I went to bed about normal 7 pm for me. Surprisingly when I told Ron he said he wanted to go also. That was about 2 hours or earlier than he normally goes to bed. His normal time to go to bed is 9 or a bit later. But we went to bed together. Along with Tupac.
We cuddled several hours with me holding him and then us reversing and him cuddling me. We go back and forth during the night. We often fall asleep in each other’s arms, and I often get my most restful sleep while we cuddle. Which is going to seem strange with what I am going to write next.
After four hours of holding each other, I noticed Ron’s legs were fidgeting and fussing. I asked him if he legs were bothering him and he replied yes. I was a bit miffed he did not tell me before I noticed but I told him we needed to take some time off on our own sides and he asked if we could cuddle later to which I agreed.
At some point I started to have a bad memory nightmare. I know in the nightmare I was begging for help, I was screaming for help. Then I could hear Ron’s voice calling me begging me to wake up, but my fear / pain was too much and I still yelled for anyone to help me.
Then With Ron yelling next to me, as he knew better than to touch me when I am in that state, I started to hear him and even as I was still crying out for help I heard him beg me to follow his voice. When I came to he told me I was the loudest I had been in a long time, begging for help at one point I screamed out several times “help me, someone please help me”.
After he woke me I got out of bed and went to the bathroom. When I got back he asked if I wanted to talk. I said no. He told me Scottie that was bad, you were really upset and loud. I just got back into bed and faced away from him. He understood I was not ready to deal with it.
For the next couple of hours I lay there trying not to think of the memories I had just experienced in my nightmare. In the morning I got up early, when Ron got up he twice asked me to talk about what I went through. I told him I was not ready yet. I could see him wanting more but knowing pushing me would only cause me pain.
The memory / nightmare was a really bad hours long rapes by multiple people when I was a really young kid. I was young enough to think that screaming and yelling would get me help. As I got older I understood doing such things only brought more punishment. In the dream I was experiencing it as I did then, with all the pain, panic, desperation and then submission.
I have come to realize burdening Ron with these memories only causes him to feel pain thinking of what I went through with no way to stop it. Trust me my wonderful Ron would have killed to stop a child being abused. Yes he tries to be a grand husband to comfort me, but it is wrong of me to ask that of him I think. Is it transferring my pain on to him in the name of “sharing”, the same question could be asked of my sharing of it on the blog. But he can only take the pain and memories I share as I could only take the abuse. He is then stuck with them in his mind as I am with them in mine. Do I have that right? Is that not abusing my own husband the man I adore to do that, to ask that. Is that the same for when I share with everyone here on my blog. I am giving you my memories and pain with no way to stop it. Have I become a villain, an abuser?
Until I figure out if I am doing more damage than good I will have to keep telling him I just don’t want to talk. Better to suffer in silence than cause him a pain he can not rid himself of. Hugs
Trump doesn’t rule out pardon for Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine MaxwellIt comes as Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche met with Maxwell – who’s serving 20 years in prison for sex trafficking – for a second time.
Ghislaine Maxwell, who sources told ABC News initiated the meetings with the Department of Justice, answered questions for about nine hours over two days after being granted a limited form of immunity, the sources said.
The immunity allowed Maxwell to freely answer Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s questions without fear that her responses could later be used against her, the sources said.
The so-called proffer immunity is commonly granted to individuals prosecutors are seeking to make cooperators in a criminal case. Maxwell has already been tried, convicted and sentenced for sex trafficking underage girls.
FILE – Audrey Strauss, acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, points to a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, during a news conference in New York on July 2, 2020.
John Minchillo/AP
DOJ did not immediately respond to request for comment. A lawyer for Maxwell did not immediately respond.
The second meeting between Maxwell and Blanche lasted for about three hours.
Maxwell’s attorney, David Markus, told ABC News afterward, “There have been no asks and no promises.”
Markus said Maxwell was asked about “maybe 100 different people” during her interview with the deputy attorney general. He said she answered every question.
“She didn’t hold anything back,” Markus said.
He declined to be specific about who Maxwell was asked about or whether she provided information about others who might have allegedly committed crimes against victims, as Blanche said he was seeking.
“We haven’t asked for anything. This is not a situation where we are asking for anything in return for testimony or anything like that,” Markus added on Friday. “Of course, everybody knows Ms. Maxwell would welcome any relief.”
Blanche didn’t speak to reporters upon his arrival at the federal courthouse in Tallahassee, Florida. On social media, Blanche said he would reveal what he learned from Maxwell “at the appropriate time.”
FILE – Audrey Strauss, acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, points to a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, during a news conference in New York on July 2, 2020.
John Minchillo/AP
The first meeting between Maxwell and Blanche on Thursday lasted six hours.
Maxwell is currently appealing her 20-year prison sentence for child sex trafficking and other offenses in connection with Epstein, the deceased financier and convicted sex offender.
“We don’t want to get into the substance of the questions,” Markus had said about Thursday’s meeting. “There were a lot of questions and we went all day and she answered every one of them. She never said ‘I’m not going to answer,’ never declined.”
It is almost unheard of for a convicted sex trafficker to meet with such a high-ranking Justice Department official, especially one who used to be the president’s top criminal defense attorney.
ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Mary Bruce asked President Donald Trump on Friday if clemency is on the table for Maxwell.
“I can’t talk about that now because, you know, it’s a very sensitive interview going on,” Trump responded. He went on to call Blanche a “great attorney” and said “I don’t know exactly what’s happening. But I certainly can’t talk about pardons.”
Trump was also pressed by ABC News’ Bruce if he can trust what Maxwell is telling the DOJ during these interviews.
“Well, he’s a professional lawyer. He’s been through things like this before,” Trump said, referring to Blanche.
After Trump’s comments on Friday about clemency, ABC News asked Maxwell’s attorney whether that gave her an incentive to tell Blanche what he wanted to hear.
“No,” Markus answered. “She wants to tell the truth.”
Markus said Maxwell’s legal team has not approached Trump about a pardon, but suggested it could happen in the future.
“We haven’t spoken to the president or anyone about a pardon just yet. And listen, the president this morning said he had the power to do so we hope he exercises that power in the right and just way,” he said.
Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche look on as US President Donald Trump (not on frame) speaks during a news conference in the Brady Briefing Room of the White House on June 27, 2025, in Washington, DC.
Andrew Caballero-reynolds/AFP via Getty Images
Annie Farmer, who testified against Maxwell at trial, questioned why Maxwell was granted a meeting with the deputy attorney general in the first place.
“It’s very disappointing that these things are happening behind closed doors without any input from the people that the government asked to come forward and speak against her in order to put her away,” Farmer said. “There were so many young girls and women that were harmed by her.”
Maxwell’s attorney said on Friday she’s been treated poorly for the last five years and is grateful to be able to meet with Blanche as she appeals her sex trafficking conviction and seeks to leave prison.
“If you looked up scapegoat in the dictionary, her picture would be next to the definition,” Markus said. “She’s keeping her spirits up as best she can.”
Blanche’s meetings with Maxwell comes as the Justice Department has tried to quiet calls from Senate Republicans to release more information about Epstein and his interaction with high-profile figures.
And it comes as questions swirl about Trump’s connections to Epstein and reports that his name appeared in the Epstein files.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Attorney General Pam Bondi told Trump in May that his name was mentioned in the Epstein files multiple times, along with other high-profile people.
Trump has denied that account, and appearing in the files is not necessarily indicative of any wrongdoing.
“I want all the information out,” said Republican Sen. Josh Hawley.
“Just put everything out, make it as transparent as you can,” echoed Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham.
The Justice Department said earlier this month that it planned to release no additional information despite an earlier commitment to do so.
This is a hard story for me to cover and keep hearing about. It is picking the scab of my healing over my childhood abuse. I was also trafficked. These were girls but I was used as if I was a girl because to these people if you are young enough it doesn’t matter, you either have three holes to use or only two holes to use. I struggle to remember the many times I was told I was better than YYY girl or better than my hell spawn sibling, or that a boy was better than a girl we knew what to do and were more trainable … that one was when I was 6 years old.
Sorry as I said this issue is hard for me to deal with. I am not feeling well to begin with and this issue I am constantly dealing with has made my own abuse come to the front of my mind / memories. I am again not sleeping and Ron has been constantly waking me from vocal violent nightmares. I recently wrote a male survivor friend that while I always knew and dealt with my abuse I am still recovering memories of it that my mind has denied me from knowing to protect me. Some of them are the most abusive or when I was given to others … the feelings of betrayal. Those memories are mostly from when I was very young.
The last thing I would ask is not that you feel sympathy for me. I am now 62 years old and while I suffer the scars of my childhood I worry about the children of today. Please keep your eyes and ears open. If you hear a child cry, especially in a public place find out why. If you see a child not wanting to go with an adult and the child is very upset / crying investigate. I read an article how a little girl before puberty had been abducted and abused for several days was rescued because a store worker noticed how she pulled back when the abductor reached for her and how she held herself. The store worker noticed how strained the little girl was with the man and how she reacted when the man touched her, then called the police.
I know it is too late for me, but I wonder at the people who knew or suspected that tried to help on the margins like keeping library books for me when they knew I couldn’t take them home, or those that seen the bruises and welts yet never asked questions. Would my life have been changed? Hugs
Ghislaine Maxwell, who sources told ABC News initiated the meetings with the Department of Justice, answered questions for about nine hours over two days after being granted a limited form of immunity, the sources said.
The immunity allowed Maxwell to freely answer Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche’s questions without fear that her responses could later be used against her, the sources said.
The so-called proffer immunity is commonly granted to individuals prosecutors are seeking to make cooperators in a criminal case. Maxwell has already been tried, convicted and sentenced for sex trafficking underage girls.
Alan Dershowitz, who was very close with Epstein and served as an attorney for both Epstein and Trump, called for Ghislaine Maxwell to be given immunity just a few days ago.
“We are just learning that Ghislaine Maxwell was granted limited immunity in order to talk with Trump’s personal attorney turned deputy attorney general.” – CNN
Ghislane Maxwell is a child sex trafficker that Trump just gave immunity to in exchange for her silence on him.
Wanna bet she only names democrats now and magically gets pardoned in a few years?
— Adam Kinzinger (Slava Ukraini) 🇺🇸🇺🇦 (@AdamKinzinger) July 26, 2025
Maxwell’s only hope to get out of jail is a pardon from Trump.
When Trump pardons her for her “truthful” information, it will be blatant corruption: an official act (pardon) for a thing of value (favorable testimony).
But SCOTUS gave Trump criminal immunity so he can’t be…
🚨BREAKING: Trump’s DOJ gave Ghislaine Maxwell LIMITED IMMUNITY for her answers over the last few days, per ABC. So not only has Trump kept the door open on a pardon but now she is protected for her recent answers. Wow.
Israeli ministers said the settler outpost at Homesh will be retrospectively legalised (file photo from May 2023)
Israeli ministers say 22 new Jewish settlements have been approved in the occupied West Bank – the biggest expansion in decades.
Several already exist as outposts, built without government authorisation, but will now be made legal under Israeli law. Others are completely new, according to Defence Minister Israel Katz and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.
Settlements – which are widely seen as illegal under international law, though Israel disputes this – are one of the most contentious issues between Israel and the Palestinians.
Katz said the move “prevents the establishment of a Palestinian state that would endanger Israel”, while the Palestinian presidency called it a “dangerous escalation”.
The Israeli anti-settlement watchdog Peace Now called it “the most extensive move of its kind” in more than 30 years and warned that it would “dramatically reshape the West Bank and entrench the occupation even further”.
BBC team’s tense encounter with sanctioned Israeli settler while filming in West Bank
Israeli settlers are seizing Palestinian land under cover of war – they hope permanently
Israel has built about 160 settlements housing some 700,000 Jews since it occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem – land Palestinians want, along with Gaza, for their hoped-for future state – in the 1967 Middle East war. An estimated 3.3 million Palestinians live alongside them.
Successive Israeli governments have allowed settlements to grow. However, expansion has risen sharply since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returned to power in late 2022 at the head of a right-wing, pro-settler coalition, as well as the start of the Gaza war, triggered by Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack on Israel.
On Thursday, Israel Katz and Bezalel Smotrich – an ultranationalist leader and settler who has control over planning in the West Bank – officially confirmed a decision that is believed to have been taken by the government two weeks ago.
A statement said they had approved 22 new settlements, the “renewal of settlement in northern Samaria [northern West Bank], and reinforcement of the eastern axis of the State of Israel”.
It did not include information about the exact location of the new settlements, but maps being circulated suggest they will be across the length and width of the West Bank.
Katz and Smotrich did highlight what they described as the “historic return” to Homesh and Sa-Nur, two settlements deep in the northern West Bank which were evacuated at the same time as Israel withdrew its troops and settlers from Gaza in 2005.
Nine of the settlements would be completely new, according to the watchdog. They include Mount Ebal, just to the south of Homesh and near the city of Nablus, and Beit Horon North, west of Ramallah, where it said construction had already begun in recent days.
The last of the settlements, Nofei Prat, was currently officially considered a “neighbourhood” of another settlement near East Jerusalem, Kfar Adumim, and would now be recognised as independent, Peace Now added.
Katz said the decision was a “strategic move that prevents the establishment of a Palestinian state that would endanger Israel, and serves as a buffer against our enemies.”
“This is a Zionist, security, and national response – and a clear decision on the future of the country,” he added.
Smotrich called it a “once-in-a-generation decision” and declared: “Next step sovereignty!”
But a spokesperson for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas – who governs parts of the West Bank not under full Israeli control – called it a “dangerous escalation” and accused Israel of continuing to drag the region into a “cycle of violence and instability”.
“This extremist Israeli government is trying by all means to prevent the establishment of an independent Palestinian state,” Nabil Abu Rudeineh told Reuters news agency.
Lior Amihai, director of Peace Now, said: “The Israeli government no longer pretends otherwise: the annexation of the occupied territories and expansion of settlements is its central goal.”
Elisha Ben Kimon, an Israeli journalist with the popular Ynet news site who covers the West Bank and settlements, told the BBC’s Newshour programme that 70% to 80% of ministers wanted to declare the formal annexation of the West Bank.
“I think that Israel is a few steps from declaring this area as Israeli territory. They believe that this period will never be coming back, this is one opportunity that they don’t want to slip from their hands – that’s why they’re doing this now,” Mr Ben Kimon told the BBC’s Newshour programme.
Israel effectively annexed East Jerusalem in 1980, in a move not recognised by the vast majority of the international community.
AFP
Israeli soldiers accompanied settlers establishing the Homesh outpost in May 2023
This latest step is a blow to renewed efforts to revive momentum on a two-state solution to the decades-old Israel-Palestinian conflict – the internationally approved formula for peace that would see the creation of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel – with a French-Saudi summit planned at the UN’s headquarters in New York next month.
Jordan’s foreign ministry condemned what it called a “flagrant violation of international law” that “undermines prospects for peace by entrenching the occupation”.
UK Foreign Office Minister Hamish Falconer said the move was “a deliberate obstacle to Palestinian statehood”.
Since taking office, the current Israeli government has decided to establish a total of 49 new settlements and begun the legalisation process for seven unauthorised outposts which will be recognised as “neighbourhoods” of existing settlements, according to Peace Now.
Last year, the UN’s top court issued an advisory opinion that said “Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is unlawful”. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) also said Israeli settlements “have been established and are being maintained in violation of international law”, and that Israel should “evacuate all settlers”.
Netanyahu said at the time that the court had made a “decision of lies” and insisted that “the Jewish people are not occupiers in their own land”.
I have very few photos of me as a child. I only have these few. I wish I had more. I did have a small book given to me by someone who knew my adopting adults but hurricane Ian took them from me and I did not have them saved digitally. Notice that until I was 17 and in the church boarding school was I allowed to have long hair. Hair was used as a way to set me apart from other kids, to reenforce the idea that I was less than the others, I was the one to be hurt and used. As I have mentioned while the other kids could have their hair the current style I was required to have my hair as short as possible. When I was young my adopting father cut it himself and would often leave bald spots and make it as ugly as possible. Hugs
Me at 7 months
These two pictures below I do not know how old I am, but again notice the hair. In the top picture we are at the large farm my grandparents owned. It was a place the entire family gathered at holidays. I was happy to be outside because inside the big farm house with a dozen bedrooms I was constantly being raped or made to please “my” siblings, cousins, and uncles. Even at that age of 4 or 5 I was no stranger to the emotional, physical, and sexual abuse that started at age 3. The clothing was always decent when we were there, to be taken from me once we left. At the farm house I had food to eat when hungry, and grandmother was always talking to me, hugging me, and just letting me stay near her. No one yelled at me even though I was scared of some of the adult men. But when we left the good times stopped and the abuse began.
The lower one I think was taken after we have had moved to the small cow town to evade the abuse charges against the adults. I think this might have been my second grade school photo. By now the light was going from my eyes and I learned not to talk. I simply looked at everyone as possibly the next one I would have to “make happy” or perform for. It was now happening at school, by the one of the town police officers, and of course at home. My siblings would drug me and take me to parties or simply have them at the house we lived in and I would be a party favor.
In this picture below I am about 11 or 12. I am about to go to be taken somewhere to some event to be displayed. I think it might have been to church where for a while the adopting adult female and her daughters were going to hopefully to buy their way past their guilts. The pastor there was regularly abusing me, I have talked about that before. I was grateful he only wanted to play with my nude body or have me suck him, never put something in my butt as normally I would have been raped at least once before getting ready for church. By now I had no fight left in me. Notice the always long sleeves to cover the marks and bruises and the long pants to cover the welts and marks. Again notice the short hair at a time when longer flowing hair was being worn by boys my age in school. This would have been in the early 1970s. By now at this age I had accepted I was a toy to be used or displayed, moved and directed by them. I had no agency, no authority, no say in my life. My retreat was in my head, the place I lived, the dreams and stories I told myself that no one else could hear.
Below is me at 18 at the church boarding school. This is the first time in my life I was allowed to grow my hair out. The adopting adults hated it. The adopting adult female constantly bitching and insulting me over. At this point the adopting male refused to speak to me or be in any room I was in if I had to be at their home during the school year. I tried to remain at the school as much as possible.
Below is me at age 23 or early 24 when I had just gotten out of the military. I had already started to let my hair grow over my ears. This was the way I kept my hair most of my life just longer on the sides and back. Parted on the left and swept to the right. Hugs
This is me at age 23 or early 24 when I had just gotten out of the military. I had already started to let my hair grow over my ears. This was the way I kept my hair most of my life just longer on the sides and back. Parted on the left and swept to the right. Hugs
Detained children line up in the cafeteria at the Karnes County Residential Center in Karnes City, Texas, on 10 September 2014. Photograph: Eric Gay/AP
The Trump administration is trying to end a cornerstone immigration policy that requires the government to provide basic rights and protections to child immigrants in its custody.
The protections, which are drawn from a 1997 consent decree known as the Flores Settlement Agreement, limit the amount of time children can be detained by immigration officials. It also requires the government to provide children in its custody with adequate food, water and clean clothes.
The administration’s move to terminate the Flores agreement was long anticipated. In a court motion filed Thursday, the justice department argued that the Flores agreement should be “completely” terminated, claiming it has incentivized unauthorized border crossings and “prevented the federal government from effectively detaining and removing families”.
Donald Trump also tried to end these protections during his first term, making very similar arguments.
Ice arrests at immigration courts across the US stirring panic: ‘It’s terrifying’
Read more
The move to end protections follows a slew of actions by the Trump administration that target children, including restarting the practice of locking up children along with their parents in family detention. Immigration advocacy groups have alleged in a class-action lawsuit filed earlier this month that unaccompanied children are languishing in government facilities after the administration unveiled policies making it exceedingly difficult for family members in the US to take custody of them. The president and lawmakers have also sought to cut off unaccompanied children’s access to legal services and make it harder for families in detention to seek legal aid.
“Eviscerating the rudimentary protections that these children have is unconscionable,” said Mishan Wroe, senior attorney at the National Center for Youth Law. “At this very moment, babies and toddlers are being detained in family detention, and children all over the country are being detained and separated from their families unnecessarily.”
The effort to suspend the Flores agreement “bears the Trump administration’s hallmark disregard for the rule of law – and for the wellbeing of toddlers who have done no wrong”, said Faisal al-Juburi of the Texas-based legal non-profit Raices. “This administration would rather enrich private prison contractors with the $45bn earmarked for immigrant detention facilities in the House’s depraved spending bill than to uphold basic humanitarian protections for babies.”
The Trump administration in 2019 asked a judge to dissolve the Flores Settlement Agreement, but its motion was struck down. During the Biden administration, a federal judge agreed to partially lift oversight protections at the Department of Health and Human Services, but the agreement is still in place at the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agencies.
“Children who seek refuge in our country should be met with open arms – not imprisonment, deprivation and abuse,” said Sergio Perez, executive director of the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law.
The settlement is named for Jenny Flores, a 15-year-old girl who fled civil war in El Salvador and was part of a class-action lawsuit alleging widespread mistreatment of children in custody in the 1980s.
Since the settlement agreement was reached in 1997, lawyers and advocates have successfully sued the government several times to end the mistreatment of immigrant children. In 2018, attorneys sued after discovering unaccompanied children had been administered psychotropic medication without informed consent.
In 2024, a court found that CBP had breached the agreement when it detained children and families at open-air detention sites at the US southern border without adequate access to sanitation, medical care, food, water or blankets. In some cases, children were forced to seek refuge in portable toilets from the searing heat and bitter cold.
Trigger warnings for starving and abused kids / people. Sadly this is what the US government is supporting and keeping other world leaders from stopping. This was because Biden was an old person who remembered being part of Israels founding and thought they were so important that it excused everything they did. tRump doesn’t care about the human cost, he wants the value of the land or as much of the share he can get. This is sickening. Personal note. I was so lacking nutrition in my childhood that my childhood doctors were concerned enough to tell my adopting mother if I did not get more food I would never see five feet in height. I ended up in a child ICU rushed to the hospital by my grandfather and I had clinical death. Hugs
AFP
Israeli ministers said the settler outpost at Homesh will be retrospectively legalised (file photo from May 2023)AFP
