Attention to the Unseen

NBC News reports: A Christ figurine watches over the door as the man secures the bolts and bars that protect his home. If the locks fail, a host of archangels, holy cards and crosses stand guard on nearby walls and tables. “Most people don’t live like I do,” said the Mexican immigrant, who didn’t want to give his name out of fear for his safety. “I know they’re just pieces of wood or little locks, but they help me because…

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The New York Times reports: The Justice Department has moved on two fronts to chip away at some of the last traces of its vast investigation into the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, aligning itself ever more closely with President Trump’s own efforts to whitewash the events of that day. On Friday evening, just as the holiday weekend was beginning, federal prosecutors in Washington filed motions to formally dismiss the most serious criminal cases stemming from Jan….

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    Hawaii just made history, becoming the first state in the nation to effectively ban dark money in elections. The new law takes a novel approach: rather than trying to restrict corporate speech, it redefines the powers corporations have in the first place — and political spending is not among them. The strategy, known as the “Corporate Power Reset,” was developed by Tom Moore of the Center for American Progress. And at least a dozen states are now working…

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The Guardian reports: Britain has created a new breed of political prisoners through the systematic incarceration of people acting to prevent climate breakdown and the annihilation of Gaza, a report claims. The research by Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) and the protest group Defend Our Juries says that custodial sentences for acts of direct action or civil disobedience were once rare but are now being imposed with increasing length and frequency. Their report, which will be launched on Tuesday,…

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The New York Times reports: The Trump administration has pulled back its aggressive operations in cities like Chicago and Minneapolis after bad polling indicated the crackdown on illegal immigration was unpopular. In its wake, however, a new approach is emerging on legal immigration, one that makes it harder for those abroad to enter the United States, and for those already here on a temporary basis to stay. In recent months, Trump administration officials have discussed the legal immigration system as…

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Tennessee Lookout reports: A federal judge on Friday dismissed a criminal indictment against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a 30-year-old man living in Maryland who was wrongly deported to El Salvador last year, calling the prosecution “vindictive and selective.” “Then-Attorney General Robert H. Jackson warned his fellow prosecutors long ago of the danger of picking the person first and the crime second … That is the situation here,” U.S. District Court Judge Waverly Crenshaw, who was appointed by President Barack Obama to…

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NBC News reports: Screaming, yelling and accusations of self-dealing. That’s how Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, on Friday described a closed-door meeting with Senate Republicans and acting Attorney General Todd Blanche on the Trump administration’s $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund that’s drawn bipartisan opposition. On his podcast “Verdict with Ted Cruz,” the Texas senator described the meeting as “one of the roughest meetings I’ve seen in my entire time in the Senate.” “Fiery does not begin to cut it,” Cruz said. “My…

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Rep. Jamie Raskin writes: These days it takes a spectacular burst of corruption to get the attention of our scandal-weary nation, but President Trump and his administration have managed, once again, to transfix Americans by establishing a $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization” fund in the Department of Justice that will undoubtedly be used to line the pockets of Mr. Trump’s partisans and foot soldiers — with your tax dollars. The creation of this fund is a stupefying feat of self-dealing, part of…

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Chicago Sun-Times reports: Chicago’s top federal prosecutor announced the permanent dismissal Thursday of charges against the remaining members of the “Broadview Six” in a stunning hearing that revealed apparent misconduct by his staff before a grand jury during Operation Midway Blitz. In a rare courtroom appearance, U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros told U.S. District Judge April Perry he’d learned of what happened three weeks ago. He said he didn’t believe any member of his staff had intentionally misled the judge. Then,…

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Noah Shachtman writes: This new slush fund — set up with minimal guardrails, not even a definition of what constitutes “weaponization” — could take all the ethical disasters of the pardon market and multiply it by, well, 1.8 billion. Just think what people might be willing to do to get this money, and what Mr. Trump might get in return. This fund would institutionalize that ethical disaster. Forget the one-off deals or the handshakes at the 18th hole. This would…

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Rolling Stone reports: The exact criteria for receiving money from Donald Trump’s $1.8 billion “weaponization” compensation slush fund remains an open question — but his supporters who feel they have been victimized are already lining up to collect a slice of the pie, and laying out plans for what they might do with it. “Anybody can apply,” Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told lawmakers during a hearing before the Senate on Tuesday. He even suggested that former first-child Hunter Biden…

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The Intercept reports: Colorado law enforcement officials warned their counterparts across the country that social media posts by the Department of Homeland Security recruiting for ICE contained so many white supremacist themes that they could endanger the public, according to internal records obtained by The Intercept. The Colorado Information Analysis Center cautioned in a March bulletin that “violent extremists” might perceive “White Supremacy Ideology in ICE Recruitment Materials, Leading to a Potentially Increased Threat Environment.” The bulletin from an agency…

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Anna Bower and Eric Columbus write: Donald J. Trump is famously the most litigious of all American presidents. From his years as a New York real estate mogul through both terms in the White House, he has used litigation not merely as a legal tool, but as a political weapon. In 2023, a federal judge fined him and his attorney, Alina Habba, nearly $1 million, for filing a “completely frivolous” lawsuit against Hillary Clinton and 30 other defendants. The judge described…

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Wired reports: Last week, as President Donald Trump prepared to leave the White House on his way to China for a state visit, he was asked if he would be willing to deploy troops from the National Guard or agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to polling locations during November’s midterms. “I would do anything necessary to make sure we have honest elections,” Trump responded. Trump’s comments are the latest in a litany of confusing and sometimes contradictory statements…

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Reed Shaw and Winston Berkman-Breen write: The press, elected officials, and advocacy groups have sounded the alarm about what they describe as rampant corruption in the Trump administration: pardons issued following political contributions or a business deal that benefited the president and his family personally; mergers approved following multimillion dollar payoffs and backroom deals; access provided to government data that could benefit corporate interests aligned with the president; and some secret donations for the president’s gilded ballroom, in return for as-yet-undisclosed benefits. The New Yorker has tabulated “some three and a half billion dollars in Presidential profits” for Trump and his…

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