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Intro by Tom Engelhardt for Tom Dispatch At almost 82, I still walk six miles a day without fail. And sometimes now, when I’m walking in my city, New York, I imagine ICE agents arriving here in the hundreds or even thousands as they have in other cities across this country to cause distinctly Trumpian chaos. […]

Donald Trump has decided to close the Kennedy Center entirely.Starting in July, for the next two years, the performing arts space will undergo “construction, revitalization, and complete rebuilding,” according to a Trump Truth Social post Sunday evening.The decision follows a year of canceled performances by a litany of artists who oppose the Trump administration’s agenda, Trump’s ousting of the center’s Democratic board members, and the center’s recent, potentially illegal name change. Trump claimed that he deemed the decision necessary after a “year review” of the center, suggesting that he had anticipated an overhaul of the historically apolitical arts space as soon as he returned to high office.“Based on these findings, and totally subject to Board approval, I have determined that the fastest way to bring The Trump Kennedy Center to the highest level of Success, Beauty, and Grandeur, is to cease Entertainment Operations for an approximately two year period of time, with a scheduled Grand Reopening that will rival and surpass anything that has taken place with respect to such a Facility before,” Trump wrote.The center will shutter for the project on July 4, “in honor of the 250th Anniversary of our Country.”“Financing is completed, and fully in place!” Trump continued. “This important decision, based on input from many Highly Respected Experts, will take a tired, broken, and dilapidated Center, one that has been in bad condition, both financially and structurally for many years, and turn it into a World Class Bastion of Arts, Music, and Entertainment, far better than it has ever been before.” Long before Trump’s meddling, the Kennedy Center was widely considered a premier, world-class arts institution. But since the White House became directly involved in its operations and programming, its normally star-studded lineup has fallen apart. In December, the president suddenly decided to rename the venerated cultural institution “The Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts,” in a flagrant rejection of the laws that created the center in the first place.Kennedy’s family was quick to rip the president apart for the half-baked idea Sunday.“I’ve determined that due to this change in schedule, it’s best for me to close this center down and rebuild a new center that will bear my name, which will surely get everybody to stop talking about the fact that everybody’s cancelling … right?” mocked Maria Shriver, the thirty-fifth president’s niece, on X.Kennedy’s grandson, Manhattan congressional candidate Jack Schlossberg, bit harder, arguing on X that Trump could try but would never succeed in killing Kennedy’s legacy.“Trump can take the Kennedy Center for himself. He can change the name, shut the doors, and demolish the building. He can try to kill JFK,” Schlossberg wrote online. “But JFK is kept alive by us now rising up to remove Donald Trump, bring him to justice, and restore the freedoms generations fought for.”

The propaganda film is eager to present the First Lady as a benevolent political force, and pretend she isn't part of her husband's racist, authoritarian project. It fails at both.

The Department of Justice made a lame attempt to cover up Donald Trump’s face in a photo in the latest trove of Jeffery Epstein files. The photo appears to be of Trump making a speech at an event. Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon sent it in a text message to Epstein in 2019. In it, a small portion of Trump’s head, including his ear, are still visible next to a black box covering the rest of his face. Why attempt to cover up this photo? On its own, it doesn’t incriminate Trump in any of Epstein’s crimes, and previous file releases have already established that Bannon and Epstein had a long correspondence. It seems as though it was an attempt to conceal Trump, although he is still identifiable underneath the black box. The rest of the files contain multiple references to Trump, his Mar-a-Lago estate, and his family members. They also contain interviews with Epstein’s victims, some of whom refer to the president. The government has only released half of its total Epstein records, despite being required by law to release all unclassified files by six weeks ago. Trump continues to deny a close relationship with the convicted sex trafficker, despite mountains of evidence that one existed. It seems that the DOJ and Attorney General Pam Bondi are assisting the president in trying to minimize the obvious.

A whistleblower’s lawyer accused Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard of burying their client’s complaint about her, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday. In a letter sent to Gabbard’s office in November, attorney Andrew Bakaj accused the director of preventing a complaint detailing her wrongdoing from reaching lawmakers. The complaint, which was originally filed with the intelligence community’s inspector general in May, is so highly classified that Bakaj himself has not been able to review it. Typically, an employee is able to share a complaint alleging wrongdoing directly with lawmakers, as long as the director of national intelligence instructs them on how to securely transmit it. But months after the complaint was originally filed, it reportedly remains locked away in a safe, a person familiar with the matter told the Journal. “From my experience, it is confounding for [Gabbard’s office] to take weeks—let alone eight months—to transmit a disclosure to Congress,” said Bakaj in a statement. In addition to accusing Gabbard of wrongdoing, the complaint reportedly implicates “an office within a different federal agency” and raises potential claims of executive privilege, officials told the Journal. One official warned that disclosure of the complaint could cause “grave damage to national security.”The intelligence community’s inspector general determined that the specific allegations against Gabbard weren’t credible, but it could not make a determination about the other claims, according to a representative for the federal watchdog. Bakaj said he was never informed that any determination was reached. Last week, Gabbard was spotted lurking around a federal raid at the Fulton County, Georgia, election office. Having been completely sidelined from the typical responsibilities of the director of national intelligence, Gabbard has apparently spent months leading an investigation into President Donald Trump’s baseless claims about the results of the 2020 presidential election.

Donald Trump threatened to sue comedian Trevor Noah for daring to mention his long-standing connection with child sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. Practically everyone at the 68th Annual Grammy Awards jabbed and sneered at the president and his administration, but the South African celebrity was the man who really got his goat, inspiring Trump to post a legal threat to Truth Social.“The Grammy Awards are the WORST, virtually unwatchable!” Trump wrote at 1:01 a.m. Monday.“CBS is lucky not to have this garbage litter their airwaves any longer,” he said, referring to the music institution’s 2024 contract to move its award ceremony to ABC for the next decade, ending a 53-year run at CBS.“The host, Trevor Noah, whoever he may be, is almost as bad as Jimmy Kimmel at the Low Ratings Academy Awards,” Trump continued. “Noah said, INCORRECTLY about me, that Donald Trump and Bill Clinton spent time on Epstein Island. WRONG!!!“I can’t speak for Bill, but I have never been to Epstein Island, nor anywhere close, and until tonight’s false and defamatory statement, have never been accused of being there, not even by the Fake News Media.“Noah, a total loser, better get his facts straight, and get them straight fast,” he said. “It looks like I’ll be sending my lawyers to sue this poor, pathetic, talentless, dope of an M.C., and suing him for plenty$. Ask Little George Slopadopolus, and others, how that all worked out. Also ask CBS! Get ready Noah, I’m going to have some fun with you!”Hours earlier, while setting up the nominees for the “Song of the Year” category, Noah quipped that the highly coveted prize was nearly as desired by artists as Greenland is by Trump—for a very particular reason.“Song of the Year—that is a Grammy that every artist wants almost as much as Trump wants Greenland, which makes sense because Epstein’s island is gone, he needs a new one to hang out with Bill Clinton,” Noah told the crowd.Trump has long relied on the legal system and lawsuits in order to settle his problems, using the incredible financial heft of his real estate empire or other investments to smother his opposition.

Posted by Joshua Scheer In this episode of Informed Rant, host Joshua Scheer speaks with Venezuelan‑American analyst and CodePink organizer Leonardo Flores about one of the most explosive geopolitical stories of the year: the U.S. bombing raid and kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro. Flores walks through the media distortions, the collapse of international law, the […]