Former special counsel Jack Smith has been a constant target of fury and legal threats by President Donald Trump, dating back to even before the election, when the famed prosecutor was helming a pair of federal criminal cases against him.But Smith doesn't dwell much on the possibility that Trump's Justice Department will fabricate some charges against him, he told MS NOW's Nicolle Wallace in an exclusive interview on Thursday. There's something he worries a lot more about."Do you think that this is a department that you could send someone to go work in, and they could be asked to indict you?" asked Wallace.Smith agreed "that could happen" — however, he continued, "in the Justice Department, even as we sit here right now, there are lots of people doing good work prosecuting violent crime, protecting their communities, doing the everyday work of being a prosecutor. And yes, it could happen. That could happen, and that would be unfortunate. And then you might have to step down." Nonetheless, he added, "I don't want to see people run from public service because of that possibility.""Do you expect to be indicted?" Wallace followed up, noting that Trump "said he would indict you."Smith replied, "I'll tell you, Nicolle, I honestly do not spend a lot of time thinking about the things he says about me and his threats about me."Instead of that, he continued, "I'm really focused on the people who I worked with, looking out for them. I'm really focused on how the Justice Department is going to be better going forward, things like that."What Smith worries about more, he made clear, is the future of the people he worked with who helped him do his job.Ultimately, Smith said, "I had an all-star team ... the agents on my case, if I were to walk you through all the awards they've won throughout generations of administrations, we would be here all night. These were superstars. I'm much more concerned that those people get to serve in the department, get to serve in the bureau again someday." - YouTube www.youtube.com
According to the renowned fascism historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat, the Supreme Court has become President Donald Trump’s “partner in corruption,” not only working to enrich those who are in on the scam, but reshaping the U.S. as an authoritarian state in which one must “fear and obey” Trump.“This is the summer of corruption,” wrote Ben-Ghiat on Thursday. “Defined as the abuse of power for private gain, corruption can happen in any kind of organization and government, but under authoritarianism it attains a new status: it is how the executive branch operates, expands its power, and recruits elite and grassroots partners. The Supreme Court is one of these partners, as we’ll see below.”The Trump administration and its enablers on the Court, argues Ben-Ghiat, “are providing Americans and the world with a lesson in how corruption can become systemic.” This, she says, is the goal of all authoritarians: they “seek to retool government and the culture to create the conditions to lie, steal and repress people with impunity. That means going after journalists, judges, investigators, opposition politicians and others who expose official wrongdoing. It also means puffing up the leader’s personality cult and inventing narratives, backed by complicit religious institutions, about his selflessness and purity.”She raises the example of Justice Clarence Thomas, who has a well-documented history of “accepting luxury gifts and travel from billionaire GOP donor Harlan Crow,” who in turn “has a garden full of statues of dictators, and collects Adolf Hitler and Nazi memorabilia.” And, according to Ben-Ghiat, “As per the sacred laws of corruption, these ‘gifts’ were likely supposed to be repaid whenever Thomas put on his robes. No matter that the Court, which has no ethical oversight mechanism, finally instituted a code of conduct in November 2023, which states that justices must ‘uphold the integrity and independence of the judiciary’ and avoid actual and apparent impropriety.”Thomas has paid no attention to this code, refusing to recuse himself in cases involving Trump’s election lies, even though Thomas’s wife Ginny was directly engaged in those lies. As Ben-Ghiat muses, “What good would Thomas be as a link in the chain of corruption if he took himself out of the game just when he was most needed?”“And here we arrive at the Supreme Court as a partner in Trump administration corruption, first by giving the President immunity for official acts, and now by upholding his right to dismiss an official on political grounds,” writes Ben-Ghiat. “A landmark ruling in July 2024 gave the president ‘the power of a king,’ as the Brennan Center termed it, conferring upon him absolute immunity (for the exercise of core constitutional powers) and presumptive immunity (for all other official acts). This created the legal space for a lawless individual such as Trump to feel even more emboldened to use corruption and violence to destroy our democracy and make money doing it.”Now, while the Supreme Court has for 100 years upheld that the president does not have the authority to fire heads of independent agencies without cause, Trump’s allies on the court have overturned that precedent, creating conditions for further “systematic corruption.”“We need to see this decision through autocratic eyes,” explains Ben-Ghiat. “Not obeying the Leader, refusing to participate in his corruption, and politicizing the practice of government are acts of negligence and malfeasance in office in the authoritarian world. Such people must be removed from public service, lest they influence others with their moral stances.”The power to fire agency officials at will is exactly what the president needs to shape government to his private agenda. According to Ben-Ghiat, proof of this intention was revealed by the words of Solicitor General John Sauer, who represented the Trump administration in the case, arguing before the court that the president needs to be able to remove officials in the agencies because “the President must have the power to control and…the one who has the power to remove is the one who…is the person that they have to fear and obey.”
The US believed Israel was plotting to kill Iran's head negotiators, Abbas Araghchi and Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, in the middle of the peace talks, with America going as far as to warn Tehran through third party countries of the risks, officials said.
Some 163 million people in the U.S. live in areas that experienced dangerous heat on Thursday, according to the National Weather Service — sending “heat risk” forecasts in major cities (including New York, Washington, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Atlanta) into the most extreme risk category through Saturday. Part of the reason is the planet is warming dangerously, but Trump calls climate change a “hoax” and is encouraging more use of fossil fuels. Especially endangered are workers toiling under the hot sun, or in stifling warehouses, or in delivery trucks with no AC.Yet Trump’s pick to run the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, David Keeling, is weakening the agency’s own heat standards by removing specific inspection goals. OSHA’s Heat National Emphasis Program expired on April 8. Its proposed heat standard has been stalled.For many workers, heat standards are literally a matter of life and death. Every year, workers collapse, suffer permanent injuries, and die while doing their jobs in extreme heat. Years ago, when I ran the Labor Department, we had the toughest Occupational Health and Safety Administration in history, run by a truly committed worker advocate named Joe Dear. We made workplaces safer — reducing worker deaths and injuries.Since its inception in 1971, OSHA has reduced workplace-related fatalities by almost 63 percent. It has slashed the rate of serious workplace injuries and illnesses by 75 percent. But OSHA under Keeling is retreating from worker safety. Before Trump picked him to head OSHA, Keeling was Amazon’s top safety executive. During Keeling’s tenure at Amazon, a Senate report found that Amazon warehouses were twice as dangerous as those of its competitors.This year, we’ve already seen reports of Amazon workers dying on the job on a near monthly basis, including incidents in Oregon and North Carolina. Why would we trust Amazon’s safety head with the country’s workers?Before he was at Amazon, Keeling was in charge of safety at UPS. How did he do there? OSHA repeatedly cited UPS for exposing drivers to excessive heat. Federal investigators found at least 100 drivers were hospitalized for heat-related injuries between 2015 and 2018. UPS delivery trucks had no air conditioning until 2024, when it was won in a landmark collective bargaining agreement with the Teamsters.Now Keeling is head of OSHA, and OSHA is weakening its heat protection standards. Workers are already paying the price. Reports of worker deaths during extreme heat continue to emerge across the country. Heat exposure can trigger heat stroke, organ failure, and chronic kidney disease. These are among the most predictable workplace hazards, which means they can often be prevented with strong safety standards and rigorous enforcement.But instead of strengthening those protections, OSHA under Keeling has weakened them. At a time when record-breaking temperatures are becoming more frequent, retreating from enforcement sends a dangerous message that worker fatalities are a cost of doing business.When he was in charge of safety at Amazon, Amazon became notorious for dangerous warehouse conditions. When in charge of safety at UPS, UPS resisted providing air conditioning for delivery vehicles. Now, when the agency responsible for protecting millions of workers should be leading the fight against preventable heat deaths — it’s backing away from its most basic responsibility to protect people over profits.Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/.
MAGA loyalists were melting down Thursday after President Donald Trump's Social Security Administration announced a new design for babies born this year.The limited edition "Freedom 250" logo-themed cards will be issued for babies born between now and the end of the year, The Washington Post reported."Freedom 250 is the public-private initiative the Trump administration launched last year to organize events — often aligned with the administration — for the nation’s semiquincentennial. It is different from America250, a nonprofit established by Congress in 2016 to organize such celebrations," according to The Post.But MAGA fans, still apparently upset over the Supreme Court's ruling this week to uphold birthright citizenship, were outraged online. Some right-wing commentators claimed the cards would be used for "anchor babies" and shared their anger over the high court's decision. "Notice how they don’t say American Children? Oh yea that’s because 5 people destroyed what it meant to be an American the week of our independence. Being an American is nothing sacred anymore the Supreme Court just cemented that," user Cori, who frequently shares MAGA-aligned content, wrote on X."Doesn’t feel the same knowing they’ll also be going to anchor babies," user Alexandra, whose profile states "all I want for Christmas is mass deportations," wrote on X."It boils my blood that some baby tourist is going to have one of these while they live in China or somes---," Renlos Malik, a user who frequently shares MAGA-related material, wrote on X."Anchor babies too... or nah?" Tim Young, Heritage Foundation media fellow with more than 1.1 million followers, wrote on X."I wonder, how many illegal birth tourism anchor babies will enjoy this very special honor?!!!!" Luce Wood, author and self-described "proud conservative" with more than 18,000 followers, wrote on X.
A 52-year-old man reportedly died in New York City on Thursday after setting himself on fire near the United Nations‘s headquarters. A protester with a Tibetan flag carried out the self-immolation, according to the New York Post. He was reportedly protesting China‘s occupation of Tibet. Papers that said “China Out of Tibet” were found at […]
With July 4th looming, the nation’s capital has become a “fortress” as the White House prepares for President Donald Trump’s much vaunted fireworks display amid what security experts say is a “heightened” potential for attack. Increasing the complexity of the situation is “Trump’s approach of making himself the star of the nation’s semiquincentennial celebration.”This is according to the latest from the Atlantic, which explained, “This year’s Fourth of July fireworks show on the National Mall is the first such event to be designated a ‘National Special Security Event,’ which requires the kind of screening procedures and police presence usually reserved for presidential inaugurations and Super Bowls. It’s a reflection of the logistical complexity and anticipated crowd size of America’s 250th birthday party, but also, unfortunately, its potential appeal to attackers at a time of rising threats.”That NSSE designation puts the Secret Service in charge of protecting the event, which Trump has declared will be “THE LARGEST FIREWORKS SHOW IN HISTORY.” With temperatures forecasted to soar as high as triple digits, “getting in may be more like going through an airport than going to a party,” writes the Atlantic. “That’s not least because the president has placed himself at the center of the festivities and has plans to give ‘a really long speech just to show that I can do anything.’”As a result of this and other events, D.C. has become a “fortress,” and “the normally wide-open expanse at the city’s heart has been ringed with security fences for weeks… ‘I’ve lived here most of my life, and I’ve never seen it look like this on the Mall,’ Mayor Muriel Bowser told reporters on Monday.” According to the agent in charge of the Secret Service DC office, Trump has mobilized thousands of National Guard troops in the capital in addition to “unseen resources” readied to “disrupt any bad actor.”Said Secret Service spokesperson Anthony Guglielimi, there is good reason for all the extra security. As the Atlantic explains, he “told us that the volume of threats that his agency is monitoring overall ‘has never been higher.’ Threat reports requiring Secret Service investigation so far this year have increased 40 percent compared with the same period last year, according to the agency. Security officials say there has been a particular uptick in threats from ‘nihilistic violent extremists,’ many of whom aim to use violence against law-enforcement personnel or symbols of government.”Trump’s war with Iran has only “heightened the threat.” Said Frank Figliuzzi, a former assistant director of the FBI, “I’m very concerned about a lone actor inspired by Iran, rather than an actual all‑out professional attack. That’s the hardest thing to detect — that lone actor who’s been inspired.” He says that a potential attacker may see the 250th celebrations as the perfect opportunity for “striking at the heart of what they think America stands for.” Further complicating the situation is the fact that “as the threats facing the country have grown, the law-enforcement and intelligence agencies tasked with keeping the country safe have been dealing with a shortage of man power and expertise. Many top officials have quit or been fired since Trump returned to office, and Figliuzzi described an FBI now staffed with what he believes is ‘the youngest cadre of special agents in charge and assistant directors in the modern history of the FBI.’ Some officials acknowledge — in private — that politically motivated purges have left the country’s law-enforcement and intelligence agencies understaffed and more prone to mistakes.”Law-enforcement officials also told the Atlantic that “the president’s central role in the July 4 events and the extending of their length late into the evening have added complexity — and risk.”“This year,” writes the Atlantic, “Trump will occupy the prime-time slot… The White House has not said whether he’ll deliver a written speech or make the kind of semi-improvised remarks more typical of a MAGA rally. But at some point, he’s planning to show off his new Air Force One jet — given to him by the government of Qatar — with a flyover of the crowd. Trump said on Wednesday that he will use the occasion to demonstrate his stamina despite the summer heat. It’s not customary for presidents to give a speech on the Mall for July 4, but it’s in keeping with Trump’s approach of making himself the star of the nation’s semiquincentennial celebration.”
