These Are Democratic Senators

As usual, that is omitted, then people believe it when other people say Dems do nothing. Elected Dems are doing all they can. Sen. Rand Paul is also involved, as Libertarians will be in matters of war.

Politics

Senators will force a vote to prevent war on Venezuela without approval from Congress

October 17, 2025 5:00 AM ET

Claudia Grisales

Amid a wave of U.S. military strikes in the Caribbean and plans for covert operations in Venezuela, Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., is leading a bipartisan effort to force a vote to stop President Trump from unilaterally declaring war on the South American nation.

Kaine, a longtime proponent of Congress’ powers to declare war, filed the resolution late Thursday, a move that will force the Senate to take up the legislation after a 10-day waiting period. Sens. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., co-sponsored the plan.

Kaine said concerns about war in the Latin American region are growing.

“The pace of the announcements, the authorization of covert activities and the military planning makes me think there’s some chance this could be imminent,” Kaine told reporters.

Reporters holding their smartphones surround Senator Tim Kaine as he speaks to them outside the Senate chamber on October 1.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., speaks to reporters outside the Senate chamber on Oct. 1. Kaine is hoping to prevent President Trump from unilaterally waging war on Venezuela without approval from Congress. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

This week, Trump said the U.S. had conducted another military strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean and announced that he had authorized CIA operations in Venezuela. He also said he was considering land operations in the country.

“We’ve almost totally stopped it by sea. Now we’ll stop it by land,” Trump said from the Oval Office on Wednesday about alleged drug smuggling.

Last week, Kaine and Schiff forced a Senate vote to limit Trump’s war powers in the Caribbean. While that vote failed 48-51, two Republicans, Paul and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, joined Democrats in support.

Paul has been a vocal critic of the new military strikes, saying they set a precedent for the U.S. to shoot first without asking questions.

“The American people do not want to be dragged into endless war with Venezuela without public debate or a vote,” Paul said in a statement. “We ought to defend what the Constitution demands: deliberation before war.”

Kaine, Paul and Schiff are hoping more Republican members will vote in favor of the new limits. Several Republicans have voted for other war powers and use of military force resolutions led by Kaine in the past.

“I think it’s probably 10 or so [Republicans] who voted yes on at least one of them,” he said. “So we’ll start to work that.”

It remains unclear whether there are enough Republican votes for the measure to succeed.

Kaine said Congress continues to face a “black hole” of information related to action against Venezuela. Lawmakers say the administration still has not shared evidence to justify the boat strikes, which Kaine and others believe are illegal and unconstitutional.

Since September, Trump has ordered at least five U.S. military strikes on boats that the administration has claimed were smuggling illegal drugs. So far, at least 27 people have been reported killed, but their identities have yet to be shared.

My Boyfriend Founded Uncloseted Media. It’s What I Needed as a Kid

Growing up as someone who is different from the majority is difficult no matter the circumstances.  For the LGBTQ+ it is horrific when just your very existence is called an abomination and you are equated with the worst being in history.  Especially when your parents and your god are pushing the idea that you are a monster who can only be cured if you follow their god, their church doctrines, have their feelings about everything in your life.  Hugs.  


https://www.unclosetedmedia.com/p/my-boyfriend-founded-uncloseted-media

At 40 years old, I am still shedding an upbringing of religious trauma. But today, I feel free.

Three clips from The Majority Report about ICE being totally out of control

ICE Makes Huge Mistake In Chicago

 

Trump’s ICE Is Out Of Control

ICE Goes Fully Unhinged By Smashing Into Watchdog’s Truck

How Fox News is using lies to enrage Christians

A white Christian Karen uses her own mistake and inability to understand to pull a Riley Gaines to make a life out of fake outrage at something she did not understand.  Hugs

RFK Goes Full Weirdo

Bernie And AOC Expose Trump’s MAGA Betrayal

Zohran Dominates Cuomo During NYC Mayor Debate

Political cartoons / memes / and news I wish to share. 10-18-2025

#National Suicide Prevention Hotline from What Are You Really Afraid Of?

 

#wounds from What Are You Really Afraid Of?

 

#Battlestar Galactica from What Are You Really Afraid Of?

 

image

#assignedmale from Assigned Male

 

 

#abortion from Liberals Are Cool

 

 

Image from Liberals Are Cool

#affordable care act from Liberals Are Cool

#maga maha from It seemed like a good idea at the time...

Image from Saywhat Politics

Image from Making Donald Drumpf Again

 

 

Image from What Are You Really Afraid Of?

 

 

#equality from What Are You Really Afraid Of?

 

 

This why I'm skeptical about the midterms being free and fair. Whenever the GOP has power, they do everything they can to rig elections. https://t.co/1gkThPOn4f

— SK Media (@SpaghettiKozak) October 16, 2025

 

Image from Making Donald Drumpf Again

 

 

 

 

Mike Smith for 9/29/2025

 

Mike Smith for 10/13/2025

Mike Smith for 10/9/2025

 

 

 

Jimmy Margulies for 10/15/2025

 

 

 

#fuck trump from If

 

 

Jailing Enemies

#donald trump from FuckMAGA

 

 

 

Project 2025

Image from Liberals Are Cool

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lee Judge for 10/9/2025

 

 

Tomahawks to Ukraine

 

 

Image from Liberals Are Cool

#young republicans from Liberals Are Cool

Image from It seemed like a good idea at the time...

 

#young republicans from Liberals Are Cool

Image from Assigned Male

 

Image from Liberals Are Cool

#young republicans from Liberals Are Cool

#young republicans from Liberals Are Cool

 

 

 

Mike Smith for 10/8/2025

 

Image from Liberals Are Cool

 

 

Stephen Miller

Image from Juice Trump 2.0

 

 

Michael de Adder CagleCartoons.com

Mike Smith for 10/16/2025

 

 

Mike Smith for 10/7/2025

Image from Liberals Are Cool

#chicago from Liberals Are Cool

 

Lee Judge for 10/10/2025

#Portland military takeover from Republicans Are Domestic Terrorists

Image from Robert Reich

 

 

 

 

Image from Guerrilla Tech

#trump from Art de Trump

 

 

Stop the Violent Rhetoric

#trump is a threat to democracy from hopes & fears

 

 

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#antifa from Liberals Are Cool

 

 

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No Kings

 

#politics from scorchede4rth

#politics from scorchede4rth

#antifascist from Resist Much

 

#MAGAt Mike Johnson from Rejecting Republicans

 

 

Adam Zyglis The Buffalo News

 

Lee Judge for 10/13/2025

 

 

At an airport three travellers stand in front of a television screen showing Kristi Noem.

“It’s also the Democrats’ fault that your flight is delayed by three hours and you’ll be seated behind a screaming baby.”

Lee Judge for 10/16/2025

All new TSA checkpoint

 

Everything is going up!

Jimmy Margulies for 10/14/2025

 

Tariff Inflation Frankenstein

Image from No-Longer-Just-Another-Bondi-Blonde.

#vote blue from Self-love Is My Superpower

Image from Juice Trump 2.0

Image from Juice Trump 2.0

 

 

#fuck trump from WIL WHEATON dot TUMBLR dot COM

 

 

Political/Editorial Cartoon by Adam Zyglis, The Buffalo News on Trump to Declare Martial Law

#republican assholes from Republicans Are Domestic Terrorists

 

Mike Smith for 10/6/2025

 

 

Pentagon Media Policy

 

Jimmy Margulies for 10/16/2025

 

 

White House Press Corp

 

 

 

#trump tariffs from Saywhat Politics

 

#dotard from The Iron Snowflake

 

#follow the money from Liberals Are Cool

#follow the money from Liberals Are Cool

#argentina from Liberals Are Cool

#donald trump from Saywhat Politics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gaza Homes Destruction Post War Reconstruction

 

Gaza Peace

Mike Smith for 10/14/2025

Mike Smith for 10/10/2025

Lee Judge for 10/14/2025

#republican assholes from Social Justice In America

Image from Saywhat Politics

 

 

 

#Trump and Putin from Republicans Are Domestic Terrorists

 

Jeff Koterba patreon.com/jeffreykoterba

 

Political/Editorial Cartoon by Pat Bagley, Salt Lake Tribune on MAGA Targets Leftist

 

Queer and trans immigrants allege forced labor and sexual assault in Ice facility: ‘I was treated worse than an animal’

I originally posted a clip of this but trashed it to post the longer report.   Hugs.   

 

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/16/ice-immigration-queer-trans-louisiana

At the South Louisiana Ice Processing Center in Basile, detainees say they were forced into hard labor – and sexually assaulted and stalked by an assistant warden

Graphic illustration of silhouette against barred light.‘It is for my daughter and my family that I have endured everything that I have in this detention facility for the past 28 months.’ Illustration: Rita Liu/The Guardian

A selfie of a person with one hand in wavy blond-tipped hair, wearing a white T-shirt.

Flat landscape, with small parking lot and really quite small one-story building with peaked roof. Does not look like a jail.A Google Maps screenshot of the South Louisiana Ice Processing Center (SLIPC) in Basile, Louisiana.

Photograph: Google Maps
A person smiling, wearing a white baseball cap backwards and a white T-shirt.

A closeup of the chest pocket of a person wearing a blue work shirt, with the words “Geo officer” embroidered above a couple pens.A spokesperson for Geo categorically denied the allegations detailed in the complaints.

Photograph: Patrick T Fallon/AFP/Getty Images

Queer and trans immigrants at a detention facility in south Louisiana have alleged that they faced sexual harassment and abuse, medical neglect and coerced labor by staff at the facility, and that they were repeatedly ignored or faced retaliation for speaking out.

In multiple legal complaints, immigrants detained at the South Louisiana Ice Processing Center (SLIPC) in Basile, Louisiana, said they were recruited into an unsanctioned work program that forced them to perform hard manual labor for as little as $1 per day. Detainees also alleged that queer people were targeted by an assistant warden who stalked, harassed and sexually assaulted them.

Three current and former detainees who spoke to the Guardian said that, between 2023 and 2025, they endured months of abuse from an assistant warden named Manuel Reyes and his associates. In their complaints to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), the detainees also said that they faced retaliation for reporting the abuse to authorities, alleging that Reyes and other staff beat them and denied them medical treatment.

“I was treated worse than an animal,” said Mario Garcia-Valenzuela, one of the detainees. “We don’t deserve to be treated like this.”

Garcia-Valenzuela, a trans man detained at SLIPC, has alleged that, as part of the unsanctioned work program, Reyes forced him to move heavy cabinets and cinder blocks, and to clean using industrial-strength chemicals without gloves or protective gear. When Garcia-Valenzuela complained of injuries from the work program, he said, Reyes and his associates forcefully stripped him naked and mocked him.

Kenia Campos-Flores. Photograph: Kenia Campos-Flores

Kenia Campos-Flores, who is trans and non-binary, told the Guardian that they suffered from persistent migraines and chest pain after exposure to cleaning chemicals they were made to use during unofficial, overnight work shifts. Campos-Flores also alleged in a complaint they were persistently sexually harassed by Reyes, who entered their dorm and stole possessions including their boxers.

Another trans detainee, Monica Renteria-Gonzalez, complained that a stripper chemical he was told to use to clean the facility floors seeped through his fabric shoes and burned the skin of his feet. On more than one occasion, while Renteria-Gonzalez was bent over cleaning, he said, Reyes came up from behind and inappropriately touched him. The assistant warden also told Renteria-Gonzalez he was watching the detainee through security cameras, including while he was showering.

A fourth detainee, identified by the pseudonym Jane Doe, is a cisgender, queer woman who said that Reyes forced her to perform oral sex on him on a “near daily basis” between February and May 2024, threatening to kill her if she refused, according to her complaint.

Doe, who was deported to the Dominican Republic in January this year, has chosen not to share her name or speak publicly because she fears that Reyes will make good on his threat to find and harm her, her lawyer said.

Taken together, the detainees’ stories present a troubling pattern of mistreatment and abuse inside SLIPC, their attorneys said. Though the alleged abuse took place across two presidential administrations, advocates worry that conditions inside detention facilities could further deteriorate amid the Trump administration’s present push to arrest and detain a record number of immigrants. Trans and queer immigrants in detention are especially vulnerable, advocates said, given that the administration is also moving to roll back key civil rights protections for LGBTQ+ people in federal custody.

The detainees’ allegations are detailed in four separate administrative complaints filed under the Federal Tort Claims Act, which allows individuals to sue the government for injuries caused by federal employees. The government has six months to adjudicate the complaints, or the claimants could move forward with a federal lawsuit. They were submitted in September by Robert F Kennedy Human Rights, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Louisiana and the National Immigration Project. Those groups have also submitted a civil rights complaint to the DHS oversight bodies, including the office for civil rights and civil liberties (CRCL), on behalf of the detainees.

“This was a sadistic late-night work program,” said Sarah Decker, a senior staff attorney with RFK Human Rights. “It was designed to target vulnerable trans men or masculine-presenting LGBTQ people, who [Reyes] coerced into participating.”

When detainees tried to report their abuse, Decker said, Ice officials repeatedly disregarded them. Officials dismissed multiple reports of abuse in accordance with the federal Prison Rape Elimination Act (Prea), Decker said, as well as complaints to the Ice office of inspector general (OIG), the department charged with oversight of Ice.

“These people screamed for help. They filed grievances. They filed complaints under the Prison Rape Elimination Act, they filed verbal complaints through the office of the inspector general. They did everything to get help,” Decker said. “And they were systematically ignored, and complaints were buried.”

The Guardian attempted to locate Reyes though multiple means, including public records and social media searches and were unable to contact him. Reyes is not facing criminal charges for the alleged sexual abuse at the facility.

He is no longer employed at SLIPC, Decker said – he left the facility in July 2024. But, Renteria-Gonzalez and Garcia-Valenzuela, who remain detained at SLIPC, told the Guardian other staff at the facility have continued to retaliate against them, placing them in solitary confinement and denying them full access to medical care.

The DHS and Ice did not respond to the Guardian’s queries about the detainees’ allegations, nor did the agencies address whether any of the detainees’ Prea complaints were investigated.

‘It’s devastating and heartbreaking, everything that they do to us in here’

Located about 90 miles (145km) from the Gulf coast in the rural town of Basile, Louisiana, SLIPC was once a correctional facility. But in 2019, it opened as an Ice detention facility, operated by Geo Group, one of the largest private prison and surveillance firms in the US.

Over the past several years, the detention center, which houses mostly women as well as a few trans people, has attracted a string of allegations of civil and human rights violations, medical neglect and poor hygiene. In 2022, an internal inspection by the office of the immigration detention ombudsman – an independent office within the Department of Homeland Security – found that the facility had insufficient medical staffing, and had been inconsistent in addressing the medical and mental health needs of detainees. A 2025 report by the Yale Law School also found that detainees were “left hungry, cold, and in an atmosphere detainees describe as abusive”.

A Google Maps screenshot of the South Louisiana Ice Processing Center (SLIPC) in Basile, Louisiana. Photograph: Google Maps

“It’s devastating and heartbreaking, everything that they do to us in here,” said Renteria-Gonzalez, who first arrived at the facility in May 2023. “We struggle on a daily basis.”

He said his decision to remain in detention while his immigration case is under review – rather than accept deportation – has been painful.

Renteria-Gonzalez came to the US when he was 12 and has been in the country for 31 years. His eight-year-old daughter is a US citizen. “It is for my daughter and my family that I have endured everything that I have in this detention facility for the past 28 months,” he said. “It’s so that I can make it back home to her.”

A person with glasses and hair in a bun smiling and making a heart shape with their hands.
Monica Renteria-Gonzalez. Photograph: Monica Renteria-Gonzalez

Renteria-Gonzalez said Reyes first recruited him to participate in the late-night work program in September 2023, according to his complaint. Reyes would often come into his dorm late at night – at around 2 or 3am – to wake him up for his night shift.

“It’s like he lived [at the detention center] 24/7,” Renteria-Gonzalez told the Guardian.

Each recruit worked alone, during different times or in different parts of the detention facility – meaning they were often alone with Reyes, the detainees allege. During these times, Renteria-Gonzalez said, he would watch them work and probe them with invasive and inappropriate questions. “It made me feel uncomfortable,” he said. “He used to sit on his phone and asked us for personal information to look us up on Facebook and stuff.”

Sometimes, he said, Reyes entered detainees’ dorms late at night for no particular reason, and would take their used underwear and personal hygiene products. On other occasions, Renteria-Gonzalez alleged in the complaint, Reyes would stalk him as he went to and from the showers and ask invasive questions: “And after, he would say: ‘Tell me what were you doing in the shower?’”

Twice, Renteria-Gonzalez said, Reyes came up behind him and touched him inappropriately. Another SLIPC officer, according to Renteria-Gonzalez, began to sexually harass him as well, sending him explicit notes and showing him pornographic images of herself.

“I just felt overwhelmed,” he said. “I thought enough was enough.”

Eventually, he realized he wasn’t alone.

After being detained at SLIPC in February 2024, Garcia-Valenzuela said he also found himself trapped in Reyes’s unofficial work program.

Mario Garcia-Valenzuela. Photograph: Mario Garcia-Valenzuela

Garcia-Valenzuela had fled to the US in 2014 from Mexico, where he was tortured by members of a drug cartel. “I have no choice, that’s why I’m fighting,” he said. “Because I know that as soon as they deport me, I’m going to be handed over to the cartels and I’m going to be tortured and killed – ripped into pieces.”

But in SLIPC he faced a new kind of horror. He alleged that on more than one occasion he was told to move heavy metal filing cabinets back and forth across a room. When he struggled to lift the furniture, Reyes would taunt him, he said, saying: “If you think you are a man, I’m going to treat you like a man.”

In the spring of 2024, Garcia-Valenzuela reported sexual harassment on the basis of his gender, in accordance with Prea. He said he felt targeted due to his gender identity and wanted the fact he is transgender removed from his file, as a measure of protection. But an Ice officer responded that “even if we take off your transgender marker, there is no hiding that you are transgender”, noting Garcia-Valenzuela’s physical appearance, he said. To Garcia-Valenzuela’s knowledge, no follow-up investigation into Reyes was conducted.

Renteria-Gonzalez’s complaints were dismissed as well, Renteria-Gonzalez said.

A spokesperson for Geo categorically denied the allegations detailed in the complaints.

“GEO strongly disagrees with these baseless allegations, which are part of a long-standing, politically motivated, and radical campaign to abolish ICE and end federal immigration detention by attacking the federal government’s immigration facility contractors,” said Christopher V Ferreira, a Geo group spokesperson.

Ferreira added that “GEO has comprehensive policies in place for the reporting and investigation of all incidents that occur at the Center, including instances of assault and/or sexual assault. These policies are governed by standards and requirements established by the US Department of Homeland Security.”

Geo did not respond to questions about Reyes’s employment status at SLIPC.

Harsh retaliation

The detainees who filed complaints against Reyes and other SLIPC staff said that they faced harsh retaliation for doing so.

When Jane Doe filed a Prea complaint with Ice using a paper form and through the phone hotline, detailing that Reyes had sexually assaulted her, she received no response, according to her legal complaint.

But afterwards, Reyes redoubled his efforts to stalk her, the complaint alleges – and forced her to perform oral sex on him, saying he had her cornered in the facility’s “camera blind spots” where no one would see them.

When she attempted to resist, Reyes told her he had found her mother’s home address in the Dominican Republic, Doe alleges in the complaint, and told her that if she were deported, he would follow her to her family’s residence where “you won’t have any protection”.

A spokesperson for Geo categorically denied the allegations detailed in the complaints. Photograph: Patrick T Fallon/AFP/Getty Images

Jane Doe said Reyes and other staff also blocked her from accessing medical treatment for her epilepsy, even as her seizures became more severe and frequent during her time in detention, the complaint states. He repeatedly cornered Doe as she was en route to the medical center to receive treatment, and told her he would watch her on cameras while she was receiving medical evaluation. On one occasion, he told Doe he was “masturbating to her because he saw her body in medical condition when she was in an observation cell”, the complaint alleges.

“We feel so vulnerable, impotent,” Renteria-Gonzalez said.

After he reported that Reyes had sexually assaulted him, Renteria-Gonzalez said, Reyes burst into his housing unit and yelled, “You should have never put my name on it!”, in reference to the complaint to Ice. Renteria-Gonzalez said he was then placed in solitary confinement for two weeks.

After Renteria-Gonzalez reported harassment from another officer, his complaint was dismissed as “unsubstantiated” and the officer came back and told him: “They can’t do nothing to me,” according to the complaint.

Meanwhile, Garcia-Valenzuela said he was repeatedly sent to solitary confinement, he believes in retaliation for speaking out. He said staff at the detention center falsely reported that he had attempted self-harm, and needed to be placed under suicide watch, even though he had not in fact tried to hurt himself.

At one point, while Garcia-Valenzuela was in the medical isolation unit, officers delivered him a meal that consisted of a few potatoes and a few grains of cereal. There was no spoon provided, he said, and there was a note that instructed him to eat it “like a dog”.

Shortly after that incident, he said, a doctor at the facility suddenly – without explanation – stopped providing him access to medication for hand pain that had been exacerbated by his working in Reyes’s night-shift program.

He has avoided making further complaints. He tries not to speak to or make eye contact with staff, and avoids leaving his dorm. He limits trips to the restroom, he said. And rather than go to the cafeteria to warm up his food and eat, he takes his meals cold, and dines in bed. “I have to stay in the back-most corner of my bed, and eat there,” he said.

“I don’t ever feel at ease.”

Trans people in federal custody under threat

The allegations of abuse at SLIPC come at a time when the health and safety of trans people in federal custody is especially under threat, advocates say.

On the first day of his presidency, Donald Trump unveiled a flurry of executive actions targeting trans rights, rolling back anti-discrimination protections and mandating that people in immigration detention be placed in facilities based on their sex assigned at birth.

On 16 January – the last day of Joe Biden’s administration – Ice reported that 47 trans people were in Ice detention facilities around the country and that 69 had been arrested since the start of the fiscal year. As soon as Trump took office, the agency began omitting data on the number of transgender people in immigration detention from its reports.

“The government is essentially refusing to acknowledge the existence of trans people, let alone their humanity,” Decker of RFK Human Rights said.

Although a federal judge has blocked enforcement of Trump’s ban on transgender healthcare in federal prisons, Decker told the Guardian that inside detention centers, guards and staff have been emboldened to deny healthcare to trans clients, or retaliate against them for requesting care.

“I worry that the situation will only get worse from here for trans people,” she added.

The administration also closed the civil rights division of the DHS, as well as the ombudsman office overseeing immigration detention, arguing that the staff in these congressionally mandated divisions were “internal adversaries that slow down operations”.

The divisions included employees tasked with regularly visiting detention centers, investigating complaints and preparing reports for Congress. Detainees facing discrimination, neglect and abuse now have even fewer options for recourse, Decker said.

a man with a flag
LGBTQ+ Americans consider move to Canada to escape Trump: ‘I’m afraid of living here’
Read more

It’s a scary, difficult moment to speak out, said Campos-Flores, a 37-year-old single parent of two children who came to the US from El Salvador when they were 11 years old.

During the seven months that Campos-Flores was detained at SLIPC, they would call their parents every day, just to reassure them that they were still alive. Periodically, they would beg their family and their lawyer to find ways to get them out. “I asked them to try to book me into another facility,” they said. “It was too much – just too much.”

In November 2024, they were deported – and immediately they felt a sense of relief to be freed from Reyes, they said. But they couldn’t stay away from their children, who are US citizens – so they crossed back into the US and were again apprehended.

They are currently detained at a different correctional facility in Louisiana, serving a criminal sentence for illegal re-entry. But after finishing their sentence, it is likely they will be transferred back to SLIPC before deportation – and face the same officers who harassed them, or ignored their complaints.

“But I have my 12-year-old son. He is also gay, he likes boys, and I don’t want him to experience anything like what I have experienced,” they said. They want to fight for his rights, too, they said.

 

 

Some Stuff From Around & About

I didn’t think I could love Martha Plimpton more until I saw this earlier today:

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Nick Offerman on The Daily Show:

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Open Secrets on campaign finance for the NYC mayoral race:

Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (I) established a new 2025 benchmark for the most dollars received from private contributions in one day on Sept. 29, receiving over $244,000 from individual contributors, a day after New York Mayor Eric Adams announced his departure from the 2025 mayoral race. 

But Cuomo still trails Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani in total fundraising, thanks to Mamdani’s massive lead in public funds received, with just a few weeks to go until Election Day.

Mamdani, a state assemblyman and self-described democratic socialist, defeated Cuomo and Adams in the Democratic primary. The ex-governor and outgoing mayor continued to run as independents but trail Mamdani in fundraising and the polls.

After reaching fundraising and spending caps, Mamdani has stopped soliciting donations. His campaign has raised $16.8 million and spent $10.7 million, and the New York City Campaign Finance Board estimates Mamdani has around $6.1 million left to spend, the most of any candidate.

Cuomo’s campaign has raised about $12.6 million and spent $8.9 million, leaving it with about $3.7 million. That fundraising total includes about $69,000 that was transferred in from one of Cuomo’s previous campaigns. In the last public funds payout on Oct. 9, Cuomo received $2.3 million, more than twice the payout for either Mamdani or Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa. 

Sliwa didn’t receive any public payments during the primary since his race wasn’t competitive. He’s received $4.5 million in public funds for the general election and is estimated to have around $3.4 million to spend, not far behind Cuomo.

The Campaign Finance Board denied Adams public funds 12 times because his campaign failed to submit requested documents and may have violated election law, contributing to his departure from the race.

“Despite all we’ve achieved, I cannot continue my reelection campaign. The constant media speculation about my future and the Campaign Finance Board’s decision to withhold millions of dollars have undermined my ability to raise the funds needed for a serious campaign,” Adams said in his departure announcement.

His campaign still has about $3.3 million remaining. Adams’ campaign received the most private contributions of all candidates, but he also had a head start. By the time Mamdani, the first general election candidate other than Adams to raise funds, received his first contribution in October 2024, Adams’ campaign had already raised more than 60 percent of its $6.7 million in private contributions.

Adams may use some of the remaining funds to wrap up his campaign and pay any outstanding bills. Beyond that, his options are limited for the remaining money. He could save it for a future city race or transfer it into a state campaign fund that he could use to pay his legal expenses. He is strictly prohibited from contributing it to another campaign or organization.

With Adams out of the race, Cuomo’s campaign insists that the contest has shifted in his favor, and that the race is now a match-up between him and Mamdani, and the former governor did see a significant increase in financial support. (snip-MORE on the page linked above the story; worth the click to get the info.)

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Pot, kettle (kettle being Trump.)

John Bolton by Joyce Vance Read on Substack

John Bolton has been charged by a grand jury in the District of Maryland with 18 counts of mishandling classified information in violation of the Espionage Act, 18 USC 793. He is charged with eight counts of unlawfully transmitting national defense information and 10 counts of unlawfully retaining it in his possession. The information Bolton is charged in connection with was classified at the secret and top secret levels. (snip-MORE)