“A UC Berkeley graduate student is suing the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement amid widespread visa revocations for international students at universities across California. Zhuoer Chen, who is set to graduate from UC Berkeley in May with a master’s degree in architecture, is one of four plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit alleging that ICE’s sweeping effort to terminate the federal records of hundreds — possibly thousands — of international students occurred without notice, justification or legal basis. ‘The terminations have occurred without any consistent rationale or legal justification and are entirely arbitrary,’ the complaint states, describing the wave of record terminations in the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System as ‘sweeping and unprecedented’ with ‘nationwide impact.’ SEVIS records are digital files maintained by the Department of Homeland Security that track international students’ visa status, academic enrollment and legal standing.” (04/18/25)
“Last week, the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) membership voted overwhelmingly to approve a new contract following nearly a year of negotiations that were at times contentious with the Chicago Public Schools (CPS). The four-year contract represents a direct rebuke to the Trump administration’s attacks on academic freedom and immigrants, enshrining protections that the union began fighting for months before President Trump was elected. The agreement is also a prime example of the labor strategy of bargaining for ‘the ‘common good’, with provisions that help not only specific union members in the workplace but the broader community as a whole, at a time when such measures are especially crucial. Union members voted by 97% to approve the contract, and the months-long negotiations showcased an impasse between the union and CPS CEO Pedro Martinez. Martinez was ultimately fired by the school board in December but remains in office with a legal challenge pending.” (04/18/25)
“Recently, in an executive order, President Trump directed the removal of ‘improper, divisive, or anti-American ideology’ from the Smithsonian Institution. That order was, in essence, an attempt to rewrite history on race and gender. One-hundred-and-one-year-old Colonel James H. Harvey, one of the last of the famed Tuskegee airmen of World War II, blamed Trump, saying, ‘I’ll tell him to his face. No problem. I’ll tell him, you’re a racist.’ In addition, government websites began scrubbing African-American history, including in the case of the National Park Service eliminating a photo of the famed abolitionist Harriet Tubman and descriptions of the brutal realities of slavery. Black people in America have often led change in this society because our humanity and our liberties were so long suppressed and denied. Black people in my family and community were, of course, descendants of the enslaved.” (04/17/25)
“Disdain for President Donald Trump translates into a refusal to accept reality if doing it gives Trump a political victory. Examples include, but are certainly not limited to, the continuing [and irrefutably factually correct] assertion that Trump, about Charlottesville, said some variation of, ‘There were good and bad white nationalists and neo-Nazis on both sides;’ the denial of the Hunter Biden laptop; that Trump ‘mocked’ a disabled reporter; that Trump said to ‘drink bleach’ to fight COVID; and that the Trump tax cuts [sic] ‘only benefit the rich.'” (04/17/25)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“They are sending billionaires and pop stars into space while the planet burns and Americans ration their insulin / There are companies marketing AI lovers to lonely people and harvesting their data / Last night Israel bombed a tent camp in Gaza, and women and children burned alive / This is a strange, dark place; Strange, dark times in a strange, dark world / Light a candle for those who have died / Light a candle for those who are dead inside / Light a candle for those with algorithms in their eyes / Light a candle for those with AI in their souls / Light a candle for the screaming red children / Light a candle for the silent gray children / Light a candle for the Great Pacific Garbage Patch / Light a candle for the songs of the whales / Light a candle for the hearts like cast lead / Light a candle for the hearts like wallaby roadkill …” (04/17/25)
“In Washington, facts are often the first casualty of politics. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the debate over the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 — President Donald Trump’s signature tax reform law from his first term in office. As debates rage whether to extend the TCJA’s individual tax cuts, left-wing politicians and legacy media outlets are ramping up their usual misinformation campaign. We’ve all heard the talking points: The TCJA was a ‘wealth transfer’ that came ‘at the expense of working families,’ a ‘giveaway to billionaires,’ or my personal favorite, a ‘reverse Robin Hood’ scheme to rob the working class for the benefit of the ultra-wealthy.’ There’s just one problem: none of that is true.” [editor’s note: Neither is it true that there were any tax cuts. If spending isn’t cut, taxes aren’t cut. Payment is just deferred with interest added – TLK] (04/17/25)
“When the Social Security Administration recently reclassified more than 6,000 living and breathing immigrants as dead in order to deny them the Social Security numbers and benefits they legally held, I empathized with those migrants. I’m not an immigrant, and I don’t receive Social Security benefits. Yet my family, like millions of other Americans, has felt the pain and helplessness of losing access to services and benefits through no fault of our own. The technique of declaring thousands of people ‘dead’ with one stroke of the pen is particularly cruel and epitomizes the long-standing dehumanization of immigrants in this country. But it would be short-sighted to view this as an immigration issue. In fact, this move reveals both our common vulnerability to the whims of high-up decision-makers, and our shared humanity.” [editor’s note: The delusions continue that proven fraud is just a myth – SAT] [additional editor’s note: Yes, indeed, some delusions do continue – TLK] (04/17/25)
“The Trump administration plans to eliminate habitat protections for endangered and threatened species in a move environmentalists say would lead to the extinction of critically endangered species because of logging, mining, development and other activities. At issue is a long-standing definition of ‘harm’ in the Endangered Species Act, which has included altering or destroying the places those species live. Habitat destruction is the biggest cause of extinction, said Noah Greenwald, endangered species director at the Center for Biological Diversity. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service said in a proposed rule issued Wednesday that habitat modification should not be considered harm because it is not the same as intentionally targeting a species, called ‘take’. Environmentalists argue that the definition of ‘take,’ though, has always included actions that harm species, and the definition of ‘harm’ has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.” (04/16/25)
“I first ran into a little-known New York City councilwoman named Letitia James in the aughts at a Brooklyn news conference about rapper Foxy Brown. It seems Foxy had been busted, again, over some bad behavior. And among the people who came out to defend her was James, whose real agenda had nothing to do with hip-hop or crime. It was all about making a name for herself. And she did. For all the wrong reasons. James, whom I’d never met or even heard of, made a beeline for me at the event and started haranguing me — but not about the troubled recording artist. She was furious about my columns supporting the still-unbuilt Barclays Center, which I believed would revitalize a decrepit swath of Brooklyn and bring high-profile entertainment and jobs to a place where they were desperately needed.” (04/17/25)
“Another Biden meltdown. Former President Joe Biden was smuggled into Harvard University for a surprise appearance Wednesday — during which he clumsily dropped his ice cream bar on the floor and mistakenly referred to Ukraine as Iraq. The 82-year-old’s discussion with roughly 50 students at the Ivy League school’s Institute of Politics was marked by embarrassing blunders similar to those that plagued his disastrous and short-lived 2024 re-election campaign, the Harvard Crimson reported. During his remarks, Biden accidentally referred to Ukraine as Iraq while discussing Russia’s three-year-old invasion of its European neighbor, prompting his longtime senior adviser Mike Donilon — now a resident fellow at the institute — to correct him. The 46th president then bit into a melting ice cream bar that plopped onto the floor after the talk, the student newspaper reported.” (04/17/25)
