Trump gets told off

The women of the Supreme Court just did what far too many elected officials have failed to do: they stood up to Donald Trump’s regime and called bullshit—directly, publicly, and with surgical precision.

Amy Coney Barrett—yes, that Amy Coney Barrett, Trump’s handpicked ideologue—looked Trump’s lawyer in the eye and essentially asked, “Are you really suggesting the president can ignore court rulings he doesn’t like?”

Because that’s what this case boils down to: a wannabe king trying to erase birthright citizenship and daring the courts to stop him.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson didn’t just challenge the logic—she torched it. She warned that Trump’s legal argument would transform the entire justice system into a “catch me if you can” farce.

No rights. No protections. Just every person for themselves, suing the government individually while it tramples them one by one.

Elena Kagan drove it home with cold clarity: “Every court is ruling against you.” Translation?

This isn’t a legal debate. This is a last-ditch power grab dressed up in bad lawyering.

And then came Justice Sotomayor, wielding the Second Amendment like a rhetorical sledgehammer. She asked the nightmare question: What if a president decided to seize everyone’s guns—would courts have to wait while rights were trampled coast to coast?

Her point was clear: If the executive can ignore the judiciary, then we don’t have a Constitution anymore. We have a monarch.

This wasn’t just about immigration. This was about whether a president can bulldoze the law and dare the courts to clean up the wreckage. It was about whether the rule of law is still alive in America.

And the fact that women—conservative, liberal, and everything in between—were the loudest voices defending the Constitution?

That’s not just poetic. That’s historic.

Doge

#ResistanceMovement #DemocracyNow #SicSemperTyrannis

The below information about what our senior officials in the United States Government are doing is absolutely frightening!   Thanks to my friend Sam for sharing this on his Facebook!
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Important everyone knows the truth to what is happening in america.  It’s time to take the entire regimes down.  This simply isn’t acceptable and why in the world is no one talking about it out loud and holding them accountable.

How is this being investigated?  Who is protecting us if any of this is true????

See below:

🚨 Government IT whistleblowers have come forward with explosive allegations: DOGE is not a cost-saving initiative — it’s a digital front. A cover operation. Its true purpose? To infiltrate federal systems, extract sensitive government data, and deliver it directly to Russian intelligence.

Here’s how it unfolded — and how it continues to unfold inside U.S. agencies:

⸻

1️⃣ Step One: Infiltration

DOGE operatives entered federal offices under the guise of restructuring for efficiency. They locked out internal staff, restructured access, and installed high-tech override systems that deleted all records of their activity. No logs. No trails.
This tactic has reportedly occurred at multiple agencies and continues in real time.

⸻

2️⃣ Step Two: Extraction

IT whistleblowers recovered metadata showing massive amounts of sensitive government data were — and are still being — downloaded.
Where this data is going remains unknown. Officials have refused to comment, and no internal review has been made public.

⸻

3️⃣ Step Three: Sabotage

Each week DOGE has spent at a new agency, they’ve left all digital security doors wide open — no firewalls, no alarms, no protections.
Soon after, Russian IP addresses begin accessing U.S. government systems using DOGE-issued credentials. Actual usernames and passwords were created and distributed by DOGE insiders. These Russian-linked accounts have spent full weeks siphoning highly sensitive federal data — directly from U.S. systems.

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🇺🇸 America is under siege.
Our digital infrastructure — across multiple government agencies — has been, and continues to be, penetrated by Russian intelligence, aided by DOGE and Trump-aligned insiders. Every citizen’s data is vulnerable. The implications are staggering.

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So what’s the cost?

💸 Elon Musk once promised $2 trillion in savings through DOGE.
That estimate has now plummeted to $150 billion — and the federal government has already spent more than that implementing the cuts.
⚠️ Musk has since taken down the transparency portal he once championed, and is now facing lawsuits tied to DOGE’s implementation and misinformation.

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The Distraction Strategy

None of this happened in a vacuum.

The sudden political assault on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) didn’t just ignite a culture war — it was the culture war they needed.
By engineering a national outrage campaign, they flooded the media with emotionally charged debates that dominate headlines, social media, and everyday conversations. While the public was distracted, DOGE was quietly rewriting access rules, wiping digital footprints, and building backdoors.

This is how authoritarian propaganda works in a 24-hour news cycle: you don’t have to lie well — you just have to lie first.

It’s a tactic based on the primacy effect, a psychological principle that shows people remember the first version of a story far more than any correction. It’s why Fox News continues to thrive despite having one of the highest retraction rates in modern media — their audience never internalizes the walk-backs, because they were never designed to stick.

That’s exactly what DOGE did with its “$2 trillion in savings” claim. They knew it would be retracted. They knew the number would shrink. But they also knew it wouldn’t matter — because the public had already absorbed the big, bold headline.
The retraction? That’s buried on page twelve, long after the outrage has moved on.

⸻

What this really is

This isn’t just incompetence. It’s not just corruption.
This is a coordinated digital invasion — executed from within — and aligned with a hostile foreign power.

What was once speculation about Trump being a possible Russian agent has now escalated into something far more dangerous.
If the allegations are true, this is a coordinated alliance between Trump, Elon Musk, DOGE, and powerful insiders within the U.S. government — all enabling and protecting what amounts to state-level espionage on behalf of the Russian authoritarian state.

This goes far beyond a single traitor or rogue operative.

This is the formation of an oligarchic alliance embedded within American institutions — working to dismantle democracy, consolidate power, and serve the geopolitical interests of a hostile Russian regime.

And as wild as it may have sounded a year ago, this is exactly what Bernie Sanders, AOC, and others have been warning about:
A global class of ultra-wealthy elites undermining democratic institutions from within — and now, apparently, collaborating with authoritarian powers to do it.

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*Daniel Berulis, the lead IT whistleblower behind these revelations, is now under protection following serious death threats, including drone-taken surveillance photos left at his residence. While Berulis is the most visible, he is not alone — multiple cybersecurity professionals have stepped forward behind the scenes, corroborating his findings and pushing for accountability.

He is being shielded under federal whistleblower laws and is represented by the nonprofit Whistleblower Aid, which is calling for an independent investigation. The severity of these claims and the clear conflict of interest within DOGE and the White House demand it.
As expected, DOGE, the Trump-aligned administration, and conservative media have begun issuing coordinated denials, signaling just how deeply implicated they are — and how desperately they’ll try to gaslight the public into ignoring the truth.

⸻

And here’s the most damning truth of all:

If even a single part of this story is true, it would implicate both Elon Musk and Donald Trump in acts that meet the constitutional definition of treason.

This is one of those moments where silence helps the enemy.
Share this. Talk about it. Get loud.
This story needs exposure — and fast.

Who is the richest

This list of members of the United States Congress by wealth includes the fifty richest members of Congress as of 2018. It displays the net worth (the difference between assets and liabilities) for the member and their immediate family, such as a spouse or dependent children. These figures offer only an estimation of wealth, as the Congressional financial disclosure rules use value ranges instead of exact amounts.[1] As an upper range is not specified for values over $50 million (or over $1 million for a spouse), large assets are not represented accurately. Additionally, government salaries and personal residences are not typically included in disclosures.[2] Furthermore, several members of Congress do not use a standardized electronic format, instead filing reports that range from vague to indecipherable.[3] As of 2020, over half of the members of Congress were millionaires and the median net worth of members was approximately $1 million.[4]
The original documents for each member’s disclosure are publicly available on a database website, maintained by the Center for Responsive Politics.[5]
Since 2009, the salaries per annum of members of the United States Congress have been as follows:[6]
PositionSalary

Speaker of the House of Representatives$223

,500Majority leader and minority leader of the House of Representatives$193,400

President pro tempore of the Senate$193,400Senators and House Representatives$174,000

Non-voting members of the United States House of Representatives$174,000
As of 2018, the top 50 wealthiest members of the United States Congress were as follows:
Source: Center for Responsive Politics (2018)[5]RankNamePartyStateChamberIncumbentNet worth ($ million)

1Mark WarnerDemocraticVirginiaSenateYes214.12

Greg GianforteRepublicanMontanaHouseNo189.33

Paul MitchellRepublicanMichiganHouseNo179.64

Vernon BuchananRepublicanFloridaHouseYes157.25

Chris CollinsRepublicanNew YorkHouseNo154.56Don BeyerDemocraticVirginiaHouseYes124.97Nancy PelosiDemocraticCaliforniaHouseYes114.78Dianne FeinsteinDemocraticCaliforniaSenateYes87.99Suzan DelBeneDemocraticWashingtonHouseYes79.410Fred UptonRepublicanMichiganHouseYes79.011Roger WilliamsRepublicanTexasHouseYes67.012Kevin HernRepublicanOklahomaHouseYes61.013Scott PetersDemocraticCaliforniaHouseYes60.514Rick W. AllenRepublicanGeorgiaHouseYes52.115John HoevenRepublicanNorth DakotaSenateYes46.716Joe Kennedy IIIDemocraticMassachusettsHouseNo46.517Ralph NormanRepublicanSouth CarolinaHouseYes43.418Johnny IsaksonRepublicanGeorgiaSenateNo43.019Jim RischRepublicanIdahoSenateYes41.820Ron JohnsonRepublicanWisconsinSenateYes39.221Mitch McConnellRepublicanKentuckySenateYes34.122Kenny MarchantRepublicanTexasHouseNo33.723Buddy CarterRepublicanGeorgiaHouseYes33.224Steve DainesRepublicanMontanaSenateYes32.925Lloyd DoggettDemocraticTexasHouseYes29.726Brad SchneiderDemocraticIllinoisHouseYes27.227Lamar AlexanderRepublicanTennesseeSenateNo25.928David PerdueRepublicanGeorgiaSenateNo25.829Nita LoweyDemocraticNew YorkHouseNo24.830Jim SensenbrennerRepublicanWisconsinHouseNo21.831Phil RoeRepublicanTennesseeHouseNo20.232Richard ShelbyRepublicanAlabamaSenateYes19.133John YarmuthDemocraticKentuckyHouseYes17.134Jim CooperDemocraticTennesseeHouseYes16.335Michael BennetDemocraticColoradoSenateYes15.736Liz CheneyRepublicanWyomingHouseYes14.737Tom RiceRepublicanSouth CarolinaHouseYes14.638Bill FosterDemocraticIllinoisHouseYes14.139Dan NewhouseRepublicanWashingtonHouseYes13.840Carolyn MaloneyDemocraticNew YorkHouseYes13.041Earl BlumenauerDemocraticOregonHouseYes12.642Mike KellyRepublicanPennsylvaniaHouseYes12.443Mike ConawayRepublicanTexasHouseNo12.444Ralph AbrahamRepublicanLouisianaHouseNo12.445Markwayne MullinRepublicanOklahomaHouseYes11.446Ann WagnerRepublicanMissouriHouseYes11.147Jackie SpeierDemocraticCaliforniaHouseYes11.048Thom TillisRepublicanNorth CarolinaSenateYes11.049Rob PortmanRepublican

Calls for GOP not to be seated in Congress: A look at the fallout from Texas’s brazen election lawsuit

Image

The Supreme Court on Friday rejected a brazen lawsuit by Texas that had asked the court to throw out the presidential election results in favor of President-elect Joe Biden in four battleground states.
The lawsuit, although built on baseless claims of election voter fraud in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, was backed by more than 100 House Republicans and more than a dozen Republican state attorneys general, highlighting their unflagging willingness to stand in support of President Trump no matter the test.
While the legal case may be over, the reverberations were still being felt within the party and across the country as of Saturday morning. Here’s a look at some of the most blistering reactions following the Supreme Court’s decision to reject the Texas lawsuit challenging President-elect Joe Biden’s victory.

#StopTheSeating

Democratic Representative Bill Pascrell of New Jersey called on House leaders not to seat the 126 Republicans who signed onto the brief in the new Congress, accusing them of traitorous behavior.
“I’m demanding that the 126 Republicans who have endorsed a malignant lawsuit to overturn the will of the people and undermine our democracy not be seated in Congress,” Rep. Pascrell said in a tweet Friday night.

Pascrell wrote a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren, explaining his reasoning by citing the 14th Amendment, which states no person should hold any civil or military office who has “engaged insurrection or rebellion” against the US.
“Men and women who would act to tear the United States government apart cannot serve as members of Congress,” Pascrell wrote. “These lawsuits seeking to obliterate public confidence in our democratic system by invalidating the clear results of the 2020 presidential election attack the text and spirit of the Constitution, which each member swears to support and defend.”

Other political figures echoed Pascrell’s sentiment, and #StopTheSeating was trending on Twitter early Saturday morning.

Pelosi has called the lawsuit “an act of flailing GOP desperation,” and said, “Republicans are subverting the Constitution by their reckless and fruitless assault on our democracy, which threatens to seriously erode public trust in our most sacred democratic institutions, and to set back our progress on the urgent challenges ahead.”

‘Our bad’

The Orlando Sentinel’s editorial board apologized to its readers Friday morning for endorsing Republican Representative Michael Waltz in the 2020 general election. Waltz was one of the 126 House Republicans that backed the Texas lawsuit.
“We had no idea, no way of knowing at the time, that Waltz was not committed to democracy,” the editorial said. “During our endorsement interview with the incumbent congressman, we didn’t think to ask, ‘Would you support an effort to throw out the votes of tens of millions of Americans in four states in order to overturn a presidential election and hand it to the person who lost?’ Our bad.”
Waltz was one of the 10 Florida Republican members of Congress to support the lawsuit.
“They wanted to undo 231 years of election tradition and norms so their guy, Donald Trump, can have another four years in office,” the editorial continued. “And so the president won’t send out a mean tweet that might torpedo their chances for reelection.”
The newspaper said every American should be “appalled at the attempted usurpation, and at elected officials taking part in this terrifying fiasco.”

De Joy backs down

Postal Service backs down on changes as at least 20 states sue over potential mail delays ahead of election
By Marshall Cohen and Kristen Holmes, CNN
Updated Aug 18, 2020
(CNN) – Embattled Postmaster General Louis DeJoy reversed course Tuesday, saying that all changes being made to the Postal Service would be suspended until after the November 3 election, just as 20 Democratic states announced plans to file federal lawsuits.
DeJoy said that some of the deferred decisions mean that retail hours at post offices will not change, mail processing equipment and blue collection boxes will remain in place and no mail processing facilities will be closed.
At least 20 Democratic attorneys general across the country are launching a multi-pronged legal effort to push back on the recent changes that disrupted mail delivery across the country and triggered accusations that Trump and his appointees are trying to undermine mail-in voting.
The Democratic attorneys general plan to argue that DeJoy is illegally changing mail procedures ahead of the 2020 election as the Post Office braces for an unusually high number of mail-in ballots as voters look to avoid casting ballots at polling centers where they could potentially contract the coronavirus.
DeJoy “acted outside of his authority to implement changes to the postal system, and did not follow the proper procedures under federal law,” according to a statement from Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson.
The USPS and DeJoy have maintained that the changes are intended to improve the agency’s dire financial situation. DeJoy also rejects accusations that he made these changes at Trump’s behest.
At least two lawsuits are being filed Tuesday. One led by Washington state will be joined by Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia and Wisconsin.
Another group of state Democratic attorneys general are filing a similar lawsuit in a Pennsylvania federal court. These states include California, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Delaware, Maine and North Carolina.
The Postal Service is also facing intense scrutiny from congressional Democrats, who announced earlier this week that they’re ramping up their probe into what they call “recent, sweeping and dangerous operational changes at the Postal Service that are slowing the mail and jeopardizing the integrity of the election.”
DeJoy is set to testify before a Senate committee on Friday and the House Oversight Committee next week.
Trump and other Republicans have been railing against mail-in voting, baselessly asserting that it will lead to voter fraud, with the President saying last week that he opposes much-needed funding for the United States Postal Service because he doesn’t want to see it used for mail-in voting this November.
There is not widespread voter fraud in US elections, and nonpartisan experts say neither party automatically benefits when states expand access to mail-in voting.
This story has been updated.
TM & © 2020 Turner Broadcasting System, Inc.
A WarnerMedia Company.
All Rights Reserved.

Supreme Court Rules Eastern Oklahoma Land Is Tribal Territory

The justices ruled 5-4, declaring that Congress never diminished or disestablished the land as a reservation.

In a stunning blow to Oklahoma’s state government, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday that much of eastern Oklahoma is located on an Indian reservation.

In a 5-4 ruling, the justices declared that Congress never diminished or disestablished the land as a reservation. Major crimes committed by a tribal member on their own reservation, in effect, must be prosecuted by the federal government in accordance with the Major Crimes Act.

“Today we are asked whether the land these treaties promised remains an Indian reservation for purposes of federal criminal law. Because Congress has not said otherwise, we hold the government to its word,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote in the majority opinion.

“While there can be no question that Congress established a reservation for the Creek Nation, it’s equally clear that Congress has since broken more than a few of its promises to the Tribe,” he wrote. “Not least, the land described in the parties’ treaties, once undivided and held by the Tribe, is now fractured into pieces.”

The ruling in McGirt v. Oklahoma could have major implications for the long-running dispute over who has jurisdiction to prosecute crimes by enrolled tribal members on tribal land, as well as what constitutes tribal land. The state of Oklahoma and tribes in the state have been waiting for a Supreme Court ruling on the matter for years.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the dissenting opinion and was joined by Justices Samuel Alito, Brett Kavanaugh and Clarence Thomas. Thomas also wrote a separate dissent.

Roberts said the court’s ruling will have major consequences for the area’s residents, who are largely not part of any tribe, and state laws, including those pertaining to zoning, taxation, family and environmental law.

“The rediscovered reservations encompass the entire eastern half of the State—19 million acres that are home to 1.8 million people, only 10%–15% of whom are Indians,” he wrote. “Across this vast area, the State’s ability to prosecute serious crimes will be hobbled and decades of past convictions could well be thrown out. On top of that, the Court has profoundly destabilized the overnance of eastern Oklahoma.”

Roberts went on to argue that Congress did disestablish Indian territory by dismantling tribal governments, tribal courts and tribal sovereignty, as well as by making the tribal members U.S. citizens.

“In taking these transformative steps, Congress made no secret of its intentions. It created a commission tasked with extinguishing the Five Tribes’ territory and, in one report after another, explained that it was creating a homogenous population led by a common government,” he wrote.

Forrest Tahdooahnippah, a member of the Comanche Nation of Oklahoma and a lawyer who specializes in businesses in Native American country, said the decision could change how many things operate on tribal lands. 

“In the long term, outside of the criminal context, there may be some minor changes in civil law, the majority opinion points out assistance with homeland security, historical preservation, schools, highways, clinics, housing, and nutrition programs, as possible changes. The Creek Nation will also have greater jurisdiction over child welfare cases involving tribal members,” Tahdooahnippah said in a statement. “The short term implications of McGirt are largely confined to the criminal context in which the case arose.”

He added that individuals convicted by the state may not want to challenge their convictions again. “Federal penalties may be harsher than the state penalties,” he said. 

The Muscogee (Creek), Cherokee, Choctaw, Seminole and Chickasaw Nations — which make up the Five Civilized Tribes — were hoping for a ruling that would upholdtheir sovereignty and the status of their lands as reservations,which currently make up around 19 million acres and nearly the entire eastern half of Oklahoma.

The court punted on the matter last year when it failed to come to a decision in Sharp v. Murphy. That case involved Patrick Murphy, a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation who is on death row for murder. The court sought to establish whether land within the 1866 territorial boundaries of the Creek Nation in eastern Oklahoma, formerly known as Indian Territory, could still be considered an Indian reservation. But the court failed to settle the case, with only eight justices participating in the deliberations. Gorsuch recused himself because of his involvement in the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled on the matter previously.   

With its ruling in McGirt v. Oklahoma, the Supreme Court sided with that appeals court by ruling that the Creek Nation’s reservation was never disestablished and remains Indian country.

The federal government promised the Creek a reservation in perpetuity. … Congress has never withdrawn the promised reservation.Justice Neil Gorsuch

Ian Heath Gershengorn, Murphy’s attorney who argued the case in May, said he was “immensely pleased” for his client and McGirt. 

“

The Supreme Court reaffirmed today that when the United States makes promises, the courts will keep those promises. Congress persuaded the Creek Nation to walk the Trail of Tears with promises of a reservation—and the Court today correctly recognized that this reservation endures,” he said in a statement to HuffPost.

The McGirt case gave the court another opportunity to consider tribal boundaries and sovereignty. More than two decades ago, Jimcy McGirt was convicted in Oklahoma’s Wagoner County District Court of lewd molestation, first-degree rape and forcible sodomy. He was sentenced to 500 years each for the rape and molestation counts and to life without parole for the forcible sodomy charge. 

McGirt argued that as an enrolled member of the federally recognized Seminole and Muscogee (Creek) Nations, the state of Oklahoma could not prosecute him, according to the Major Crimes Act of 1885. That law states that the federal government alone has the authority to prosecute any major crime committed by an enrolled member of a tribe on their own reservation. 

McGirt’s legal team argued that the Major Crimes Act of 1885 qualified McGirt for an appeal because the state government had no jurisdiction to prosecute him in the first place. Instead, his lawyers argued, McGirt should have been prosecuted in federal court. Advertisement

Eventually, the case made its way to the Supreme Court, which heard oral arguments on May 11 via teleconference due to the coronavirus pandemic.  

The oral arguments centered around whether the Creek Nation ever had a reservation and, if so, if it was ever disestablished. Federal Indian reservations are usually exempt from state jurisdiction since Native American tribes have the right to govern their own internal affairs. The Constitution gives the federal government, not state governments, the authority to deal with tribes as governments.

As white colonizers moved West, they forced Indigenous people from their lands and onto reservations across the U.S. Eventually, Native Americans were even forced off their original reservations as colonizers continued to settle and did not want to live among Indigenous people. 

In both the Murphy and McGirt cases, petitioners argued that Congress never disestablished their tribal reservations or changed their boundaries and that those lands are still reservation land. That means that the men in question should be prosecuted by federal courts and not the state. 

The state of Oklahoma, meanwhile, argued that those lands were “Dependent Indian communities” and not reservations. This would disqualify them from being considered a reservation and mean that the state had the authority to prosecute the men’s cases. 

“The federal government promised the Creek a reservation in perpetuity,” Gorsuch wrote. “Over time, Congress has diminished that reservation. It has sometimes restricted and other times expanded the Tribe’s authority. But Congress has never withdrawn the promised reservation.” 

Much of Eastern Oklahoma will now remain classified as a reservation. 

Florida officer murders black trans man

URGENT ACTION – Follow the link below and send emails to demand #JusticeForTonyMcDade On May 27th, 2020, Tony McDade, a black transgender masculine person was shot five times in the back and killed by a Tallahassee Police Department (TPD) officer. TPD, notorious for its racism, white supremacy, and transphobia has consistently misgendered Tony and refused to release the officer’s body camera footage and/or admit their wrongdoing in murdering and misgendering an unarmed black trans person. Many details surrounding this incident are unclear, but eyewitness accounts and video footage contradict the official TPD report which states that Mr. McDade was armed. In fact, video footage of the shooting shows that Tony was shot 5-8 times in the back and that the officer was standing over Tony when the last shot was fired. This is the THIRD murder of a black person by Tallahassee police in three months (March – May) under the direction of the newly installed racist killer cop Chief of Police, Lawrence Revell, who gunned down an unarmed black teenager 20 years ago and was promoted as a consequence of this, and his involvement in the white supremacist police team “the Alpha Squad” that used police intimidation and harassment to terrorize black youth in Tallahassee. Please join us in demanding #JusticeForTony. This form allows you to send an email to the State Attorney, Chief of Police, Mayor, City Commissioners and City Manager demanding that they 1) remove the racist Chief of Police Lawrence Revell from office, 2) open an unbiased investigation into the brutal murder of Tony McDade and arrest all the police officers involved, 3) demand the TPD Citizens Advisory Committee be dissolved and replaced with a freely elected Citizens Police Accountability Council, and 4) demand a response from the Mayor, City Commission, and the Mayor’s “LGBTQ Advisory Board” (all of which have been distinctly quiet) that outlines specific actions they will be taking to address and overcome the racism and transphobia widespread in the Tallahassee Police Department. Afterwards please share online. When the community stands together we will have justice. https://actionnetwork.org/letters/demand-justice-for-tony-mcdade?source=direct_link&

This Is One of the Dumbest Things in the History of the American


It’s not exactly news that the president doesn’t read. This is an indictment of the country, and of the news media that covers him—which, despite all the yelling about Media Bias, actually cuts this guy a ton of slack. Because he is the president, a lot of people pretend he might actually have a clue what’s going on. Reporters should just start asking him basic factual questions about the matter at hand. “What is contact tracing?” He would have no idea. Right now, we’re continually asking him which road he’s taking when he’s never seen the map. He doesn’t read anything, including his briefing reports. The New Yorker documented the process of trying to deliver information to The Leader of the Free World back in 2017. It wasn’t a pretty picture—but apparently, it required lots of pictures.
We know this, and yet nobody seems to care he gets all his information from the brain-melting hellscape of cable news—and, according to The New York Times, from Gary Player. Allow us to introduce a paragraph—the one in the middle below—that may well document one of the dumbest things in the history of the American presidency.

Mr. Trump, who has mounted a yearslong attack on the intelligence agencies, is particularly difficult to brief on critical national security matters, according to interviews with 10 current and former intelligence officials familiar with his intelligence briefings.

The president veers off on tangents and getting him back on topic is difficult, they said. He has a short attention span and rarely, if ever, reads intelligence reports, relying instead on conservative media and his friends for information. He is unashamed to interrupt intelligence officers and riff based on tips or gossip he hears from the former casino magnate Steve Wynn, the retired golfer Gary Player or Christopher Ruddy, the conservative media executive.

Mr. Trump rarely absorbs information that he disagrees with or that runs counter to his worldview, the officials said. Briefing him has been so great a challenge compared with his predecessors that the intelligence agencies have hired outside consultants to study how better to present information to him.

How is this acceptable? We’ve got some of the country’s best and brightest tiptoeing around the nation’s chief executive, trying not to piss him off with inconvenient reality while simultaneously holding his quantum attention. (The ability to accept bad news ought to be one of the minimum requirements to be the president. You should be able to hear negative information without throwing a tantrum, maybe.) Briefing the current president on critical national security matters is apparently like my parents trying to ask 14-year-old me what happened at school while I was watching MTV. Except I wasn’t the goddamned President of the United States. We had standards back then, and one of them was that the president had to read things. Really setting the bar high in the ’90s.

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Also, I’d actually gone to school. We hired this guy to do a job, and during the one or two hours a day he actually does it, he does it terribly. He doesn’t do the reading, and we expect him to produce a book report? He doesn’t know what’s going on. How much death and economic damage could we have avoided during this cataclysm if the president read his briefing reports in January and February? If he was not constantly bringing up what Sean Hannity said last night while people were trying to talk to him? If he did not treat anyone who says nice things about him as a comparable or better source than people who actually know what’s going on in the world? How many of the 93,000 Americans now dead would still be alive if the president did his job?
This is a results business. He should be fired.