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To Speak the Truth: On the Mediated Obscene
The anniversary of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack and the three-year, U.S-funded Gazan genocide it ignited marks the birth of a dark new world where "the unthinkable has become banal," where many thousands of damaged Palestinian children - homeless, toy-less, traumatized, unschooled, with mournful questions about a lost world - have been given only "tents, hunger, and rubble as answers." Zohran Mamdani on the arduous, unfulfilled task before us: "There must be room to mourn every single life."
Precisely one year into what over 100 human rights organizations around the world call "a ceasefire in name only," Gaza remains "Ground Zero" in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. In the last three years, Israeli strikes have killed at least 74,254 people, including over 21,500 children, and wounded 175,000 more, killing or wounding more than 1 in 10 of Gaza's pre-war population; health officials estimate tens of thousands more dead remain buried beneath Gaza's 61 million tons of rubble. Since the start of the so-called ceasefire on Oct.10 of last year, at least 1,470 more Palestinians have been killed, including nearly one child a day. No hospital is fully functional, over 1.4 million Palestinians face crisis-level hunger and most Gazan families remain trapped in a devastating cycle of loss, grief, deprivation and uncertainty.
Reports seeping out from a still-mostly-blockaded Gaza describe "entire worlds wiped out" - extended families, neighborhoods, over 80% of all buildings, resulting in nearly 1.9 million Palestinians displaced. Gaza's missing, or last seen detained, handcuffed, tortured, naked, haunt those who survive: "We don't know whether to mourn them or wait for them." During occasional prisoner swaps, Israel hands over images or remains of decomposing bodies of detainees, many handcuffed, blindfolded, missing limbs, clearly tortured. Parents scroll or search through them, all that's left of a long-missing son: "How did I become a mother who hopes to find her child among mutilated corpses? My dream was to hug him. Now I pray simply to bury him."
Others relive brutality they withstood: fires, bombings, multiple evacuations, sights, smells, sounds of phosphorous bombs, drones, tanks; the terror of running to an outhouse fast enough not to "be sniped," as bombs fall the uneasy sleep close enough to outside walls that, if buildings fall, neighbors can dig them out or at least bury them, the first up-close sight of Israeli soldiers swathed in armor, looking "invincible." The orders to strip to underwear, blindfolded, tightly handcuffed behind backs; kneeling on ground of broken glass and rubble; insults, beatings, cold relieved only when their own warm welcome blood from punches runs over them. Trying to pray or sleep, hallucinating "between life and death," when blankets, speaking, changing position is forbidden: "Everything was forbidden except breathing and swift death."
Palestinian detaineePhoto by Activestills
And always there are the children, Gaza's "lost generation," roughly 700,000 students left behind by three years of war and deliberate “scholasticide" that have destroyed 95% of their schools, turned the rest into shelters for the displaced, killed over 20,000 students and 1,000 teachers, seen books burned for fuel for warmth or cooking. At the start of a new school year, the UN and its partners have set up over 500 tent sites - no desks, chairs, books, water, ovens in summer, freezing in winter - to serve up to 100,000 hungry, shell-shocked students struggling to focus in an attempted return to a "normal life" they can't imagine, who've grown up falling asleep to the sound of bombs, "their entire existence one of life amid rubble, tents, stones and sand," writes Tareq Hajjaj of kids often too young to remember what a home or school was.
Hajjaj fled for Cairo in 2024 so his only child wouldn't "grow up believing the whole world looked like Gaza." He left behind 15 nieces and nephews whose "expectations for ordinary life" he's seen shrink; on one video call, a six-year-old nephew saw him sitting on a sofa and asked how he fit it in his tent, and they dream only of a bigger, dryer tent. In the occupied West Bank, residents likewise endure new Israeli gates that turn villages into "an effective cage," Bedouin families are expelled, settlers steal land, livestock, homes, olive groves harvested by Palestinian generations past. This is not a Palestinian "superhuman capacity" for resilience, Hajjaj argues, but "the ordinary human behavior of people who have no other choice, who are left alone to their fate." To cope, they dismiss the hardship with “aadi,” Arabic for normal -"it is what it is" - but "there is nothing normal about it."
Many Gazans are still surviving on a fraction of the food aid they need.Getty Image
In a deeply complicit America that contributed over $30 billion to the enduring carnage, the truth of what our blood money has wrought slowly seeps out. Last month, the New York Film Festival premiered NAZA, the Guardian-produced documentary by two Israeli filmmakers that offers a grim "Window Into Systems of Mass Killings" in a Gaza where rabid Zionists argued there are "no innocent people." NAZA, the Hebrew acronym for civilian deaths as high as 500 for one legit target, presents damning testimony from 24 Israeli soldiers, faces obscured from Israeli retribution, who veer from naming their genocidal acts to rationalizing them through performative nods toward their guilt - a longtime form of Israeli sort-of-moral-reckoning with state violence known as "shooting and crying" that critics dub "addiction to the mediated obscene." The film will stream for free in November on The Guardian website.
This week, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani proffered a more heartfelt, equitable reckoning with what remains "a moral tear in the universe" by attending a peace vigil and press conference to commemorate the grim anniversary. As expected, he caught flak from both sides when he called out both Hamas' “horrific war crimes” - he's a Muslim "traitor" - and Israel's “devastating, ongoing genocide” - he's an "anti-Semite." Calmly, he noted, he "signed up for this," and will continue to insist on it, citing the need to equally mourn and extend human rights to the over 1,100 Israelis killed and 74,000 Palestinians subsequently killed. "This is part of what it means to believe in a sense of humanity, " he said. "We need not choose between which death we will mourn and which we will ignore, and we must reckon with the fact that all of it is to be opposed.”
A ceasefire in name only: The mother of 8-year-old Amal al-Mughayir mourns her death in an Israeli strike on Khan Younis last month.Photo by Doaa Albaz
Further glad proof of that reckoning was the awarding of the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize to “Navi” Pillay, 85, South African jurist, former U.N. human rights chief and member of the ICC who has led decades-long fights seeking accountability for apartheid, wartime rape and most recently the Gaza genocide. The Nobel committee cited Pillay's “exceptional courage”; noting her last report naming Gaza a genocide, she responded, "Why would you need courage to speak the truth?" Fittingly, Pillay learned of the award while at Germany's Nuremberg Forum, where Nazis went on trial in 1945: "I was sitting here minding my own business, listening to the panel present their research, because you’re always learning.” When colleagues applauded her, Pillay won the Internet by slyly adding, "Thank you so much. If you clap a little more, I may share this prize with President Trump."
Last year, Pillay was also awarded the Sydney Peace Prize. She dedicated it to “all the survivors of international crimes” and to “defenders of international justice (who) ensure that impunity will not be allowed to reign.” Joining her righteous fight is Mosab Abu Toha, a Palestinian writer and poet from Gaza and winner of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary. Recently, per Zeteo, Toha wrote A Letter of Sympathy to the President of the United States after he saw posts online mocking Trump when he was seen wincing at the “deafening sound" of a military flyover for his autocrat bestie Chinese President Xi. "I didn’t like the tone of many of those posts,” Toha wrote. "I don't blame you for such a reaction/ I have reacted like this, and worse, hundred of times..."
To wit:
"My parents, wife, kids, and siblings have too.
So all of us now
know how
that sound feels.
In 2008, I was 16
on the roof of our house in Beit Lahia,
standing with my father, watching his pigeons in their coop,
when an Israeli, U.S.-made F-16
flew low, like a shaving machine,
before razing a neighborhood.
I panicked at its piercing shriek,
but also at the sight of the missiles
mounted beneath its wings.
But Mr. President, all of us, except you, know
the screech of a missile
or the blast of an explosion.
Do you know what’s louder than the screech and the blast?
The voice of a mother in Jabalia Camp,
begging me on October 31, 2023,
to search for the bodies of her husband and children
under the rubble
not just of her house,
but of the entire neighborhood.
The desperate pleas of 5-year-old Hind Rajab
from her uncle’s car in January 2024,
and the 335 bullets fired at her
before, during, and after the call.
The trickle of tears on the cheek of a father
who returned with no bread for his kids in a tent
in Khan Younis, and the screams of an infant
whose mother’s breast had dried up.
The heartbeat of 18-year-old Ahed
as her uncle, Dr. Hani Bseiso,
amputated her leg on a kitchen table,
without anesthesia.
It was dark!
The grinding footsteps of Dr. Hussam Abu Safiyya
as he walked toward the tank in his white coat.
I can hear the sound of his disappearance.
And I can still hear and hear more!
But do you know what will be much louder than all?
The sound of the gavel
in the court of justice."
Oct 10, 2026
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Trump Administration Sued Over 'Callous Giveaway to Big Oil and Big Auto'
A coalition of environmental groups filed a lawsuit Friday seeking to block the Trump administration's rollback of fuel efficiency standards, which they called a "giveaway" to the oil and auto industries.
Earlier this week, the US Department of Transportation finalized a rule weakening Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards, which require automakers to increase the fuel efficiency of their vehicles each year.
The Biden administration required annual fuel-efficiency improvements aimed at bringing the average for new vehicles to 50.4 miles per gallon by 2031. Under the Trump administration’s new rule, the 2031 requirement would fall below the 35.4 mpg already achieved by the 2024 fleet, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's (NHTSA) own analysis.
NHTSA estimated that as a result of the rule change, Americans will consume roughly 122 billion more gallons of gas by 2050 than they would have under the old standards, increasing average lifetime fuel costs by more than $1,600 per vehicle—more than the roughly $1,300 the administration has claimed they'll save on average in upfront vehicle costs.
It is also projected to add about 1 billion additional metric tons of CO2 emissions by 2050 compared with retaining the previous standards—equivalent to more than six months' worth of emissions from the entire US transportation sector.
“Oil companies will profit from less efficient cars, but drivers will take a hit to their wallets and our kids will breathe dirtier air," said David Pettit, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity’s (CBD) Climate Law Institute. "We’ll all pay the price for more tailpipe pollutants spewing everywhere from playgrounds to wild places. We’re asking the courts to put a stop to this callous giveaway to Big Oil and Big Auto.”
CBD was joined by the Conservation Law Foundation, Environmental Defense Fund, Public Citizen, and Sierra Club, which filed a petition on Friday to ask an appeals court to review the rule change. They argue that the rollback is illegal because federal law requires NHTSA to set fuel-economy standards at the “maximum feasible” level manufacturers can achieve.
“The Trump administration’s rollback will mean wasted gas, more air pollution, and higher costs for Americans who are already struggling with high fuel prices,” said Andy Su, senior transportation attorney at Environmental Defense Fund. “We’re going to court to oppose this dangerous U-turn away from decades of successful work to make our cars more efficient and less expensive to drive.”
Oct 02, 2026
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'I Know Where I Want to Live': Ex-Venture Capitalist Explains Why He'd Be Happy to Pay California Billionaire Tax
As some of California's richest residents pour tens of millions of dollars into defeating a proposed billionaire tax, one former venture capitalist is making a remarkably different argument: He is perfectly happy to pay it—and he's not alone.
John O'Farrell, a former partner at Andreessen Horowitz, explained Wednesday in a 12-post thread on the social media platform X why he supports the California Billionaire Tax Act, commonly known as Proposition 40, which is on the state's November midterm ballot.
O'Farrell's argument contradicts the chorus of Silicon Valley billionaires and their allies who warn that taxing billionaire wealth would drive the ultra-rich out of California.
"I know where I want to live," he wrote.
"I've been fortunate to benefit from tech wealth. I'm not even close to being a billionaire, but I could easily afford to pay the wealth tax—and any billionaire certainly can—without the slightest effect on my lifestyle," O'Farrell said. "I support a wealth tax at my wealth level also."
Introduced by the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West, Prop 40 would impose a one-time 5% levy on people worth $1 billion or more, with an option to pay the tax in annual installments of 1% over five years.
The proposal would require the state to spend 90% of revenue from the tax on healthcare and the rest on food assistance and public education. Proponents say the tax would raise roughly $100 billion in revenue. Critics argue that it could drive wealthy residents and investment from California and stall economic growth.
"I find the knee-jerk opposition of some ultra-wealthy people to the idea of paying any new tax deeply disappointing," O'Farrell said in his thread. "To be honest, I can't understand it. They have so much money they couldn't spend it in multiple lifetimes."
Inequality.org, a project of the Institute for Policy Studies—a Washington, DC-based progressive think tank—exposed 22 California billionaires who have poured more than $150 million into defeating Prop 40, "with more rolling in every day," as Chuck Collins wrote for the group.
"These 22 include a prince, several private jet-flying chums of Jeffrey Epstein, and a bunch of crypto and tech bros designing the [artificial intelligence] future for the rest of us," Collins noted. "On January 1, 2025, these 22 billionaires had a combined wealth of $439.8 billion. By September 1, 2026, their wealth had grown to $722.1 billion. In a little under 20 months, their combined wealth increased $282.6 billion, a gain of over 64%."
O'Farrell's social media thread pointed out how "our tax system favors wealthy people."
"I believe it's a patriotic duty to pay taxes, and I do so with pride," he wrote, adding, "the least we can do is pay up rather than try to avoid it."
"Paying taxes is ultimately a matter of self-interest," he contended. "What kind of society do we want to live in? One that rewards achievement but also emphasizes fairness and opportunity for all—or one in which you have to cower in a bunker and live in fear of the pitchforks?"
"One enables the pursuit of happiness for all," he concluded. "The other, just the pursuit of endless wealth."
Prop 40 is backed by numerous progressive groups including the Teamsters union, California Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), and Our Revolution, as well as individual progressives such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), and Democratic congressional candidate Connie Chan, who is running to replace retiring longtime San Francisco congresswoman Nancy Pelosi.
Sanders, Khanna, and others—including Congresswoman Aisha Wahab (D-Calif.), Democratic congressional candidate Randy Villegas, and California insurance commissioner candidate Jane Kim—are set to speak at a series of rallies for Prop 40 starting Saturday in San Francisco.
O'Farrell isn't the only wealthy Californian who supports Prop 40. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, whose fortune has soared into the hundreds of billions of dollars, has said he is “perfectly fine” with the proposed tax, telling Bloomberg that he and his family “chose to live in Silicon Valley” and that whatever taxes California applies, “so be it.”
Oct 01, 2026
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Right-Wing Smear Campaign Against James Talarico Collapses in Mere Hours
A right-wing smear campaign against Texas Democratic US Senate candidate James Talarico fell apart in mere hours on Sunday.
On Sunday afternoon, MAGA influencers Nick Sortor and Rhein Amacher posted a 45-second audio recording on social media that they claimed was of an employee at an Ohio mental health center stating that Talarico had been discharged from the facility on Saturday.
Right-wing social media accounts had spent days spreading rumors about Talarico undergoing mental health treatment after the Texas Democrat stepped away from the campaign trail for more than a week after coming down with the flu.
Problems with the influencers' narrative quickly emerged, as the recording indicated that Talarico was discharged from the Ohio facility on Saturday, and by that point the Democratic Senate hopeful had already returned to the campaign trail, making a public appearance on Friday at the Austin City Limits festival.
On Sunday night, the official social media account of Lindner Center Hope, the facility where the Texas Democrat was purportedly staying, posted a statement that "James Talarico has never received treatment" there.
The Bulwark later obtained a recording of the entire six-minute phone call showing that the employee repeatedly denied having any record of anyone named James Talarico at the facility.
After minutes of being badgered by Amacher about Talarico's presence, the employee indicated that he must have already been discharged, which is why she had no record of him.
Will Sommer, a reporter for The Bulwark who specializes in tracking far-right disinformation and conspiracy theories, noted in a Sunday social media post that some of the MAGA influencers have started taking down posts they wrote promoting the audio recording.
Talarico responded to the botched smear campaign on Sunday night by writing on his social media account, "I've never even been to Ohio.”
Talarico spokesman JT Ennis called the smear campaign "a lie designed to promote a pathetic conspiracy theory."
"Last week James Talarico was home in Austin, Texas," Ennis added, "recovering from the flu."
Oct 12, 2026
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As Catholic Convert Vance Casts Doubt on Execution Livestream, Lead US Bishop Says Plan Promotes 'Culture of Death'
While US Vice President JD Vance—a Catholic convert—suggested on Friday that the administration may not actually livestream a firing squad execution at a military base in December, the church's top bishop in the country denounced the widely decried plan.
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth pledged this week to make the execution of Fort Hood mass shooter Nidal Hasan "public," and officials said that would mean a livestream. As Religion News Service noted, the Pentagon chief is an evangelical Christian who has often spoken about his faith and "attends a church led by Pastor Doug Wilson, a self-described Christian nationalist."
On Friday, the vice president—who recently published a book about his religious experiences, including his conversion to Catholicism—told reporters that despite those statements about a livestream, "I don't know that that's actually gonna happen."
Vance argued that Hasan, a former Army major and doctor, committed "the worst terrorist attack on American soil outside of 9/11," but also said that "if it's ultimately livestreamed, I'm not gonna be watching it."
Meanwhile, using President Donald Trump's preferred term for the Department of Defense, Archbishop Paul Coakley, president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, said in a statement that "it is with shock and great sorrow that I have learned of the Department of War's decision to publicly livestream the execution of Nidal Hasan."
"Our God is the God of life. In no way can Hasan's actions be condoned, but this decision is a barbaric promotion of a culture of death and must be reconsidered. The word of God exhorts us: 'Do not repay anyone evil for evil' (Romans 12:17)," declared Coakley, a "conservative culture warrior" elected to his leadership role last year.
"The public execution even of one who has done grave harm will only further undermine the moral fabric of our nation and be a blight on the conscience of its people," he added. "I pray for the intercession of Our Lady of Good Counsel that we as a nation may always choose life even in the most trying times and circumstances."
Coakley joined a growing chorus of critics who have condemned the Pentagon plan, including the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, which said Friday that "the livestreaming of an execution is tantamount to a public execution and would breach the absolute prohibition of torture."
American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, who had blasted the livestream decision on Thursday, called the archbishop's statement a "strong response from the Catholic Church."
James Martin, a Jesuit priest and editor at large of America Magazine, explained that "the Catholic Church teaches that the death penalty is 'inadmissible,' primarily because every human being has God-given dignity, even a murderer, even a mass murderer. The televising of an execution is barbarism of the worst kind, offering up death as entertainment."
"Some Catholics still reject Pope Francis' magisterial pronouncement on the death penalty, which is now included in the Catechism," he noted. "But opposition to the death penalty, grounded in the respect for all human life, is not a brand new doctrine. Rather, it is one that took time to develop, as the church came to understand more deeply the innate dignity of every human life."
Sharing Coakley's comments on social media Friday, journalist Paul Blest wrote that "this happening so soon after the botched Tennessee execution is creating the conditions for real momentum against the death penalty."
Tennessee last week botched two attempts to kill Christa Pike with injections of pentobarbital, after which she was rushed to the hospital. Pike's legal team said Thursday that she "continues to experience cognitive challenges" but is taking "limited steps" with assistance. While Republican Gov. Bill Lee has responded by halting executions and ordering a probe, the incident has fueled fresh calls for the US to outlaw the death penalty at the state and federal level.
The Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, also weighed in on the livestream plan, saying Friday that "it is truly incomprehensible that anyone would want to use this method in this day and age. I do not know for what purpose. It is certainly unacceptable to turn death into a spectacle. However guilty the person may be, there are other ways."
"The church's position is one of total opposition to the death penalty. It is incompatible with human dignity and does not serve as a deterrent," Parolin said, acknowledging Coakley's comments and pledging that "there will be a statement from the Holy See."
As the Catholic leaders and others from various faiths spoke out against the Defense Department plan, Robert Jeffress, a Texas-based American Southern Baptist pastor and televangelist, wrote on social media that "I support the Pentagon's decision to livestream the execution of mass murderer Nidal Hasan. Capital punishment is commanded by God in Genesis 9:6 to remind people of the sanctity of human life. The more people that can see that truth illustrated through a public execution, the better."
Christa Brown, a former lawyer, sexual abuse survivor, and author of the memoirs This Little Light and Baptistland, responded: "Livestreaming an execution is barbaric. And no amount of Bible verses will change that."
Oct 09, 2026
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'There Must Be Room to Mourn Every Single Life,' Mamdani Says of Oct. 7 Attack and Genocide That Followed
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said during a press conference on Thursday that "there must be room to mourn" both the Israelis killed during the Hamas-led October 7 attack three years ago and the Palestinians killed in the Israeli government's subsequent genocidal assault on Gaza.
“I believe that there must be room to mourn every single life," said Mamdani, echoing the sentiment he expressed in a statement 24 hours earlier marking the three-year anniversary of the October 7 attack—and the start of Israel's military response.
At Thursday's press conference, a reporter noted that Mamdani "got it from both sides yesterday," referring to criticism the New York City mayor received from both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian voices in response to his statement. Mamdani's statement described the Hamas-led attacks as "horrific war crimes" and the Israeli government's response as a "devastating, ongoing genocide."
Asked if he "made any missteps that inflamed tensions" and whether he would, in hindsight, alter the language of his statement or decide against attending a vigil hosted by the anti-occupation group Israelis for Peace—where the mayor faced jeers from protesters accusing him of complicity in genocide—Mamdani responded: "There must be room to mourn the lives of the more than 1,100 Israelis that Hamas killed there years ago. There must be room to mourn the 74,000 Palestinians that the Israeli government has killed since."
"There must be room to reckon with the ways in which so many New Yorkers' lives have been shattered," he continued. "And that to me is a part of what it means to believe in a sense of humanity, that we need not choose between which death we will mourn and which we will ignore. That we can reckon with the fact that all of it is to be opposed."
Video footage from the Wednesday night vigil shows Mamdani standing expressionless alongside Brad Lander, a Democratic congressional candidate who is Jewish, as protesters shout at the mayor, calling him a "traitor."
Lander, the former New York City comptroller, told reporters that protesters at the vigil sometimes drowned out the reading of testimony from loved ones of people killed in the October 7, 2023 attack and in the Israeli government's assault on Gaza.
“From where I sit, Mamdani is a very strong supporter of Palestinian freedom and human rights,” said Lander. “I don’t know what world leaders have done more.”
During his press conference on Thursday, Mamdani said of those protesting him, "This is what I signed up for."
Mamdani is stone-faced as the protesters call him a traitor and sellout. https://t.co/oXducpYsMR
— Peter Sterne (@petersterne) October 8, 2026
Mamdani also faced hysterical backlash from pro-Israel members of his party. Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), who lost to Lander in the Democratic primary for New York's 10th congressional district, denounced Mamdani's statement as "reprehensible" and declared that it would "offend and further upset those same people he pretends to grieve with."
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) falsely accused Mamdani of "desecrating the memory of murdered, innocent Jews" and "refusing to even condemn Hamas."
Mamdani didn't back away from his criticism of the Israeli government in response to such attacks.
"The Israeli government used and continues to use that day, those war crimes, as a justification for an ongoing genocide against Palestinians," Mamdani told reporters on Thursday. The mayor also stressed "our federal government's complicity in funding so much of the weaponry" that has been used by the Israeli military in Gaza.
"We have to extend human rights to all people," said Mamdani, "and that has to include Palestinians."
Oct 08, 2026
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'You're Not Going to Get Rid of Us,' Vows Leonard Peltier Amid Trump Assault on Indigenous Rights
"We just want to be left alone," the former longtime political prisoner said. "We don’t want to be part of a government that’s killing women, children, babies, and bombing every damn thing that they can."
Oct 12, 2026
Leonard Peltier, the Indigenous activist who spent nearly half a century in prison for murders he says he did not commit before outgoing President Joe Biden commuted his sentence last year, vowed Monday that Native Americans would resist the Trump administration's attacks on Indian rights and tribal sovereignty.
“We’re not free yet. We are in danger,” Peltier, 82, told Democracy Now! in an interview released Monday to mark Indigenous Peoples’ Day. “Trump and these organizations, they’re talking about doing away with our reservations and our treaties and everything else.”
Peltier—whose freedom struggle is the subject of a new documentary, Free Leonard Peltier, directed by David France and Jesse Short Bull—said: "Some people became greedy and selfish and murderous, and they tried to exterminate us because they wanted it all for themselves. Well, 500 years later, we’re still here, and I’m still talking, and I’m going to talk 'til I die."
"We just want to be left alone," Peltier said of Indigenous peoples. "Let us live our own lives. Let us have our own society we’ve had for thousands of years. What the hell? I mean, we don’t want to be part of a government that’s killing women, children, babies, and bombing every damn thing that they can, and talking about annihilating a race of people."
Peltier's remarks came as Indigenous communities across the United States face numerous federal policies and actions affecting their lands, cultures, civil rights, and access to critical services.
In Arizona, the Trump administration is moving ahead with a border wall opposed by the Tohono O’odham Nation, whose ancestral homeland straddles the US-Mexico border. A recent Arizona Luminaria investigation revealed that federal authorities used drones, surveillance equipment, and masked agents to monitor Tohono O’odham members and a prayer camp as the Trump administration moved forward with border wall construction through their ancestral lands.
The Arizona border wall and a similar barrier project in Texas' Big Bend region are among the numerous conflicts over Native lands and treaty rights under attack by the government. According to the National Indian Law Library’s 2026 roundup of Indigenous land disputes, tribes are fighting to protect sacred sites, recover ancestral territory, and oppose mining and development projects.
The Trump administration has also moved to shrink the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments in Utah, drawing tribal leaders' condemnation of the loss of protections for culturally significant landscapes.
Education is also under attack, as Trump seeks to dramatically slash federal funding for tribal colleges and universities.
Meanwhile, the administration’s proposed changes to the 2030 census could make Native Americans less visible in federal data by removing questions about race and ethnicity from the decennial questionnaire, raising concerns about the consequences for federal funding, voting rights, and civil rights enforcement.
Peltier—who supporters long said was framed for the murder of two federal agents during a 1975 shootout at the Oglala Sioux Reservation in South Dakota—sounded a note of defiant perseverance during his Democracy Now! interview.
“We’re going to stay here,” he said of Indigenous peoples. “You’re not going to get rid of us.”
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As Trump Embraces Pakistan's Military Chief, Government Jails Elected Opposition Leaders
"Everyone saw these pro-democracy protests," said a critic of Pakistan's US-backed military government. "This is a very transparent attempt to crush them by a military regime that is terrified of its own people."
Oct 12, 2026
As US President Donald Trump deepens his ties with Pakistan's powerful military chief, the nation's government has detained the elected leadership of the last province controlled by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan's opposition party—a move critics have condemned as a coup.
Pakistan's president, Asif Ali Zardari, declared a state of emergency on Sunday in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, suspending its elected government and transferring authority to a federally appointed governor. Hundreds of members of Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, including its provincial chief minister, Sohail Afridi, have been arrested, as have Khan's three sisters, according to The Guardian.
The emergency measures come after days of protests calling for the release of Khan—who was forced to step down from power in 2022 by a parliamentary vote of no confidence under heavy pressure from the US government, then led by President Joe Biden. Khan was subsequently imprisoned by Pakistani authorities and accused the military of orchestrating his ouster.
Pakistan's government said it declared the state of emergency after local leadership failed to stop escalating attacks from Islamist terrorist groups. But PTI leaders described it as a thinly veiled pretext to squash protests, including a planned march on Islamabad to demand Khan's release.
Mehlaqa Samdani, the director of the Community Alliance for Peace and Justice—a group advocating against US support for political repression in Pakistan—described Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as "the last remaining province where the military regime had been unable to take control."
"The government has now declared a state of emergency and imposed governor's rule in the province, effectively removing its elected government from power," Samdani said in a video. "Just think about what that means: Millions of people voted for their representatives, only to see their elected government stripped of its authority."
"Everyone saw these pro-democracy protests," she added. "This is a very transparent attempt to crush them by a military regime that is terrified of its own people."
Amid mass protests calling for his release, Amnesty International has argued that Pakistani authorities have weaponized criminal proceedings to keep Khan out of power and crack down on dissent.
After the emergency measures went into effect this weekend, the internet monitoring organization NetBlocks reported major disruptions to internet service in parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Mobile phone networks have reportedly been disrupted, public transit closed, and several roads across the province shut down.
"Reports of arbitrary detentions of key leaders—including the provincial chief minister—and internet disruptions across the province raise concerns about the proportionality of these emergency measures," Babu Ram Pant, Amnesty International’s deputy director for South Asia, said on Sunday following news of the emergency declaration.
"While states may, in strictly limited circumstances, derogate from their human rights obligations to respond to a public emergency that threatens the existence of the nation, emergency measures are not a blank cheque to crack down on human rights, silence dissent, or concentrate power," he said.
Trump has warmly embraced Asim Munir, the military chief who has overseen the crackdown on Khan and his opposition party, spent recent years consolidating control over Pakistan's armed forces, and secured immunity from criminal prosecution.
Munir has regularly been heaped with praise by Trump, who hosted him for an unprecedented two-hour Oval Office meeting last year without any other Pakistani officials. Trump has referred to Munir as "my favorite field marshal," "a very important guy," and an "exceptional human being."
In December, the Trump administration approved a $686 million sale to upgrade Pakistan's F-16 fighter jets. Trump has also tapped Munir as a key intermediary between Washington and Tehran amid the US war with Iran.
Hussain Nadim, a Pakistani political analyst and lecturer at George Washington University, has argued that Munir has made himself useful to Trump because it "confers international legitimacy as his military rule faces deep questions at home."
"Pakistani generals have long understood how to capitalize on American fears, anxieties, and domestic political needs of a wide range of American presidents," Nadim wrote in August. "Military rulers position themselves around political changes in Washington, knowing urgent American political and security needs can override concerns about democracy and governance in countries like Pakistan."
Opponents of US intervention, including Samdani, have renewed calls for the US to cut off support for Pakistan's government.
"The US continues to train and work closely with the very military regime that is now attacking its own people," she said. "Members of Congress should speak out immediately. They should tell Pakistan's peaceful pro-democracy protesters that the world stands with them and tell the military dictatorship that we are watching and will not allow this repression to go unanswered."
"American taxpayers do not want to be involved in training a corrupt military regime that's oppressing its own people, including relatives of around one million Americans of Pakistani descent," said Erik Sperling, the executive director of Just Foreign Policy—a member of the Coalition to Change US Policy Towards Pakistan.
"If the Pakistani regime cannot allow its own people to protest and vote in free elections, they should not be receiving any training or support from the United States military or intelligence services," he told Common Dreams.
"The US is harming its relationship with the Pakistani people by continuing to side with the military regime that fraudulently stole elections and is now attacking its own people," he said. "There's a chance for the United States to stand up for freedom and democracy and build a genuine partnership with the people of Pakistan by siding with them as they fight for their freedom from military rule."
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Israel Has Demolished Majority of Villages in Southern Lebanon—Mostly After the Ceasefire
Defense Minister Israel Katz has bragged that Israel was destroying "not one house at a time," but "the entirety of those villages."
Oct 12, 2026
When Israel and Lebanon reached a ceasefire in April, the Israel Defense Forces' systematic destruction of villages in southern Lebanon was supposed to halt. Instead, it was just getting started.
Israeli forces have largely leveled 48 of the roughly 60 villages and towns in occupied southern Lebanon, a New York Times investigation published Monday revealed, fueling fears that Israel intends to permanently prevent displaced residents from returning.
Rather than collateral damage from military attacks, the razing of Lebanese villages since April has largely been carried out through controlled demolitions by Israeli forces.
Nearly all the villages destroyed have been majority Shia—the sect from which Hezbollah draws much of its support—while those containing Christian, Druze, and Sunni Muslims have largely been spared.
In July, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz acknowledged that Israel had destroyed at least 24 historic Lebanese villages, describing it as punishment for their residents.
“Twenty-four Lebanese villages that were hundreds of years old—with Shiite residents who acted as enemies [of Israel] on behalf of Hezbollah and threatened our borders and our residents—we destroyed all of the buildings.”
“Not one house at a time," he emphasized. "The entirety of those villages—their demolition has been completed.”
Since March, Israel's military campaign has displaced at least 1.1 million Lebanese civilians, while its forces have entrenched themselves in an occupied swath of southern Lebanon extending as far as eight miles from the border.
Roughly 270,000 people remain barred from returning home. Many have no homes to return to. In many villages, homes, roads, utilities, and public facilities no longer function.
The Times found that Israeli forces have also burned about 16,500 acres of land—roughly 11% of the total occupied area—since the April ceasefire, including farmland and olive groves. Meanwhile, thousands of trees have been bulldozed.
As this life-sustaining infrastructure has come down, Israel has erected what appear to be the fixtures of a long-term military occupation: satellite imagery shows at least three new Israeli military outposts have been at least partially built since the ceasefire began, alongside new roads connecting them to Israeli territory.
The US-brokered ceasefire expressly prohibited "offensive military operations against Lebanese targets, including civilian, military, and other state targets, in the territory of Lebanon" except in cases where it was necessary to take defensive measures against planned, imminent, or ongoing attacks.
Israel's military told the Times it received no directive “to carry out widespread damage to structures or to demolish villages" in southern Lebanon. “The IDF operates in the security zone in southern Lebanon with the aim of removing threats posed by the Hezbollah terrorist organization to the residents of Israel and to IDF troops," it added.
Israeli officials have suggested that the occupation of southern Lebanon will continue indefinitely. Katz said last month that Israel "will not withdraw from the security zone" until Hezbollah disarms.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has suggested that some of the Christian villages would like to be annexed into Israeli territory. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, meanwhile, renewed his call last month for Israel to extend its borders north to the Litani River, which encompasses most of the Lebanese territory it currently occupies.
Israel has said it has razed entire villages to destroy Hezbollah military infrastructure and prevent fighters from returning to the area near the Israeli border.
Janina Dill, a professor of global security at the University of Oxford, has said using mass destruction to carry out this objective was "manifestly illegal" under international law, which says that destroying civilian property without an imperative military necessity can constitute a war crime.
"It’s deeply implausible that imperative military necessity applies to every house in a particular village," she told the Financial Times in August.
Volker Türk, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, said in July that Israel was engaging in the "wholesale destruction" of civilian homes, adding that "demolition of this type raises huge flags about compliance with international humanitarian law.”
"In large parts of southern Lebanon, Israel’s ‘everybody-leave’ orders were followed by ‘don’t-come-back’ orders," said Kristine Beckerle, Amnesty International's deputy regional director for the Middle East and North Africa in June. "Israel’s forced displacement and prevention of return of tens of thousands of civilians from southern Lebanon amounts to unlawful transfer, which is a grave breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention and thus a war crime."
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'Totally Beyond the Pale': Angry Judge Shuts Down Trump Administration's Mass Destruction of DC Trees
US District Judge Ana Reyes said the Trump administration's weekend removal of hundreds of trees at the East Potomac Golf Links "has cost the government all of its credibility."
Oct 12, 2026
A federal judge on Monday expressed outrage at the Trump administration for cutting down hundreds of trees at the East Potomac Golf Links in Washington, DC over the weekend.
As reported by journalist Scott MacFarlane in a Monday social media post, US District Judge Ana Reyes, who is overseeing a legal challenge to President Donald Trump's renovation plans for the golf course, slammed the administration for removing more than 400 trees on Saturday without providing any significant notice.
In addition to the roughly 430 trees that have already been cut down, attorneys from the US Department of Justice (DOJ) acknowledged in court that nearly 300 additional trees had also been marked for removal.
Reyes said that the trees' destruction "has cost the government all of its credibility" in the case. Later in the hearing, the judge called the administration's actions "totally beyond the pale," according to MacFarlane.
A CNN account of the Monday court hearing captured Reyes ripping into a DOJ attorney who said they were doing their "best" to keep the judge informed of tree removals.
"No," Reyes shot back, "you did your absolute worst."
Reyes ordered the total halt of all construction on the course, including the removal of any trees, until at least Tuesday at 2 pm. Reyes said that she hoped to learn more about the trees' removal from at least one other administration official involved in the project during a Tuesday hearing.
In a July ruling, Reyes had allowed construction on the golf course to continue so long as the administration notified the court ahead of time if it planned to remove more than 10 trees from the property at a time.
Per MacFarlane's account, the judge said on Monday that the administration gave the court notice that it was planning to cut down hundreds of trees at 4:55 pm on Friday afternoon, ahead of a holiday weekend.
A Monday report in The Washington Post noted that the trees at the golf course were chopped down even though the administration has only referred to Trump's renovation of the property as a "potential project" in court filings, and has not released any details about a timeline for construction or about its projected cost.
Over the last two years, Trump has developed several vanity projects throughout the nation's capital, including a luxury ballroom at the White House, a "Triumphal Arch," and botched renovations of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
Last month, Democrats on the congressional Joint Economic Committee released a report calculating that the projected cost to taxpayers for President Donald Trump’s vanity projects has soared to more than $1.8 billion.
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IDF Vets: Post-10/7 Rules Allowed Hundreds of Civilian Deaths to Kill Single Hamas Member
"You can't authorize the potential killing of 300 civilians... and still tell the public we did everything we could to avoid harming innocent people," said one veteran.
Oct 12, 2026
Former Israeli military and intelligence personnel affirmed that rules for targeting confirmed and alleged Hamas members in Gaza were dramatically loosened after the October 7, 2023 attack, allowing strikes expected to kill hundreds of Palestinian civilians to target even low-ranking members of the Palestinian resistance group, according to a report published Monday.
In a paywalled article published by Haaretz, Israel's oldest daily newspaper, Yaniv Kubovich gathered testimonies from former Israel Defense Forces intelligence personnel that add to the body of evidence from Israeli whistleblowers, military officials, and investigative journalists documenting how the IDF expanded its targeting practices during its devastating US-backed annihilation of Gaza, which has killed or wounded more than 250,000 Palestinians in the coastal exclave over the past three years.
One change described by some of those interviewed by Kubovich was "the opening of the intelligence apparatus to untrained personnel."
"People arrived at military intelligence who weren't from the unit, reservists who'd never even served in intelligence, brought in from all sorts of places," said one veteran, identified as "A."
"They sat in the Targeting Directorate looking for the most insignificant targets, the small fry, so they could kill them," A added. "Anyone displaying Hamas symbols on Facebook or identifying themselves as Hamas was marked as a target. Some were Hamas members, some were fighters too, but they really were small fry."
Another veteran, "D," who was assigned to a strike cell—units that coordinate drone and other aerial attacks—said: "Suddenly, the IDF was striking even the lowest of the low indiscriminately, and everyone had forgotten about conserving ammunition. We were striking Hamas drivers. That's how far it went."
Kubovich wrote that "a recurring theme in the accounts is the gap between a target's importance, the scale of the strike and the civilian toll deemed acceptable."
For example, on October 31, 2023, IDF warplanes dropped 2,000-pound "bunker-buster" bombs supplied by the United States on the densely populated Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza in order to kill one Hamas commander, Ibrahmi Biari.
"We knew Biari was underground, beneath several large buildings, but we couldn't pinpoint which building he was under," said D. "So they chose several buildings that were still occupied and decided to bring down all the buildings above the tunnel he was in. We didn't initiate an evacuation because it was important to kill him before he could get away."
A, who was also involved in the mission, said the decision to bomb the buildings was referred to the IDF chief of staff for approval, since intelligence officials estimated that there would be hundreds of civilian casualties. The IDF calculated that roughly 100 people would be killed or wounded in the proposed attack.
"We couldn't get any more intelligence to pinpoint his exact location," said veteran D. "They told us, 'He's killing soldiers right now. We have to strike him,' out of concern for the troops on the ground, and in the end the strike was approved. They really wanted to kill this guy."
Hamas said that 400 people were killed or wounded in the attack.
"Among other things, we relied on figures coming from Hamas, which we considered relatively plausible, even if they weren't 100% accurate," veteran A told Kubovich. "As time went on, we realized the death toll was around 250. I remember being stunned that we were bringing down several densely populated buildings, killing and injuring hundreds of people, to kill a battalion commander who, just a few weeks earlier, hadn't even been someone we were supposed to gather intelligence on."
The UK-based civilian casualty monitor Airwars said that at least 126 civilians, including 69 children, were killed in the attack, which wiped out whole families.
"You can't authorize the potential killing of 300 civilians for a battalion commander, or the killing of 20 civilians for every Hamas truck driver, and still tell the public we did everything we could to avoid harming innocent people," Nadav Weiman, executive director of the IDF veterans' group Breaking the Silence, told Kubovich.
Referring to the Jabalia massacre, D said: "I can't say this particular strike is what really messes with my head. What's much harder for me is the system of strike after strike after strike, with collateral damage running into dozens of people, sometimes hundreds. Being part of a system like that bothers me more than taking part in any particular strike."
The veterans' accounts raise further questions about Israel's repeated assertions that its military operations have been conducted in accordance with international humanitarian law, which requires parties in armed conflicts to distinguish between civilians and combatants and prohibits attacks expected to cause excessive civilian harm relative to the anticipated concrete and direct military advantage.
Those claims stand in stark contrast with statements by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior Israeli officials, who began calling for the genocidal destruction of Gaza and its 2.2 million people in the immediate aftermath of the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023.
Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant—his former defense minister who ordered the “complete siege” of Gaza, explaining that “we are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly"—are currently fugitives from the International Criminal Court in The Hague, where they are wanted for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder and forced starvation.
The International Court of Justice (ICJ), also in The Hague, is currently conducting a genocide case against Israel filed by South Africa and formally supported by more than 15 nations. While a ruling in the case isn’t expected until at least 2029, a United Nations commission of inquiry, the International Association of Genocide Scholars, and other experts—including many Israeli and international Jewish academics, jurists, human rights campaigners, and others—have already concluded that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
The new Haaretz investigation adds to the body of reporting on Israel's loosened rules of engagement and their disastrous implications for Gaza civilians, including a December 2024 New York Times exposé involving interviews with over 100 IDF soldiers and veterans, Israeli officials, dozens of airstrike victims, and experts on the law and conduct of war.
Kubovich's revelations also come as the documentary NAZA, directed by Israeli journalists and filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, brings testimony from Israeli military and intelligence insiders to international audiences. The film features 24 anonymized insiders describing the surveillance, artificial intelligence-assisted targeting, and military procedures used during the assault on Gaza.
IDF veteran testimonies are consistent with earlier investigations into the IDF's use of artificial intelligence to generate targets at extraordinary speed, often with limited human scrutiny.
In April 2024, Abraham reported for +972 Magazine and Local Call that the military used an AI system called Lavender to identify suspected Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives. The investigation found that the IDF initially authorized officers to accept civilian casualty estimates of up to 15 or 20 people for each low-ranking alleged militant targeted, and more than 100 civilians for certain senior Hamas officials.
“The IDF bombed them in homes without hesitation, as a first option,” one intelligence officer told the outlets. “It's much easier to bomb a family's home. The system is built to look for them in these situations.”
The investigation also found that officers were permitted to rely on Lavender's recommendations without thoroughly checking the underlying intelligence.
Former IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi has also acknowledged the enormous human toll of the war.
“This is not a gentle war; we took the gloves off from the first minute,” Halevi said during a September 2025 speech to residents of Ein Habor, adding that “not once” has any legal authority “limited” his wartime conduct.
Implicitly confirming Gaza Health Ministry casualty figures—which then stood at around 220,000 Palestinians killed or wounded—Halevi said that “over 10%” of Gaza’s population of approximately 2.2 million had been "killed or injured” since October 2023.
In August 2025, Abraham and Emma Graham-Harrison, The Guardian's senior international affairs correspondent, revealed that classified IDF intelligence data suggested that 5 in 6 Palestinians, or 83% of people, killed by Israeli forces through the first 19 months of the war were civilians.
Current and former IDF troops have accused their own of deliberately shooting Palestinian civilians, including children, sometimes out of sheer boredom. Palestinian and international volunteer medical professionals have also described what they say is the deliberate shooting of Gazans, including children, more than 21,500 of whom have been killed by Israeli bombs and bullets—with more victims added to that grim total with every passing day.
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Elon Musk's 'Absolutely Insane' $276 Million Midterm Spending Exposed in New Report
"He's not doing it to make Americans more free. He's doing it to make Americans his serfs," said one critic.
Oct 12, 2026
Far-right billionaire Elon Musk is spending an unprecedented fortune helping the Republican Party maintain its majorities in Congress, according to a Monday report in The New York Times.
The Times used filings made with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to calculate that Musk has funneled at least $276 million to GOP groups and his own super political action committee (PAC) since July alone.
In total, the Times estimated that Musk has given $366 million in campaign contributions during the 2025-26 election cycle, which is even more than the $290 million he gave during the 2023-24 election cycle to return President Donald Trump and the GOP to power.
Much of Musk's giving this cycle has been to help Republicans maintain their majority in the US Senate, as he has donated $158 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, the super PAC charged with helping GOP candidates in Congress' upper chamber.
According to the Times, Musk's donation to the fund is "one of the largest political donations in American history, and more than the group’s Democratic rival raised from all of its donors that quarter."
Since July, Musk has also given $76 million to his America PAC, which is building what the Times described as "a sprawling canvassing program to try to turn out hard-to-reach Republican voters" in the coming elections.
The Times emphasized that the $366 million is only the publicly disclosed amount that Musk has given, and one source told the newspaper that the billionaire "has also made some seven-figure donations to support midterm candidates through groups that are not required to disclose their donors."
In a Monday social media post, journalist Daniel Nichanian described Musk's midterm spending as "absolutely insane," and said the billionaire is "single-handedly destroying records and swamping [Democratic] candidates."
Mark Jacob, former metro editor at the Chicago Tribune, said the massive Musk donations should deeply worry Americans who care about democracy.
"He's not doing it to make Americans more free," Jacob wrote. "He's doing it to make Americans his serfs."
Don Moynihan, professor of public policy at the University of Michigan, argued that Democrats cannot allow Musk's efforts to buy congressional elections go unanswered.
"Dems should promise to minimize contracts with clearly partisan government contractors and to impose more regulatory scrutiny on Musk," Moynihan wrote. "At this point, nothing to lose."
In addition to concerns about the sheer volume of Musk's donations, election officials have been raising alarms about how the money is being used.
As reported by CNN on Saturday, America PAC has been sending text messages to Colorado voters telling them that their request for a mail-in ballot has been received, then inviting them to "confirm now where and when to return it."
Carly Koppes, the Republican election chief in Weld County, told CNN that these messages have been causing significant confusion among voters, who automatically receive mail ballots without having to file a specific request.
“People were like, ‘Wait a second. I didn’t submit that request. Is something fishy going on? Did someone submit something on my behalf?'" said Koppes.
Josh Zygielbaum, the Democratic election chief in Adams County, told CNN that he'd received dozens of calls asking about the America PAC texts, and emphasized "that volume of phone calls is usually a good indicator for us that something’s a bigger issue because people generally don’t pick up the phone these days unless there’s a bigger concern."
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Ilhan Omar’s Home Raided by DHS Following Trump-GOP Deportation Threats
Trump and other Republicans have called for Omar to be stripped of her citizenship and deported for years.
Oct 12, 2026
Following years of threats from President Donald Trump and other Republicans to deport Rep. Ilhan Omar, the Minnesota congresswoman's Washington, DC home was raided on Monday morning by agents with the Department of Homeland Security.
The US Department of Justice (DOJ) has confirmed that the raid was carried out as part of a judicially authorized warrant, which it said was part of an ongoing criminal investigation.
Fox News, which first reported news of the raid, said it was part of a probe into the naturalization paperwork filed by Omar's late father when she became a US citizen in 2000 after immigrating to the US as a refugee from Somalia in 1995.
In September, The New York Post reported that federal investigators were examining whether Omar may have been older than 17 when she obtained citizenship through her father as a minor in 2000. The allegation, which stems partly from a discrepancy in historical records of her birth year, has not been substantiated.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a fellow at the American Immigration Council, argued that the case was "even weaker than it already seems," since federal immigration law includes a waiver for people who obtain legal status through fraud they were unaware of.
Joyce Vance, who served as the US attorney for the Northern District of Alabama under President Barack Obama, noted that the raid took place just weeks before the November 3 midterms, inside the 60-day window where DOJ typically avoids such dramatic actions.
"To state what’s obvious to prosecutors here, we are within the period before an election where DOJ doesn’t take overt steps in an investigation that might influence its outcome," she said, adding that it was "another hard norm out the window."
Omar has not yet commented on the raid as of Monday morning, and the DOJ has not indicated what, if any, specific charges have been filed against her.
The search comes after years of demands from Trump and other Republicans for Omar—who has served in the US House of Representatives since 2019—to be deported, imprisoned, or otherwise removed from office.
In a statement Monday morning, Joel Payne, a spokesperson for the progressive advocacy group MoveOn condemned the raid on Omar as a political attack.
“Rep. Omar is a dedicated public servant and a true ally for working families, and Donald Trump has done nothing but use racist tropes and stereotypes to attack her," he said. "Now, he’s abusing his power to physically intimidate and harass her."
Last November, Trump remarked that Omar should be thrown out of the country because she is "always complaining" and referenced her religious attire, referring to it as a "swaddling hijab." In another post that day, he called for the US to "denaturalize migrants who undermine domestic tranquility."
He also said Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), the only Palestinian American member of Congress, should be "sent back" along with Omar after the two protested his state of the Union address in February.
Trump has often referenced Omar while calling for all Somali immigrants to be deported from the country—even though most are US citizens. Trump has referred to Somalis collectively as "garbage" and said they have "low IQs."
Last week, Trump called for the people of Minnesota to "fight back" against Somalis living there in a post on Truth Social, which was widely interpreted as an incitement to violence.
In March, Vice President JD Vance said on a podcast that the administration believed Omar had "definitely committed immigration fraud against the United States of America" and that he'd discussed with senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller—who is not a federal prosecutor—how to "go after" her.
Beau Tremitiere, counsel and deputy director of impact programs for Protect Democracy, told Common Dreams that "raiding the home of a prominent critic and longtime target of President Trump’s racist attacks on the eve of an election is an obvious attempt to intimidate the opposition."
“This administration already has a long track record of failed political prosecutions," he said. "Each new one should both anger and stiffen the spine of those standing up for our democracy.”
Several Republican members of Congress have referenced Omar's religion and political viewpoints as reasons for her to be stripped of citizenship and deported.
Rep. Randy Fine (R-Fla.), who introduced a resolution to expel Omar from Congress last year, referred to her as a "Muslim terrorist" because of her outspoken criticism of Israel's genocide in Gaza and said she should not "be a citizen."
Rep. Brandon Gill (R-Texas) has also called for her deportation, claiming she helped to facilitate the "invasion" of the US after she discussed informing Somali American residents of her district of their constitutional rights should they encounter immigration officers.
In a statement Monday, House Democratic leadership called the raid on Omar's residence "deeply disturbing" and said it "raises serious questions about the continued corrupt weaponization of the federal government against Donald Trump’s adversaries."
"For years, Donald Trump and far-right extremists have relentlessly targeted Congresswoman Omar with vile personal attacks and baseless accusations," they said. "Now, less than 30 days until the midterm election, his violent mass deportation machine has descended upon the home of a duly elected Member of Congress and her family."
They added that "the American people deserve transparency, and we will deliver full accountability for the rogue abuse of power from the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice."
This article has been updated to include comments from House Democratic leadership and Beau Tremitiere at Protect Democracy.
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Right-Wing Smear Campaign Against James Talarico Collapses in Mere Hours
Talarico spokesman JT Ennis said the smear campaign was "a lie designed to promote a pathetic conspiracy theory."
Oct 12, 2026
A right-wing smear campaign against Texas Democratic US Senate candidate James Talarico fell apart in mere hours on Sunday.
On Sunday afternoon, MAGA influencers Nick Sortor and Rhein Amacher posted a 45-second audio recording on social media that they claimed was of an employee at an Ohio mental health center stating that Talarico had been discharged from the facility on Saturday.
Right-wing social media accounts had spent days spreading rumors about Talarico undergoing mental health treatment after the Texas Democrat stepped away from the campaign trail for more than a week after coming down with the flu.
Problems with the influencers' narrative quickly emerged, as the recording indicated that Talarico was discharged from the Ohio facility on Saturday, and by that point the Democratic Senate hopeful had already returned to the campaign trail, making a public appearance on Friday at the Austin City Limits festival.
On Sunday night, the official social media account of Lindner Center Hope, the facility where the Texas Democrat was purportedly staying, posted a statement that "James Talarico has never received treatment" there.
The Bulwark later obtained a recording of the entire six-minute phone call showing that the employee repeatedly denied having any record of anyone named James Talarico at the facility.
After minutes of being badgered by Amacher about Talarico's presence, the employee indicated that he must have already been discharged, which is why she had no record of him.
Will Sommer, a reporter for The Bulwark who specializes in tracking far-right disinformation and conspiracy theories, noted in a Sunday social media post that some of the MAGA influencers have started taking down posts they wrote promoting the audio recording.
Talarico responded to the botched smear campaign on Sunday night by writing on his social media account, "I've never even been to Ohio.”
Talarico spokesman JT Ennis called the smear campaign "a lie designed to promote a pathetic conspiracy theory."
"Last week James Talarico was home in Austin, Texas," Ennis added, "recovering from the flu."
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Newsom Endorses Ballot Measure That Would Cancel Out Billionaire Tax—and Ban Future Wealth Taxes
"He’d rather millions of children and families lose their healthcare than ask a couple hundred billionaires to finally pay their fair share."
Oct 11, 2026
California Gov. Gavin Newsom ramped up his opposition to a proposed tax on the state's billionaire residents on Friday by endorsing a competing ballot measure that would both cancel out the billionaire wealth tax initiative and prohibit any new taxes on the ownership of financial assets or other personal property.
"He’s showing California his true colors," Debru Carthan, vice president of Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW)—which is leading the campaign for the California billionaire tax—said in response to Newsom's endorsement of Proposition 42. "He’d rather millions of children and families lose their healthcare than ask a couple hundred billionaires to finally pay their fair share."
The push for Proposition 42 is funded by Building a Better California, a group bankrolled by Google co-founder Sergey Brin and other billionaires.
If passed, Prop 42 would ban "any new state tax... imposed on the ownership of personal property (all things people own other than real estate)." It would also prohibit any tax that "applies retroactively based on taxpayer’s past activities." (The proposed 5% billionaire tax, which will appear on California's November ballot as Proposition 40, would apply retroactively to billionaires living in California on or after January 1, 2026.)
In a statement, Newsom framed his support for Prop 42 as an effort to protect Californians' retirement savings.
"We all agree that Californians deserve to have their retirement and life savings protected from new state taxes so those savings are there when they need them," the governor said.
But critics have described Prop 42 as a "poison-pill measure" whose supporters are fearmongering about a nonexistent threat to retirement savings in an effort to defeat the proposed billionaire tax, revenue from which would be used to fund healthcare, food aid, and education in the state.
"Its true target is Prop 40," the editorial board of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote of the Newsom-backed measure. "Prop 42 papers over its real purpose by cynically appealing to middle-class worries about retirement security. Reject this appalling tactic and disincentivize its further use by voting no."
Newsom has opposed the idea of a wealth tax on California's billionaires from the proposal's inception, pitting him against major unions, the California Democratic Party, and prominent national progressives such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.).
"Some of the SEIU-UHW members I’ve talked to are tired of Democratic politicians like Gavin Newsom taking their marching orders from the donors who would fund a future presidential campaign," Khanna, who is considering a presidential run, said during a rally in support of Prop 40 last weekend. "We are tired of a governor defying grassroots delegates in the California Democratic Party, defying California labor... all because he’s on the side of Trump allies like Peter Thiel and Sergey Brin."
"You can’t pretend to be anti-Trump if you’re doing the bidding of Trump donors," Khanna added.
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'We May': Trump Says US Could Soon Start Bombing Yemen Again to Help Saudi Arabia
"Congress never authorized Trump to wage war to defend the Saudi regime," said Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna.
Oct 11, 2026
President Donald Trump said Saturday that his administration could soon join Saudi Arabia's military assault on Yemen following a deadly Houthi attack on Riyadh's international airport, the latest salvo in a long-running conflict that has intensified since the US launched an illegal war on Iran earlier this year.
Trump told reporters that "we may" join US ally Saudi Arabia in directly attacking Yemen's Houthis. The president said that "we're going to look at it," adding, "We move very quickly."
The president's remarks prompted swift pushback from progressives in the US. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who is considering a presidential run in 2028, wrote on social media that "Congress never authorized Trump to wage war to defend the Saudi regime."
"I introduced a Yemen War Powers Resolution (H.Con.Res.124) with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) to mandate that the US stay out of war in Yemen," added Khanna, who has been working for years to stop unauthorized US involvement in Saudi-led attacks on Yemen.
"Trump must honor the US-Yemen ceasefire and use diplomacy, not war," wrote the California Democrat, referring to a 2025 agreement that the president reached with the Houthis following a weeks-long US bombing campaign. The US attacks came as the Houthis targeted shipping in the Red Sea in response to Israel's genocidal war on Gaza.
The Costs of War project at Brown University estimates that in the two years after October 7, 2023, the US spent between $2.76 billion and $4.95 billion attacking the Houthis. American forces have been bombing Yemen since 2002 and have for years supported devastating Saudi-led coalition attacks on one of the world's poorest countries.
Trump said Saturday that members of his administration "have communication with the Houthis," a political and military organization that claimed responsibility for Saturday's attack on the Saudi airport. The attack, which drew international condemnation, killed at least a dozen people—including one US citizen—and injured over 300 more.
The New York Times observed Sunday that "repeated, deadly Houthi attacks on the airport this week have struck at the heart of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s ambitions to turn the city into a global travel and business hub, threatening to disrupt major international events planned for the coming weeks."
"Across the border in Yemen, Saudi warplanes have been waging a deadly bombing campaign against the Houthis, who say that the country has been subjected to hundreds of airstrikes in recent weeks," the Times added. "Since September 3, airstrikes have killed 91 people in Yemen, mostly women and children, according to Anees al-Asbahi, a spokesman for the Houthi government-affiliated health ministry."
The Houthis are also facing an all-out assault from Yemen's Saudi-backed government, which is aiming to recapture Houthi-controlled areas. Trump administration officials told Axios earlier this month that the US military is providing Saudi Arabia with "everything short of direct combat, mainly intelligence and targeting data."
The Saudi crown prince has reportedly pressured Trump to intervene directly in the Saudi-led assault on the Houthis.
The US-based advocacy group Just Foreign Policy said Sunday that "there is nothing less America First than waging an unconstitutional war to defend the corrupt Saudi regime."
"The Saudis should use diplomacy to resolve their dispute," the group added.
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