NewsFlash

Yeah, but that's not "no" defense budget. 

They've got a budget, and funded it. I suspect that going forward they'll be using more of it, if things keep hotting up over there.

Shutdown threat: The federal government edged closer to a shutdown after Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, said the stopgap bill to fund the government for six months did not have enough support for a vote in the Senate. He said Democrats in the chamber instead wanted a 30-day bill to negotiate a bipartisan solution. The government’s funding is set to run out on Friday and there is little time to find another path: House Republicans purposefully left town after passing the six-month funding bill.

...
After a private party meeting, Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, instead urged Republicans to consider another extension to allow time to consider individual spending bills. “Our caucus is unified on a clean April 11 C.R. that will keep the government open and give Congress time to negotiate bipartisan legislation that can pass,” Mr. Schumer said, using the shorthand for a continuing resolution to extend federal funding temporarily.

Democrats have been dubious about the Republican-drafted bill passed by the House on Tuesday, which would keep federal spending going at roughly current levels for the next six months, saying it would give the Trump administration too much leeway to continue efforts to drastically overhaul the government. The bill would need the support of at least eight Democrats to overcome procedural hurdles and come to a final vote.

Federal funding is set to lapse at 12:01 a.m. on March 15 if Congress does not act before then to extend it. Any changes in the House bill or another extension would require the House to return and approve it, which is highly unlikely. Republican leaders deliberately adjourned the chamber and left town after passing the legislation on Tuesday to effectively force the Senate to accept their funding legislation."


https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/03/12/us/trump-news

The chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities, Shelly C. Lowe, left her position on Wednesday “at the direction of President Trump,” the agency said. Ms. Lowe, a scholar of higher education and the first Native American to lead the agency, was nominated by former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. in October 2021 and confirmed by the Senate in February 2022. Michael McDonald, the agency’s general counsel, was named its acting chairman on Wednesday.

“I can confirm that, at the direction of President Trump, Shelly Lowe has departed her position as chair of N.E.H.,” a spokesman for the agency, Paula Wasley, said in a statement. She said Mr. McDonald would serve as acting chairman “until such time as the president nominates and the Senate confirms a new N.E.H. chairman.” Agency chairs are appointed for four-year terms, though some have served across administrations. Maria Rosario Jackson, the chair of the endowment’s sister agency, the National Endowment for the Arts, announced her resignation on Jan. 17, shortly before Mr. Trump’s inauguration.

The National Endowment for the Humanities was founded in 1965 and has awarded more than $6 billion in grants to museums, historic sites, universities, libraries and other organizations, according to its website. Ms. Lowe’s departure comes as Mr. Trump has moved to put his stamp on federal cultural agencies, most prominently the Kennedy Center, where he purged Biden appointees from the bipartisan board, fired the center’s president and had himself elected chairman.  The president has also issued sweeping executive orders banning diversity, equity and inclusion programs across the federal government while calling for the promotion of “patriotic history.”

MORE at https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/03/12/us/trump-news

The acting head of the government’s human resources arm, Charles Ezell, will no longer testify on Thursday in a case challenging the legality of the recent mass firings of federal workers, lawyers for the Trump administration said.

The move could pave the way for a federal judge to order the government to pause the firings.

Mr. Ezell had been ordered to appear before a San Francisco judge as part of a lawsuit brought against the Office of Personnel Management by unions representing some of the fired workers.  As the office’s acting chief, Mr. Ezell began issuing guidance in January that agencies interpreted as orders to fire federal employees, particularly those with probationary status. That guidance is at the heart of multiple legal challenges, with the once-obscure agency assuming a lead role in President Trump’s government-gutting initiative.

According to a legal complaint from the employee unions, Mr. Ezell held a meeting on Feb. 13 with the heads of many federal agencies in which he ordered them to fire tens of thousands of employees. The next day, O.P.M. provided a template to agencies to use for the termination letters, stating that employees were being fired for performance reasons, according to the plaintiffs. The unions argued that O.P.M. does not have the authority to make such personnel decisions and asked the court to rule that the office’s orders were illegal and force the government to stop firing people at their direction.


MORE - https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/03/12/us/trump-news

SEE ALSO - https://www.yahoo.com/news/did-top-trump-administration-official-205513357.html

https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/11/politics/federal-judge-trump-administration-testify-probationary-firings/index.html

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday it would roll back dozens of regulations on energy, air quality and carbon emissions.

The rollbacks are intended to reduce costs associated with energy and personal vehicles and the business of manufacturing. Administration officials discussing the rollbacks in statements on Wednesday emphasized those financial and economic costs, and said the changes will translate to increased jobs, particularly in the automotive sector. "We are driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion to drive down cost of living for American families, unleash American energy, bring auto jobs back to the U.S. and more," EPA administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement.

Particular changes expected from the agency include:

    Reconsidering the 2009 Endangerment Finding, under which the EPA held that greenhouse gas emissions "threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations." This scientific finding became the legal basis of other EPA standards and regulation on greenhouse emissions.
    Reconsidering rules that would have required coal and natural gas power plants to reduce or otherwise capture 90% of greenhouse emissions through 2032.
    Revising the definition of "waters of the United States" to align with a 2023 Supreme Court decision that limited the bodies of water covered by the Clean Water Act.
    Reconsidering 2024 regulations intended to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles.

MORE - https://www.10news.com/politics/president-trumps-first-100-days/environmental-protection-agency-announces-rollback-of-dozens-of-emissions-and-environmental-rules

It's too much to keep up with.

I'll restrict to posting the truly earth-shattering stuff from here. I'm sure that by now you will have gotten the idea of what's actually going on that doesn't necessarily get a lot of press. It's going to be a very, very ugly few years. And I'm not convinced we'll be voting at mid-terms as we should be, or that if we do it won't either be rigged or ignored.

So. Maybe we can hope for an act of God.

Stay safe.

This counts.

 

Trump Administration Live Updates: Judge Orders Thousands of Federal Workers Reinstated

A federal judge on Thursday ordered six federal agencies to rehire thousands of workers with probationary status who had been fired as part of President Trump’s government-gutting initiative. Ruling from the bench, Judge William J. Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California went further than he had previously, finding that the Trump administration’s firing of probationary workers had essentially been done unlawfully and by fiat through the Office of Personnel Management, the government’s human resources arm.... Judge Alsup concluded that the government’s actions were a “gimmick” designed to expeditiously carry out mass firings. He said it was clear that federal agencies had followed directives from the Office of Personnel Management to use a loophole allowing them to fire probationary workers en masse based on poor performance, regardless of their actual conduct on the job. “It is a sad day when our government would fire some good employee and say it was based on performance when they know good and well that’s a lie,” he said. “It was a sham in order to try to avoid statutory requirements,” he added.

[SNIP]

FROM https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/03/13/us/trump-tariff-government-news#trump-federal-workers-rehire-ruling

SEE ALSO - https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-judge-extend-block-trump-administration-ordering-mass-firings-2025-03-13/

So. The government shutdown. As I understand it, if the Democrats block the spending bill, a government shutdown as of midnight tonight could go on almost indefinitely until a bill was approved.  Trump kept the government shut down for like a full month during his last term, and people were hurting as a result. If Trump didn't want all those agencies to be actually alive and functioning, all he has to do is keep a budget from being passed. He has the House and Senate controlled, so it's entirely possible he'd do that. Collateral damage appears to be of no concern to him. He, apparently, would be solely in charge.... [Edit: I believe Schumer said Trump would have the equivalent of several massive blowtorches  "to destroy huge parts of the government far beyond what any American would want.”]

If the Democrats cave in and the funding bill is passed, a large percentage of people in this country will be outraged and feel betrayed by those Democrats, who apparently have no plan at all as to how to fight all this. The outrage would be quite vitriolic, I would think.

The budget for veterans and several other vital services will be slashed in the proposed budget. These cuts would last until at least September.  It's another lose/lose, and Checkmate.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/13/politics/deadline-federal-government-shutdown-congress/index.html

https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/13/politics/schumer-gop-funding-bill/index.html

This IS really a big deal.


 President Donald Trump is expected to invoke a sweeping wartime act that could speed up his plan for mass deportations. The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 could give the president tremendous power to target and remove undocumented immigrants. The last time the act was invoked was during World War II, when Japanese Americans were detained and sent to internment camps....According to the Brennan Center for Justice, the act could pave the way for faster deportations without hearings and based on a person's country of birth or citizenship.

FROM https://www.10news.com/news/local-news/japanese-americans-react-to-trumps-plans-to-invoke-alien-enemies-act

SEE ALSO https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-alien-enemies-act-1798-deportations-guantanamo/

Canadian woman put in chains, detained by ICE after entering San Diego border
Third foreign national sent to detention center from San Ysidro crossing

https://www.10news.com/news/local-news/never-seen-anything-so-inhumane-canadian-woman-put-in-chains-detained-by-ice-after-entering-san-diego-border

https://www.10news.com/news/local-news/i-feel-like-we-have-been-kidnapped-canadian-speaks-out-in-tearful-video-call-from-ice-detention

Canadians and other non-USA nationals might want to avoid trying to enter the USA from Mexico.

Canadians and other non-USA nationals might want to avoid trying to enter the USA from Mexico.

Or even being near to the Mexican border.

We have been stopped 3 times in Texas for just being close to the border. The last time this happened to us was in 2015 when ALL the traffic on I10 near El Paso was diverted off for documents checks. We were on our way to our daughter’s place in Santa Monica at the time.  This was the start of a very long road trip going up the Californian coast into Canada so we fortunately had our US passports with us.

The 2 other times we were stopped was while visiting Big Bend National Park, which was more understandable and to be expected so we also had our US passports with us.

Draft List for New Travel Ban Proposes Trump Target 43 Countries

...A draft circulating inside the administration lists three tiers of countries whose citizens may face restrictions on entering the United States....It is also not clear whether people with existing visas would be exempted from the ban, or if their visas would be canceled. Nor is it clear whether the administration intends to exempt existing green card holders, who are already approved for lawful permanent residency...Some of the countries on the draft red and orange lists were sanctioned by Mr. Trump in his first-term travel bans, but many are new. Some share characteristics with the earlier lists — they are generally Muslim-majority or otherwise nonwhite, poor and have governments that are considered weak or corrupt...But the reason several others were included was not immediately clear. Bhutan, for example, was proposed for an absolute ban on entry. The small Buddhist and Hindu country is sandwiched between China and India, neither of which were on any of the draft lists....

FROM - https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/14/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html

AND - https://www.newsweek.com/trump-travel-ban-list-2045321

[Looking down the road, he could seek to ban citizens from any country that offends him. What that would do to dual citizens and green-card holders from those countries who are already in-country is not pleasant to think about. Since that could potentially involve people with ANY dual citizenship, it's concerning. This one bears watching as it, as it should hopefully, winds through the courts.]

 


Federal judge temporarily blocks Trump’s ability to quickly deport noncitizens under Alien Enemies Act

A federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s ability to use a sweeping wartime authority to quickly deport some migrants whom the US has accused of being affiliated with the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. The judge also ordered any planes in the air carrying some of those migrants to turn back to the US. 

Earlier Saturday, the Trump administration invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which gives the president tremendous authority to target and remove undocumented immigrants, to speed up the deportations of migrants. The law is designed to be invoked if the US is at war with another country, or a foreign nation has invaded the US or threatened to do so.  US District Judge James Boasberg had blocked the administration from deporting five individuals who challenged President Donald Trump’s use of the act. Following a hastily scheduled hearing hours later, Boasberg broadened his temporary block on the administration, granting a request from the plaintiffs’ lawyers to certify a provisional class that covers all noncitizens in US custody who would be subject to Trump’s proclamation. Boasberg, who serves as the chief judge of the federal trial-level court in Washington, DC, agreed that those individuals’ deportations should also be temporarily blocked while the legal challenge proceeds.

“Particularly given the plaintiffs’ information, unrebutted by the government, that flights are actively departing and planning to depart, I do not believe that I’m able to wait any longer,” Boasberg continued. “Any plane containing these folks that is going to take off or is in the air needs to be returned to the United States.”  The judge said the temporary restraining order will remain in effect for 14 days “or until further order of the court.” He set another hearing in the case for later this month. “I think there’s clearly irreparable harm here given these folks will be deported,” Boasberg said. “A brief delay in their removal does not cause the government any harm.”

The Justice Department has appealed Boasberg’s decisions to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals.   

MORE AT - https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/15/politics/judge-blocks-trump-wartime-authorities-alien-enemies-act/index.html

 Trump announces US aerial attacks against Houthis in Yemen

President Donald Trump said he has ordered a “decisive” military action against Houthi rebels in Yemen, opening a new salvo against the Iran-backed group that has targeted shipping lanes in the Red Sea. US personnel were carrying out aerial attacks on Houthi bases, leaders and missile defenses “to protect American shipping, air, and naval assets, and to restore Navigational Freedom,” Trump said. The US would deploy “overwhelming lethal force” against the group “until we have achieved our objective,” he wrote on Truth Social. “They have waged an unrelenting campaign of piracy, violence, and terrorism against American, and other, ships, aircraft, and drones.”




More on this and more actions taken at https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/trump-administration-presidency-03-15-25/index.html

[Not earth-shattering, but a smoking gun.]


Final report into Trump's handling of classified documents should never be released: DOJ

Last month, the White House said the FBI returned boxes of materials.

Hours after President Donald Trump publicly praised the judge who oversaw his classified documents case, lawyers with the Department of Justice urged the U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon to ensure the final report into Trump's alleged conduct never becomes public.

MORE at https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/final-report-trumps-handling-classified-documents-released-doj/story?id=119823414