Category: Police / Law Enforcement / ICE

Commentary: The masking of ICE agents is indefensible

https://www.arcamax.com/politics/opeds/s-3886918

Amy Dru Stanley and Craig Becker, Chicago Tribune on 

Published in Op Eds

Commentary: The masking of ICE agents is indefensible

Amy Dru Stanley and Craig Becker, Chicago Tribune on Published in Op Eds

Last month, a federal judge observed that masked figures were creating terror on American streets — not criminals but agents of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. “Law enforcement in the United States has usually been performed in the open,” wrote Judge William G. Young, a Ronald Reagan appointee to the U.S. District Court in Massachusetts.

“Images of plain-clothed, masked federal agents — faceless agents of the federal government — snatching a non-violent person off the streets” have created “fear in citizens and non-citizens alike.”

We’ve all seen the arrests in our neighborhoods and felt that fear. We’ve watched the raids unfold on the news: on the streets, on college campuses, in workplaces, in homes, outside courtrooms, in Home Depot parking lots. ICE agents wearing masks, violently detaining people, holding them captive, disappearing the suspects.

And we’ve heard the explanation that masking protects the ICE agents. “If you expose them,” President Donald Trump has said, “you put them in great danger, tremendous danger.”

But that rationale is indefensible, as it would apply to every public official and employee involved in the criminal justice system, all of whom face the threat of retaliatory violence. Moreover, severe penalties exist for attacking or intimidating law enforcement officers. Surely a judge who sentences convicted criminals to prison is as much at risk as ICE agents, yet the notion is absurd that judges should be anonymous or allowed to mask their faces in the courtroom.

Anti-masking bills have been introduced in Congress — including the “No Secret Police Act” and “No Anonymity in Immigration Enforcement Act”— but the measures have no chance of enactment under GOP control. Recently, Chicago and California banned masked arrests, but the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has stated: “We will NOT comply.”

What is needed is for the courts to act — to declare masked arrests unconstitutional, as unreasonable seizures barred by the Fourth Amendment. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that “reasonableness depends on not only when a seizure is made, but also how it is carried out.” Guarantees exist against seizures without probable cause or warrants, and the court has found that law enforcement agents violate the Fourth Amendment if they seize someone with unreasonable force or execute a warrant to search someone’s home without first knocking and announcing their presence. Such protections, essential in a democracy, should be extended to bar the carrying out of masked arrests. That ban is necessary to identify bad actors, and reduce the risk of harm and thereby uphold constitutional guarantees against unreasonable seizures and interference with freedom of expression.

ICE use of masks has spread more than fear. It has led to criminal impersonation: men pretending to be ICE agents carrying out kidnappings and sexual assaults. But threats to liberty and security lie in masked ICE policing itself — that faceless agents will use excessive force on immigrants or retaliate against witnesses who protest their raids by exercising free speech rights, and that no redress for the wrongs can be sought because the ICE agents can’t be identified. That masked men can act with impunity, as in authoritarian regimes.

Aggressive recruitment of new ICE agents, who are deployed with little training, heightens the risks of the masked raids. As the crackdown spreads — with the White House demanding 3,000 arrests by ICE a day— so, too, is protest against the masking. “More raids means more unidentified federal law enforcement intimidating and in some cases terrorizing our communities,” states the American Civil Liberties Union, noting the difficulty of distinguishing ICE arrests from kidnappings.

Masking also presents dangers for the ICE agents, who may be mistaken for imposters. Obscuring identity has long been a tactic used in certain undercover operations. But as former ICE official Scott Shuchart warned about the masked arrests, there is now “a kind of vigilante problem where people either don’t know, or at least aren’t sure, that these officers who are dressed up like bank robbers are actually law enforcement officers.” In such circumstances, violent self-defense might result.

Judicial prohibition of masked arrests is supported by trends toward greater transparency in policing nationwide. “In evaluating the reasonableness of police procedures under the Fourth Amendment,” the Supreme Court has, by its own account, “looked to prevailing rules in individual jurisdictions.” ICE agents’ masking is sharply discordant with rules requiring local police to wear badges and nameplates and barring them from preventing the public from reading the information. The increasing use of body-worn cameras similarly serves police accountability.

 

According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, however, assaults on ICE agents are up by more than 1,000% this year and masking has been informally tolerated to prevent doxxing, harassment and violence. Meanwhile, the U.S. Justice Department has begun to prosecute people who follow agents or publicize their addresses. Yet ICE has issued no policy requiring mask use to protect agents — nor any official guidelines on masking at all. Appearing on Fox News in July, the acting ICE director, Todd Lyons, equivocated. “I’m not a fan of the masks,” he said. “I think we could do better, but we need to protect our agents and officers.”

The unreasonableness of masked arrests is highlighted by state legislation outlawing the wearing of disguises by private individuals on public property. It reflects the understanding that masking promotes lawlessness — and as the Supreme Court has recognized, “Decency, security and liberty alike demand that government officials shall be subjected to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen.”

Currently, some 22 states have anti-masking rules on the books, as do many local governments, rules now being enforced to suppress peaceful dissent rather than criminal activity. In extreme instances, felony charges have been threatened against masked students protesting the war in Gaza. No doubt the repressive use of the restrictions will broaden. Last June, Trump posted on social media: “From now on, MASKS WILL NOT BE ALLOWED to be worn at protests. What do these people have to hide, and why???”

Anti-masking rules governing private conduct are almost a century old, with most originating in efforts to quell the terrors of the Ku Klux Klan. With much to hide, the Klan has attacked anti-masking laws in the very terms now used by ICE to defend masked arrests: “Members wear their masks to protect their anonymity,” the Klan has argued, “because of the harassment, threats of violence, violence.”

The depth of community protest against ICE agents’ masking may well be rooted in historical memory of faceless Klansmen riding through the night, seizing their captives. As Judge Young warned recently, “Masks are associated with cowardly desperados and the despised Ku Klux Klan. In all our history we have never tolerated an armed masked secret police.”

We should not do so now.

____

Amy Dru Stanley is a history professor at the University of Chicago. Craig Becker is a lawyer with Democracy Defenders Fund.

We Found That More Than 170 U.S. Citizens Have Been Held by Immigration Agents. They’ve Been Kicked, Dragged and Detained for Days.

Please note that this is from October so a lot more US citizens have been detained and abused by ICE.   Hugs

We Found That More Than 170 U.S. Citizens Have Been Held by Immigration Agents. They’ve Been Kicked, Dragged and Detained for Days.

Topics

Browse by Place

Type

Info

Follow ProPublica

A man in jeans and a light hoodie stands at the entrance to a house, surrounded by bright red dirt.
Leonardo Garcia Venegas was detained by immigration agents while filming a raid on his worksite, despite having a REAL ID on him and telling the officers he was a citizen.

Reporting Highlights

  • Americans Detained: The government doesn’t track how many citizens are held by immigration agents. We found more than 170 cases this year where citizens were detained at raids and protests.
  • Held Incommunicado: More than 20 citizens have reported being held for over a day without being able to call their loved ones or a lawyer. In some cases their families couldn’t find them.
  • Cases Wilted: Agents have arrested about 130 Americans, including a dozen elected officials, for allegedly interfering with or assaulting officers, yet those cases were often dropped.

These highlights were written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.

When the Supreme Court recently allowed immigration agents in the Los Angeles area to take race into consideration during sweeps, Justice Brett Kavanaugh said that citizens shouldn’t be concerned.

“If the officers learn that the individual they stopped is a U.S. citizen or otherwise lawfully in the United States,” Kavanaugh wrote, “they promptly let the individual go.”

But that is far from the reality many citizens have experienced. Americans have been dragged, tackled, beaten, tased and shot by immigration agents. They’ve had their necks kneeled on. They’ve been held outside in the rain while in their underwear. At least three citizens were pregnant when agents detained them. One of those women had already had the door of her home blown off while Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem watched.

About two dozen Americans have said they were held for more than a day without being able to phone lawyers or loved ones.

Videos of U.S. citizens being mistreated by immigration agents have filled social media feeds, but there is little clarity on the overall picture. The government does not track how often immigration agents hold Americans.

So ProPublica created its own count.

We compiled and reviewed every case we could find of agents holding citizens against their will, whether during immigration raids or protests. While the tally is almost certainly incomplete, we found more than 170 such incidents during the first nine months of President Donald Trump’s second administration.

Among the citizens detained are nearly 20 children, including two with cancer. That includes four who were held for weeks with their undocumented mother and without access to the family’s attorney until a congresswoman intervened.

Immigration agents do have authority to detain Americans in limited circumstances. Agents can hold people whom they reasonably suspect are in the country illegally. We found more than 50 Americans who were held after agents questioned their citizenship. They were almost all Latino.

Immigration agents also can arrest citizens who allegedly interfered with or assaulted officers. We compiled cases of about 130 Americans, including a dozen elected officials, accused of assaulting or impeding officers.

These cases have often wilted under scrutiny. In nearly 50 instances that we have identified so far, charges have never been filed or the cases were dismissed. Our count found a handful of citizens have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanors.

Among the detentions in which allegations have not stuck, masked agents pointed a gun at, pepper sprayed and punched a young man who had filmed them searching for his relative. In another, agents knocked over and then tackled a 79-year-old car wash owner, pressing their knees into his neck and back. His lawyer said he was held for 12 hours and wasn’t given medical attention despite having broken ribs in the incident and having recently had heart surgery. In a third case, agents grabbed and handcuffed a woman on her way to work who was caught up in a chaotic raid on street vendors. In a complaint filed against the government, she described being held for more than two days, without being allowed to contact the outside world for much of that time. (The Supreme Court has ruled that two days is generally the longest federal officials can hold Americans without charges.)

A man with a mustache wears a white T-shirt and stands with his arms crossed on an empty road.
George Retes, an American combat veteran, at the site of his arrest by immigration agents on California’s Central Coast. Retes was detained for three days without access to a lawyer and missed his daughter’s third birthday.

In response to questions from ProPublica, the Department of Homeland Security said agents do not racially profile or target Americans. “We don’t arrest US citizens for immigration enforcement,” wrote spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin.

A top immigration official recently acknowledged agents do consider someone’s looks. “How do they look compared to, say, you?” Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovino said to a white reporter in Chicago.

The White House told ProPublica that anyone who assaults federal immigration agents would be prosecuted. “Interfering with law enforcement and assaulting law enforcement is a crime and anyone, regardless of immigration status, will be held accountable,” said the Deputy Press Secretary Abigail Jackson. “Officers act heroically to enforce the law, arrest criminal illegal aliens, and protect American communities with the utmost professionalism.”

A spokesperson for Kavanaugh did not return an emailed request for comment.

An immigration raid on 79-year-old Rafie Ollah Shouhed’s car wash left him with broken ribs. Courtesy of Rafie Ollah Shouhed. Compiled by ProPublica.

Tallying the number of Americans detained by immigration agents is inherently messy and incomplete. The government has long ignored recommendations for it to track such cases, even as the U.S. has a history of detaining and even deporting citizens, including during the Obama administration and Trump’s first term.

We compiled cases by sifting through both English- and Spanish-language social media, lawsuits, court records and local media reports. We did not include arrests of protesters by local police or the National Guard. Nor did we count cases in which arrests were made at a later date after a judicial process. That included cases of some people charged with serious crimes, like throwing rocks or tossing a flare to start a fire.

Experts say that Americans appear to be getting picked up more now as a result of the government doing something that it hasn’t for decades: large-scale immigration sweeps across the country, often in communities that do not want them.

In earlier administrations, deportation agents used intelligence to target specific individuals, said Scott Shuchart, a top immigration official in the Biden, Obama and first Trump administrations. “The new idea is to use those resources unintelligently” — with officers targeting communities or workplaces where undocumented immigrants may be.

When federal officers roll through communities in the way the Supreme Court permitted, the constitutional rights of both citizens and noncitizens are inevitably violated, argued David Bier, the director of immigration studies at the libertarian Cato Institute. He recently analyzed how sweeps in Los Angeles have led to racial profiling. “If the government can grab someone because he’s a certain demographic group that’s correlated with some offense category, then they can do that in any context.”

Cody Wofsy, an attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, put it even more starkly. “Any one of us could be next.”

The video Garcia Venegas made of an immigration raid on a construction site shows him walking away from the officer while trying to film and then stating that he’s a citizen before being detained. Courtesy of Garcia Venega

When Kavanaugh issued his opinion that immigration agents can consider race and other factors, the Supreme Court’s three liberal justices strongly dissented. They warned that citizens risked being “grabbed, thrown to the ground, and handcuffed simply because of their looks, their accents, and the fact they make a living by doing manual labor.”

Leonardo Garcia Venegas appears to have been just such a case. He was working at a construction site in coastal Alabama when he saw masked immigration agents from Homeland Security Investigations hop a fence and run by a “No trespassing” sign. Garcia Venegas recalled that they moved toward the Latino workers, ignoring the white and Black workers.

Garcia Venegas began filming after his undocumented brother asked agents for a warrant. In response, the footage shows, agents yanked his brother to the ground, shoving his face into wet concrete. Garcia Venegas kept filming until officers grabbed him too and knocked his phone to the ground.

Other co-workers filmed what happened next, as immigration agents twisted the 25-year-old’s arms. They repeatedly tried to take him to the ground while he yelled, “I’m a citizen!”

Officers pulled out his REAL ID, which Alabama only issues to those legally in the U.S. But the agents dismissed it as fake. Officers held Garcia Venegas handcuffed for more than an hour. His brother was later deported.

A man with a small goatee seated on the steps of a single-wide home, wearing a blue shirt, jeans and a pair of sandals.
Leonardo Garcia Venegas told agents he was a citizen both times he was detained. His REAL ID was dismissed as a fake.

Garcia Venegas was so shaken that he took two weeks off of work. Soon after he returned, he was working alone inside a nearly built house listening to music on his headphones when he sensed someone watching him. A masked immigration agent was standing in the bedroom doorway.

This time, agents didn’t tackle him. But they again dismissed his REAL ID. And then they held him to check his citizenship. Garcia Venegas says agents also held two other workers who had legal status.

DHS did not respond to ProPublica’s questions about Garcia Venegas’ detentions, or to a federal lawsuit he filed last month. The agency has previously defended the agents’ conduct, saying he “physically got in between agents and the subject” during the first incident. The footage does not show that, and Garcia Venegas was never charged with obstruction or any other crime.

Garcia Venegas’ lawyers at the nonprofit Institute for Justice hope others may join his suit. After all, the reverberations of the immigration sweeps are being felt widely. Garcia Venegas said he knows of 15 more raids on nearby construction sites, and the industry along his portion of the Gulf Coast is struggling for lack of workers.

Kavanaugh’s assurances hold little weight for Garcia Venegas. He’s a U.S. citizen of Mexican descent, who speaks little English and works in construction. Even with his REAL ID and Social Security card in his wallet, Garcia Venegas worries that immigration agents will keep harassing him.

“If they decide they want to detain you,” he said. “You’re not going to get out of it.”

A plywood shell of a house with men on top of it adding roof framing.
Men building a home in rural Baldwin County, Alabama. Garcia Venegas was detained by immigration agents twice while working on homes in the area.

George Retes was among the citizens arrested despite immigration agents appearing to know his legal status. He also disappeared into the system for days without being able to contact anyone on the outside.

The only clue Retes’ family had at first was a brief call he managed to make on his Apple Watch with his hands handcuffed behind his back. He quickly told his wife that “ICE” had arrested him during a massive raid and protest on the marijuana farm where he worked as a security guard.

Still, Retes’ family couldn’t find him. They called every law enforcement agency they could think of. No one gave them any answers.

Eventually, they spotted a TikTok video showing Retes driving to work and slowly trying to back up as he’s caught between agents and protestors. Through the tear gas and dust, his family recognized Retes’ car and the veteran decal on his window. The full video shows a man — Retes — splayed on the ground surrounded by agents.

George Retes’ family noticed his car in a compiled video posted to TikTok. This clip from that longer video shows his white vehicle surrounded by tear gas. Immigration agents later pinned him on the ground. nota.sra/TikTok

Retes’ family went to the farm, where local TV reporters were interviewing families who couldn’t find their loved ones.

“They broke his window, they pepper sprayed him, they grabbed him, threw him on the floor,” his sister told a reporter between sobs. “We don’t know what to do. We’re just asking to let my brother go. He didn’t do anything wrong. He’s a veteran, disabled citizen. It says it on his car.”

Retes was held for three days without being given an opportunity to make a call. His family only learned where he had been after his release. His leg had been cut from the broken glass, Retes told ProPublica, and lingering pepper spray burned his hands. He tried to soothe them by filling sandwich bags with water.

Retes recalled that agents knew he was a citizen. “They didn’t care.” He said one DHS official laughed at him, saying he shouldn’t have come to work that day. “They still sent me away to jail.” He added that cases like his show Kavanaugh was “wrong completely.”

DHS did not answer our questions about Retes. It did respond on X after Retes wrote an op-ed last month in the San Francisco Chronicle. An agency post asserted he was arrested for assault after he “became violent and refused to comply with law enforcement.” Yet Retes had been released without any charges. Indeed, he says he was never told why he was arrested.

Retes said that agents knew he was a citizen. “They didn’t care.”

The Department of Justice has encouraged agents to arrest anyone interfering with immigration operations, twice ordering law enforcement to prioritize cases of those suspected of obstructing, interfering with or assaulting immigration officials.

But the government’s claims in those cases have often not been borne out.

Daniel Montenegro was filming a raid at a Van Nuys, California, Home Depot with other day-laborer advocates this summer when, he told ProPublica, he was tackled by several officers who injured his back.

Bovino, the Border Patrol chief who oversaw the LA raids and has since taken similar operations to cities like Sacramento and Chicago, tweeted out the names and photos of Montenegro and three others, accusing them of using homemade tire spikes to disable vehicles.

“I had no idea where that story came from,” Montenegro told ProPublica. “I didn’t find out until we were released. People were like, ‘We saw you on Twitter and the news and you guys are terrorists, you were planning to slash tires.’ I never saw those spike tire-popper things.”

Officials have not charged Montenegro or the others with any crimes. (Bovino did not respond to a request for comment, while DHS defended him in a statement to ProPublica: “Chief Bovino’s success in getting the worst of the worst out of the country speaks for itself.”)

The government’s cases are sometimes so muddied that it’s unclear why agents actually arrested a citizen.

Andrea Velez was charged with assaulting an officer after she was accidentally dropped off for work during a raid on street vendors in downtown Los Angeles. She said in a federal complaint that officers repeatedly assumed she did not speak English. Federal officers later requested access to her phone in an attempt to prove she was colluding with another citizen arrested that day, who was charged with assault. She was one of the Americans held for more than two days.

DHS did not respond to our questions about Velez, but it has previously accused her of assaulting an officer. A federal judge has dismissed the charges.

Other citizens also said officers accused them of crimes and suddenly questioned their citizenship — including a man arrested after filming Border Patrol agents break a truck window, and a pregnant woman who tried to stop officers from taking her boyfriend.

The prospects for any significant reckoning over agents’ conduct, even against citizens, are dim. The paths for suing federal agents are even more limited than they are for local police. And that’s if agents can even be identified. What’s more, the administration has gutted the office that investigates allegations of abuse by agents.

“The often-inadequate guardrails that we have for state and local government — even those guardrails are nonexistent when you’re talking about federal overreach,” said Joanna Schwartz, a professor at UCLA School of Law.

More than 50 members of Congress have also written to the administration, demanding details about Americans who’ve been detained. One is Sen. Alex Padilla, a California Democrat. After trying to question Noem about detained citizens, federal agents grabbed Padilla, pulled him to the ground and handcuffed him. The department later defended the agents, saying they “acted appropriately.”

How Moms for Liberty Took Over One Florida County

I can’t understand living just to hate and harm others who are not doing anything that harms you.    To carry that bitterness and to work so hard to deny to others what you demand for yourself seems like poisoning one’s self.  With so much to enjoy in diversity and inclusion why work so hard to create a homogeny of everyone being the same.   Hugs

https://www.unclosetedmedia.com/p/how-moms-for-liberty-took-over-one

As the M4L annual summit kicks off this weekend, here’s how one of the group’s original chapters is sowing chaos and pushing anti-LGBTQ policies in Indian River County.

Hope Pisoni
Oct 14, 2025

Design by Sam Donndelinger.

Mink Tyner says some people call her a “helicopter parent” because of how protective she is over her kids. Despite this, she wasn’t concerned about bringing her daughter, then 14, to the Indian River County, Florida, school board meeting in August 2023, where they were discussing changes to the state’s curriculum relating to race and slavery.

That’s why she was shocked when she saw community members at the podium reading excerpts of sexual content from books.

“I hate lights out now because my D has a mind of its own,” one woman read. Then a man came up and read, “When Doris had just turned 11, her current stepfather started having sex with her.” And a third person read, “He took a long long time peeling off my jeans and T-shirt, pink bra and panties, and a longer time stroking and kissing me.”

The meeting had turned into more of a stunt led by protestors affiliated with the local chapter of Moms for Liberty (M4L), a Southern Poverty Law Center-designated far-right extremist group.

“I’m not gonna have my kid in here listening to these adults doing this shit,” Tyner remembers thinking.

She took her daughter out of the room and pleaded with security to intervene, but they refused. So she spoke up to disrupt the meeting herself, only for security from the Sheriff’s office—who told Uncloseted Media their deputies responded “appropriately and in accordance with established procedures”—to escort her out.

As she was leaving, conservative pastor John Amanchukwu, who had attended the meeting with M4L, confronted her while recording a video that he would later post to X calling her “demonic” and lashing out about her being pro-LGBTQ: “You’re okay with DEI. … You’re okay with Pride Month. You’re okay with the rainbow flag. You’re okay with all that junk,” he yelled. Tyner responded by calling him a “fucking weirdo” and walked out.

That video opened a floodgate of harassment that tormented Tyner and her family for years: She received insults, accusations of pedophilia, and persistent threats of violence from a Facebook account displaying the name CURTIS COUSINS who called her a “fent-using fat fucking dyke” and told her she deserved to have “a potato peeler peel her clit right off to the bone.”

“I never know if this week or 10 years from now somebody’s gonna show up [to my business] based on some kind of misinformation that Moms for Liberty started about me [or] want to harm me and my family,” Tyner, who owns a tattoo shop, told Uncloseted Media.

Indian River County is home to one of the first of M4L’s 320 chapters nationwide. The group’s annual summit is this weekend and will feature a variety of politicians with anti-LGBTQ track records, including Oklahoma’s former state superintendent Ryan Walters, who made headlines for making anti-trans comments after the death of 16-year-old trans teen Nex Benedict. Last year, conservative heavyweights spoke at the event, including President Trump, Tulsi Gabbard and Sebastian Gorka.

Trump at last year’s M4L summit (WPTV)

Over the last four years, M4L have built a reputation for chaos and controversy. Members have made the news for quoting Hitler, stripping at a school board meeting and offering bounties to report teachers who teach about “critical race theory.”

At one point in Indian River County, close allies of M4L made up a majority of the school board where they pressured the district to ban scores of books, many of which contain LGBTQ themes, and reverse a racial equity policy—all while harassing, doxing and defaming their adversaries.

Maurice Cunningham, a retired professor of political science from the University of Massachusetts, says what’s playing out in Indian River County is a microcosm for so many other chapters across the country.

“[The media are] falling like suckers for this story that they’re a grassroots moms organization. They are not, they are connected to … the far right establishment,” he says. “And that’s become … more and more apparent. So this whole grassroots thing is hogwash.”

Beginnings

Moms for Liberty was founded in Florida in 2021 by three current and former school board members: Tiffany Justice, Tina Descovich and Bridget Ziegler, the latter of whom has since left the group after being involved in a sex scandal wherein her husband allegedly prowled local bars to solicit women for threesomes.

Shortly after M4L launched, Justice tapped Jennifer Pippin, who had made a name for herself for leading activism against COVID-19 restrictions, to lead the chapter for her home county, Indian River.

While the anti-mask circles that would later be folded into M4L always had a conservative lean, multiple county residents told Uncloseted Media that the group’s discriminatory views were not initially apparent.

Tyner, a lesbian who identifies as politically independent, actually felt welcomed by the group when she worked with them on their anti-mask mandate advocacy. However, that changed as M4L’s focus turned towards opposing LGBTQ inclusion measures in schools.

“Once they organized and got the appearance of a grassroots start … and many people in the community that were siding with them, it’s like they took the steering wheel and they just steered another direction,” she says.

When Tyner began speaking up against this rhetoric, she says she was blocked from the group’s Facebook pages. But as she continued to oppose them publicly, Justice offered to meet with her to address her concerns.

Over breakfast at a local cafe, Tyner says Justice gave her a “scripted” response in the hopes of winning back her support. She even invited Tyner to an M4L chapter meeting. However, Tyner declined as the meeting was allegedly to be hosted by a community member who had made an online post suggesting necrophilia and pedophilia are part of the LGBTQ umbrella.

“I was like, ‘Alright, this is not a good or a safe movement,” says Tyner.

Justice did not respond to a request for comment. In an email, Pippin told Uncloseted Media that M4L have “members and members children that are LGB in [their] chapter and across the country.”

Another local parent, who requested anonymity due to concerns about his job security, says while he’d initially been on board with M4L’s parental rights advocacy, he ran into conflict with the group when they started opposing the school district’s racial equity policies and tried to ban books with antiracist themes, including Ibram X. Kendi’s “Antiracist Baby” and “Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You.” Like Tyner, he says he was approached by Justice and Pippin to win him over again but was ultimately unconvinced.

After he split from M4L, he began publicly criticizing the group’s book bans. In retaliation, some M4L members accused him of supporting pedophiles.

When he reached out to Pippin to ask for the people making such accusations against him to be held accountable, he says she waved him off—all while blocking him on social media and accusing him of “bullying.” He also says that she doxed him after another dispute—a major factor in his decision to remain anonymous.

“Her response to me basically was ‘free speech,’ ‘we don’t control what our members say.’ And I’m like, ‘But Jennifer, you know me, and you know I’m not a pedophile, and this is unacceptable,’” he told Uncloseted Media.

Building Political Power

The Indian River County School District’s J.A. Thompson Administrative Center. Photo by Kiran891.

Efforts to ban LGBTQ and racial justice-related books in schools are part of M4L’s national ammo that helped them quickly explode in popularity.

Cunningham says M4L were boosted by high-profile connections on the right. Ziegler and Descovich both served as presidents of the Florida Coalition of School Board Members, a group billed as a conservative alternative to the Florida School Board Association. Ziegler’s husband, Christian, was vice chairman of Florida’s Republican Party at the time and worked as a media surrogate for the Trump campaign in 2016.

Since their launch, M4L have had their conferences and events sponsored by the Heritage Foundation and the Leadership Institute; were directly advised by Leadership Institute founder Morton Blackwell; and were a part of Project 2025’s advisory board. And this summer, Justice was hired as executive vice president of Heritage Action.

In 2022, the Indian River County chapter leveraged this influence to carve out power in local government: They got two close allies, Jacqueline Rosario and Dr. Gene Posca, elected to the school board, and they developed close relationships with the Ron DeSantis-backed county sheriff Eric Flowers. Pippin was even appointed by Florida’s Department of Education to a statewide workgroup to develop compliance training for Florida’s classroom censorship policies, including the infamous “Don’t Say Gay” law.

As M4L became notorious for pushing exclusionary measures in schools, some officials—including school board member Peggy Jones—criticized the group. In retaliation, Jones reportedly received so many death threats that the district had to increase security detail at all school events where she was present.

In the midst of increasing chaos surrounding M4L, the group mounted a campaign of hundreds of requests to ban books containing “sexual content.”

While some librarians continued to hold the majority of books where bans were unsuccessful, M4L convinced Flowers to investigate one school library, alleging that keeping the books on the shelf could constitute a sex crime. While the investigation found that no crime had been committed, Flowers concluded that “we do not feel that this content is appropriate for young children,” putting even further pressure on local librarians.

Pippin at the school board meeting in August 2023. Photo via YouTube.

This kind of direct action proved very effective. Even the reading protest where Tyner was escorted out won them 34 additional book bans from a unanimous board vote.

“You can’t deny that the kind of tactics that they have have been useful,” Cunningham says. “Some of the places they’ve taken over, [including] Sarasota County, where Bridget Ziegler was on the board, became much more conservative over the past few years.”

Silencing Opposition

In addition to school board meetings, the group has a track record of trolling progressive events. Tyner and the anonymous parent remember an incident where a group of M4L members showed up to a local National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) meeting that had been organized to discuss plans for opposition against new state regulations that required classes to portray slavery in a more positive light. Tyner says white M4L members attempted to shout down NAACP speakers, with one member allegedly using the n-word. Thomas Kenny, a M4L member who was at the event, said this “did not happen” and that one of their members using the n-word is “an absolute lie.”

Cunningham says these disruptions are part of M4L’s playbook. He pointed to the example of Jennifer Jenkins, the liberal school board member who unseated Tina Descovich in neighboring Brevard County, who says protestors spurred by M4L have turned up outside her home calling her a pedophile and burning “FU” in her lawn.

“They [use the] same kind of tactics … over and over again,” says Cunningham.

Pippin

Chapter leader Jennifer Pippin has mastered those tactics, becoming widely known as one of the most influential book banners in the country. She’s also made headlines for filing a complaint against the Kilted Mermaid, a Vero Beach wine bar, alleging that they had hosted an all-ages drag event with sexual content, which the bar owner denies. M4L rallied against the bar online, spamming the posts of one of the bar’s drag performers, telling the queen to “stay away from children.” This stunt caught the attention of Florida’s Attorney General James Uthmeier, who launched an investigation and issued subpoenas for video recordings of the bar on the day of the event as well as identifying documents for employees and performers.

Pippin has also claimed to be a nurse, despite no public records showing that she has a license, and appeared on the antisemitic and homophobic far-right news website TruNews, where she claimed, without evidence, that anti-M4L activists have been killing pets and livestock owned by the group’s members.

Fear

Tyner and the other anonymous parent both say that they’ve had to take a step back from the school board and local activism because of the toxic environment M4L have created.

“It’s been turned into such a circus,” Tyner says.

In the meantime, things have gotten worse for the LGBTQ community in Indian River County, and in Florida overall, between the “Don’t Say Gay” law and anti-LGBTQ legislation that requires teachers to deadname trans students unless they have signed parental permission slips. The anonymous parent says he’s watched many of the LGBTQ people in his life, including one of his own children, who is a teacher, leave the state due to the hostile environment.

“It’s not safe for a lot of people,” he says.

Greener Pastures?

Despite all of this, a sea change may be on the horizon. A 2024 Brookings report found that the success rates of M4L-endorsed candidates were on the decline, and in Indian River County’s elections last year, both of M4L’s school board candidates lost. With the continued controversies of the Trump administration and the growing popularity of groups that oppose M4L’s ideology, Cunningham feels the tide may be turning for M4L’s influence in Indian River County and across America.

“In school board races, the Moms for Liberty label is toxic, so try to not get attached to that,” he says. “They’ve had quite an impact … I don’t wanna downplay that. But in terms of popular appeal and growth, I think it’s much more limited than it is portrayed.”

Editor’s Note: In an email, Jennifer Pippin responded to the allegations made about her in this story. You can read them here.

If objective, nonpartisan, rigorous, LGBTQ-focused journalism is important to you, please consider making a tax-deductible donation through our fiscal sponsor, Resource Impact, by clicking this button:

Donate to Uncloseted Media

New headlines. It feels so good to be caught up.

tRump’s ego / tRump con artist / tRump steals from the taxpayers

WH Insisted FIFA “Peace Prize” Be As Big As World Cup

 

Trump: I’ll Give Myself $1B In My Lawsuit Against DOJ

 

Trump Boasts That He Can Identify A Giraffe [VIDEO]

 

WH Pitches Glitzy $112B Resorts On Gaza’s Rubble

 

 

Horrible people doing horrible things / Elections 

Bannon Gets Turning Point Crowd To Boo Rob Reiner

 

Stefanik Quit Race After Trump Withheld Endorsement

 

GOP Bill Would Authorize Pirates To Attack Drug Boats

 

 

Racism / Hate / DEI / Bigotry

Ramaswamy To Turning Point: Stop Being So Racist

 

State Dept Nominee Has Past Of Antisemitic Writings, Praise For Rioters, Call To Execute Teachers Union Chief

He has additionally espoused a view of the United States as a white, Christian nation, claiming that white people are undergoing a “cultural genocide” and deliberate replacement. 

Multiple Trump nominees have had histories of racist, violent, white supremacist, and even pro-Nazi tweets. But almost all of them still end up being confirmed by Senate Republicans.

 

 

Bessent Spits In Own Food And Storms Out Of DC Restaurant After Confrontation By CODEPINK Activist

 

 

The Ukrainian war 

Orban: “It’s Not Clear” Who Started Russia/Ukraine War

 

Epstein files / protecting tRump

At Least 550 Epstein Pages Are Entirely Blacked Out

 

Massie Blasts DOJ’s Partial Epstein Release As Illegal

 

DOJ Deletes Epstein Doc Containing Trump Photos

NPR identified more than a dozen files released by the DOJ on Friday that are no longer available Saturday afternoon, including one that shows President Trump’s photo on a desk among several other photographs. The removed files also show various works of art, including those containing nudity.

 

 

Health / US healthcare system

NYC Hit Hardest In Spreading “Super Flu” Outbreak

Trump: Lowering Drug Costs 800% Will Win Midterms

“Prices will be dropping by 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, and even 800%!

 

 

At USF Tampa, Christian supremacists mock, spit, and wave bacon at praying Muslim students

At USF Tampa, Christian supremacists mock, spit, and wave bacon at praying Muslim students

 

University of South Florida, TampaUSF logo. By Seán Kinane/WMNF News (Aug. 2015).

In Florida, maliciously disturbing a religious gathering is a first-degree misdemeanor, or a third-degree felony with hate crime enhancement.

by Valerie Smith – Creative Loafing; shared as part of the Tampa Bay Journalism Project

Composite image of three vertical panels: (Left) A man in a cap looking up in profile; (Center) A man with a beard wearing a white robe and turban, with the text "12th IMAM SAYS JESUS IS GOD" in large blue letters; (Right) A young man in a light blue shirt smiling over his shoulder.(L-R) Richard Penkoski, Christopher Svochak, and Ricardo.Credit: Screengrab via Warriors for Christ / YouTube

A video posted to Instagram by the University of South Florida’s Muslim Student Association (MSA) shows three men interrupting students during their morning prayer, spitting and yelling at them, and waving strips of bacon at them. USF said that their police department is currently gathering evidence and anticipates asking the state attorney to bring criminal charges.

Last Tuesday morning, Nov. 18, several MSA members gathered on top of a parking garage on USF’s Tampa campus for Fajr, Islam’s morning prayer. A livestream by Warriors for Christ—an organization recognized by the SPLC as a hate group—shows Muslim students kneeling in prayer as one of the men, identified in the video only as Ricardo, approaches with a painted cardboard box that reads “KAABA 2.0 JESUS IS LORD.” The Kaaba is a stone building at the center of the holiest site in Islam. While praying, Muslims face the geographical direction of the Kaaba.

The man sets up the box in front of the crowd while two other men, identifiable via their social medias (where they posted the video along with many other similar videos at other locations) as Richard Penkoski of Oklahoma and Christopher Svochak of Illinois, start to “insult” the Muslim prophet, Muhammad, in obscene and sexual ways. One of the men calls them all terrorists. “Go back to Mecca,” he shouts.

At one point, Penkoski brings out a small Wawa container with bacon in it and waves it around while snacking from it.

“We do care about you, so we brought you some bacon,” Penkoski says. “It’s really good. Bacon? Bacon? Anybody?”

Like all pork products, bacon is considered haram, meaning Islam’s rules forbid eating it. All of the students remain kneeling and continue on with their prayer.

“I spit on the grave of Muhammad,” the man identified as Ricardo says before spitting on the ground within a few feet of the students, who are still praying on the ground.

“Take that towel off of your head,” he says, pointing to a woman in the back wearing a religious head covering. At this point, after several minutes of the men shouting at the largely silent students, Ricardo lunges towards a student and points his finger in his face, prompting the student to briefly grab his wrist. Immediately, all three Christian men say this is evidence that Islam is a violent religion.

“This is not how you preach,” one of the students can be heard saying. “Brother, you’re harassing us,” he says to Penkoski.

“You’re not my brother,” Penkoski responds. “This isn’t harassment; this is free speech. But thank you for doing what you did to give us more ammo to prove you’re a bunch of violent psychopaths.”

The video continues like this until the students leave and the Christian content creators do the same. “That was awesome. That was fun,” one of the men can be heard saying as they walk away.

“By the way, don’t ever spit on the ground. It’s actually illegal,” one of the Christians says to the man identified as Ricardo. “What? Spitting on the ground?” “Yes, it’s illegal.” “Well, uh, I didn’t know that.”

Penkoski later posted a screenshot from the MSA group chat, in which one member gives an update on legal proceedings with the state attorney’s office.

“It’s not a hate crime,” Penkoski writes in the caption. “For a ‘hate crime’ to exist, there has to be an actual crime first.”

  • Florida Statute 871.01, which makes disrupting religious assembly a crime, reads: “Whoever willfully and maliciously interrupts or disturbs any school or any assembly of people met for the worship of God, … commits a misdemeanor of the first degree.” In Florida, a first-degree misdemeanor is punishable by up to a $1,000 fine and one year in prison.
  • Florida Statute 775.085 contains rules for hate crime enhancement when there is evidenced prejudice against “race, color, ancestry, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, national origin, homeless status, or advanced age of the victim.” This bumps first-degree misdemeanors up to third-degree felonies. Third-degree felonies are punishable by up to $5,000 in fines and five years in prison.
  • Florida Statute 784.0493 deals with harassment based on religious or ethnic heritage. It makes it illegal (first-degree misdemeanor) to “willfully and maliciously harass or intimidate another person based on the person’s wearing or displaying of any indicia relating to any religious or ethnic heritage.”

The man, identified as Ricardo repeatedly told two women with religious head coverings to “get that towel off your head,” and called one a “wicked woman” and a “Jezebel dog.”

As the men left the parking garage, Svochak spoke to the camera, saying Jesus helped him and Penkoski beat drug addiction.

“What did he save you from?” Penkoski asks Ricardo. “I used to be a heathen,” Ricardo replies.

The state attorney typically decides what initial charges to bring. The 13th Circuit State Attorney’s Office has plans to speak with Creative Loafing Tampa Bay this morning, but as a policy it waits to start a case until police send investigative information along.

A statement issued by USF says that campus police are still trying to identify the men in the video. USF also said that it has reached out to the affected students, and will issue trespass warnings to the men who interrupted the prayer. They anticipate referring the perpetrators to the state attorney for criminal charges.

This wouldn’t be the first time Penkoski found himself in court over a stunt. The Christian content creator takes videos of himself and others “street preaching,” often insulting and demeaning nearby targets. Penkoski uploads the videos to his social media accounts and makes other targeted posts and includes a donation link through a Venmo account under his wife’s name.

In 2022, Penkoski was accused of targeting two leaders of Oklahoma for Equality, who later filed for a protective order against him. They were granted the protective order, but it was overturned on appeal by the Oklahoma Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision, since Penkoski was targeting organizations rather than individuals.

Penkoski has also been the plaintiff in several legal battles, including an attempt to overturn federal marriage equality for gay couples, a suit against the mayor of Washington D.C. for allowing a “Black Lives Matter” mural, and a lawsuit against a school district that sent his daughter home for wearing a shirt that said “homosexuality is a sin.”

CAIR Florida has called for a hate crime probe for this and another similar incident that took place in Florida. 

Svochak gave this reporter a statement about his religious beliefs over Instagram DM, but would not answer specific questions. Svochak, who is affiliated with the recognized hate group Warriors for Christ, said that he is trying to spread Jesus’ message of love.

Tags

, , , , 

Protests in Dearborn: Anti-Islam activists clash with Muslim residents

https://www.mlive.com/news/2025/11/protests-in-dearborn-anti-islam-activists-clash-with-muslim-residents.html

Jake Lang
Jake Lang, a Jan. 6 rioter and anti-Islam activist, leads a protest on Michigan Avenue in Dearborn on Nov. 18, 2025.Fuad Shalhout — MLive.com
By

DEARBORN, MI — A pair of dueling demonstrations unfolded along Schaefer Road and Michigan Avenue on Tuesday, Nov. 18, as anti-Islam activists and pro-Muslim counter-protesters clashed in front of a heavy police presence before moving toward Dearborn City Hall for the evening council meeting.

The city, home to one of the largest Muslim populations in the United States, has recently become a repeated target for out-of-state activists who falsely claim it operates under “Sharia law.”

The tensions began when Jake Lang, a Jan. 6 rioter who has described himself as a political prisoner, arrived on Michigan Avenue attempting to burn a Quran.

Lang tried several times to ignite the book, holding it up with a lighter, but counter-protesters repeatedly knocked it from his hands.

At one point, Lang stepped into the center of Michigan Avenue and tapped the Quran with a slab of bacon before a Muslim counter-protester snatched the book and ran off with it.

Lang’s group later marched toward City Hall ahead of the 7 p.m. meeting.

Curtis Hertel, chair of the Michigan Democratic Party, released the following statement.

“Attempting to burn a religious document is an unacceptable act of hate,” Hertel said. “Dearborn is a beloved, multicultural city with tens of thousands of people who are cherished friends, family members, and neighbors.”

Pro Muslim and Palestine supporter
A pro-Muslim and pro-Palestinian supporter holds a sign reading “Defeat Trump’s Fascist Movement” during a counterprotest in Dearborn on Nov. 18, 2025.Fuad Shalhout — MLive.com

A Dearborn police officer told MLive there were about seven police cars stationed nearby to help keep the situation calm.

At the same time this was happening, Michigan gubernatorial candidate Anthony Hudson, who had previously organized a separate protest without affiliation to Lang, walked with supporters along the sidewalk.

Hudson’s and Lang’s demonstrations were unrelated but appeared in the city on the same afternoon, drawing a mix of residents, activists, and counter-protesters on both sides of Michigan Avenue.

Hudson, a truck driver from Grand Blanc Township, had initially planned a protest to take place in Dearborn, dubbing it an “American Crusade” against “Muslim infiltration” and “Sharia Law,” according to a news release from the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Yet after visiting three mosques in the area, Hudson declared “that there are many false and misleading narratives about Dearborn being spread and that all he found from Muslims in Dearborn was hospitality.” He further stated that he was opposed to outsiders coming to Dearborn with plans to burn the Quran.

As a result, Lang spray-painted the word “cuck” on what appeared to be Hudson’s campaign bus in Dearborn, accusing the Republican candidate of “selling out” for visiting mosques and expressing sympathy toward Muslims.

Hudson later denied the bus belonged to him.

Anthony Hudson
Michigan gubernatorial candidate Anthony Hudson walks with supporters during a protest on Michigan Avenue in Dearborn on Nov. 18, 2025.Fuad Shalhout — MLive.com

One Hudson supporter, Kelly Elias, said she drove several hours from Northern Michigan because she wanted to see the situation firsthand.

“I just wanted to come and see what the mainstream media (is reporting) — if they’re lying to us. I’m Arabic too. I’m from the God of love. I don’t want to hurt anybody. If we’re in danger or if there’s any problem, I want to know. But if not, let’s be peaceful with each other and solve this problem. We need to work together and be just. Love each other. We don’t need any problems. Anybody with hate.”

Elias described herself as culturally mixed.

“I’m Lebanese, I’m Syrian, Italian,” she said. “I’m a mix.”

She said she has long viewed Dearborn positively.

“I’ve always thought it was a wonderful area. I’ve had friends here. I worked in Detroit. I lived in Detroit,” Elias said.

On the other side of the street, Muslim and pro-Palestinian counter-protesters rallied in response to Lang’s actions and the broader anti-Islam messaging.

Dearborn resident Karrar Haidar explained why he attended the protest.

“To show the American people that we are a religion of peace and we can coexist as the Abrahamic religions have coexisted in previous times,” Haidar said. “Some people are a little bit more extreme in their ideology, but we’re here to show them that we also have a voice and this is our country, too.

“Everybody comes from some sort of immigration, and we’re all happy to be here. We all pay our taxes, we go to work and try to provide for our family.”

Haidar also addressed claims that Dearborn is governed by Sharia law.

“If they really do believe Sharia is the jurisdiction here in Dearborn, when you walk in, you see a monument in regards of Maryam and Prophet Jesus,” he said.

He said protesters coming to Dearborn misunderstand the community.

“I think they lost their core beliefs with Christianity,” Haidar said. “I feel like there’s a form of Christianity that exists in this country that is more toward spreading hate. Because if you go towards Ford Road, you’ll see a mosque and two churches side by side, standing strong in solidarity. So, I don’t know what their ideology is. I think it’s more of a political extremist view rather than a religious one.”

Muslims performing a prayer
Muslim demonstrators pray outside Dearborn City Hall during protests on Nov. 18, 2025.Fuad Shalhout — MLive.com

As both sides continued chanting and walking toward City Hall, police kept a perimeter on the sidewalks and along Michigan Avenue, intervening briefly when tensions escalated over Lang’s attempted Quran burning.

One person was seen arrested at the Dearborn City Hall. No injuries were immediately reported.

Fuad Shalhout headshot

Fuad Shalhout

Fuad Shalhout is the business and community reporter at MLive.com-The Flint Journal. He joined MLive in July 2022 and covers a range of topics from new business openings, property sales and human interest…

Some news articles I wanted to get to but did not have time. Now I am caught up to today

So Ron and his sister arrived two days ago.   Lucky for me she is a doer who jumps in to do stuff and doesn’t wait for others to do for her.  She has really helped Ron get a lot of stuff done.  She helps when my back goes out.  She is doing supper right now so I can catch up on the last few days of news.   I really hope she finds a place to her tastes here as she is a good influence for Ron.   Hugs, loves to all, and best wishes to all who wish them.   Scottie

Thanks to Ron’s sister jumping in and doing all the extra stuff I have been trying to do I can rest my back while doing my posting.   I could get used to this.   Hugs

Affordability and costs of things in the US

Scott Bessent Claims Without Evidence That “Rents Are Coming Down Substantially” Due To Mass Deportations

 

Judge Declines To Halt Liberace’s Ballroom (For Now)

 

President Liberace Raises Ballroom Cost To $400 Million

 

 

 

tRump’s illegal war for profit to please the corporations he told to give him a billion dollars for his campaign and he would do what ever they asked.  Wow US military young adults sold for tRump’s profit.   Hugs

 

Trump Announces “Complete Blockade” Of Venezuela

 

Trump: I’m Getting Our Stolen Oil Back From Venezuela

 

Trump Asks Big Oil If They Want To Return To Venezuela

 

WaPo: Voldemort Secretly Behind “Drug Boat” Strikes

 

Politico: Trump Lied About “Warrior Bonus” For Troops

The $1,776 per person bonuses, unveiled by Trump in his nationwide address Wednesday night, will be covered with funding approved in the Big Beautiful Bill that passed in July, according to the congressional officials and later confirmed by the Pentagon. The payouts — which will cost roughly $2.6 billion — will be a “one-time basic allowance for housing supplement to all eligible service members,” said the official.

 

Trump Says He Will Not Rule Out War With Venezuela

 

Two “Drug Boat” Strikes Bring Murder Count To 104

 

 

 

DEI / Hate / Bigotry / Racism / White Supremacy.  

Coast Guard Enacts Downgraded Policy On Swastikas

 

Christian Nationalist/J6 Flag Posted In Education Dept

 

DHS Funneled $1 Billion Contract To Trump Donor

 

ICE Leader Jailed With ICE Detainees After Federal Charge For Strangling Decades-Younger Girlfriend

 

Trump Judge Threatens Contempt Over ICE Conditions: “Putrid, Cramped, Filthy, Unheated, Lights Blaring 24/7”

 

 

Hegseth: “I’m Making Military Chaplains Great Again”

 

White House To Ramp Up Stripping Of Citizenships

 

EEOC Solicits Lawsuits For “Anti-White Male” Bias

 

Trump Endorses Maine Racist Paul LePage For US House

 

 

Ryan Walters Melts Down: “The Left-Wing OK Supreme Court Has Attacked Christianity, The Bible, And Trump”

 

Tennessee High Schools To Get Turning Point Clubs

 

 

CBS News To Air Town Halls About God And Feminism

 

Franklin Graham At Pentagon Xmas Worship Service: “God Hates And God Is Also A God Of War” [VIDEO]

 

 

House Passes Bill Criminalizing Trans Youth Healthcare

 

Mehmet Oz: “The Creation Of A Penis Costs $150,000 Per Child, If You Add Testicles, That’s Extra” [VIDEO]

The Trump administration announced several moves Thursday that will have the effect of essentially banning gender-affirming care for transgender young people, even in states where it is still legal.   

The second would block all Medicaid and Medicare funding for any services at hospitals that provide pediatric gender-affirming care.

 

 

 

Really stupid things say and blame democrats for just because they think it sounds good not realizing how dumb it seems.   

 

Beetleboob Blames Dems For Colorado Power Outage

Wiles: Trump Lied About Clinton Visiting Epstein’s Island

DAMAGE CONTROL: White House Has Entire Cabinet Post Defenses Of WH Chief Of Staff Susie Wiles On X

 

Trump Installs WH Plaques Ridiculing Former Presidents

 

DOJ Launches Crackdown On Left Wing Activism

 

DOJ Offers States Secret Deal For Role In Elections

As Democracy Docket previously reported, in his previous role as a prosecutor in the Los Angeles district attorney’s office, Neff was put on leave after bringing charges against an election software executive based on information from conspiracy-driven election denier group True the Vote. The saga ultimately cost taxpayers $5 million to settle a lawsuit over the flawed prosecution.

Neff is also affiliated with True The Vote, the far-right QAnon group featured in Dinesh D’Souza’s debunked “2000 Mules” film.

 

 

tRump’s many crimes

Jack Smith: I Have Proof Beyond Any Reasonable Doubt Trump Criminally Conspired To Overturn 2020 Election

 

 

 

 

Boosting the fascist state and the dear leader.

 

Vance: Those Who Privately Trash Trump Are “Traitors”

 

Trump Again Dozes Off During White House Meeting

Slumped over in his chair at the Resolute desk, Trump’s face slackened—eyes drooping, the corners of his mouth sagging—as he fought off sleep. The elderly president has now been caught appearing to doze off at four official events in six weeks.

 

Dem Rep: I Was Muted During Kennedy Renaming Vote

 

Dear Leader’s Name Added To Kennedy Center Signage

 

DOJ Is Racing To Redact Thousands Of Epstein Pages

 

Blanche: DOJ Won’t Release Full Epstein Files Today

 

Trump Administration Now Targeting Wildlife Refuges

 

 

Positive news / Good things / Pro-LGBTQ+ Stuff

 

Palm Springs Neighbor City Of Palm Desert Rejects Anti-Pride Resolution After Impassioned Speeches By Locals

 

Study: COVID Vax Lowered Death Risk For All Causes

 

Australia To Buy Back Guns After Bondi Mass Shooting

 

Romney Calls For Higher Taxes On Wealthy “Like Me”

 

 

And now to more recent news. Yes! I finally caught up. Oh wow

This is incredible and the best I have felt in 5 months.  I have had so much old news, many hundreds of back logged news I wanted to share.  I recently found out that the mail stuff I would share was stuck on my phone so did not post.  I cleared that.  Today right now all old news mail articles are posted, the stuff I want to share is posted.   I still have to do the video on what happened because I got long term Covid.  Sadly I was able to do this because Ron was gone to Texas to help his sister and now they are on their way home.  More pressure to do as much as I can with my pain and disability.  So I have two more rooms to work on before they get here later this week.  I want to do a video on the entire thing but may not.   My goal was to clear all these tabs and then do videos …. but we will see, Hugs

Prices / affordability /

 

Bill Would Ban AI-Driven “Dynamic” Grocery Pricing

 

Trump Admin Races To Thwart Possible Tariff Refunds

 

Johnson Won’t Allow Vote On Extending ACA Subsidies

 

 

tRump Admin trying to hurt workers and lower incomes

Trump Admin Moves To Dissolve TSA Union Contract

 

 

 

Grifting / Cons / tRump family scams / tRump family news

Trump Presidential Library To Include “Fake News Wing”

 

President Liberace Boasts About New West Wing Sign

 

Trump: “My Arc Will Blow Away The Arc De Triomphe”

 

Trump Sues BBC For $10 Billion Over Capitol Riot Film

 

Wiles Torches Top White House Officials In Interview, Says Glorious Leader “Has An Alcoholic’s Personality”

Audio Busts Wiles Lying About Musk’s Ketamine Use

 

Wiles: Trump Lied About Clinton Visiting Epstein’s Island

 

DAMAGE CONTROL: White House Has Entire Cabinet Post Defenses Of WH Chief Of Staff Susie Wiles On X

 

Vance: Those Who Privately Trash Trump Are “Traitors”

 

 

Johnson Won’t Allow Vote On Extending ACA Subsidies

 

 

 

 

Hate / DEI  /  Racism /  ICE

 

COPS: Wisconsin Man Used Grindr To Harass Victim

https://youtu.be/HVKzTOzT1SQ

 

 

Rep. Ilhan Omar: My Son Was Pulled Over By ICE

https://youtu.be/pupz-Dechn8

 

Bessent Cancels “Woke” Commemorative Quarters

Mr. Bessent opted instead for the more general, and much whiter. 

 

Texas Universities Use AI To Root Out “Woke” Courses

 

Heritage Hires Anti-LGBTQ Extremist For Key Post

 

 

Carlson: Nick Fuentes Is Successful Because He’s Right

 

Rep. Randy Fine: Denaturalize And Deport All Muslims

 

Paladino: “Expel All Muslims From Western Nations”

 

Rioter/GOP Senate Candidate Jake Lang Claims He’ll “Storm” Colorado Prison To “Break Out Tina Peters”

The city, home to one of the largest Muslim populations in the United States, has recently become a repeated target for out-of-state activists who falsely claim it operates under “Sharia law.” The tensions began when Jake Lang, a Jan. 6 rioter who has described himself as a political prisoner, arrived on Michigan Avenue attempting to burn a Quran.

 

Border Chief: Everyone Must Carry Citizenship Proof

Federal law enforcement agencies are detaining US citizens who do not carry proof of their citizenship in what civil rights advocates describe as a flagrant violation of constitutional rights—and a top Trump administration official is claiming the government has the authority to do so.   Bovino recently lied in court about being hit with a rock by anti-ICE protesters, despite video showing that never happened. According to reports, some Border officials privately refer to Bovino a “Little Napoleon” due to his height and volatile temper.

 

 

 

 

 

Things that are just wrong on too many levels / Medical Misinformation / tRump’s illegal war to steal oil / Rule by decree

Zelensky Drops Request For Ukraine To Join NATO

The only one making concessions here is Ukraine

 

 

JetBlue Has Near Miss With US Aircraft Near Venezuela

The pilot of a JetBlue flight reported on Friday that he narrowly avoided colliding with a U.S. military aircraft over the Caribbean after an Air Force refueling tanker passed in front of the commercial plane without broadcasting its position, according to air traffic control radio communications.

 

DOE Moves To Build Nuclear-Powered AI Data Centers

 

FDA Likely To Roll Back Warning Labels On Supplements

 

Trump Signs Order Designating Fentanyl As A WMD

so fuking stupid, it’s an fda approved drug

Thumbnail

US Kills Eight More In Three Pacific “Drug Boat” Strikes

 

Pentagon To Downgrade Military Command Groups

It would reduce in prominence the headquarters of U.S. Central Command, U.S. European Command and U.S. Africa Command by placing them under the control of a new organization known as U.S. International Command. Those familiar with the plan said it aligns with the Trump administration’s national security strategy, released this month, that declares that the “days of the United States propping up the entire world order like Atlas are over.”

Their way to rid themselves of officers who will refuse to follow an illegal order and put command in the hands of those who will.  All of this is to reduce the number of Admirals and Generals who could credibly disobey the illegal orders that will be coming soon.

 

 

The Atlantic: New Pentagon Policy Is A “Suicide Note”

This past September, the Trump administration terminated these agreements. The center’s former head, James Rubin, called this decision “a unilateral act of disarmament,” and no wonder: In effect, the United States was declaring that it would no longer oppose Russian influence campaigns, Chinese manipulation of local politics, or Iranian extremist recruitment drives. Nor would the American government use any resources to help anyone else do so either.

 

Hegseth Refuses To Releases Full Double-Tap Video

 

 

 

Things that are good and need to be mentioned.

Australia To Further Tighten Gun Control Laws [VIDEO]

 

Wisconsin Judge Advances Case Against Fake Electors

 

 

Yes more recent news. But wow has the US gone nuts! The grifting, hate, and denying basic facts of reality is really scary.

Trump: European Nations Want Me As Their Leader

 

 

Boebert Spent $3381 In Donor Money To See Kid Rock

 

Miami Herald: DeSantis Secretly Diverted $35M Meant For Needy Children To Anti-Weed And Anti-Abortion Ads

 

Trump Plans To Seize DC-Area’s Public Golf Courses

 

 

US Begins Selling $1M “Trump Gold” Fast Citizenship

Foreign nationals can now pay $1 million plus a $15,000 processing fee for the Trump Gold Card, which grants them U.S. residency “in record time,” the website states. Corporations, meanwhile, can also partake in the program by making a $2 million contribution and paying the $15,000 processing fee.

 

GOP Senator: Make Things Affordable By Earning More

 

 

Almost 400 J6 Rioters Seek Millions In “Restitution”

The St. Louis-based lawyer declined to share copies, citing his clients’ privacy, but said most are seeking $1 million to $10 million for alleged injuries and property damage during their arrest, prosecution and, in many cases, imprisonment. Earlier this year, US officials agreed to pay nearly $5 million this year to settle a claim brought by the family of Ashli Babbitt, who was shot and killed by a police officer inside the Capitol on Jan. 6.

 

 

SC Measles Outbreak: 111 Cases, One Person Vaxxed

 

South Carolina Measles Outbreak Continues To Worsen

 

 

QAnon Ron Johnson Backs Using Bleach To Treat Autism

 

FDA To Label COVID Vax With “Most Serious Warning”

 

Denmark Designates US As Potential Security Threat

 

Florida Sues Starbucks For Anti-White Discrimination

In the lawsuit filed Wednesday, Uthmeier’s office alleged that for the “past five years and continuing to the present day, defendant has excluded or disfavored nonminorities in numerous employment practices and programs.”

 

NPS Gift Shops Get Deadline To Purge “DEI” Merch

The move is part of the administration’s wider campaign to scrub federal institutions of “corrosive ideology” recognizing historical racism and sexism. The directive instructs park staff to report by Friday any retail items that have content that “inappropriately disparages Americans past or living” or that includes “matters unrelated to the beauty, abundance or grandeur” of a natural feature in its description.

 

Border Chief Wants “Honor Of Cuffing” Rep. Ilhan Omar

DHS Is Using TSA Lists To Make Deportation Arrests

 

 

Hegseth Posts Cartoon Of “Trans” Person Being Kicked

 

FL City Hits Back At Duffy With 11 Rainbow Bike Racks

Key West Hits Back At Duffy With Rainbow Fences

Hit the link for many photos of Key West homes now sporting rainbow picket fences. As for Ms. Walker, the self-proclaimed “Christian Republican” felt compelled to boast about her complaint on X.

 

Arlington Pride Canceled After City Axes LGBTQ Rights

Literal Potty Police Demand IDs In Texas Capitol

 

Kirk’s Killer May Face Anti-Christian Hate Crime Charge

 

 

Leavitt: US May Seize More Oil Tankers Near Venezuela

Yet the Russian oil shadow fleet is left totally alone by the tRump admin?  I wonder why the oil tankers off Venezuela are OK to attack yet the same sanctioned oil tankers of Russia are off limits?  What is the difference between illegal sanctioned oil tankers?  Oh yes Putin has something over on tRump.   Hugs 

 

Navy Submits Possible Punishments For Sen. Mark Kelly

 

WSJ: Pentagon Readies “Land Strikes” On Venezuela

 

 

DOJ Sues Georgia’s Fulton County For 2020 Election Records And Four Blue States For Lists Of Voter Rolls

“States have the statutory duty to preserve and protect their constituents from vote dilution,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

This is code for balck people voting which white supremacist feel makes their votes less important.   Hugs

 

 

Duffy Threatens To Pull $73M In NY Highway Funds

 

Cops: ICE Leader Strangled Decades-Younger Girlfriend

 

 

News For The Upcoming Week:

SCOTUS works, mass shootings, Judge Hannah Dugan’s case, and more this week, from Joyce Vance.

The Week Ahead

Joyce Vance Dec 14, 2025

Saturday was shattered by two mass shootings. The first, at Brown University in Rhode Island, happened as students prepared for exams. Two people were killed and nine injured. A “person of interest,” which is a law enforcement term that means someone law enforcement wants to speak with about a crime, but whom they are not yet prepared to charge, is in custody.

Frequently, a person of interest will evolve into a suspect. But tonight, there is news that individual has been released. Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha explained that although there was “some degree of evidence” that pointed to a 24-year-old Wisconsin man who was detained Sunday morning, “that evidence needed to be corroborated and confirmed, and over the last 24 hours leading into just very, very recently, that evidence now points in a different direction.”

It’s important to give law enforcement the time it needs to do its job here, to ensure that all threats to the community are fully mitigated, and as much as possible is learned about what prompted the shooting, so victims can have closure.

What seems unimaginable to people who graduated before the epidemic of school shootings is all too real for this generation of students. Today is the anniversary of the deadliest school shooting in our history, at Sandy Hook Elementary school, where the shooter killed 26 people, 20 six- and seven-year-old children and six adults. The shooter killed his mother before he drove to Sandy Hook and took his own life as law enforcement arrived at the school.

This post on threads got it absolutely right:

The second shooting was a terrorist attack launched by two men against Jews celebrating Hanukkah at the beach in Sydney, Australia, another incident in a tide of rising antisemitism. The death toll continues to climb. The shooters took the lives of a beloved rabbi and at least 14 others who were at the event for families. A Holocaust survivor and a 10-year-old girl were also among the victims. It seems impossible that this explanation needs to be offered, but increasingly, it is essential: killing innocent Jews does not help people in Gaza, if, indeed, that was the motivation here.

One point of light in the tragedy was the bravery of a local fruit shop owner, Ahmed El Ahmad, who ran towards the violence and snatched an enormous, long gun from the hands of one of the shooters. Ahmad was shot by the other terrorist and is recovering in hospital.

After this turbulent weekend, we head into a week that promises more chaos.

Judge Hannah Dugan’s Trial Starts Monday

After jury selection began late last week, trial gets underway for Wisconsin state Judge Hannah Dugan, who was indicted by the Justice Department last May for helping a noncitizen try to evade arrest by immigration authorities at the county courthouse where she sits, last April.

If you want to review the facts and the background, we discussed this situation when the Judge was first arrested and again when she was indicted.

Judge Dugan’s capable lawyers will put on a solid defense. She has maintained she was simply trying to keep order in her courtroom and permitted the non-citizen to use one of the doors leading out of her courtroom that was less public, but that didn’t prevent agents and officers from accosting him. The message behind the indictment is clear: If they can arrest judges, no one is safe. And in the months since Duggan’s indictment, the administration has certainly expanded on it, indicting Kilmar Abrego Garcia on stale charges in apparent retaliation for his efforts to insist he was illegally deported and bringing now-failed indictments against a former FBI Director, Jim Comey, and current New York State Attorney General, Letitia James, whom Trump views as political enemies.

The good people of Wisconsin seem to understand this threat. They have been protesting even since the Judge was first detained.

We will follow the trial’s progress this week. Tuesday night at 6:30 p.m. Central, we’ll be joined by legal reporter Adam Klasfeld of All Rise News, who will be in the courtroom this week and will join us to share what’s transpiring. Make sure you mark your calendars.

Friday, DOJ is required to release the Epstein Files

On the heels of House Democrats’ release of photographs from Jeffrey Epstein’s estate last week, the Justice Department has a deadline on Friday. This is the result of the law Congress overwhelmingly passed in mid-November to force the DOJ to release its files related to Jeffrey Epstein.

Whether DOJ will comply is an entirely different matter. Trump demanded that his attorney general open an investigation into only Democrats whose names have surfaced. Bondi may well try to use that new investigation to block demands for release. We’ve already lived through a government shutdown, which seemed to be contrived at least partially to prevent the passage of the law requiring this disclosure and the record-breaking 50-day delay in swearing in newly elected Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva of Arizona. So it’s clear the administration is determined to protect the president from further disclosures like Friday’s photo of “Trump Condoms.”

Survivors deserve justice and the public demand for it is what’s driving the process here. Keep demanding.

But ultimately, if DOJ balks, that could require intervention in the courts and delay matters. Democrats, who are in the minority in both the Senate and the House, lack the ability to issue subpoenas to obtain further information from Epstein’s estate, information that could provide the source of and context for photos that were released last week and additional information like financial records and testimony from witnesses. A process like this is essential if there is going to be accountability for Epstein’s operation and the people who participated in it, benefited from it, and helped to conceal it. So it’s worth noting that Republicans currently hold a very slender majority in the House, which will narrow further with the departure of Marjorie Taylor Greene and perhaps others, even before the midterm election.

Control of the House likely determines whether the full files ever get released.

SCOTUS

The Court is done hearing oral arguments until it picks back up with them on January 12. But that doesn’t mean we might not hear from them in the form of decisions off of the shadow docket as we head into the holidays, with National Guard cases, among other issues, developing in multiple states.

Trump Excesses

This afternoon, Trump posted “Get Your TRUMP CARD today!” on Truth Social. It’s an advertisement for the so-called Trump Card, a golden ticket for those wealthy (and presumably white) enough to buy immigration status in the U.S.

Trump even helpfully added a link to where people could go to apply—on what’s being billed as “an official website of the U.S.” at trumpcard.gov

There are two options:

  • The Gold Card “For a $15,000 DHS processing fee* and, after background approval, a contribution of $1 million, receive U.S. residency in record time with the Trump Gold Card.”
  • The Platinum Card, billed as coming soon. “Foreign nationals can sign up now and secure their places on the waiting list for the Trump Platinum Card. When launched, and upon receipt of a $15,000 DHS processing fee and $5 million contribution, they will have the ability to spend up to 270 days in the United States without being subject to U.S. taxes on non-U.S. income.”

The ick factor is high here. It reduces the presidency and this president to the position of a cheap huckster, hawking U.S. residency to the highest bidder while violently deporting hardworking people, and in some cases, getting it wrong and grabbing American citizens and military veterans.

On September 19, Trump signed Executive Order 14351, which authorized the creation of the Gold Card program, claiming that he was “prioritizing the admission of aliens who will affirmatively benefit the Nation, including successful entrepreneurs, investors, and businessmen and women.”

There are obvious questions about the legality of this pay-for-play spectacle and the decision-making process for who qualifies. Potential immigrants make their million-dollar payments, which are referred to as a “gift.” The Executive Order says that suffices as evidence of “exceptional business ability” and “national benefit,” which is sufficient for the person paying the money, regardless of where they got it from, to receive a waiver that permits entry under the statute titled “Allocation of immigrant visas.”

A group of 20 state Attorneys General filed a lawsuit last week challenging the program.

California and Massachusetts are the lead plaintiffs in the case, which alleges that the plan violates the Administrative Procedure Act and the separation of powers and asks the court to enter a ruling that the policy is unlawful and that no action can be taken under Trump’s Executive Order and the Proclamation seeking to implement it. The plaintiffs are also asking the court to enter an injunction that would prohibit the federal government from moving forward with the plan.

It’s going to be another interesting week.

Thanks for being here with me at Civil Discourse and staying informed about what’s happening to our democracy. If you value access to the information and analysis you receive here, I hope you’ll consider getting a paid subscription if you don’t already have one.

We’re in this together,

Joyce

https://open.substack.com/pub/joycevance/p/the-week-ahead-752?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web