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Oh man. Same old clown show, awash with boondoggles, each more cringey than the last. As the mad man-child deconstructs DC and slaps his hideous face and name everywhere - historic buildings, fascist arches, garish statues, possibly imaginary gold phones - others have taken his lead with their own patriotic spinoffs. Cue "Fuck You" upgrades, a Strait to Hell arcade for a video-game war, and a Trump/Epstein "Memorial Reading Room" packed with 3.5 million pages of files, where "the truth is hard to deny."
Trump's narcissistic vandalizing of D.C. - couldn't his KKK dad have just hugged him now and then? - is "something dictators have done throughout history," noted Bernie Sanders of his proposed SERVE Act, or Stop Executive Renaming for Vanity and Ego. Co-sponsored by six Senate Dems, the bill would bar any sitting president from naming federal properties after themselves, an act both "arrogant" and illegal. At this rate many weary Americans would likely argue, "Let the chiseling off begin," but for now the bill sits in legislative limbo and we're stuck with the resulting atrocities; they continue to multiply like locusts, even as he's proposed a $10-billion fund for more "beautification" projects around "the capital of the greatest Nation in the history of the world."
Though he increasingly nods off in public - or per the White House, blinks - he still clutches at a farcical show of dominance he's leaned on in the endless self-glorification campaign that is his execrable life. There are posts quoting fictional "fans": "Remarkable leadership,” "Master of the Deal,” "THE GREATEST PRESIDENT WE HAVE EVER KNOWN." From the guy who's "confused the country for his living room," there's D.C's re-branding: the plaques, name changes, razed East Wing for a billion-dollar "albatross" nobody wants. There are new massive Stalin-esque banners at construction sites proclaiming, “Thank you, PRESIDENT TRUMP”- "like Michael Scott buying himself a World’s Best Boss coffee mug" we paid for - to which unenthused residents added, "Fuck You Cunt."
Snug in a delusional bubble where his approval is def not in the toilet, he feels free to rant, lie, melt down online without consequence. In one manic night, he posts 55 times in three hours: “Arrest Obama the traitor” and “DEMONIC FORCE,” also Hillary, Brennan, Comey, Kelly. Asked how much he thinks about the cost to Americans of his calamitous war, he blurts, “Not even a little bit.” His lackeys follow suit: Ka$h Patel yells, lies, hustles bourbon, pads his stats and takes a "VIP snorkel" in Pearl Harbor around the tomb of 900 U.S. soldiers as Sean Duffy takes his nine offspring on a "patriotic," seven-month Great American Road Trip filmed for YouTube and complete with "head-spinning" corporate sponsorship, both on the taxpayers' now-rapidly-shrinking dime.
Meanwhile, another project nobody asked for - draining and repainting the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, aka "reflective pond," from traditional grey to garish blue - has shockingly veered off course. After boasting his bestest golf course pool painters could easy-peasy do a no-bid, $1.8 million, "smart and beautiful construction" that Dems stupidly opposed - "Dumacrats love sewage" - the cost has soared to $13.1 million, it's now by a contractor he "did not know and have never used before,” staff are worried the job is behind schedule, with "uneven application" leaving bubbles, holes and "mottled shades of blue" in the pool, and a judge has set a May 21 hearing for a lawsuit charging the project wasn't properly vetted, ditto a color "more appropriate to a resort or theme park."
More winning in Miami, where another lawsuit charges three acres of multi-million-dollar waterfront land were illegally grifted by DeSantis to Trump for $10 for his presidential “library,” actually a gaudy hotel with no books but more vitally two gold statues of, you know. They will presumably join in grotesque kinship with the $300,000, crypto-bro-funded, bronze and gold leaf Don Colossus just unveiled at Doral Miami, "where the Republic is currently moldering." Before "a robotic chorus of evangelical functionaries who (have) transformed themselves into the most theologically humiliated cohort in modern memory," the statue was honored as, not an idolatrous golden calf, insisted Pastor Mark Burns, but "a celebration of life" and symbol of "the hand of God over (Trump’s) life." Definitely not a cult.

Despite being heralded as God's second favorite son - one who "understands the Scriptures better than the Pope" - Trump is also widely deemed "an economic serial killer" presiding over an "America First Corporate Graveyard," skyrocketing inflation, national debt, farm bankruptcies, and energy costs, and possibly "the largest single act of grand larceny in American history" with a $10 billion payout by his own DOJ against his own IRS to settle his bullshit lawsuit for their leak of his tax returns, which every other president has released. Still, because grifting chutzpah thy name is, and because there's never enough money to fill the ugly gaping hole where a soul should be, he's still running penny-ante scams. Up next: Trump Mobile, "for the forgotten MAGA man."
Last June, his huckster spawn announced the launch of "a sleek, gold smartphone engineered for performance.” The T1 Phone, "proudly designed and built in the United States,” would be available in August at $499. For almost a year, they urged followers to make $100 "deposits" to "pre-order" the beauties; over half a million did, ponying up about $59 million. Then, the bait and switch. The terms of service quietly changed: The "deposit" provided "a conditional opportunity" to buy if Trump Mobile chose to sell. Pricing, production schedules, shipping costs were "non-binding." "Made in the USA" became "Proudly American Designed." "Delivery" dates got pushed back. Unexplained charges appeared. A reporter who called "Customer Service" got “Omega Auto Care." To date, no fantasy Trump phones have shipped. Cheap Crooks 'R Us.

Also, liars. With even neo-cons now deeming the Iran War potentially more of a debacle than Vietnam, the good folks at Secret Handshake, creators of the Trump/Epstein bestie statues, decided that with the regime hyping war like a video game, they might as well turn it into one. Operation Epic Furious: Strait to Hell , which is also online, features three working, arcade video games set up inside DC's War Memorial; they promise "high-octane, flag-waving, boots-on-the-ground...pure pixelated patriotism," or, per Hegseth, "laser-focused maximum reps annihilation mission crushing (with) sustained unrelenting pressure." Battles - by tweet, not gun - pit US forces against ”Iranian schoolgirl,“ "DEIyatollah,“ low-flow shower heads, the Pope and other "threats to American freedom."
Games open with Trump declaring, “Another big, beautiful day as the best President ever.” Options for the prompt, “Ready to ROCK Iran back to the Stone Ages?” are “Not Yet...” “Yes” and “Hell Yes.” Yells Pete, “Let’s liberate some oil!” Trump can order a Diet Coke or bomb Iran; search for barrels of oil, ideas for Truth Social posts, or endless threats that lead nowhere; he vows to “fight this war and win it by hamburger o’clock.” Melania: “I WAS NEVER ON THE EPSTEIN JET...Did you burn the files yet?” JD, fat-faced: “I love couch.” The only way you can lose is by trying to hold Melania’s hand, which abruptly ends the game; otherwise, it’s impossible to end or win it. Irony never dies: Images have surfaced of bored National Guardsmen - a $1 million a day deployment - playing.
Another piece of protest art brings the truth of "one of the most horrific crimes in American history” to Trump's hometown. "The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room,” in New York's Tribeca, is a first-of-its-kind, 5,000-square-foot installation containing all the unsealed Epstein files - 3.5 million pages printed and bound into 3,437 volumes weighing 17,000 pounds, "a physical, undeniable record of corruption, cover-ups, and crime." The pop-up project in the Mriya Gallery was created by the non-profit Primary Facts; it took them about a month to print the files. The exhibit is on view through May 21; admission to groups for a one-hour session is free; organizers are raising funds to cover the New York premiere and bring it to other cities.
The Trumpsonian installation is built around a candlelit tribute to Epstein's more than 1,200 victims and survivors, whose names are all redacted here in closed binders - unlike at the DOJ, where they were badly, only partly redacted, a failure adding insult to injury along with an ongoing, multi-pronged cover-up. The Trump and Epstein Reading Room also includes a timeline documenting the decades-long crimes, legal proceedings and intersections between the two men's lives, all underlining the criminal absurdity of federal claims "there's nothing left to investigate." The vast trove of information, organizers say, is "what 3.5 million pages of evidence looks like." Trump, as deeply complicit as he is narcissistic, "wanted his name on stuff." Now, here it is.

"We know that if this project goes through, our land and our water are in danger. Our future is in danger," warned Krystal Two Bulls, one of many community, conservation, and Indigenous group leaders speaking out after President Donald Trump granted a cross-border permit to what critics called "nothing more than an attempt to resurrect the unpopular Keystone XL pipeline."
Trump's permit for the Bridger Pipeline Expansion Project authorizes various "petroleum products, including gasoline, kerosene, diesel, and liquefied petroleum gas," The Associated Press reported Thursday, but Bridger spokesperson Bill Salvin said the company is currently focused on crude oil—550,000 barrels of which could flow daily from Canada, through Montana, to Guernsey, Wyoming, if the pipeline is completed.
"Water protectors are standing up again, like we have always done against all those who threaten Mother Earth," Two Bulls, an Oglala Lakota and Northern Cheyenne organizer from Lame Deer, Montana, and executive director of Honor the Earth, said Friday. "We fought against the Keystone XL pipeline proposed for these very same lands and won back in 2021. We will fight and win again against the Bridger pipeline."
Shortly after entering office in 2021, then-President Joe Biden revoked the presidential permit for Keystone XL—which Trump had signed during his first term—as part of the Democrat's efforts to combat the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency.
While Biden faced criticism from climate advocates for the oil and gas projects he did allow, Trump took a swipe at him on Thursday, telling reporters: "Slightly different from the last administration. They wouldn't sign a pipeline deal, and we have pipelines going up."
Trump—who campaigned on a pledge to "drill, baby, drill" and returned to the White House last year with financial help from Big Oil—also dismissed safety concerns about pipelines, saying: "By the way, they're way underground. They're not a problem. Nobody even knows they're there. It's so crazy. But they wouldn't approve anything having to do with a pipeline."
As the AP detailed:
Bridger Pipeline and other subsidiaries of True Company have been responsible for several major pipeline accidents including more than 50,000 gallons (240,000 liters) of crude that spilled into the Yellowstone River and fouled a Montana city's drinking water supply in 2015, a 45,000-gallon diesel spill in Wyoming in 2022 and a 2016 spill that released more than 600,000 gallons (2.7 million liters) of crude in North Dakota, contaminating the Little Missouri River and a tributary.
Subsidiaries of True agreed to pay a $12.5 million civil penalty to settle a federal lawsuit over the North Dakota and Montana spills.
Salvin said Bridger Pipeline in the years since the Yellowstone spill developed an AI-based leak detection system that allows it to be notified more quickly when there are problems. It also plans to bore 30 to 40 feet (9 to 12 meters) beneath major rivers including the Yellowstone and Missouri to reduce the chances of an accident. The 2015 accident occurred on a line that was constructed in a shallow trench at the bottom of the river.
A public comment submitted to the Trump administration by the legal group Earthjustice on behalf of Honor the Earth, Sierra Club, WildEarth Guardians, and a dozen other organizations acknowledges concerns about this pipeline's potential impacts to water, land, the climate, air quality, cultural resources, recreation, and more—and called for an intense federal review of the project.
"We know how this system works: More pipelines mean more drilling, more waste, and more spills. And when spills happen, it's communities, landowners, and tribes who are left dealing with the contamination, not the companies profiting from it," Rebecca Sobel, climate and health director at WildEarth Guardians, said Friday. "Oil and gas infrastructure fails every day in this country, and expanding that system only increases the likelihood of spills and long-term contamination."
Sierra Club Montana chapter director Caryn Miske stressed that "while the Trump administration kills affordable energy projects and jobs across the country, it is continuing to side with wealthy corporations and oil executives looking to increase profit regardless of the risks to Montana's treasured waterways and to families and businesses struggling with high energy costs. These policies aren't about fair or free markets, it's welfare for corporations and pollution for everyone else."
Earthjustice is also representing 350 Montana, Center for Biological Diversity, Families for a Livable Climate, Montana Environmental Information Center, Montana Health and Climate, Mountain Mamas, Red Medicine LLC, Western Environmental Law Center, Western Organization of Resource Councils, Western Watersheds Project, Wild Montana, and Wyoming Outdoor Council.
"The proposed Bridger tar sands pipeline is an environmental disaster waiting to happen," declared Jenny Harbine, managing attorney with Earthjustice's Northern Rockies office. "The Trump administration appears more than willing to limit public engagement to force this project through."
"Communities and tribes in the Northern Rockies have a right to know how this could impact their water sources, historic resources, and ways of life," Harbine added. "If the administration attempts to sidestep that legal obligation, we’ll see them in court."
Separately on Friday, Anthony Swift, a longtime leader in the fight against the pipeline and current senior strategist for global nature at Natural Resources Defense Council, said that "no matter what you call the project, the environmental concerns that animated the fight over Keystone XL are no less acute today. Keystone Light will threaten water supplies and exacerbate climate change. This is the moment to get off the oil roller coaster, not double down on the dirtiest oil on the planet."
"The Trump administration has been lobbing gifts to Big Oil since its first day in office. This is the latest in a long, long, long list of favors that show the oil industry is getting a great return on its billion-dollar investment in the president's campaign," Swift added. "President Trump has repeatedly said that America does not need Canada's oil, so we certainly don't need Keystone Light."
Data released by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics on Wednesday showed continued upward pressure on prices, caused in large part by President Donald Trump's war with Iran.
The Producer Price Index (PPI), which measures wholesale prices paid by businesses, posted a year-over-year gain of 6% in April, the largest yearly increase since December 2022.
Energy prices, which have surged since Trump launched an unprovoked war with Iran in late February, played a large role in raising wholesale costs, as the report finds "more than three-quarters of the broad-based increase in April can be traced to a 7.8% jump in prices for final demand energy."
However, energy prices aren't solely responsible for rising wholesale prices, as the so-called "core" PPI, which excludes the costs of food and energy, posted a yearly increase of 4.4% in April, the largest since February 2023.
PPI is seen as an important gauge of future inflation for consumers, as companies typically pass the costs they pay for inputs onto consumers in the form of price increases.
As explained by Groundwork Collaborative in a social media post, the wholesale costs measured by PPI "are what companies pay before they jack up prices on the rest of us."
"What's in the pipeline now is headed straight for your grocery bill and gas tank," Groundwork Collaborative added. "The pain isn't over. It's just beginning."
CNN economics reporter Elisabeth Buchwald similarly predicted more hurt for US consumers in the coming months, arguing in a Wednesday article that a 6% increase in PPI shows "the pain will not be short-lived."
"Even if the United States were to reach a deal with Iran today, it would still take months for shipments of oil held up by the blockade of the crucial Strait of Hormuz to reach American soil," Buchwald explained. "And even then, it would likely be months—or potentially years—before Americans see gas prices return to levels before the war."
Wednesday's PPI report came one day after the Consumer Price Index showed that consumer prices in April rose by 3.8%, the largest yearly increase since May 2023.
Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.) reacted to the latest inflation data by ripping into the president's policy decisions, including the Iran war and the global trade war he started shortly after returning to office last year.
"The only thing Trump has made great again is inflation," Boyle, the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, wrote in a social media post. "His disastrous policies—from his tariff taxes to his war in Iran—are making life even more expensive. We shouldn't be surprised the guy who managed to bankrupt a casino isn't an economic mastermind."
Rep. Maxine Dexter (D-Ore.) linked the increased prices to Trump's desire to have Congress spend $1 billion of taxpayer money on his proposed White House ballroom.
"Oregonians need real relief from these high costs at the store and the pump," wrote Dexter. "We must stop the war in Iran and refuse to pay for presidential vanity projects. Oregon families want peace. They need a break, not a ballroom."
US Sen. Bernie Sanders on Friday announced his endorsement of more than five dozen progressives running for local and state political offices across the country, from Arizona and Missouri to Georgia and New Jersey.
"In this pivotal and dangerous moment in our country's history, we need leaders at every level of government who are prepared to take on the billionaire class and fight for working families. We need bold solutions to the crises we face, not tinkering around the edges," Sanders (I-Vt.) said in a statement.
The 84-year-old caucuses with Democrats in the Senate and twice sought the party's presidential nomination, in 2016 and 2020. During those campaigns and since—particularly with the Fighting Oligarchy Tour he launched shortly after Republican President Donald Trump returned to office last year—he has encouraged Americans, especially younger people, to get involved in US politics.
"In the last 15 months, we have recruited over 8,500 Americans to run for office, many of whom are Independents," the senator noted. "Our political revolution is a multiracial, multigenerational working-class movement built from the ground up."
"Today, I am proud to endorse 61 progressives running for state and local office across America," said Sanders. "They will fight for the kind of changes our country desperately needs."
In Arizona, Sanders is supporting Bobby Nichols for Tempe City Council, Analise Ortiz for state Senate District 24, Mariana Sandoval for state House District 23, Brian Garcia for state House District 8, and two candidates for state House District 9: Lorena Austin and Jacob Martinez.
In California, he is backing four state Assembly candidates: Jessie Lopez for District 68, Ada Briceño for District 67, Fatima Iqbal-Zubair for District 65, and Sandra Celedon for District 31. He's also endorsing Joz Sida for Fontana mayor, Marissa Roy for Los Angeles city attorney, and multiple people running for LA City Council: Hugo Soto-Martinez for District 13, Faizah Malik for District 11, Estuardo Mazariegos for District 9, and Eunisses Hernandez for District 1.
In Colorado, he is endorsing Chela Garcia Irlando for state Senate District 34, Gabriel Cervantes for state House District 31, and Tyler Quick for Adams County Commission. In Delaware, Sanders is backing Shay Frisby for state Senate District 5, Adriana Leela Bohm for state Senate District 1, and Rae Krantz for state House District 6.
In Florida, he is supporting Kyandra Darling for state House District 62, and in Georgia, he is backing Ruwa Romman for state Senate District 7. In Iowa, the senator is endorsing India May for state House District 58, Leila Staton for state House District 54, and three Johnson County supervisor candidates: V. Fixmer-Oraiz, Jon Green, and Mandi Remington.
Sanders is also supporting Scott Houldieson for Indiana Senate District 1, Frank Henderson for Kansas House District 6, Robert LeVertis Bell for Kentucky House District 43, Eboni Taylor for Michigan Senate District 3, Justice Horn for the 1st District in Missouri's Jackson County Legislature, Tick Segerblom for Nevada's Clark County Commission, Ali Aljarrah for New Jersey's Passaic County Commission, and Daisy Maldonado for New Mexico's Doña Ana County Commission.
In New York, where Sanders was notably an early supporter of democratic socialist NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani, he is now endorsing three state Senate candidates—Yuh-Line Niou for District 27, Jessica Gonzalez-Rojas for District 13, and, Aber Kawas for District 12—as well as several state Assembly hopefuls: Adam Bojak for District 149, Maurice Brown for District 129, Dan Livingston for District 123, Conrad Blackburn for District 70, Eli Northup for District 69, Illapa Sairitupac for state Assembly District 65, Eon Huntley for District 56, Christian Celeste-Tate for District 54, David Orkin for District 38, Samantha Kattan for District 37, Diana Moreno for District 36, and Shamsul Haque for District 30.
In Pennsylvania, the senator is supporting Mark Pinsley for state Senate District 16, Sierra McNeil for state House District 195, and Brad Chambers for State House District 41. He's also backing David Morales for mayor of Providence, Rhode Island; Julio Salinas for Texas House District 41; and Jaelynn Scott for Washington House District 37. In West Virginia, he's endorsing three state House candidates: Olivia Miller for District 80, Cody Cumpston for District 6, and Dave Cantrell for District 3.
Sanders had previously announced his support for US Senate candidates Peggy Flanagan in Minnesota, Dr. Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, and Graham Platner in Maine, as well as multiple progressives running for the House of Representatives, including Dr. Adam Hamawy in New Jersey's 12th Congressional District earlier this month.
"We're building a movement for the future," Sanders told The New York Times, which first reported on his new endorsements Friday.
"Our effort is to lead a national movement against Trump's authoritarianism and kleptocracy and unnecessary wars and his contempt for the Constitution," he explained. "But equally important, the American people need an alternative to the Democratic establishment, which is significantly dominated by big-money interests."
The 57 confirmed bombings of boats that the Trump administration has carried out so far since last September have shattered families and communities across Latin America, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and US Southern Command never acknowledging the identities of the at least 192 people they've killed, beyond declaring them "narco-terrorists."
But despite the concerted effort to keep the names and any information about the victims hidden—their identities "blown away over vast stretches of ocean," as a new report states—20 journalists led by the Latin American Center for Investigative Journalism (CLIP) managed to identify 13 of the men whose killings have been called "murders" by legal experts and rights advocates.
The journalists and researchers represented CasaMacondo, Verdad Abierta, 360-grados.co, and NGO El Veinte in Colombia; Alianza Rebelde Investiga in Venezuela; the Trinidad and Tobago Guardian; and Airwars in the UK.
The investigation, titled "Bombed, Without the Right to a Defense," was completed despite widespread fears of speaking out about the bombings in the affected communities.
"Some relatives of victims in Venezuela and in Santa Marta, Colombia, say they have received threats, as sources confirmed to journalists in this alliance," reads the report. "Authorities have remained largely opaque, and the officials willing to talk do so only off the record, wary of dragging their countries into conflict with [US President Donald] Trump."
Three people named in the report had already been identified publicly in legal complaints—Trinidadians Chad Joseph and Rishi Samaroo, whose families filed a complaint in the US federal court; and Colombian Alejandro Carranza Medina, whose family filed a petition with the US-based Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.
The men identified for the first time by CLIP include:
Another man was identified by his nickname, and two unnamed people, including an Ecuadorian man who helped survivor Jonathan Obando escape a bombing and later died, were included in the report.
“It’s a double tragedy—not only because of the unlawful killings, but because the victims are erased, reduced to anonymity,” John Walsh, of the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), told CLIP and the reporting alliance.
The report emphasizes that all of the victims it identified came from poor families and communities. In Uribia, Colombia, where at least two bodies washed ashore after a boat attack, 92% of residents "lack adequate education, healthcare, or basic public services."
"In those conditions, recruiting young men to transport cocaine is easy work—and the pay can be good," reads the report.
A boatman in Uribia told CLIP that "most people here aren’t the owners" of vessels or the drugs they carry. “The people who own the cargo are almost always outsiders—even international players."
María Teresa Ronderos, director and co-founder of the CLIP, told The Guardian the report affirms that despite the administration's repeated claims that the military is defending "our nation’s interest" and protecting Americans from those who are "trafficking deadly narcotics" like fentanyl and cocaine, “the US is not taking down any Pablo Escobar or Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán."
“Despite the US claim that the strikes are fighting narco-terrorism, what is actually happening is that young people living in extremely precarious conditions, doing whatever work they can to support their families, are being targeted," Ronderos said.
As the investigation into the identities of the boat strike victims illustrates, the people the Trump administration is killing are not in fact the "al Qaeda of our hemisphere" as repeatedly claimed by SecDef.www.elclip.org/los-bombarde...
[image or embed]
— Brian Finucane (@bcfinucane.bsky.social) May 15, 2026 at 10:13 AM
The boat that Fuentes and Amundarain, who had both gone to Trinidad and Tobago to work, were on was traveling from the Caribbean country to Venezuela, calling into question the claim that the vessel was trafficking drugs.
"Boats carry drugs from South America northwards, not the reverse,” Ronderos told The Guardian.
Legal experts have emphasized that even in the cases of victims who were involved in the drug trade, the bombings still legally qualify as extrajudicial killings, or even murder. Trump informed Congress in October that the White House views the US as being in an armed conflict with drug cartels in Latin America, claiming a rationale for carrying out the boat strikes. But no conflict has officially been declared, and rights experts warn that the military has clearly violated international law by targeting the survivors of some of the boat attacks in "double-tap" strikes.
“The deaths of Joseph and Samaroo were clearly extrajudicial killings,” Steven Watt, an attorney with the ACLU who is working on the case brought by the two Trinidiadian families, told CLIP. He added that "the Trump administration’s argument—that a 'war on drugs' justifies violent strikes like these—cannot legally excuse the killings."
Brian Finucane of the International Crisis Group told CLIP that "the law of war permits violence otherwise prohibited, but only during genuine armed conflict—a threshold the Trump administration has failed to meet, as it has not even identified who the US is supposedly fighting."
“Beyond that foundational problem, the administration’s suggestion that vaguely defined ‘enablers’ may be targetable raises further concerns that it is violating the rules of its own bogus legal paradigm," Finucane said.
Ronderos added that “there is no death penalty for cocaine trafficking."
"So the fact that they were killed without even having the chance to defend themselves is deeply troubling," she told The Guardian.
In accordance with international and domestic laws, the US has historically treated drug trafficking on the high seas as a criminal offense and has ensured those who are found trying to bring drugs to the US are brought to justice in court.
A spokesperson for US Southern Command told the reporters that the bombings have been “deliberate, lawful, and precise, directed specifically at narco-terrorists and their enablers," and that the US has "full confidence in the operations and intelligence professionals who inform our missions.”
But the administration has not released any evidence showing the strikes have targeted major drug trafficking operations, and as Common Dreams reported last month, data from US Customs and Border Protection shows little evidence that the strikes are stopping the flow of illicit substances.
“CBP’s seizures of fentanyl at the US-Mexico border had been declining, often sharply, since mid-2023. But since early 2025, the declines stopped,” said Adam Isacson of WOLA at the time. “Halfway into fiscal 2026, seizures are almost exactly half of 2025’s full-year total: a flat trendline.”
Finucane told The Guardian that the boat strikes have never been “a serious counter-drug operation."
"I think this was in part a military spectacle to give the illusion of the administration doing something ‘macho’ about drugs,” Finucane said.
Walsh said Hegseth and Trump "want to impress the public, to make Americans believe that they, unlike previous governments, are finally ending the terrible problem of drug trafficking."
"The profound cruelty and indifference with which they order these systematic and intentional killings allows them to project this menacing image of faceless ‘narco-terrorists,'" he added. "In doing so, they shock many Americans while numbing their sense that the US officials responsible for these murders should be held accountable.”
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez hit back Thursday after senior Israeli officials condemned FC Barcelona star Lamine Yamal for waving a Palestinian flag during a parade celebrating the soccer team's La Liga championship.
The 18-year-old winger—who has established himself as one of the world's best soccer players—waved the flag from atop an open team bus during Monday's celebration in Barcelona. Yamal also shared a photo of him holding the flag with his 42.5 million Instagram followers. The post had nearly 7 million "likes" as of Thursday afternoon.
The display of solidarity with Palestine—whose people have endured 31 months of genocide in Gaza and generations of illegal occupation, settler colonization, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing in the West Bank—drew predictably baseless claims of "antisemitism" and "supporting terrorism" from numerous Israelis, including Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who in 2007 was convicted of supporting a Jewish terror group.
"He is raising the flag of a nonexistent entity," Ben-Gvir said of Yamal in a Facebook post. Numerous Israeli officials including Ben-Gvir deny the existence of the Palestinian people and nation.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on X Thursday that Yamal "chose to incite against Israel and foment hatred while our soldiers are fighting the terrorist organization Hamas, an organization that massacred, raped, burned, and murdered Jewish children, women, and elderly" during the October 7, 2023 attack.
"Whoever supports this type of message should ask themselves: Does he consider this humanitarian? Is this moral?" added Katz, who oversees military forces that have killed or wounded more than 250,000 Palestinians in Gaza in a war that United Nations experts and many others, including prominent Israeli Holocaust scholars, have called a genocide.
Responding to the criticism, Sánchez wrote on X: "Those who consider waving the flag of a state to be 'inciting hatred' have either lost their judgment or been blinded by their own ignominy. Lamine has only expressed the solidarity with Palestine felt by millions of Spaniards. Another reason to be proud of him."
The Spanish government's support for Palestine includes intervention in the International Court of Justice genocide case against Israel, backing the International Criminal Court's effort to bring Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to justice for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza, promotion of United Nations Gaza ceasefire resolutions, an arms embargo against Israel, and formal recognition of Palestinian statehood.
Katz also said on X that he expects "a great and respected club like FC Barcelona to distance itself" from Yamal's display of solidarity "and make it unequivocally clear that there is no place for incitement or for support of terrorism."
FC Barcelona coach Hansi Flick said Tuesday that if Yamal wants to show support for Palestine, "it is his decision. He is old enough. He's 18 years old."
Yamal's display came just weeks before the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) Men's World Cup kicks off in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Yamal is a member of the Spanish national team. Some observers have voiced concerns about possible backlash from the Trump administration, which has revoked and denied visas for people who publicly support Palestine.
Labor rights and voting rights groups were among those who gathered in Selma and Montgomery, Alabama for the All Roads Lead to the South Day of Action.
This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates...
In a show of resistance to the US Supreme Court's dismantling of the Voting Rights Act and Republicans' efforts to redraw congressional districts across southern states in a bid to retain power despite their party's unpopular agenda, labor and voting rights groups were among those that arrived in Montgomery, Alabama Saturday for "Day One" of a mass mobilization against GOP lawmakers who they said are intent on "resurrecting Jim Crow."
While groups including the Movement for Black Lives and National Jobs With Justice boarded buses in Atlanta Saturday morning to join more than 250 organizations at a rally at the Alabama State Capitol, other organizers began the "All Roads Lead to the South" National Day of Action with a march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama—the same site of the historic 1965 voting rights march that became known as Bloody Sunday.
"We started here because we wanted to stand on sacred ground and consecrate ourselves," said organizer LaTosha Brown, co-founder of the group Black Voters Matter. "You cannot fight hate with hate, you have to stand in the spirit of love, and so look around—this is what love looks like."We’re joining the All Roads Lead to the South coalition in Alabama today to show that We the People will not allow a Jim Crow 2.0.
Today’s march is a powerful reminder: courage and community are how we will get through this.
WATCH: https://t.co/9Z5DOblam1
— Democracy Forward (@DemocracyFwd) May 16, 2026
The march and rally were organized in response to a ramp-up of efforts by the Republican Party and right-wing courts, including the far-right majority on the US Supreme Court, to redraw electoral maps in states including Louisiana, Alabama, and Tennessee.
The mass mobilization was organized after the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in Louisiana v. Callais last month, effectively eviscerating Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which has held that voters of color have the right to legally challenge racially discriminatory congressional maps.
The Supreme Court this week allowed Alabama to revert back to an electoral map with just one majority-Black district out of seven, despite that fact that 26% of Alabama residents are Black.
Tennessee Republicans also adopted a new electoral map that splits up the state's only majority-Black district, and the Missouri Supreme Court approved a congressional map that targets the state's 5th District, represented by Rep. Emanuel Cleaver.
Arriving in Montgomery, Tennessee state Rep. Justin Jones (D-52) said voters across the South need "a united front... to take on this new Confederacy... We know what the intent of these governors and state lawmakers are, to dismantle every gain made during the civil rights movement and dismantle the crown jewel of the civil rights movement, which was the Voting Rights Act."
Rep. @brotherjones_ in Montgomery: “We’re here united to take on this new confederacy, 60 years after the Selma March… because we know their intent is to dismantle everything gained during the civil rights movement.” pic.twitter.com/op87I4g8hT
— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) May 16, 2026
"Our parents and grandparents marched, organized, bled, and won," said organizers ahead of the rally. "The Voting Rights Act was theirs. The fight to keep it is ours. Right now, state by state, that law is being dismantled. We know that we cannot fight the same battles the same way. New times demand new tactics—economic pressure, political organizing, community action, culture, and faith. But we know what we know: Organizing works. And we have unfinished business."
At the rally, US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) emphasized the need for solidarity from across the US, with supporters of voting rights mobilizing in states near and far from the South—the current center of the GOP's attacks.
"They think they can draw us out of power. They do not know the sleeping giant they just awakened," said Ocasio-Cortez. "When Black Americans have the right to vote and that vote is protected, our schools get funded. When voting rights are protected, healthcare gets expanded. When voting rights are protected, our country moves forward. And Montgomery, that's what they're actually afraid of."
AOC: “It is time for the North to pull up to the South and let them know exactly what they have uncorked with this injustice. They think they can draw us out of power. They do not know the sleeping giant they just awakened. What they thought was the final blow is actually just… pic.twitter.com/kQvixR2Olv
— Marco Foster (@MarcoFoster_) May 16, 2026
Erica Smiley, executive director of Jobs With Justice, said labor groups joined the mass mobilization because "the bridges we have to cross are not only in Selma."
"Jim Crow didn't just come for the ballot. It came for anyone who tried to organize and have a voice," said Smiley. "Efforts to rollback equality and democracy are happening in the occupied cities, shop floors, and now the halls of the Capitol across the country."
Rep. Terri Sewell (D-Ala.) called for the rally to mark the beginning of a "Freedom Summer," with rallies at "every State House" in the country to pressure state legislators to end the GOP gerrymandering efforts, which President Donald Trump has explicitly called for.
"Let's declare a Freedom Summer and go to every courthouse this summer, to tell those legislators, 'We will not go back,'" said Sewell.
Dozens of satellite events were also taking place across the US on Saturday.
"Donald Trump, Republican state legislatures, and conservative courts are systematically and unabashedly tilting power away from the people for Trump’s political gain," said state Attorney General Jay Jones.
Virginia's Democratic attorney general, Jay Jones, said Friday night that he would redouble efforts to campaign on behalf of Democrats in the upcoming midterm elections following the US Supreme Court's rejection of a request to restore a voter-approved congressional map.
Following the high court's one-sentence denial of Democratic state officials' petition for emergency relief, which they had filed to block the state Supreme Court's ruling against a congressional map that passed via ballot measure last month, Jones said he would be "working tirelessly to support our Democratic candidates so we can win control of the House in spite of Republicans putting their thumbs on the scale."
With no dissents noted, the Supreme Court said Friday evening that it was denying the request to block the Virginia high court's ruling that had tossed out last month's redistricting referendum.
BREAKING: SCOTUS denies Virginia Democrats' request to block the Virginia Supreme Court ruling tossing out the redistricting referendum. There are no noted dissents and no opinion.
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— Chris Geidner (@chrisgeidner.bsky.social) May 15, 2026 at 6:35 PM
The decision "leaves in place the deeply flawed ruling from the Supreme Court of Virginia, which overturned the results of a lawful election and erased the will of millions of Virginia voters," said Jones.
It also served as "yet another profoundly troubling example of the continued national attack on voting rights and the rule of law by [President] Donald Trump, Republican state legislatures, and conservative courts," said the attorney general.
The map that was narrowly approved by voters last month included four new Democratic-leaning US House districts in Virginia, putting the party on equal footing with Republicans nationally or potentially giving it an edge in a mid-decade redistricting battle that was kicked off last year. Trump has urged Republican state legislatures to redraw congressional districts to give the GOP more winnable seats in the US House—as the president's economic policies and his deeply unpopular war on Iran as well as other military actions have pushed his approval rating to a low point for his second term ahead of the November midterms.
The redistricting fight was intensified late last month with the Supreme Court's ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, which held that Louisiana must redraw its 2024 congressional map. The map had created a second majority-minority district in the state, whose population is one-third Black. The ruling effectively gutted Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which allowed voters of color to challenge racially discriminatory electoral maps in court.
After the ruling, Louisiana's Republican governor, Jeff Landry, suspended the state's primary elections to allow the Republican-controlled legislature to redraw the congressional map, throwing out roughly 45,000 votes that had already been cast.
In the Virginia case, the US Supreme Court sided with the state's high court, which had found earlier this month that Virginia's Democratic legislature improperly began the process of placing an amendment to the state constitution after early voting in last fall's election was underway. The amendment cleared the way for Democrats to redraw the map, and the General Assembly approved the amendment days before the election.
Virginia voters then approved the redrawn map in April, only to have the state Supreme Court strike it down.
In filing their emergency petition with the US Supreme Court, Virginia Democrats argued the ruling had undermined the will of the residents who had voted for the referendum in April.
On Friday evening, Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger said the court had chosen "to nullify an election and the votes of more than three million Virginians."
Jones added in his statement that "Donald Trump, Republican state legislatures, and conservative courts are systematically and unabashedly tilting power away from the people for Trump’s political gain. Just this past month in Louisiana, Tennessee, and South Carolina, they have redrawn their maps and diluted Black political representation because it threatens their hold on power."
"This attack is not subtle," said the attorney general. "It is a coordinated effort to stack the deck in the Republicans' favor before the midterms, lock in political advantage, and make it harder for voters, especially Black voters and communities of color, to hold Trump and his allies accountable. There can be no doubt: Trump and his allies want only their most politically extreme supporters to have their voices heard in Washington. The Supreme Court of Virginia’s previous decision and today’s refusal by the United States Supreme Court to act are only bolstering these extreme MAGA voices."
Addressing Virginia voters, Jones added, "This fight is far from over, and I am committed to fighting alongside you."
Cuban Chargé d'Affaires Lianys Torres Rivera said her government is willing to negotiate with the US, but "the only exception is our sovereignty, independence, and right to self-determination."
Cuba's top diplomat in the United States on Friday underscored the inviolability of her country's sovereignty amid tenuous negotiations with the Trump administration and mounting fears that the US is planning to criminally indict a former Cuban president and possibly invade the island to abduct him.
Cuban Chargé d'Affaires Lianys Torres Rivera told The Hill that her country's socialist government is open to negotiating with the US, but that "the only exception is our sovereignty, independence, and right to self-determination," adding that "those are the red lines."
Torres Rivera acknowledged that ramped-up US pressure—including President Donald Trump's invasion threats and tightening of the internationally condemned 65-year economic embargo—is inflicting tremendous suffering on the Cuban people.
“It’s difficult. What the Cuban people are enduring these days is difficult," she said. "They are under a collective punishment from the US."
The Cuban government said Thursday that Trump's oil blockade has left the island and its 11 million people without fuel—a situation United Nations experts last week described as illegal "energy starvation."
“We have reorganized the whole country, the healthcare system, the education system, the transportation system, to keep the basic services running," Torres Rivera told The Hill. "But it doesn’t mean that they are running normally. They are running under huge stress.”
Still, "a serious country that respects yourself... won’t put on the table your political system or your internal order that the people of our country decide in a sovereign way," she stressed.
The delicate balancing act Cuba is being forced to perform was on stark display on Thursday as Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe traveled to Havana for talks aimed at pressuring Cuban officials into complying with demands that critics say would inrfinge upon the nation's sovereignty. These likely include political and economic reforms, releasing political prisoners, and ending or weakening Cuba's alliances with US adversaries including China, Iran, Russia, and Venezuela.
It was a bitter pill to swallow for Cubans, as the CIA was behind myriad efforts to topple their government, from assassination attempts against revolutionary leader Fidel Castro to the failed Bay of Pigs invasion to supporting Cuban exile terrorists who carried out deadly attacks that Havana says killed thousands of people.
Further stoking fears of aggression from the Trump administration,r unidentified US officials told CBS News that the Department of Justice is preparing to criminally indict 94-year-old former Cuban President Raúl Castro for the 1996 shoot-down of planes belonging to the subversive US-based group Brothers to the Rescue after they violated Cuban airspace.
Some observers noted the 1976 midair bombing by US-based anti-Castro militants of Cubana de Aviacion Flight 455, a commercial airliner carrying 73 passengers and crew. The CIA, under then-Director George H.W. Bush, knew that Cuban exiles were plotting to blow up a Cubana plane, but did not warn Havana. The perpetrators of the bombing eventually made their way back to Florida, where they were welcomed as heroes.
Others surmised that the reported planned indictment is a pretext for a US invasion and arrest of Castro similar to January's abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on dubious—and partially retracted—narco-terrorism allegations.Thirty-two Cubans, including military and police officers providing security for Maduro, were killed by US forces during the abduction operation.
"To me, this signals that the Pirate State could be planning another kidnapping operation against Cuba like they did in Venezuela," British journalist Richard Medhurst said in response to the reporting, referring to the US. "This is the lawless behavior they want to normalize around the world."
ACLU head of digital engagement Stefan Smith said on social media: "Remember Maduro and Venezuela? If you’re a foreign leader indicted in American courts, we claim the right to send the military to kidnap you. Indictment is permission to invade."
Following his visit to Cuba, Ratcliffe said that negotiations "will not stay open indefinitely," remarks that followed numerous threats by Trump to "take" Cuba.
"Whether I free it, take it—I think I can do anything I want," the president said in March as his fuel embargo caused blackouts that brought deadly suffering to the most vulnerable Cubans, including sick people and children.
Torres Rivera insisted that protests over the blackouts don't mean Cubans won't rally in defense of their homeland.
“When they are enduring 20 hours of blackouts, they have grievances, and they express it,” she told The Hill, cautioning US officials against a "wrong reading" of the demonstrations.
"We are preparing to defend ourselves," Torres Rivera said, adding that a US invasion "could be a big mistake. It could be a bloodbath."
"We don’t want Cubans dying in Cuba,” she stressed, nor “any American soldier.”