LizD “Vote in every election!”

Sarcasm is to be expected ~ postcards to writer with @DemocratWit ~ Democracy is on the line! Vote BLUE up & down the ballot.

[Tamer Nahed @Tamer_Alnoaizy]

A very dangerous new nightmare we are living in Gaza City, and no one in the world is paying attention to it.

Days ago, the Israeli army installed huge military cranes, each about 30 meters tall, on the eastern areas it controls. These cranes are equipped with machine guns and cameras, and they fire randomly and almost continuously at tents, streets, and exposed neighborhoods.

Gaza City is extremely narrow, only 10 kilometers wide. A single crane at that height is enough to expose the entire city from east to west. Every street, every square, every tent, every house has become completely exposed. There is no place to hide, and not a single moment of safety.

In just the past two days, three people were killed by fire from these cranes. One of them was sitting quietly with his father in a small café, trying to breathe for a few minutes. Hours later, a 5year old girl was killed while playing near her home.

These cranes have turned the entire city into an open field. The latest military technologies are directed at civilians. We have become an open testing ground for their new weapons. The horror is not just in the sound… it is the constant feeling of being an exposed target at all times, where even children cannot run in the street without fear.

[Qasim Rashid, Esq. @QasimRashid]

10 years ago today Police took Dylan Roof to Burger King after he killed 9 Black people in church.

This week Police killed 1-year-old Black child named Kohen Wiley on the lie that his mother stole diapers.

A 1 year old Black baby is more threatening to police than an armed white supremacist who just mass murdered 9 Black people.

[Acyn @Acyn]

CNN montage of Trump bashing the JCPOA and releasing any money to Iran:

I would have never given him back the money. I would have said, the money is off the table. Let's start negotiating. And you know what? I would have won that negotiation

[Democracy Forward @DemocracyFwd]

BREAKING: Judge orders FBI to review and release thousands of records related to the Epstein Files.

We knew the Trump-Vance admin’s attempt to delay this process was unlawful and absurd – today the court agreed with us.

[Senator Adam Schiff @SenAdamSchiff]

Donald Trump, the developer:

Tear down a historic building for a project that the public didn’t want or approve.

Triple the initial price tag.

Make taxpayers foot the bill after promising they wouldn’t.

[Headquarters @HQNewsNow]

Sen. @MarkWarner: What we're witnessing today is an extraordinary display of dysfunction from Trump who decided to install an individual as acting DNI that does not meet even the basic tenets of the law. You've got to have national security background. Bill Pulte doesn't even have a security clearance.

[MeidasClips @MeidasClips]

Snyder: Trump is starting stupid wars — he's losing them in ways that are spectacularly obvious to the entire world.

That you would fight bad wars and then lose them on your own terms very quickly when you're supposed to be a superpower. That's a symptom.

It's a symptom of not having a functional government where plans are reviewed.

It's a symptom of oligarchical politics where a few people are making decisions on the basis of either their emotions or how they can make a quick buck.

[The Lincoln Project @ProjectLincoln]

The difference between this and the deal Trump tore up is that Iran now gets more money, fewer restrictions, less oversight, and more regional autonomy.

[Laiken Jordahl @LaikenJordahl]

Breaking: Tohono O’odham Nation sues DHS over border wall plans that would take sovereign tribal land, use the Nation’s water & destroy sacred sites. O’odham Legislative Council approved suit unanimously while facing wall construction that may start in the next few weeks.

[Mike Young @micyoung75]

The Southern District of New York is the office that prosecuted Trump on 34 felony counts. He is still appealing those convictions.

The lawyer he just named to run that office - James M. McDonald - is on the legal team handling that appeal.
McDonald is a partner at Sullivan & Cromwell. He is part of the team that last month secured the Justice Department's decision to drop a fraud and conspiracy case against Indian billionaire Gautam Adani - a case brought under the Biden administration and killed under this one.

SDNY has jurisdiction over terrorism, espionage, securities fraud, and public corruption. It is arguably the most consequential prosecutor's office in the country. Trump is now placing his personal defense attorney in charge of it.

Jay Clayton, who previously held the SDNY job, is being moved to director of national intelligence - a role that opened when Tulsi Gabbard resigned and that Trump briefly tried to fill with Bill Pulte, the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, before congressional pressure forced a different choice.

The chain here is not complicated. The office that convicted him gets his lawyer. The intelligence community gets the man who ran the housing finance regulator. A personal attorney now controls a portfolio that includes public corruption cases.

This is what the completion of the project looks like.

[Senator Chris Van Hollen @ChrisVanHollen]

$12 million. That's how much taxpayer money the Trump Administration spent to rehire the same federal workers they'd previously fired.

Talk about waste, fraud, and abuse – this Administration commits all three on a daily basis.

[SEIU @SEIU]

If corporations can’t afford to pay their workforce a livable wage, maybe they should spend less on yachts, lavish trips, and mansions. Just a thought.

[Melanie D'Arrigo @DarrigoMelanie]

When corporations pay poverty wages, our tax dollars subsidize their workers’ salaries through social safety nets.

Their profits are our tax hikes.

[Reich-Wing Watch @ReichWingWatch]

🚨Christopher G. Walter, 52, of Deshler, Ohio — Lead Pastor of Immanuel Lutheran Church, school bus driver, and registered Republican — has been arrested and charged with grooming and s*xually battering a minor.

Court records indicate the alleged victim was a member of his own congregation.

Walter was booked into the Corrections Center of Northwest Ohio on June 2. A judge set bond at $30,000 with 10% allowed.

His employer, Patrick Henry Local Schools, suspended him without pay.

Bishop Daniel Beaudoin of the Northwestern Ohio Synod terminated Walter following his arrest.

Voter records show Walter is a registered Republican in Henry County, Ohio.

The MAGA culture continues to permeate through American society.

The right-wing media? Nowhere to be found.

Could you imagine the coverage this would be getting if it was an LGBTQ person?

White conservative men in positions of authority always get a pass for this type of behavior.

[Democracy Docket @DemocracyDocket]

⚠️ The DOJ wants to cancel voter registrations across the country in the days leading up to the midterm elections in November.

The alarming offensive is emerging in two court cases that could have far-reaching consequences for elections across the country — and SCOTUS could have the final say. https://t.co/L58SZEQpK1

[Mike Levin @MikeLevin]

My friend Jamie Raskin is one of the most careful and principled people in Congress. So when he says the director of the FBI may be running a taxpayer funded slush fund, I pay attention.

Here is what he found.

Kash Patel directed more than $1 million in bonus payments to a small circle of agents in his inner circle and on his security detail.

Some were getting nearly $8,000 every two weeks on top of salaries that were already maxed out at the federal ceiling. A number of them collected close to $40,000 over consecutive pay periods.

The payments came so fast that the FBI’s bonus reserve accounts ran dry and some checks bounced.

So who got the money?

Agents on Patel’s so-called "director’s advisory team."

That is the unit created in 2025 and described internally as a payback squad, built to dig up dirt on the law enforcement officials who investigated Trump and his allies.

Raskin has given Patel until June 29 to account for every payment, every recipient, and any internal review of whether this was even legal.

Patel should answer for all of it.
https://t.co/HZPeRJ2Kqg

[Sheldon Whitehouse @SenWhitehouse]

Here’s what’s interesting.

The judge in her order invited a response into (a) whether DOJ policies were violated; (b) whether the parties colluded and deceived the court; and (c) the client (IRS’s) defense memo.

DOJ’s silence is really deafening here, in the wake of that.

[AnthonyAndrews @anthon7yandrews]

Yuri Milner said to have funneled money to Kushner in the email below from 2017.

[Aaron Rupar @atrupar]

BLUMENTHAL: Was the Capitol attacked on January 6?

BERTHIAUME: Uh. We had activity outside the Capitol, protests and such

BLUMENTHAL: Was the Capitol attacked? You're supposed to be the inspector general

BERTHIAUME: There was protest activity

[Americans For Tax Fairness @4TaxFairness]

SpaceX is public now.

That means we can see certain business documents.

One shows that SpaceX has claimed $1.9 BILLION in tax breaks they think the IRS would reject if they got audited.

Just in case you wondered why Musk and DOGE wanted the IRS defunded so badly.