Each of these red state governors who sent their national guard to Washington have cities with higher crime rates than the nation’s capital.
Former Under Secretary of State in Obama admin & Editor of TIME. Author of “Information Wars: How We Lost the Battle Against Disinformation” & the audiobook, “Mandela: The Lost Tapes.” Analyst @MSNBC
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Each of these red state governors who sent their national guard to Washington have cities with higher crime rates than the nation’s capital.
American presidents of both parties have spent decades courting India as a hedge against China. Now Trump’s petulant and short-sighted policies have pushed India closer to China. Our children and grandchildren will pay the price.
Int'l students do not take the place of American students—they subsidize them by paying full freight & reducing costs for US students. Foreign students contributed $43 billion to the economy & supported 10s of thousands of US jobs. It is one of our key exports and this admin is killing it. Grade: F
Tariffs = tax on US businesses & American consumers = higher prices for household staples = inflation.
FEMA employees write to Congress that Trump adm cuts and mismanagement will jeopardize the safety of millions. The admin says it wants states to manage disasters. Disaster management is where you should concentrate federal power, not in an imperial presidency. They have everything upside down.
Solzhenitsyn recounts how it was difficult for Stalin to have cabinet meetings because no one wanted to be the first one to stop applauding.
The Framers didn’t even want a standing army much less have them patrolling our cities. No healthy republic should have its army in the streets during peacetime.
1. Flag burning is not in the top 1000 problems this country faces. 2. His executive order is a stunt. 3. The Supreme Court has long established that flag burning is protected expressive speech. 4. Even Justice Scalia defended it.
"As with all dictators, Trump's most dangerous opponent is knowledge." —Marc Elias, "Democracy Docket"
Trump's strong-arming Intel for gov't equity is something Mao and Stalin would be proud of. It is Shake-down capitalism. Once, the GOP believed in laissez-faire capitalism and government not interfering in the private sector. Look it up: the state owning the means of production is called Marxism.
The Framers were intent on distinguishing between retribution and justice, pursuing the latter and suppressing the former. Hence, the 5th and 14th amendments and due process and a prohibition of ex post facto laws. Talk about weaponizing DOJ.
The “root cause” of the war in Ukraine is Vladimir Putin.
Peace is not simply a temporary cessation of hostilities, which is what most of these examples are—and some not even that. Wanting to be seen as a peacemaker is different from actually being one. Good piece.
Just saying, in a normal world (pre-Trump), everything we know now about Russia's positions was already known, but we would have discussed it behind the scenes, and then the US would have decided, no, it's not time for a summit because we're too far apart.
The truth is, everything we know now, we knew before Anchorage.
By the way, when Chamberlain gave Hitler Sudetenland, Hitler had not yet invaded Czechoslovakia. Chamberlain was trying to prevent Hitler from invading. Now, this administration is talking about giving Putin land after he invaded with no price to pay.
1. This is essentially an intervention: European leaders gathering to prevent an American president from betraying the Atlantic alliance. 2. He is already halfway there with his acquiescence to Putin's demand for Donbas and that Ukraine never join NATO. 3. A model of how not to negotiate.
This is the diplomatic equivalent of the Eagles "tush push"—everyone gathered around the quarterback to protect him and push him into the end zone.
What you worry about and try to prepare for in diplomacy are unknown unknowns. But everything Putin said and did in Alaska was a known known, and yet they didn't seem prepared for it. Malpractice. Incompetence. My piece in Time:
President Trump thought President Putin had friends, and that he was one of them. President Putin has interests, not friends, and Russia's interests trumped America's. Now Trump has even backed down on a ceasefire. My take:
What’s the Dealmaker-in-Chief without a deal? Some thoughts on the summit—and my interview with Putin in 2007.
Please don't use the description "high-stakes" for the summit. (A.) It's a journalist cliche with virtually no meaning, and (B.) it plays into Trump's theatrical framing of the whole artificial made-for-TV "event."
"Conservatives have for generations used denigrating language to describe the condition of major cities & called for greater law enforcement, often in response to changing demographics in those cities driven by non-white populations relocating in search of work or safety from racial discrimination."
Trump said several times in his press conference that Zelensky has been in power for three-and-a-half years, the implication being he hasn’t ended the war. Let’s be clear, his nation was invaded without provocation by a much larger nation seeking to conquer it.
Crime in DC is at a 30-year low. It's not even in top 10 dangerous cities in US. Throughout history, autocrats use a false pretext to impose government control over local law enforcement as a prelude to a more national takeover. That's far more dangerous than the situation he says he is fixing.
I sincerely hope for a peace agreement, but Trump has already handed Putin a victory. He has invited a fugitive of the International Criminal Court to US territory. He has talked about "land swaps," something Zelensky opposes. Remember, we bought Alaska from Russia for 2¢ an acre. That was a deal.
“They paved over paradise and put up a parking lot.” 🎶 — Joni Mitchell
The head of state choosing CEOs, where factories are built, how much tariffs and interest rates should be, welcome to autocratic socialism in the USA.
Among the many flaws of Trump's tariffs (besides, of course, that they are illegal) is that US companies & consumers pay them; foreign companies & countries will find other markets, hurting the US economy; and the chaos and uncertainty of Trump's policies will deter companies from building here.
Real estate moguls make "deals." World leaders and diplomats negotiate agreements and treaties that are in their own interest. They don't place any value on "deals" that are cosmetic and about publicity. That's why this administration is making no headway in Ukraine and Gaza.
The enduring truth of American history is that people who come here to make a better life for themselves also make life better for the people already here.
Plutarch tells the story of tyrannical King Tigranes getting news of a defeat at the hands of Roman troops. What does he do? He executes the messenger of course.
Shameful. Craven. Jen Easterly is a patriot, a veteran, and a scholar who has spent her career making all Americans safer.
One of the ideas behind the tariffs is that they will spur other countries to build factories in the US. What responsible foreign CEO is going to commit billions to building here when the CEO of this country is unreliable, unpredictable, irrational?
No, the Russians didn't meddle in the 2016 election: they interfered. Volumes of evidence show thousands of fake accounts created by the Internet Research Agency in St. Petersburg to mislead voters. The evidence of cyber manipulation of voting infrastructure is less clear, but that was a small part.
Just asking, but what is he trying to distract us from?
🙏
"Trump’s corruption of justice isn’t just individual; it’s categorical. We have grown accustomed to him rewarding his loyalists and punishing his critics."
Delighted to join Ali Velshi to discuss a difficult topic, American decline. It predated Trump, but he is accelerating it in a way few would have predicted. He is undermining many of our strategic advantages, take just one for example, higher education.
Greetings on #MandelaDay2025 "It is in your hands," Madiba said, which is why the UN and the Nelson Mandela Foundation are starting the Mandela Center for Social Change at the Colin Powell School at City College to create a new generation of leaders who can overcome polarization like he did.
It’s comical they cite Article II. It was II because the most powerful branch, Congress, was Article I. Congress, not the Executive, had the power of the purse, of war, of domestic affairs. The idea of the “unitary executive” would have been anathema to them.
According to ICE's own data, of the estimated 10ok deported through June 24, convicted murderers totalled 0.58%; kidnappers 0.42%; sexual assault, 1.2%. Of those with criminal records, most are traffic or immigration offenses.
The framers of the Constitution thought political parties might cause the death of the republic, but they always believed that members of Congress would stick up for their designated powers even above party loyalty. I guess they were wrong about that.
Is this really what people voted for? A soon-to-be $300 billion tax on consumers that will raise the price on nearly everything?
The EU, our largest trade partner, is now making “deals” with Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Southeast Asian nations—and pretty much anyone frustrated by our wild and inconsistent trade policies. America First = America Isolated = America in decline.
Trump’s budget would close 10 laboratories run by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Admin that help predict life-threatening weather, including one in Miami that sends teams of “hurricane hunters” into storms to collect critical data. Why cut programs that protect people's lives?
The expertise, knowledge, and experience of the Foreign Service has no rival. I never knew what party any of them may have been a member of. They served the American people.
I wish there were more Democrats thinking what can we learn from Mamdani instead of panicking about him.
The only polygraph and loyalty test the FBI should use is loyalty to the Constitution and the American people.
One out of three US counties essentially has no journalists. The number of reporters has declined by 75% since the turn of the century. Democracy dies in news deserts.
Gallup has new polling on immigration. Topline findings: -Americans hate Trump's immigration policy (35% approve, 62% disapprove) -Share who say immigration is a "good thing" for the country just hit an all-time high (79%) news.gallup.com/poll/692522/...
“It should be deeply, deeply worrisome to anyone who cares about their safety and their liberty, that the government can, without showing evidence to anyone of anything, spirit you away on a plane to wherever, forever.”
Great conversation on July 4th weekend about American soft power, which is not our military might but the power of our ideas and values. We are not defined by a common heritage, but an uncommon set of ideas: that all people are created equal. We have to continue to fight for those values.
"To secure these rights [life, liberty, pursuit of happiness], Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." True, but we also can withhold our consent from actions that undermine/weaken the republic, like the bill passed yesterday. #happyfourth
There's nothing wrong with the traditional conservative tax philosophy of "broadening the base, and lowering the rates"—but cutting healthcare and food stamps to pay for tax cuts that disproportionately benefit the wealthy is not that idea and weakens the nation as a whole.
The multi-billion dollar cuts in Medicaid are not only bad for the health of the American people, but the health of the economy. Healthcare is America's largest employer and cutting Medicaid will not only make America sicker but cut an untold number of jobs.
Trump is holding up nearly $7 billion in education grants that support teacher training, after-school programs, migrant education, and classroom technology. And they are cutting school programs at the same time they are imposing work requirements on Medicaid recipients, many of whom are caregivers.
Trump's bill will take away health insurance for nearly 12 million people. How is that "healthy" for the republic? It is not. It hurts families, the economy, the hospital system. It will make society less healthy in order to subsidize tax cuts for the wealthy who already have healthcare.
I've always thought that the purpose of government, as Lincoln said, "is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves." No. 1 on that list is healthcare.
It's a very sad day when the federal government uses its immense power on the side of inequity, unfairness, and discrimination.
Adlai Stevenson's famous bargain was, If my opponents stop telling lies about me, I will stop telling the truth about them. But even if the Trump admin stops telling lies about the press, the press will continue to tell the truth about them.
For people who habitually do not tell the truth, the presentation of facts is often seen as an attack.
For people who habitually do not tell the truth, the simple presentation of facts is seen as an attack.
The fact that the attack was not as successful as he said it was does not in any way demean the heroism of the soldiers who executed it.
Delighted to join the board of CUNY's Newmark Graduate School of Journalism which is helping to reinvent journalism for our time and will become the nation's first tuition-free journalism school by 2027. Great students, great board, and great leadership by Graciela Mochkofsky.
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Have been on a lot talking about Iran. It's a heckuva lot easier to start a war than end one. War is the place where unintended consequences reign. Let's pray that all the actors show restraint and realize that this only ends at the negotiation table. Bargaining, not bombs.
If there was a Nobel for boasting and whining, he would be a shoo-in.
‘This is war’: Trump says he is still considering a U.S. military strike on Iran’s nuclear sites. @amymcgrath.bsky.social, @rickstengel.bsky.social and @charliedent.bsky.social join The Weeknight to respond.
I asked Richard Stengel to elaborate on this POV for today's Reliable Sources newsletter. He obliged 🧵
He conducts foreign policy like it’s a tv show; but we shouldn’t cover it like a tv show.
I think we know the kind of enrichment the president is interested in.
There were two major wars going on when he took office which he said he’d settle in days. Now there’s a new war that he’s thinking about joining while the other two continue.
We need regular, mass, peaceful protests.
It’s so much easier to destroy than to build. Voters should know that federal workers are hired on merit and are loyal to the American people, not a would-be-monarch.
#NoKings protest, Hudson NY. We revolted from a monarch 249 years ago; we can do it again.
If Israel had attacked Iran while Biden was in office, Trump would have said, “It never would have happened if I was president.”
Judge Breyer, waving a copy of the Constitution, said: “We’re talking about the president exercising his authority, and the president is of course limited in that authority. That’s the difference between a constitutional government and King George.”
We’re seeing one of the hallmarks of authoritarianism: the criminalization of dissent and its suppression by violence.
The Founders were all against the idea of a standing army. They saw how an autocratic ruler, George III, used his military to intimidate American citizens. That's precisely what they did not want, and that's precisely what this president is doing in sending Marines to LA.
Federalizing the National Guard when there is no threat of invasion or rebellion is illegal/unconstitutional. It is also goes against the traditional conservative idea of federalism. But the simple truth is that he is federalizing the National Guard to suppress protest against him and his policies.
Unlike other militaries, American soldiers do not swear an oath to the state, or a person, or a monarch, but to the Constitution. Trump calls them "his" military—but they are ours, and they swear to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic"
Peaceful protest is patriotic and protected by the First Amendment. Violent protest is not and is illegal. It is the essence of authoritarianism to clamp down on peaceful protest. #NoKings
Autocrats turn ordinary situations into emergencies so they can wield extraordinary power.
His reaction is not strong, it’s weak. Over-reaction is never strength, but its opposite. It’s a weak man using these legal protests as a pretext to demonstrate what he thinks is strength. It’s from the autocrat’s playbook.
In a democracy, agents of the state do not wear masks.
If Mr. Moran worked for me, I would have had a private conversation with him about crossing a line into too much subjectivity—I would not have suspended him. I suspect if he had said the same exact words on air, nothing would have happened. Journalists have free speech rights too.
President Eisenhower authorized the use of the National Guard to protect young Black students who were integrating Little Rock High School. President Trump authorized the National Guard to LA to reign in demonstrators legally protesting what may be the unconstitutional deportation of immigrants.
Trump has a fetish about his signature. As with so much else, he's stuck in the past. He still thinks of signatures the way we did in the 18th and 19th century, when one's John Hancock signified something. Today, it's an inefficient anachronism. You can get a lot more done with an Autopen than a pen
I guess someone else has the better hand.
Look who was played. DOGE was never about "government efficiency" or cutting costs, it was about its leader being a "useful idiot" to bring about the destruction of the administrative state. www.cnbc.com/2025/06/03/m...
Miles Taylor is a patriot who risked his career and reputation to do what was right for his country. Revenge is not a legitimate end of government.
Here's a recipe for disaster: appoint a partisan with no experience to be in charge of dealing with disasters.
Antonio was my Congressman in NY's Republican-leaning 19th district. He represented all the voters. He was about people, not party; policy, not partisanship. He is where the Democratic party needs to be.
Over the weekend, the ACLU asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit to stop the Trump admin from using the Alien Enemies Act to deport immigrants. I write here about why it is one of the worst laws in American history and how this administration is making it even more dangerous.
“I voted for Donald Trump, and so did practically everyone here,” said Ms.Cowart, a friend of Ms. Hui from church. “But no one voted to deport moms. We were all under the impression we were just getting rid of the gangs, the people who came here in droves...This is Carol." Yes, they are real people.
Journalists should call it the budget bill, not the “one big beautiful bill.” Journalists are meant to call things by their actual names, not some subjective nickname which is designed to positively shape voters’ perceptions.
Lincoln, Kennedy, FDR, and Reagan all talked about America as an idea and a home of universal values; Trump says America is a "big, beautiful department store" where "everybody wants to go shopping."
Congressman Pat Ryan, a West Point grad and vet: "Trump didn’t even have the decency to stay and shake the graduating cadets’ hands, a longstanding tradition embraced by every president from Biden to Reagan — instead he went golfing." www.lohud.com/story/opinio...
The problem with doing cuts without a plan, and doing them sequentially rather than holistically is that some agencies get eviscerated, USAID, and some agencies, where there is a lot more money, DOD, remain untouched. And doing it without Congress means they ultimately may not get enacted.