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mitt romney
Mitt "47%" Romney's Post-Career Call to Tax the Rich Met With Kudos and Criticism
"When Romney had real power," noted journalist David Sirota, "he fortified the rigged tax system that he's only now criticizing from the sidelines."
Dec 19, 2025
In a leaked fundraiser footage from the 2012 US presidential campaign, Republican candidate Mitt Romney infamously claimed that 47% of Americans are people "who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to healthcare, to food, to housing, to you name it." On Friday, the former US senator from Utah published a New York Times opinion piece titled, "Tax the Rich, Like Me."
"In 2012, political ads suggested that some of my policy proposals, if enacted, would amount to pushing grandma off a cliff. Actually, my proposals were intended to prevent that very thing from happening," Romney began the article, which was met with a range of reactions. "Today, all of us, including our grandmas, truly are headed for a cliff: If, as projected, the Social Security Trust Fund runs out in the 2034 fiscal year, benefits will be cut by about 23%."
"Typically, Democrats insist on higher taxes, and Republicans insist on lower spending. But given the magnitude of our national debt as well as the proximity of the cliff, both are necessary," he argued. "On the spending-cut front... Social Security and Medicare benefits for future retirees should be means-tested—need-based, that is to say—and the starting age for entitlement payments should be linked to American life expectancy."
"And on the tax front, it's time for rich people like me to pay more," wrote Romney, whose estimated net worth last year, when he announced his January 2025 retirement from the Senate, was $235 million. "I long opposed increasing the income level on which FICA employment taxes are applied (this year, the cap is $176,100). No longer; the consequences of the cliff have changed my mind."
"The largest source of additional tax revenues is also probably the most compelling for fairness and social stability. Some call it closing tax code loopholes, but the term 'loopholes' grossly understates their scale. 'Caverns' or 'caves' would be more fitting," he continued, calling for rewriting capital gains tax treatment rules for "mega-estates over $100 million."
"Sealing the real estate caverns would also raise more revenue," Romney noted. "There are more loopholes and caverns to be explored and sealed for the very wealthy, including state and local tax deductions, the tax rate on carried interest, and charity limits on the largest estates at death."
Some welcomed or even praised Romney's piece. Iowa state Rep. JD Scholten (D-1), a progressive who has previously run for both chambers of Congress, declared on social media: "Tax the rich! Welcome to the coalition, Mitt!"
US House Committee on the Budget Ranking Member Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), who is part of the New Democrat Coalition, said: "I welcome this op-ed by Mitt Romney and encourage people to read it. As the next chair of the House Budget Committee, increasing revenue by closing loopholes exploited by the wealthiest Americans will be a top priority."
Progressive Saikat Chakrabarti, who is reportedly worth at least $167 million and is one of the candidates running to replace retiring former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), responded: "Even Mitt Romney now agrees that we need to tax the wealthiest. I call for a wealth tax on our billionaires and centimillionaires."
Michael Linden, a senior policy fellow at the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, said: "Kudos to Mitt Romney for changing his mind and calling for higher taxes on the rich. I'm not going to nitpick his op-ed (though there are a few things I disagree with), because the gist of it is right: We need real tax reform to make the rich pay more."
Others pointed to Romney's record, including the impactful 47% remarks. The Lever's David Sirota wondered, "Why is it that powerful people typically wait until they have no power to take the right position and effectively admit they were wrong when they had more power to do something about it?"
According to Sirota:
The obvious news of the op-ed is that we've reached a point in which even American politics' very own Gordon Gekko—a private equity mogul-turned-Republican politician—is now admitting the tax system has been rigged for his fellow oligarchs.
And, hey, that's good. I believe in the politics of addition. I believe in welcoming converts to good causes in the spirit of "better late than never." I believe there should be space for people to change their views for the better. And I appreciate Romney offering at least some pro forma explanation about what allegedly changed his thinking (sidenote: I say "allegedly" because it's not like Romney only just now learned that the tax system was rigged—he was literally a co-founder of Bain Capital!).
"And yet, these kinds of reversals (without explicit apologies, of course) often come off as both long overdue but also vaguely inauthentic, or at least not as courageous and principled as they seem," Sirota continued, stressing that "when Romney had real power, he fortified the rigged tax system that he's only now criticizing from the sidelines."
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US Fascism Has Arrived Thanks to 30 Years of Right-Wing Talk Radio Dominance
The GOP hold on most of American radio seems pretty unshakable, but Democrats must get into the talk-radio game before ever more damage is done.
Sep 28, 2024
“Whoever controls the media controls the mind.” — Jim Morrison
After Ronald Reagan struck down the Fairness Doctrine and the Equal Time Rule, Republican money men got the memo. Whichever party controlled the most states would have a big edge in both the Senate (and thus control of the Supreme Court nominations) and the Electoral College, and most of the low- and medium-population states had relatively inexpensive media markets.
You could buy or lease radio stations for less than a party might spend over a four-year electoral cycle on advertising, so why not simply acquire a few hundred stations across a dozen or more states and program them with rightwing talk radio 24/7?
This became particularly easy after Bill Clinton signed the neoliberal Telecommunications Act of 1996 that ended limits on how many radio or TV stations a single corporation or billionaire could own. Within months of that bill passing into law, Clear Channel and other networks had gone from small regional groups to massive nationwide radio empires.The strategy worked, and today there are over 1,500 rightwing radio stations in America, along with another 700 or so religious stations that regularly endorse Republican memes and candidates for office.
I wrote the original business plan for Air America Radio back in December of 2002 with an article I published that month on Common Dreams.
Right-wing talk radio has been integral to Republican strategy for decades. In 1994, when Newt Gingrich took control of the House of Representatives, he understood the power of talk radio.
“For the first 100 days of the congressional session,” writes Randy Bobbit in his book Us Against Them, “talk radio hosts broadcast live from the capitol building…. When the talk radio throng outgrew the working spaces available, Gingrich allowed some hosts to work in the extra space in his office.”
George W. Bush repeatedly invited talk-radio hosts to broadcast from the White House lawn, although Obama cancelled the tradition; Trump then continued the Republican seduction of the media that dated back to the 1990s.
And the GOP hold on most of American radio seems pretty unshakable.
A few years ago, a billionaire acquired one of the largest networks of these stations (800+ stations) and a senator I’ve known for years invited him and me to meet in his office near the US Capitol. The Senator asked the billionaire — who then owned several hundred stations programming exclusively rightwing content — if he’d ever considered putting some progressive content on the air.
Right-wing talk radio has been integral to Republican strategy for decades.
The billionaire leaned back in his chair, took a deep breath, tented his fingers in front of his mouth, and then said, carefully but emphatically:
“I’ll never put anybody on my air who wants to raise my taxes.”
A few years earlier, I’d sat at lunch at a Talkers Magazine conference with a vice president of what is arguably the most influential of the rightwing radio station networks; the company had started out as a bible publishing business and moved from there into radio and then into political radio.
I asked him if he’d consider putting a progressive show on any of his stations (they were all 100% conservative talk) and he bluntly told me it was “never going to happen” because, he said, “It’s impossible for a liberal to be a true Christian.”
Along with Fox “News,” rightwing talk radio is the main way Republicans have seized and held control over multiple red states. History shows that putting progressive programming on the air in those states could reverse that trend.
Back in 2008, Air America was broadcasting on 62 radio stations that covered a large part of America, including rural areas that had never before experienced progressive talk radio. Most of the stations were leased from Clear Channel, which also owned and programmed rightwing radio on several hundred of its stations.
I’m not aware of any studies proving or disproving the hypothesis, but I believe a large factor in President Obama’s election in 2008 was Air America promoting his candidacy relentlessly. It certainly didn’t hurt: we reached millions of people every single day during that election.
Liberal talk radio carried important messages that were vital to the rural parts of America. That we are all interdependent; that none of us can entirely stand alone unless we are fabulously rich, which is the sales pitch the billionaires try to sell us with their libertarianism; that without government supports and a social safety net, farming would be so vulnerable and financially dangerous (particularly with our weather emergency) that it wouldn’t be viable.
Think about it — political campaigns will pay thousands for a minute of advertising, and find that to be so effective that they continue to buy ads year after year. If that minute can be so influential, how about a host — who’s built a relationship with his or her listeners — telling them dozens of times a day who they should vote for and why? You literally can’t buy promotion like that; you have to buy the station instead.
I wrote the original business plan for Air America Radio back in December of 2002 with an article I published that month on Common Dreams.
Sheldon and Anita Drobney, two venture capitalists from Chicago, read the article and called me up; the next thing I knew I was in the Midwest helping them and Jon Sinton game out how to bring a progressive network into being. Sheldon wrote about it in his book, The Road to Air America, including reprinting my original article.
Impatient to prove the concept of progressive talk radio could work, I started my own program on a local Vermont station in March, 2003, and then moved it to a radio network in 2004. When Air America came online in 2005, we moved it to that network and picked up SiriusXM.
Then Mitt Romney decided he was going to run for president. No slouch, Mr. Romney: he understood the power of media and so apparently directed his private equity firm, Bain Capital, to purchase the entire portfolio of Clear Channel radio stations in the summer of 2008.
Within two years, heading toward the 2012 election when Romney challenged Obama, most all of their stations had flipped their programming from Air America to sports. It killed Air America, although my show was the lone survivor and is still on SiriusXM, Free Speech TV, and stations across the country.
Around the time Romney was buying Clear Channel, a group of Air America talent and I met in DC with a group of Democratic members of the House and Senate. We suggested they should reach out to big Democratic donors and encourage them to buy stations, so if Clear Channel ever pulled the plug on our leases we’d still be on the air.
We argued that, just as Republicans have discovered, it would be a lot cheaper than spending billions on advertising every two or four years.
Initially, the response was positive until one of the senators, who later ran for president, threw cold water on the idea, arguing that the “free market” should determine things like who owns radio stations, rather than a political party or people aligned with it.
Time has passed and word has spread. Entrepreneurs across America have bought or started radio stations — some normal, some “low-power FM” that works just fine in urban areas — to carry progressive programming. It’s a growing trend, and there are even rumors that George Soros is investing in the business.
I’ll be the opening keynote speaker for the Grassroots Radio Conference this week in New Orleans; progressive radio station owners, operators, programmers, and talent from more than half the American states will be there. This is a big step.
A Pew study found that 16 percent of Americans get their election-year information from talk radio. In rural states, where radio stations are cheap, people are far more likely to drive long distances and listen to local radio than in cities; flipping smaller red states shouldn’t be impossible if progressives could put up a few good stations in each state.
While Democrats spend over a billion dollars on paid advertising every two years, and several billion every four years, Republicans use this model of long-term trusting relationships with radio hosts to get out the vote for the GOP.
They know the truth of the old advertising saying, “Nothing beats word-of-mouth.” And a recent Neilson survey supports that adage when it found that 92 percent of consumers “believe recommendations from friends and family over all forms of advertising.”
In 2016, right-wing talk radio gave Donald Trump the boost he needed to put him in the White House. The hosts loved him and promoted him relentlessly. The same went for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, as talk radio became the primary locus for swift-boating John Kerry.
It works. Every weekday, all across America, people get into their cars and drive to or from work listening to the radio; as the nation’s largest statistics organization, Statista, notes, “During an average week in September 2020, radio reached 90.9 percent of all American men aged between 35 and 64 years of age.”
Radio engages, persuades, and informs — and, when done right, builds trust. And the first rule of politics is that trust wins elections.
In politics, just a few points usually decides winners and losers — and talk radio has reliably delivered that incremental edge to the GOP for three decades.
Democrats must get into the talk-radio game. As the old saying goes, “You can’t win if you don’t play.”
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TikTok Sues US Government Over 'Unconstitutional' Potential Ban
One expert said legislators' admissions "that the ban was motivated by a desire to suppress content about the Israel-Gaza conflict will make the law especially difficult for the government to defend," said one First Amendment expert.
May 07, 2024
A top First Amendment expert on Tuesday said TikTok has a strong case against the U.S. government as the social media platform filed a federal lawsuit against a potential ban—particularly since proponents of the law have admitted it is aimed at blocking Americans' access to news out of Gaza.
The platform filed the lawsuit against U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit nearly two weeks after President Joe Biden signed the Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversaries Act into law as part of a larger foreign aid package.
Under the law, TikTok parent company ByteDance, a Chinese firm, has 270 days to sell the platform, allowing it to continue operating in the U.S. If it does not sell TikTok, the app will no longer be available on U.S. networks and app stores.
As Common Dreams reported Monday, Republican lawmakers including U.S. Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) and Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) have linked TikTok to the burgeoning anti-war protest movement spreading across the U.S., with the latter saying in an interview with Secretary of State Antony Blinken last Friday that "there was such overwhelming support" in Congress to shut down TikTok because of the frequent posting of Palestine-related content on the app.
"Restricting citizens' access to media from abroad is a practice that has long been associated with repressive regimes, so it's sad and alarming to see our own government going down this road," said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, on Tuesday. "TikTok's challenge to the ban is important, and we expect it to succeed. The First Amendment means the government can't restrict Americans' access to ideas, information, or media from abroad without a very good reason for it—and no such reason exists here."
"The fact that some legislators have acknowledged that the ban was motivated by a desire to suppress content about the Israel-Gaza conflict will make the law especially difficult for the government to defend," Jaffer added.
The law's sponsors claim it "is not a ban because it offers ByteDance a choice: divest TikTok's U.S. business or be shut down," reads the lawsuit. "But in reality, there is no choice. The 'qualified divestiture' demanded by the act to allow TikTok to continue operating in the United States is simply not possible: not commercially, not technologically, not legally."
Even if selling the app within the time frame was feasible, added TikTok and ByteDance, the law "would still be an extraordinary and unconstitutional assertion of power," ultimately allowing Congress to "circumvent the First Amendment by invoking national security and ordering the publisher of any individual newspaper or website to sell to avoid being shut down."
"And for TikTok, any such divestiture would disconnect Americans from the rest of the global community on a platform devoted to shared content—an outcome fundamentally at odds with the Constitution's commitment to both free speech and individual liberty," the plaintiffs continued.
At The Philadelphia Inquirer on Tuesday, columnist Will Bunch noted that about a third of Americans between the ages of 18-29 get their news from TikTok, according to a recent Pew survey—as Romney openly stated he fears last week.
As Bunch wrote:
During the war in Gaza, most mainstream Western journalists have been blocked from entering the war zone. The best source of real-time information is often the phone video of airstrikes and their aftermath either shot by Palestinian journalists—more than 90 of whom have been killed—or civilian bystanders. Look, there's disinformation about every issue on social media—it's a serious problem. I'm a clueless boomer myself about TikTok, but I do spend way too much time on X/Twitter and I can tell you exactly what is radicalizing young people about Gaza.
The reason so many under-30 folks have adopted the Palestinian cause isn't disinformation, from Hamas or China or anyone else. They've been radicalized by the truth—daily videos of young children, some of them bloodied, some of them already dead, covered in dust and targeted by 2,000-pound dumb bombs made right here in America.
"If the real motivation for zapping TikTok from your phone is to silence legitimate political speech, just because a lot of members of Congress don't like it," wrote Bunch, "then this bill is the worst attack on the First Amendment since the government was sending World War I critics like Eugene V. Debs and Kate Richards O'Hare to prison, more than 100 years ago."
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Romney Admits Push to Ban TikTok Is Aimed at Censoring News Out of Gaza
A conversation between Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the Republican senator offered an "incredible historical document" showing how the U.S. views its role in the Middle East.
May 06, 2024
A discussion between U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Sen. Mitt Romney over the weekend included what one critic called an "incredible mask-off moment," with the two officials speaking openly about the U.S. government's long-term attempts to provide public relations work for Israel in defense of its policies in the occupied Palestinian territories—and its push to ban TikTok in order to shut down Americans' access to unfiltered news about the Israeli assault on Gaza.
At the Sedona Forum in Sedona, Arizona on Friday, the Utah Republican asked Blinken at the McCain Institute event's keynote conversation why Israel's "PR been so awful" as it's bombarded Gaza since October in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack, killing at least 34,735 Palestinians—the majority women and children—and pushing parts of the enclave into a famine that is expected to spread due to Israel's blockade.
"The world is screaming about Israel, why aren't they screaming about Hamas?" asked Romney. "'Accept a cease-fire, bring home the hostages.' Instead it's the other way around, I mean, typically the Israelis are good at PR. What's happened here? How have they, and we, been so ineffective at communicating the realities there?"
Blinken replied that Americans, two-thirds of whom want the Biden administration to push for a permanent cease-fire and 57% of whom disapprove of President Joe Biden's approach to the war, are "on an intravenous feed of information with new impulses, inputs every millisecond."
"And of course the way this has played out on social media has dominated the narrative," said the secretary of state. "We can't discount that, but I think it also has a very, very challenging effect on the narrative."
Romney suggested that banning TikTok would quiet the growing outrage over Israeli atrocities in the United States.
"Some wonder why there was such overwhelming support for us to shut down, potentially, TikTok or other entities of that nature," said Romney. "If you look at the postings on TikTok and the number of mentions of Palestinians relative to other social media sites, it's overwhelmingly so among TikTok broadcasts."
The interview took place amid a growing anti-war movement on college campuses across the U.S. and around the world, with American police forces responding aggressively to protests at which students have demanded higher education institutions divest from companies that contract with Israel and that the U.S. stop funding the Israel Defense Forces.
Right-wing lawmakers and commentators have suggested students have been indoctrinated by content shared on social media platforms including TikTok and Instagram, and wouldn't be protesting otherwise.
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.), who co-sponsored a recent bill to ban TikTok—included in a foreign aid package that Biden signed late last month—said last week that "there has been a coordinated effort off these college campuses, and that you have outside paid agitators and activists."
"It also highlights exactly why we included the TikTok bill in the foreign supplemental aid package because you're seeing how these kids are being manipulated by certain groups or entities or countries to foment hate on their behalf and really create a hostile environment here in the U.S.," said Lawler.
Social media has provided the public with an unvarnished look at the scale of Israel's attack, with users learning the stories of Gaza residents including six-year-old Hind Rajab, 10-year-old Yazan Kafarneh, and victims who have been found in mass graves and seeing the destruction of hospitals, universities, and other civilian infrastructure.
U.S. college students, however, are far from the only people who have expressed strong opposition to Israel's slaughter of Palestinian civilians and large-scale destruction of Gaza as it claims to be targeting Hamas.
Human rights groups across the globe have demanded an end to the Biden administration's support for Israel's military and called on the U.S. president to use his leverage to end the war. Josep Borrell, the European Union's high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, in February lambasted Biden and other Western leaders for claiming concern about the safety of Palestinians while continuing to arm Israel, and leaders in Spain and Ireland have led calls for an arms embargo on the country. The United Nations' top expert on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories said in March that there are "reasonable grounds" to conclude Israel has committed genocidal acts, two months after the International Court of Justice made a similar statement in an interim ruling.
Romney and Blinken didn't mention in their talk whether they believe social media and bad "PR" have pushed international leaders and experts to make similar demands to those of college students.
The conversation, said Intercept journalist Ryan Grim, was an "incredible historical document" showing how the U.S. government views its role in the Middle East—as a government that should "mediate" between Israel and the public to keep people from having "a direct look at what's happening."
"Romney's comments betray a general bipartisan disinterest in engaging Israel's conduct in Gaza on its own terms, preferring instead to complain about protesters, interrogate university presidents, and, apparently, muse about social media's role in boosting pro-Palestinian activism," wrote Ben Metzner at The New Republic. "As Israel moves closer to a catastrophic invasion of Rafah, having already banned Al Jazeera in the country, Romney and Blinken would be wise to consider whether TikTok is the real problem."
Enterpreneur James Rosen-Birch added that "Mitt Romney flat-out asking Antony Blinken, in public, why the United States is not doing a better job manufacturing consent, is wild."
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No Labels Denounced for 'Dangerous' Dark Money Ploy to Boost Trump in 2024
"Their decision to move forward with a dark-money, Trump donor-funded third-party fantasy bid is shameful and puts millions of Americans at risk," said one opponent.
Mar 08, 2024
With Democratic U.S. President Joe Biden expected to face former GOP President Donald Trump in the November election, No Labels on Friday confirmed it is pushing ahead with plans for a third-party "unity" ticket that critics fear could help the Republican return to the White House.
"The consequences of the next presidential election could not be more serious or more existential, and, despite this, No Labels has put their dangerous, reckless thought experiment ahead of the rights and freedoms of millions of Americans and the future of our democracy," declared MoveOn Political Action executive director Rahna Epting. "Their decision to move forward with a dark-money, Trump donor-funded third-party fantasy bid is shameful and puts millions of Americans at risk."
"Their own founder said they are 'not in it to win it,' and several current and past supporters of No Labels have implored them to stand down. And yet, they have decided to pump millions of dollars of dark money into a run that would swing the election to Donald Trump," she warned. "Any candidates who join the No Labels presidential ticket will be complicit in making it easier for Donald Trump and MAGA extremists to win a second term in the White House."
"Any candidates who join the No Labels presidential ticket will be complicit in making it easier for Donald Trump and MAGA extremists to win a second term."
Epting's comments came after No Labels national convention chair Mike Rawlings said in a statement that "earlier today, I led a discussion with the 800 No Labels delegates from all 50 states. These citizen leaders have spent months discussing with one another the kind of leadership they want to see in the White House in 2024. These are some of the most civic-minded, thoughtful, and patriotic Americans I have ever met. They take their responsibility seriously."
"Even though we met virtually, their emotion and desire to bring this divided nation back together came right through the screen. I wasn't sure exactly where No Labels delegates would land today but they sent an unequivocal message: Keep going," he added. "They voted near unanimously to continue our 2024 project and to move immediately to identify candidates to serve on the unity presidential ticket. Every one of our delegates had their own explanation for wanting to move ahead."
No Labels is a dark money group with secret far-right donors.
It’s not trying to find the so-called “middle ground.”
It’s trying to put Donald Trump back in the White House.
Be warned. pic.twitter.com/5cJgBTFGNj https://t.co/PCluXaWhBQ
— Robert Reich (@RBReich) March 8, 2024
While Rawlings provided some examples of delegates' statements from the call, so did journalists who obtained recordings of it. The New Republic's Greg Sargent—who got the audio from Matt Bennett, co-founder of the Democratic-centrist group Third Way—reported on concerns about a No Labels candidate being a spoiler for Trump:
For instance, a No Labels leader in Idaho said that while members are all for a run, they believe the ticket should "only" be offered to a candidate who has a "reasonable path to succeed and not be a spoiler." A leader in Iowa said the candidate must be "strong" and have "the ability to win."
Many others echoed these sentiments. At one point a party member from New Hampshire said: "We are in it to win it. But we also don't want to look like liars when we're telling people that we're not going to be a spoiler."
However, participants in the call expressed support for pursuing a unity ticket, according to Politico's Shia Kapos and Daniel Lippman, who also obtained a recording and reported that "delegates compared what No Labels was doing to Abraham Lincoln delivering the Gettysburg Address and the Founding Fathers during the American Revolution."
Third Way's Bennett said in a statement Friday: "What part of 'no' is so hard to understand? Time and again, voters, candidates, and election experts have told No Labels that a third-party presidential ticket can't win and would help Trump."
As Andrew Perez and Nikki McCann Ramírez detailed Friday for Rolling Stone:
Over the past year, the dark-money group has been leading a reported $70 million campaign to secure ballot access nationwide for a potential 2024 "unity" ticket. No Labels has refused to disclose who's funding this effort, claiming that this is to protect its donors from "agitators and partisan operatives." Thanks to a quirk in America's broken system of campaign finance laws, the group will never be required to disclose who funded its ballot access effort—and would only have to start reporting donors if it were to formally back candidates.
So far, No Labels has secured ballot access in 16 states, and is trying to do so in 17 other states. The group has given no concrete hints as to which two divide-spanning politicians might run on its unity ticket, or to what party they might belong.
Outgoing U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.)—a right-winger who weighed a run for president—suggested last week that a No Labels ticket would be a spoiler, saying that "right now, if you can't get on 50 states and you're going to basically hit in some of the battleground states that could be very detrimental to what the outcome would be."
During Biden's State of the Union speech on Thursday night, Trump said that it was "interesting" that Manchin and retiring Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah)—the 2012 GOP nominee—were sitting together, "and nobody wants to talk to them."
"I think they'd make a great No Labels team!" added Trump—whose only remaining primary challenger, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, dropped out earlier this week. She has also publicly opposed running with No Labels.
Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, an Independent who ditched the Democratic Party shortly after the 2022 election, revealed this week that she is not seeking another term in November but she is also "not running for president."
Another potential No Labels candidate, former Republican Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, recently resigned from the group's board in frustration and has decided to run for Senate. He remains opposed to both major candidates, saying Thursday that "I'm like 70% of the rest of people in America who do not want Joe Biden or Donald Trump to be president."
While No Labels searches for candidates, the group's critics continue to warn of the consequences of its potential ticket.
"There is no path to victory for No Labels. They will only ensure a second Trump presidency that serves the interests of their billionaire and corporate special interest backers," End Citizens United president Tiffany Muller said Friday. "It's why they've fought every effort to play by the rules and disclose their donors."
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The US Shouldn’t Waste $125 Billion on Dangerous New ICBMs
A wide array of experts, including scientists, disarmament groups, top U.S. military officials, and even a former U.S. defense secretary, agree that land-based ICBMs have outlived their usefulness.
Feb 28, 2024
Last December, Utah Sen. Mitt Romney issued a press release crowing about all the money he secured for his state in the National Defense Authorization Act, the annual bill that lays out what the government will spend on the U.S. military in the following fiscal year. He specifically cited the $4.3 billion in the legislation for the new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) system, a chunk of which will go to the system’s manager, the Hill Air Force Base, 30 miles north of Salt Lake City.
Ultimately, the Air Force is poised to spend more than $125 billion on 650 Sentinel ICBMs, deploying 400 of them to replace the Cold War-era Minuteman III ICBMs siloed in five Great Plains states. The new ICBMs are part of the Pentagon’s plan to spend more than $1.5 trillion over the next 30 years to replace the entire nuclear arsenal with new weapons and delivery systems.
Romney claims that the land-based leg of the nuclear triad is “vital” to nuclear deterrence. The evidence, however, suggests otherwise. That’s why experts inside and outside of the government have called for completely eliminating silo-based ICBMs, maintaining that a nuclear dyad of bombers and submarines would be more than adequate to deter a nuclear attack or, in the unlikely event of such an attack, retaliate. They also warn that the ICBMs are destabilizing—and deadly. Russian missiles could reach them within a half hour, giving the U.S. president at most 10 minutes to decide whether to launch them before they were destroyed on the ground.
Even if current political realities will saddle Great Plains states with ICBMs for the time being, the Air Force can take steps to protect them—and the rest of us.
To ensure that it can launch the missiles unscathed, the Air Force maintains them on high alert, ready to fire within minutes of receiving a presidential order. Doing so, however, increases the possibility of an accidental nuclear war triggered by a false warning. Indeed, there have been a number of close calls over the last six decades due to human and technological errors.
Land-based ICBMs may have made sense years ago, when they were more accurate and powerful than submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) and communications links with subs were unreliable. But sub-launched missiles are now as accurate as ICBMs—if not more so—and the Navy has secure submarine communication links. Moreover, ICBMs are sitting ducks, while nuclear-armed submarines—each of which could destroy two dozen cities—are virtually invulnerable when they are at sea.
Making the Case Against ICBMs
A wide array of experts, including scientists, disarmament groups, top U.S. military officials, and even a former U.S. defense secretary, agree that land-based ICBMs have outlived their usefulness.
In December 2021, nearly 700 scientists and engineers, including 21 Nobel laureates, sent a letter to President Joe Biden urging him to consider eliminating the ICBMs because they create “the risk of a mistaken launch in response to a false warning” and “provide no military capability that is not provided by SLBMs at sea…” If elimination is not politically feasible, they recommended canceling the Sentinel ICBM replacement program and extending the life of the current Minuteman ICBMs for at least another 20 years.
More than 60 national and regional disarmament organizations, including Back from the Brink, Global Zero, Physicians for Social Responsibility, and RootsAction, issued a statement in January 2022 calling for scrapping land-based ICBMs altogether. “Rather than being any kind of deterrent, ICBMs are the opposite—a foreseeable catalyst for nuclear attack,” the statement read. “ICBMs certainly waste billions of dollars, but what makes them unique is the threat that they pose to all of humanity.”
At least two generals—George Lee Butler, a former U.S. Strategic Command director, and James E. Cartwright, a former Joint Chiefs of Staff vice chair and U.S. Strategic Command director—have been unequivocal about getting rid of silo-based ICBMs. When asked in a 2017 interview about their role, Butler replied: “I would have removed land-based missiles from our arsenal a long time ago. I’d be happy to put that mission on the submarines.”
Cartwright, meanwhile, has spoken out numerous times on the topic. As far back as 2012, he recommended doing away with the ICBMs, taking U.S. nuclear weapons off hair-trigger alert, and reducing the number of deployed U.S. nuclear warheads—estimated at the time at 2,150—to 900. Five years later, Cartwright coauthored a column in The Washington Post repeating his point that land-based ICBMs “carry higher risks of accidental war that, fortunately, we no longer need to bear. We are safer without these expensive weapons, and it would be foolish to replace them” with a new generation of missiles.
Cartwright’s coauthor for that 2017 column was William J. Perry, U.S. defense secretary from 1994 to 1997. Perry coauthored another Washington Post column in 2020 that again warned about the threat posed by land-based ICBMs. “These dangerous missiles are not needed for deterrence, as we would use survivable weapons based on submarines at sea for any retaliation,” he wrote. “Yet ICBMs increase the risk that we will blunder into nuclear war by mistake… Starting a nuclear war by mistake is the greatest existential risk to the United States today. The ICBMs are, at best, extra insurance that we do not need; at worst, they are a nuclear catastrophe waiting to happen.”
Subsequent defense secretaries Chuck Hagel, who served from 2015 to 2017, and Gen. James Mattis, who served from 2017 to 2019, also questioned the need for siloed ICBMs, but backpedaled when pressured during their respective Senate confirmation hearings. Two years before former President Donald Trump tapped him to be his defense secretary, for example, James Mattis cast doubt on keeping the ICBMs, partly because of risk of an accidental launch. In 2015 he told the Senate Armed Services Committee: “You should ask, ‘Is it time to reduce the triad to a dyad removing the land-based missiles?’”
The “Sponge” is Us
Failing to come up with a viable technological justification for land-based ICBMs, proponents cite a rationale concocted by the Air Force decades ago that maintains the ICBMs’ vulnerability to attack is just what makes them essential. In 1978, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Lew Allen Jr. said the ICBMs provide a “great sponge” of targets to “absorb” Soviet nuclear missiles. It would take too many warheads to destroy all of the ICBMs, the theory goes, thus deterring the Russians from considering such an attack. Without the land-based missiles, Russia would have significantly fewer military targets and could train its sites on U.S. cities.
It may have been the case 50 years ago that it would take two to four enemy warheads to ensure the destruction of each ICBM, but according to a 2018 Arms Control Association white paper: “Today the probability of destroying a Minuteman III missile silo with a single Russian warhead could exceed 98% given advancements in inertial guidance that could be aided with a Global Positioning System (GPS) and maneuverable reentry vehicles (MaRVs) to improve accuracy. While this may be an overstatement now, it should not be expected to remain one.”
Russia currently has an estimated 1,674 strategic warheads deployed on ballistic missiles and at bomber bases, slightly fewer than the estimated 1,770 warheads the United States now deploys on ICBMs, submarines, and bombers. Even if it took two Russian warheads to completely destroy each of the 400 U.S. ICBM in their silos, Russia would still have 874 left over, more than enough to incinerate the rest of the country.
Late last year, Sébastien Philippe, a scientist at Princeton University, and his colleagues at the school’s Program on Science and Global Security mapped the radiological threat posed by a nuclear attack on U.S. ICBMs in what he called “unprecedented detail” by using current computational capacity and higher resolutions of archived weather data. In an article in Scientific American’s December issue, Philippe explained the likely result:
According to my models, a concerted nuclear attack on the existing U.S. silo fields—in Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, Montana, and North Dakota—would annihilate all life in the surrounding regions and contaminate fertile agricultural land for years. Minnesota, Iowa, and Kansas would also probably face high levels of radioactive fallout. Acute radiation exposure alone would cause several million fatalities across the U.S.—if people get advance warning and can shelter in place for at least four days. Without appropriate shelter, that number could be twice as high. Because of great variability in wind directions, the entire population of the contiguous U.S. and the most populated areas of Canada, as well as the northern states of Mexico, would be at risk of lethal fallout—more than 300 million people in total.
In other words, we—along with our neighbors to the north and south—are the sponge.
To be sure, Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, withdrew from the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, suspended Russian participation in the New Start treaty, and is allegedly developing a space-based nuclear antisatellite weapon, but it is highly unlikely that he would contemplate launching a first strike against the United States. That said, the potential for an ICBM-triggered accidental nuclear war looms large and—as Philippe pointed out in his article—the communities near U.S. missile silos live under threat of an accidental warhead detonation or release of radioactive materials due to a fire or explosion, which has happened before.
Why Are the ICBMs Still There?
Given the dangers silo-based ICBMs pose—and the fact that they are unnecessary—why are they still there?
A major obstacle to questioning, let alone modifying, the status of U.S. land-based missiles is the powerful ICBM Coalition in Congress. Comprised of senators from states that are home to the nation’s three ICBM bases—Montana, North Dakota, and Wyoming—as well as Utah, where the Air Force and its contractors manage the ICBM system, the coalition has so far been able to quash attempts to cut back the number of missiles and bases, which provide a major boost to their state and local economies. The F.E. Warren Air Force Base just outside Cheyenne, for example, is Wyoming’s largest employer.
Over the years, ICBM Coalition members have been rewarded for their efforts with generous campaign contributions from the defense contractors that service ICBMs, including General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, and Northrup Grumman, the sole contractor that bid on building the new Sentinel missile. William D. Hartung, now a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, crunched Federal Election Commission numbers for a May 2021 cover story he wrote for Arms Control Today, “Inside the ICBM Lobby.” From 2012 through 2020, Hartung reported, the coalition members who received the most money from ICBM contractor political action committees and employees were Mitt Romney, who took in $645,545 (mainly when he ran for president in 2012); Jon Tester from Montana, who received $102,360; John Barrasso from Wyoming, who pulled in $89,000; Steve Daines from Montana, who received $85,948; and John Hoeven from North Dakota, who got $81,145. Hartung also found that from 2019 through 2020, the top 11 ICBM contractors spent more than $119 million on lobbying Congress and employed 380 lobbyists, many of whom had formerly worked on Capitol Hill.
A Saner Path Forward
President Biden came into office promising to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. national security policy. Unfortunately, with both Russia and China reportedly modernizing their nuclear arsenals and an election year now in full swing, eliminating the land-based ICBMs does not appear to be politically viable. Not surprisingly, the Biden administration’s most recent Nuclear Posture Review reapproved most of the Pentagon’s longstanding plans to spend an estimated $756 billion over the next 10 years to maintain and upgrade its nuclear forces, which includes replacing the ICBMs.
But even if current political realities will saddle Great Plains states with ICBMs for the time being, the Air Force can take steps to protect them—and the rest of us.
A 2020 Union of Concerned Scientists report, “Rethinking Land-Based Nuclear Missiles,” coauthured by Hartung and physicists Lisbeth Gronlund and David Wright, echoed former Secretary of Defense Perry’s position. It explicitly called for getting rid of the missiles, but until that happens, it recommended that the Air Force immediately take the ICBMs off hair-trigger alert and prolong their life instead of replacing them. “Official studies,” the report pointed out, “show that the Air Force can continue to extend the operational life of the Minuteman missiles for many decades.”
Indeed, according to the Air Force itself, there is no reason to replace the Minuteman ICBMs. Between 2002 and 2012, it spent some $7 billion to upgrade them to the point where an Air Force program analyst confirmed that they were “basically new missiles except for the shell.” Five years later, commenting on a successful ICBM missile flight test, the Air Force Global Strike Command Public Affairs Office boasted: “Through continuous upgrades, including new production versions, improved targeting systems, and enhanced accuracy, today’s Minuteman system remains state of the art and is capable of meeting all modern challenges.” Nothing has changed since then. In September 2023, the Air Force conducted yet another successful ICBM flight test and proclaimed that it demonstrated “that the United States’ nuclear deterrent is safe, secure, reliable, and effective to deter 21st century threats…”
The initial estimate of the Sentinel program’s price tag was $95.3 billion, but recent news reports, citing “poor budget forecasting, supply-chain challenges, and pandemic-driven inflation,” estimate that the new missile program now could cost more than $125 billion. That’s a lot of money for new versions of weapons that even former Secretary of State and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Colin Powell said are “useless” and “must never be used.” It may not be politically expedient to scrap these dangerous weapons at the moment, but the least the Air Force could do is save U.S. taxpayers billions and stop throwing good money after bad on new ICBMs.
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'All a Political Game to Them': Trump and GOP Under Fire for Cynical Border Ploy
"Speculating that the GOP is blocking border security legislation to help Trump win the election would sound like a crazy conspiracy theory but it's literally what the Republicans are saying is happening."
Jan 25, 2024
Critics have long argued that Republicans are interested only in using immigration—and increasingly hysterical claims of a crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border—as a political cudgel, and not in genuine policy reform.
That view appeared to receive some confirmation Thursday when Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) addressed reports that former President Donald Trump—the front-runner for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination—has instructed Republican senators not to strike an immigration deal with Democrats so that he can make the border a central focus of his bid for a second White House term.
"I think the border is a very important issue for Donald Trump," said Romney, who has opted not to run for reelection this year. "And the fact that he would communicate to Republican senators and congresspeople that he doesn't want us to solve the border problem because he wants to blame [President Joe] Biden for it is really appalling."
Romney was responding to a journalist's question about comments that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) reportedly made during a closed-door meeting with fellow Republicans on Wednesday. According to Punchbowl News, McConnell told his colleagues that the "politics on this have changed," referring to the GOP's demand that any military aid for Ukraine be paired with draconian changes to U.S. immigration policy.
"We don't want to do anything to undermine him," McConnell said of the former president, who won the Republican primary in New Hampshire on Tuesday after his landslide victory in Iowa last week, further establishing his stranglehold on the party.
Trump, who has pledged to launch the "largest domestic deportation operation in American history" if reelected, has repeatedly tried to insert himself into the ongoing negotiations, writing on social media last week that he'll accept nothing less than a "PERFECT" immigration deal. Proposals on the table reportedly include new asylum restrictions and cuts to the number of people allowed to live and work in the U.S. temporarily.
While some GOP senators pushed back on the notion that Republicans are preparing to drop their border demands to appease Trump's desire to campaign on the issue, The Washington Post's Aaron Blake wrote Thursday that "it's becoming increasingly difficult to dispute that Trump and some Republicans see political value" in preventing an immigration deal that could be seen as beneficial to Biden, who has expressed openness to cutting such a deal—to the dismay of rights groups.
"A comment I keep coming back to on this," wrote Blake, "is one from Rep. Troy E. Nehls (R-Texas), who just came out and said it early this month: 'I'm not willing to do too damn much right now to help a Democrat and to help Joe Biden's approval rating.'"
Other House Republicans—including Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.)—have also indicated that they're not interested in serious immigration talks.
"I don't think now is the time for comprehensive immigration reform," Johnson said last week.
In response to Romney's comments on Thursday, Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) asked, "Can we all finally agree that House Republicans and Donald Trump do not want to solve the border challenges?"
"It's all a political game to them," Garcia added. "We've proposed real solutions but the MAGA right isn't interested. Shameful."
Vox's Andrew Prokop wrote Thursday that "if Republicans do kill the deal, it would make all their protestations about how much they supposedly care about this issue look hollow, and the GOP would come off looking tremendously cynical."
"They claim to believe the migrant surge of the past few years is destroying the country," Prokop added, "but they'd be happy to let it continue unaddressed for another year if it means they win an election."
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Victory Over Fascism in America Must Come From the Ballot Box
Americans who believe in democracy and reject strongman oligarchy must turn out next November in overwhelming numbers and so shatter the GOP that the party will be forced to reinvent itself.
Dec 28, 2023
How would you react if one day you were sitting at home and the phone rang and when you picked it up you heard a man shout:
Kill yourself now so we can save ammo!
Moments later, an email arrives that says:
I hope the Federal government hangs you and your daughter from the Capitol dome, you treasonous piece of shit! I pray that I will be sitting close enough to hear your necks snap.
This is what happened to “Shaye” Moss and Ruby Freeman when former President Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani decided to blame Trump’s loss in Georgia on them, incorrectly claiming they were stuffing ballots for President Joe Biden. Just a few hours later, a mob with torches and a bullhorn showed up at Freeman’s house, although she’d already left after being warned by the FBI that she was on the “kill list” of a January 6 defendant they’d just arrested.
Mitt Romney, speaking with writer McKay Coppins for his book Romney: A Reckoning, told him the story of multiple Republican senators who were so terrified of violence at the hands of Trump’s fascist followers that they set aside their consciences and voted against convicting him of trying to blackmail Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and, later, trying to overthrow the government of the United States.
One Republican congressman confided to Romney that he wanted to vote for Trump’s second impeachment, but chose not to out of fear for his family’s safety. The congressman reasoned that Trump would be impeached by House Democrats with or without him—why put his wife and children at risk if it wouldn’t change the outcome?
Later, during the Senate trial, Romney heard the same calculation while talking with a small group of Republican colleagues. When one senator, a member of leadership, said he was leaning toward voting to convict, the others urged him to reconsider. You can’t do that, Romney recalled someone saying. Think of your personal safety, said another. Think of your children. The senator eventually decided they were right.
I know liberals and regular reporters in the media who are quite happy trash-talking Biden but are frankly terrified of the possibility that Trump or one of his high-profile followers might sic Trump’s fascist fan boys on them. As a result, they self-censor.
Similarly, multiple judges in the past few months have been given the chance to take Trump off the ticket because of his clear violation of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment by inciting and supporting an insurrection. Each one whiffed, and their legal logic was so thin it’s reasonable to conclude they’re also unwilling to have their families suffer the death threats and harassment that comes with being an “enemy of Trump.”
Violence and the threats of violence are the key to understanding fascists like Trump and the movements they inspire.
When the justices on the Colorado Supreme Court finally found the spine to vote him off the ballot, within hours the threats began. Now they’re having to pay for security for themselves and their family members, and go to sleep every night dreading the possibility that a lone wolf Trump supporter—like the one who broke into Paul Pelosi’s home and attacked him with a hammer—may be looking for them, too.
As NBC News reported, Trump’s followers reacted to the Colorado justices with predictable ferocity:
“This ends when we kill these f--kers,” a user wrote on a pro-Trump forum that was used by several Jan. 6 rioters.
“Kill judges. Behead judges. Roundhouse kick a judge into the concrete,” read a post on a fringe website. “Slam dunk a judge’s baby into the trashcan.”
NBC’s Ryan Reilly added:
The threats fit into a predictable and familiar pattern, seen time and time again after legal developments against Trump.
Thus, Jack Smith was unable to find even four Supreme Court justices who were willing to grant cert to hear his challenge to Trump’s claim of absolute immunity from prosecution; terrified, they left the case with the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in the hope those judges will draw Trump’s ire—and his followers’ fire—thus diluting their own risk.
This is how fascism takes over a nation from within: with violence and the fear of violence.
I’ve been doing what is now the nation’s largest progressive radio/TV show for 20 years, reaching an estimated audience of 6 million a week. My writings here on HartmannReport.com are frequently reprinted by other progressive media.
The result is that I regularly get threats, although this is not a phenomenon shared by my right-wing colleagues. When I asked a couple of right-wing radio hosts I’ve known for years if they get threats of violence or death, each said, “No.”
There is no movement advocating political violence on either the American left or in the center. It is entirely confined to the American right, and the media needs to admit that and the FBI needs to recalibrate their efforts.
As fascism expert and historian Emilio Gentile noted about how fascist movements start and gain power:
In the beginning there was violence.
Violence and the threats of violence are the key to understanding fascists like Trump and the movements they inspire.
As any professional interrogator can tell you, deep down inside, all of us humans are really just scared little kids. The more we’re broken down by the circumstances of life or government policy, the less secure we feel, the harder it is to get by in life, and the more scared we become.
And, for many people, out of that fear comes the willingness—hell, the enthusiasm—to embrace “big daddy” in the form of a tough guy leader who promises to “restore” those who feel the fear back to their previous (or imagined future) positions of power, wealth, and authority.
This becomes particularly easy for fascist leaders when their followers are convinced that the nation’s government has become hopelessly corrupt, a project right-wing fossil fuel billionaires, right-wing media, and Republican politicians have been promoting here in the U.S. for decades.
Ever since the Reagan Revolution, in their zeal to cut their own taxes and stop regulation of the fossil fuel and other polluting industries, they’ve been hammering the message that our government has been seized by “deep state socialists” bent on destroying our country.
Republicans and the billionaires who own them have repeated this conspiracy theory so often for the last few decades that an entire religion, QAnon, as arisen around it.
This belief, that much of what our government does is illegitimate or even malicious, makes it easy for low-information voters to bind themselves to a fascist “reform movement” that promises better times ahead.
If we try to stop them and fail, Trump has already told us he’ll have a nice cold cell waiting for you and me in the concentration camps he promises to build to hold “millions.”
As fascist followers act out their violent threats against their leaders’ perceived enemies, they get an inner sense of strength and the feeling that they’ve joined a community: that diminishes their own fear for a short while.
The more an “other”—political enemies; racial, religious, and gender minorities; women—are blamed for the ills of the nation, the more vigilante-style violence against them is justified and the more violent the future becomes.
When the state pushes back against that violence, as America did after January 6, the calls for increased violence become even louder. Trump is practically shouting “kill them!” with a bullhorn, and even our court system is afraid to stop him by throwing him into jail as they would have any other common criminal who encouraged such violence against judges, juries, witnesses, court officials, and their families.
Calling people to violence by denouncing those being scapegoated is central to fascist politics.
Mussolini used to feature Italian “whistleblowers” who, like Joe McCarthy here back in the day, would call out “corrupt” government officials whose only real crime was not supporting him. Hitler had every radio station in Germany play phone calls from local citizens who denounced their neighbors for sympathizing with Jews, socialists, or trade union organizers.
Once publicly targeted in these ways, mobs or lone-wolf assassins would descend on these people’s homes. After a few well-publicized beatings and killings, everybody from media figures to politicians to judges backed away from trying to stop fascists or even hold them accountable.
When he was rising to power in Hungary, for example, Victor Orbàn’s right-hand man led a torchlight march into a Budapest Roma neighborhood threatening to burn the “gypsies”—who fled in terror—out of their homes. More recently, Orbán started arresting people who “defamed” him on social media.
Soon, nobody in or out of the government is willing to stand up to the fascists; it’s too dangerous and too exhausting. Being the object of regular threats of violence or death is not something anybody would volunteer for unless they saw the stakes as being very, very important.
This is what Trump and the GOP he’s captured are working toward: the silencing of dissent and accountability, replacing them with fear and a guilty complicity. Just take a look at the state of social media today, particularly Xitter and Facebook, which have dialed back on their content moderation and thus loosed the fascists on anybody who dares criticize Trump or the GOP.
As Michael Ebner wrote in his book Ordinary Violence in Mussolini’s Italy:
The Fascist state ruled Italy violently, projecting its coercive power deeply and diffusely into society through confinement, imprisonment, low-level physical assaults, economic deprivations, intimidation, discrimination, and other quotidian forms of coercion.
Moreover, by promoting denunciatory practices, the regime cemented the loyalties of “upstanding” citizens while suppressing opponents, dissenters, and social outsiders.
Trump is telling us right up right now that he intends to rule as a fascist if he’s able to either win or seize power through other means in 2024. Informally, his militia followers will be showing up at polling places next fall to intimidate voters; they see themselves as the shock troops of the new GOP.
Formally, he’s planning on ending your and my protections against state-sponsored police violence, which he openly intends to deploy against anybody who opposes him and his regime:
I am also going to indemnify our police officers. This is a big thing, and it’s a brand-new thing, and I think it’s so important. I’m going to indemnify, through the federal government, all police officers and law enforcement officials throughout the United States from being destroyed by the radical left for taking strong actions against crime.
When Trump says “crime,” of course, he’s using the same fascist-speak that Hitler, Mussolini, Putin, and Orbán use that means “minorities” and “political enemies.”
And his followers are listening and acting.
The Anti-Defamation League published a report finding there have been more than 170 murders committed by right-wing (and, I’d add, therefore probably Trump-aligned) extremists over the past five years; only three deaths could be attributed to people “on the left.” None of the victims were “criminals.”
So, how does a nation deal with an epidemic of violent rhetoric and actual violent attempts?
Fascists are always a minority when they rise to power in a country. They’re experts at manipulating democratic systems—particularly through things like voter suppression, gerrymandering, voter roll purges, and voter intimidation—to seize power, and then corrupting the existing systems and laws in ways that keep them in power.
At the moment, the fascist movement in the U.S. is very much confined within the GOP and aligned with fringe militia and fundamentalist religious factions.
Merrick Garland should have come down on them hard as soon as he assumed his job as attorney general; because he dithered for two full years until he was shamed into appointing Jack Smith by the January 6 Committee, Trump’s fascist followers have gained considerable momentum.
By continuing to refuse to investigate or prosecute the people who are still in power and conspired with Trump to overthrow our government, Garland further empowers America’s homegrown fascist movement. This must stop, and news that the FBI has finally acquired some of the content of Congressman Scott Perry’s phone is a positive sign, albeit too little and too late.
But the ultimate victory over fascism in America has to be in the ballot box rather than the courthouse. Americans who believe in democracy and reject strongman oligarchy must turn out next November in overwhelming numbers and so shatter the GOP that the party will be forced to reinvent itself in a way that includes purging itself of its fascist-supporting members.
And we damn well better succeed, because fascists never give you a second chance to defeat them or hold them to account. If we try to stop them and fail, Trump has already told us he’ll have a nice cold cell waiting for you and me in the concentration camps he promises to build to hold “millions.”
There is pretty much nothing more important now than waking up our friends and neighbors to this threat…
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As GOP Pursues 'Death Panel,' Poll Shows 81% Oppose Social Security Cuts
The Republican-led push for a "fiscal commission" to examine Social Security and other key programs is "specifically designed to avoid accountability from voters," argued one critic.
Nov 30, 2023
Survey results out Thursday show that more than 80% of U.S. voters oppose cuts to Social Security and Medicare, a finding released a day after House Republicans and some right-wing Democrats made their case for a bipartisan "fiscal commission" that critics warn would fast-track cuts to the popular and critical programs.
Conducted by Navigator Research, the poll found that 81% of registered voters from across the political spectrum are against cutting funding for Social Security and Medicare while 82% support increasing funding for the programs.
The nationwide survey reached 1,000 U.S. voters and was run from November 9-13.
The deep unpopularity of Social Security cuts may help explain why Republicans, led by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), are pushing for a bipartisan, bicameral fiscal commission tasked with proposing legislative changes to U.S. trust fund programs. The Biden White House and progressive advocacy groups have called the commission a "death panel" for Social Security.
Under legislation that the Republican-controlled House Budget Committee examined during a hearing on Wednesday, proposals approved by the fiscal commission would be expedited in both chambers of Congress.
Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, wrote in an op-ed for Common Dreams on Thursday that the proposed commission is a ploy "specifically designed to avoid accountability from voters," as it would "require Congress to vote on the commission's recommendations right after the 2024 election, without any amendments."
"This will allow members to run on the claim that they won't cut Social Security and Medicare, and then turn around and vote for cut," Altman added. "They will insist that they hated the cuts, but had to do something about the federal debt, so their hands were tied. Some voting for it will have lost re-election or will be retiring, with nothing to lose. All of them will be as far away from the next election as possible."
"Commissions of this kind always focus on cutting benefits and never on the adequacy of benefits."
Two of the leading supporters of a fiscal commission—Sens. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.)—announced recently that they will not be running for reelection next year, shielding them from any political pressure to oppose Social Security cuts.
Johnson, the head of the House Republican caucus, described a fiscal commission as one of his top priorities after winning the gavel last month. When he served as chair of the Republican Study Committee (RSC) between 2019 and 2021, Johnson proposed massive cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
Max Richtman, president and CEO of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, said following Wednesday's budget committee hearing that "commissions of this kind always focus on cutting benefits and never on the adequacy of benefits," pointing to Social Security cuts proposed by the co-chairs of the infamous Bowles-Simpson commission.
"In fact, their main purpose is to give lawmakers political cover for cutting benefits. They routinely neglect revenue-side solutions, such as asking the wealthy to contribute their fair share," said Richtman. "On behalf of our members and supporters across the country, we urge members of Congress to vote against a fiscal commission, roll up their sleeves, and legislate improvements to Social Security and Medicare that protect—not punish—current and future beneficiaries."
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GOP Pushes Social Security 'Death Panel' After Years of Tax Cuts for Rich
"At today's hearing, Republicans made the true purpose of their 'fiscal commission' crystal clear: demolish Social Security and Medicare behind closed doors," said one campaigner.
Nov 29, 2023
The Republican-led push to establish a fiscal commission for the U.S. debt was met with vocal opposition during a House Budget Committee hearing on Wednesday, with progressive advocates and Democratic lawmakers calling the proposal a thinly veiled ploy to further undermine and cut Social Security and Medicare.
Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), one of eight witnesses who testified at Wednesday's hearing, said he was "a little skeptical" that Republican lawmakers are now concerned about the national debt given that they have driven it up with tax cuts for the rich and large corporations in recent years—and are still trying to increase it.
According to one analysis, the series of tax cuts approved under former Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump have added $10 trillion to the debt since their enactment and are responsible for the bulk of the increase in the debt ratio since 2001.
Social Security, by contrast, is
not a driver of federal deficits.
"If we want to ensure long-term solvency [for Social Security], there are two choices: Some on the other side think we should cut benefits, I think we should ask the ultra-rich to pay their fair share. We don't need a commission to tell us that," McGovern said during his testimony. "And my fear is that a commission would be used by some as an excuse to slash Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal anti-poverty programs."
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), a member of the House Budget Committee who served on the infamous Bowles-Simpson commission that proposed deep cuts to Social Security, expressed similar concerns during Wednesday's hearing.
Schakowsky said she was "happy" the Bowles-Simpson proposals—which she vocally opposed at the time—weren't adopted and warned that a fiscal commission of the kind backed by Republicans and right-wing Democrats is "a way for members of Congress to get out from under having to take the blame for the kinds of cuts that may be presented."
In an op-ed for Common Dreams on Wednesday, Schakowsky wrote that "if Republicans cared about improving our fiscal position, they would demand the rich pay their fair share."
"If Republicans wanted to actually solve our budget challenges, they would robustly fund tax enforcement to ensure corporations are complying with laws already on the books," she added. "But Republicans aren't serious about the deficit. They aren't even serious about governing. They are serious about only one thing, and that's ripping away Social Security from seniors behind closed doors."
Wednesday's hearing examined three pieces of legislation put forth by bipartisan groups of lawmakers in the House and Senate.
A bill introduced earlier this month by Sens. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.)—both of whom testified at Wednesday's hearing—would form a 16-member bipartisan, bicameral fiscal commission comprised of 12 elected officials and four outside experts tasked with crafting legislation to "improve solvency of federal trust funds over a 75-year period."
If approved by the commission, the legislation would be put on a fast track in the House and Senate.
Romney insisted during his testimony Wednesday that he doesn't know of a single Republican or Democrat who wants to cut Social Security and said benefit reductions should be off the table.
But Social Security Works, a progressive advocacy group, pointed out that a proposal released earlier this year by the Republican Study Committee (RSC)—a panel comprised of 175 House Republicans—called for raising the Social Security retirement age, which would de facto cut benefits across the board.
Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), who presided over Wednesday's hearing, is a member of the RSC. During his opening remarks, Arrington described efforts to prevent what he called a "sovereign debt crisis" as "our generation's World War."
Alex Lawson, executive director of Social Security Works, told Common Dreams that "at today's hearing, Republicans made the true purpose of their 'fiscal commission' crystal clear: demolish Social Security and Medicare behind closed doors, while avoiding accountability from voters."
"Chairman Jodey Arrington referred to the commission's supporters as 'partners in crime,'" Lawson added. "That's exactly what they are: criminals who are plotting to reach into our pockets and steal our earned benefits."
"It should be a national scandal that middle- and working-class families have to pay Social Security taxes on all of their income but millionaires and billionaires do not."
Instead of taking the deeply unpopular step of slashing benefits, Democrats who spoke at the budget committee hearing argued that Congress should pass legislation requiring the rich to contribute more to Social Security. This year, because of the payroll tax cap, millionaires stopped paying into the program in late February.
"It should be a national scandal that middle- and working-class families have to pay Social Security taxes on all of their income but millionaires and billionaires do not," said McGovern.
Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, said at Wednesday's hearing that Congress could extend Social Security's solvency through the end of the century by requiring the rich to pay more in taxes.
"I think that is fair. I think that is appropriate," said Boyle. "And for those who disagree, I would be very interested in seeing what their plan is and their alternative."
Following the hearing, Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.) delivered a speech on the House floor condemning Republicans for working to "establish a death panel commission to gut earned benefits" and described the effort as part of a "cycle" that must be opposed.
"First, Republicans pass tax handouts for their filthy rich donors, promising a trickle-down miracle that never has and will never happen—from Reaganomics to Trump's tax scam," said Lee. "Then, when their tax scam causes the economy to slow and deficits to grow, they refuse to correct their mistake. Instead they blame immigrants, poor folks, Black folks, and brown folks."
"Then they repeat the cycle," she continued, "hoping enough of us will forgive or forget their scheme to tear away Medicare and Social Security and believe their lie that they were 'only after' food assistance, healthcare, and housing for poor folks—not your earned benefits—when the truth is that they always were and always will be after it all."
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