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Nevilledog
Nevilledog's Journal
Nevilledog's Journal
March 2, 2026
The main bet on the front page of Polymarket right now is “Will the Iranian regime fall by June 30?” The site has this at a 41 percent chance of happening as I write this.
On Polymarket, more than $5 million has been spent gambling on this question. On Kalshi, a competing prediction market where users can bet on almost anything, $54 million was spent on “Ali Khamenei out as Supreme Leader?,” a bet whose results somehow ended up ambiguous even after Khamenei’s assassination.
In a series of tweets over the weekend, Kalshi’s CEO and founder Tarek Mansour repeatedly twisted himself into pretzels attempting to explain how the absurd, grotesque exercise of allowing people to bet on politics, geopolitics, and world events is not supposed to allow people to profit from death.
“We don’t list markets directly tied to death. When there are markets where potential outcomes involve death, we design the rules to prevent people from profiting from death,” he wrote. He then posted the underlying rules of the bet, which read “If leaves solely because they have died, the associated market will resolve and the Exchange will determine the payouts to the holders of long and short positions based upon the last traded price (prior to the death).”
That we are discussing the ins-and-outs of which random gamblers get paid out during an illegal war in which already hundreds of school children have been bombed to death feels like the type of grotesque sideshow that is only possible because the U.S. government is only interested in regulating its perceived political enemies, and which only feels possible because much of the American economy feels held together by cope and the gobs of money being thrown into AI, data centers, and gambling. All of this is part of the perverse Silicon Valley, AI, crypto, and X-adjacent hustlebro gambling economy, which was legalized by companies like DraftKings and FanDuel, who spent eyewatering sums lobbying states to allow their gambling apps, and has been “legitimized” by sports leagues who wanted to print money and media companies desperate for the advertising dollars that came from gambling and has turned this all into a massive industrial complex that is not-so-slowly bankrupting a generation of underemployed people addicted to gambling. Polymarket and Kalshi took the DraftKings and FanDuel model and let people bet on basically anything, so now you can bet on which countries Iran will launch missiles against on the same app you bet on the Nuggets/Jazz game or the winner of the Best Picture Academy Award. The new model is so good at parting people from their money that DraftKings and FanDuel themselves have been anxious to get into prediction markets.
*snip*
With Iran War, Kalshi and Polymarket Bet That the Depravity Economy Has No Bottom
https://www.404media.co/with-iran-war-kalshi-and-polymarket-bet-that-the-depravity-economy-has-no-bottom/?ref=daily-stories-newsletterThe main bet on the front page of Polymarket right now is “Will the Iranian regime fall by June 30?” The site has this at a 41 percent chance of happening as I write this.
On Polymarket, more than $5 million has been spent gambling on this question. On Kalshi, a competing prediction market where users can bet on almost anything, $54 million was spent on “Ali Khamenei out as Supreme Leader?,” a bet whose results somehow ended up ambiguous even after Khamenei’s assassination.
In a series of tweets over the weekend, Kalshi’s CEO and founder Tarek Mansour repeatedly twisted himself into pretzels attempting to explain how the absurd, grotesque exercise of allowing people to bet on politics, geopolitics, and world events is not supposed to allow people to profit from death.
“We don’t list markets directly tied to death. When there are markets where potential outcomes involve death, we design the rules to prevent people from profiting from death,” he wrote. He then posted the underlying rules of the bet, which read “If leaves solely because they have died, the associated market will resolve and the Exchange will determine the payouts to the holders of long and short positions based upon the last traded price (prior to the death).”
That we are discussing the ins-and-outs of which random gamblers get paid out during an illegal war in which already hundreds of school children have been bombed to death feels like the type of grotesque sideshow that is only possible because the U.S. government is only interested in regulating its perceived political enemies, and which only feels possible because much of the American economy feels held together by cope and the gobs of money being thrown into AI, data centers, and gambling. All of this is part of the perverse Silicon Valley, AI, crypto, and X-adjacent hustlebro gambling economy, which was legalized by companies like DraftKings and FanDuel, who spent eyewatering sums lobbying states to allow their gambling apps, and has been “legitimized” by sports leagues who wanted to print money and media companies desperate for the advertising dollars that came from gambling and has turned this all into a massive industrial complex that is not-so-slowly bankrupting a generation of underemployed people addicted to gambling. Polymarket and Kalshi took the DraftKings and FanDuel model and let people bet on basically anything, so now you can bet on which countries Iran will launch missiles against on the same app you bet on the Nuggets/Jazz game or the winner of the Best Picture Academy Award. The new model is so good at parting people from their money that DraftKings and FanDuel themselves have been anxious to get into prediction markets.
*snip*
February 21, 2026
No paywall link
https://archive.ph/boBCI
I’m not sure we’re terrified enough about the American right’s scrapping even its own scant moral boundaries.
Every segment of the Trump-backing right wing—America First nationalists, Trump loyalists and rank-and-file MAGA activists—has unsubscribed from the idea that there is any such thing as right and wrong, much less that wrongdoing should result in consequences. In effect, there is no behavior Trump’s GOP sees as too wrong to vote for. In late July 2025, almost half of Republicans said they would keep voting for Trump even if he were “officially implicated in Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking activities.” Crime is legal, where right-wingers are concerned, however heinous the crime is.
At least, for themselves. The right still has morals for days when it comes to Black folks, immigrants and trans people. Its moral code has always been selective and conditional; rigorously enforced and mercilessly punitive toward “outsiders” and “others,” but generally indifferent to even the worst acts by those on the right side of whiteness and power. Wilhoit’s Law—coined by music composer Frank Wilhoit in a now-famous 2018 comment on a political science blog—neatly captures this truth. “Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition—there must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.” Now it’s ditching even its in-group protections.
The right’s reaction to the Epstein files disclosures is the clearest evidence of this. For the better part of a decade, conservatives lurched from one pedophile-focused moral panic to the next, proclaiming themselves the true saviors of children. They didn’t mean all children, of course; these are the same people who gifted a white woman with $750,000 just for calling a 5-year-old autistic Black boy the N-word. Their concern was always reserved for the white children they saw as fully human. They insisted pedophiles were hiding in pizza parlor basements; obsessed over Q drops and waved signs calling us to “#SavetheChildren” and “Stop Child Trafficking”; and pushed anti-LGBT “groomer” hysteria alongside anti-drag bills. Roughly half of Trump voters said they believed elected Democrats were running child sex rings in surveys from 2020 and 2022; a majority of 2020 Trump voters told pollsters that Trump was actively working to take down “an elite child sex trafficking ring involving top Democrats.” White lives mattered to conservatives, especially the youngest white lives. At least in theory.
And at least as long as they thought their political opponents were responsible. But the more we know about Epstein, the less they care. The nearly half of Republicans who said the Epstein files mattered at least “a little” to how they assess Trump’s presidency in July 2025 dropped to just 36 percent by November. (That figure is 64 percent for Democrats.) Faced with at least one allegation in the files that Trump sexually assaulted an underage girl and well-documented associations between their leader and Epstein—as well as other alleged sexual predators—the right isn’t just overlooking the implications; they’re abandoning the principles. The right has “gradually de-emphasized” the Epstein issue, CNN writes, choosing to “largely move on.” It was all political calculation.
*snip*
MAGA's Reaction to the Epstein Files Reveals Total Moral Collapse
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/epstein-maga-trump-morals/No paywall link
https://archive.ph/boBCI
I’m not sure we’re terrified enough about the American right’s scrapping even its own scant moral boundaries.
Every segment of the Trump-backing right wing—America First nationalists, Trump loyalists and rank-and-file MAGA activists—has unsubscribed from the idea that there is any such thing as right and wrong, much less that wrongdoing should result in consequences. In effect, there is no behavior Trump’s GOP sees as too wrong to vote for. In late July 2025, almost half of Republicans said they would keep voting for Trump even if he were “officially implicated in Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking activities.” Crime is legal, where right-wingers are concerned, however heinous the crime is.
At least, for themselves. The right still has morals for days when it comes to Black folks, immigrants and trans people. Its moral code has always been selective and conditional; rigorously enforced and mercilessly punitive toward “outsiders” and “others,” but generally indifferent to even the worst acts by those on the right side of whiteness and power. Wilhoit’s Law—coined by music composer Frank Wilhoit in a now-famous 2018 comment on a political science blog—neatly captures this truth. “Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition—there must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.” Now it’s ditching even its in-group protections.
The right’s reaction to the Epstein files disclosures is the clearest evidence of this. For the better part of a decade, conservatives lurched from one pedophile-focused moral panic to the next, proclaiming themselves the true saviors of children. They didn’t mean all children, of course; these are the same people who gifted a white woman with $750,000 just for calling a 5-year-old autistic Black boy the N-word. Their concern was always reserved for the white children they saw as fully human. They insisted pedophiles were hiding in pizza parlor basements; obsessed over Q drops and waved signs calling us to “#SavetheChildren” and “Stop Child Trafficking”; and pushed anti-LGBT “groomer” hysteria alongside anti-drag bills. Roughly half of Trump voters said they believed elected Democrats were running child sex rings in surveys from 2020 and 2022; a majority of 2020 Trump voters told pollsters that Trump was actively working to take down “an elite child sex trafficking ring involving top Democrats.” White lives mattered to conservatives, especially the youngest white lives. At least in theory.
And at least as long as they thought their political opponents were responsible. But the more we know about Epstein, the less they care. The nearly half of Republicans who said the Epstein files mattered at least “a little” to how they assess Trump’s presidency in July 2025 dropped to just 36 percent by November. (That figure is 64 percent for Democrats.) Faced with at least one allegation in the files that Trump sexually assaulted an underage girl and well-documented associations between their leader and Epstein—as well as other alleged sexual predators—the right isn’t just overlooking the implications; they’re abandoning the principles. The right has “gradually de-emphasized” the Epstein issue, CNN writes, choosing to “largely move on.” It was all political calculation.
*snip*
February 20, 2026
Federal agents shot and killed a U.S. citizen in Texas last year, but initial reports did not reveal their involvement, with the details now coming to light through internal U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) records.
Ruben Ray Martinez, 23, was shot by an ICE Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) officer in South Padre Island, Texas, on March 15, 2025, after what ICE described as a failure to follow law enforcement instructions during a traffic incident as agents worked with local police on immigration enforcement.
While Martinez’s death was reported in local media at the time, the reports did not identify HSI involvement or disclose that a federal agent fired the shots through the driver-side window.
Newsweek is reporting new details based on internal incident reports obtained by the watchdog American Oversight through a Freedom of Information Act request and reviewed by Newsweek, as well as publicly available information.
*snip*
Third American Death Linked to ICE Crackdown Uncovered by Newsweek
https://www.newsweek.com/ice-agent-fatally-shot-us-citizen-texas-dhs-records-11544225Federal agents shot and killed a U.S. citizen in Texas last year, but initial reports did not reveal their involvement, with the details now coming to light through internal U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) records.
Ruben Ray Martinez, 23, was shot by an ICE Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) officer in South Padre Island, Texas, on March 15, 2025, after what ICE described as a failure to follow law enforcement instructions during a traffic incident as agents worked with local police on immigration enforcement.
While Martinez’s death was reported in local media at the time, the reports did not identify HSI involvement or disclose that a federal agent fired the shots through the driver-side window.
Newsweek is reporting new details based on internal incident reports obtained by the watchdog American Oversight through a Freedom of Information Act request and reviewed by Newsweek, as well as publicly available information.
*snip*
February 14, 2026
No paywall link
https://archive.li/bk4cW
Writing about a recent ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that affirmed the Trump administration’s policy of mandatory and indefinite detention for immigrants held by either ICE or Customs and Border Protection, my colleague David French makes a point that bears repeating:
People who have lost legal status because they have overstayed their visas, he also notes, “aren’t guilty of any crime at all, since their original entry is lawful.” And even illegal entry is “a misdemeanor for a first offense.”
Immigration detention is not a criminal procedure. And yet the Trump administration is treating it as a criminal punishment. It is using detention to inflict pain on anyone — immigrant or citizen — caught in its grasp. It is subjecting detainees to horrific conditions of deprivation and abuse, meant to pressure people into leaving the country, even if they have valid asylum claims or even legal status. And the administration is trying to expand its system of internment camps, purchasing warehouses across the country meant to hold tens of thousands of people — an archipelago custom-ordered by America’s most famous real estate developer, Donald Trump.
It would not be an exaggeration to call these “concentration” camps. “A concentration camp exists wherever a government holds groups of civilians outside the normal legal process — sometimes to segregate people considered foreigners or outsiders, sometimes to punish,” Andrea Pitzer writes in “One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps.” Conditions within the administration’s detention facilities certainly meet the bill.
*snip*
Jamele Bouie: Detention Doesn't Begin to Describe It
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/14/opinion/columnists/trump-immigrant-detention.htmlNo paywall link
https://archive.li/bk4cW
Writing about a recent ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that affirmed the Trump administration’s policy of mandatory and indefinite detention for immigrants held by either ICE or Customs and Border Protection, my colleague David French makes a point that bears repeating:
There are thousands upon thousands of immigrants facing brutal conditions who’ve been convicted of no crime and haven’t even been accused of a crime beyond their initial alleged illegal entry.
People who have lost legal status because they have overstayed their visas, he also notes, “aren’t guilty of any crime at all, since their original entry is lawful.” And even illegal entry is “a misdemeanor for a first offense.”
Immigration detention is not a criminal procedure. And yet the Trump administration is treating it as a criminal punishment. It is using detention to inflict pain on anyone — immigrant or citizen — caught in its grasp. It is subjecting detainees to horrific conditions of deprivation and abuse, meant to pressure people into leaving the country, even if they have valid asylum claims or even legal status. And the administration is trying to expand its system of internment camps, purchasing warehouses across the country meant to hold tens of thousands of people — an archipelago custom-ordered by America’s most famous real estate developer, Donald Trump.
It would not be an exaggeration to call these “concentration” camps. “A concentration camp exists wherever a government holds groups of civilians outside the normal legal process — sometimes to segregate people considered foreigners or outsiders, sometimes to punish,” Andrea Pitzer writes in “One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps.” Conditions within the administration’s detention facilities certainly meet the bill.
*snip*
February 11, 2026
No paywall link
https://archive.li/aitD0
“Sorry, I don’t mean to interrupt you guys.” The man crunches his way toward us, through this snow-covered field and past rows upon rows of identical wooden tombstones, then gestures back in the direction he came from. “I wanted to make sure you’re aware that there’s ICE right there.”
This is how it happens, I was told the day before. Immigration and Customs Enforcement moves fast in Minneapolis, the way you have to when an entire city is against you. Volunteers call in license plates to volunteers who check those plates against databases created by other volunteers. Once identified, these agents have minutes at best before residents with whistles and horns and furious loud voices gather to alert their neighbors to the threat in their midst. If you’re more than five minutes away from a sighting, odds are you’ll be too late. No, the best way to find ICE in Minneapolis is to stay in one place. Go about your day. Eventually, you’ll see them.
I am standing with two Minneapolis residents who go by Tim and Star, looking out at the Say Their Names memorial. The art installation consists of over 100 tombstones, each with identical black fists and names I remember from 2020. Philandro Castile. Ahmaud Arbery. And, of course, George Floyd, who took his final breath two blocks south of here. Minneapolis is no stranger to tragedy, or to the white-hot spotlight of international media attention, or to banding together in the face of a crisis.
“In some ways, it primed the pump,” Tim told me, referring to the George Floyd protests in the summer of 2020. Like everyone I spoke to, Tim and Star ascribe Minneapolis’ successful mobilization to lessons learned during that time.
“We have a lot of media coming in and asking, ‘Oh, what’s your organization? Who are you with?’ And it’s like, we don’t have an organization. We’re not with anyone,” Star told me.
“We’re just neighbors. That’s how we know each other,” Tim confirmed. “We live here.”
*snip*
Why Minnesotans Still Haven't Backed Down From Fighting ICE
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2026/02/minneapolis-ice-activists-immigration-trump.htmlNo paywall link
https://archive.li/aitD0
“Sorry, I don’t mean to interrupt you guys.” The man crunches his way toward us, through this snow-covered field and past rows upon rows of identical wooden tombstones, then gestures back in the direction he came from. “I wanted to make sure you’re aware that there’s ICE right there.”
This is how it happens, I was told the day before. Immigration and Customs Enforcement moves fast in Minneapolis, the way you have to when an entire city is against you. Volunteers call in license plates to volunteers who check those plates against databases created by other volunteers. Once identified, these agents have minutes at best before residents with whistles and horns and furious loud voices gather to alert their neighbors to the threat in their midst. If you’re more than five minutes away from a sighting, odds are you’ll be too late. No, the best way to find ICE in Minneapolis is to stay in one place. Go about your day. Eventually, you’ll see them.
I am standing with two Minneapolis residents who go by Tim and Star, looking out at the Say Their Names memorial. The art installation consists of over 100 tombstones, each with identical black fists and names I remember from 2020. Philandro Castile. Ahmaud Arbery. And, of course, George Floyd, who took his final breath two blocks south of here. Minneapolis is no stranger to tragedy, or to the white-hot spotlight of international media attention, or to banding together in the face of a crisis.
“In some ways, it primed the pump,” Tim told me, referring to the George Floyd protests in the summer of 2020. Like everyone I spoke to, Tim and Star ascribe Minneapolis’ successful mobilization to lessons learned during that time.
“We have a lot of media coming in and asking, ‘Oh, what’s your organization? Who are you with?’ And it’s like, we don’t have an organization. We’re not with anyone,” Star told me.
“We’re just neighbors. That’s how we know each other,” Tim confirmed. “We live here.”
*snip*
February 8, 2026
I get asked this a lot. The short answer is: because hate is the point. But let me break it down.
Grievance as identity
MAGA isn't a political movement built on policy. It's built on resentment. The core message has always been "you've been wronged" — by elites, by immigrants, by cities, by universities, by the media, by women, by minorities, by anyone who isn't you.
This isn't a coalition that comes together to BUILD something. It comes together to tear things down. Hate isn't a byproduct of the movement. It's the fuel.
Zero-sum thinking
They genuinely believe that if someone else gains, they lose. Rights for gay people? That's an attack on Christians. Immigrants succeeding? They must be stealing from "real Americans." A Black president? He must be illegitimate.
There's no concept of shared prosperity or expanding opportunity. Just winners and losers. And they're terrified of losing.
The dominance hierarchy
A lot of MAGA is rooted in evangelical and authoritarian psychology. There's supposed to be a natural order: white at the top, Christian at the top, male at the top, straight at the top.
When you've been at the top of a hierarchy your whole life, equality feels like oppression. Giving others a seat at the table feels like theft.
The media ecosystem
Fox News → OANN → Newsmax → podcasts → Twitter/X. It's a 24/7 rage machine. Every algorithm rewards outrage. Every host competes to be more extreme than the last.
These people are literally addicted to anger. Neurologically. They get dopamine hits from feeling righteous fury. They wake up and immediately check their phones to find out what they should be mad about today.
Turn it off for a week and they go through withdrawal.
Economic anxiety — weaponized
Here's the thing: a lot of the underlying pain is real. Deindustrialization gutted their towns. Opioids killed their families. Wages stagnated while costs exploded. The American Dream stopped working for them.
But instead of blaming the corporations that shipped jobs overseas, or the billionaires that rigged the economy, or the politicians that deregulated everything — they're taught to blame immigrants. To blame welfare recipients. To blame Black people in cities. To blame trans kids.
Classic fascist playbook: take legitimate economic anger and redirect it at the vulnerable.
The permission structure
Trump didn't create the hate. He just gave it permission.
For decades, these people were told to keep the quiet part quiet. Be polite. Use dog whistles. Then Trump came along and said the loud part loud — and nothing happened. No consequences.
He showed them they could be openly racist, openly cruel, openly contemptuous of democracy — and not only survive, but win.
"He fights" doesn't mean he fights for them. It means he's mean to people they don't like. The cruelty is the point.
Community built on enemies
This is the part people miss: MAGA is a community. For a lot of these people — especially older, rural, isolated Americans — it's their entire social world. Their friends are MAGA. Their family is MAGA. Their church is MAGA.
The hate is the membership card. The shared enemies are what bind them together. Leaving the movement doesn't just mean changing your politics. It means losing everyone you know.
So they double down. And double down again. Because the alternative is being alone.
The bottom line
Why is MAGA so hateful?
Because scared people + relentless propaganda + permission to be cruel + community built on shared enemies = hate as a lifestyle.
They're not going to be reasoned out of it. They weren't reasoned into it.
The only thing that works is making it socially and politically costly to be part of it. Outvoting them. Out-organizing them. And building something better that gives people a different place to belong.
Source:
https://twitter.com/spooked75/status/2020511531885015373
Why is MAGA so hateful? (best concise explanation I've seen)
Why is MAGA so hateful?I get asked this a lot. The short answer is: because hate is the point. But let me break it down.
Grievance as identity
MAGA isn't a political movement built on policy. It's built on resentment. The core message has always been "you've been wronged" — by elites, by immigrants, by cities, by universities, by the media, by women, by minorities, by anyone who isn't you.
This isn't a coalition that comes together to BUILD something. It comes together to tear things down. Hate isn't a byproduct of the movement. It's the fuel.
Zero-sum thinking
They genuinely believe that if someone else gains, they lose. Rights for gay people? That's an attack on Christians. Immigrants succeeding? They must be stealing from "real Americans." A Black president? He must be illegitimate.
There's no concept of shared prosperity or expanding opportunity. Just winners and losers. And they're terrified of losing.
The dominance hierarchy
A lot of MAGA is rooted in evangelical and authoritarian psychology. There's supposed to be a natural order: white at the top, Christian at the top, male at the top, straight at the top.
When you've been at the top of a hierarchy your whole life, equality feels like oppression. Giving others a seat at the table feels like theft.
The media ecosystem
Fox News → OANN → Newsmax → podcasts → Twitter/X. It's a 24/7 rage machine. Every algorithm rewards outrage. Every host competes to be more extreme than the last.
These people are literally addicted to anger. Neurologically. They get dopamine hits from feeling righteous fury. They wake up and immediately check their phones to find out what they should be mad about today.
Turn it off for a week and they go through withdrawal.
Economic anxiety — weaponized
Here's the thing: a lot of the underlying pain is real. Deindustrialization gutted their towns. Opioids killed their families. Wages stagnated while costs exploded. The American Dream stopped working for them.
But instead of blaming the corporations that shipped jobs overseas, or the billionaires that rigged the economy, or the politicians that deregulated everything — they're taught to blame immigrants. To blame welfare recipients. To blame Black people in cities. To blame trans kids.
Classic fascist playbook: take legitimate economic anger and redirect it at the vulnerable.
The permission structure
Trump didn't create the hate. He just gave it permission.
For decades, these people were told to keep the quiet part quiet. Be polite. Use dog whistles. Then Trump came along and said the loud part loud — and nothing happened. No consequences.
He showed them they could be openly racist, openly cruel, openly contemptuous of democracy — and not only survive, but win.
"He fights" doesn't mean he fights for them. It means he's mean to people they don't like. The cruelty is the point.
Community built on enemies
This is the part people miss: MAGA is a community. For a lot of these people — especially older, rural, isolated Americans — it's their entire social world. Their friends are MAGA. Their family is MAGA. Their church is MAGA.
The hate is the membership card. The shared enemies are what bind them together. Leaving the movement doesn't just mean changing your politics. It means losing everyone you know.
So they double down. And double down again. Because the alternative is being alone.
The bottom line
Why is MAGA so hateful?
Because scared people + relentless propaganda + permission to be cruel + community built on shared enemies = hate as a lifestyle.
They're not going to be reasoned out of it. They weren't reasoned into it.
The only thing that works is making it socially and politically costly to be part of it. Outvoting them. Out-organizing them. And building something better that gives people a different place to belong.
Source:
https://twitter.com/spooked75/status/2020511531885015373
January 28, 2026
In the wake of poet and writer Renee Good’s killing, Donald Trump and his collaborators have done all they can to define her as an enemy of “The Homeland.” The administration claims, for instance, that Good was a “domestic terrorist,” a term it is now applying to Alex Pretti, the ICU nurse whom federal agents killed on Saturday. This rhetoric is employed to justify the state taking life, by associating the dead with national villainy. But the campaign against Good is different—because The Homeland takes particular and perverse interest in women deemed insufficiently reverent of hearth and home. Trump propagandists tell us that Good was part of a growing cabal of insolent white ladies turned violent; that she was a “lesbian agitator” in league with “68 IQ Somali scammers”; or that she was simply, as her killer apparently labeled her, “a fucking bitch.” For these and other sins, her castigation has extended into the afterlife: with Elon Musk’s AI tool, Grok, users churned out deepfakes of Good with bullets in her head and of her corpse in a bikini. This is all appropriate: In defending the undocumented, Good violated the sanctity of The Homeland, which is to say that she questioned the divine promise of American soil to a mythical and singular people.
For The Homeland is not “The State” or even “The Country.” The Homeland is not defined by simple geography. It exists beyond laws and norms. It is unconcerned with traditional American concepts like “liberty,” “freedom” or “pluralism.” The Homeland is that piece of earth providentially deeded to The Volk. The Homeland’s borders are drawn in untainted blood, its sanctity exemplified in proper gender conduct and the fulfillment of gender roles. It is The Homeland that ICE venerates in its recruitment posts festooned with victorious white settlers and vanquished indigenous Americans. It is The Homeland that Musk saluted (twice) at Trump’s inauguration. It is The Homeland that the late Charlie Kirk was fond of invoking:
It is often said that The Homeland is skeptical of immigrants, but more precisely, The Homeland is skeptical of aliens. Asylum-seekers from Gaza fleeing a genocide have no place in The Homeland; Afrikaners suffering the indignity of post-apartheid are welcome. The Homeland is covetous of Northern Europeans, but regards Somali Americans as “garbage.” “Why can’t we have some people from Norway, Sweden, just a few?” Trump recently said. “But we always take people from Somalia, places that are a disaster, right? Filthy, dirty, disgusting, ridden with crime.” The criteria for these distinctions—between putative immigrant and indelible alien—are not complicated; for above all, The Homeland is a racist project.
Securing The Homeland is the central feature of the Trump administration. In Los Angeles and Chicago, Trump seeks to cleanse it. With Greenland and Venezuela, Trump seeks to expand and enrich it. Heterosexual men are the rightful defenders of The Homeland. Lesbian agitators, such as Good, are its nemeses. Christians are the lifeblood of The Homeland. “Stupid Muslims” are its cancer. A characteristic of The Homeland is that its foes must be subhuman—members of the LGBTQ+ community are “freaks,” disagreeable women are “ugly” pigs, and the residents of DC are “cockroaches.”
*snip*
The Blood-and-Soil Nationalism That Killed Alex Pretti and Renee Good
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/story/tanehisi-coates-homeland-ice-minneapolis-trumpIn the wake of poet and writer Renee Good’s killing, Donald Trump and his collaborators have done all they can to define her as an enemy of “The Homeland.” The administration claims, for instance, that Good was a “domestic terrorist,” a term it is now applying to Alex Pretti, the ICU nurse whom federal agents killed on Saturday. This rhetoric is employed to justify the state taking life, by associating the dead with national villainy. But the campaign against Good is different—because The Homeland takes particular and perverse interest in women deemed insufficiently reverent of hearth and home. Trump propagandists tell us that Good was part of a growing cabal of insolent white ladies turned violent; that she was a “lesbian agitator” in league with “68 IQ Somali scammers”; or that she was simply, as her killer apparently labeled her, “a fucking bitch.” For these and other sins, her castigation has extended into the afterlife: with Elon Musk’s AI tool, Grok, users churned out deepfakes of Good with bullets in her head and of her corpse in a bikini. This is all appropriate: In defending the undocumented, Good violated the sanctity of The Homeland, which is to say that she questioned the divine promise of American soil to a mythical and singular people.
For The Homeland is not “The State” or even “The Country.” The Homeland is not defined by simple geography. It exists beyond laws and norms. It is unconcerned with traditional American concepts like “liberty,” “freedom” or “pluralism.” The Homeland is that piece of earth providentially deeded to The Volk. The Homeland’s borders are drawn in untainted blood, its sanctity exemplified in proper gender conduct and the fulfillment of gender roles. It is The Homeland that ICE venerates in its recruitment posts festooned with victorious white settlers and vanquished indigenous Americans. It is The Homeland that Musk saluted (twice) at Trump’s inauguration. It is The Homeland that the late Charlie Kirk was fond of invoking:
I want to be able to get married, buy a home, have kids, allow them to ride their bike till the sun goes down, send them to a good school, have a low-crime neighborhood, not to have my kid be taught the lesbian, gay, transgender garbage in their school. While also not having them have to hear the Muslim call to prayer five times a day.
It is often said that The Homeland is skeptical of immigrants, but more precisely, The Homeland is skeptical of aliens. Asylum-seekers from Gaza fleeing a genocide have no place in The Homeland; Afrikaners suffering the indignity of post-apartheid are welcome. The Homeland is covetous of Northern Europeans, but regards Somali Americans as “garbage.” “Why can’t we have some people from Norway, Sweden, just a few?” Trump recently said. “But we always take people from Somalia, places that are a disaster, right? Filthy, dirty, disgusting, ridden with crime.” The criteria for these distinctions—between putative immigrant and indelible alien—are not complicated; for above all, The Homeland is a racist project.
Securing The Homeland is the central feature of the Trump administration. In Los Angeles and Chicago, Trump seeks to cleanse it. With Greenland and Venezuela, Trump seeks to expand and enrich it. Heterosexual men are the rightful defenders of The Homeland. Lesbian agitators, such as Good, are its nemeses. Christians are the lifeblood of The Homeland. “Stupid Muslims” are its cancer. A characteristic of The Homeland is that its foes must be subhuman—members of the LGBTQ+ community are “freaks,” disagreeable women are “ugly” pigs, and the residents of DC are “cockroaches.”
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January 27, 2026
Just hours after their son was shot and killed by federal agents on the streets of Minneapolis, Michael and Susan Pretti decried the “sickening lies” told by the Trump administration. “Please get the truth out about our son,” they wrote. “He was a good man. Thank you.”
The truth is that senior Trump administration officials quickly smeared Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse who worked at a veterans’ hospital, as a “domestic terrorist.” They lied – repeatedly – before any investigation could be completed, and before Pretti’s parents, friends, and colleagues could testify to his kind character. The administration is, of course, attempting to deflect blame from its own culpability. But that is only part of the story.
Senior officials’ dishonest portrayal of Pretti as a domestic terrorist is not a slip of the tongue or impulsive idea.
Instead, it appears to be part of the administration’s campaign to demonize opposition to its anti-immigrant policies as “domestic terrorism,” and to weaponize powers of the federal government against such perceived political opponents. That plan is set forth in a National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM-7) and other official memoranda. It is a direct threat to First Amendment rights, as well as the lives of protesters opposed to the administration’s unconstitutional and increasingly violent anti-immigrant policies. Indeed, by falsely declaring Pretti to be a “domestic terrorist,” some officials are arguing, in effect, that the federal government was justified in killing him. It is a lie – one that Trump officials have told before, including after the killing of Renee Good. And it is part of a broader effort to smear everyone from other ICE observers to elected state and city officials as supporters of “terrorism.”
Consider how quickly the administration attempted to frame Pretti. Within three hours after his death, the DHS posted a picture of a 9mm semi-automatic that was reportedly found on Pretti’s person, claiming “this looks like a situation where an individual wanted to do maximum damage and massacre law enforcement.” (Border Patrol chief Greg Bovino and Secretary Kristi Noem would repeat that statement later in the day.) DHS added that Pretti was killed as “officers attempted to disarm the suspect but the armed suspect violently resisted.” DHS Secretary Kristi Noem alleged that Pretti “committed an act of domestic terrorism.” She elaborated: “When you perpetuate violence against a government because of ideological reasons and for reasons to resist and perpetuate violence, that is the definition of domestic terrorism.” Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller declared that Pretti was a “domestic terrorist” who “tried to assassinate federal law enforcement.” Miller also shared a post claiming that Pretti “likely intended to MASSACRE LAW ENFORCEMENT.”
*snip*
The Smearing of Alex Pretti and NSPM-7
https://www.justsecurity.org/129797/alex-pretti-nspm-7/Just hours after their son was shot and killed by federal agents on the streets of Minneapolis, Michael and Susan Pretti decried the “sickening lies” told by the Trump administration. “Please get the truth out about our son,” they wrote. “He was a good man. Thank you.”
The truth is that senior Trump administration officials quickly smeared Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse who worked at a veterans’ hospital, as a “domestic terrorist.” They lied – repeatedly – before any investigation could be completed, and before Pretti’s parents, friends, and colleagues could testify to his kind character. The administration is, of course, attempting to deflect blame from its own culpability. But that is only part of the story.
Senior officials’ dishonest portrayal of Pretti as a domestic terrorist is not a slip of the tongue or impulsive idea.
Instead, it appears to be part of the administration’s campaign to demonize opposition to its anti-immigrant policies as “domestic terrorism,” and to weaponize powers of the federal government against such perceived political opponents. That plan is set forth in a National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM-7) and other official memoranda. It is a direct threat to First Amendment rights, as well as the lives of protesters opposed to the administration’s unconstitutional and increasingly violent anti-immigrant policies. Indeed, by falsely declaring Pretti to be a “domestic terrorist,” some officials are arguing, in effect, that the federal government was justified in killing him. It is a lie – one that Trump officials have told before, including after the killing of Renee Good. And it is part of a broader effort to smear everyone from other ICE observers to elected state and city officials as supporters of “terrorism.”
Consider how quickly the administration attempted to frame Pretti. Within three hours after his death, the DHS posted a picture of a 9mm semi-automatic that was reportedly found on Pretti’s person, claiming “this looks like a situation where an individual wanted to do maximum damage and massacre law enforcement.” (Border Patrol chief Greg Bovino and Secretary Kristi Noem would repeat that statement later in the day.) DHS added that Pretti was killed as “officers attempted to disarm the suspect but the armed suspect violently resisted.” DHS Secretary Kristi Noem alleged that Pretti “committed an act of domestic terrorism.” She elaborated: “When you perpetuate violence against a government because of ideological reasons and for reasons to resist and perpetuate violence, that is the definition of domestic terrorism.” Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller declared that Pretti was a “domestic terrorist” who “tried to assassinate federal law enforcement.” Miller also shared a post claiming that Pretti “likely intended to MASSACRE LAW ENFORCEMENT.”
*snip*
November 4, 2025
Introduction
Soon after taking office, President Donald Trump invoked the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose a range of country-specific and global tariffs. These actions triggered legal challenges before lower courts, which consistently held against the president, including at the appellate level. In Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, the Supreme Court will decide two crucial questions:
Yet even before answering these two questions, a third threshold issue must be answered:
Merits briefs have been filed by the parties and 44 groups of amici curiae: 37 in support of the challengers, 6 in support of the government, and 1 in support of neither (see here). Ahead of the Court’s oral argument on Nov. 5, 2025, this “bench memorandum” provides a concise reader’s guide to amici’s main arguments.
The Tariff Case Briefing: A Reader’s Guide
This case consolidates three separate challenges to the Trump Administration’s tariffs brought by Learning Resources and hand2mind, private companies including V.O.S. Selections, and several states (collectively “the challengers”). The challengers argue that Trump’s so-called “global reciprocal tariffs” and country-specific opioid “trafficking tariffs” are illegal, because IEEPA does not authorize the president to impose tariffs and cannot constitutionally delegate such power. The challengers also argue that the tariffs are invalid because the president’s justifications to impose tariffs do not meet IEEPA’s statutory requirements. The U.S. government rejects each of these arguments.
The Challenge to Trump’s Tariffs
The challengers urge the Supreme Court to reject the Trump Administration’s use of IEEPA to impose tariffs. They recall that the framers regarded the power to tax, which includes the power to impose tariffs, as the “most important of the authorities” held by the federal government. Accordingly, the Constitution vests that power exclusively in Congress. Although the president has significant foreign affairs powers, he has no independent constitutional authority to impose tariffs or taxes, so can impose tariffs only if Congress has specifically authorized him to do so.
*snip*
Bench Memo - The Trump Tariff Case: Separation of Powers, Delegation, Emergencies, and Pretext
https://www.justsecurity.org/123818/scotus-trump-tariff-separation-powers/Introduction
Soon after taking office, President Donald Trump invoked the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose a range of country-specific and global tariffs. These actions triggered legal challenges before lower courts, which consistently held against the president, including at the appellate level. In Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, the Supreme Court will decide two crucial questions:
(1) By enacting IEEPA, did Congress authorize the president to impose tariffs?
(2) If so, is that delegation of authority lawful?
Yet even before answering these two questions, a third threshold issue must be answered:
(3) Has IEEPA been lawfully triggered at all here? Has Trump lawfully unlocked IEEPA’s emergency powers by satisfying the necessary congressional prerequisites to invoke it? Or, as some amici assert, did Trump not only fail to meet those prerequisites, but also make an invocation of IEEPA that is pretextual and hence illegal for that reason as well?
Merits briefs have been filed by the parties and 44 groups of amici curiae: 37 in support of the challengers, 6 in support of the government, and 1 in support of neither (see here). Ahead of the Court’s oral argument on Nov. 5, 2025, this “bench memorandum” provides a concise reader’s guide to amici’s main arguments.
The Tariff Case Briefing: A Reader’s Guide
This case consolidates three separate challenges to the Trump Administration’s tariffs brought by Learning Resources and hand2mind, private companies including V.O.S. Selections, and several states (collectively “the challengers”). The challengers argue that Trump’s so-called “global reciprocal tariffs” and country-specific opioid “trafficking tariffs” are illegal, because IEEPA does not authorize the president to impose tariffs and cannot constitutionally delegate such power. The challengers also argue that the tariffs are invalid because the president’s justifications to impose tariffs do not meet IEEPA’s statutory requirements. The U.S. government rejects each of these arguments.
The Challenge to Trump’s Tariffs
The challengers urge the Supreme Court to reject the Trump Administration’s use of IEEPA to impose tariffs. They recall that the framers regarded the power to tax, which includes the power to impose tariffs, as the “most important of the authorities” held by the federal government. Accordingly, the Constitution vests that power exclusively in Congress. Although the president has significant foreign affairs powers, he has no independent constitutional authority to impose tariffs or taxes, so can impose tariffs only if Congress has specifically authorized him to do so.
• Text: The challengers assert that IEEPA makes no such specific authorization to impose tariffs. The text of the statute grants the president emergency powers to “regulate…importation or exportation” to deal with an “unusual and extraordinary threat,” emerging in whole or substantial part outside of the United States. The plain meaning of “regulate” in this context does not entail a tariffing power, according to the challengers. Because “regulate” applies to both importation and exportation, it cannot imply the power to tariff, since no branch of the federal government has the power to impose tariffs on exports. The judiciary requires Congress to speak clearly when delegating major authority to the Executive, and Congress has never delegated tariffing or taxing powers through these words.
• Legislative History: IEEPA’s legislative history also shows, the challengers argue, that Congress did not authorize the president to impose tariffs through that statute. When Congress was reforming its emergency legislation, including IEEPA, it adopted other statutes that explicitly delegated to the president limited authority to impose tariffs. They made no such provisions in IEEPA. In the 69 times that presidents have invoked IEEPA since its passage in 1977, none until Trump has attempted to use the statute to place tariffs on other nations.
• Nondelegation and Major Questions Doctrines: The challengers additionally argue that if the Court construed IEEPA’s authority to “regulate” as the power to tariff, such an interpretation would raise serious major questions and nondelegation concerns. The challengers contend that Congress has not clearly delegated the unprecedented and highly significant authority claimed by the government, raising issues under the major questions doctrine (which says that Congress must clearly authorize delegations of major economic and political significance). Additionally, the challengers submit, accepting the government’s interpretation would mean that Congress had granted the president virtually limitless authority to remake the national economy without any congressional limiting guidance or instruction — essentially usurping Congress’s full legislative power to tax, thereby raising significant nondelegation doctrine concerns.
• IEEPA Not Lawfully Triggered: Finally, the challengers address the third, threshold argument identified above: that even if IEEPA lawfully authorized the imposition of tariffs, Trump did not properly invoke it: i.e., he did not comply with the prerequisites of IEEPA that are legally required to access that statutory power. IEEPA mandates that to invoke emergency powers, the president must declare an emergency with respect to an “unusual and extraordinary” threat and can take emergency action only to “deal with” that specific threat. But here, the challengers argue, the U.S. trade deficit — the claimed emergency that the president invokes to impose the global reciprocal tariffs — is neither unusual nor extraordinary, but instead, a long-standing and persistent condition. Additionally, tariffs do not “deal with” opioid trafficking and thus fall beyond the statute’s scope.
*snip*
June 13, 2025
On Wednesday an email landed in the inboxes of all ICE employees with the subject: “Termination of Castañon-Nava Settlement Agreement.” For those unfamiliar, the settlement was the outcome of a class action lawsuit brought by people who had been subjected to unjustified warrantless arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during the first Trump administration when now-Border Czar Tom Homan was Deputy Director. The parties involved entered into the agreement in May of 2022 wherein it became nationwide ICE policy that warrantless arrests must be documented in a specific manner to remain in compliance with the law.
The terms of the settlement were given a three year duration, meaning it —by ICE’s definition, at least—expired last month. The email on Wednesday—a copy of which was shared with The Handbasket—was sent by ICE’s Principal Legal Advisor Charles Wall, and it made one thing clear: Agents are no longer constrained by the need to justify their warrantless arrests.
“What they are encouraging is for all the officers to violate the law, and now you don't even have to document it,” Mark Fleming, the Associate Director of Federal Litigation at the National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC) who served as one of the attorneys on the case, told me on Thursday.
In Wall’s email he wrote: “Despite a pending motion to enforce the settlement agreement and a motion to extend the settlement agreement, it remains terminated. Accordingly, I hereby rescind the May 27, 2022, Castañon-Nava Settlement Obligation statement of policy.” Fleming disagreed with ICE’s assessment that the settlement is still terminated in the face of ongoing litigation.
*snip*
ICE agents get green light to make unjustified warrantless arrests
https://www.thehandbasket.co/p/ice-warrantless-arrests-castanon-navaOn Wednesday an email landed in the inboxes of all ICE employees with the subject: “Termination of Castañon-Nava Settlement Agreement.” For those unfamiliar, the settlement was the outcome of a class action lawsuit brought by people who had been subjected to unjustified warrantless arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during the first Trump administration when now-Border Czar Tom Homan was Deputy Director. The parties involved entered into the agreement in May of 2022 wherein it became nationwide ICE policy that warrantless arrests must be documented in a specific manner to remain in compliance with the law.
The terms of the settlement were given a three year duration, meaning it —by ICE’s definition, at least—expired last month. The email on Wednesday—a copy of which was shared with The Handbasket—was sent by ICE’s Principal Legal Advisor Charles Wall, and it made one thing clear: Agents are no longer constrained by the need to justify their warrantless arrests.
“What they are encouraging is for all the officers to violate the law, and now you don't even have to document it,” Mark Fleming, the Associate Director of Federal Litigation at the National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC) who served as one of the attorneys on the case, told me on Thursday.
In Wall’s email he wrote: “Despite a pending motion to enforce the settlement agreement and a motion to extend the settlement agreement, it remains terminated. Accordingly, I hereby rescind the May 27, 2022, Castañon-Nava Settlement Obligation statement of policy.” Fleming disagreed with ICE’s assessment that the settlement is still terminated in the face of ongoing litigation.
*snip*
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