As has been discussed here and elsewhere, now is a time for Democratic politicians to step up, be bold, and not only make the changes we need, but be rewarded politically for it. Look at the kind of things that are happening since Van Hollen decided fuck this bullshit I am going to El Salvador to meet my constituent:
When Joe Rogan becomes the voice of reason…pic.twitter.com/rpOrqsAK7O
— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) April 20, 2025
Now I am not saying that anything Joe Rogan says is necessarily a good thing, but if he can reach people and make the argument Dems should be making, which is not only is this about due process for Garcia, it’s about due process for all of us, then good. Van Hollen esssentially said the same damned thing:
Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., said Sunday that his recent trip to El Salvador was not about defending Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland resident deported despite a court order, but about defending the Constitution.
“I am not defending the man. I’m defending the rights of this man to due process,” Van Hollen told ABC News’ “This Week” co-anchor Jonathan Karl on Sunday. “And the Trump administration has admitted in court that he was wrongfully detained and wrongfully deported. My mission and my purpose is to make sure that we uphold the rule of law, because if we take it away from him, we do jeopardize it for everybody else.”
Exactly.
Our Absent Friends
dc
I really think everyone should stress that all these people were not deported in the usual sense, they were abucted and sent to prison in El Salvador without any due process. We don’t send mass murderers, duely convicted, to prison in another country. They go to prison here in the US. Yet now we are paying to essentially disappear people to a gulag in El Salvador.
prostratedragon
Leadership urgently needed in NY State.
Oswego County:
New York County:
Baud
Not really interested in using right wingers as an example on the rare occasions they happen to get it right.
Eunicecycle
@dc: yes if they were deported they would go to their home country and would be free
ETA and of course many of their countries are not good places to be in the first place. But they would not be sent to a foreign prison!
Melancholy Jaques
@Baud:
With you all the way on that. After all, we have good people on our team.
Hungry Joe
This crap has Stephen Miller’s signature tattooed all over it.
I finally figured out why every picture of Miller looks a little bit off: He’s not wearing a black SS uniform.
scav
@Baud: Acknowledging facts and situations is somehow slightly different than full-throated endorsement. Knowing where enemy forces are (and which way they are facing) isn’t joining them.
Matt McIrvin
Trump’s people say one thing in court and another thing in the media. They’ll claim they abducted Albrego Garcia by accident, then turn around and call him a terrorist to the public.
Jackie
@Baud: I wonder how/if FFOTUS and MAGAts will react to Rogan. If he can get through to some of them re respecting due process, I’m ok with that.
ALL Americans should respect and demand due process for all, as stated in the Constitution. I’m glad Rogan spoke out.
Marc
@dc: May I suggest that is too complicated and doesn’t express the actual danger well enough:
People are being abducted off the streets by masked gangs and being deported to foreign
prisonsconcentration camps, without due process and without a determination of guilt or innocence for any crime. There is no wiggle room on this, those rights are conferred to all persons in the US, not just citizens. So, if they can get away with denying anyone those rights, they won’t necessarily stop before they get to you.schrodingers_cat
Define lead.
@Baud: Agreed. Not a fan of David Hogg and his PAC fueling an intraparty war either nor a fan of the Republican running in Chicago to unseat the vice chair of the Progressive Caucus either
m.j.
I see Cheryl Rofer has noted that the U.S. has been raped by Russia with the aid of Doge. It’s like world-scale Jeffrey Epstein.
Baud
@Jackie:
I don’t mind him speaking out. I just want him to stay in his lane. We don’t need to prop him up to complain about our people.
schrodingers_cat
@m.j.: Trump was duly elected. This is what Republican voters wanted.
lowtechcyclist
@dc:
This. Deportation is sending someone to another country, where they’re free to go where they want to from there, but they just can’t come back here.
What’s happening with the ‘deportees’ to El Salvador is that we are sentencing them to prison without trial, in violation of (at least by my nonlawyerly reading) the Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments.
And once in CECOT, according to what Sen. Van Hollen said the other day, they are cut off from the outside world: no news gets in, no communication is allowed between the prisoners and people on the outside. They might as well be in a black hole. I’d consider that a violation of their Eighth Amendment rights to be free of cruel and unusual punishment, even without the possibility of torture.
So this goes far beyond mere ‘deportation.’ We don’t really have a word for this, AFAICT.
“Good-bye to you, old Rights-of-Man.” – Billy Budd
Timill
@lowtechcyclist:
I think “Extraordinary Rendition” fits the bill…
Driven into the surf off Plozévet by Amazon and Indefatigable?
Jackie
FFOTUS today on his social media:
My bold. Sounds like he’s threatening Americans yet again. Again, glad Rogan spoke up, as it sounds like FFOTUS is including him in his threats, too.
bbleh
Alas that it still has to be said. But with PAINFULLY few exceptions — you can count ’em on two (or maybe three now) hands from BOTH houses of Congress — national-level Dem political “leaders” seem clearly to have decided to follow the Carville “strategy” of doing and saying nothing (except begging for money) and waiting for the Trump regime to implode and collapse on its own.
Wait, did I say Carville? I meant Underpants Gnomes:
1. Do and say nothing (except maybe the occasional press release well after the fact)
2. ? ? ?
3. Victory!
Focus on state- and local-level issues. Build local organizations. Don’t wait for Senator Godot.
MagdaInBlack
@m.j.: DOGE is a heist.
They Call Me Noni
@Jackie: Of course he knows fully damned well that we don’t know if Kilmar Garcia is innocent because he has not been afforded his right to due process.
UncleEbeneezer
@Baud: Even to back-handedly bash Dems?
CHETAN MURTHY
@dc: perhaps the relevant historical analogy is what happened to maher arar: kidnapped off flight transiting thru USA, sent to syria for torture. Extraordinary rendition, they called it. Eventually syria released him, said he was innocent.
Soprano2
@Marc: These are the points I keep making to people, that in our system even the worst people get due process. Plus, sometimes I add that if these people had just been deported we wouldn’t be talking about it.
Jackie
Ooops! He did it, again:
WaterGirl
@Baud: I wasn’t going to be the first to say it, but you are absolutely right.
Van Hollen is leading. He literally says the president is LYING. Other Democrats are leading, too.
It’s not Van Hollen saying the same thing on Sunday as Joe Rogan.
This was a post here on Friday. Watch the whole press conference by Van Hollen – it’s over an hour but it’s totally worth it.
Another Scott
Emptywheel.net from Friday:
She’s right.
These first 90 days have seen 47 and his minions try to destroy much of the economy, higher education, the social safety net, the rule of law, international treaty and intergovernmental agreements, and the federal government itself, but if members of the Democratic opposition talks about more than 3 of those topics in a week, then it’s somehow Democrats in Disarray™ all over again. Or Democrats Playing Politics and Hating America again. Or …
All of us have to multitask. We can expect our representatives to be able to do that as well, and they should not be punished by the sensible press for it.
The Twitterization of public discourse is dangerous. “If you’re explaining you’re losing” is dangerous. Some things need more than 5 seconds and 280 characters to explain and discuss. (FDR’s fireside chats were 11-44 minutes.) The continued Both Sidesing of everything is dangerous.
Grr…
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
WaterGirl
@Jackie: Does his wife have a fucking security clearance? Guessing no.
OUTLAWS
prostratedragon
Say what, now? Note last sentence.
Jackie
@They Call Me Noni: That’s exactly the point; we’re not defending Garcia, we’re fighting for his right to his day in court. Should he be found guilty, deport him – DON’T ship him to a country to be imprisoned. As with all the others FFOTUS has unlawfully sent to El Salvador prisons.
cmorenc
Gee…if only Joe Rogan had figured this all out say..5 months ago. Even so, far better for Joe to be helping walk his huge audience toward the light now instead of toward the tempting darkness that is Trump-ism. We can understandably be furious toward anyone who voted for Trump or even sat the election out in the delusion that it didn’t matter – but the success of our effort to climb the country out of the dark hole it’s crashed into needs as many converts from the path of darkness as we can get.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@prostratedragon:
Yeah….that’s not how government agencies are supposed to communicate to the public. They’re talking like Trump cultists, maybe a touch more formal/polite, but it’s the same sentiment. Creepy
cain
@Hungry Joe:
He’s absolutely behind it. “America is for America, only”. Remember that? Fuck him. Fuck him a million times. I hope a million fleas infest his body cavity and drive him crazy.
H.E.Wolf
@m.j.:
That is probably someone else’s paraphrase. Cheryl Rofer has been a consistent voice criticizing the casual use of penis-related metaphors of violence.
sab
@dc: They weren’t deported oddly. They weren’t deported at all. They were renditioned, like to Guantanomo. Let’s avoid any words that make this seem anywhere like normal USA legal proceedings.
Baud
Someone wants out of the trump spotlight.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Jackie:
Exactly. I’ll add, that if their evidence (if it exists at all), was strong, they could’ve just gone to court and proved it, and avoided all of this scandal. The fact that they didn’t, and the “evidence” they are presenting in the media is so flimsy, means they knew they’d never get Garcia deported, so they abducted him and others instead
Jackie
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
and admitted to the judge they abducted him accidently.
cmorenc
Samuel Alito’s dissent from the Court’s temporary injunction against using the Alien Enemies act to deport foreign nationals to El Salvador or Venuzuela is about as ass-backwards upside-down piece of garbage as you might expect:
The order was granted precisely because of the substantial number of people who were at risk of imminent deportation beyond the ability of the US legal process to reach and correct any mistakes.
Matt McIrvin
@prostratedragon: That’s not a scientist speaking. Or if it is, I wish I could see a video so I could note down their pattern of blinks.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Baud:
I don’t like the sound of this part:
My fear would be these Venezuelan political prisoners (Venezuela denies they are political prisoners, but it is Maduro) would be incarcerated at the CECOT once they were exchanged with the Venezuelans the Trump admin abducted
Martin
@dc: I will again note this article, which CNN has similar reporting.
Trump has twice returned one of the leaders of MS-13 to El Salvador, knowing that MS-13 is working in conjunction with Bukele and that this individual, that the US was holding on terrorism charges, would be released once returned. The second return, which happened as part of the flights that included Garcia was clearly designed to disguise the return of Greñas.
It’s good that we’re having this discussion of Garcia, but we also need to be talking about Greñas, why Trump keeps releasing him, and what the administration’s agenda is with continuing to release these individuals.
Democrats need to be careful not to fall into a rhetorical policy trap, when they have a perfect issue here with Greñas to avoid that trap.
prostratedragon
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Creepy very.
WaterGirl
@Jackie:
So they say.
But when your excuse every single day is that the dog ate your homework, it’s hard to any instance of “the dog ate my homework” as truth.
I think that’s their go-to response when they get pushback. Oh, that one was just an accident, nothing to see here.
Darkrose
@Baud: I’m perfectly fine with acknowledging when they get something right. You don’t have to go overboard, but right now, I’m find with giving Bill Kristol a thumbs up for finally getting around to “Abolish ICE” and “Trans rights are human rights;” especially when my shithead governor can’t seem to figure that out.
WaterGirl
@Darkrose: It’s the “lead follow or get out of the way” that’s an issue here – as if Joe Rogan is leading and the message is that Democrats are feckless on this, and possibly every issue.
Jackie
@WaterGirl:
Nor does Hegseth’s personal attorney. I hope, between this and Hegseth’s inner circle getting fired for leaking to the media, a bridge has been crossed that FFOTUS can’t ignore any longer.
prostratedragon
@Matt McIrvin: I thought it was even more remarkable than the Orwellian bullshit masterpiece that preceded it.
oldster
Another point that I’d like Rogan to pick up on;
If Trump can take away the non-profit status from Harvard, he can take it away from your church.
And if he can dictate what Harvard teaches, then he can dictate what your pastor preaches.
Matt McIrvin
@WaterGirl: I interpreted it as “Chris Van Hollen is leading, and made a big enough splash that it affected the thinking of Joe Fucking Rogan.”
I think the thing people need to do when complaining about “Democrats” is to be specific. Name the Democrats who you think aren’t leading. Otherwise you’re just dampening enthusiasm for people who might actually be setting a good example.
Sure Lurkalot
@bbleh: I rarely have a good word to say about Liz Cheney…she highjacked the Jan 6 investigation to be all about Trump and ignored all his co-conspirators, accused Democrats of wanting to legalize killing of born babies, chip off the old block of her war criminal father, but damn if she doesn’t get a lot right here:
Former US Congresswoman Liz Cheney issues urgent call to Democrats: “stop fundraising and start fighting” – Georgia Today
Betty
@lowtechcyclist: I call it rendition.
zhena gogolia
Setting a good example: Chris Murphy, Jasmine Crockett, Chris Van Hollen, Cory Booker, Rosa De Lauro . . .
Do I need to go on? I could.
Eyeroller
A complicating factor is that Abrego Garcia is a citizen of El Salvador who was here as a refugee. Despite Trump’s many lies he was a legal resident of the US, but he was sent to his own country, unlike the Venezuelans caught in a Kafkaesque limbo in which their country of origin won’t accept them so they are sent to a country to which they have no ties but which now says it will never release them. Abrego Garcia was still (obviously) entitled to a hearing before being sent back to the country he fled. I don’t know this guy’s full history but some of their attempts to defame him (such as “identifying” his knuckle tattoos) are just comical, but dangerous because of the power of the government forces arrayed against him. Sen. Van Hollen said his goal was to protect due process and the rule of law, it was not about Abrego Garcia’s character; that is the key point. And f*ck consultants like James Carville who are apparently still insisting Democrats stay in their usual defensive crouch. That is bad both morally and politically.
Jackie
@Matt McIrvin:
That was my thought, too. I also saw that Sen. Kennedy thinks it’s a bridge too far. Hopefully more republicans will find their lost cajones and start pushing back against FFOTUS. Once upon a time being denied due process would have been very anti-republican.
Darkrose
@WaterGirl: I guess I didn’t read that as saying Rogan was leading–more that Van Hollen is leading, and Rogan is following his lead.
TBF, I was thinking about the rest of Van Hollen’s statement, specifically this part:
This was pretty clearly aimed at Newsom, who, since he’s clearly not willing to lead, needs to get the fuck out of the way.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Fair enough. The title and the embedded tweet left a wrong impression. The fact is. I don’t know if any Dem that is in the way. Even Newsom thing wasn’t him being in the way but answering a media question.
JoyceH
@Jackie: It was the attorney that caught my attention. But overall, what Hegseth appears to be doing with these group chats isn’t “work” – it’s GOSSIP. Even in the first chat I wondered, “why is this conversation even happening?” No one in the group needed to take any action or stay up to the minute. Hegseth is just bragging about all these cool operational plans he knows about.
I’m also curious as to how this story came out. Someone leaking or someone actually investigating?
dc
@CHETAN MURTHY: Accept that “extrodinary rendition” was the term of art that our courts accepted as constitutional, if I remember correctly. We don’t want to use any term that at any time was or could be considered legal. They are abducting people and sending them to a gulag in El Salvador that we are paying for. And based on nothing but being brown and having bad luck.
Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Maduro does not want “his people” back, because they aren’t “his people”.
They left Venezuela because of the gangs, the drugs, the violence, the politics and the economy. They are not drug dealers, gang bangers or other criminals, they are artists, performers, sheet metal workers, home care aides, etc.
Maduro will not release his political prisoners, he went to too much trouble to “disappear” them, and they will cause as much or more trouble for his regime, free and outside, than even free and inside.
All that has happened, is that Bukele, having exposed himself as a violent, brutal criminal to the world, is proposing a “humanitarian” gesture to try to whitewash his rep, with out thinking it through. Maduro isn’t even responding to the offer. In the banana puree that passes for a brain, Bukele probably think’s he can send Maduro’s Venezuelans to the US. ICE won’t take them.
Darkrose
I’ve been pretty specific about the Democrats I don’t think are leading: my governor, my junior senator, and the Senate minority leader.
Jackie
@Eyeroller: FFOTUS showed a photo of Garcia’s knuckle tattoos that was so obviously photoshopped… very reminiscent of his sharpie altering the hurricane’s path moment.
Other recent photos do NOT show MS-13 on his knuckles.
Darkrose
@Baud: Newsom made a choice to claim that Abrego Garcia was “a distraction” and that defending him was politically dangerous–and that’s before we get into his newfound career as a podcaster who hangs out with Steve Bannon and Charlie Kirk. Newsom is absolutely in the way, and he’s trying to climb over the bodies of the folks he’s thrown under the bus to become president.
dc
@Eyeroller: He wasn’t just sent back to his country of origin, he was sent there to be imprisoned with no trial, no due process, these assholes didn’t even know why he was being sent there and don’t care (they are making up reasons now, after the fact), no nothing. We can’t let the word “deport” take over here. He was abducted and sent to a gulag or concentration camp. Period.
TS
@Jackie: They are all doing so many ghastly things without thought nor reason – and all drop from the news within days because something more nefarious happens. How do you make these things stay in the news, like “the birth certificate”, “Benghazi” and “but her emails”
Hilary spend 9 hours in front of congress answering questions, Hegseth & many others need to do the same.
Baud
@Darkrose:
I don’t think that’s being in the way. Being in the way is trying to stop Dems who are doing the right thing. I don’t agree with Newsom but his statement is easy enough to give the back of the hand.
JoyceH
@dc: I agree. The Bush administration sanitized what they were doing by calling it rendition. The Trump administration isn’t even making a faint gesture toward any sort of process, let alone due process, so let’s be accurate. What they’re doing is human trafficking. Kidnapping, human trafficking and delivering people to a concentration camp.
Baud
@Eyeroller:
Has anyone asked Bukele why he’s not releasing his own citizen?
Darkrose
@Baud: How is he not in the way when he’s saying in public that Democrats shouldn’t be concerned with people being imprisoned in another country because it’s a “distraction”? He literally said that Democrats shouldn’t focus on silly things like due process as is guaranteed in the Constitution. Trying to change the conversation away from that to something that he things polls better is absolutely being in the way.
Baud
@Darkrose:
I think he said he was going to treat it as a distraction. In any event, his stupid advice is not getting in the way of anyone who’s not following his advice. I’ll wait until he doesn’t sometimes that actually impedes someone.
Jackie
@JoyceH: I saw this yesterday:
My bolding.
Jay
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/20/us-citizen-jose-hermosillo-border-patrol
bbleh
@cmorenc: The order was granted precisely because of the substantial number of people who were at risk of imminent deportation beyond the ability of the US legal process to reach and correct any mistakes.
And Alito knows this perfectly well — he’s not stupid — and he APPROVES. And he had a hissy-fit precisely because he wasn’t allowed to slow the system long enough to ensure it would happen.
I gotta say, I’m not at all unhappy he went public with it, or that it’s getting top-of-the-page headlines (seriously, when was the last time a dissent got that kind of coverage?), because it’s a very public split between him and a majority — we don’t know how large — of the Court. And of course they all know what happened, and why. And they generally don’t like public airing of dirty laundry.
I bet it still galls him — a former acolyte of the Concerned Alumni of Princeton, whose signature issue was that women should NOT be admitted — that Sonia Sotomayor, a Princeton graduate, is one of his colleagues. I hope it gives him ulcers.
Jackie
@Jay: This monstrosity is happening almost every day. EVERY DAY.
rikyrah
@Jackie: ,He could have legally had due process, and deported to any country outside of El Salvador.
rikyrah
@Jay:
Sue sue sue
Jackie
@Jackie: @JoyceH:
Just saw this:
Of course we thought Hegseth’s goose was cooked after the first Signalgate… but here’s hoping.
And would his replacement be better… or worse?
George
@Matt McIrvin: Word. The pattern in recent US political history is that Democrats lead, and then get punished by the electorate.
It’s as if some commenters are unable to understand the concept of constituencies, and that elected Democratic representatives do what they believe is necessary to get re-elected within their districts or states.
Anyone who chirps about leading or getting out of the way is more than welcome to run for public office themselves. It takes time, money, and commitment.
Jackie
@rikyrah: Yes. And deported. NOT imprisoned in another country.
Jay
@Baud:
While Dem’s don’t need to be all “on” the same cause, they should be “on” the same page.
Newsom is making the whole “both sides” argument easy.
He underbussed masks, social distancing and the lockdowns during covid.
Recently, he underbussed Trans people.
Now he’s underbussing “due process”.
The same week, that many Canadian Federal, Provincial and Professional Orgs, issued major travel advisories for the US, (basically, don’t) he did a tone deaf ad for Canadians to travel to California.
“Visit California, and maybe El Salvador too”.
Dude is completely tone deaf.
@Baud:
Jay
@Jackie:
DJTdiot saw Hegseth on Faux News lots of times, so he’s completely safe for now, right up until he get’s an aircraft carrier sunk by the Houthi’s.
YY_Sima Qian
Entirely predictable:
The referenced article:
WaterGirl
@zhena gogolia: Yes, please.
Jeffro
Van Hollen > Newsom
that is all for now but I got others
(AOC > Schumer)
Jeffro
Yup, 100%
As I mentioned to my better half this morning, this is not a hard argument to make: if I went to work and shot everyone at our conference table, turned in the gun to police and admitted I did it…I’d still get a lawyer and a hearing.
(no offense to my co-workers, who I love!)
TS
@Jackie:
And this
BUT
Look what wapo had to add
Still carrying water for trump & co
Glidwrith
@Betty: Still too complicated because that’s what we do to “terrorists”. Kidnapping and human trafficking.
Glidwrith
@Eyeroller: The thugs think they haven’t smeared Garcia enough-now he’s a wife beater too.
Jay
@YY_Sima Qian:
It’s kinda funny, as I have 6 in face interviews this week, based off phone interviews. All 6 Companies want my experience on how to bypass the US “affordably” with their imports. Importing through the US has been the standard, but with the cumulative tariff’s (FFS) and the collapse of shipping, the coming collapse of truck and rail retransport,……………………
Well, let’s just say at one point in time, during a previous trade war, I arranged to bring in LCD product via 1st Class Seats on Air Canada, (had a cheaper route, but that = time) from Japan for 45% less than transhipping from US ports.
Jeffro
almost doesn’t matter
Hegseth is endangering our country pretty severely with his intelligence leaks, lack of leadership skills, lack of institutional knowledge, and lack of judgement.
It’s not like the next person could be much worse.
In the meantime, it’s important for the public to see what this trumpov-nominated and MAGA GOP-approved clown is doing. It makes him and them look bad, as it should.
So…I say let the horror stories continue to unfold until the MAGA GOP and trumpov can’t take it any more. It’s not like we as a country will be in some sort of worse danger by putting a cabbage in the office of SecDef: at least the cabbage won’t text its wife and brother trying to look cool.
Jeffro
@Jay: Van Hollen > Newsom
Jay
@Jeffro:
Well, Hesgeth will last as long as a cabbage, about 200 Scaramucci’s, he’s no Liz Truss, (lettuce).
And of course, if he is replaced, (lot’s of scapegoats at the Pentagon), his replacement will be worse.
Jay
@Glidwrith:
That came out last week. DHS smeared Garcia with a release of a police complaint, retracted by his wife, and also doxxed him, releasing home address, phone numbers, etc.
He did not lay a finger on her, he was just very angry and probably verbally abusive.
As any “intimate partner violence” person who knows the system, you need a paper trail for before and after they kill you.
KKops did nothing, did not even come to the house. She had to go into the station and file.
And she retracted it all, after they went to counselling.
But now, they are smearing him with AI doctored photo’s of gang tats on his knuckles.
If he ever get’s back to the US, it’s going to be Dominion Systems Lawsuits x 1,000, not just on the admin, but every tom, dick and harry, (all white names), spreading it.
It will be a good decade for the lawyers.
Librettist
Rogan is not a thought leader. His production team are chasing his audience on this.
Jackie
@Jay: I wonder if since Joni Ernst kept her head low, mouth shut, and actually voted to confirm Hegseth, she’ll be nominated? Or not qualified any longer as defined as DEI.
JoyceH
@Jay: I don’t think so. I don’t think the GOP will allow Trump to make another pick like Hegseth. My guess is that once Hegseth is gone (and he can’t hold on much longer), GOP leaders from Congress and outside government, will meet with Trump and explain to him. “Okay, sir” (they’ll say sir a lot because they know he likes that), “we let you have your pick and we gave it a try. And the result was so much damage to national security and to the public’s view of the Republican Party, now we’re going to do it our way.” They’ll provide him with a list of four or five names along with resumes, all white men of course and intensely conservative, but all also actually qualified to do the job. They’ll emphasize repeatedly that he can make the selection of any name from the list so it’s really his nomination, and with enough flattery he’ll go along with it. After all, every one of his Supreme Court nominees was from an approved list.
Mr. Bemused Senior
Only the best people /s
lowtechcyclist
@Martin:
I don’t think it’s a trap, and I’m not going to criticize Dems for emphasizing due process for Abrego Garcia and all the others sent to CECOT with him, or for jumping on Trump’s repeatedly letting Greñas loose.
This is a target-rich environment, and yeah, in a way the abundance of targets is its own problem. But as long as they’re on the attack, I’m not gonna argue about which front it would be best to attack on.
Jay
@Jackie:
Wrong gender, not enough botox and cosmetic surgery, too old. Not DJTdiot”s “type” (easily rapeable),
Not a Faux News personality.
I’d bet on Jesse Watters.
Citizen Dave
lowtechcyclist
@Betty:
Gotta admit, I had to Google and refresh my memory about all that GWOT insanity to remember what the word meant.
Which worries me that it might not be a word that would connect with normies.
cain
@Jay:
The funny thing is that these folks are not socialists or folks that want to vote Democrats. They are the future GOP base!
Jay
@JoyceH:
Since when has any Rethug shown a spine in regards to DJTdiot 47?
His pick, if he get’s rid of Hesgeth, ( that would admit being wrong, DJTdiot doesn’t do that*), will be whom ever Steven Miller picks.
*When push comes to shove, Hesgeth will resign wanting to spend more time with the family, needs to get back to day drinking or because he’s pining for the Fjords.
George
@Librettist:
Exactly. Rogan is motivated by audience and money, nothing more.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Jay: “pursuing other opportunities.”
lowtechcyclist
@Jackie:
Trump chose a clown, got a circus, and he deserves better? That’s hilarious. Who knew that putting a walking disaster area like Hegseth in charge of DOD would become a problem and “a major distraction for the president,” speaking of walking disaster areas.
Only three months in, and already one Cabinet member is about to be pushed out for sheer incompetence. No telling which one’s next, but I bet this will be a recurring feature.
Gvg
@Jackie: and are so…immature that they have not learned how to handle their own mistakes without making it worse. They have cultivated a base that doesn’t accept mistakes as inevitable and human, but instead thinks admitting them is weak. They probably agree. So they don’t just get the guy back in half a day and lecture the ice agents to be more careful or something that could be forgotten and over by now.
I am not sure it was a mistake exactly. The administration hates nearly all “foreigners “ and really thinks they are all illegal in some way. I’ve sure does. It looks like ice even hates British and Canadian tourists. So, I think their various biases were going to lead to this pretty soon, and the bosses didn’t care.
spoot
@Sure Lurkalot: WOW.
This message from Liz Cheney needs to be sent to one of the Front Pagers to be copied as a post, and this community can start to figure out how we realize these actions, to form a true resistance by linking up the right people and organizations to get together to formulate and implement plans of action.
There are talented people in the government who are now losing their jobs, does anyone know how to contact them? We now know what the Trump team is going and where they are going, so can we use local Democratic Party groups and advocates to set up meetings to figure out what is next for us?
We need lawyers, journalists, social media mavens, computer people, money backers, organizers,so many others.
Jackie
@Jay:
Oh jesus. Or Tucker. He and Tulsi would work hand in hand.
Jay
@Jackie:
Fucker Fishsticks is too busy slagging the dead horse subject of Canada as the 51st State.
RevRick
@bbleh: I hear Democratic officials speaking out against the Trump administration all the time. But their voices are limited to the media that chooses to give them the opportunity to speak. My local paper is a shadow of what it was when I first subscribed in 1988. It has given more play to the protests than any comments by local Democratic leaders and even that is somewhat perfunctory.
Few Democrats have the megaphone of a Joe Rogan.
It’s the proverbial if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around, does it make a sound?
Just this morning a local Democratic state representative posted about a verbal online tussle he had with a man who accused him of being insufficiently Jewish. He posted an extensive, thoughtful response, but how many besides me heard him?
It’s easy to garner attention when you accuse a group of people of eating dogs and cats. A thoughtful response? Not so much.
Matt McIrvin
@Gvg: Every so often I still hear some Republican insist that “it’s only ILLEGAL immigration we hate.” The Catch-22 is that according to Stephen Miller essentially all immigration is “illegal”, and he’s setting the agenda.
Matt McIrvin
@Gvg: …There’s also some weaponized incompetence here. We saw this in the first Trump admin when they separated immigrant children from their families and deliberately lost the paperwork. They’re determined to use disorganization to obliterate paper trails. Sometimes the President literally eats the paper trails.
LAC
Matt McIrvin
@Jeffro: My central fear has always been that Trump and Hegseth are planning a war of extermination on the United States itself, and that his purges are creating a new military leadership who will be willing to carry out that plan. If he’s sowing so much chaos that he can’t manage something like this, it’s good news.
Matt McIrvin
@spoot: One of the front-pagers already did that, didn’t they? Maybe it was a mistermix crosspost?
Anyway, I DO NOT trust Republicans telling us how to fight. It’s the Lincoln Project redux. At some point they’re gonna tell us the next step is to throw the trans people under the bus or something.
Mr. Bemused Senior
Josh Marshall’s suggestion:
Clay
@Baud: Totally agree. These Red/ Brown alliances always end up with the right coopting left. Rogan has a big megaphone, Dems don’t need to amplify it; especially at the expense of Dems who are making the point and can’t get coverage.
Miss Bianca
@Jackie: If the pattern of Trump appointment persists…worse. Although it’s hard to imagine a worse pick for that position. Someone evil and competent, as opposed to evil and stupid, I guess.
Miss Bianca
@spoot: Is this the real message from Liz Cheney or the one that was attributed to her? Personally, I’m getting tired of Republican harangues against Democrats. Let her harangue Republicans, not that they’d listen to her, of course.
Paul in KY
@Hungry Joe: I bet he has one that he dresses up in. Riding crop and whole shebang.
Paul in KY
@Darkrose: The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Even if that enemy was/is a douchewad idiot.
Paul in KY
@Jackie: Probably worse. That seems to be how they roll. Maybe Kid Rock or the lead singer from Five Finger Death Punch? Maybe ‘Karen’ Mace?
Paul in KY
@Jay: Yet if Gov. Newsom is elected President in 2028, I would be so so so so so delighted and happy!
Paul in KY
@JoyceH: Ha! That was so first term. He’s letting his freak flag fly, baby. So I don’t think that will happen (unfortunately).