Tag Archives: Donald Trump

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Detention Centers and Worse: It Can Happen Here

“Last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act helped roughly triple the ICE budget, allocating $45 billion for building new immigration centers and hiring 10,000 new ICE agents. One dispiriting lesson of the imperial boomerang is that, once. bought and paid for, structures of intimidation and oppression tend to endure.” David Wallace-Wells, 1/25/2026

Update, 1/30/2026 – The Washington Post reported that local officials are raising logistical and humanitarian concerns in 23 towns where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement plans to convert industrial buildings into detention centers that combined would hold up to 80,000 people. ICE has offered few details about its plan since The Washington Post first reported on it  in December 2025. One detention center the Department of Homeland Security wants to open would be a more than 1 million sq. ft. industrial warehouse in Social Circle, Georgia that would be retrofitted to hold 8,500 detainees and hundreds of staff, more than the city’s total population. The City Manager, Eric Taylor, has said the city does not have the water or sewer infrastructure to support the facility. Unaddressed is the question of why the government needs such huge detention facilities when it says it’s objective is to deport people.

Update, 2/12/2026 – It’s not just more detention centers coming down the pike. Wired reported that ICE and DHS have quietly carried out a months-long expansion, securing more than 150 new leases and office expansions across nearly every state, often in or near major metro areas. Many new facilities sit near schools, medical offices, and places of worship, with DHS pressing the GSA to bypass standard procurement rules and hide lease details under claims of “national security.”

Update, 2/21/2026 – Funding for the Department of Homeland Security expired has expired and Democrats have made   10 demands to rein in Trump’s surge of deportation forces into U.S. cities. One of those demands is “Compliance with Basic Detention Standards and Oversight of Facilities.” Think about it. Incarceration facilities are already legally required to be humane and hygienic., but as Radley Balko has reported on SubStack in The Unpopulist, there is a growing pile of reports from attorneys, journalists, human rights groups, judges, and others about shocking, inhumane conditions at facilities around the country.

Update, 3/7/2026 – So far, DHS has completed the purchase of 10 of the 23 detention center properties it initially pursued, spending more than $890 million, according to deed records or statements by local officials. Efforts to acquire 10 other properties — in Indiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, New Hampshire, New York, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia — have failed, according to statements by local officials or building owners.

In the years preceding his death in 1875, George Templeton Strong, a prominent Wall Street attorney, kept a voluminous journal of his life and times. In April 1865, near the end of the American civil war, he wrote, “These four years have reduced me to something like pauperism, But I am profoundly grateful for them nevertheless. They have given me — & my wife & my boys, — a country worth living in & living for, & to be proud of.”

I can’t say President Trump’s inhumane crackdown on immigrants and harassment and murder of American citizens in the past year have given me a country worth living in, living for and to be proud of.

Not while the Trump administration promotes hatred of “the other”. David Masciotra. David Masciotrar ecently wrote in the Washington Monthly, “Through (Elie) Wiesel’s story and the stories he told and created, two truths become inescapable. The first is that it is naïve, if not catastrophic, to underestimate the power of hatred. “

I doubt 7-year-old Diana Crespo, a second grader at Gresham’s Alder Elementary School, and 5-year-old Liam Ramos, the bunny-hatted child detained by immigration agents in Minneapolis, see America as a country worth living in and living for and to be proud of either. They are both being held at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s South Texas Family Residential Center in Texas.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has spread its detention center tentacles across the United States: 

Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) reported on January 29, 2026 that ICE is planning another detention center in Newport, Oregon as soon as May.

The spread of these. detention centers reminds me of another brutal time.

Most of us know the names of a few Nazi concentration camps, like Dachau,  Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, where Anne Frank died. But they were part of a massive complex of more than 850 ghettos, concentration camps, forced-labor camps and extermination camps CNN has identified. They stretched from France and the Netherlands in the west to Estonia, Lithuania and Poland in the east that the Nazis established during the 12 years Adolf Hitler was in power. Their purpose — to  segregate  , oppress and persecute their opponents.

Like the ICE detention centers, the Nazi system started small and then metastasized like a cancer, according to the Wiener Holocaust Library. 

Initially there were so-called SA camps. (Sturmabteilung (SA), or “Brownshirts,” was the Nazi Party’s original paramilitary wing). After the Night of Long Knives in 1934, the SS and Heinrich Himmler shut down the SA camps and consolidated control of all camps in Germany. Himmler and the SS used Dachau, an original SS camp, as a blueprint  for all camps. From 1934 onwards, the SS developed and then operated the camp system, which lasted until Germany’s defeat in 1945.

The SS started building major camps, beginning with Sachsenhausen in 1936, then Buchenwald in 1937, Flossenbürg and Mauthausen in 1938 and Ravensbrück for women in 1939. Political prisoners were the first inmates. Then people with previous criminal convictions. Next were the  so-called “asocials”, such as Roma, homosexuals, prostitutes, the homeless and the “work-shy”. The mass imprisonment of Jews began in 1938 after the Anschluss and  Kristallnacht.

As the Second World War began in earnest, foreign citizens from newly occupied countries such as Czechoslovakia and the Netherlands began to be imprisoned , followed by Soviet prisoners of war (POW’s) after the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941.

Those who believe U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement can and will be restrained under the Trump administration might want to stop and reconsider.

With an administration where cruelty is the point, it can happen here.

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Republican Lobbyist Shows “Scam PACs” are Alive and Well

There’s so much money sloshing around in American politics a lot of questionable activities get overlooked, like the sweet thing Virginia lobbyist Robert J. “Rob” Catron has going on. 

Robert J. “Rob” Catron

A native of South Florida and a graduate of Florida State University, Catron worked as Chief of Staff for Rep. Ed. Schrock, a conservative Virginia Republican, during 2001 – 2003. He later joined the Arlington, VA-based lobbying firm of Alcalde & Fay, where he’s now a Partner. According to the firm, he is “a proud veteran of the United States Army Reserve” and “has successfully managed or consulted on more than 50 winning political campaigns for federal, state and local offices”.

On December 4, 2023, Catron registered Ranger PAC, a political action committee, with the Federal Election Commission (FEC). Based in Athens, Georgia, the PAC says its mission is to support the election of “highly accomplished conservative military veterans to Congress to defend the Constitution and get America squared away”.

The focus on veterans is an exploitation of the fact that although public trust in many institutions is in retreat, the public generally still has high confidence in veterans as effective leaders in civic life. 

Ranger PAC’s treasurer is Paul Kilgore, CEO of Professional Data Services Inc (PDS), a political financial consulting company in Athens he founded in 1999 that is a leading compliance firm in Republican politics. In 2024, Kilgore represented more than 157 Republican candidates.

From January 1, 2025 to November 30, 2025, Catron’s Ranger PAC raised $1,394,894.74, according to its filing with the Federal Election Commission (FEC). In the same period, it spent $1,353,836.73.

The problem is that, in a deliberate assault on trust, Catron’s Ranger PAC spent just $69,500, 5% of its total spending, on aspiring or serving politicians. That’s right, a measly 5%. The rest, 95%, went to fundraising and administrative expenses.

Although there’s no legal minimum percentage of money raised that a PAC must donate to candidates, legitimate PACs generally spend less than a quarter of their donations on fundraising, with many spending considerably less. 

Charity Navigator, an independent non-profit organization that evaluates U.S. charities on their financial health, accountability and transparency, encourages nonprofits to spend no more than 30% combined on administrative and fundraising costs. Organizations earning the highest scores spend less than 10 cents to raise $1 (a 10% ratio).

In Ranger PAC’s case, it added insult to injury: 5 the 19 politicians who received donations from January 1, 2025 to November 30, 2025 weren’t even veterans.[1]

The Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit newsroom that investigates betrayals of public trust, calls PACs like Ranger PAC “Scam PACS”. They purport to raise money for political and social causes, but spend most of the money they raise from unsuspecting donors on fundraising, salaries and overhead.

In 2015, Politico reported, for example, that a PAC called the Black Republican PAC spent less than 1 percent of the $700,000 it raised on contributions to candidates or ads supporting them, according to government filings. 

The FBI warns: “Scam PACs are fraudulent political action committees designed to reroute political contributions for personal financial gain. This is a federal crime—and can be costly to victims who thought they were making legitimate campaign contributions.”

If most of the money Ranger PAC raised didn’t go to candidates, where did it go?

$19,641.81 went to Paul Kilgore’s Professional Data Services Inc for “PAC Compliance Consulting”. 

Most of the rest went primarily to enriching 10 firms involved in fundraising[2] , some of them with shadowy histories. 

The website for Better Mousetrap Digital, which Ranger PAC paid $25,291.33, says it “is the premier digital fundraising consulting firm for Republicans…with decades of experience spanning from state house campaigns to the White House”. 

Better Mousetrap Digital’s founder is Jack Daly. The company’s website doesn’t note that in December 2023, Daly was sentenced to 4 months’ imprisonment for conspiring to (i) commit mail fraud by defrauding thousands of conservative political donors out of money and (ii) lie to the Federal Election Commission (“FEC”). He was also ordered to pay a $20,000 fine, along with two separate payments of $69,978.37 for restitution and forfeiture.

Daly emerged from federal custody, nevertheless, to re-establish himself as a top Republican Party campaign fundraiser. NOTUS reported in Oct. 2025 that dozens of federal-level Republican political committees — including the Republican National Committee, numerous congressional committees and campaign operations tied to President Donald Trump — had together spent nearly $18 million on digital fundraising, donor lists and other services from Better Mousetrap Digital.

The FBI says it is actively looking for Scam PACs that only spend money on telemarketing and junk mail. It urges Americans targeted by a scam PAC to contact their local FBI office and ask to speak to an election crimes coordinator. 

Unfortunately, scam PACs have been around for a while.

“Since the tea party burst into the political landscape in 2009, the conservative movement has been plagued by an explosion of PACs that critics say exist mostly to pad the pockets of the consultants who run them,” Politico wrote in 2014. “They collect large piles of small checks that, taken together, add up to enough money to potentially sway a Senate race. But the PACs plow most of their cash back into payments to consulting firms for additional fundraising efforts.”

A POLITICO analysis of reports filed with the Federal Election Commission covering the 2014 cycle found 33 PACs that courted small donors with tea party-oriented email and direct-mail appeals raised $43 million, but spent only $3 million on ads and contributions to boost the long-shot candidates often touted in the appeals.

In 2016, two Democratic FEC commissioners, Ellen Weintraub and Ann M. Ravel, urged their colleagues to take action against scam PACs, but there’s been little follow-up. On January 31, 2025, President Trump sent a brief letter to Weintraub firing her “effective immediately” as a FEC Commissioner and Chair. Weintraub challenged her dismissal, but is no longer serving on the commission.  Ravel resigned from the FEC in February 2017. Weintraub has not been replaced, denying the FEC a quorum for votes.

During 2002 – 2018, Virginia political operative Scott B. Mackenzie served as treasurer of 12 PACs that spent 68% of the money they raised on fundraising, wages and administration. But he paid a price. In 2020, a Federal District Judge sentenced him to 12 months and one day in prison for making false statements to the FEC in relation to his association with the PACs. Mackenzie also had to pay $172,200 in restitution.

“If the Justice Department was seeking to send a message to others tempted to get into the ‘scam PAC’ game, that message came through loud and clear,” said Brett Kappel, a campaign finance lawyer at the Akerman law. “These are not victimless crimes and people will go to prison for them.”

It looks like Catron hasn’t gotten that message, even though he’s been in trouble before. 

In June 2021, he was indicted by a Virginia Beach grand jury on 10 counts of making false statements and election fraud. He avoided prison when he pleaded no contest to three election-related charges. The charges stemmed from a petition scandal during a Republican congressman’s ultimately losing 2018 campaign for a second term in Congress representing a coastal Virginia district. Catron was accused of being involved in an effort to get a third-party spoiler candidate on the ballot with petitions using forged signatures.

Catron received a three-year suspended sentence and was ordered to pay court costs and fines after entering the plea to three counts of neglect of election duty. 

With his Ranger PAC antics, maybe it’s time to bring morally hollow Robert J. “Rob” Catron back to court.

[1] Recipients of Ranger PAC donations, January 1, 2025 – November 30, 2025

Donation RecipientDonation ($)Service
Matt Van Epps, Tennessee  10,000Army
Michael Whatley, N. Carolina  5,000Not a veteran
Ronny Jackson, Texas   8,500Navy
Derrick Van Orden, Wisconsin    5,000Navy
Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Iowa   5,000Army
Zach Nunn, Iowa      5,000Air Force
Gabe Evans, Colorado    5,000Army
Tom Barrett, Michigan    5,000Army
Stewart Whitson, Virginia   1,000Army
Dan Butierez, Arizona    1,000Not a veteran
Jen Kiggans, Virginia    5,000Navy
Ryan Zinke, Montana     5,000Navy
Pat Harrigan, N. Carolina   2,000Army
Nick Lalota, New York  1,000Navy
Ken Calvert, California    1,000Not a veteran
Warren Davidson, Ohio    1,000Army
Abraham Hamadeh, Arizona  2,000Army
Randy Fine, Florida    1,000Not a veteran
Jimmy Patronis, Florida   1,000Not a veteran 

[2] Recipient / percent of total disbursements / Total disbursement

DIRECT SUPPORT SERVICES   17.15%

$232,119.45

ONE VOICE SOLUTIONS   14.29%

$193,522.35

CONSOLIDATED MAILING SERVICES.  9.23%

$124,999.46

DRAGONFLY CONSULTING   9.1%

$123,200.00

FORTHRIGHT STRATEGY, INC.   7.78%

$105,323.46

LAUNCHPAD STRATEGIES, LLC.  3.9%

$52,765.05

TAILWINDS POLITICAL   3.89%

$52,686.42

NAMS-NORTH AMERICAN FULFILLMENT.  3.56%

$48,140.77

DIRECT SUPPORT SYSTEMS   3%

$40,677.94

BETTER MOUSETRAP DIGITAL    1.87%

$25,291.33

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Chocolate Milk: Richard Grenell on The Kennedy Center

A January 2, 2026 PBS NewsHour interview with Richard Grenell, President Trump’s choice to lead the now renamed Trump-Kennedy Center was a classic lesson in evasiveness. 

According to The New Yorker, Kennedy Center staff and others often liken Grenell to Grendel, the “powerful demon, a prowler through the dark” in Beowulf. In his PBS interview, he showed he has another talent.

Richard Grenell

Co-Anchor Amna Nawaz led off with a direct question, asking him to respond to a report that a number of artists had chosen to cancel or pull out of performances at the Center because of the president’s takeover of the Center’s board and the renaming of the Kennedy Center. 

“Chocolate milk,” Grenell replied. 

Well, not exactly. 

That’s how I characterize non-answers. 

Grenell might as well have said “chocolate milk” because his response completely ignored the question and immediately veered off into an allegation that NewsHour had consistently failed to cover the Center’s finances. 

“At the Trump-Kennedy Center, we have 19 unions. It’s incredibly expensive to go and put on performances,” he whined. “We cannot have unpopular programming that doesn’t pay the bills.”

“How about ticket sales at the Center.,” Nawas asked. ‘Are ticket sales down? Is that confirmed or not?”

Grenell’s response. “I find it to be outrageous that PBS is not reporting on the phenomenon that arts institutions have been having for decades. Since President Trump has arrived at the now Trump-Kennedy Center, we have raised more than $130 million, blowing away all other fund-raising, and that’s corporate donors who are coming back because they trust the programming.”

In other words, “Chocolate milk”.

And so it went, on and on.

Nawas said, “Viewership for the Kennedy Center Honors were down dramatically. Does that — as a steward of this institution, does all of this, the backlash, the headlines about artists pulling out, the fact that so few people paid attention to the Honors, does that worry you?”

Grenell: “If you go to CBS, they will tell you that the CBS Trump-Kennedy Center Honors this year tied for number one in its demographic.” In other words, it did well with a specific segment of the tv audience in that time period, not total viewers. 

In other words, “Chocolate milk”.

Politicians have long evaded media questions, but Trump and his minions have raised it to an art form, figuring there’s little or no downside these days to giving a word salad answer or sequeing to a completely unrelated topic.  

Donald Trump himself is the role model for his administration in this behavior.

His stream-of-consciousness speaking style, involving long seemingly unscripted statements that veer from topic to topic, is a practiced deceit allowing him to avoid directly answering questions. He has referred to his meandering speaking style as the purposeful “weave”. In his case, however, it could just as well be a rambling sign of muddled thinking and cognitive decline. 

 As Sir Walter Scott understood: “Oh, what a tangled web we weave,/ when first we practise to deceive!”

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The Destruction of American Diplomacy Is Underway

Piece by piece, President Donald Trump is dismantling America’s representation and reputation around the world.

With about 80 U.S. ambassador posts worldwide already vacant, the Trump administration has abruptly recalled nearly 30 career ambassadors at U.S. embassies around the world. They’ve been directed to vacate their posts by Jan. 15 or 16, 2026. Most of the affected ambassadors are at diplomatic posts in Africa, but the removals are also impacting posts in Europe,

Africa was hit the hardest, with about a dozen ambassadors or chiefs of mission recalled from Niger, Uganda, Senegal, Somalia, Côte d’Ivoire, Mauritius, Nigeria, Gabon, Congo, Burundi, Cameroon, and Rwanda. In the Middle East, heads of mission were recalled from Egypt and Algeria. European chiefs of mission were also recalled from Slovakia, Montenegro, Armenia and North Macedonia.

A senior department official told the Journal the recall was part of a standard process to reassess ambassadors in any administration and that it’s the president’s right to ensure he has envoys in place who advance his foreign-policy agenda.

The damage done by the vacancies is compounded by the questionable quality of some of Trump’s ambassadors who are already confirmed .

For example, Herschel Walker, a former professional football player who ran unsuccessfully as the Republican party’s nominee in the 2022 U.S. Senate election in Georgia, is Trump’s s ambassador to the Bahamas. Then there’s Charles Kushner, a disbarred attorney who in 2005 was convicted of illegal campaign contributions,  tax evasion and witness tampering, and who happens to be the father of Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Charles Kushner is Trump’s Ambassador to France and Monaco. And there’s Kimberly Guilfoyle, Trump’s Ambassador to Greece. She’s a former Fox News personality and Donald Trump Jr.s ex- fiancée.

The American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) , which represents the U.S. foreign service and career diplomats, said the recall represents “a steady erosion of norms, transparency, and professional independence in the Foreign Service.”

“Abrupt, unexplained recalls reflect the same pattern of institutional sabotage and politicization our survey data shows is already harming morale, effectiveness, and U.S. credibility abroad,” AFSA said.

The United States is going to pay a steep price for President Trump’s reckless moves undermining our country’s diplomatic authority.

Already Vacant U.S. Ambassador Posts

PostCurrent Ambassador
AfghanistanVACANT
AlbaniaVACANT
  
Angola and São Tomé & PríncipeVACANT
APECVACANT
ASEANVACANT
AustraliaVACANT
AzerbaijanVACANT
BarbadosVACANT
BelarusVACANT
BelizeVACANT
BoliviaVACANT
Bosnia and HerzegovinaVACANT
BrazilVACANT
BulgariaVACANT
BurmaVACANT*
CambodiaVACANT
Central African RepublicVACANT
ChadVACANT
EcuadorVACANT
El SalvadorVACANT
Eswatini (formerly Swaziland)VACANT
The GambiaVACANT
GeorgiaVACANT
GermanyVACANT
GhanaVACANT
GuineaVACANT
HaitiVACANT
HondurasVACANT
IAEAVACANT
IcelandVACANT
IndonesiaVACANT
IraqVACANT
JamaicaVACANT
KenyaVACANT
KosovoVACANT
LesothoVACANT
LiberiaVACANT
LibyaVACANT
MalawiVACANT
MauritaniaVACANT
MoldovaVACANT
MozambiqueVACANT
New Zealand, Cook Islands and NiueVACANT
NicaraguaVACANT
NorwayVACANT
OECDVACANT
OSCEVACANT
PakistanVACANT
ParaguayVACANT
QatarVACANT
RussiaVACANT
SamoaVACANT
Saudi ArabiaVACANT
SerbiaVACANT
SeychellesVACANT
SloveniaVACANT
Solomon IslandsVACANT
South KoreaVACANT
SudanVACANT
SyriaVACANT
TanzaniaVACANT
Timor-LesteVACANT
TogoVACANT
TongaVACANT
Trinidad and TobagoVACANT
UkraineVACANT
United Arab EmiratesVACANT
UN / Conf. on DisarmamentVACANT
UN / GenevaVACANT
UN / Human Rights CouncilVACANT
UN / ViennaVACANT
UNESCOVACANT
VenezuelaVACANT

Information taken from www.whitehouse.gov and foreign.senate.gov.

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Beyond the Pale: Trump Steps Over the Line in Anti-Immigrant Rant

How dare you, Donald Trump. 

“Go back to where you came from”, he said to the Somali immigrants in Minnesota, employing an insulting slur unacceptable in polite society. 

Last week Trump said on his social media channel, Truth Social, he’d send Somalis “back to where they came from.” Yesterday he said Somalis in the U.S. should “go back to where they came from and fix it.”

A person familiar with Trump’s plans told the Associated Press federal authorities are preparing a targeted immigration enforcement operation in Minnesota that would primarily focus on Somali immigrants living unlawfully in the U.S.

At a cabinet meeting yesterday, Trump said Somalis “contribute nothing.” 

“I don’t want them in our country,” a snarling Trump told reporters. “Their country is no good for a reason. Your country stinks and we don’t want them in our country.”

I remember hearing that taunt directed at minorities by racist know-nothings in my youth in the 1950s, but I thought people had long ago been shamed from uttering it. 

Trump, however, seems to enjoy denigrating “the other”.

Trump’s own Equal Employment Opportunity Commission cites “Go back to where you came from,” as an example of unlawful workplace conduct, along with the use of “insults, taunting, or ethnic epithets”.

I suppose in some respects nobody should really be surprised by Trump’s insults. That’s his modus operandi. Demean and slander his opponents, particularly those he deems not “real” Americans.  And his supporters often embrace his scurrilous attacks.

He even goes after members of Congress with abandon. He has described Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, (D-Minn), who came to the United States from Somalia as a refugee and became a citizen 25 years ago, as “garbage.”

“We could go one way or the other, and we’re going to go the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country,” Trump said. “She’s garbage. Her friends are garbage.” 

And Trump’s recent explicit use of hateful speech is not original or unprecedented. It was a feature, not a bug, of his campaigns for office. 

An analysis published by Presidential Studies Quarterly[1] , cited by the National Library of Medicine, concluded that “no other comparable candidate of either major US party has ever approached the level of negativity and vitriol toward racial/ethnic minorities that Trump did.” 

A Washington Post column today by George Will is headlined “A sickening moral slum of an administration”. 

Indeed.

  1. [1] Çinar I, Stokes S, Uribe A. Presidential rhetoric and populism. Presidential Studies Quarterly. 2020;50(2):240–263. doi: 10.1111/psq.12656. [DOI] [Google Scholar]

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US Action in Venezuela: Menacing and Unpredictable

The largest U.S. military presence in the Caribbean in decades is now operating, with nearly 20% of the Navy’s deployed warships in the region, according to a Stars and Stripes’ analysis. The deployment also includes the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit based in Camp Lejeune and Marine Corps Air Base New River. The 22nd MEU consists of Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 263 (Reinforced), Combat Logistics Battalion 26 and the Battalion Landing Team, 3rd Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment.

Additionally, a squadron of Marine Corps F-35 Lightning II fighter aircraft has been sent to Puerto Rico, where the former Naval Station Roosevelt Roads has become a staging area for U.S. forces in the region, according to Task & Purpose, a military-focused news publication.

Other American aircraft, including an AC-130J Ghostrider, an Air Force gunship designed for close air support, air interdiction and armed reconnaissance, have been spotted operating in El Salvador. The aircraft, known for being the most heavily armed gunship in history, “plays a critical role in supporting ground operations, providing close air support to troops in contact, conducting armed reconnaissance missions, and engaging enemy targets” according to The Aviationist.

An AC-130J Ghostrider being refueled

The New York Times has reported that U.S. officials ran a war game during President Trump’s first term to assess what the Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro’s fall might unleash. “The results showed that chaos and violence were likely to erupt within Venezuela, as military units, rival political factions and even jungle-based guerrilla groups jockeyed for control of the oil-rich country.”

Nevertheless, asked if he would rule out U.S. troops on the ground in Venezuela, Trump said on Monday “No, I don’t rule out that, I don’t rule out anything.”

And then, of course, no matter what happens, will it matter? Mary Speck, former executive director of the Western Hemisphere Drug Policy Commission, wrote today in the Dispatch, “The United States—for all its military might—cannot defeat “narco-terrorism” unilaterally by ousting a corrupt and brutal dictator. Whatever the end game of the U.S. military deployment in the Caribbean, the region’s drug cartels have nothing to fear.”.

“What is the balance of risk? ,” opinion columnist Bret Stephens wrote in November 19s New York Times. “Unintended consequences must be weighed against the predictable risks of inaction…And Trump’s hesitation will be read, especially in Moscow and Beijing, as a telling signal of weakness that can only embolden them, just as President Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan did.”

“Any morally serious person should want this to end,” Stephens opined. “The serious question is whether American intervention would make things even worse.”

As Puck observed on Nov. 20, “Trump’s plan for Venezuela may be a mystery even to himself. “I think he thinks about what will make him look tough, but he doesn’t think much beyond that,” said John Bolton. “He never does.”

What does the Trump administration want to achieve in this dramatic effort and what will be the cost? America waits.

U.S. Forces Now in the Caribbean

Up to 15,000 U.S. troops are in the area.
USS Newport News SSN-750
Four F/A-18E/F Super Hornets, assigned to Strike Fighter Squadrons 31, 37, 87, and 213 from embarked Carrier Air Wing Eight aboard USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78), and a U.S. Air Force B-52 Stratofortress operate as a joint force with the Gerald R. Ford, Nov. 13, 2025. US Navy photo
  • The “Tomcatters” of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 31 – F/A-18E – from Naval Air Station Oceana, Va.
  • The “Ragin Bulls” of VFA 37 – F/A-18E – from Naval Air Station Oceana.
  • The “Golden Warriors” of VFA 87 – F/A-18E – from Naval Air Station Oceana.
  • The “Black Lions” of VFA 213 – F/A-18F – from Naval Air Station Oceana.
  • The “Gray Wolves” of Electronic Attack Squadron (VAQ) 142 – EA-18G – from Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, Wash.
  • The “Bear Aces” of Airborne Command and Control Squadron (VAW) 124 – E-2D – from Naval Air Station Norfolk, Va.
  • The “Rawhides” of Fleet Logistics Squadron (VRC) 40 Det. – C-2A – from Naval Air Station Norfolk.
  • The “Spartans” of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron (HSM) 70 – MH-60R – from Naval Air Station Jacksonville, Fla.
  • The “Tridents” of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron (HSC) 9 – MH-60S – from Naval Air Station Norfolk.

Carrier Air Wing 8


USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) with 9 embarked squadrons of Carrier Air Wing Eight
Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Bainbridge (DDG 96)
Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Mahan (DDG 72)
Air and missile defense command ship USS Winston S. Churchill (DDG 81)

Littoral combat ship USS Wichita (LCS-13)

Guided missile cruiser USS Lake Erie (CG – 70)

Wasp-class amphibious assault ship USS Iwo Jima (LHD-7)

Amphibious transport dock ship USS Fort Lauderdale (LPD-28)

Amphibious transport dock ship USS San Antonio (LPD-17)

Guided missile destroyer USS Gravely (DDG-107)

Guided missile destroyer USS Stockdale (DDG-106)

“Militarily, the table is set quite effectively for air strikes,” retired Navy Adm. James Stavridis, who led U.S. Southern Command, or SOUTHCOM, from 2006 to 2009, recently told Task & Purpose. “Now it’s up to [President Trump] to decide.”

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Deceptive Political Fundraising: A Cautionary Tale

UPDATE: Dec. 2, 2025 – Missouri bill targets ‘misleading’ automatic donations connected to Bill Eigel

State Rep. Jim Murphy says the bill was prompted by The Independent’s story about a Nebraska veteran who gave 35 times this year to Eigel’s campaign for St. Charles County executive.

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Politicians running deceptive political fundraising campaigns can’t count on hiding in the dark. 

A case in point.

Earlier this year I started getting bombarded with high-intensity inflammatory emails, such as one urging me to support President Trump’s use of the Insurrection Act and another telling me, “Without mandatory voter ID in ALL 50 states, your vote will be replaced by an illegal alien”. And, of course, every email asked for a contribution. 

I noticed none of the emails actually listed a political candidate associated with it, just something called Bill PAC.  It turned out BILL PAC is a political action committee associated with William C. (Bill) Eigel, a conservative former state senator from the 23rd District in Missouri’s St. Charles County who’s now seeking the post of St. Charles County Executive. Some more digging revealed he’s running a deceptive national fundraising campaign targeting vulnerable seniors. 

That motivated me to write a couple stories:

Those stories came to the attention of Rudi Keller, Deputy Editor of  The Missouri Independent, a nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization covering state government, politics and policy. It’s an affiliate of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization. The Capitol Chronicle in Oregon is part of the network. 

Keller took a more exhaustive look at Eigel’s BILL PAC  and wrote a story that ran today in the Missouri Independent and The States Newsroom. His in-depth story further exposed the deceptive tactics of Eigel’s BILL PAC:

Republican Bill Eigel is once again facing accusations that his campaign relies on deceptive fundraising tactics to lure out-of-state donors to give recurring contributions

Former State Sen. Bill Eigel of Weldon Spring, shown in a 2024 photo, is using recurring donations from across the country to finance his bid for St. Charles County executive (Rudi Keller/Missouri Independent).

Keller exposed how people across the country, overwhelmingly seniors, are being lured into contributing to BILL PAC, unaware that it is supporting a local Missouri Republican, not a national conservative campaign. 

 A retired man from Reston, VA, a consistent donor to Republican state and federal candidates and committees, made an astonishing 65 separate online donations to BILL PAC, according to reports submitted to the Missouri Ethics Commission in 2025.

Keller tracked down some donors who had unwittingly committed to monthly recurring donations. 

A retired woman in Texas has contributed $1,205 in 74 separate donations since December. All are about the same dates each month.

A 92-year-old Korean War veteran from Nebraska named Russell Wood, made 35 donations totaling $1,050 over the last year to Bill Eigel’s campaign for St. Charles County executive. But Wood told Keller he has never heard of Eigel or set foot in St. Charles County and had no idea he had made so many donations to Eigel’s campaign.

People running for public office at the federal, state and local level always run the risk of taking an “ends justifies the means” approach to campaigning, observes Judy Nadler at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.

“The conduct of the campaign itself can say a lot about the ethical principles a candidate brings to public life,” she says.  That’s something Eigel, Missourians and all voters should ponder.

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Oregon’s Food Stamp Demand Exposes a Troubled Economy

“We have the best economy maybe in the history of the world,” President Trump insisted during his 60 Minutes interview on Nov. 2. Oregonians and other Americans who depend on food stamp benefits under SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, likely beg to differ.

While President Trump and his entourage were enjoying an over-the-top “Great Gatsby”-themed Halloween party at Mar-a-Lago last week, millions of Americans were worrying about the loss of their SNAP food benefits. The timing could not have been more unseemly.

On. display at Mar-a-Lago.
“‘She’s got an indiscreet voice,’ I remarked. ‘It’s full of—’ I hesitated. ‘Her voice is full of money,’ [Gatsby] said suddenly.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
President Trump’s Great Gatsby-Themed Halloween Party at Mar-a-Lago, 2025

One-sixth of Oregon’s population.  0.16, 16%. No matter how you put it, a lot of Oregonians depend on SNAP benefits.

Currently, benefits average just over $6 per person per day. In fiscal year 2024, that translated into about 757,000 of our neighbors, including about 210,000 children and 130,000 adults aged 65 and older.

With the federal government shutdown, Oregon and other states have run out of money to distribute to the more than 42 million Americans who rely on SNAP. The Department of Agriculture has claimed it can’t spend $6 billion sitting in reserves, but two federal judges have ordered the Trump administration to use contingency funds to fund SNAP during the shutdown. The Trump administration responded in court filings that it would use contingency funds to provide partial SNAP benefits in November.

The administration said it would send partial payments this month, but eligible households may receive just half of their usual amounts and the partial payments could take weeks to arrive. (As of mid-day on Nov. 4, however, Trump muddied the waters by posting on Truth Social, “SNAP BENEFITS…will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up government, which they can easily do.”)

Further complicating matters, on Nov. 5 The New York Times reported that some normal food stamp recipients may receive nothing at all in November because of the way that the White House has chosen to pay partial benefits during the government shutdown.

“The problem stems from the way in which the administration has opted to fund benefits, and the intricate rules it has foisted on states this week to calculate aid amounts for the 42 million people enrolled in SNAP,” the New York Times said. “For nearly 1.2 million households, or almost five million people, the changes may result in benefits of $0 in November, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a left-leaning group, which analyzed the government’s public filings and shared its findings early with The New York Times.”

On November 6, the situation changed again when a federal judge, John McConnell, ordered the Trump administration to fully fund November’s food-assistance benefits by November 6. Of course, the administration’s lawyers told the court it was appealing the order.

While the legal wrangling persists, it’s appalling that so many Oregonians, the majority children, disabled or seniors, are in such dire straits that the federal government has to step in to help them get enough to eat.

According to an analysis of USDA data by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), Oregon ranks third in the percentage of the state’s population that relies on SNAP. Only New Mexico and Louisiana are in front of Oregon.

Meanwhile, in a reflection of the number of Oregonians living on the edge, Oregon food banks report they are being hit with a deluge of SNAP participants desperate for food, even though they got their last benefits as recently as last month. At the same time, food banks are seeing some of the thousands of federal employees who are going without pay during the government shutdown. That’s all consistent with the Federal Reserve’s report on America’s economic well-being in 2024 that found 37% of Americans couldn’t pay for an unexpected $400 expense without turning to a credit card and 60% of adults said that changes in the prices they paid compared with the prior year had made their financial situation worse.

In Oregon, high unemployment is partly to blame.

According to the most recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Oregon’s unemployment rate was 5.0% in August 2025, higher than the national rate of 4.3%, and has been climbing steadily for more than two years. The rate has been influenced by increasing layoffs and an overall cooling off of the state’s labor market. Oregon unemployment rate is higher than every state in the Pacific Northwest., including Alaska, Idaho, Montana, and Washington. .Too many Oregonians are also working less than they’d prefer, leading to a rising so-called “underemployment rate”.

Oregon’s economy also relies heavily on service, retail, and tourism jobs , many of which are seasonal, that pay lower wages, even with Oregon’s mandated hourly wage levels, resulting in many hard working families falling below the income threshold for SNAP eligibility.

And Oregon’s economy is retreating, diminished from job losses at Intel, PacificSource, Wells Fargo, Nike, OHSU and even Powell’s Books, which has had four rounds of layoffs this year. Despite President Trump’s claim he is leading a resurgence of manufacturing in the US, U.S. manufacturing has contracted for seven straight months—the exact opposite of what Trump and other tariff proponents predicted. 

Overall, the number of jobs U.S. employers have announced they would cut in 2025 has reached 1,099,500, up 65% from the first 10 months of 2024, according to Challenger, Gray and Christmas, a Chicago-based outplacement firm.

Aggressive outreach is another reason for high SNAP usage. Some see getting more people on SNAP as a good thing, but that’s questionable when food stamp enrollment has surged from 17.3 million individuals in 2001 to 41.7 million in 2024, and that in the same period enrollment as a percentage of the population has doubled from 6.1 % in 2001 to 12.3 % in 2024.

Oregon’s SNAP error rate in fiscal year 2024 was 14.06%, eighth-highest in the nation. That was down from error rates of 16.7$ in fiscal year 2023 and 22.9% for fiscal year 2022, but there’s still really no excuse for such high error rates.

If anything, then, increasing dependence on food stamps by Oregon’s population reflects a failure of the state’s economy in providing opportunities for its people and holding down taxes. That’s not a good thing.

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Campaign Finance Shenanigans: Don’t Be A Sucker

Sure, I know, it takes money to run for office and if we want to support dignified, well-meaning, thoughtful candidates somebody has to chip in. But as fundraising has gone digital, it has, to use a term technology critic and author Cory Doctorow came up with, undergone “Enshittification”. The whole damn enterprise has just made our daily lives worse and filled the internet with junk.

“Will you stand with President Trump and Senator Rubio in this critical moment?”  was a message I got the other day from the Anti-Woke Fund, demanding my attention with the following:

STAND WITH TRUMP AND RUBIO
This could be the end of faith, family, and freedom, if we do nothing.

Leaving aside the fact that Marco Rubio is no longer a senator, the message urged me to go on record now to tell every Republican to STAND WITH MARCO RUBIO AND TRUMP TODAY. 

I guess all of my contribution will go to Trump and/or Rubio, right?

NOPE!

I clicked through and found this: “Your contribution will benefit Anti-Woke Fund, Trump National Committee, Anti-Woke Caucus JFC, and 1 other.”

Click through further and you’ll find that if you give $25, $23.50 of that will go to the Anti-Woke Fund PAC, $1.25 to the Trump National Committee JFC and 25 cents to Hageman for Wyoming, the fundraising site for Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-WY). Larger contributions will be apportioned in the same way. 

What’s the Anti-Woke Fund PAC?

In 2024, Hageman was chair of the Anti-Woke Caucus, a group within the House of Representatives that says it is dedicated to fighting the growing influence of “woke” ideologies in government, business and society. But the Anti-Woke Fund has no clear connection to the Anti-Woke Caucus or Hageman.

According to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the Anti-Woke Fund is a political action committee (PAC) that registered on January 3, 2025. Its total receipts as of June 30, 2025 were $471,572.54. Almost all of its contributions were $200 or under. 

Its expenditures totaled $364,113.90, all of it going to 27 companies engaged largely in digital fundraising and messaging.

More than 50% of its expenditures went to six firms:

  • Better Mousetrap Digital: a digital fundraising consulting firm for Republicans – $68,635.22
  • Launchpad Strategies LLC: A Republican online advertising, digital consulting and fundraising firm – $48,169.64
  • DonorBureau: Aggregates and analyzes data to create a deep understanding of donors – $26,600.36
  • O2M Digital LLC: Works to deliver conservative political messaging – $26,010.93
  • Apex Strategies LLC: Facilitates fundraising, specializing in Political Candidate Fundraising and Non-Profit Event fundraising – $24, 158.80
  • TMA Direct Inc: Specializes in Data Management, Data Brokerage, Email Marketing, Political Consulting, Fundraising, and Direct Mail – $21,787.95

The rest went to 21 other mostly similar companies.[1]

What politician or interest group benefited from the work of all these companies that were paid by the Anti-Woke Fund from monies contributed by people who responded to the Fund’s email? Who Knows. 

Dozens of other political messages are similarly deceiving.

There’s the message from Team Crane.

National Debt or Refund Check

How would you like the tariff revenue spent, Friend?

Reply before our survey closes in 60 MINUTES!

SUBMIT YOUR RESPONSE HERE >>

Along with the usual plea for a contribution, the message says, “Your contribution will benefit Crane for Congress and Trump National Committee JFC.” But you have to dig deeper to find out that if you give $75, for example, $71.25 of that will go to Crane for Congress, a PAC affiliated with Republican Rep. Eli Crane of Arizona. Only $3.75 will go Trump.  Larger contributions will be apportioned in the same way. 

Crane promoted the conspiracy theory that there were “massive amounts of fraud” in the 2020 U.S. presidential election and called upon the Arizona State Legislature to decertify Joe Biden’s victory in the state. 

Republican Rep. Mary Miller from Illinois sent out a message alerting me that former FBI Director James Comey had been indicted:

This will be the FIERCEST battle for TRUTH in America! Comey LIED to the American people in order to PLOT against President Trump. 

We deserve justice. America deserves justice. 

MAGA needs to mobilize NOW!
STAND WITH TRUMP!

If you click on ‘Stand With Trump”, she asks you:

SIGN YOUR NAME to our petition of MAGA Patriots that are declaring I STAND WITH PRESIDENT TRUMP! 

Of course, if you sign your name, you are asked to chip in. “Your contribution,” she says “will benefit Mary Miller for Congress and Trump National Committee JFC” but as with Eli Crane, if you give $25, only $1.25 will go to Trump; $23.75 will go to Mary Miller for Congress.  Larger contributions will be apportioned in the same way. 

“There’s a sucker born every minute”, the American showman P.T. Barnum is supposed to have said, thinking of how confidence tricksters operate.

Don’t be a sucker.

[1] WINRED TECHNICAL SERVICES LLC: an American fundraising platform for the Republican Party 

TAILWINDS POLITICAL, LLC: Helps causes acquire, grow and enhance audiences, specializing in fundraising and political campaigns

NORTH COUNTRY STRATEGIES LLC: N/A

FRONTLINE STRATEGIES LLC: Data-driven fundraising

RED CURVE SOLUTIONS: Offers comprehensive treasury, budgeting and FEC compliance services for political campaigns, party organizations and PACS

A-TEAM DIGITAL LLC: a political digital marketing firm

ROC MEDIA, LLC: Digital media targeting firm.

LP BROKERING LLC: N/A

OLYMPIC MEDIA LLC: digital marketing and advertising firm

P2P MESSAGING: Delivers managed service text messaging solutions to political organizations, non-profits, and government officials.

TWENTY MANOR PROJECTS LLC: a digital advocacy and fundraising company

CONSERVATIVE OUTREACH GROUP, LLC:  List acquisition 

EDEE INC.: List acquisition

POP ACTA: Creates and uncovers highly targeted and curated audiences to raise funds, acquire donors and expand the reach of political candidates.

GRASSROOTS FOR YOU LLC: Political campaign marketing

MAWCO LLC: Elevates conservative campaigns with fundraising and marketing 

NORTH COUNTRY STRATEGIES: Political consulting

GET OUT THE LISTS LLC: Curates updated lists of conservative Republicans, donors, and activists

RIGHT RAIL LIST COMPANY: N/A

BELIEVE MEDIA, LLC: Digital marketing agency

CHAIN BRIDGE BANK, N.A.: Delivers banking and trust services nationwide

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Say It Ain’t So, Bari Weiss

Bari Weiss

With all the turmoil over free speech rights, I can’t believe Bari Weiss, co-founder of The Free Press, is considering selling out for millions to David Ellison, the new owner of CBS News, and taking the job of editor in chief or co-president of the network.

Weiss started The Free Press as an unflinching alternative to traditional media organizations. She positioned herself and The Free Press as brave, independent, dogged, fierce, provocative, high impact, committed to separating the signal from the noise. 

CBS is the network that caved when Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem accused “Face the Nation” of deceptively editing an interview with her. Two days later, CBS announced the show would now air only interviews that are conducted live, or are prerecorded with no cuts or edits, giving away its editorial freedom. Editing interviews for clarity and brevity is a common practice in the news business. Removing that authority will just let politicians bloviate and eat up time.

It was CBS’s parent company, Paramount Global, that was in the process of being taken over by Ellison, that settled an insane lawsuit with Donald Trump, agreeing to pay Trump $16 million over a 60 Minutes interview with then-Vice President Kamala Harris in which Trump alleged that the editing was intentionally deceptive to favor Democrats. As Anya Schiffrin, at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, has said, American media companies are demonstrating an unprecedented willingness to openly put their business interests ahead of their obligations to the public. “What’s happened in the last six months in the US is worse than anything we imagined,” she said.

It was Ellison who made commitments to the FCC that CBS’s “editorial decision-making reflects the varied ideological perspectives of American viewers”, that CBS would get rid of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, and that CBS would create a new ombudsman position to review “any complaints of bias or other concerns.”

It was Ellison who appointed as that ombudsman Kenneth R. Weinstein, former head of a conservative-leaning Washington think tank, the Hudson Institute, who is likely to be a partisan enforcer. . 

It’s Ellison who, according to the Wall Street Journal,  wants to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery — the owner of Warner Bros. studios, HBO Max and cable news giant CNN, a deal that would require the approval of Trump’s regulators. What would Ellison, and Weiss, give to Trump to win that prize? Too much, I’m afraid.

At the September 21 memorial service for Charlie Kirk, Stephen Miller, the White House’s deputy chief of staff, said, “We will prevail over the forces of wickedness and evil. They cannot conceive of the army that they have arisen in all of us.” Trump spoke about how much he hates his political foes. Trump has  said that the major TV networks have been overwhelmingly “negative” about him and suggested that “maybe their license should be taken away.” 

Trump went on to undercut a message of national cohesion, saying of Kirk, “He did not hate his opponents. He wanted the best for them, That’s where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponent, and I don’t want the best for them.”

Don’t think Trump and his minions won’t do all they can to continue to pressure and manipulate the mainstream media going forward. Does Bari really want to be part of that cowardly crew?