SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
");background-position:center;background-size:19px 19px;background-repeat:no-repeat;background-color:var(--button-bg-color);padding:0;width:var(--form-elem-height);height:var(--form-elem-height);font-size:0;}:is(.js-newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter_bar.newsletter-wrapper) .widget__body:has(.response:not(:empty)) :is(.widget__headline, .widget__subheadline, #mc_embed_signup .mc-field-group, #mc_embed_signup input[type="submit"]){display:none;}:is(.grey_newsblock .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper) #mce-responses:has(.response:not(:empty)){grid-row:1 / -1;grid-column:1 / -1;}.newsletter-wrapper .widget__body > .snark-line:has(.response:not(:empty)){grid-column:1 / -1;}:is(.grey_newsblock .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper) :is(.newsletter-campaign:has(.response:not(:empty)), .newsletter-and-social:has(.response:not(:empty))){width:100%;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col{display:flex;flex-wrap:wrap;justify-content:center;align-items:center;gap:8px 20px;margin:0 auto;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col .text-element{display:flex;color:var(--shares-color);margin:0 !important;font-weight:400 !important;font-size:16px !important;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col .whitebar_social{display:flex;gap:12px;width:auto;}.newsletter-wrapper .newsletter_bar_col a{margin:0;background-color:#0000;padding:0;width:32px;height:32px;}.newsletter-wrapper .social_icon:after{display:none;}.newsletter-wrapper .widget article:before, .newsletter-wrapper .widget article:after{display:none;}#sFollow_Block_0_0_2_0_0_0_1{margin:0;}.tabs__tab-content .row:not(:empty){margin-bottom:0;}@media (min-width: 1024px){#sHome_0_0_4_0_0_13_1_0_1{padding-left:30px;}}.donation_banner{position:relative;background:#000;}.donation_banner .posts-custom *, .donation_banner .posts-custom :after, .donation_banner .posts-custom :before{margin:0;}.donation_banner .posts-custom .widget{position:absolute;inset:0;}.donation_banner__wrapper{position:relative;z-index:2;pointer-events:none;}.donation_banner .donate_btn{position:relative;z-index:2;}#sSHARED_-_Support_Block_0_0_9_0_0_3_1_0{color:#fff;}#sSHARED_-_Support_Block_0_0_9_0_0_3_1_1{font-weight:normal;}.newswire_five_post .all-related-sections [href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire"]{display:none;}.sticky-sidebar{margin:auto;}@media (min-width: 1024px){.main:has(.sticky-sidebar){overflow:visible;}}@media (min-width: 1024px){.row:has(.sticky-sidebar){display:flex;overflow:visible;}}@media (min-width: 1024px){.sticky-sidebar{position:-webkit-sticky;position:sticky;top:100px;transition:top .3s ease-in-out, position .3s ease-in-out;}}.custom-field-newsletter-visible-on-sticky-position, .custom-field-newsletter-visible-on-sidebar-position, .custom-field-newsletter-visible-on-fixed-position{display:none;}.cta-close:before, .cta-close:after{width:50%;height:2px;content:"";position:absolute;inset:50% auto auto 50%;border-radius:2px;background-color:#fff;}.cta-close:before{transform:translate(-50%)rotate(45deg);}.cta-close:after{transform:translate(-50%)rotate(-45deg);}.sticky_newsletter_wrapper{width:100%;}.black_newsletter.is_sticky_on{transition:all .3s ease-out;}.black_newsletter.is_sticky_on.cta-hide{transform:translateY(100%);}.black_newsletter .newsletter_bar{height:auto;padding:24px 16px;}.black_newsletter .newsletter_bar.newsletter-wrapper{margin:0;background:none !important;}@media only screen and (min-width: 768px){.black_newsletter .newsletter_bar{padding:20px 16px;justify-content:space-between;}}@media only screen and (min-width: 1320px){.black_newsletter .newsletter_bar.newsletter-wrapper{margin:0 -16px;}}.footer-campaign .posts-custom .widget, .footer-campaign .posts-custom .posts-wrapper:after, .footer-campaign .row:not(:empty), .footer-campaign .row.px10, .footer-campaign .row.px10 > .col, .footer-campaign .sm-mb-1 > *, .footer-campaign .sm-mb-1:not(:empty):after{margin:0;padding:0;}.footer-campaign .sm-mb-1:not(:empty):after{display:none;}.footer-campaign{padding:0;}.footer-campaign .widget:hover .widget__headline .widget__headline-text{color:#fff;}@media only screen and (min-width: 768px){.footer-campaign .sm-mt-1:not(:empty):after{content:"";grid-column:4;grid-row:1 / span 2;}}@media only screen and (min-width: 768px){.footer-campaign .sm-mt-1:not(:empty):before{grid-column:1;grid-row:1 / span 2;}}.grey_newsblock .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper, .newsletter-wrapper.sidebar{background:linear-gradient(91deg, #005dc7 28%, #1d63b2 65%, #0353ae 85%);}.black_newsletter{background:linear-gradient(91deg, #005dc7 28%, #1d63b2 65%, #0353ae 85%);}.black_newsletter .newsletter_bar.newsletter-wrapper{background:none;}
To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page.
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
Everything is still awful, but it was heartening to see Tesla Takedown's many protests and fiery message: "Would've fought the Nazis? Now's your chance." And as the world's richest, dimmest Nazi whines about people being mean to him, their persistence brings solace: Judges, park rangers, fired workers fight back, Swasticar posters pop up - "Goes from 0 to 1939 in 3 seconds" - and wild hacks, from DOGE lists to (eww) videos of the two foot-fetish besties at it on HUD screens. What a time to be alive.
On Saturday, Tesla Takedown's Day of Action saw over 500 rallies, at nearly every Tesla showroom in the US - San Jose to Austin to New York - and in over 200 cities worldwide, rippling from Australia and New Zealand across Europe. Each was locally organized and thematically designed, "Smash the Fash" to “Down with Doge,” with great signs: Don't Buy Nazi Cars, Burn A Tesla Save Democracy, Tesla Funds Fascists, Musk the Only Immigrant Taking Away American Jobs, DOGE: Department of Greedy Elon and Honk If You Hate Elon, with its accompanying cacophony. Also their sieg-heiling balloon effigy and to the point chants: "We don't want your Nazi cars/Take a one-way trip to Mars." Add multiple incidents of Tesla burnings, eggings, poopings and beadings - revelers throwing Mardi Gras beads at an unwelcome Cybertruck in their parade - and it becomes clear the rage at Musk for his many, many (unelected) transgressions is growing. Its goal: "To boycott Tesla and hurt him so that he stops hurting us."
Despite pie-in-the-sky White House claims DOGE is "very popular" and the regime's flunkies and fawners are "thrilled" with its move-fast-and-break-things carnage, the sound of angry pitchfork-rattling is palpable, and rising. They've lost a flood of lawsuits by advocacy groups and fired workers; judges have repeatedly said their closings and very existence violate the Constitution; GOPers are fleeing angry constituents at town halls; people who've lost jobs for citing the damage being done, aka tracking how many hungry children will die from USAID cuts, are furiously speaking out; and people are realizing when rich fascists slam a "parasite class" - half of them children - to justify their crimes, rich fascists are the biggest parasites of all. When that happens, the parasites inevitably throw vengeful pity-parties for themselves. When DOGE got dealt a series of legal setbacks, Musk yowled we no longer have "real democracy in America" and all these treasonous judges should be impeached. So much for "Heal thyself."
Because, "The country is being run by your drunken uncle sitting in his recliner watching (TV) and yelling 'throw the book at ’em!'”, any pushback against illegal acts of autocrats is met with paranoid histrionics like those of Nazi Stephen Miller, who's defended the disappearing of largely innocent migrants by raving, "We were invaded and occupied. Entire towns were subjugated. Our Treasury was in the (sic) plundered...America voted for liberation." Thus have protests against Musk sparked frantic Fox headlines - "Feds on High Alert" - and threats from the regime's DOJ that said protests will be viewed as "domestic terrorism" and "hate crimes," which no Jan. 6 mobsters were charged with. The FBI has formed a task force to investigate “violent activity toward Tesla," and the mad king has vowed to "catch (the) bad guys," calmly musing, "I look forward to watching the sick terrorist thugs get 20-year jail sentences" and "perhaps they could serve them in the prisons of El Salvador...recently famous for such lovely conditions!”
Of course our salesman-in-chief also supported his "first buddy" with a recent White House auto mall, hawking Teslas outside the People's House for "a truly great American" who's "being treated very unfairly" by people "breaking a law (as) Radical Left Lunatics often do (by) trying to illegally and collusively boycott one of the World’s great automakers," even though said cars do randomly explode and have the highest rate of deadly accidents of any brand. Cue tacky burlesque show of fat geezer who can't drive and hates EVs clambering into Tesla and exclaiming, "Wow! Everything's computer!" as slimy bot moronically explains, as to one of his prop children, "It's very simple. It's literally like a golf cart that goes really fast." It's also like a rocket that explodes mid-air in a "rapid unscheduled disassembly," strewing debris into the water. Or like a car that inexplicably bursts into flames, its lithium batteries spewing toxic fumes, while often trapping people inside, sometimes fatally, due to electronic doors that don't work when needed.
Alas, as Tesla shares plunge here and abroad - down 76% in Germany, 50% in China, with sad Elmo losing billions - all 46,000 of its hideous, $80,000 Cybertrucks, once lauded as the Fascistmobile of the future, were just recalled after national safety advisors warned it can fall apart while driving due to bad glue making some trim panels detach and fly off, causing "road hazard” for other drivers. This is its 8th recall intwo years, including one for sticking pedal pads that could lead to "unintended acceleration." The Cybertruck is already banned in Europe for exterior edges deemed "a pedestrian danger"; here, it's just ceaselessly trashed as a loud rusty "shitbox" with bad suspension that gets stuck in snow. The brazen, inept hubris it represents offers a bleak metaphor, suggests Paul Krugman: "America is now trapped in a burning Tesla." And with large parts of the economy and government "on the verge of self-immolation" and the combined arrogance and ignorance of Musk/Trump, "It’s hard to see how we get out."
Swasticar billboard in UK makes a splashScreengrab from TikTok
Perhaps, in part, with the help of popular rage. There've been multiple leaks naming alleged DOGE staffers, and an updated list with newly added attorneys to handle growing lawsuits. With protests on the rise, an online searchable map called Dogequest also appeared, documenting the locations of Tesla owners and dealerships and reportedly doxxing DOGE team members with their addresses and phone numbers; the site said it would remove owners' information once they sold their vehicles, but it's evidently since been taken offline. Several leaks have named dubious "wasteful" projects DOGE shut down: millions "doled out" to "push" equity, immigrant justice, indigenous knowledge, a performance of Angels in America in Macedonia? No less outlandishly, last week DOGE (which is still legally not a thing) forcibly laid off almost all employees of the US Institute of Peace, a Congressionally funded think tank, because it "has failed to deliver peace." Two former staff just sued to stop a DOGE-r from taking over.
Of course, as Jon Stewart notes, these "profit-seeking psycopaths" won't touch the billions in subsidies to the rich, polluting, killing, "where the real money is": Over a billion in hedge-fund loopholes, $3 billion to oil and gas giants, $2 trillion to defence contractors, all while cutting health care, food stamps, hot lunch for kids. And while the mad king plays golf on 9 of 10 weekends, or over a quarter of his time "in office," at a cost of over $26 million. This weekend, he also "won" his own gazillionth tournament and boasted he made a great deal with the Finnish president to buy polar Icebreakers for the U.S. though in fact Biden made the deal last year. And Musk was there, high as a kite, playing with silverware, "in all our faces," having bought a government and hired a horde of clueless teenage incels to break shit and steal data and fire thousands of people "whose lives you’ve turned upside down who now can’t get anyone to answer the phone at Social Security because you’ve pared their staff down to the bone."
Of those who still have jobs, many are some pissed to be under the thumb of a rich jerk who demands they report what they did each week while he frolics at Motel-A-Lago. The Alt National Park Service sent shopping lists. Others said they researched why ketamine abusers wear sunglasses inside, reviewed court decisions about DOGE violating the Constitution, began the beguine, visited CatsThatLookLikeHitler.com, became Death Destroyer of Worlds, sent photos of their visit to Las Vegas' Mob Museum, "didn't vote for Elon" each day, listed five foods they couldn't keep down, "was a Lover, Sinner, Joker, Smoker, Midnight Toker," "did not give you up/did not let you down/did not run around/did not make you cry/did not say goodbye," "I get up in the evenin'/And I ain't got nothin' to say/I come home in the mornin/'I go to bed feelin' the same way." "I’m fairly sure I’m going to get fired, which is fine since I don’t work there anyway," one wrote. Another suggested, "Dear Mr. Nazi Musk, You should get a dog instead."
The "best example of civil disobedience EVER!" came the day employees were ordered back from remote work to HUD offices, where they found a grotesque, AI video of Trump fervently kissing the two left feet of his First Lady, with text of "Long Live The Real King," playing on a loop on screens throughout the building. Best: Staff couldn't turn it off, so frantically sent people to every floor to unplug TVs. "Bravo, hackers, a grateful nation tips their hats to you," was one response, urging it be shown in Times Square and at all those crappy golf clubs. Another: "They should leave it running for DOGE Bros to come fix it." After freelance journalist Marisa Kabas shared the clip online, Bluesky briefly took it down as "non-consensual explicit material," aka deepfake porn. Kabas wrote to argue it was "to protest a fascist regime, in the public interest and legitimate news"; Bluesky "reevaluated" and put it back up. One comment: "I'm fairly sure whenever this happens in real life it's completely consensual." Regardless, said another, "Bad day to have eyes."
Meanwhile, Mr. Rich Nazi Snowflake with "zero self-awareness" keeps whining. As protests and vandalism reports began rising, he whined, "The goal of the left is to destroy my influence, so they relentlessly push negative propaganda about me like the fake Nazi stuff...They are evil." Also, "My companies are suffering," but definitely not the moms who can't get food stamps for her kids or the cancer patients whose trials abruptly halted or the HIV/ Ebola clinics that had to fold or.....Then he whined about Gov. Tim Walz celebrating Tesla stocks falling into the shithole by calling Walz "a huge jerk." "What an evil thing to do," he screeched on Fox. "What a creep, what a jerk. Like who derives joy from that? Does that sound like a good person to you? I don’t think so." This, from the arbitrer of good personhood. But Minnesota's Mr. Nice Guy walked it back - "I have to be careful about being a smartass" - and offered Musk a deal: He'll stop mocking Tesla's plunging stock "when you take your hands off Social Security." No response.
Still, the huge jerk in a cheesehead hat whined on. Heckled at a Wisconsin rally where he'd come to bribe voters to elect a MAGA creep to a vital state Supreme Court seat by giving away two $1 million checks, he charged (Jewish) philanthropist George Soros was "funding" it all - "It was inevitable a few Soros operatives would be in the audience" - like it costs more than a buck or so to make a sign reading, "Fuck South African Apartheid Nazis," this while he's literally, blatantly buying votes. Chutzpah, thy name is. The next day, Ashley St. Clair, one of his baby mamas, sold her Tesla to make up for his "vindictive" cut in child support - "his modus operandi - I'm not the only one cleaning up after his messes" - and video of more protests prompted him to fume online, never mind the left's "puppets and paid foot-soldiers," "It is time to arrest those funding the attacks." We're with the patriot who watched a sneering MAGA thug cruise through the protest in his Cybertruck and declared, "Get this fucking asshole outta here."
Update: Tesla counter-protesters. They seem nice.
Musk siel-heil cut-outs at U.K protestImage from U.K. group Overthrow Musk
A region in southern Louisiana that has already been deemed a "sacrifice zone" by human rights experts—due to the high levels of pollution caused by the petrochemical and fossil fuel industry facilities that operate throughout the area—is now likely to face even more public health threats following the Trump administration's conditional approval of a new liquefied natural gas export terminal.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) on Wednesday granted conditional authorization for Venture Global's Calcasieu Pass 2 (CP2) LNG export terminal in Cameron Parish, allowing the company to export LNG to countries that don't have free trade agreements with the United States.
The project was halted in 2024 when former President Joe Biden paused the issuance of new LNG export permits for non-free trade agreement partners, and climate campaigners have called for CP2 and other LNG projects to be permanently blocked because of the greenhouse gas emissions and local pollution they would cause.
In December, the Biden administration released an analysis showing that more LNG exports would increase household energy costs.
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) noted that emissions from CP2 are estimated to reach the equivalent of more than 47 million gas-powered cars or 53 coal-fired power plants—even as Venture Global claims the project would export enough fossil gas to replace 33 coal-fired plants.
"Greenlighting this terminal is simply selling out the American public to further boost the profits of fossil fuel companies," said Gillian Giannetti, senior attorney at NRDC. "LNG extraction and export floods frontline communities with dangerous pollution, raises U.S. energy costs, and further locks in our dependence on dirty fossil fuels."
NRDC sued the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission over its approval of CP2 in September 2024, arguing FERC violated the law by not considering "adverse environmental and socioeconomic impacts" when it approved the terminal despite its determination that "the ambient air quality around the project will exceed the national air quality standards for multiple air pollutants."
FERC rescinded its approval and planned to make additional assessments after the lawsuit, but DOE's announcement on Wednesday came before the commission had made its final determination.
By conditionally authorizing the project, said Giannetti, the DOE violated "the public interest" and announced "the latest in a long line of giveaways to the fossil fuel industry from the Trump administration."
"NRDC sued over FERC's approval of this project, and we will be closely examining the legality of this DOE approval, as well," said Giannetti.
The export terminal approval announced by Energy Secretary Chris Wright is the administration's fifth—and largest—LNG approval since President Donald Trump lifted Biden's freeze on new export permits. The finished facility would have the capacity to export 3.96 billion cubic feet of LNG per day and produce 20 million tons of LNG per year.
CP2 would also be adjacent to Venture Global's Calcasieu Pass LNG facility and less than two miles from the proposed Commonwealth LNG facility, in an area with more low-income residents than 88% of the country. Venture Global's existing LNG project in the area "has already exposed the surrounding community to dangerous air pollution well in excess of permit limits in over 130 incidents since it began operations in 2022," said Sierra Club.
"Fishermen have reported a dramatic impact on their livelihoods since the commencement of Calcasieu Pass operations, highlighting the severe negative impact of gas exports on the local economy and environment," added the group.
The conditional approval was announced a week after the Environmental Protection Agency revealed plans to shutter all 10 of its environmental justice offices, ending the agency's work to address systemic injustices in places like Cameron Parish and Louisiana's "Cancer Alley."
"As a mom living in Sulphur [Louisiana], I feel a profound responsibility to protect my children's future," said Roishetta Ozane, founder and CEO of the Vessel Project of Louisiana, an environmental justice and mutual aid group. "The decision to authorize the CP2 LNG facility is a direct threat to our health and safety. We cannot allow our community to become a sacrifice zone for corporate interests. The proposed facility, with its potential for devastating air pollution and harmful impacts on our local environment, jeopardizes everything we hold dear. Our children deserve clean air, safe water, and a thriving ecosystem. I completely oppose this project and all others like it for the sake of my children and everyone else."
Mahyar Sorour, director of Beyond Fossil Fuels policy for Sierra Club, said CP2 "will be a disaster for local communities devastated by pollution."
"American consumers who will face higher costs, and the global climate crisis that will be supercharged by the project's emissions," said Sorour. "The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission had to reconsider its approval of the project after it failed in 2024 to consider the cumulative impacts of air pollution. By conditionally approving exports from this massive project, Trump's Department of Energy is once again failing to protect the American people from an unnecessary LNG project set to generate billions for corporate executives and leave everyday people with higher energy costs."
"Despite his hollow promises on the campaign trail," Sorour added, "Trump continues to fail to prioritize the livelihoods and future of our country over the profits of the dirty fossil fuel industry."
Amid growing discontent over surging economic inequality in the U.S.—and the Trump administration's elevation of unelected billionaire Elon Musk to the upper reaches of the federal government—the New York state comptroller's report on rising Wall Street bonuses was met with condemnation on Wednesday.
"Something is very broken and this is why people are so disenchanted," wrote one commenter on an article about the report at The Washington Post. "There is no American dream. Just fat cats getting fatter."
Another added that "the inequity of taxation on wealth in this country is shameful."
New York Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli lauded Wall Street's "very strong performance" in 2024 as he announced the average bonus paid to employees in the securities industry reached $244,700 last year—up 31.5% from 2023—as Wall Street's profits skyrocketed by 90%. The bonus pool reached a record $47.5 billion.
But as researcher Rob Galbraith pointed out on social media, the record-breaking take-home pay of Wall Street executives was 3.5 times the median household income for a family in Erie County, New York—leaving doubt that many workers in the state will immediately join in celebrating what DiNapoli said was "good news for New York's economy and our fiscal position" due to the bonuses' impacts on tax revenue.
"Tens of thousands of NYC families are about to lose their childcare unless we come up with another $1 billion in the state budget," said state Rep. Zohran Mamdani (D-36), who is running to be mayor of New York City, in response to the announcement.
The average bonus for Wall Street employees was about four times the salary of the median full-time U.S. worker's earnings for 2024, which came to about $62,000 or $1,200 per week.
DiNapoli's estimate was released a week after voters at a town hall in a Republican district in Nebraska shouted, "Tax the rich!" at Rep. Mike Flood (R-Neb.) when he expressed support for Musk's slashing of public spending and claimed such cuts are necessary to balance the budget.
In recent weeks, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) have drawn crowds of tens of thousands of people to hear them speak on their Fighting Oligarchy tour—leading the congresswoman to proclaim, "What is happening right now is different."
"We need to be taxing the rich on the floor of the Congress," said Ocasio-Cortez in Arizona last week, drawing loud applause. "We need to be establishing guaranteed healthcare on the floor of the Congress. We need to be passing a living wage on the floor of the Congress."
However, Congress is currently controlled by Republicans working to cut federal programs that serve working people to pay for tax cuts benefiting rich individuals and corporations.
The ever-growing amount of billionaire cash in elections is poisoning U.S. democracy, according to a report published Wednesday by the advocacy group Americans for Tax Fairness—which found that the top 100 billionaire families spent an eye-popping $2.6 billion on federal contests in 2024.
That's more than twice the roughly $1 billion spent by individual billionaire donors in 2020, according to the group, and constitutes 160 times the amount of billionaire political spending since the 2010 Supreme Court decision Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. That decision paved the way for the proliferation of super political action committees (PACs), a type of committee that can accept unlimited donations to spend on political activity.
Picking apart that $2.6 billion, there's a clear partisan skew: 70% of that billionaire money went to entities supporting Republican candidates, while 23% went to entities backing Democratic candidates. The other 7% went toward independent candidates—such as presidential contender Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is now a Cabinet secretary—and committees that gave to candidates from both parties who champion specific issues, such as cryptocurrency.
That skew is particularly pronounced when it comes to the competitive Senate races that determined control of the chamber in 2024.
Looking at Senate contests in Arizona, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, the authors of the report found that nearly 80% of the total billionaire cash in these races—which tallied $1.14 billion in outside spending—went to outside groups supporting Republican candidates, compared to 20% used to support Democratic hopefuls.
"The billions of dollars of donations these oligarchic clans give candidates, parties, and particularly outside spending groups drown out the voices and concerns of ordinary voters, endangering democracy and distorting public policy," the report states.
What's more, "this undue influence by the billionaire donor class over our government—always a concern and already present in mostly indirect ways—has found its full, frightening expression in the second Trump administration with the ascendancy of Elon Musk, the world's richest man and the biggest billionaire donor in the 2024 elections," the authors wrote.
Musk's ability to convert his extreme wealth into political influence in the Trump administration contrasts with reports that Musk pays relatively little in taxes. In 2018, for example, Musk paid nothing in federal income taxes even as his wealth soared, largely due to Tesla stock appreciation.
But Musk is just the "most notorious example of billionaires literally buying power," according to the group. ATF highlighted that billionaire Linda McMahon secured a position as President Donald Trump's education secretary after she and her ex-husband gave tens of millions to support Republican candidates, as did billionaire businessman Howard Lutnick, now the commerce secretary.
The report, titled Billionaires Buying Elections: They've Come to Collect, is the latest in ATF's "billionaires buying elections" series, and according to the group it is the most comprehensive because it covers both direct billionaire giving and "traces the indirect routes billionaire cash can take through campaign committees contributing to each other."
In its methodology section, the report gives the example of WinSenate—a super PAC that works to elect Democrats to the Senate—which did not report billionaire contributions, but received all of its funding from the Senate Majority PAC. Because the Senate Majority PAC got 19.9% of its funding from billionaires, the report counted WinSenate's share of billionaire spending at 19.9%.
According to the report, other big-name Republican megadonors in the 2024 cycle included shipping supply magnates Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein and Israeli-American billionaire Miriam Adelson.
According to the authors of the report, billionaires need to be taxed more.
"Tax policy—which has the most direct impact on billionaire wealth—is perhaps the most obviously affected by the money-for-power billionaire bargain," according to the group, which cites the current Republican push to extend parts of Trump's 2017 tax cuts that primarily benefit the wealthy as part of a general trend in tax policy over the past four decades to decrease taxes on the wealthiest people and most profitable businesses.
"The self-reinforcing combination of booming billionaire fortunes and weakening campaign finance laws continues to threaten our democratic form of government," according to the report. "As the outcome of the last presidential campaign amply demonstrates, until billionaires pay their fair share of taxes and we put effective curbs on their political spending, this threat will only grow."
The report calls for solutions like bolstering the estate tax and implementing a wealth tax, such as the Ultra-Millionaire Tax Act, a bill that was reintroduced by multiple Democratic senators in 2024. The newer version of the legislation would place a 2% annual tax on the net worth of households and trusts between $50 million and $1 billion, and impose an 1% annual surtax—so 3% tax overall—on the net worth of families and trusts that is above $1 billion.
Outraged by Elon Musk's devastating contributions to the Trump administration, tens of thousands worldwide held "Tesla Takedown" protests at over 200 locations on Saturday.
Protests began the day in front of Tesla showrooms in Australia and New Zealand. They then rippled across Europe, including Finland, Norway, Denmark, Germany, France, the Netherlands, and the UK. In the US, protests occurred in nearly every state, including the northeast, south, midwest, and west coast.
"Elon Musk is destroying our democracy, and he's using the fortune he built at Tesla to do it," organizers wrote on Action Network, which has an interactive map of the protest sites. "We are taking action at Tesla to stop Musk's illegal coup."
Organizers also have a message for people with ties to the company: "Sell your Teslas, dump your stock, join the picket lines."
Since Musk began dismantling the federal bureaucracy as chief of President Donald Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), critics have protested at Tesla facilities and posted videos about selling their vehicles on social media.
In an aerial view, protesters demonstrate against Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiatives during a nationwide “Tesla Takedown” rally at a dealership on March 29, 2025, in Austin, Texas. (Getty image)
While protesting at the Tesla dealership in west London, Louise Cobbett-Witten told The Guardian: “It’s too overwhelming to do nothing. There is real solace in coming together like this. Everyone has to do something. We haven’t got a big strategy besides just standing on the side of the street, holding signs and screaming.”
Alainn Hanson, of Washington, DC, brought her mother from Minnesota to their first Tesla protest. She told CNN: “I’m sick of billionaires trampling over working class people.”
Here are some of Saturday's actions:
Saint Petersburg, Florida
Cherry Hill, New Jersey
Washington, DC
Tucson, Arizona
Manlius, New York
Salt Lake City, Utah
Vancouver, British Columbia
Chicago, Illinois
And in London, England
The leaked messages among top Trump administration officials about U.S. strikes in Yemen earlier this month, which were held via a private sector messaging app in breach of national security protocol and inadvertently included a journalist, sparked considerable discussion among political commentators and social media users—but as the initial shock regarding the Signal conversation faded, advocates and policy experts said lawmakers' attention should turn to the illegality of the attacks on Yemen.
The advocacy groups Just Foreign Policy, DAWN, and Action Corps released a joint statement Thursday calling on Congress to take action to stop U.S. military action in Yemen by upholding "its sole authority to declare war under Article I of the Constitution and the 1973 War Powers Resolution (WPR)."
The chat messages sent between officials including Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and National Security Adviser Michael Waltz stunned the public and Washington insiders this week because they had accidentally also been sent to Atlantic journalist Jeffrey Goldberg, but the three groups pointed out that they also included an admission from Vance that the strikes were not defensive—contrary to claims by President Donald Trump:
I think we are making a mistake… 3 percent of US trade runs through the suez. 40 percent of European trade does. There is a real risk that the public doesn't understand this or why it's necessary. The strongest reason to do this is, as POTUS said, to send a message…
Vance's comments bolster the three groups' position that "the strikes also violate Chapters I and VII of the United Nations Charter, which prohibit states from launching a war unless in self-defense or authorized by the U.N. Security Council."
Even before the chats were leaked, said the groups, it was clear that Trump had not sought congressional authorization for military strikes in Yemen, which have killed at least 53 people since the U.S. launched attacks on March 15.
The War Powers Resolution of 1973, which was introduced after former President Richard Nixon's secretive bombings of Cambodia, requires congressional authorization for "the introduction of the United States armed forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances," while Article I of the Constitution grants Congress the authority to declare war.
"Congress should demand an end to this reckless, unauthorized war that will both harm U.S. interests and continue to terrorize the Yemeni people who have already suffered years of U.S.-backed violence."
"President Trump has not only launched us into a new military escapade in the Middle East, he's done so in breach of our Constitution," said Isaac Evans-Frantz, director of Action Corps. "Congress should demand an end to this reckless, unauthorized war that will both harm U.S. interests and continue to terrorize the Yemeni people who have already suffered years of U.S.-backed violence."
The groups' comments echoed those of Michigan State University professor and Quincy Institute fellow Shireen Al-Adeimi, who is Yemeni-American.
"With all the noise about the Signal leak, is anyone in Congress or the media concerned that actually bombing Yemeni people and Yemen's infrastructure is unconstitutional?" she asked on Tuesday. "Anyone?"
The Trump administration claimed that the strikes in Yemen were made because the Houthis' blockade on Israeli ships—established in retaliation for Israel's breaking of a cease-fire in Gaza—was an attack on U.S. economic interests and economic security, but the three groups noted that "there is no evidence that Houthi forces attacked any U.S. ships or personnel from the beginning of the Gaza cease-fire in January 2025 through March 15."
The Houthis struck cargo ships they deemed to be tied to Israel starting in November 2023, in response to Israel's relentless assault on Gaza. They stopped the attacks for the duration of the cease-fire, which lasted nearly two months starting in mid-January.
"The cessation of Houthi attacks during the short-lived Gaza truce underscores their primary focus to defend Palestinians from genocide—a reality obscured by Trump's rhetoric to justify unauthorized military action and deepen U.S. aggression in a widening conflict," said Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of DAWN. "The best way to protect global maritime navigation through the Red Sea is to ensure the Israeli government ends its genocidal violence in Gaza."
Along with Vance's apparent admission that the strikes were not in self-defense, the Signal discussion included what observers called a "confession" to alleged war crimes by Waltz, who said the residential building of the girlfriend of a Houthi leader had "collapsed" after a U.S. strike. As Common Dreams reported Wednesday, Waltz and Vance celebrated the strike.
Etan Mabourakh, a fellow at Action Corps, called on Congress to introduce a Yemen War Powers Resolution. The House and Senate both passed such a resolution in 2019 to bar the U.S. from participating in the Saudi war in Yemen.
"Congress should take the necessary step to stop these illegal, ineffective, and unauthorized airstrikes in Yemen," said Mabourakh. "Rather than debating the Trump administration's violation of security protocols in their Signal chats, they should do their job and challenge another unlawful new war in the region that is making everyone less safe."
Instead of strategically imposing tariffs, Trump has chosen to "give the country the most massive tax increase in its history, possibly exceeding $1 trillion on an annual basis."
As stocks "nosedived" on Thursday, economists, policymakers, and campaigners around the world continued to warn about the impacts of U.S. President Donald Trump's trade war, which includes a 10% universal tariff for imports and steeper duties—that he claims are "reciprocal"—for dozens of countries, set to take effect over the next week.
"This is how you sabotage the world's economic engine while claiming to supercharge it," wrote Nigel Green, CEO of the international financial consultancy deVere Group. "Trump is blowing up the post-war system that made the U.S. and the world more prosperous, and he's doing it with reckless confidence."
As Bloombergdetailed after the president's "Liberation Day" remarks from the White House Rose Garden:
China's cumulative tariff rate of 54% includes both the 20% duty already charged earlier this year, added to the 34% levy calculated as part of Trump's so-called reciprocal plan, according to people familiar with the matter. The European Union's rate is 20% and Vietnam's is 46%, White House documents showed. Other nations slapped with larger tariffs include Japan with 24%, South Korea with 25%, India with 26%, Cambodia with 49%, and Taiwan with 32%.
In Europe on Thursday, "the regional Stoxx 600 index provisionally ended down around 2.7%," while "the U.K.'s FTSE 100 was down 1.6%, with France's CAC 40 and Germany's DAX posting deeper losses of 3.3% and 3.1%, respectively," according toCNBC.
In the United States, CNBCreported, "the broad market index dropped 4%, putting it on track for its worst day since September 2022. The Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbled 1,200 points, or 3%, while the Nasdaq Composite fell 5%. The slide across equities was broad, with decliners at the New York Stock Exchange outnumbering advancers by 6-to-1."
American exceptionalism.
[image or embed]
— Justin Wolfers ( @justinwolfers.bsky.social) April 3, 2025 at 12:14 PM
However, as Economic Policy Institute (EPI) chief economist Josh Bivens noted last week, "because most households depend overwhelmingly on wages from work as their primary source of income and not returns from wealth-holding, the stock market tells us nothing about these households' economic situations."
And Trump's tariffs are expected to hit U.S. households hard, as the cost of his taxes on imports are passed on to consumers.
"Tariffs can be a legitimate and useful tool in industrial policy for well-defined strategic goals, but broad-based tariffs that significantly raise the average effective tariff rate in the United States are unwise," Bivens and EPI senior economist Adam Hersh stressed in a Thursday statement—which also called out Trump for mischaracterizing one of the think tank's 2022 analyses.
"Further, the second Trump administration's rationale, parameters, and timeline for tariffs have been ever-shifting," Bivens and Hersh continued. "As the original post cited by the administration argues, tariffs should not be a goal unto themselves, but a strategic tool to pair with other efforts to restore American competitiveness in narrowly targeted industrial sectors."
Instead of strategically imposing tariffs, Trump has chosen to "give the country the most massive tax increase in its history, possibly exceeding $1 trillion on an annual basis, which comes to $7,000 per household," warned Center for Economic and Policy Research co-founder and senior economist Dean Baker. "And this tax hike will primarily hit moderate and middle-income families. Trump's taxes go easy on the rich, who spend a smaller share of their income on imported goods."
Baker—like various other economists and journalists—also took aim at Trump's claims that the tariffs are reciprocal, explaining:
Trump's team calculated our trade deficit with each country and divided it by their exports to the United States. Trump decided that this figure was equal to that country's tariff on goods imported from the U.S.
Trump's method of calculating tariffs is comparable to the doctor who assesses your proper weight by dividing your height by your birthday. Any doctor who did this is clearly batshit crazy, and unfortunately so is our president. And apparently none of his economic advisers has the courage and integrity to set him straight or to resign.
However, outside Trump's administration, the intense criticism continued to mount, including from groups focused on combating the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency, which also endangers the global economy.
Andreas Sieber, associate director of policy and Campaigns at 350.org, said Thursday that "Trump's tariffs won't slow the global energy transition—they'll only hurt ordinary people, particularly Americans."
"Despite his claims he 'gets' economic policy, his record tells a different story: Tariffs are tanking U.S. stocks and fueling inflation," Sieber added. "The transition to renewables is unstoppable, with or without him. His latest move does little to impact the booming clean energy market but will isolate the U.S. and drive up costs for American consumers."
Allie Rosenbluth, U.S. campaign manager at Oil Change International, similarly emphasized that "Trump's tariffs will hurt working families first and foremost, raising costs for essentials we depend on and threatening to plunge the U.S. economy into a recession. Though Trump pretends to care about the cost of living for ordinary people, his real loyalties lie with his fossil fuel industry donors."
"If he actually cared about energy affordability, he would stop bullying other countries into buying more U.S. liquefied natural gas (LNG), which boosts the fossil fuel industry's profits, but results in increased prices for domestic consumers and pushes us further toward climate catastrophe," she asserted. "The one step countries can take to hit Trump where it hurts most is wean off their dependency on fossil fuels from the United States."
The impact of Trump's new levies won't be limited to working-class people in the United States. Nick Dearden, director of U.K.-based Global Justice Now, pointed out that "Trump has set light to the global economy and unleashed a world of pain, not least on a group of developing countries that will suffer tremendous impoverishment as a result of his punitive tariffs."
"All those affected must come together and stand up to this bully by building a very different international economy that promotes the interests of ordinary people rather than the oligarchs standing behind Trump," he argued. "For all its scraping and crawling, the U.K. got no special treatment here, and the government should learn this lesson fast: They need to stop giving away our rights and protections in a futile effort to appease Donald Trump."
Leaders in the United States are also encouraging resistance to Trump. U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said Wednesday that "this week you will read many confused economists and political pundits who won't understand how the tariffs make economic sense. That's because they don't. They aren't designed as economic policy. The tariffs are simply a new, super dangerous political tool."
Murphy made the case that "the tariffs are DESIGNED to create economic hardship. Why? So that Trump has a straight face rationale for releasing them, business by business or industry by industry. As he adjusts or grants relief, it's a win-win: the economy improves and dissent disappears."
"But as long as we see this clearly, we can stop him. Public mobilization is working. Today, a few Republicans joined Democrats to vote against one set of tariffs," he added, referring to a
resolution that would undo levies on Canadian imports. "The people still have the power."
"As Jewish students, we grew up learning about the rise of fascism, learning about how important it is to stand up when you see injustice in the world," said one protester.
Jewish Columbia University students had chained themselves to a fence on campus for 45 minutes on Wednesday, in protest of the school's cooperation with immigration agents to arrest a leader of last year's pro-Palestinian encampment, when New York City Police officers arrived to break up the nonviolent action.
One student identified as Shea, who was wearing a kippah with a watermelon design and a keffiyeh—symbols of Palestinian solidarity—told independent journalist Meghnad Bose that university trustees are "directly implicated" in Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) targeting of Mahmoud Khalil, a former student who helped lead negotiations demanding Columbia's divestment from Israel last year.
Shea said trustees handed over the names of Khalil and other pro-Palestinian students at Columbia to the government.
"We are here in protest of that to demand that the university tell us which trustees, which members of the university administration, are responsible for this so we can demand immediate consequences for them and hold them accountable for what they've done to our peer," said the undergraduate student.
Shea added that Jewish students were leading the protest because "the attacks on our international students, on students of color, have been so fierce, so dangerous, so disproportionate that we are the only students who can be here right now taking this risk."
Listen in to the student protesters themselves @DropSiteNews pic.twitter.com/R3LIWWQspI
— Meghnad Bose (@MeghnadBose93) April 2, 2025
Plainclothes ICE agents abducted Khalil last month as he was returning home to his apartment in a Columbia-owned building with his pregnant wife. The agents refused to identify themselves and ultimately Khalil was sent to an ICE detention facility in Louisiana. Khalil is an Algerian citizen of Palestinian descent and had a green card, which has reportedly been revoked by the Trump administration, while his wife—who is pregnant with their first child—is a U.S. citizen.
A federal court in New Jersey ruled Tuesday that the challenge to ICE's unlawful detention of Khalil should continue in the state. His wife responded that "this is an important step towards securing Mahmoud's freedom, but there is still a lot more to be done. As the countdown to our son's birth begins and I inch closer and closer to my due date, I will continue to strongly advocate for Mahmoud’s freedom and for his safe return home so he can be by my side to welcome our first child."
Khalil was detained days after the Trump administration announced it was canceling $400 million in grants and contracts for Columbia in retaliation for what it claimed was a failure to address antisemitism on campus. The Trump administration has conflated expressions of support for Palestinian rights on college campuses with attacks on Jewish students, as did the Biden administration before it.
Columbia oversaw an aggressive response to the protests last year, allowing NYPD officers to drag students out of a building they occupied and unofficially renamed Hind's Hall after Hind Rajab, a six-year-old girl who was killed by Israeli forces in Gaza.
An analysis of last year's pro-Palestinian campus protests, many of which were led by Jewish students, found that 97% of them were nonviolent.
A Barnard College student identified as Tali said Wednesday that "as Jewish students, we grew up learning about the rise of fascism, learning about how important it is to stand up when you see injustice in the world."
Campus security quickly cordoned off the area where students had chained themselves to the fence. After the NYPD arrived, security officers used bolt cutters to remove the protesters from the fence.
Breaking: Columbia campus security bring giant bolt cutters to forcibly break the student protesters away from the Columbia gates they had chained themselves to.@DropSiteNews pic.twitter.com/pSROblLjjf
— Meghnad Bose (@MeghnadBose93) April 2, 2025
Bose reported that "in [a] sudden escalation, Columbia campus security aggressively [engaged] student protesters," and tried to take away a banner reading, "Free Mahmoud Khalil."
"Love and solidarity to these courageous Jewish students who have chained themselves to the gates of Columbia in protest of the university turning over their friend Mahmoud Khalil to a fascist administration," said Simone Zimmerman, co-founder of the Jewish-led group IfNotNow.
The students, said Zimmerman, "are taking risks today that they know most of their peers cannot."
The Trump administration is "plotting to sell off America's national public lands to their billionaire friends, and Kate MacGregor is the perfect henchwoman."
Watchdog groups are warning that U.S. President Donald Trump's pick for deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior, Kate MacGregor—who they call a friend of the fossil fuel industry—will be an enthusiastic accomplice in the Trump administration's efforts to open up public land to oil and gas leasing.
Trump, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, and Trump's billionaire adviser Elon Musk "are plotting to sell off America's national public lands to their billionaire friends, and Kate MacGregor is the perfect henchwoman," said Alan Zibel, a research director with the watchdog Public Citizen, in a statement on Wednesday.
MacGregor, an energy company executive who was deputy secretary of the Department of the Interior during the first Trump administration from early 2020 until January 2021 had her confirmation hearing Wednesday before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
Oil Change International's U.S. campaign manager Collin Rees blasted MacGregor over her testimony, including support for legislation co-sponsored by Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.) that would require the Interior Department to hold two offshore oil and gas lease sales per year for 10 years.
MacGregor's previous time in the Interior Department, showed she "prioritized fossil fuel interests over the good of the American people."
"Her support for a decade of at least two offshore oil and gas lease sales is completely incompatible with avoiding the worst impacts of the climate crisis, as well as the Department of Interior's mandate to protect public lands and waters," Rees said.
In 2017, as an aide to then-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, MacGregor helped successfully fast track a permit for an oil firm to begin fracking on a patch of farmland in Oklahoma, according to 2019 reporting from the investigative outlet Reveal.
"While a senior staffer of the House Committee on Natural Resources, she developed strong ties to the energy industry and its lobbyists," according to Reveal. "In recent years, she has also built a public profile as an advocate of offshore oil drilling and a foe of any environmental rules that might limit energy production."
According to a record of her work calendar, which was obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request by the nonprofit publication Pacific Standard, MacGregor met over 100 times with extractive industry groups or representatives between January of 2017 and January of 2018, when she was at the Department of the Interior but not yet the deputy secretary.
Pointing to MacGregor's background, executive director of the watchdog Accountable.US Tony Carrk said that with MacGregor's nomination, Trump "continues to build a dream team of big oil and gas shills to ravage America's public lands, while taxpayers and our environment deal with all the fallout."
Zibel of Public Citizen also noted that "public lands belong to all Americans, not wealthy corporate executives."
Meanwhile, Public Citizen is also sounding the alarm on the expected appointment of Matt Giacona, a lobbyist for the National Ocean Industries Association—which represents oil, gas, and wind companies working offshore—to head the Department of Interior's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM). The current person leading BOEM is retiring, according to Politico Pro.
In response to the potential appointment of Giacona to BOEM, which oversees offshore energy production in deep waters, director of Public Citizen's energy program Tyson Slocum on Wednesday said: "Trump Appointing a Big Oil lobbyist to oversee deep water oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico shows that the administration's goal is to empower and enrich powerful corporations at the expense of everyone and everything else."
"This continues the clear trend of Trump turning federal agencies and the public good into profit opportunities for powerful corporate interests," he said.