musk would receive a "top secret" briefing on American tactics and planning for war with China, among other issues to be discussed. The Journal, like the NYT, cited anonymous U.S. officials.

Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute focused on defense strategy, told the Times: "Musk at a war-planning briefing? Giving the CEO of one defense company unique access seems like this could be grounds for a contract protest and is a real conflict of interest."