Source: Mother Jones
by Laura C Morel

“In the last year, the country’s most prominent legal organizations—such as the American Bar Association and the American Immigration Lawyers Association— have warned that scams targeting immigrants and attorneys have increased to an alarming level. Certainly, these kinds of grifts are not new in the legal world, which for years has dealt with bad actors practicing law without a license. But representatives from several legal groups and private attorneys told me that today’s scams are more sophisticated and harder to detect thanks to the proliferation of AI and social media.” (04/15/26)

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/04/the-scammers-profiting-off-trumps-immigration-crackdown/

Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Mark Nayler

“Although it’s the world’s second most-visited country, Spain hasn’t been sending out a welcoming message recently. Its Socialist-led government has proposed or passed several measures aimed at deterring foreign property investors, such as a 100% tax on non-EU citizens buying houses (so far just an idea) and a ban on Golden Visas, which awarded residency to non-Spanish citizens who purchased real estate worth at least €500,000 (effective from last April). Over the last few years, there have also been protests against what residents see as over-tourism in hotspots such as Valencia, Málaga, Catalonia, and the Balearic Islands. One might have expected all this negative publicity to have dented Spain’s reputation as one of the best places in the world to take a vacation or buy a second home. But the opposite seems to be true: Spain set a new tourism record in 2025 with 97 million visitors, a 3.2% increase on 2024’s 94 million.” (04/15/26)

https://fee.org/articles/international-appeal/

Source: The Contrarian
by Jennifer Rubin

“Donald Trump was not playing five-dimensional chess when he attacked Pope Leo for being ‘weak on crime’ or when he posted a picture portraying himself as Jesus (subsequently taken down). Assuming a clever strategy behind objectively demented conduct is the equivalent of sane washing, that is, straining to attribute rational motives to someone behaving irrationally. Trump is deeply unwell, becoming more so as he experiences serial failures and finds his bully routine no longer works (on Iran, Europe, or the Pope). … Pope Leo is as much a problem for Trump as Pope John Paul II was for communist Poland.” (04/15/26)

https://www.contrariannews.org/p/autocrats-dont-fare-well-against

Source: Libertarian Institute
by Alan Mosley

“Recently, President Donald Trump asked Republicans to unify to extend the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] with no changes in oversight or accountability. Trump posted on Truth Social, ‘When used properly, FISA is an effective tool to keep Americans safe. For these reasons, I have called for a clean 18-month extension.’ … In May 2020, Trump urged Republicans to vote ‘NO’ on FISA, explicitly tying the law to fears of abuse, including against his own re-election campaign. Four years later, he told lawmakers to ‘KILL FISA,’ claiming it had been ‘illegally used’ against him and that officials had ‘spied on my campaign.'” (04/15/26)

https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/another-trump-flip-flop-from-kill-fisa-to-clean-renewal

Source: Paul Krugman
by Paul Krugman

“There will be many post-mortems on the demise of the Orbán regime. The stunning victory of Hungary’s opposition was delivered by an electoral surge so large that it swamped the anti-democratic breakwaters the regime had erected to maintain its grip on power. A full analysis of why Hungarians repudiated Orbán will surely contain many details unique to Hungary. However, it’s also clear that there were three main factors that led to Orbán’s overthrow. And understanding these factors is important if Americans are to defeat Trump’s MAGA regime.” (04/15/26)

https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/autocracy-corruption