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Taking a break from the awful to celebrate - remember that? - indefatigable civil rights icon, all-round mensch and former chicken preacher John Lewis, who died five years ago today after a lifetime of good trouble. The peerless "moral compass of Congress," now sorely lacking, Lewis never gave up seeking his "beloved community" even as he acknowledged he might never live in it. "Our struggle is not (of) a day, month or year," he said: "It is the struggle of a lifetime."
Over 60 years, Lewis' lifetime of struggle extended from student lunch-counter sit-ins, beatings as one of 13 original volunteers on Freedom Rides, founding and leading SNCC, speaking fire as the youngest organizer of the March in Washington and Bloody Sunday's seminal Selma march to, eventually, the halls of Congress, where he served 17 terms while persisting in making good trouble in ongoing fights for peace, immigrants, LGBTQ rights and voting rights that, he resolutely declared, “For generations we have marched, fought and even died for." Above all, "John believed in the power of ordinary people to do extraordinary things."
Born the trouble-making son of sharecroppers outside Troy, Alabama in 1940, he attended segregated public schools. As a boy, he wanted to be a minister, and famously practiced his oratory on the family chickens. Denied a library card for the color of his skin, he became a voracious reader. He was a teenager when he heard, riveted, Martin Luther King Jr. preaching on the radio. They met when Lewis was trying to become the first Black student at Alabama’s segregated Troy State University; he ultimately attended the American Baptist Theological Seminary and Nashville's Fisk University.
Along with Diane Nash and other members of the Nashville Student Movement, he began organizing sit-ins at whites-only lunch counters after four Black college students in Greensboro, N.C. first did it; there, staff refused to serve them but the students wouldn't leave, and then went back with more recruits. Lewis' first arrest came in February 1960 at age 20, when he sat down at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter in Nashville. Angry white patrons beat and tried to remove him and his fellow protesters; when police finally arrived, they arrested the protesters.
“I didn't necessarily want to go to jail," he recalled in a 1973 interview. “But we knew (it) would rally the student community." And it did: By the end of the day 98 students were in jail, hundreds followed, and that spring Nashville lunch counters began serving Blacks. "Nashville prepared me," he said. "We grew up sitting down or sitting in. And we grew up very fast." Soon, Lewis was also traveling through a belligerent, still-segregated South as a Freedom Rider, enduring more beatings and arrests. Between 1960 and 1966, he was arrested at least 40 times; as a Congressman, he was arrested five more times.
As the 23-year-old head of SNCC, he gave a fiery speech at 1963's MLK Jr.-led March on Washington. Older fellow-organizers - Philip Randolph, 74, and James Farmer, Whitney Young, Roy Wilkins - urged him to tone it down; he scaled back critiques of JFK and dropped a "scorched earth" reference, but it was still potent. "To those who have said, 'Be patient'...We are tired. We are tired of being beaten by policemen, (of) seeing our people locked up in jail... How long can we be patient? We want our freedom and we want it now...We shall splinter the segregated South into a thousand pieces and put them together in an image of God and democracy.”
Two years later, hands tucked in his genteel tan overcoat, he led over 600 voting rights protesters over Selma's Edmund Pettus Bridge, named for a Ku Klux Klan leader, in what became known as Bloody Sunday. State troopers and "deputized" white thugs beat him so badly - still-chilling video here - they fractured his skull. Images of the brutality shocked a complacent nation, and eventually helped led to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. When he joined Pres. Obama at the site 55 years later, Lewis was still urging anyone who'd listen to "get in good trouble, necessary trouble, and help redeem the soul of America."
In 1981, Lewis was elected to the Atlanta City Council; in 1986, he won what became his longtime seat in Congress. He spent much of his career in the minority, but when Dems won the House in 2006, he became his party’s senior deputy whip. Humble, friendly, eloquent, he was revered as the "moral compass" of the House. His last arrest was in 2013 as one of 8 Dem lawmakers, including Keith Ellison and Al Green, arrested at a sit-in for immigration reform; police arrested 200 people for "disrupting" the street. Lewis posted a photo: "Arrest number 45." Always, he calmly insisted, "We will find a way to make a way out of no way.”
The last survivor of the civil rights icons, he worked for 15 years toward the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History. When Trump ran in 2016, he sensed the urgency, posting, "I’ve marched, protested, been beaten and arrested - all for the right to vote. Friends (gave) their lives. Honor their sacrifice. Vote." He refused to attend the inauguration because Trump wasn't a "legitimate president." He called him "a racist" after the "shithole countries" slur, and voted for impeachment: “When you see something that is not right, not just, not fair, you have a moral obligation to say something, to do something. Our children and their children will ask us, 'What did you do? What did you say?'"
He died of pancreatic cancer on July 17, 2020, at 80. Nancy Pelosi called him "one of the greatest heroes of American history...May his memory be an inspiration that moves us all to, in the face of injustice, make ‘good trouble, necessary trouble.'” This week, Congressional Black Caucus members honored his legacy by vowing to do the same and reading his works. "His words are more necessary today than ever," said Rep. Jennifer McClellan. "John Lewis understood just as Dr. King did he wasn’t going to reach the promised land of that more perfect union. But he fought for it."
Since his death, Dems have continued to reintroduce the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to restore key, GOP-trashed provisions of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. It has repeatedly stalled in Congress, and for now will likely continue to. But Lewis' colleagues vow to keep pushing for it, said Georgia Rep. Lucy McBath, "to honor his legacy with unshakeable determination to fight for what is right and what is just." "Freedom is not a state; it is an act," said Lewis. "It is not some enchanted garden perched high (where) we can finally sit down and rest. Freedom is the continuous action we all must take." While, he attested at a Stacey Abrams event the year before he died, finding joy. May he rest in peace and power.
To those who feel nothing seems to change: "You must be able and prepared to give until you cannot give any more. We must use our time and our space on this little planet that we call Earth to make a lasting contribution, to leave it a little better than we found it, and now that need is greater than ever before.” - John Lewis, near the end of his life.
- YouTube www.youtube.com
With at least 111 people confirmed dead and more than 150 still missing in Texas' catastrophic flooding as of Wednesday, Democrats in Congress are demanding answers about whether the Trump administration's cuts to federal weather monitoring and emergency management agencies may have hampered the response.
Since President Donald Trump retook office, his administration has unilaterally introduced cuts that have substantially reduced the number of employees at the National Weather Service (NWS) and its parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which forecast weather and collect environmental data. It has done the same to the Federal Emergency Management System (FEMA), which coordinates responses to natural disasters.
And following the passage of the GOP budget reconciliation package last week, further cuts to these agencies are in the works.
As the death count has climbed, Democrats in both the House and Senate have issued calls to investigate whether these cuts may have played a role in making the horrific situation in Texas worse.
"There are some serious questions about the impact of President Trump's assault on NOAA, the National Weather Service, and FEMA, and whether it made these floods more deadly," said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) in a video posted to X Tuesday night. "We aren't doing our job if we aren't seeking answers to these questions."
Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cut NOAA staff by 11% through a combination of terminations and buyouts. According to The Associated Press, this included "hundreds of jobs at NWS, with staffing down by at least 20% at nearly half of the 122 NWS field offices nationally and at least a half dozen no longer staffed 24 hours a day."
FEMA, meanwhile has shed around 2,000 permanent employees, around a third of its permanent workforce.
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson dismissed what she called "false claims" that Trump's cuts affected Texas' disaster response. Jackson said the National Weather Service "did their job, even issuing a flood watch more than 12 hours in advance." Jason Runyen, a meteorologist with the NWS, also told the AP that the NWS handling Austin and San Antonio had more forecasters on duty than normal.
However, questions still remain about how cuts may have affected other parts of the emergency response.
According to former NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad, who spoke to CNN on Tuesday, the problem was not the NWS forecasting, but the failure to disseminate warnings about the floods to the public.
"We need to understand why that last mile is where the problem was in terms of getting alerts out," Spinrad said.
According to the AP, the NWS office for Austin-San Antonio had six vacancies, including "a key manager responsible for issuing warnings and coordinating with local emergency management officials." That official, who'd held the position for 17 years, left in April after one of DOGE's mass emails urging federal workers to take early retirements.
In a Monday letter to Roderick Anderson, the Commerce Department's acting inspector general, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) noted reporting from The New York Times Saturday, which quoted several former NWS officials who said the response suffered from "the loss of experienced people who would typically have helped communicate with local authorities in the hours after flash flood warnings were issued overnight."
"The roles left unfilled are not marginal, they're critical," Schumer said. "These are the experts responsible for modeling storm impacts, monitoring rising water levels, issuing flood warnings, and coordinating directly with local emergency managers about when to warn the public and issue evacuation orders."
Schumer called on the inspector general to begin investigating why these positions were vacant and whether it affected the emergency response or forecasting.
In an interview with CNN's Dana Bash, Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) urged against jumping to hasty conclusions with the search for victims still on, but agreed there should be an investigation.
"When you have flash flooding, there's a risk that you won't have the personnel to make that—do that analysis, do the predictions in the best way," Castro said. "And it could lead to tragedy. So, I don’t want to sit here and say conclusively that that was the case, but I do think that it should be investigated."
Other Democrats have raised the possibility that cuts to FEMA may have played a role. Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee, which has jurisdiction over FEMA, called for hearings on the agency's capacity to respond.
He noted that Trump has said he wants to eliminate FEMA altogether and "bring it down to the state level," a decision Thompson said is more dangerous than ever as climate change makes extreme weather more frequent.
DOGE also canceled $880 million worth of funding for FEMA's BRIC program, which focused on pre-disaster planning. In Kerr County, one of the hardest hit by the storm, the flood system has been described as "antiquated," lacking "basic components like sirens and river gauges." The county applied for pre-disaster mitigation funding from FEMA to upgrade their system in 2017 and 2018, during the first Trump administration, but was denied.
"This administration cannot pretend that disasters like this are happening in a vacuum. They cannot ignore the fact that natural disasters are becoming more severe and more frequent due to climate change," Thompson said.
On the storm response, he added: "The federal government—as well as state and local governments—all have a role to play. We must also determine if any budget cuts or staffing shortages at the federal level—of any kind—made matters worse."
After days of publicly railing against Brazil for the trial of its former leader, Jair Bolsonaro, U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday threatened the South American country with a 50% tariff "on any and all Brazilian products sent into the United States."
Far-right Bolsonaro, sometimes called the "Trump of the Tropics," lost Brazil's 2022 presidential election to leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the recipient of the Wednesday letter that the U.S. president posted on his Truth Social network.
Bolsonaro is now facing a trial for alleged crimes, including an attempted coup d'état, following his reelection loss. The Brazilian's effort to cling to power was called "straight from Donald Trump's playbook," with critics worldwide pointing to the U.S. leader inciting the January 6, 2021 insurrection after his own electoral loss the previous November.
"This is a disgrace, just old-fashioned imperialism. A 50% tariff because Brazil's legal system has defended democracy."
In Truth Social posts on Monday and Tuesday, Trump blasted the trial as a "WITCH HUNT" and an "attack on a Political Opponent" while praising Bolsonaro as a "strong Leader, who truly loved his Country" and a "very tough negotiator on TRADE."
Echoing those posts, Trump wrote to Lula: "The way Brazil has treated former President Bolsonaro, a Highly Respected Leader throughout the World during his Term, including by the United States, is an international disgrace. This Trial should not be taking place. It is a Witch Hunt that should end IMMEDIATELY!"
"Due in part to Brazil's insidious attacks on Free Elections, and the fundamental Free Speech Rights of Americans (as lately illustrated by the Brazilian Supreme Court, which has issued hundreds of SECRET and UNLAWFUL Censorship Orders to U.S. Social Media platforms, threatening them with Millions of Dollars in Fines and Eviction from the Brazilian Social Media market), starting on August 1, 2025, we will charge Brazil a Tariff of 50%," Trump continued.
Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the Brazilian Supreme Court justice overseeing Bolsonaro's case, was also involved in a legal battle that temporarily shut down the social media platform X in Brazil. The network, formerly known as Twitter, is owned by estranged Trump ally Elon Musk, the richest man on Earth. The weekslong suspension of X last year stemmed from the company's refusal to comply with an order to deactivate dozens of accounts accused of spreading disinformation.
Trump claimed in his letter to Lula that "these Tariffs are necessary to correct the many years of Brazil's Tariff, and Non-Tariff, Policies and Trade Barriers, causing these unsustainable Trade Deficits against the United States. However, The Guardian noted, "the U.S. runs a trade surplus with Brazil, thanks in part to a free-trade agreement expanded in 2020, during Trump's first term."
The newspaper pointed to data on Brazil from the website of United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer:
U.S. total goods trade with Brazil were an estimated $92 billion in 2024. U.S. goods exports to Brazil in 2024 were $49.7 billion, up 11.3% ($5.0 billion) from 2023. U.S. goods imports from Brazil in 2024 totaled $42.3 billion, up 8.3% ($3.2 billion) from 2023. The U.S. goods trade surplus with Brazil was $7.4 billion in 2024, a 31.9% increase ($1.8 billion) over 2023.
Various journalists and other critics also highlighted the surplus. Michael Reid, a writer and visiting professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science, said on social media: "This is a disgrace, just old-fashioned imperialism. A 50% tariff because Brazil's legal system has defended democracy. And by the way, the U.S. has a trade surplus with Brazil."
Politico reported that "the overtly political tone of the letter is a break with more than a dozen other letters Trump has sent to foreign governments this week, threatening to impose new tariff rates on their exports to the U.S. beginning August 1."
While Trump's letter to Brazil has overtly political motivations, he also said during a Tuesday Cabinet meeting that he would target the entire BRICS economic group of emerging market nations, which began with Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, and now also includes Egypt, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates.
"If they're a member of BRICS, they are going to have to pay a 10% tariff, just for that one thing—and they won't be a member long," Trump said, according to CNN. "BRICS was set up to hurt us, BRICS was set up to degenerate our dollar and take our dollar, take it off as the standard."
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren was among those calling into question the official story behind CBS' cancellation of "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" on Thursday—suggesting that the decision to end the show's 32-year run wasn't driven by finances but by "political reasons."
The announcement from CBS executives came just three days after Colbert spoke out on his show about a recent $16 million settlement reached by CBS parent company Paramount over an interview that "60 Minutes" aired with former Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the 2024 election, in which Harris ran against President Donald Trump.
Colbert had told his audience that the settlement appeared to be a "big fat bribe" to end a "nuisance lawsuit."
"This all comes as Paramount's owners are trying to the get the Trump administration to approve the sale of our network to a new owner," said Colbert, referring to a pending $8.4 billion merger with the entertainment company Skydance—whose billionaire founder, David Ellison, has been spotted with Trump in recent months.
Warren (D-Mass.) said Thursday that the public "deserves to know if [Colbert's] show was canceled for political reasons."
Trump's lawsuit against Paramount claimed the Harris interview was deceptively edited and amounted to "partisan and unlawful acts of election and voter interference," allegations that legal experts and First Amendment scholars denounced as "ridiculous" and "dangerous."
After the settlement was announced earlier this month, with Paramount pledging to release transcripts of future "60 Minutes" interviews with presidential candidates, one press freedom group condemned the company for "capitulating" to the president's demands.
CBS executives appeared to preemptively respond to expected allegations that they were canceling Colbert's show due to his criticism of the settlement—and his frequent rebukes of the president—saying the decision, effective in May 2026, was "purely a financial" one.
"It is not related in any way to the show's performance, content, or other matters happening at Paramount," they said.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) expressed doubt that the end of Colbert's show, days after he spoke out against his parent company's legal decision, was "a coincidence."
Media critics joined lawmakers including Sanders and Warren in expressing skepticism.
"'The Late Show' isn't dying because people stopped watching late-night TV," wrote Parker Molloy at The New Republic. "It's being murdered because Stephen Colbert spent the last decade being one of Trump's most persistent critics on network television, and the billionaires about to take over CBS need Trump's approval for their merger."
Anonymous "Late Show" staffers also told The Independent they believed the cancellation of the show was "part and parcel of the Trump shakedown settlement."
Political scientist Norman Ornstein called the impending end of "The Late Show," considering the surrounding circumstances, "a terrible sign for democracy."
"There's only one reason to do this, and we know what it is," said Ornstein. "The same reason that this disgraceful excuse for a network succumbed to blackmail from Trump over the '60 Minutes' interview."
Trump, whose Federal Communications Commission is still deciding on approval of the merger, weighed in on Friday regarding the show's cancellation, saying in a social media post, "I absolutely love that Colbert got fired," and criticizing other late-night comedians who have taken aim at him.
As Status News reported after the Paramount settlement was announced, speculation has increased that comedian Jon Stewart, who co-hosts "The Daily Show"—where Colbert spent several years—could also "soon be silenced" after publicly criticizing the settlement. That show airs on Comedy Central, which is owned by the CBS parent company.
"Inside 'The Daily Show,' I'm told staffers have taken pride that Stewart showed once again he is willing to stand up to powerful interests, even if it potentially risks his future employment," wrote Oliver Darcy. "And while they may not yet know it, inside certain power circles, there is an open question: How much longer will Stewart have this platform?"
MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes said Friday that it is not "an overstatement to say that the test of a free society is whether or not comedians can make fun of the country's leader on TV without repurcussions."
In yet another controversial move from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons recently told officers that immigrants who arrived in the United States illegally are no longer eligible for a bond hearing as they fight against deportation and should be detained "for the duration of their removal proceedings."
The Washington Post first revealed Lyons' July 8 memo late Monday. He wrote that after the Trump administration "revisited its legal position on detention and release authorities," and determined that such immigrants "may not be released from ICE custody." He also said that rare exceptions should be made by officers, not judges.
The reporting drew swift and intense condemnation online. One social media user said: "Unconstitutional. Unethical. Authoritarian."
In a statement shared with several news outlets, a spokesperson for ICE confirmed the new policy and said that "the recent guidance closes a loophole to our nation's security based on an inaccurate interpretation of the statute."
"It is aligned with the nation's long-standing immigration law," the spokesperson said. "All aliens seeking to enter our country in an unlawful manner or for illicit purposes shall be treated equally under the law, while still receiving due process."
The move comes as President Donald Trump and leaders in his administration, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, attempt to deliver on his promised mass deportations—with federal agents targeting peaceful student activists, spraying children with tear gas, and detaining immigrants in inhumane conditions at the so-called "Alligator Alcatraz."
In a statement about the ICE memo, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said that "President Trump and Secretary Noem are now enforcing this law as it was actually written to keep Americans safe."
"Politicians and activists can cry wolf all they want, but it won't deter this administration from keeping these criminals and lawbreakers off American streets—and now, thanks to the Big Beautiful Bill, we will have plenty of bed space to do so," she added, referring to $45 billion for ICE detention in Republicans' recently signed package.
According to the Post:
Since the memos were issued last week, the American Immigration Lawyers Association said members had reported that immigrants were being denied bond hearings in more than a dozen immigration courts across the United States, including in New York, Virginia, Oregon, North Carolina, Ohio, and Georgia. The Department of Justice oversees the immigration courts.
"This is their way of putting in place nationwide a method of detaining even more people," said Greg Chen, senior director of government relations for the American Immigration Lawyers Association. "It's requiring the detention of far more people without any real review of their individual circumstances."
Rebekah Wolf of the American Immigration Council told NBC News that her group has also received reports of some immigration judges "accepting the argument" from ICE, "and because the memo isn't public, we don't even know what law the government is relying on to make the claim that everyone who has ever entered without inspection is subject to mandatory detention."
The Post reported that "the provision is based on a section of immigration law that says unauthorized immigrants 'shall be detained' after their arrest, but that has historically applied to those who recently crossed the border and not longtime residents."
The newspaper also noted that Lyons wrote the new guidance is expected to face legal challenges. Trump's anti-immigrant agenda—like various other policies—has been forcefully challenged in court, and there has been an exodus from the Justice Department unit responsible for defending presidential actions.
Ministerial delegates from more than 30 nations gathered in the Colombian capital Bogotá Tuesday for an emergency summit focused on "concrete measures" to end Israel's U.S.-backed genocide in Gaza and other crimes against occupied Palestine.
The two-day Hague Group summit ultimately aims to "halt the genocide in Gaza" and is led by co-chairs Colombia—which last year severed diplomatic relations with Israel—and South Africa, which filed the ongoing genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) joined by around two dozen countries. Progressive International first convened the Hague Group in January in the eponymous Dutch city, which is home to both the ICJ and International Criminal Court (ICC), whose rulings the coalition is dedicated to upholding.
"This summit marks a turning point in the global response to the erosion and violation of international law," South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Ronald Lamola said ahead of the gathering. "No country is above the law, and no crime will go unanswered."
Colombian Deputy Foreign Minister Mauricio Jaramillo Jassir said before the summit: "The Palestinian genocide threatens the entire international system. Colombia cannot remain indifferent in the face of apartheid and ethnic cleansing. The participating states will not only reaffirm their commitment to opposing genocide, but also formulate concrete steps to move from words to collective action."
That action includes enforcement of ICC arrest warrants issued last year for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister, for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza including murder and forced starvation in a war that has left more than 211,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing since October 2023, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
Hague Group members Bolivia, Cuba, Honduras, Malaysia, Namibia, and Senegal will attend the summit. Algeria, Bangladesh, Botswana, Brazil, Chile, China, Djibouti, Indonesia, Iraq, Ireland, Lebanon, Libya, Mexico, Nicaragua, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Qatar, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Uruguay, and Venezuela will also take part.
Notably, so will NATO members and U.S. allies Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, and Turkey. Like Israel, the United States denies there is a genocide in Gaza, despite growing international consensus among human rights defenders, jurists, and genocide experts including some of the leading Holocaust scholars in Israel and the United States.
A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department—which has sanctioned ICC judges and United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories Francesca Albanese for seeking accountability for Israeli crimes—told Jewish News Syndicate Monday that the United States "strongly opposes efforts by so-called 'multilateral blocs' to weaponize international law as a tool to advance radical anti-Western agendas."
The spokesperson added that the Trump administration "will aggressively defend our interests, our military, and our allies, including Israel, from such coordinated legal and diplomatic warfare," even as U.S. allies take part in the summit.
Undaunted by U.S. sanctions, Albanese is among several U.N. experts who spoke at the summit, which she hailed as "the most significant political development in the past 20 months."
In prepared remarks, Albanese—who earlier this month said that "Israel is responsible for one of the cruelest genocides in modern history"—told attendees that "for too long, international law has been treated as optional—applied selectively to those perceived as weak, ignored by those acting as the powerful."
"This double standard has eroded the very foundations of the legal order," she argued. "That era must end."
According to Albanese:
The world will remember what we, states and individuals, did in this moment—whether we recoiled in fear or rose in defense of human dignity. Here in Bogotá, a growing number of states have the opportunity to break the silence and revert to a path of legality by finally saying: Enough. Enough impunity. Enough empty rhetoric. Enough exceptionalism. Enough complicity. The time has come to act in pursuit of justice and peace—grounded in rights and freedoms for all, and not mere privileges for some, at the expense of the annihilation of others.
The Israeli Mission to the United Nations told Jewish News Syndicate that "what the event organizers, and perhaps some of the countries attending, forget is what triggered this conflict—namely, the butchering of 1,200 innocent souls on October 7, and how 50 Israelis remain in brutal captivity to this day by Hamas in Gaza."
"Attempting to exert pressure on Israel—and not Hamas, who initiated and are prolonging this conflict—is a moral travesty," the mission added. "The war will not end while hostages remain in Gaza."
In addition to the ICC warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, the ICJ—whose ruling in the genocide case is not expected for years—has ordered Israel to prevent genocidal acts in Gaza, to stop blocking lifesaving humanitarian aid from entering the strip, and to halt its assault on Rafah. Israel has ignored all three orders.
"The choice before us is stark and unforgiving," Colombian President Gustavo Petro wrote in The Guardian last week. "We can either stand firm in defense of the legal principles that seek to prevent war and conflict, or watch helplessly as the international system collapses under the weight of unchecked power politics."
"While we may face threats of retaliation when we stand up for international law—as South Africa discovered when the United States retaliated for its case at the International Court of Justice—the consequences of abdicating our responsibilities will be dire," Petro continued. "If we fail to act now, we not only betray the Palestinian people, we become complicit in the atrocities committed by Netanyahu's government."
"For the billions of people in the Global South who rely on international law for protection, the stakes could not be higher," he added. "The Palestinian people deserve justice. The moment demands courage."
Citing the suit and other recent Republican attacks on the press, one critic said that "it sure looks like an open attempt at authoritarian control of the media."
U.S. President Donald on Friday made good on his pledge to sue The Wall Street Journal over its reporting that he wrote a "bawdy" letter for a leather-bound album that Ghislaine Maxwell prepared for the 50th birthday of Jeffrey Epstein, the financier and convicted sex offender who allegedly killed himself in jail while facing federal sex trafficking charges.
Maxwell, who is now serving a 20-year prison sentence "for conspiring with Jeffrey Epstein to sexually abuse minors," collected dozens of letters for the book, according to the Journal.
The one allegedly crafted by Trump, the newspaper reported, "contains several lines of typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman, which appears to be hand-drawn with a heavy marker. A pair of small arcs denotes the woman’s breasts, and the future president's signature is a squiggly 'Donald' below her waist, mimicking pubic hair."
As the paper—part of billionaire Richard Murdoch's media empire—detailed Thursday evening:
The letter concludes: "Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret."
In an interview with the Journal on Tuesday evening, Trump denied writing the letter or drawing the picture. "This is not me. This is a fake thing. It's a fake Wall Street Journal story," he said.
"I never wrote a picture in my life. I don't draw pictures of women," he said. "It's not my language. It's not my words."
He told the Journal he was preparing to file a lawsuit if it published an article. "I'm gonna sue The Wall Street Journal just like I sued everyone else," he said.
On Friday, the president—a well-documented liar—sued the Journal in a federal court in Miami, Florida for assault, libel, and slander, according to CNN. In addition to the newspaper and its parent company News Corp, Politico reported, "the suit names WSJ reporters Khadeeja Safdar and Joe Palazzolo. It also names Rupert Murdoch."
Trump sued Murdoch and the Wall Street Journal in Judge Aileen Cannon's district. www.cnbc.com/2025/07/18/t...
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— Alejandra Caraballo (@esqueer.net) July 18, 2025 at 5:43 PM
Trump had said on his Truth Social platform Friday morning: I look forward to getting Rupert Murdoch to testify in my lawsuit against him and his 'pile of garbage' newspaper, the WSJ. That will be an interesting experience!!!"
Later Friday, he addressed the filing in a post that noted his other recent lawsuits against media companies:
BREAKING NEWS: We have just filed a POWERHOUSE Lawsuit against everyone involved in publishing the false, malicious, defamatory, FAKE NEWS "article" in the useless "rag" that is, The Wall Street Journal. This historic legal action is being brought against the so-called authors of this defamation, the now fully disgraced WSJ, as well as its corporate owners and affiliates, with Rupert Murdoch and Robert Thomson (whatever his role is!) at the top of the list. We have proudly held to account ABC and George Slopadopoulos, CBS and 60 Minutes, The Fake Pulitzer Prizes, and many others who deal in, and push, disgusting LIES, and even FRAUD, to the American People. This lawsuit is filed not only on behalf of your favorite President, ME, but also in order to continue standing up for ALL Americans who will no longer tolerate the abusive wrongdoings of the Fake News Media. I hope Rupert and his "friends" are looking forward to the many hours of depositions and testimonies they will have to provide in this case. Thank you for your attention to this matter. We will, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
The president's history with Epstein has received heightened scrutiny in recent days, amid demand for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to release its full files on the late sex offender. The two men were publicly associated with each other in the 1990s, up until a reported falling out over a business deal in 2004. Epstein was first arrested for sex crimes two years later.
Shortly after leaving the Trump administration earlier this year, Elon Musk, the richest man on Earth, claimed on his social media platform X that the president "is in the Epstein files" and "that is the real reason they have not been made public."
After congressional Republicans repeatedly blocked a measure that would force the DOJ to release all Epstein files while protecting victims early this week, Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) introduced the Epstein Files Transparency Act and warned that if it is not considered by the House of Representatives within seven legislative days, a discharge petition will be circulated.
Late Thursday, after the Journal report was published, Trump said in a Truth post: "Based on the ridiculous amount of publicity given to Jeffrey Epstein, I have asked Attorney General Pam Bondi to produce any and all pertinent Grand Jury testimony, subject to Court approval. This SCAM, perpetuated by the Democrats, should end, right now!"
In a post on X, Bondi said, "President Trump—we are ready to move the court tomorrow to unseal the grand jury transcripts."
Trump's suit against the Journal comes as CBS parent company Paramount is under fire for its $16 million settlement with the Republican, who filed suit over the media organization's handling of a "60 Minutes" interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris, last year's Democratic presidential candidate, before the November election.
Among the critics framing that deal as a "big fat bribe" intended to secure federal approval of Paramount's pending merger with Skydance is late-night host Stephen Colbert, who announced Thursday that CBS has canceled his show following his recent commentary. The network's claim that it was a financial, not political, decision has been met with widespread skepticism.
"It's pretty obvious why Paramount chose to surrender to Trump," U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said in a Friday statement. "The Redstone family, the major owners of the company, is in line to receive $2.4 billion from the sale of Paramount to Skydance, but they can only receive this money if the Trump administration approves this deal."
Tying the end of "The Late Show With Stephen Colbert" to congressional Republicans' attack on funding for NPR and PBS, the DOJ targeting Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), and Trump's threats to oust Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, Sanders declared that "this is what the march toward authoritarianism looks like."
The Paramount settlement followed one in Trump's case against ABC—which last December agreed to pay $15 million and release a note of regret after anchor and political commentator George Stephanopoulos said Trump had been found "liable for rape" of writer E. Jean Carroll. A federal jury found him civilly liable for sexual abuse and defamation, but not rape.
Sanders and several other critics have warned that the media "succumbing to pressure" from Trump sets "an incredibly dangerous precedent."
"This does not save taxpayers money; it simply shifts costs to hospitals, families and communities left to bear the health and economic consequences of increased pollution and weakened oversight."
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Friday that it will reduce its workforce by more than 3,700 and abolish its stand-alone science branch, moves that one group of former EPA officials warned will "gut" research and enforcement and "leave communities unprotected."
The EPA said the personnel cuts—which will be achieved via layoffs, voluntary early retirements, and other measures—will deliver $748.8 millions in savings.
"Under President [Donald] Trump's leadership, EPA has taken a close look at our operations to ensure the agency is better equipped than ever to deliver on our core mission of protecting human health and the environment while Powering the Great American Comeback," EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement. "This reduction in force will ensure we can better fulfill that mission while being responsible stewards of your hard-earned tax dollars."
However, the Environmental Protection Network—an advocacy group of over 650 former EPA career staff and political appointees—said the move "signals a systematic dismantling of the agency's ability to protect public health and the environment."
Jennifer Orme-Zavaleta, former EPA principal deputy assistant administrator for science, said that "today's cuts dismantle one of the world's most respected environmental health research organizations."
She continued:
EPA's science office has long been recognized internationally for advancing public health protections through rigorous science. Reducing its workforce under the guise of cost savings is both misleading and dangerous. This does not save taxpayers money; it simply shifts costs to hospitals, families, and communities left to bear the health and economic consequences of increased pollution and weakened oversight.
"The people of this country are not well served by these actions," Orme-Zavaleta added. "They are left more vulnerable."
Environmental Protection Network senior policy adviser Jeremy Symons said, "These layoffs are targeted to do maximum long-term damage to the Environmental Protection Agency because polluter lobbyists are calling the shots."
"This administration claims to champion transparency, but there is nothing transparent about how these cuts are being executed," Symons added. "This is not honest government. It's a deliberate strategy to shrink the agency's capacity while shielding that reality from public view because 9 out of 10 Americans oppose cuts to EPA."
Friday's EPA announcement follows other cuts at the agency amid the Trump administration's evisceration of the federal government, spearheaded by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. Zeldin has boasted of canceling billions of dollars worth of green grants and ordering the closure of every environmental justice office nationwide. Amid a worsening planetary emergency, Zeldin also bragged about "driving a dagger straight into the heart of the climate change religion."
An appropriations bill currently before Congress proposes slashing EPA funding by 23%.
"This action is not only morally indefensible, but also wasteful, strategically shortsighted, and completely counter to the entirety of your work while in the Senate."
More than 50 congressional Democrats on Friday condemned U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio's decision to withhold and destroy nearly 500 metric tons of emergency food aid for Afghanistan and Pakistan—a move that came a month after the Trump administration's State Department abolished all overseas positions at the United States Agency for International Development.
The USAID emergency food aid—which has been stored in a warehouse in Dubai for months and will expire before the end of July—is enough to feed around 1.5 million children for a week. The aid consists of high energy biscuits that are used primarily to satisfy the immediate nutritional needs of children enduring food crises. It is now set to be incinerated.
"This action is not only morally indefensible, but also wasteful, strategically shortsighted, and completely counter to the entirety of your work while in the Senate," the Democratic lawmakers wrote in a letter to Rubio.
"Given the alarming rates of food insecurity and famine in regions like Gaza and Sudan, the decision to burn lifesaving aid produced by American farmers and paid for by American tax dollars amounts to a tragic abdication of our global humanitarian responsibilities and hurts our own global interests," the letter asserts.
Secretary Rubio is planning to withhold 500 metric tons of vital food aid that could feed 1.5 million starving children… and then incinerate the food once it expires. UNACCEPTABLE!
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— Rep. Mark Pocan (@pocan.house.gov) July 18, 2025 at 12:55 PM
"We are also alarmed by reports indicating that internal USAID memos requesting urgent approval to move the biscuits went unanswered for months," the lawmakers said. "If accurate, this speaks to a systemic breakdown in communication and leadership that has paralyzed America's food aid delivery systems."
"The United States has long led the world in humanitarian assistance, not only as a matter of compassion but also as a cornerstone of global stability and diplomacy," the letter concludes. "Destroying aid that could save lives undermines that legacy and damages our standing in the international community. We urge you to immediately prioritize the distribution of all remaining and viable food assistance stockpiles. American leadership demands nothing less."
Rubio's decision comes a month after the secretary of state ordered the abolition of all overseas USAID positions amid the Trump administration's downsizing and elimination of the agency, one of many targeted by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, formerly led by multibillionaire Elon Musk.
As Common Dreams reported in May, 66,000 tons of food—including grains, high-energy biscuits, and vegetable oil—were already mouldering in USAID warehouses.
U.S. State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce attempted to justify Rubio's decision during a Thursday press conference.
"If something is expired, we will destroy it. It's a matter of whether or not it's safe to distribute," she said, adding that 500 metric tons amounts to "less than 1%" of all annual U.S. food aid.
"We, as an example, distribute roughly 1 million metric tons of food aid every year, which is reflective of the American people's generosity," Bruce said.
While many observers expressed surprise over the impending destruction of so much food aid, some contended that it tracks with the Trump administration's wider attitudes toward poor people.
"Republicans don't care if American children starve," said podcast host Lana Quest, "so why would they care about famine in other countries?"