Lori Dehlin

[Chris Murphy 🟧 @ChrisMurphyCT]

Trump reversed decades of national security objections to selling advanced AI chips to UAE. National security experts were alarmed.

But there was a secret. Before the deal, UAE had sent $187M to the Trumps and $31M to the Witkoffs in secret payments.

Mind blowing corruption.

[Patrick Skinner @SkinnerPm]

Left hand on the ground trying not to hit the pavement; right hand still holding a cell phone. ICE person standing with a one handed grip pointing his gun right at the man’s head.

There is nothing about this that we should accept. We all must reject this. This is our government

[Adam Kinzinger (Slava Ukraini) 🇺🇸🇺🇦 @AdamKinzinger]

Since the whole 2016 trend is happening:

[Tom Dreisbach @TomDreisbach]

I've watched thousands of videos from the Jan. 6 riot as part of NPR's reporting and archive project on that day.

Here are some of the lesser known videos that have really stuck with me.

🧵

[Pete Buttigieg @PeteButtigieg]

"Iron laws of the world"? Some of America's most important national accomplishments are about leading humanity away from this kind of bullshit.

If we let ideologues like Stephen Miller drag us back into a world where brute force is all that matters, all of us will be less safe.

[Acyn @Acyn]

Schiff: I think it's valuable that the American people get a sense of what you have refused to answer today. So these are just some of the questions you refuse to answer, but or have answered with personal attacks on members of this committee. You were asked whether you consulted with career ethics lawyers, as you promised you would do during your nomination hearing. When you approved the president receiving a $400 million gift from the qataris, you refused to answer that question. You were asked who or what role you may have played, or who played the role in asking the trump's name be flagged in any of the Epstein documents gathered by the FBI? You refuse to answer that question. You were asked whether Homan kept the $50,000 bribe money. You refuse to answer that question. You were asked whether Homan paid taxes on the $50,000 bribe money. You refused to answer that question. You were asked, did career prosecutors find insufficient evidence to charge James Comey. You refused to answer that question. You were asked, how are military strikes on these boats in the caribbean legal. And you refuse to even answer that question. You are asked, excuse me, excuse me? You are asked, did you discuss indicting James Comey with the president. You refused to answer that question. You were asked, did you approve the firing of antitrust lawyers who disagreed with the Hewlett Packard merger. You refused to answer that question. You were asked whether you support a restoration fund for violent insurrections, insurrections to attack the capitol on January 6th. Refuse to answer that question. You were asked whether you were firing career professionals, career prosecutors just because they worked on January 6th. Question January 6th investigations. You refuse to answer that question. You were asked by my colleague whether you believe government officials, like immigration officials, have to abide by court orders. You wouldn't answer that question

[Mehdi Hasan @mehdirhasan]

So much disinformation on this site tonight in the wake of the horrific Kirk murder, with conservatives cynically suggesting that all of the political violence in this country comes from the left.

In fact it’s the opposite. Here are the facts for those with short memories:

The man who targeted and killed Democratic state Rep Melissa Hortman was a Trump supporter.

The man who targeted the home of Dem Governor Josh Shapiro was a Trump supporter.

The men who wanted to hang Mike Pence on Jan 6th were Trump supporters.

The man who targeted and killed the son of Obama-appointed District Judge Esther Salas was a Trump supporter.

The man who tried to kidnap Nancy Pelosi and assaulted her husband was a Trump supporter.

The men who were convicted trying to kidnap Dem Governor Gretchen Whitmer were Trump supporters.

The man who sent pipe bombs to the homes of Obama and Biden was a Trump supporter.

There is no equivalent or even similar list of Obama or Biden supporters who have carried out similar murders, attempted murders, or violent attacks.

[Jo @JoJoFromJerz]

Since MAGA is out there once again saying their Melon-hued Messiah is making “prayer great again”, let’s talk about God and Trump, shall we?

When Donald was a 5 year-old boy, he was caught throwing rocks at a baby in a crib in the neighboring yard.

When he was eligible for the draft, while his peers went off to war, he sought medical deferments for an ailment he didn’t have.

He left his first wife, who said he raped her, for his second wife, who he cheated on with his third wife, who he cheated on with a porn star and a Playmate, who he then paid to keep quiet, before he lied about the money he paid them.

Yes, really.

He bragged about grabbing women by the pussy when he wasn’t making fun of their looks, their weight, their menstrual cycles, or calling them “dogs,” he cheated people out of their money, stole from charities, mocked a disabled reporter, joked about Paul Pelosi being attacked by a man with a hammer, opined about having sex with his daughter, insulted people who stutter, said he didn’t want war-wounded amputees in his sight, golfed and tweeted while Americans died from Covid, incited horrific violence in order to install himself in an office he was voted out of, and then pardoned every single person who perpetrated the violence he himself incited.

He is named in the files of a notorious sex trafficker he spent decades being best friends with, and relocated said sex trafficker’s partner in crime to a bougie Club Fed cushioned with comforts most of the survivors of her abuse will never know.

Yes, really.

He’s a sociopathic, narcissistic, pathologically lying, serial sexual predator, and a bigoted, hateful, vitriolic criminal conman who refers to innocent immigrants as “vermin,” while praising murderous despots at the same time.

He can’t cite a single passage from the Bible when asked but will still sell them for profit, he doesn’t attend church but worships instead every Sunday at Our Lady of The Perpetual Mulligan, and he’s even had the audacity to refer to himself as the second coming of Jesus.

Yes, really.

God has turned him into a tomato-sauce-stained sloth-like felon with bruised hands, slurred speech and swollen ankles. God impeached him twice, made him lose reelection once and visited upon his first term in office a once-in-a-lifetime global pandemic which ravaged our country along with the rest of the world. And then God convicted him on 34 counts and found him liable of defamation, sexual abuse & business fraud.

God created someone as hateful, impulsive, intolerant, needy, angry, vengeful, malevolent, selfish, sadistic, depraved, amoral, areligious, idiotic, envious, devious and evil as Donald Trump, made his first presidency the most infamous in the history of time, and then rained down upon him the hammer of justice in historic fashion all so that he could return him to the office he once tried to steal?

That’s God at work, is it?
He handed the highest political office on the planet to the physical embodiment of the seven deadly sins rolled into a sadistic, senile, septuagenarian who personifies everything Jesus spoke against because he is so “devout”?

The truth is that slimmest plurality of Americans, comprised of the dumbest, most willfully self-sabotaging fools in this country put him back in office for a second term because they either couldn’t or wouldn’t vote for a Black woman.

But that victory is what the cult will point to as the “proof” their spiteful psychopathic savior was sent “by God.”

Really?!?

That he was “chosen” by God himself.

Well, that’s straight up bullshit.

But it’s also what they have to tell themselves, because despite everything he’s done and everything he’s said, despite what they can see with their own eyes and hear with their own ears—MAGA will still believe what they need to believe.
Because the truth is that this was never about God.
These people don’t worship God.
They worship Trump.

[julie k. brown @jkbjournalist]

A friend sent me this. Heartbreaking.

[Sesame Street @sesamestreet]

For more than 50 years, Sesame Workshop has been proud to partner with PBS to bring learning and joy to children across America. Generations of children have benefitted from the public investment that has enabled PBS to do such important work, and the need remains. PBS, we’re so proud to be your neighbor. 💛💚

[Acyn @Acyn]

Jessica: 40% of Trump's wealth has been accumulated since he became president because of two crypto coins.

Gutfeld: This is not even part of the segment. You’re talking about a meme coin.

Jessica: No, I’m talking who is corrupt.

Gutfeld: Did he try to cover that up? I don’t think so

[Don Winslow @donwinslow]

Jeanine Pirro is the 23rd Fox News employee that Donald Trump has named to his administration.

23rd.

[Ruth Ben-Ghiat @ruthbenghiat]

Authoritarian leader cult alert

[James Tate @JamesTate121]

Former Defense Secretary and retired Marine Corps General James Mattis has released a statement. Here is the text of the complete statement.
IN UNION THERE IS STRENGTH
I have watched this week’s unfolding events, angry and appalled. The words “Equal Justice Under Law” are carved in the pediment of the United States Supreme Court. This is precisely what protesters are rightly demanding. It is a wholesome and unifying demand—one that all of us should be able to get behind. We must not be distracted by a small number of lawbreakers. The protests are defined by tens of thousands of people of conscience who are insisting that we live up to our values—our values as people and our values as a nation.
When I joined the military, some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside.
We must reject any thinking of our cities as a “battlespace” that our uniformed military is called upon to “dominate.” At home, we should use our military only when requested to do so, on very rare occasions, by state governors. Militarizing our response, as we witnessed in Washington, D.C., sets up a conflict—a false conflict—between the military and civilian society. It erodes the moral ground that ensures a trusted bond between men and women in uniform and the society they are sworn to protect, and of which they themselves are a part. Keeping public order rests with civilian state and local leaders who best understand their communities and are answerable to them.
James Madison wrote in Federalist 14 that “America united with a handful of troops, or without a single soldier, exhibits a more forbidding posture to foreign ambition than America disunited, with a hundred thousand veterans ready for combat.” We do not need to militarize our response to protests. We need to unite around a common purpose. And it starts by guaranteeing that all of us are equal before the law.
Instructions given by the military departments to our troops before the Normandy invasion reminded soldiers that “The Nazi slogan for destroying us…was ‘Divide and Conquer.’ Our American answer is ‘In Union there is Strength.’” We must summon that unity to surmount this crisis—confident that we are better than our politics.
Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership. We can unite without him, drawing on the strengths inherent in our civil society. This will not be easy, as the past few days have shown, but we owe it to our fellow citizens; to past generations that bled to defend our promise; and to our children.
We can come through this trying time stronger, and with a renewed sense of purpose and respect for one another. The pandemic has shown us that it is not only our troops who are willing to offer the ultimate sacrifice for the safety of the community. Americans in hospitals, grocery stores, post offices, and elsewhere have put their lives on the line in order to serve their fellow citizens and their country. We know that we are better than the abuse of executive authority that we witnessed in Lafayette Square. We must reject and hold accountable those in office who would make a mockery of our Constitution. At the same time, we must remember Lincoln’s “better angels,” and listen to them, as we work to unite.
Only by adopting a new path—which means, in truth, returning to the original path of our founding ideals—will we again be a country admired and respected at home and abroad.
-Veterans For Common Sense

[Seth Abramson @SethAbramson]

Trump told us he had a deal with El Salvadoran dictator Nayib Bukele to temporary hold U.S. deportees for a fee.

Now we know that was a lie.

Trump told Bukele he'd *sell* him bodies to *own*—to be housed in his massive prison until death.

America is back in the slave trade.

[Melanie D'Arrigo @DarrigoMelanie]

By invoking a national economic emergency under IEEPA, Trump can now:

- deploy the military domestically
- suspend labor laws
- freeze finances
- expand warantless searches
- control domestic radio, social media and broadcast networks

Pay attention.
It’s not just about tariffs.

[Everything Price Sufferer (but especially eggs) @agraybee]

"Non-citizens don't get due process" without due process there are no citizens, you are whatever the closest ICE agent says you are.

[Occupy Democrats @OccupyDemocrats]

BREAKING: Yale University exposes Donald Trump and the entire Republican Party by revealing that their proposed budget plan would transfer a massive amount of wealth from the poorest 40% of Americans to the richest 1%.

The numbers simply do not lie...

According to Yale's Budget Lab, the MAGA plan to dish out $4.5 trillion in tax cuts paired with $1.5 trillion in spending cuts will disproportionately affect the poorest swath of the population.

Researchers Harris Eppsteiner and John Ricco explain that the MAGA budget includes a staggering $230 billion in cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) over ten years, as well as an $880 billion gutting of Medicaid in the same time span.

While Trump has insisted that he doesn't want to cut Medicaid, experts agree that there is simply no way to finance the budget plan without such cuts.

"The overall effect of these three policy changes would be regressive, shifting after-tax-and-transfer resources away from tax units (members of a household filing a tax return together) at the bottom of the distribution towards those at the top," they write.

"Tax units at the bottom of the income distribution would see a reduction in after-tax-and-transfer income of 5%, those in the middle of the distribution would see a modest increase of 0.6%, and those in the top five percent of tax units would see an increase of 3%. More than 100% of the net fiscal benefit would accrue to the top quintile," they add.

Of course, this is what MAGA always stood for. The gullible voters who thought that Trump actually cared about the working class are going to see their benefits slashed so that billionaires can buy more yachts.

Please retweet and ❤️ if you oppose the MAGA budget — and consider joining the growing exodus to Tribel, a new pro-democracy social network that is exploding in popularity because Twitter and Facebook are trying to stop its growth — which is only making Tribel grow even faster. Please follow us on Tribel to get all of our breaking news alerts sent straight to your phone or computer by clicking the following link: https://t.co/HnJzSKjCwX

[Liberal Jane @liberaljanee]

[THREAD] This #WomensHistoryMonth, let's not forget how many of our rights were only won in recent decades, and weren’t given by asking nicely and waiting.

We need to fight for our rights.

Here's are a few examples:

[Zac ~ VANCOUVER N3✨ @alltoozac]

Yeah they gotta do it themselves now since trump fired like 90% of the national park service