Niea Gardner

Sharing random streams of consciousness. Observations about this thing called life. Politically (in)correct at times.

[BrooklynDad_Defiant!☮️ @mmpadellan]

WOW, everybody is there at the Grand Opening for the Obama Presidential Center: The Clintons, The Bushes, The Bidens, and of course The Obamas.

Every presidential family that matters. 🙏💪🏽

[Katie @KazooKatherine]

Wow! Raskin just sent Kash Patel this letter. It’s umm… interesting. Read it twice. 👀

The House Judiciary minority says Patel has handed out more than $1 million in “bonus” payments to agents on his Director’s Advisory Team and his security detail. The letter calls it a personal slush fund.

Here’s the mechanism. Federal pay is capped by statute. The letter alleges Patel routed money around that cap. Nearly $8,000 per agent, every two-week pay period. Some collected five in a row. Roughly $40,000 each.

Then the accounts ran dry. Raskin says some of the payments bounced.

Who got paid? The letter points to the unit NOTUS reported as the “Payback Squad.” And it ties the cash to silence, alleging agents were polygraphed over whether they helped cover up Patel’s drinking.

Now the other column. The agents he fired include an FBI Medal of Valor recipient, the official who led the Jan 6 law enforcement response, a Marine combat veteran cut weeks after his wife died of cancer, and a counterintelligence unit that tracked Iranian threats.

Reward the loyal. Purge the rest.

Raskin wants every bonus, every authorization, and every legal memo on whether this broke federal law. Deadline June 29.

[Acyn @Acyn]

De Niro: I hate to say it, but loving our country is starting to sound like an abused spouse saying they love their abuser.

I can’t love a country that starts stupid and inhumane wars, killing thousands of innocents and indirectly causing the deaths and suffering of millions more.

I can’t love a country that takes healthcare away from millions of people and uses that money to enrich their pals in the Trump-Epstein class.

I can’t love a country that sends out masked militias to shoot citizens in the streets, torture our neighbors, and separate families.

I can’t love a country that’s led by a racist, misogynist, xenophobic tyrant.

And let me just say it: I can’t love a country that’s led by Donald Trump and his sycophant Congress.

[Emoluments Clause @Emolclause]

#BREAKING: Psaki: “…today has also been a very good day for Donald Trump’s billionaire buddies. Tonight we got the news that the Trump DOJ has approved Paramounts $111 billion deal to acquire Warner Brothers Discovery. That means two major movie studios, two major streaming services, CNN and CBS News will now all be under one roof, and all of it will be controlled by David Ellison, the son of course of MAGA billionaire Larry Ellison. Now, did paying $16 million to settle a completely BOGUS lawsuit over Kamala Harris’ interview, installing Bari Weiss at CBS News, gutting 60 Minutes and firing Stephen Colbert help grease the wheels a little bit? Who knows? I think you know. But what we do know for sure, is that it was a big day for the the Ellison boys.” 😂😳

[Congresswoman Deborah Ross @RepDeborahRoss]

The DOJ is attempting a cover-up.

I discovered a quiet policy change that now lets the AG approve prison transfers at their discretion.

This comes after they moved Ghislaine Maxwell to a prison that doesn't allow sex offenders. This is an attempt to cover their tracks. I will keep demanding answers.

[Sammi🦋 @StoriesBySammi]

The U.S. government just made a land deal with the world's first trillionaire. Not a sale. A trade.

Because apparently that's how we do things now.

715 acres of the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge - built by Congress in 1979 to protect one of the most biodiverse wildlife corridors left in North America - handed to SpaceX.

Endangered ocelots. Aplomado falcons. Piping plovers. Land the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas has called sacred since long before there was a United States.

SpaceX built a rocket launch site next door. Then came the explosions. Concrete and metal hurled six miles across refuge land. A 2024 study found that after one launch, every single monitored shorebird nest near the site suffered egg damage or loss. The Fish and Wildlife Service's response was not enforcement. It was a land swap.

FOIA documents show internal planning for this transfer started as early as April 2025 - while Musk was running DOGE and threatening to fire federal workers who didn't justify their jobs to him. The agency developed what they called "the most expedited schedule possible" to get it done.

Part of what's being handed over includes the Palmito Ranch Battlefield - the site of the last battle of the Civil War. A National Historic Landmark. Once transferred, SpaceX can restrict public access whenever they want.

25,000+ people submitted public comments. Most opposed the deal. The government moved forward anyway.

A coalition of tribal and conservation groups filed a federal lawsuit this week to stop it. Because someone has to.

Why are we cutting real estate deals with a trillionaire when we could have just made him pay for it?

#DemsUnited

[MP Arizona☀️🏳️‍🌈💙🌵🐕🐕‍🦺🫂💦🏜🐟🌴🎙🌎🌻♍️🌊 @AzPetrich]

Probably just a coincidence that a man becomes a trillionair about a year after having unfettered access to our government's finances, right? 🤔

[Acyn @Acyn]

Joy Reid: Brendan Carr is weaponizing the agency to bully and control the press and suppress the wider televised media.

Don Lemon arrested. Georgia Fort arrested. Terry Moran fired from ABC.

Scott Pelley fired from CBS by the clique of far-right ideologues who bought it and handed it over to a zealot named Bari Weiss, who may soon also control CNN.

Jim Acosta out at CNN. Karen Attiah fired from The Washington Post. And me, more than a year ago.

All of us shown the door for just doing our jobs, standing up to the administration and, in my case, also for speaking out against the genocide.

[Nathan J Robinson @NathanJRobinson]

Instead of discussing how Elon Musk is now the world's first trillionaire, we should talk about how he killed hundreds of thousands of people through his dismantling of food and medical aid to poor countries
https://t.co/8kY171r5w1

[Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @ReichlinMelnick]

The "Trump Kennedy Center" apparently repeatedly ignored the terms of a contract with the Washington National Opera, locked the WNO out from viewing their own financial records, and is now refusing to return$17 million of their own money — and even already spent some of it!

[Acyn @Acyn]

Buttigieg: Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that there have to be nine Supreme Court justices. That one doesn't even take a constitutional amendment. It just takes a readiness to set up a court that fits this country. 

We could have 13 seats matching the district structure of the federal judiciary, but also a process that makes it less partisan. We cannot have partisan warfare every time there's an opening on the court

[Acyn @Acyn]

Buttigieg: We didn't know it, but we've all been trusting our lives to the restraint of whoever the president might be. And now we have a president who is completely unrestrained. And so the only answer to that is a functioning Congress.

It turns out we do not have a functioning Congress. The House of Representatives is not representative. One of the most important organs of our democracy is not democratic.

They say, "Oh, no. We're not manipulating the map to disempower black people. We're manipulating the map to disempower Democrats who happen to be black people.”

So, the time has come to make it impossible to manipulate the map for any reason and just have fair maps.

[Anthony Scaramucci @Scaramucci]

Trump said something outside a press gaggle that I don’t think enough people caught.

A reporter called him out on the corruption. He gave three responses.

1. I have the right to do it.
2. He’s not stealing that much. A billion or two billion dollars. Not that much money. Classic Trump.
3. People don’t care.

That’s the permission structure. Our collective apathy is what they’re using to justify everything happening in Washington right now.

Please stand up and prove him wrong.

[MayoIsSpicyy @Mayoisspicyy]

FACT: Trump cut funding to stop the spread of screwworms. Then he signed an executive order allowing 100,000 metric tons of beef from Argentina into the U.S. per year. America eradicated screwworms in 1966, while Argentina has been struggling with them for well over a century.

[Scott Dworkin @funder]

DOJ lawyers just got caught flat-out lying to a federal court to seize private medical records of transgender children. Now, a judge has referred them for potential disbarment. Read how the plot failed: 👇
https://t.co/MixXytxd6U

[Brian Allen @allenanalysis]

BREAKING: Scott Pelley Just Made A Pretty Stunning Allegation.

According to Pelley, CBS leadership wanted a story about the killing of ICE protester Renée Good changed to better match Trump's version of events.

Pelley says he was told management wanted protesters portrayed as more violent and wanted Good described as driving toward the officer who shot her. He says the video evidence showed otherwise.

Then came the admission.

"There was a thumb on the scale for the president's version of events."

A veteran journalist with 37 years at CBS is alleging political pressure was applied to change the facts of a story.

That's a remarkable accusation.

[Q The Storm Rider @Q_TheStormRider]

JUST IN: Reporter Catherine Herridge testifies that CBS News locked her out of the building and seized all her files, says she was working with sources to "expose government corruption."

Nothing at all going on here, folks.

"CBS News’ decision to seize my reporting records crossed a red line that I believe should never be crossed by any media organization."

"Multiple sources said they were concerned that by working with me to expose government corruption and misconduct they would be identified and exposed."

"CBS News locked me out of the building and seized hundreds of pages of my reporting files, including confidential source information."

FOLLOW ME, THE NEXT DROP WILL BE SHOCKING.

[Anna @AnnaDeMilanese]

Trump lässt 900 Tiefseesensoren aus dem Atlantik und Pazifik herausziehen – ein 370-Millionen-Dollar-Netzwerk das seit 2016 läuft.
Es sollte 30 Jahre laufen. Es wird nach 10 Jahren gestoppt. Was diese Sensoren messen: Meerestemperaturen. Strömungen. Salzgehalt. CO₂-Aufnahme. El-Niño-Früherkennung. AMOC – den Atlantischen Umwälzstrom der Europas Wetter reguliert. Ozeanograph Ed Dever: „Es ist ein lähmender Informationsverlust."

Project 2025 hatte das Netzwerk explizit als Quelle von „Klimaalarmismus" bezeichnet und seine Abschaltung gefordert.
Der Kongress hatte die Finanzierung zweimal gerettet.
Die NSF zog es trotzdem durch. Die Folgen werden Jahrzehnte dauern. Daten die wir nie mehr bekommen werden. 1/2
🇺🇸🇪🇺

[Popular Liberal 🇺🇸 @PopularLiberal]

BOOM! Jamie Raskin is UNSTOPPABLE: Constitutional scholar, lawyer, and competent congressman Jamie Raskin is looking healthier and more energized than ever.

He just drew a moral line on the House floor that the GOP can't cross: "We draw a line against the rape and sexual violation of children."

He named the banks that bankrolled Epstein's billion-dollar trafficking ring: JPMorgan Chase, Deutsche Bank, Bank of America, and Bank of New York Mellon.

He named Alex Acosta—Trump's Labor Secretary—who killed the investigation that could've brought down the entire network. He looked directly at the GOP and said: "You have children. Don't you want to know?" Then he mentioned college sports teams. You know who that is.

Jim Jordan—who had a locker two down from Dr. Richard Strauss at Ohio State, whom wrestlers say looked them in the face and dismissed their abuse as "that's just Strauss," and who they say KNEW and did NOTHING while 177 young men were violated.

And the files? They show Elon Musk emailing Epstein asking about the "wildest party" on his island and responding to Epstein's offer of "no one over 25 and all very cute." JPMorgan lawsuits allege Epstein referred to Musk as a client WHILE moving billions for his trafficking operation.

This isn't about party. This is about truth.

Conservatives: You scream about "protecting children" while voting for the men who covered up the largest child sex trafficking ring in American history.

How do you sleep? How do you vote? How do you look your kids in the eye?

[Mike Levin @MikeLevin]

This is really stupid, and it’s not getting enough attention.

The Trump administration is pulling a working $368 million ocean monitoring system out of the water, equipment taxpayers already bought, built, and sank into the deep ocean.

And they are doing it right when the oceans are behaving in ways that alarm the scientists who study them.

Record-breaking temperatures.

A system of Atlantic currents that may be lurching toward collapse.

The response?

Yank out the instruments and walk away.

That is not budgeting. That is smashing the gauges while the engine is on fire and calling it efficiency.

For what? The Trump administration dressed it up as a “nimbler approach” and “smart lifecycle management,” which is fancy nonsense for “we shut it off and hoped nobody would ask why.” There is no return-on-investment analysis. They cannot show taxpayers save a dime, because the gear is already paid for and the science it produces protects real money and real lives.

The kicker: the same people killing the monitors want to mine the deep sea for minerals. So they are destroying the only tools that could measure what that mining does. That is not an accident.

That is the point. You cannot see the damage if you break the instruments first.
https://t.co/MzE4AW1QBv