I barely had a moment to get comfortable before my phone started buzzing. In one of those coincidences that make you believe the good lord does not want to see CNN turned into Fox News, I got a flood of messages that the state attorneys general had just won another major antitrust case that they took to trial: the Live Nation-Ticketmaster monopoly. I immediately jotted a note and passed it to Katie, who broke the news to the room during her opening statement:

Katie, David, and Mark were representing different constituencies that were signatories to a letter that we at Democracy Defenders Fund, the Committee for First Amendment, Future Film Coalition, and many other groups had put together. It features over 3,500 signatures urging state AG action here, just as in the LiveNation case, and pledging their support for the AGs. The signers include everyone from stars like Ben Stiller, Bryan Cranston, and Jane Fonda to the working people who actually make the film, television, and news businesses operate: camera operators, makeup artists, sound engineers, and many others.

The letter dropped on Monday with a New York Times exclusive, was widely covered everywhere, and served as a wake up call to Larry and David Ellison, the father-son duo who run Paramount, that this dangerous combination faces the same opposition that was successful in the Live Nation-Ticketmaster case. The news of that state AG win galvanized the wood-paneled hearing room in the Rayburn House Office Building and with the letter and hearing constituted a one-two-three punch that knocked the inevitability out of the Paramount-WBD narrative.

I was so proud of my friends who testified with the other witnesses, Mara Verheyden-Hilliard representing the Committee for the First Amendment and Michael Isaac representing the Writers Guild of America East. As Katie said when she was later reflecting on the hearing, “Each and every witness delivered … the critical messaging that we all need to hear, which is that this merger threatens creative independence … [and] the ability to deliver truthful fact-driven journalism.” Here’s our Substack Live conversation moderated by the Contrarian’s wonderful culture columnist Meredith Blake where you can catch that and more:

It’s fitting that our work to oppose this merger, which is only beginning, came the same week that the Hungarian people finally threw out Viktor Orbán after 16 years of authoritarian rule. The excessive control of entertainment and news by merging two of Hollywood’s iconic film and TV producers, putting CBS, CNN and TikTok under the ownership of the Ellisons, would effectively represent the Orban-ization of America. As our letter of support for the state AGs said, “Competition is essential for a healthy economy and a healthy democracy. So is thoughtful regulation and enforcement. Media consolidation has already weakened one of America’s most vital global industries — one that has long shaped culture and connected people around the world.”

As I recently wrote, the Ellisons are notorious cronies of Trump, who with his administration have been openly pushing for the merger, including the takeover of CNN to get better coverage. And to prove the point about this unholy alliance, David Ellison will this week host a D.C. dinner “in celebration of the First Amendment honoring the Trump White House” together with the CBS White House correspondents. You can’t make this up. How do you celebrate freedom of the press by honoring a president and a White House who viciously attack it daily? The oxymoronic nature of the gathering is only highlighted by its location, the “Donald Trump United States Institute of Peace.”

This is exactly the kind of thing that Hungary–where Orban-linked forces took over the media–just rejected. We can’t let Orbanization happen in this country. We are just getting started with our work to stop it.

That is thanks to you Contrarians of course. Your paid subscriptions make it possible for us to work on this matter and about 300 others! That includes many of the landmark cases and wins of the Trump period. It’s the most unique bargain in American journalism: you get the Contrarian’s scintillating coverage of how our democracy is fighting back, and you get to join the fight by supporting my and my colleagues’ legal cases.

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As for the anti-merger letter the over 3,500 entertainment and news professionals who have now signed are all heroes because they are speaking up despite the risk of retaliation. Indeed, that retaliation was demonstrated — together with the Ellisons’ unfitness to operate CNN — when Paramount pulled all its advertising from a leading entertainment publication because one of its columnists signed the letter. There was no real doubt about the unsuitability of the Ellisons after the shocking mishandling of CBS News on their watch, but the episode highlighted how brave the signers are. Ruffalo put it well in his testimony when he compared this moment to the notorious Hollywood blacklist era.

Perhaps my favorite moment of the entire process of putting together this letter, however, was when my friend Damon Lindelof told us several days before the letter launched that he was going to apply his signature. He’s one of the great TV creators whose body of work includes Lost, Watchmen, and much more. He has made his professional home at Warner Bros. for a decade and a half. He explained on Instagram, “Hollywood mergers mean fewer movies and fewer TV shows and that means fewer jobs. When two storied backlots are owned by the same company, the outcome is intuitive—one becomes a Ghost Town. I’m scared. But I’m not a ghost. And a fight is already lost if it’s never fought. So I signed. Proudly.” His entire statement is worth reading. I am nominating him for a Profile in Courage Award! (Documentarian Rory Kennedy signed the letter too, so I know who to call.)

True, all of this was just one battle in a much larger war for democracy being waged in the United States and around the world, including in Hungary. But that’s how we save our democracy: one battle after another (so to speak). And that is also how we at the Contrarian cover our democracy. See for yourself in our rundown of the best of the Contrarian’s work this week, as always put together by my wonderful colleagues.

Under the Banner of Heaven

Hegseth’s Enraging Purges Shock but Don’t Surprise

Shalise Manza-Young wrote on the secretary of Defense’s ongoing exercises in bigotry and poor military leadership, a man seemingly determined to exclude everyone more qualified (and non-white/straight/cis/male) than he is. “Before he publicly prayed that his God give troops the power to commit ‘overwhelming violence’ in Iran, Hegseth had already acted like a segregationist intent on taking the military back to 1948.”

Trump’s Puerile Pope Problem

Catholic author and scholar Christopher Hale joined Jen Rubin to break down Trump’s recent attacks against Pope Leo XIV, and why the pope’s comments are getting so far under Trump’s skin in the first place. “When Americans can see the man in the white cassock speak natural English and speak thoughtfully about American issues…. I think that is his superpower.”

Elections

The California Quagmire

Tim Dickinson reported on the latest in the “semi-dysfunctional scrum” of California’s governor’s race, which, following the exit of Democrat Eric Swalwell in light of sexual assault allegations, has created a bizarre danger zone for Democrats: If they don’t coalesce around a viable candidate soon, California could end up choosing between two Republicans.

Trump Mobilizes DHS and USPS in Latest Assault on Elections

Samantha Tarazi told us what we need to know about Trump’s second executive order on elections, signed last month in the aftermath of the SAVE Act’s legislative failure, and no less of a blatant attempt at disenfranchisement. “[It’s] all to create chaos and sow seeds of doubt ahead of this year’s midterms while giving Trump’s allies in state legislatures a playbook to undermine American citizens’ freedom to vote.”

Long Cons

The Tax Fairness Question Dominating This Filing Season

Elena Patel wrote on the new inequalities of this year’s tax season, courtesy of the One Big Beautiful Bill — the benefits of which tilt toward the very top of the income ladder while the costs fall on those at the bottom.”

Russ Vought Is Rewriting America’s Budget

Apropos of Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought testifying before the House Budget Committee — during which lawmakers quizzed him on Trump’s proposed $1.5 trillion defense budget (a 44% increase) and cuts to domestic programs — Bobby Kogan joined Jen to discuss Vought’s real game: the continued gutting of federal programs.

Why Donald Trump and Kash Patel Want Your Data

Jeff Nesbit wrote on how the very administration that claimed to be the victim of surveillance overreach is now asking for the keys to the most powerful spy machine ever built. “The timing is calculated.”

Media Matters

Why the Meme Wars Are No Laughing Matter

Josh Levs wrote on “memetic warfare,” in which the base units of internet commentary have become powerful tools of statecraft, propaganda, and cyberattacks. “It’s a phenomenon that surrounds and manipulates us in ways most people don’t realize.”

Block the Merger!

Katie Phang laid out an exacting case against the Paramount–Warner Bros. merger, which would erode press freedom and make important stories harder to tell. “Maybe no executive ever says the quiet part out loud…. Careers are made and destroyed through suggestion, through silence, through raised eyebrows.”

‘If Someone Won’t Answer, Persist’

Meredith Blake interviewed the subject and filmmakers behind Steal This Story, Please!, a documentary about Amy Goodman, the unflinching Democracy Now! Host whose prescient vision for independent media is now a beacon in a time of unprecedented consolidation and threatened free speech.

Fighting Back

Orban’s Defeat Spurs Democracy’s Resurrection

Tim Mak joined Jen to discuss celebrations in the streets of Budapest, what Viktor Orbán’s defeat means for global democracy, and what we can learn for our own fight against autocracy. “They were chanting Europe, Europe, Europe….”

This AG Fought the Ticketmaster Monopoly and Won

California Attorney General Rob Bonta joined Jen to discuss his win this week in the monopoly case against Ticketmaster and Live Nation — welcome proof that states can fight the oligarchy despite a federal government with no interest in enforcing antitrust laws.

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week, we saw protests in Texas and Washington, Tesla Takedowns, and much more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists took on the Strait of Hormuz (Holding the Cards, Taking a Toll, Nick Anderson; Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling), dire straits at CNN (Coming Soon: The New CNN, RJ Matson), and straight-up blasphemy (Big Crowds, Doctor, Doctor, Michael de Adder).

Inventors Have Looked to Perfect ‘Robot Umpires’ for Better Part of a Century

Frederic J. Frommer reported on the MLB’s recent adoption of the automated ball-strike system — and how it’s actually the culmination of a surprisingly long, quixotically funny quest for robot umpires. “Jeez, Luciano, this machine is even blinder than you.”

Moon Joy

Lily Conway wrote about the joy the Artemis II crew gave us. From naming a crater in remembrance of one of the crewmember’s late wife to reveling in the possibility that humanity can do amazing things when united, everyone can use a little Moon Joy right now.

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One last thing: Your big idea (350 words) could win $1,000. Five colleagues and I are judging The Future of Democracy Prize — and we’re looking for young voices (18–30) with bold answers to one question: What will it take for U.S. democracy not just to survive, but to thrive? No finished essay required to enter. Just a 350-word abstract by April 30. Finalists get $1,000 and publication in a national anthology. Learn more or submit your entry here! And please, forward this to one smart 20-something who needs a nudge.

That’s not exactly the approach that President Trump, his cronies, and their families have adopted. I’ve written before about the Top 10 most outrageous corruption scandals of this administration. This week, my Democracy Defenders Fund colleagues and I added another item to the list. Working with former New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin, we filed a complaint with the Securities and Exchange Commission urging it investigate ALT5 Sigma (ALTS).

This company boasted Trump’s son Eric as a board member (later re-designated as a board “strategic advisor and observer”) and Trump Special Envoy Steve Witkoff’s son Zach as its board chair. Its history in recent months is one of serious failures of compliance, breakdowns of governance, and profoundly concerning financial connections with another Trump and Witkoff-linked venture, World Liberty Financial (WLF).

The story starts in August, when ALTS told the world that it had raised $1.5 billion through various investment vehicles. ALTS then moved the money to WLF by buying $750 million of its $WLFI governance tokens, about 7% of total supply. As detailed in our letter, “ALTS appears to have steered as much as $500 million of private investor money directly into the pockets of the Trump family and their associates.” When this money hit their wallets, Zach Witkoff (co-founder and CEO of WLF) and Eric Trump (also a WLF co-founder) assumed leadership roles on the board of ALTS.

These facts give rise to questions that are of the utmost importance to the integrity of our financial markets and of our democracy, as our letter explains. The most profound: who were the investors who funded the ALTS $WLFI purchase–and did they do so in order to get in the good graces of the Trump administration?

The concerns about this transaction are only deepened by what went on in the period in and around this massive financial transfer to WLF. In August, ALTS disclosed that several months earlier a Rwandan court had ruled that ALT5 Sigma Canada Inc., a subsidiary of the company, and its former principal were criminally liable for illicit enrichment and money laundering, ordering imprisonment, fines, and dissolution of the subsidiary. Shortly thereafter, the CEO of ALTS was suspended without explanation, auditors changed multiple times within just a few weeks, and the company failed to meet the due date for filing its annual report. It’s little wonder that ALTS was at risk of being delisted from Nasdaq and its share price has plummeted. Despite the immense capital influx from these transactions, the share piece has declined by around 75%. The company is looking at hundreds of millions of dollars in losses for the 2025 fiscal year.

Given these troubling data points, our letter urges the SEC’s Enforcement Division to “carefully examine these issues because they indicate, both individually and collectively, that ALTS may have engaged in a number of securities violations, thereby harming investors and financial marketplace writ large.” This is not just a story about corporate governance. It is a test of whether the rules that protect investors and the integrity of American markets still apply when political power and private profit intersect.

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Our SEC letter calling for an investigation of ALTS is just one of many similar filings we’ve made. This one is outrageous enough that even Trump’s SEC may investigate. But whatever they do, we’re laying down a marker for the press, the public and other enforcement authorities. Whether for state attorneys general and securities regulators, a future more independent Congress, or future federal regulators, there will be a trail of breadcrumbs to follow. Meanwhile, we must all demand answers.

Our ability to continue pushing back against Trump and his cronies’ web of dubious dealings is, of course, supported by your paid subscriptions. We are deeply grateful that you Contrarians make this work possible as well as our weekly pro-democracy Contrarian coverage. See for yourself in this week’s roundup of our best content produced by my terrific colleagues:

War Crimes

What Comes From the Failure to Confront Insanity

Jen Rubin wrote on the cascade of civil and political failures behind Trump’s genocidal threats on Tuesday: “some muddled tale of a diplomatic breakthrough should in no way diminish the illegality, the horror, or the frightful intrusion of religious zealotry into our politics.”

The Strategic Gift to Tehran

Brian O’Neill wrote on how Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may be helping to produce the strongest Islamic Republic since 1979. “It would be one of the great strategic self-inflicted wounds in Middle East policy.”

Toxic Religious Rhetoric & Why a Ceasefire in Iran Isn’t Enough

On the podcast this week, Jen spoke with Robert P. Jones about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s crusader rhetoric and the dangers of Trump’s “refrigerator-magnet style” theology, and with Joyce Vance about Iran after the ceasefire, the Republicans finding a shred of conscience, and more.

Break Glass

Norman Ornstein thinks it’s time to call an emergency an emergency and invoke the 25th Amendment. “We have a malignant narcissistic psychopath as president, with control over the military and the atomic arsenal, who is deteriorating mentally before our very eyes.”

Cabinet Chaos

What Pam Bondi Destroyed in One Year Could Take Decades to Rebuild

Stacey Young wrote on just how much Pam Bondi’s reign as AG degraded the Justice Department: an exodus of talent, criminal cases shut down, an utter loss of good faith with the courts and more. “Now, the best way we can fight for the department is from the outside.”

Which Cabinet Member is Next on The Chopping Block?

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) joined Jen to consider the next attorney general—and the next vacant cabinet seat—amid war with Iran. “I think Kash Patel stands a very good chance of being shown the door.”

The Home Front

Texas Stripped 15,000 Businesses of Opportunity. Now It Faces a Legal Challenge.

Stacey Abrams wrote on how Republicans have made disadvantaged communities a scapegoat for failed economic policies, including a Texas comptroller who quietly decertified more than 15,000 minority- and women-owned businesses in December.

Don’t Forget About Minnesota

Annastacia Belladonna-Carrera of Common Cause reminded us that, despite what the Trump regime claimed, ICE has never left Minnesota and is continuing operations across the state. “The media may not be all over it … but the need is still there.”

No Farms, No Food

John Boyd, founder of the Black Farmers Association, spoke to April Ryan to sound the alarm on Trump’s devastating attack on small and minority farmers. “There’s going to be a lot of generational land that changes hands.”

Affordability is the Issue, Especially for Childcare

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf wrote on how the Trump administration is putting the onus on states to fund social services — while making it impossible for them to provide those services.

Checking in With the Bots

5 Things You Should Know About AI Right Now

Amid the many hype and doom cycles about AI, Adam Conner of the Center for American Progress gave us a breakdown of what AI is actually doing right now — to the economy, to warfare, to your job.

How the Media is Helping AI Spread Lies

Josh Levs wrote on the problem with AI summaries having taken the place of traditional media as the first source of information for many, even when it comes to war — and how this is compounded by the media’s acquiescence to AI-first search.

History Has Its Eyes on You

Operation Enduring Glory

Tim Dickinson gave us a rundown of all the things Trump is naming after himself, which somehow includes both the Institute of Peace and the “most lethal warship ever built” at the tip of the iceberg.

The Infuriating Hypocrisy of Usha Vance

Meredith Blake checked in with the second lady, who thinks kids should read more but doesn’t have much to say about the Trump administration defunding libraries (or anything else).

Split Screen: Giorgia Meloni — Feminist or Fascist?

Azza Cohen took a nuanced look at Giorgia Meloni, Italy’s first female prime minister, as both gender-empowerment opportunist and persevering target of media sexism. “That a woman can be the head of a political party named ‘brothers’ is some kind of ironic victory.”

Fighting Back

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week, we saw anti-war protests nationwide in New York, Illinois, Washington, D.C., Missouri, Tennessee, and more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

This Congresswoman Is Jamming the Gears of Trump’s Chaos Machine

Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-TX) joined Jen Rubin with an update on the ongoing standoff over ICE funding and why there is still cause for hope. “The point really is people’s freedoms … so we’re not going to vote for one more penny until these reforms are done.”

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists took on hollow wins (Rescue from Iran, Nick Anderson), obvious losses (Both Sides Win, Michael de Adder), better worlds (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling), and more.

The Auriemma/Staley Spat is Good for Women’s College Basketball

Carron J. Phillips wrote on how the 2026 Women’s Final Four will be deservedly remembered for one thing — and it wasn’t the championship game. “Sports are more enjoyable when what’s at stake is more than the final score.”

This column is based on our letter and associated materials.

Correction: An earlier version said Eric Trump sits on the board of ALT5 Sigma. He is now a strategic advisor and observer. This version has been updated.

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Like the hundreds of others in the crowded courtroom, I expected to see history in the making — a case that would enter the annals of American law. What I didn’t expect was to witness a scene out of a reality TV show: The Real Cabinet Members of D.C.

I was seated in the third row of the gallery. The first row is reserved for cabinet members and VIPs, and it was filling up when, at about 9:45 a.m., Attorney General Pam Bondi arrived and took an open seat for the 10 a.m. argument. She looked uncomfortable and unhappy, her face a grimace, her back stiff. I assumed she knew her side was going to have a rough day of it. We now know that she had just been fired in the car ride over with the president.

Before long came the lumbering bulk of Donald Trump, accompanied by the more diminutive White House Counsel David Warrington. He sandwiched himself between Bondi and Trump, with the president occupying the spot at the very end of the far right of the row. That’s where the drama kicked in. Trump began whispering to Warrington and to his Secret Service detail. Then Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick hurried over from further down the row, sycophantically groveling in the aisle to Trump’s right for more presidential whispering.

The next thing I knew, Trump was getting up and moving to the far left opposite end of the bench, about five feet in front of me — and as far away from Bondi as possible. She was left alone at the end of the row, looking none too chipper.

At the time I thought maybe Trump just didn’t like the view, although it wasn’t that different. It was a little over 24 hours later that Bondi’s firing was announced. In retrospect, it makes me wonder if it wasn’t the seat that Trump disliked but the seatmate. Whatever the explanation, I momentarily felt sorry for Bondi, abandoned at the end of the row like a school kid without a lunch companion.

But my flicker of sympathy was short-lived. After her role in pursuing baseless criminal charges against innocent victims of Trump’s misplaced revenge, in exposing the names of the Epstein victims, and then in doing so much other damage to the Department of Justice and the rule of law, I can only say she deserves to be shunned–and disbarred. (Hmm, that gives me an idea….)

With all that as prologue, what then transpired once the arguments began must have done little to improve her mood. Based on what I saw in court on Wednesday, I am guessing we are looking at a 6-3 or 7-2 victory for our birthright case. It was a terrible day for Trump, Bondi and their ilk — but a great day for justice and for all you Contrarians, whose paid subscriptions help support my work on cases like this one.

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It appears that the Supreme Court is poised to affirm that the citizenship clause of the Fourteenth Amendment means what it has always been understood to mean: that every person born on American soil is an American citizen. ACLU Legal Director and my co-counsel Cecillia Wang did a brilliant job of explaining that the meaning of the citizenship clause has been fixed since the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868. Subsequent Supreme Court case law, notably the Wong Kim Ark decision in 1898, has only reinforced that babies born in the country are American citizens regardless of the citizenship status of their parents. Here I am with Cecillia right after the argument:

Even the conservative justices were skeptical of the government’s argument: that only babies with parents who are “domiciled” in the United States and have permanent legal status here are entitled to birthright citizenship. Solicitor General John Sauer was peppered with questions about the lack of textual and historical support for this argument. At one point, after Sauer mentioned Wong Kim Ark, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch said, “Well, I’m not sure how much you want to rely on Wong Kim Ark.” Gorsuch also called out the government on the striking absence of discussion of “domicile” in congressional debates at the time the Fourteenth Amendment was passed. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. referred to the government’s examples as “quirky.”

We do not expect to win this case 9-0, and Justices Clarence Thomas and, to some extent, Samuel A. Alito were sympathetic to the government’s arguments. That said, based on the questioning from the justices, it appears that a clear majority will rule for our clients. This is not a difficult case, in large part because the court already decided this issue in Wong Kim Ark, which involved the son of Chinese immigrants. In fact, Kavanaugh asked Wang whether the opinion could be a very short one affirming that the court is following Wong Kim Ark, and she agreed that it could.

As I explained at a rally after the argument, Wednesday was the culmination of years of planning that began even months before Trump was reelected in 2024. This planning was the reason that Democracy Defenders Fund and our partners were able to act immediately when Trump’s executive order purporting to end birthright citizenship as we know it was issued on the first day of his second term. More of my rally remarks are here:

We do not relish that this work is necessary, but I and my litigation colleagues at Democracy Defenders Fund and Democracy Defenders Action stand ready to continue fighting. That is thanks in no small part to your paid subscriptions, which fuel our role in cases and matters like this one and over 280 others.

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Of course, your paid subscriptions don’t support only my work in the courts of law; they also support the Contrarian’s stellar coverage that shapes the court of public opinion. Just take a look at this week’s highlights, put together by my wonderful Contrarian colleagues:

Birthright citizenship at SCOTUS

Trump Is Likely to Lose on Birthright

Erwin Chemerinsky laid out multiple legal paths by which SCOTUS could strike down Trump’s illegal executive order on birthright citizenship, as suggested by Wednesday’s oral arguments on Trump v. Barbara. “The Fourteenth Amendment is not the only avenue.”

On the Ground from SCOTUS’ Hearings on Birthright Citizenship [podcast]

This week on the podcast, we heard from Juan Proaño, head of LULAC, court reporter Adam Klasfield, post-oral argument impressions from yours truly, and more from the front lines of the SCOTUS birthright citizenship case.

No Kings Day at the Court

Taryn Wilgus Null wrote about what else is at stake in the birthright case: whether the president can unilaterally change the Constitution. “The court’s decision will go to the very rule of law … and whether our country is truly by the people and for the people.”

War in Iran

Iran’s Negotiating Strategy Is Built on Distrust

Brian O’Neill analyzed Tehran’s playbook in response to Trump’s flailing negotiations: engage tactically, resist irreversible concessions, and assume diplomacy can be used to justify further military pressure. “Iranian officials have indicated a willingness to continue conflict rather than return to a pre-war status quo that leaves the regime exposed.”

Is It Too Late To Apologize?

Dennis Ross, former ambassador and Middle East negotiator, joined Jennifer Rubin to weigh in on Iran peace talks and answer some billion-dollar questions: Will anyone give up control of the Strait of Hormuz? Are maintaining sanctions against Iran a non-starter? Do the Houthis and other external parties need to be addressed simultaneously? And what, finally, will it take to secure a ceasefire?

American Consumers Will Pay for Trump’s War with Iran

Jeff Nesbit wrote on where the American public is already paying for the war in Iran — at the grocery store, the gas pump, in our electronics — and where it could go from here. “We’re no longer dealing with a localized conflict or a simple energy shock. We’re witnessing the systematic deconstruction of the global supply chain.”

Trump Is Serious About Accepting a Humiliating Defeat

Jen checked in with our reckless firestarter-in-chief, whose most recent spate of rambling, false statements on the war in Iran lay bare his modus operandi in what is already a snowballing geopolitical nightmare. “No other president could possibly have done this much damage in such a short time. The United States stands alone — more despised and less respected than we have ever been in the modern era.”

Inhumane policies, ongoing harms

The Echo in Trump’s Detention Camps

Shalise Manza Young situated ICE’s detention facilities in the searing context of a legacy of state violence. “There is nothing in American history that compares to the horrors of chattel slavery and the Trail of Tears. But damn if the echoes of both can’t be heard when it comes to these federal concentration camps.”

For Meta, the Mask Is Off: They Knowingly Harmed Children

Yaël Eistenstat reported on two landmark guilty verdicts in the long road to holding social media companies accountable for their predatory — and predator-enabling — design and business practices. “This is the type of evidence social media companies have fought tooth and nail to prevent from ever entering a courtroom.”

Women Who Serve Also Face the Trump Administration’s Misogyny

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf wrote on the increasingly hostile environment women in the military endure under the Trump administration’s misogynist, anti-DEI policies. “We’ve reached the point in the plot where they no longer worry about saying the quiet part out loud.”

Fighting back

In Defense of Joyful Protest

Tim Dickinson reported on No Kings 3 from Portland, Oregon, where the day was a party with purpose. “Portland protesters turned the tables by laughing in the face of fascism, donning chicken suits and inflatable frog costumes, and refusing to cower before an authoritarian president.

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

All this week, we featured coverage from some of the 8 million of us who attended No Kings protests last weekend. We also highlighted protest planning for May Day, including plans for a nationwide general strike. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Protesting is Necessary but Not Sufficient

Danny Miller and Steve Silverman wrote on what must come the day after we take to the streets, if we’re serious about stopping democratic backsliding: “strikes, boycotts, deliberate non-cooperation with illegitimate exercises of power, and the patient work of organizing across every sector of civil society.”

Cartoons, culture & fun stuff

This week our cartoonists covered making deals (The Next Big Iran War Announcement; Help!, Nick Anderson), breaking promises (‘If they rise, they rise’, Michael de Adder), losing big (Have You Seen the Dow?, RJ Matson), and the biggest loser (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling).

‘Mr. Nobody Against Putin’ Takes a Chilling Look at the Effects of Russian Propaganda

Meredith Blake wrote on the Oscar-winning Russian documentary that has a lot to teach Americans about how a society gets militarized — especially its schools.

Plus, Emily Beyda shared her perfectly imperfect Easter treats, and G. Elliott Morris shared Pancake.

The mega-merger would allow the Ellisons to consolidate and control how Americans consume news and information to benefit Trump’s authoritarian agenda. Exhibit A: Last August, the Ellisons took control of Paramount, the home of CBS news, in a separate merger through their company Skydance — and immediately transformed CBS News’s coverage, with the network taking more fawning positions on Trump’s political program. There is little doubt that, should the Paramount-WB merger pass regulatory and legal scrutiny, the Ellisons will look to transform CNN — though they claim otherwise — as they did their network news empire. That is a deeply alarming prospect, particularly to champions of democratic rule who know that media consolidation is a time-honored authoritarian tactic.

The Ellison takeover of CBS News provides us with a painful picture of what a future CNN might become. As detailed in our Democracy Defenders Action letter with partners to Paramount’s board, the company’s handling of CBS News raised serious concerns about a steady erosion of editorial independence. That deterioration culminated in the elevation of Bari Weiss to a position of extraordinary influence over the network’s direction. Ratings are now in the toilet, but there is no sign of change, raising the question of whether the whole point was to destroy the storied CBS journalism operation as an independent overseer of government, including of Trump.

And it may be even worse for CNN, the news crown jewel of WBD. Reports indicate that David Ellison promised Trump that he would make “sweeping changes” to the network. This reportedly may include giving Weiss some control over CNN as well as CBS. It’s unsurprising that Trump administration officials have expressed vocal support for the Ellisons in their hostile takeover bid, as has been widely reported.

On Friday, FCC Chair Brendan Carr openly bragged that “President Trump took on the fake news media, and President Trump is winning,” including because “soon enough CNN will have new ownership.” And Trump himself allegedly has gone so far as to give Larry Ellison a “direct personal assurance” that Paramount would win the WB war, according to a recent lawsuit.

Don’t minimize the non-news harms of this fiasco either. The Ellisons would also control a huge market share of movies and television. The 20th century teaches us that those may be even more powerful tools for pushing pro-Trump propaganda.

Moreover, these kinds of concentrations of market power hurt consumers. Instead of Paramount and Warner competing in the marketplace, they would be one consolidated mass. Basic economics teaches us that would lead to higher prices and fewer choices for consumers. Rather than HBO Max and Paramount+ contending with each other to drive prices down, they can agree to hike them. The mashing together of big companies would likely lead to layoffs at the combined enterprises — another blow to working people.

To students of authoritarianism, this pattern is unmistakable. Twenty-first century strongmen consolidate power steadily, across institutions — government, business, media and culture — until dissent has nowhere left to stand. It is the playbook followed by Vladimir Putin in Russia, Viktor Orbán in Hungary, and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey: centralize power, marginalize independent voices, and bring the information ecosystem to heel. They don’t care whether the crony capitalism they practice worsens economic conditions for average people in those countries. When Trump, his backers in politics, and his aligned corporate actors move to concentrate control over media and cultural production, they are not just reshaping markets; they are testing whether the same model can take hold here in the United States.

That is why the proposed merger is so dangerous. What’s at stake here is not simply another corporate combination, but rather a profound shift in who controls the production and distribution of news and entertainment in the United States. When a handful of firms dominate both creative output and the channels through which Americans understand the world, the risks aren’t just economic — they’re civic.

That is particularly problematic with this merger, as it would unite major studios, streaming platforms, and national news networks under a single, right-wing corporate umbrella — a new media giant that could easily convert CNN and its other properties into a new Fox News. A Trump-blessed, Ellison-controlled media empire would bring a narrowing of editorial autonomy when the country can least afford it.

In the face of all of that, we unfortunately have little expectation that the federal government will stop the deal. The Trump administration has retreated from serious, robust, and nonpartisan antitrust enforcement — likely, in this case, at the behest of the president himself. DOJ has sought more information about the transaction but that is probably a fig leaf in light of the pro-Ellison remarks by the President and other administration officials. Crossing Trump is hardly a recipe for career advancement in this administration.

That places the burden of protecting consumers from monopolies on the shoulders of the state attorneys general. Fortunately, the states have all the federal government’s legal tools, if not more. They can open investigations, compel documents, and, if necessary, go to court to block the transaction or impose meaningful conditions. California Attorney General Rob Bonta has already signaled that states are prepared to move independently of federal regulators. And they should. Courts have long recognized that mergers threatening to reduce competition, suppress wages, or degrade quality can and should be stopped before the damage is done. In a case of this magnitude — touching not just markets but also the infrastructure of democratic discourse — the argument for action is overwhelming.

This moral burden will place a major strain on the states. State attorneys general, unlike the federal government, suffer from resource constraints. Most have small antitrust departments, with only a few lawyers and experts to review key mergers — a process that can take months, depending on a deal’s complexity. This is why we have seen — and will likely continue to see — multi-state enforcement efforts, like the Live Nation-Ticketmaster litigation. And even these collaborative efforts come with high costs, as states must go toe-to-toe with companies willing to pour hundreds of millions into their legal defense. The states have notched some critical wins, but they still need help.

That’s where organizations like ours and the rest of the democracy movement come in. Outside advocacy can play a key role in shaping the political environment in which these cases unfold. That is especially true here, where fear of professional retaliation could mute voices within the industry itself. Civil society groups, journalists, creators, and even shareholders can help fill that silence by documenting the merger’s likely harms, supporting the costly litigation such a challenge would require, and making clear to the public that this deal is neither benign nor inevitable.

Other opposition is also beginning to emerge. The Los Angeles Board of Supervisors approved a motion to conduct a “comprehensive economic impact analysis” of the merger, which could be a disaster for the city. Across the Atlantic, the European Commission appeared to expand its investigation into the deal’s potential funding sources from the Middle East under the Foreign Subsidies Regulation. Brussels reportedly issued new requests for information from Paramount, demanding transparency into the various sovereign wealth funds backing the Ellison bid — specifically questioning whether capital from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates constitutes an unfair market distortion.

For all these reasons, the assumption that the merger is a fait accompli deserves to be challenged. And, Contrarians, we will continue to challenge it. That’s because the fight over this merger is, in the end, a fight over whether the American media and information systems remain pluralistic and independent of the government or whether they become further consolidated and more easily influenced by autocrats. That is not a question to be decided quietly — or by default. It needs to be litigated in the court of law and the real, full court of public opinion. Thanks to your paid subscriptions, we and our colleagues do both, through our democracy litigation and our democracy coverage. It’s the most unique bargain in American journalism.

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As always, that brings me to the stellar work The Contrarian published this week, rounded up by my colleagues for you here:

Abdication of Governance

What Did Republicans Expect?

Jen Rubin had little patience this week for the private fretting of the party that empowered Trump. “Whether the Iran War ends this month or months from now, Republicans cannot escape responsibility for the massive expenditure of taxpayer dollars, loss of life, rise in energy costs, regional instability, and damage to alliances Trump has wrought.”

Governance by Ideological Whim Meets the Rule of Law

Jeff Nesbit wrote on the reckless abandon of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s first year at the Department of Health and Human Services and the recent federal district court ruling that has halted his radical overhaul of the child vaccine schedule — a “procedural guillotine” damning in its assertion of incompetence and lost public trust.

Fundraising at a Predator’s Picnic

Ciera Stone reported on the shocking story of how a convicted child sex offender ascended the ranks of the North Carolina GOP — with the full knowledge and support of state-level leaders, including current U.S. Senate candidate Michael Whatley.

Misogyny & Resistance

Another Lesson from Dolores Huerta: The Patriarchy Has No Place in Social Justice

Maria L. Quintana wrote on the bright lights of the national farmworker’s movement undimmed by César Chávez. “Movements for civil rights and social justice are not immune to the patriarchy and all its violence. But every day, we work to root it out.”

Why Conspiracies and Propaganda Fuel Violent Extremism

Cynthia Miller-Idriss and Bill Braniff joined Jen to discuss the violent misogyny and anti-minority brainwashing still happening — even accelerating — online in the wake of the federal government gutting the departments built to stop it.

Attacks on Women Continue Unabated

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf wrote on the danger of normalizing the administration’s constant drumbeat of attacks on women’s health and rights, and updated us on the latest from across the country. “Attacks on women’s bodily autonomy haven’t stopped — they just stopped making the front page.”

The Smokescreen of War

When Intelligence Stops Judging, It Stops Mattering

Brian O’Neill analyzed how recent congressional hearings from Tulsi Gabbard, Kash Patel, and John Ratcliffe have revealed an intelligence system drifting from strategy to sycophancy. “When pressed on whether Iran posed an imminent threat to justify the U.S. attack on Iran, Gabbard responded that determining what constitutes an ‘imminent threat’ is the responsibility of the president.”

What Can We Believe About the Iran War?

Representative Jim Himes (D-CT) joined Jen to decode Trump’s mixed messaging on the possibility of a peace deal on the horizon — and just how much it would cost the United States to secure the Strait of Hormuz. “This is a war of many contradictions.”

Sports Spotlight

Trump Seems Intent on Tanking the World Cup

Shalise Manza Young wrote on our ratings-obsessed president’s ironic determination to ruin the most-watched sports event on the planet – with the minor complications of a war of choice in the Middle East, ICE’s reign of terror, and a travel ban. “How many fans will want to come here under these conditions?”

Death of the Cinderella Story

On this week’s Offsides, Pablo Torre joined Jen to discuss the WNBA’s landmark deal to raise salaries and the NCAA’s poaching problem. “The big win, really, for women’s sports writ large, is that this is not a charity. This is good business.”

Trump’s ‘Protection’ of the Army-Navy Game is an Ineffective Diversion

Carron J. Phillips wrote on more of Trump’s unwelcome sports-world meddling, this time the ignoble cause of “protecting” the Army-Navy game as an attempted distraction from American soldiers dying in Iran. “At this rate, Trump might as well mandate that Chick-fil-A can’t be sold on Sundays.”

Fighting Back

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw opposition to ICE’s incursion at airports across the country, protests in Virginia, Ohio, Oregon, Georgia, Indiana, and more, and a lot of planning ahead for No Kings Day! For today and going forward, see Indivisible for more information, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org. We hope to see you out there!

MAGA is Afraid of Your Vote

Janai Nelson joined Jen to break down MAGA Republicans’ strategy to stop your vote — and how you can help protect it for yourself and your community. “We can all do something, and it doesn’t cost us anything to exercise those rights, but it will cost us our future if we don’t.”

Cartoons, Culture & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists covered chickening out (TACO Tuesday, Nick Anderson), doubling down (Meet the Press, RJ Matson), brute force (The Fog of War, Michael de Adder), brutish force (Regime Change Hydra, Michael de Adder), and more (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling).

Days of Love and Rage

Anand Gopal joined Abraham Kenmore in conversation on Gopal’s book, Days of Love and Rage, which documents a remarkable experiment in self-governance at the start of the Syrian civil war. “We tend to think of democracy as something that happens once every two or four years for a few minutes when you go to the ballot box … [but] there are much more capacious visions of democracy.”

‘The Bachelorette’ Controversy is Nothing New for Reality TV

Meredith Blake wrote on the latest scandal to rock reality TV, joining a legacy of muck. “Bad behavior is an asset for aspiring reality stars, whether they’re a soft-swinging’ Mormon mom or a serially bankrupt real estate heir.”

Why Young People Can’t Get Enough of ‘Love Story’

Meredith also wrote on Gen Z’s new obsession with Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, whose press-shy mystique feels like a breath of fresh air to the TikTok set — even as the series introducing her “arguably couldn’t have come at a worse time for the Kennedy family.”

That’s the story of Vladimir Putin in Russia. Viktor Orban in Hungary. Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey. And, of course, that is what Donald Trump and his allies are trying right here in the United States.

But unlike those others, he is running into a buzzsaw: the democracy movement, which of course includes you Contrarians. Just look at a few examples from this week where we are fighting back, from the Voice of America to the Paramount-Warners merger; and from the Anthropic case to the Kennedy Center litigation.

Let’s start with government. Courts have stopped Trump over and over again from thwarting the will of Congress and bringing government agencies under his heel. But our heroic federal judges don’t act on their own initiative. Someone has to bring the cases!

That’s where you Contrarians come in. Your paid subscriptions help support my and my colleagues’ over 275 legal cases and matters.

This week was no exception. With wonderful colleagues, we won a landmark court judgment. It reversed Trump’s efforts to shut down the vitally important, US government owned Voice of America. The court ordered that journalists return to work and for broadcast operations to resume.

It was a resounding victory for our partners and clients including federal employee unions AFSCME and AFGE, Reporters Without Borders, other partners–and you Contrarians.

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What about business? In the Anthropic fight, the Trump administration went into a rage because that company would not allow its AI to be available for possible mass surveillance or autonomous killer robots. They retaliated by attempting to designate the company as a “supply chain risk,” which would have devastating commercial consequences for Anthropic.

With your support, we represented 149 former federal and state judges to file a bipartisan amicus brief rejecting this bullying. Invoking purported national security risks does not place the Executive above the law. Our brief calls this what it is: unlawful retaliation. And it makes clear that the judiciary has both the authority and the obligation to set it aside.

This is not about courts intruding where they don’t belong. It is about ensuring the Executive stays where it does belong.

Then, there is media. This week, I joined Jim Acosta to speak out against the Paramount–Warner Bros’ merger on The Contrarian right after he appeared before members of Congress to denounce the deal:

We explained that the Ellison family, who put together this unholy alliance, are close Trump allies who already own CBS and control TikTok. Adding CNN would give them and Trump too much power over the media that Americans consume. Trump is openly relishing that prospect. And his lackey Pete Hegseth declared, “The sooner David Ellison takes over, the better.”

Not to mention that combining the movie and television operations of Paramount and Warner would allow the Ellisons to charge consumers higher prices and give them fewer viewing choices.

But there is good news about the government review of the deal. Not from the Trump administration. It can hardly be expected to undertake the usual regulatory scrutiny given comments like Trump’s or Hegseth’s. Nor can it be expected from the FCC’s Brendan Carr, who has threatened to revoke broadcasters’ licenses if they don’t cover the news the way the administration wants.

Rather, hope comes from the state attorneys general. We public interest litigators have often worked in parallel with them over the past 14 months to go to court when democracy is threatened–and win. Here, we were proud to help lead dozens of members of the democracy movement to call on the AG’s to block this merger.

They have said that they will scrutinize the merger under applicable law. They proved they mean business by challenging another unsavory media merger of media giants Nexstar and Tegna on Wednesday. Friday news broke that two of the largest state AG offices, California and New York, are working together to review the deal.

You Contrarians already have the AG’s backs. Thanks to your support, we have been pushing back legally on Paramount’s overreach for months. We will not let up–and we are grateful for the state AG’s leadership.

Finally, let’s not neglect the Arts. Once again, with your support my colleagues and I struck a series of blows in defense of the Kennedy Center and in opposition to Trump’s effort to rename, close, and significantly demolish the place.

Last weekend, we at Democracy Defenders Fund with the great folks at Washington Litigation Group won a temporary restraining order on behalf of our client Congresswoman Joyce Beatty—a longstanding trustee of the Center. The order forced the administration to provide her with documentation it had been holding back about the planned closure and to allow her to speak at the board meeting addressing that closure.

And speak she did, dramatically confronting the president and telling him why his actions were illegal. No sooner did he and his cronies on the board vote for the closure anyway then we were back in court. This time we secured a “rocket docket” scheduling order to fully brief why it is illegal to rename and close the Kennedy Center. Again, we could not do it without you.

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This is just one week and four cases. But if you multiply it by our efforts and everyone’s in the democracy movement over the past 60 or so weeks of the Trump administration, that adds up to a lot of resistance. It also explains why, despite his repeated aspirations to “be a dictator,” Trump has not achieved the success of his admired authoritarians like Putin or Orban.

That is what we cover every week here at the Contrarian, along with much much more. Just see for yourself in this week’s roundup, put together by my wonderful Contrarian colleagues.

SAVE Act

The Anti-Voter SAVE Act Must Be Stopped

Michael Waldman and Emily Whitehead sounded the alarm on just how catastrophic the SAVE Act, which would require voters to show a passport or birth certificate as proof of citizenship to register or re-register to vote, would be for democracy if it is allowed through the Senate. “If passed, it would be the most restrictive voting bill ever approved.”

The SAVE Act: Awful and Unconstitutional

Why exactly is Trump pushing so hard for the SAVE Act, Erwin Chemerinsky asked? To advance his theory of voter fraud, despite study after study showing no evidence for his claims. “The SAVE Act addresses a problem that does not exist.”

War

Trump Chose War

Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) joined Jen Rubin to lay plain the ground realities of the war in Iran, informed by multiple classified briefings on America’s actual military position: there was no imminent nuclear threat, and we may now be poised for another forever war. “The idea that we’re going to somehow impose a crown prince…is a difficult fantasy.

Trump’s War is the Worst Conceived in American History

Jen Rubin started the week by writing on just how many experts—and previous presidential policies—Trump ignored to launch his deadly folly of a war. “The annals of regime change are not littered with success stories.”

Health & Science

Why the Trump Administration Couldn’t Kill the Nature Record

Jeff Nesbit wrote on the Trump administration’s efforts to disband a first-of-its-kind federal effort to catalog the health of nature and the environment—and how its work is not as easy to kill as they’d like. “Science has a way of refusing to stay buried.”

What They Don’t Want You to Know About Long COVID

Megan Armstrong gave us a brave and blistering essay on what it’s like to live with a condition much of the medical establishment—not to mention the federal government—wants to wish away. “The effects of COVID hide in plain sight…unfortunately, blissful ignorance has never been an effective strategy.”

Economy & Corruption

The “Affordability” Trap: Why Progressives Need to Talk About Design, Not Just Prices

Dr. Julie Sweetland wrote on why, to build a lasting movement, we must stop talking about the economy like a force of nature and start treating it like a blueprint. “Making life ‘affordable’ is a modest, bureaucratic goal. Designing a society where the system works for ordinary people by default? That is a vision worth fighting for.”

PA Representative Exposed For Insider Trading?

Mayor Paige Cognetti (Scranton, PA) joined Jen to discuss Congressional corruption—namely whether an elected official should be allowed to leverage policy votes for personal profit—and the ethics reform we need. “We’ve had to really work hard to rebuild trust.”

Dispatch from Chicago: Illinois Primary Has a Lesson on Big Money in Politics

Lorraine Forte broke down the more than $50 million of dark money poured into the Chicago primaries from PACs and special interest groups, and asked: how can we keep our elections from turning into auctions?

Fighting Back

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw protests in New York, South Carolina, Vermont, and more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Yeah, the ‘90s Were Cool, But We’re Ready to Fight Now

Jennifer Weiss Wolf wrote on how the real story about Gen X feminism should be less about looking back to the riot grrl past and more about their place on today’s front lines, fighting against ICE, the SAVE Act and more. “Today’s quiet democracy protectors are the same people who may become tomorrow’s pro-democracy voters.”

Cartoons, Culture & Fun Stuff

This week our cartoonists took on misdirection (Just Another Distraction?, RJ Matson; Misleading Packaging; Michael de Adder), crying wolf (The President Who Cried Nato, Michael de Adder), and how to stop making sense (Talking Head, Nick Anderson).

Why the Irish are Taking Over Pop Culture

Meredith Blake wrote on Jessie Buckley’s Oscar win for best actress—somehow a first for an Irish woman—and why Ireland’s pop cultural ascendance is a lesson in civic investment (and maybe a little homegrown luck).

Must-Read

A Reckoning Long Overdue

Maria Cardona, a political strategist for Dewey Square Group, founder of Latinovations, and dear friend to The Contrarian, closed out the week with a stunning tribute to the bravery of Dolores Huerta in the wake of Thursday’s shocking revelation about César Chávez. Though the farmworker movement has always been far more significant than any one individual, we must correct the historical record about a man long miscast as an infallible hero. She leaves us with a message devastatingly relevant to our current moment: “It is long past time to hold perpetrators accountable, no matter how powerful they may be.”

Iran is certainly the worst of Trump’s foreign policy fiascos, but it by no means is the only one. Indeed, there have been so many that it’s hard to keep track. That’s why I decided for this week’s column, I would catalog Trump’s Top 10 foreign policy failures as the latest entry in our Contrarian Top 10 lists. I drew on my experience as a U.S. ambassador among many other sources (including colleague Jen Rubin’s own version of this list for 2025).

As you will see when you look at the list, this is not only a tale of Trump’s wrongdoing – it’s also the story of our pro-democracy pushback. Despite the difficulty of litigating foreign policy snafus, with your support we have often found a way to do that in the courts of law as well as, of course, in the court of public opinion, including through our coverage here at the Contrarian. You make all of that possible with your paid subscriptions.

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1. Insane Iran Illegalities

In a matter of days, Trump has somehow managed to combine the worst aspects of our most foolish wars, from Vietnam to Iraq. It is also outlandishly illegal, as I explained with a bipartisan group of experts last week in the Contrarian. We are working up a litigation rejoinder — stay tuned!

2. Terrible Tariff Troubles

Trump’s erratic and ill-defined tariffs policy has alienated allies, shaken the global reputation of the U.S. economy, and penalized millions of American small businesses and working families with an illegal tax, as the Supreme Court recently ruled. Because there is an enormous amount of damage to rectify, Democracy Defenders Fund and our wonderful partner Platkin LLP have filed a lawsuit against the government over the collection of tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. We will fight to recover funds that were unlawfully seized from our wonderful client Busy Baby LLC and its owner Beth Benike, fighting on behalf of all small businesses. And I hosted New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin and Benike at the Contrarian this week:

3. The Maduro Mess

Trump’s trial run on regime change unilaterally began in our own backyard. Two months ago, the United States launched strikes against the Maduro regime, seizing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in the process and bringing him and his wife to the United States for trial. Whatever you think of that end, it should not be achieved by illegal means. At DDF, we filed a bipartisan ethics complaint from our all-star team of ethics experts, representing the Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations, seeking an investigation of the lawyers at the Office of Legal Counsel who gave the wrong legal advice.

4. Maritime Massacres

The illegal use of power in Latin America began with strikes on boats in the Caribbean and the Eastern Pacific that the administration claimed to be carrying drugs. Not only does it appear that some people on these boats may have been innocent civilians, but, even worse, defenseless survivors were apparently killed. We at DDF make sure that the rule of law is applied to everyone, and I, alongside fellow ethics experts Ginny Canter and Richard Painter, filed a complaint at the Justice Department demanding that this illegal advice be exposed to the public.

5. Undermining Ukraine

​​Despite Trump claiming he’d negotiate peace between Russia and Ukraine within a day of taking office, the war between Russia and Ukraine has only intensified under his watch. In fact, 2025 was the deadliest year for civilians in Ukraine since the war began. For President Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine, and Europe, Trump has been the worst of allies. That has sent a message to our friends everywhere that we cannot be trusted. But fortunately Trump does not speak for all Americans, and he certainly does not speak for the Contrarian, where we have been vocal in standing up for Ukraine and for American alliances.

6. Greenland Greed

Trump’s obsession with treating sovereign nations like real estate is nothing new. In his first term, he tried to buy Greenland — an idea that was quickly shot down by the Danish government. This time around, he decided to send Donald Trump Jr. to advance the deal in Greenland, during which the junior Trump met with locals with a message from his father promising that the United States would “treat [Greenlanders] well.” Unsurprisingly, Denmark and the rest of our NATO allies rejected the offers resoundingly.

Ultimately, at the World Economic Forum, NATO General Secretary Mark Rutte and Trump announced a “framework of a future deal” that would renegotiate American military presence in Greenland but ultimately prevent the United States from acquiring the territory. As I told the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, the absurdity of acquiring another sovereign nation’s territory is only “made worse by allegations that Trump[’s] associates have ties to companies who could benefit from the president’s actions.”

7. Undoing USAID Unlawfully

The complete gutting of the U.S. Agency for International Development has been nothing short of catastrophic. Once one of the world’s largest funders of disaster relief, food security, clean water, and disease prevention — credited with saving more than 90 million lives over two decades — it has been all but dismantled. According to estimates from Boston University epidemiologist Brooke Nichols, more than 500,000 children died in the first year alone as a direct result of these cuts. This is abhorrent — a betrayal of every principle we claim to hold.

We at DDF were the first to sue over Elon Musk’s actions through DOGE and the legality of his appointment. The case is ongoing, and we are now fighting to take his deposition and prove the wrongdoing. We won’t stop until justice is done.

8. Canada Clownshow

Trump’s repeated attacks on our ally Canada are unhinged. He has battered our peaceful neighbor with a series of erratic tariffs, publicly ridiculed Canadian leaders, and even joked about taking over the country and making it the 51st state. In doing so, he has squandered the goodwill Canadians have long held toward the United States, turning a trusted partner into a wary skeptic increasingly inclined to distance itself from us. Just ask the bourbon industry — and many others.

9. A Chinese TACO

By contrast, Trump seems never to have met a dictator to whom he won’t kowtow. One of the more humiliating examples was his about-face on China. His initial tariffs on that nation were met with pushback, setting off an escalating trade war. Unfortunately, Trump neglected the fact that we need China’s rare earth minerals for a wide variety of U.S. uses. China cutting off those exports brought Trump to his knees. He ultimately made concessions, including dramatically cutting back the tariffs he had imposed. Who knew that TACO was Chinese food?

10. Voiding Voice of America

Voice of America and other U.S. government global media have long been crown jewels of American soft power around the world. Countless people have relied on the news our nation provides, particularly where free media is scant. As a former ambassador in Prague, I know this well. So many foreign friends told me how they counted on “the radios” broadcasting VOA and more.

Over the past year plus, that has been systematically dismantled, profoundly affecting our interests and reach as a nation. Here, too, with wonderful partners and clients, my democracy litigation colleagues and I have pushed back, with win after win. Most recently, we secured a court order that Kari Lake’s appointment as interim CEO of the U.S. Agency for Global Media was illegal and her actions invalid. The battle continues – thanks to your paid subscriptions.

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11. Bonus: Donald’s Domestic Defeats

Of course, in a sense, all of our 267 legal cases and matters help counteract Trump’s foreign policy fiascos. That is because domestic victories also act as guardrails on Trump’s power, preventing him from veering even further off the rails. Conversely, when our allies see that the rule of law is holding, they are reminded of what really makes America great and that our nation will be back.

After we went to court this week in our case to stop the renaming, closing, and demolition of the Kennedy Center, Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH), our wonderful client, explained on the Contrarian YouTube channel:

We at Democracy Defenders Action and our colleagues at Washington Litigation Group were in court with the congresswoman fighting for her to receive essential documents and the right to speak before Monday’s board meeting. Saturday morning brought the welcome news that we had substantially won, with the court ordering information and a meaningful opportunity to be heard — sending the message around the world that American rule of law still works.

That is thanks to your support. And that support also makes possible our Contrarian coverage of foreign and domestic issues alike. Just see for yourself in our usual review of all this week’s Contrarian analysis and reporting brought to you by my wonderful colleagues.

War in Iran

These Christian Nationalists Are Loving War with Iran

Tim Dickinson gave us a must-read on how the famously irreligious Trump has the full backing of Christian nationalists on Iran. “God is using President Trump to execute judgment on wicked civilizations.”

Trump’s War on Iran Challenges a Democracy Already Under Stress

Robert Weissman and Lisa Gilbert wrote on the potential for Trump to use war in Iran and national security threats to erode a democracy already pushed to its limits — including as an excuse to interfere with the November elections.

Trump Thinks He Can Gain Historic Glory

Aaron David Miller gave us his analysis of why Trump wants to be known as the president who killed the supreme leader of Iran. “He started to think like this is fun and easy and like you bomb stuff and you accomplish things and he made the mistake of thinking this would be easy again.”

Forced Regime Change Doesn’t Work

Philip Gordon joined Jen to tell us why military-imposed regime change never works — and why Iran may not give up the fight, even if both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu back down.

Economy & Corruption

Democrats Can’t Let Up on DHS Funding

Norman Ornstein argued that Democrats can force Trump and his minions to do the right thing by hammering home common-sense reforms most Americans support. “It is time — actually, past time — for Democrats to seize the initiative.”

Not a Dime More for Trump’s Illegal War

Jen wrote on the mounting costs of Trump’s new war — in lives and taxpayer dollars alike. “Despite lip service to root out waste, fraud, and abuse, Trump’s consistent demands for more defense spending suggest that enough is never enough for the voracious military-industrial complex.”

If Corruption Falls, So Does the Regime

Former federal prosecutor Brendan Ballou joined Jen to lay out how to raise the price of corruption: by tracking and suing those responsible. “There’s criminality upon criminality here: If somebody commits a crime to be absolved of a crime, that itself creates a certain amount of liability.”

Kristi Noem’s $220 Million Tax Heist

Rep. Joe Neguse sat down with Jen to expose the corrupt Department of Homeland Security ad contracts your tax dollars paid for — and how to hold Noem accountable after her departure from office. “[Noem’s firing] is a first step, not a panacea. There’s more to be done.”

Health, Aid, & Civil society

Thousands of Americans with HIV at Risk of Losing Access to Lifesaving Care

Jeffrey Crowley sounded the alarm on the prospective loss of the AIDS Drug Assistance Program, the nation’s primary safety net for HIV medications, which is facing its largest financial crisis in decades. “This moment demands new urgency and new solutions.”

Global Health After USAID Is Vulnerable and Volatile

Roberto Valadéz gave us a new report card on the Trump administration’s “America First Global Health Strategy,” which replaces humanitarian gains with transactional self-interest while making the world less ready for the next pandemic.

Dissecting the President’s Women’s History Month Statement

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf reviewed the receipts of a year in degrading healthcare and denying history. “As with everything Trump says and does, we have written, video, and audio proof of who he is — whether that be as a citizen, candidate, defendant, or president — and how he regards girls and women.”

Images and Optics

We Built the Surveillance State Ourselves

Brian O’Neill wrote on how the Nancy Guthrie kidnapping case reveals an uncomfortable truth: We have long since traded privacy for useful technologies. “This landscape did not arise because governments imposed a single sweeping surveillance regime. It grew out of consumer demand for safety and convenience.”

Split Screen: Visuals of Survivors and Predators

Azza Cohen took a bracing look at the depiction of Epstein’s survivors versus his accomplices, asking: are these images more often evidence or propaganda? “I want to see Epstein, a predator, depicted as such — and his associates, some of whom at least knew of his criminality, not shown exclusively as the powerful people they are.”

Canceling the Atlanta Hawks’ ‘Magic City Monday’ Shows That Adam Silver Has Lost the Plot

Carron J. Phillips questioned why a strip club has drawn “more scrutiny in the NBA than incidents of violence against women.”

Fighting Back

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week, we saw Stand Up for Science protests in Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia, anti-ICE protests in Minnesota, Tennessee, and elsewhere, anti-war protests in Vermont, New York, and London, and more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Undaunted

For this week’s “Undaunted” column, Jen celebrated some of the journalists covering the Trump administration and the outbreak of war by asking hard questions and digging for the full story despite a government increasingly hostile to a free press. “[These] reporters do not aim to create “balance” between lies and truth or between a pro-democracy party and a cult.”

You Got ‘The Look’ from Hillary Clinton?

A propos of Hillary Clinton’s appearance before the House Oversight Committee, where MAGA members tested no one’s time and patience more than hers, Shalise Manza Young celebrated the look: Clinton’s “now-famous indication that you are a fool.”

Cartoons, Culture & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists took on misdirections (Pain at the Pump; ‘The First Casualty When War Comes is Truth’, Michael de Adder), wrong directions (The Magic Feather; Battleship: Strait of Hormuz Global Shock Edition, RJ Matson), a likely destination (How the War Ends, Nick Anderson), and a better timeline (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling).

Stream This Album and Help Kids in War Zones

Meredith Blake wrote on “Help (2),” a sequel to the hit charity album of 1996, that this time around features music from Olivia Rodrigo and Oasis and will raise money for children in Ukraine, Gaza, and beyond.

On Iran, there is much to say, as I explained in my Contrarian essay with Republican luminaries who formerly served in senior roles in all three branches of the federal government. The war is grossly illegal. But there is, alas, little to be done in my preferred venue for action, the courts. They have erected strict barriers to suing in this area. (My colleagues and I did come up with one idea I am trying to develop into a case; stay tuned for that in future weeks.)

I was, however, able to take action on a domestic legal violation by seeking expedited relief in our Kennedy Center case to stop the destruction of that cultural treasure. We first brought this matter on behalf of Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH) with Nathaniel Zelinsky and other colleagues at Washington Litigation Group to reverse Donald Trump’s attempt to add his name to the Kennedy Center. Now we’ve amended it to stop the plans to close and demolish the Kennedy Center, and we are asking for rapid review from the court, as we explained on the Contrarian YouTube channel. You make all that possible with your paid subscriptions.

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Different as they are, these topics do share touchpoints. Above all, both exhibit profound contempt for the rule of law. In the case of Iran, the Constitution gives Congress the power to take this kind of action, pure and simple. There is no excuse for failing to get congressional authorization, and no president has ever tried something of this scope and scale without doing so.

Of course, it is true that presidents of both parties have committed offenses against the text of the Constitution and the War Powers Resolution, but assembling those lesser transgressions into a single justification will not fly.

And then there’s the matter of the UN Charter, which the U.S. Senate ratified in 1945. That means it has been and continues to be the “law of the land.” The president is required to follow it. Instead, the Trump administration has grossly violated it, including by openly calling for regime change, carrying out the assassination of a foreign leader, and launching a war of aggression in the absence of an imminent threat.

There’s much more that I, along with Judge J. Michael Luttig (Article III), former Sen. John Danforth (Article I), expert ethics attorney Richard Painter (Article II), and others outline in our essay, which I hope you will read.

Though hardly comparable, we cannot ignore the illegalities occurring here at home, like what has happened with the Kennedy Center. Even renaming it (the subject of our pending case) was a flagrant violation of a clear dictate of Congress — and shutting it down for demolition and remodeling, as Trump proposes to do despite Congress ordering it be a “living memorial” to the slain president, would be, too.

And that’s not to mention the devastating impact on the other statutorily mandated purposes of the Kennedy Center. That includes serving as an arts hub for the nation. According to the law, the Kennedy Center Board must “present classical and contemporary music, opera, drama, dance, and other performing arts from the United States and other countries” and serve as a leader in “arts education and policy,” among other functions.

The risk of losing the Kennedy Center as we know it is too great to ignore. It may never recover, particularly if Trump largely demolishes it. That is precisely why, with your support, we have amended our complaint and are challenging this blatantly illegal effort in court with full force, alongside our outstanding co-counsel. We are hopeful that the court will intervene to halt this repeated sidestepping of Congress and to protect a storied institution that belongs to the American public, not Donald Trump.

No, it’s not the same as stopping an illegal war. That was up to Congress — and the president’s party again failed us this week. But it is an important initiative to maintain the rule of law, protect Congress’s role under Article I, and keep the fight moving forward where we can. We’ve done that in 265 cases and matters to date — and we are going to keep going (including with that litigation idea we’re developing related to the Iran war). That is thanks to your paid subscriptions, and so of course is all of our scintillating Contrarian coverage. See for yourself in this week’s roundup put together by my wonderful colleagues.

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An Illegal War

Trump Brings America Closer to a Quagmire in Iran

Brian Katulis diagnosed Trump’s second-term foreign policy as “strikes without strategy” and wrote on what America must now do to avoid another forever war. “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there, and it will likely lead you astray.”

Operation Epic Fury and the Law

Brian Finucane took us inside the illegality of Trump’s operation in Iran — and what it will take to hold him to account under the Constitution, the War Powers Resolution, and international law. “There is no silver bullet solution to the problem of a president bypassing Congress to enact force unilaterally.”

Trump’s Avoidable, Deadly, Costly War with Iran

On the podcast this week, Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ) and Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) asked: Where is the intelligence or evidence that an attack from Iran was imminent? They’ve seen none. See also: Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) condemning what he calls “ a War of Choice,” and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) on “funding an Unconstitutional War.”

Trump and Hegseth Want AI Without Rules

Tom Malinowski wrote on Anthropic’s principled stand against weaponized AI, which got it fired by Trump’s DOD — and in the process showed a legislative and political path forward for Democrats. “Support for AI safety rules is one of the few causes that unites Americans across party lines.”

Selling Out / Cashing In

The Paramount/Warner Bros. Merger Is Not What a Free Press Looks Like

Neera Tanden condemned the Ellisons’ plan to increase a Trump-friendly media monopoly that has already compromised CBS News — and outlined how state attorneys general can stop it.

An Illegal, Unjustified War Underscores Danger of Media Consolidation

Jen Rubin wrote on how, on the advent of Trump’s deadly operation in Iran, the stakes of the journalism crisis grow even higher. “Major news events — including complex wars — highlight the danger in allowing a few MAGA billionaires to control our news.”

Everything Is Gambling Now

On this week’s “Offsides,” Pablo Torre and Jen dissected the insider trading pandemic rocking sports and politics. “When you have a market that is telling you, here’s what the future is like, but that future is literally being shaped by money … you’re not only creating a vector for corruption and quid pro quo and insider trading stuff, you’re also fundamentally creating a dystopia.” See also: Who’s Feeling Lucky?, Meghan Houser’s deeper dive on the ascendance of prediction markets.

Science & Healthcare

The Silent Starvation of American Science

Jeff Nesbit wrote on the invisible impoundment of science funds that is doing exactly what Trump’s sweeping budget cuts were designed to do — without the messy public debate.

Why We Fight for Science When Everything Is Going Sideways

Colette Delawalla put the administration’s war on scientific innovation in urgent context and offered ways we can all defend something that is at the heart of “the great experiment of American democracy.” (Including a National Day of Action today, March 7!)

Where U.S. Athletes Always Lose: Healthcare

As we said goodbye to the Winter Games, Megan Armstrong wrote on what else American athletes left behind in Milan Cortina: a standard of healthcare many of their peers take for granted. “The human body can be miraculous, but it can also be unexpectedly cruel. The system shouldn’t be even crueler.”

Elections

How are Black Americans Engaging with Elections Now?

After major Democratic wins in Tuesday’s primaries, Democratic pollster Terrance Woodbury joined April Ryan to dig beneath the headlines and look ahead to the midterms. “What I keep warning Democrats is not to take [Black] voters for granted.”

Every Expansion of Democracy Has Faced Backlash

Diamond Brown and Melody Dodoo wrote on the SAVE Act: the latest chapter in a long history of institutions and actors mobilizing to contain Black political power, “offered in the name of ‘election integrity’ but engineered as instruments of exclusion.”

NC Voters Oust Politically Unfaithful Officials

Anderson Clayton, chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party, joined Jen to discuss how Democrats pulled off state-level and local victories — and how to keep the momentum going. “I think the sky’s the limit for what North Carolina can do in November.”

Fighting back

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw protests against war and ICE in Oregon and California, in Texas, Illinois, Minnesota, Washington, found a new protest song, and more. Check out the State Up for Science National Day of Action this Saturday, find other protests in your area at mobilize.us, and see other things you can do right now in our weekly Calls to Action. And, as always, send us your resistance photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Democracy Rises and Falls with Women’s Movements and Mobilization

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf marked the beginning of Women’s History Month with “a state of the state for women,” highlighting feminist perspectives on the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, the downward spiral of reproductive rights at home, the affordability crisis — and how women are on the front lines of resistance.

Rev. Jackson’s Legacy Demands More: Disturb the Comfortable Anyway

Michael Franklin spoke with Dr. Joe Leonard Jr. on the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s legacy — and the standard it sets for those who inherit it. “The question is not whether older leaders will keep telling stories. They will. The question is whether younger leaders will treat those stories as nostalgia — or as instruction.”

Cartoons, Culture & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists took on the many ways “Operation Epstein Fury” doesn’t add up (A Chicken In Every Pot, In Two Weeks, Nick Anderson; Flyover Country, RJ Matson; Those Numbers Are Way Up, Michael de Adder) and why A.I. won’t be fixing anything (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling).

Meredith Blake wrote on two essential-viewing, Oscar-nominated documentaries: The Devil is Busy, which follows a clinic worker on the front line of America’s abortion war in Georgia; and The Alabama Solution, which bears witness to conditions in the countries’ deadliest prisons via contraband cell phone footage taken by incarcerated men.

Pistachio and Lemon Olive Oil Cake

Marissa Rothkopf Bates gave us a cake dedicated to “Cricket, soon-to-be former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s former dog, who deserved so much better from her. As we all did.” (It’s delicious.)

Contrarian Pet of the Week

And last but never least, meet Tanner! Daryn Dickens’s cockapoo enjoys sleeping, belly rubs, and any time people come over.

Those are serious matters. Still, I could not help some bemusement at coverage of such threats to “nationalize” elections as if they were something new. Trump has been actively trying to tamper with our elections for the past year. The good news is that he has met ferocious opposition at every turn and has so far failed — and that record suggests that his latest stratagems and whatever else he tries will fail as well.

Contrarians stopped the last elections executive order

One of the most consequential of Trump’s election takeover efforts of 2025 was the March 25 executive order on voting. Framed as an “election integrity” measure, the order sought to unlawfully impose new voter registration requirements, direct an independent bipartisan agency to alter election procedures, and introduce barriers that risked disenfranchising millions of eligible voters.

The order blatantly exceeded the president’s constitutional authority. Our system is clear: Congress legislates. States administer. And presidents cannot unilaterally rewrite election rules.

My litigation colleagues and I met this threat in the courts, and we won an injunction. The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia struck down key portions of the order.

That success was thanks in no small part to you Contrarians. My pro-democracy litigation is supported by your paid subscriptions. Because we are owned by no one, all profits go to help with cases like this one.

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That experience offers an important perspective for the present moment. It signals that if our elections are attacked again, the democracy movement — including those who go to court and the courts themselves — stand ready to defend our democracy.

That’s why I’m so confident that Trump will fail if he tries another executive order, this one to declare a state of emergency to take over elections. The press reported that this possibility has been discussed in the White House and that Trump’s allies have been circulating a draft EO. As I explained when I testified at a shadow hearing in the U.S. Senate this week, there is absolutely no constitutional or other legal basis for such an order, and the courts will sweep it aside as they did with the last one.

War is no excuse to tamper with Elections

In the context of a possible emergency EO, Trump’s Truth Social reference to Iran interfering in the 2020 and 2024 elections was ominous. It came early Saturday morning as he launched a war on that country without congressional authorization. One cannot help but wonder if he could use this or similar pretexts to declare a nonexistent emergency and take control of elections.

On Friday, Trump denied that he is considering an election takeover order. But it came in a terse exchange with a reporter who did not have time to probe the issue. Besides, we can hardly take his word as gospel. If Trump does try it, my democracy litigation colleagues and I stand ready to go to court in the blink of an eye and defeat his illegal use of presidential power, as we did with his last elections executive order.

Trump’s legislative gambits will keep failing, too

Of course, executive action is not the only trick Trump has up his sleeve. He and his cronies are also attempting to push legislation to give him control of elections. The main vehicle is the so-called SAVE America Act, which passed the House and may or may not get a vote in the Senate. It doesn’t protect elections. Instead it disqualifies voters over trivial paperwork and overly burdensome requirements. Voters who have faced generations of barriers to obtaining birth certificates or passports — along with students, married women, seniors, and disaster-displaced families — could be denied the right to vote.

The central rationale for this campaign — that existing safeguards are inadequate and non-citizens are voting in significant numbers — is a myth. As we wrote in our report with LULAC on The Big Lie of 2024–La Gran Mentira, there are so few incidents of this kind that they approach zero statistically. Even the Heritage Foundation’s own data revealed this reality.

The good news is that at least so far the Senate doesn’t seem to be falling for it. On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) poured cold water on right-wing fever dreams that this voter suppression bill could get around the filibuster.

We will need to keep a sharp eye on the SAVE America Act in the Senate until it is good and dead. But the experience of 2025 suggests that Trump’s legislative end-arounds are doomed to fail.

For example, Trump thought he could deal with the likely coming blue landslide flipping the House by legislative redistricting. That is, creating more red House seats through friendly state legislatures redrawing maps in places like Texas. There, he connived with state GOP leaders to take away five Democratic congressional seats and give them to Republicans.

With your support, we helped stop him — first by representing brave Texas legislators who fled the state to help sound the alarm. And then by going to court to defend California’s Prop 50, which added five Democratic seats to cancel out the five stolen ones in Texas.

That’s why I’m confident that Trump’s legislative games, like the SAVE America Act, will also fail. And if he tries other crazy measures like sending immigration agents to polling places, we are ready to fight those as well and win in the courts of law and public opinion. Your paid subscriptions support both.

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We are so grateful to you for making possible both our pro-democracy litigation and our pro-democracy Contrarian coverage. See for yourself in this week’s round up of our top content, put together as always by my wonderful Contrarian colleagues:

Tariffs + unaffordability

Millions of Americans Are Paying for Health Insurance But Can’t Afford to Get Sick

Chiquita Brooks-LaSure wrote on the GOP’s decision to let tax credits expire. The tax credit made real insurance affordable — and already many Americans are going without. “A healthcare system that forces people into plans that don’t protect them is not working.”

Americans and the Supreme Court Agree: Trump Overstepped on Tariffs

April Ryan reported on what should have been the end of Trump’s tariff fight — the Supreme Court decision that his capricious, retaliatory global taxes are unconstitutional — but which, of course, was not, given that “Trump never learns any lessons.”

Okay, What’s Actually Happening with the Tariffs?

Justin Wolfers joined Jen Rubin to unpack Trump’s lack of economic strategy, why the U.S. stock market is lagging behind the rest of the world, and where the growth in the job market is actually coming from.

Black history — present and future!

Trump’s Plot to Make the Lost Cause Great Again

Jenice R. Robinson and Tianna Mays wrote on W.E.B. Du Bois’ essential warning about democratic backsliding — and how Trump and co. are determined to bring back this shame in a new iteration of the Lost Cause.

Exploring the Fraught and Fruitful Alliance Between Black and Jewish Americans

Meredith Blake wrote on a new documentary series that looks at the complicated history of Black-Jewish relations in the United States. Says host Henry Louis Gates, Jr., early on: “Under the floorboards of Western culture run two streams. One is anti-semitism, the other is anti-Black racism.”

From Award Shows to Basketball Games, Caucasians Keep Shouting the N-Word

Carron J. Phillips took on the despicable obsession, in all-too-public cultural precincts, with uttering “the one word that should never be said” — and why people are saying it: “Donald Trump is proof of how far you can go by hating Black people.”

Faith for (and in) democracy

End Religious Nationalism in Politics

Sarah Trone Garriott joined Jen to discuss what it will take to end the weaponization of faith in politics. “Religious communities need to be very wary of how the state might try to use them to get what they want.”

Reclaiming Faith for Democracy

On the podcast this week, the Rev. Paul Raushenbush, president of Interfaith Alliance, spoke on how religious communities can and should be a critical part of a broad pro-democracy coalition. “People are willing to put their lives on the line to show up for one another.”

Rebutting & Resisting

The Rip-roaring Response to Trump’s Lies

After Trump’s deplorable State of the Union, Jen wrote on why Democrats are in better shape than one might think. “Think of Tuesday as a preview of the November election, when Democrats will run on the arguments they made Tuesday night and MAGA Republicans will have to defend that mess of a regime.”

A State of the Union for the People

In their own words — as spoken to on-the-ground reporter Ciera Stone — see why members of Congress skipped Trump’s speech. “Trump can spare us the speech.… He owes us a lot of money.”

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week, we saw State of the Union protests nationwide, as well as more protests in Tennessee, California, New Hampshire, Texas, and a word from God. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Cartoons, Culture & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists covered sore losers (Come and Take It, Nick Anderson); poor winners (Biggest Hockey Win Ever, Michael de Adder); whatever Kash Patel was up to (Kash Patel Presents: FBI, RJ Matson; Air Traffic Control, Nick Anderson), and where the investigation spotlight should be shining (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling).

The Success of ‘Heated Rivalry’ Is a Lesson for the Men’s Hockey Team

Meredith Blake gave us the only take you need on Team USA’s disappointing, misogynistic bowing to the Trump administration. “The gay romance became a cultural phenomenon by celebrating a non-toxic form of masculinity. Team USA should take some notes.”

“We Will Abolish ICE”: The New Protest Songbook

Tim Dickinson wrote on how federal brutality in Minneapolis unleashed a new wave of protest music — from Springsteen to the streets—and rounded up entries in the new songbook.

For all our vehement disagreements with the Roberts Court, this also represents a triple bogey at SCOTUS with respect to Trump’s abuse of emergency powers. First, the court denied him authorization to use the Alien Enemies Act to target migrants based on bogus claims of alien invasion. Then, the court shut down his abuse of the National Guard because there was no emergency regular forces could not deal with. And now his attempt to deploy tariffs because of a supposed trade emergency has been blocked.

The Contrarian not only covered all of those wins for democracy and rule of law – but you Contrarians also played a key role in them. That is because your paid subscriptions power my and my colleagues’s pro-democracy litigation in these and literally hundreds of other cases and matters.

For example, in the tariffs case, you helped support brief after brief from some of our nation’s most distinguished conservatives, representing every presidential administration from Nixon to Trump I. Those conservative titans explained that these tariffs are contrary to conservative principles. Given the administration’s abdication of those values, it is powerful for Republican-appointed judges to hear from known and respected voices on what an atrocity these tariffs were.

Now the fight moves to the most important issue that was left open by the 6-3 opinion: refunds. The illegally collected $200 billion in tariffs will need to be repaid. That is important for businesses of any kind, but particularly so for small businesses. They are the backbone of the American economy but run on extremely tight margins that the tariffs hit hard. I explained why when I went live with my friends Katie Phang and Jim Acosta as soon as the decision dropped.

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Through your paid subscriptions you’ve made so many landmark cases possible since we started The Contrarian. That includes one that that is quite literally about a landmark: our new lawsuit to stop Trump’s takeover of East Potomac Golf Links here in Washington, D.C. Democracy Defenders Fund is working on the case with amazing co-counsel Democracy Forward and Lowell & Associates.

In its own way, stopping Trump’s aspiration to turn a historic and affordable public course in D.C. into a “beautiful, world-class, U.S. Open-caliber course” is important, too. In fact, just like our litigation over other scandals, such as the Epstein files, border “czar” Tom Homan’s CAVA bag of cash, the Gold Card giveaway, and the Kennedy Center renaming, the takeover of this golf course is corrupt.

Corruption is the abuse of entrusted power to benefit yourself. Trump’s comments about what he wants to build make clear that this would be a monument to his ego – to the detriment of ordinary citizens who use, love, and rely on this course. As Rebecca Miller, executive director of DC Preservation League, aptly put it in an interview with the New York Times, “The East Potomac Golf Links is a unique cultural landscape that reflects the history of recreation in the nation’s capital…. Losing this golf course would significantly impact our shared history and limit public access to one of the District’s vital recreation and green spaces.”

Moreover, there are very serious rule of law issues here. As we allege in the complaint, the Trump administration violated the National Historic Preservation Act, including the duty to evaluate and consider potential effects on this historically recognized site – in many respects among the first of its kind in the country. Those effects are devastating.

This is also an environmental case because the administration is dumping 30,000 cubic yards of debris in East Potomac Park, about 2,000 truck loads. And where did he get this rubble? From the demolition of the East Wing of the White House–another outrageous offense against history. Those materials may include toxic substances that the public is now being exposed to.

This is about much more than golf. To that point, I also heard from people who golf on the course, use the adjacent park, or are just outraged. “Way to go,” they told me. I’m passing those congratulations to all of you, because your paid Contrarian subscriptions make our work possible.

Of course, you also make possible our great journalism – compiled as usual in our weekly roundup by my wonderful Contrarian colleagues. Trump may have attempted to slice rule of law into the rough, but our Contrarian coverage was, as usual, on par.

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ICE Terror

Inside Trump’s ICE Concentration Camps

If you read only one of our pieces this week, make it Tim Dickinson’s essential reporting on a system “designed to punish, not protect”: the network of crowded, disease-ridden, altogether inhumane detention centers the Trump administration is using — and expanding — to warehouse the thousands of Americans taken by ICE.

Texas Lawmakers Say They’re Demanding Major ICE Reforms Because ‘Families and Children Are Terrified’

Hannah Langenfeld at The Barbed Wire wrote on the 21 Texas legislators who have signed a new letter to Congress calling ICE “an unaccountable paramilitary force that threatens the constitutional rights and safety of the communities we serve.”

“Peace” and “Security”

Chairman of “Peace” Board Starting a War with Iran?

Steven Cook joined Jennifer Rubin to discuss the gathering of Trump’s “Board of Peace,” his new attempt to dominate the narrative of diplomacy in the Middle East — and of which he has appointed himself chairman for life — even as he warns Iran of “bad things” to come.

Last week’s Munich Security Conference Confirmed Uncertainty, Not Unity

Brian O’Neill wrote on the annual conference of allies at which, for the second year in a row, Washington’s reassurances sounded all too hollow to skeptical European leaders. “A United States that alienates its closest partners is not asserting strength. It is dismantling its own margin for error.”

Election Interference & A War with Iran?

Tom Malinowski joined Jen to speak out after his congressional run and game out the possible scenarios of war with Iran. “I would be shocked if there were a credible, coherent plan in place in this administration.”

Remembering Jesse Jackson

The Rev. Jesse Jackson’s Legacy

April Ryan gave us an essential tribute to the late civil rights icon and political visionary. “The best way to mourn the Rev. Jesse Jackson is to continue to put in the hard work — because the fight for our rights, for civil rights, for human rights is unyielding, just as Jackson was.”

Jesse Jackson’s Passing Should Stir the Democracy Movement

Jen wrote on a way we all can carry on tJackson’s legacy right now: opposing the SAVE Act and other MAGA policies that seek to destroy voting rights for millions of Americans. “The Trump regime presents the greatest attack on [Jackson’s] vision of pluralistic democracy and racial justice in the modern era.”

Jesse Jackson’s Death Highlights the Absurdity of Stephen A. Smith’s Political Aspirations

Carron J. Phillips wrote on how Jackson’s presidential campaigns paved the way for Obama — and how a Stephen A. Smith campaign would, by stark contrast, encourage more incompetence. “It’s akin to watching a toddler trying to walk in Shaquille O’Neal’s shoes.”

Trump’s Media Agenda: Censorship & Hate

They’re Echoing Nazis. It’s Not an Accident. It’s a Strategy

Ciera Stone put to rest any doubts about Trump and his government loyalists imitating extremist visuals, symbols, and slogans on purpose. “It is easier to carry out fascist policies when the public is manipulated.”

Trump’s Government Mainstreams White Supremacy

Bill Braniff of PERIL joined Jen to connect new dots between the Trump administration’s racist rhetoric, culture, & behavior — and how it’s going global. “The United States [is] an exporter of culture … and in this instance, also as an exporter of violent political culture. We are known as an exporter of white supremacy specifically.”

CBS Tries to Kill Stephen Colbert’s Interview With James Talarico; Makes it Go Viral Instead

Meredith Blake wrote on the delicious irony of CBS’ latest attempt to curry favor with the Trump administration: demanding that The Colbert Show kill its interview with James Talarico, which backfired to the tune of millions of views and a new stream of candidate donations. “Someone at the network needs to Google ‘The Streisand Effect.’”

Fighting Back

Older Women — Not Young Men — Might Save Democracy

Jennifer Weiss-Wolff shone a spotlight on some of our most tireless defenders of democracy, who she also sees as an overlooked source of electoral clout. “Midlife and older women’s fury — and therefore our collective power — may have solidified even more in the early weeks of 2026.”

Undaunted in Denouncing Religious Hypocrites

In this week’s Undaunted column, Jen celebrated Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) and others who are fearlessly calling out white Christian nationalists. “Reclaiming the language of faith…helps rebut MAGA’s offensive accusation that Democrats are not part of ‘real America.’”

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week, we saw protests against ICE, fascism, and the worst president in history as widespread as ever, with Texas, Ohio, Missouri, Florida, California, Pennsylvania, and more getting in on the action. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

Our cartoonists took on revisionist history (Special Collector Series: U.S. Presidents*, RJ Matson; Just Doing Research, Nick Anderson), future irony (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling), truth in advertising (ICE Barbie, Michael de Adder), bad leadership (Give Peace a Whack, Michael de Adder), real heroism (Leading the People, RJ Matson), and presidential power (Steamrolled, Michael de Adder).

Olympians are Human Too

In this week’s “Offsides,” Pablo Torre joined Jen for a thoughtful discussion of Ilia Malinin, integrity in sports, and insurmountable pressure. “We want sports to be better than we are.”

Even worse was her callous attitude toward Epstein victims, refusing to apologize to — or even look at — them despite DOJ’s gross mishandling of their data on her watch:

Wednesday was extreme, but this kind of bizarre, pugilistic behavior has been constant since Bondi took office. That’s why — powered by your paid Contrarian subscriptions — my colleagues and I at the Democracy Defenders Fund this week took aim at another one of her low points. We filed a Department of Justice Inspector General complaint calling out her response to the crisis precipitated by ICE violence: to demand Minnesota’s voter registration database!

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Bondi’s Jan. 24 letter to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, exploiting the situation on the ground to try to grab voter data, was dissociated and provocative in an already fraught and charged environment. Her demand for this information lacked any lawful justification, as we pointed out to the Inspector General. Because voter data is protected by state and federal safeguards, federal authority may not be used to illegitimately pressure a sovereign state, and such actions inflict predictable harm on voter participation, this was a destabilizing assertion of power that warranted OIG review.

Will it get that review? That remains to be seen. Unlike many of our over 250 legal cases and matters, there’s no Article III judge to force action on an OIG complaint. But that does not mean that we should neglect these kinds of accountability tools. I often write in this column about our court cases, but administrative and regulatory complaints are also a critically important public marker. And they lay down a trail of breadcrumbs for Congress to follow should pro-democracy forces achieve the majority again, do real oversight, and decide whether to apply constitutional accountability measures such as impeachment. We have the receipts, and we are saving them up.

Supported by your paid subscriptions, we go to court constantly. (We just filed our latest case Friday, working with great colleagues to stop the Trump administration from taking over a leading public golf course in D.C.) But through actions like our Bondi complaint, we also act as an administrative and regulatory watchdog to call out violations of the rule of law at the Department of Justice and across the administration. It is a powerful one-two punch.

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To take another example, we are litigating under the Freedom of Information Act to get Epstein files that are being wrongly withheld. And, complementing our FOIA litigation, our team has now filed three comprehensive complaints to the OIG calling out DOJ’s cover-up under the Epstein Files Transparency Act.

Your paid subscriptions support all of that, as well as our many court cases, and our great Contrarian coverage. It’s the most unique bargain in journalism. And, of course, the sparkling content at the Contrarian also provides an important form of documentation. To see why, just take a look at this week’s amazing coverage.

From Dog-whistle to Klaxon

LIVE w/April Ryan: The Tea ft. Maria Teresa Kumar & Dr. Bernice King

Dr. Bernice King and Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH) joined April Ryan on this week’s essential episode of The Tea to talk about the Trump administration’s erasure of Black history, Bondi’s awful hearing, and how we resist. “Go make sure that you’re still on the voter roll because they’re actively trying to purge black and brown communities as we speak.”

The Sad Truth Behind the Reaction to Trump’s Sick Meme

Shalize Manza Young wrote on Republicans’ weak condemnations of Donald Trump’s latest openly racist meme—hollow lip service in the face of unchallenged systemic racism.

Question Republicans and white evangelicals — not Black people — about Trump’s racism

Carron J. Phillips analyzed the public tendency to ask anyone but Trump’s own supporters about his every fresh outburst of overt racism. “Republicans and white evangelical Christians: ‘is this your king?’”

Epstein Accountability

The Pathetic Price of Entry to Epstein’s World

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf wrote on the Epstein files’ ever-expanding cast of sordid characters — people of unimaginable power and privilege for whom just a little more “was apparently enough to continue to associate with a sex trafficker.”

The Epstein Files Release is a Failure. Survivors Deserve Better.

Rachel Foster wrote on the administration’s total failure to pursue justice for those who deserve it most in the Epstein saga — while perpetuating further harm. “Our own government published nude photographs of women, and possibly minors, in the released materials, which constitutes the dissemination of child sexual abuse material.”

DOJ Can Give the Survivors Answers

Joyve Vance and Mimi Rocah wrote on what legislators can do to expose the full extent of Epstein’s crimes and hold his network accountable — even in the face of DOJ’s refusal to engage. “The survivors have kept Epstein and his circle from walking away from all of this with impunity. Now it’s Congress’s turn.”

The Epstein Cover-Up is Coming From Inside the DOJ

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) joined Jen Rubin after Bondi’s atrocious House Judiciary performance to break it all down — including Bondi dodging the question of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s connection to Epstein, and how DOJ is monitoring the activity of lawmakers researching the Epstein files.

Elections & the Court of Public Opinion

U.S. Olympians Give Voice to American Realities

Megan Armstrong highlighted the U.S. athletes speaking their mind about the state of the union — and how much Trump hates it. “Holding a mirror up to our country’s reality is the most patriotic thing our Olympians could do. Anything else is a lie.”

The United States Has Started Campaigning Abroad

Brian O’Neill wrote on how Trump’s endorsements in foreign elections are turning U.S. alliances into personal bets — with real strategic costs and implications for his election plans at home. “When outcomes are seen as externally shaped, the politics that follow tend to harden rather than settle. The record is uneven at best.”

How Democrats Can Flip Back Latino and Rural Voters

On this week’s podcast, Carlos Eduardo Espina and Jess Piper looked at why voter outreach programs are having success on the ground. “Since Trump regained office, Democrats have flipped 27 seats. Republicans haven’t flipped any.”

The GOP’s Voter Integrity Sham

Norman Ornstein wrote on the partisan scam that is the SAVE Act, which House Republicans passed this week in a bid to require proof of citizenship for all voters. “They are using their lies about voter fraud to push a bill designed to eliminate the right to vote from people who are likely to vote in a way Republicans don’t like.”

Fighting Back

How to Fix the Washington Post, and Media in General

Josh Levs gave us a modest proposal for transforming American journalism. “What if it stopped rushing to tell audiences what people said, and instead investigated whether what they said was accurate?”

Gov. Josh Shapiro Won’t Be Intimidated

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro joined Jen to talk about his strategy for not backing down from Trump or ICE, even in the aftermath of personal attacks on his family. “The mission [of ICE is] absolutely compromised. It needs to end, and there need to be firm legal guardrails.”

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week, we saw protests against ICE, Epstein unaccountability, and much more in Minnesota, Texas, New York, New Mexico, and elsewhere nationwide. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org. And check out our weekly Calls to Action for more ways to stay involved.

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists took on what the Trump administration is saying loud and clear (The Racist Megaphone, Michael de Adder), what they’re silencing (Six Questions for Pam Bondi, RJ Matson), what’s in plain sight (Getting the Ick, Nick Anderson), what’s in plane spite (Source Neutralized, Michael de Adder), and what’s new in the public domain (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling).

Bad Bunny Embodies the American Dream

“Ten years ago, he was bagging groceries. Now he’s on top of the world.” Meredith Blake wrote on Bad Bunny’s dazzling, record-breaking halftime show—which was far more “all-American” than its feeble right-wing alternative.

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That famous line was at the center of the classic 1970s film Network – but it is also an apt motto for how my democracy litigation colleagues and I are responding to Donald Trump’s corruption in all its forms. According to the New York Times, there are over 600 cases defending the guardrails of democracy against his assault. We have 252 cases and matters at Democracy Defenders Fund and Democracy Defenders Action alone, with hundreds more by other organizations.

Building on those successes, the time has come to go on offense against corruption by Trump and his cronies. That’s why this week we at DDF, along with wonderful partners, filed a lawsuit challenging Trump’s so-called “Gold Card” visa program. It is a blatantly illegal attempt to strip qualified immigrants of a path to citizenship while selling legal status to wealthy foreigners. Forget “give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.” Trump’s maxim is “give us your money, your oligarchs, your privileged few.”

Guess who made that lawsuit possible? You did, Contrarians! All profits from your paid subscriptions go to help support that and our other 251 cases and matters–like our huge win at the Supreme Court this week defending California’s Prop. 50 and counteracting Trump’s attempt to steal congressional seats. If you’re not a paid subscriber, please consider becoming one and joining the fight.

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I cover the Gold Card case and nine other outrages in my updated top 10 list of Trump and his cronies’ worst corruption scandals – and of the pushback in the courts of law and of public opinion. There is nothing the American people hate more than corruption, and it has contributed to Trump’s historic unpopularity.

Since we published our first list in December, new schemes have emerged, and old ones have metastasized or featured shocking additional revelations of abusing power for personal or financial gain, corrupting the rule of law, and more. What follows is an updated list, reflecting both brand-new scandals and new developments in cases we flagged before. After you give the list a look, please keep on reading for our usual roundup of all our great Contrarian coverage this week.

1. The Epstein Files Cover-Up

The signature corruption scandal of the Trump administration remains Trump’s association with one of the most notorious child sex traffickers in history – and his administration’s refusal to turn over all of the files about the case so we can be certain we have all Trump-Epstein documents. The administration admitted it’s refusing to disclose about 3 million files, despite a law requiring their disclosure. The Department of Justice wants us to trust that it has good reasons for all that, but the place is run by two of his former defense lawyers, the FBI is helmed by an even bigger Trump loyalist, and they have acted like it too often for us to give them any credence. This scandal is not going away.

Current Status: Democracy Defenders Fund filed a complaint this week with the Office of the Inspector General about the missing documents, and we are litigating and investigating on multiple fronts. We will continue to pursue all legal avenues to ensure the complete release of all eligible files relating to the Epstein investigation, as required by the Epstein Files Transparency Act.

2. Selling American Residency to the Super-Rich

In September, Trump debuted the so-called “Gold Card,” a program that lets wealthy foreigners effectively buy permanent U.S. residency for a $1 million payment to the federal government. That’s bad enough, but consider this: Rather than asking Congress to create a new visa category, Trump simply ordered federal agencies to treat these massive cash “gifts” to the Department of Commerce as proof of eligibility for elite EB-1 and EB-2 visas. Those are categories Congress reserved for Nobel laureates, pioneering scientists, and individuals whose work serves the national interest. But these employment-based visas are strictly capped – so every Gold Card handed to a millionaire donor necessarily displaces a qualified scientist, engineer, physician, or researcher already waiting in line. (It is worth noting that all available EB-1 visas were granted September 8, 2025, with the cap resetting every year on October 1.) That means that Trump has effectively transformed lawful permanent residency into a luxury commodity, letting oligarchs buy into our country like they buy Ferraris and Picassos.

We’re not letting Trump auction off our immigration system without a fight. This week, we brought suit on behalf of a group of highly accomplished professionals – people who followed the rules, only to find themselves subject to being pushed aside by wealthy applicants who could jump the line with a seven-figure check. And remember: Congress — not the president — has the exclusive authority to set immigration eligibility and raise federal funds. The Gold Card program overrides Congress’s choices — both as to who qualifies for employment-based immigration and how and under what conditions agencies may collect revenue.

Current Status: We will see Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in court (and in the Epstein files).

3. World Liberty Financial

Trump’s crypto company, World Liberty Financial (WLFI), was near the top of our list when we debuted it in December – and things have only gotten worse. New reporting last week revealed that the “Spy Sheikh,” Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al Nahyan — the United Arab Emirates’ national security adviser and one of the most powerful men in the Gulf – had quietly amassed a secret stake in Trump’s crypto venture through a web of investment vehicles designed to obscure his involvement. His hidden investment in Trump’s crypto business created an extraordinary conflict of interest: a foreign national security advisor with direct financial ties to the sitting U.S. president’s private enterprise. And it may already be paying off, as, months later, the UAE secured a deal for millions of the most advanced computer chips from American company NVidia, a “coup” for the tiny nation. The White House has denied any impropriety here.

Current Status: WLFI is flush with Gulf cash – but these revelations may make Trump’s crypto conflicts so unpalatable that there are consequences. Perhaps even the crypto industry PAC’s $193 million midterms war chest won’t be enough to get uneasy Democrats to vote for legislation creating a market structure for cryptocurrency without any checks on Trump’s ability to influence the market to his benefit.

4. The Meme Coin Grift

Trump’s meme coin represents perhaps his most brash self-enrichment scheme, one unlike anything we have ever seen from an American president. According to the website, the token is “intended to function as an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol “$TRUMP“ — and not as an investment or security. But of course this slice of code was listed on various crypto exchanges and immediately surged in price. Since its launch, the coin’s value closely followed Trump’s announcements, with wild fluctuations. The president even hosted an exclusive dinner for meme coin “investors” who spent tens of thousands to buy the digital token. This access auction was a scheme so brazen — even for Trump — that it left ethics experts like us stunned. The White House denies any conflicts of interest.

Current Status: The Trump-dominated Securities and Exchange Commission has shown zero interest in examining Trump’s meme coin activities. This makes defeating the new crypto market bill even more important. We have been sounding the alarm, and our fight continues.

5. Tom Homan’s $50,000

With Trump’s Border Czar Tom Homan back in the news as he took center stage in Minnesota’s ICE invasion, Democracy Defenders Fund this week expanded our investigation of his conduct. We launched additional FOIA requests about his alleged acceptance of a $50,000 payment from undercover federal agents posing as business executives. Homan has denied wrongdoing. But if Trump is going to thrust him into the country’s civil rights flashpoint, then we have to have transparency. A tape of the alleged payoff reportedly exists. Let’s see it. The secrecy surrounding these meetings raises the same fundamental question that follows so many Trump officials: Is government power being secretly shaped by those with money and access? The American people deserve to know what kind of person has taken control of immigration actions in Minnesota and whether he can be trusted to wield that power.

Current Status: If we don’t promptly get the materials we are asking for, we are prepared to pursue all legal remedies. If Trump and Co. don’t believe us, they should take a look at our 252 cases and matters.

6. The USD1 Binance-UAE Deal

Less than two months after Trump’s WLFI launched USD1, its stablecoin, a UAE state-backed investment firm announced that it would use USD1 to finance a $2 billion investment in crypto exchange Binance, which was then under SEC investigation. In May, Binance decided to list USD1 – and, days after the announcement, Trump’s SEC dropped its securities case against the exchange. And then there’s Trump’s treatment of Binance’s head Changpeng “CZ” Zhao. He pleaded guilty to money laundering in 2023 and got a Trump pardon this past October. The White House defended Zhao, criticized his prosecution, and blamed the Biden administration for creating a “war on cryptocurrency.“

Current Status: With last week’s latest revelations of the UAE’s crypto influence campaign with the “Spy Sheikh’s” role in WLFI (#3 above), it’s worth keeping an eye on this while we wait for the next shoe to fall.

7. Trump’s Qatari Boeing

In May, Qatar presented Trump and his administration with a $400 million Boeing 747, ostensibly to use as Air Force One — a present reportedly worth more than all foreign gifts bestowed on all former American presidents combined. As my colleagues and I noted in a legal complaint, the Trump administration is apparently illegally transferring nearly $1 billion from a nuclear weapons program at the Defense Department to retrofit the jet, a gross mismanagement of key federal funds. And it will barely have time in the air before Trump’s term ends and it gets “donated” to Trump’s presidential library for his continued use. Meanwhile, after the transfer, Qatar got a guarantee that the United States will defend Qatar through “diplomatic, economic, and, if necessary, military” measures and a new “military facility” for Qatar’s Air Force at the Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho. Trump has defended the transfer of the plane as a legitimate “gift,” and the White House said that “any gift given by a foreign government is always accepted in full compliance with all applicable laws. President Trump’s administration is committed to full transparency.”

Current Status: We’re waiting for the Government Accountability Office to act on our complaint — but it’s hard to imagine a clearer conflict of interest.

8. Melania’s Amazin’ Flop

Amazon’s Melania film had its lavish Washington, D.C., premiere last week, and it went about as expected: a high-profile commercial event designed to elevate — and monetize — the Trump brand. Black carpets, media spectacle, and exclusive distribution through Amazon’s Prime Video platform were deployed to attempt to transform Melania Trump’s story into something in line with the $40 million Amazon paid for the rights. That was about $26 million above the nearest bidder, which raises questions about what Amazon was really paying for here. Unfortunately for Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Melania Trump, and director Brett Ratner (who was already having a bad day after surfacing in the Epstein files), the movie scored a putrid 6% on Rotten Tomatoes, with reviewers describing it as, “primarily a film about a woman walking into and out of rooms,” and an “unbelievable abomination of filmmaking.”

Current Status: Melania’s 6% rating leaves it in the rarified air of films like 1997’s Mortal Kombat Annihilation (4%), and 2010’s The Last Airbender (5%).

9. Trump’s Foreign Real Estate Boom

Trump is set to more than triple his foreign properties during this term, as real estate developers are working on at least 23 Trump-branded projects. These projects are a global feeding frenzy for foreign governments looking to curry favor with the president. To take only a few examples, Trump is building a hotel, golf course, and residences in Oman on property owned by the government. A Saudi real estate firm (with close ties to the Saudi government) is the Trump Organization’s partner in various real estate deals, including a new Trump Hotel in Dubai and a residential tower in Jeddah. In November, the Trump Organization announced a project in the Maldives with the same Saudi firm. The very next day, Trump met with Saudi Crown Prince and Jared Kushner buddy Mohammed bin Salman and announced an “Economic and Defense Partnership” with the kingdom. Hard to come up with better reasons why the Constitution prohibits the president from accepting foreign emoluments. When asked about possible conflicts of interest in the context of Trump’s then-upcoming trip to the Middle East, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed that it was “ridiculous that anyone in this room would even suggest that President Trump is doing anything for his own benefit.”

Current Status: Each individual property may constitute an emoluments clause violation. We at Democracy Defenders Fund include leaders of the team that won multiple emoluments cases against Trump in his first term, and we ain’t playing. Watch this space!

10. Trump’s D.C. Renovation Racket

In the middle of the longest government shutdown ever, as federal workers were going without pay and standing in bread lines, Trump ordered the destruction of the historic East Wing to build a massive, $300 million-plus ballroom. And that’s only one of his Washington, D.C., personal vanity projects, which also include renaming the Kennedy Center after himself. When that caused artists and audiences to hemorrhage, Trump suddenly announced he planned to close the center for supposed renovations. We can’t help but wonder if it’s to avoid the additional embarrassment of no one showing up. Trump says he’s raised private money for both these renovations, but the ballroom donors include corporations that have received billions in federal contracts – and about a dozen facing federal enforcement actions.

Current Status: We and partners are litigating the Kennedy Center renaming on behalf of Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH), with the government’s filing due on March 1. nd we are considering all legal steps to address the closing if it moves forward. Others are litigating the ballroom case, and initial signs point to a tough ruling for the White House.

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I’ll periodically update this and my other Top 10 Trump trackers. So many scandals, so little time. And in each one, I will also cover the Democracy Movement pushback made possible by your paid subscriptions. And now for our usual review authored by my wonderful colleagues of all this week’s coverage at the Contrarian:

Attacks on the Fourth Estate

The Killing of The Post

Jen Rubin gave an obituary for her former employer and once globally essential news organ. “The layoffs are solely the responsibility of inept, incompetent, and inattentive ownership and management. It inherited a great American paper and left it in the rubble.”

Intimidating the Press

Erwin Chemerinsky wrote on the arrests of Don Lemon and Gail Fort as a textbook “part of the authoritarian playbook”: a clear escalation in Trump’s war with the press that should raise alarms everywhere.

The Face of Authoritarianism

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf analyzed how the Trump regime is using a 1994 law intended to protect women’s access to reproductive health against journalists. “Truly, this is the FACE of authoritarianism.”

Pressing Forward in the Face of Intimidation

Shalise Manza Young gave us the hidden-in-plain-sight linkage between the unconstitutional arrests of four journalists and activists: bald-faced racism. “Black journalists don’t have the luxury of looking away from the Trump madness.”

Election Interference & MAGA Reconstruction

The War of Southern Aggression

Michael Podhorzer gave us a (characteristically) brilliant analysis of MAGA’s long-term plan, in which everything from election interference to ICE terror is another front: nothing less than the Reconstruction – or Redemption – of the North.

Tulsi Gabbard Is Most Dangerous When She Needs to Be Useful

Brian O’Neill wrote on why the Director of National Intelligence’s cameo — during a raid on the state’s FBI election office — matters beyond Georgia. It’s the latest example of Trump’s loyalists competing to further undermine public trust in America’s institutions.

Trump FBI Executes an Electoral Smash & Grab

Lauren Groh-Wargo, CEO of Fair Fight, joined Jen from Fulton County HQ as she gears up to help ensure that Trump’s election-meddling won’t work.

The Big Game (Now Served With ICE)

The Dangerous Spectacle of ICE at the Super Bowl

Jeff Nesbit wrote on the universally unwanted imposition of ICE on the Super Bowl. “Levi’s Stadium will no longer be just a football field — it’ll become a tinderbox where two levels of American law enforcement are on a collision course.”

Trump and ICE Have Overshadowed Super Bowl Week for the NFL

Carron J. Phillips wrote on the recurrent phenomenon of Americans waking up to poisonous politics and realizing (demanding) that sports are about more than sports. “How can we expect American athletes — particularly Black ones — to step up and help this country confront its problems, again — especially considering that America has never made an effort to protect them?

NFL Owners in the Epstein Files & Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Moment [podcast]

This week on the podcast, Pablo Torre discussed why powerful, wealthy figures are rarely held accountable in the United States and what Bad Bunny’s presence at the Super Bowl means in our supercharged political moment.

50 Years Ago, Up With People Changed Super Bowl Halftimes

Frederic J. Frommer gave us a welcome sunnier lens on Super Bowl Sunday, with a look back at “when a cheesy musical group of clean-cut youths took stage at football’s premier event.”

Fighting Back

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw even more protests against ICE nationwide: Illinois, Texas, Ohio, Oklahoma, Washington, California, Missouri, Rhode Island, Tennessee: Americans coast-to-coast show no signs of backing down in the face of tyranny. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

The Minneapolis Protesters are Showing What it Takes to Change Minds

Nat Kendall-Taylor wrote on what we can learn from the “narrative masterclass” being taught by Minnesotans demanding both individual accountability for ICE violence and systemic change for the politics that caused it. “This how moments become movements.”

How to Fight Trump’s War to Rig the Election, with Leader Hakeem Jeffries

Democratic House Leader Hakeem Jeffries joined Jen to discuss how Democrats are fighting back on multiple fronts, including countering Trump’s attempts to manipulate the midterms, demanding ICE reform, Epstein accountability & more.

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week our cartoonists took on the demise of The Washington Post (The Darkness Descends, Michael de Adder; Death by 1,000 Cuts, Nick Anderson), what Bezos thought was worth more (Ready for Her Close-up, Nick Anderson), and the grim absurdities of ICE cruelty (Don’t Ask, Don’t Kill, RJ Matson; ICE Application, Jeff Danziger; Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling).

Musicians Speak Out in Defiance of ICE while Honoring the Many Voices that Make Us Great

Meredith Blake wrote on last week’s Grammy Awards, at which artists like Bad Bunny and Billie Eilish denounced ICE and celebrated those being targeted by the Trump administration – a stark and welcome contrast from the lily-livered Golden Globes.

The Librarians, Our Unlikely Heroes

Katherine Stewart heralded an upcoming documentary airing on PBS about some of democracy’s most stalwart defenders: librarians, who risked their jobs and their safety to resist the wave of reactionary book-burners.

Oven-Baked Parmesan Panko Crusted Chicken

Jamie Schler gave us an easy weeknight recipe and an evergreen message: happiness matters, whenever it finds us.

Contrarian Pet of the Week

Last but never least, meet Simone! Lorraine Forte’s tabby enjoys purring for Dad and “editing” for Mom.

That was why I found myself this Tuesday and Wednesday in Minneapolis. The killing first of Renee Good and then of Alex Pretti marked a similar turning point in the opposition to Donald Trump’s’ attempted imposition of an authoritarian regime and the democracy movement that has bloomed in response. That inflection point was only deepened by the unconstitutional indictment of independent journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort on Friday for covering a protest in the state.

Patriotic opposition to all of that and to Trump’s autocracy is radiating outward from Minnesota. For over a year now, we’ve chronicled the evolution of growing opposition to Trump here at The Contrarian. Indeed, we like to think that we’ve done our bit to advance the democracy movement with our coverage – and thanks to your paid subscriptions supporting pro-democracy litigation (249 cases and matters–and counting!).

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We’ve chronicled and litigated resistance to Trump’s presidency. But I went to Minnesota to see the patriotic opposition for myself. My first stop was a visit with my fellow Contrarian and YouTube co-host Katie Phang, who was in the state reporting for us for most of the week. Her dynamic real-time conversations on our YouTube channel were part of what inspired me to get on the plane and see what was happening in person, as I explained:

As it turned out, the view from afar, as impressive as it was, did not begin to describe the breadth and depth of the pro-democracy movement that I witnessed when I touched down. But it wasn’t just me: I met with civil rights leaders, who were also drawn to bear witness, not just to the terrible wrongs but also to the resilience of the people of Minneapolis/St Paul and of the patriotic opposition of Americans to tyranny.

Here is an interview Katie and I did with two great American civil rights leaders, Juan Proaño, the CEO of LULAC, the nation’s largest and oldest Latino civil rights organization (and one of our most frequent pro-democracy litigation clients), and Derrick Johnson, head of the NAACP (with whom we also have the honor of litigating from time to time).

Those were only some of the dozens of conversations I had. One of the most meaningful was with Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, my long-time dear friend. I’ve known him since he was a brilliant member of Congress, but now, in this moment of crisis, the whole country can see what an extraordinary leader he is. We talked about the situation and his unbending fight for justice. But to me that wasn’t the most meaningful part of our time together. When we met, we simply embraced each other. Resistance is powered not just by lawsuits but also by hugs.

Of course, I didn’t only talk to nationally known leaders. I had dozens of conversations with everyday folks, including when I stopped for breakfast at Nina’s Coffee Cafe and chatted with the barista and the patrons. Everywhere I go, I meet Contrarians, and this trip was no exception. Several of the coffee drinkers said, “We’re here to support you” – they included Contrarian subscribers! I see y’all wherever I go.

Some of the most meaningful time I spent came when I visited the Alex Pretti and Renee Good memorial sites, situated just a short distance from each other. I recorded this reflection for our Contrarian YouTube Channel.

At the Pretti site, one resister was offering hot coffee for everyone. Another person brought a stack of pizzas to feed people. And others were there to extend a welcome and to share the moment. Afterward, it occurred to me that between those offerings of kindness and the candles, s flowers, and other artifacts that surrounded the spot where Pretti died was a holy site . I shared a further impression on Coffee with the Contrarians live from Minneapolis on Wednesday morning:

Wherever I go, people want to talk to me about the terrible things Trump has done. Yes, the death, devastation, and destruction have been vast. We mustn’t however only focus on that half of the equation but also on how we have met his flood-the-zone wrongdoing with rule-of-law shock and awe, both in the courts of law and of public opinion. I never felt that more acutely than in my time in Minneapolis as I experienced the power of the pro-democracy opposition that has sprung up. That same spirit of acknowledging what we are up against honestly but greeting it with a spirit of hope for the future runs through our Contrarian coverage.

That coverage ended on an unexpected note, with yesterday’s shocking news that journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort had been arrested – for doing their jobs by covering events in Minneapolis this month. Be assured that neither we at The Contrarian nor our friends in the independent media and legal communities will be cowed by such an outrageous violation. Just the opposite: independent journalism – and your support of it! – has never felt more essential.

The inimitable April Ryan, Jen Rubin, and I went live to discuss this flagrant violation of our First Amendment. Here’s our initial response to the breaking news, followed by our roundup of the rest of the week’s wealth of Contrarian analysis and reporting put together by my colleagues.

The ICE Front Lines

Alex Pretti Cannot Die in Vain

Sen. Angela Alsobrooks (D-MD) joined April Ryan last Sunday to discuss what must be done in the aftermath of the murder of yet another American citizen — and to ask: Why are Republicans so afraid to do the right thing? “If you can do this in Minneapolis, you can do it anywhere.”

For the Love of God, Get ICE Out of Minnesota

Rev. Paul Brandeis Raushenbush wrote on his experience of protesting with fellow faith leaders and community members in Minnesota, where he felt the “contagious courage” of neighbors rejecting state violence. “It is time for people of faith and for all Americans to choose love and solidarity over ICE’s brutality.”

Trump’s Comply-Or-Die Policing Isn’t New

Tim Dickinson contextualized the brutality unfolding in Minnesota in a much longer legacy of police violence in America — in which what is shocking to so many Americans is who’s getting shot. “The protective factor of white privilege is collapsing in the face of Trump’s fascism.”

Maine is ICE’s Latest Battleground

Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-ME) joined Jen to discuss the rapid escalation of ICE tactics in Maine, where just this week over 200 people were arrested in a sweep across the state.

Congressional Courage

No Funding Until we Get ICE Reform

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) took us inside the Senate’s surprise bipartisan decision this week to block the GOP’s DHS spending bill, and Democrats’ strategy for next steps to ensure that not one more dime of taxpayer money goes to funding ICE’s lawlessness.

Why Dems Should Force Kristi Noem Out

Jen wrote on the demands for DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s impeachment and removal this week, and how we can keep the anti-ICE — and pro-democracy — momentum going. “Democrats must knock out Noem and then mount even greater assaults on the Trump fascist enterprise.”

How Do We Put Checks on a Runaway Executive?

Nick Penniman joined Jen to outline the six policies that Congress and the courts must put in place to push back. “We’ve seen an absolute photo negative of what the Constitution thinks of the president.”

Voting Rights at Risk

Pam Bondi Exploited ICE Violence to Control State Elections

Samantha Tarazi wrote on the attorney general’s suspicious demand last week that Minnesota grant access to the state’s voter rolls — a demand made on the very day of Alex Pretti’s killing, which, she argues, amounted to taking advantage of a tragedy to advance the Trump regime’s undemocratic election agenda.

The Ball and The Ballot

Carron J. Phillips explored a new report on how pro athletes vote, based on polling data, and asked: Why do some athletes participate in activism while others don’t? “The data indicates a clear distinction between ‘Black’ and ‘white’ sports at the professional level.”

It’s The Economy, Stupid

The Fed Is Not an Island

Max Stier wrote on Capitol Hill’s recent resistance to Trump’s overreach at the Federal Reserve, arguing that such opposition needs to be the norm, not the exception. “During the past year, the Supreme Court, without formal rulings, has given Trump a green light to fire members of a wide array of independent agencies and replace them with loyalists.”

No One Can Afford to Buy in Trump’s Economy

Justin Wolfers joined Jen to analyze the consequences of declining commerce under Trump, with shopping at an all-time low under fears of instability and real-time mismanagement. “Consumer sentiment is at its lowest level since 2014.”

A Five-Alarm Threat to U.S. Financial Stability

Virginia Canter and Christopher Swartz sounded the alarm on a measure of global economic stability, the U.S. Treasury market, that has never been dependent on the financial interests of a single person—until now. “Trump is making deals in broad daylight, openly entwining his presidency with private profit….”

Political Misogyny on the Rise

The Trump Regime’s Misogyny is Not Exclusive To Nor Deadly Only to Women

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf wrote on an increasingly clear, hard fact about the Trump administration’s inherent misogyny: it kills — and it doesn’t care about your gender when it does. “Their response to the killing of Alex Pretti is case in point.”

AI Sexual Assault is Pushing Women Out of the Public Square

Lily Conway took a deep dive into the Grok “undressing” scandal, which saw Elon Musk’s pet chatbot giving X users yet another tool to victimize — and silence — women online. “With a few simple keystrokes, users could demand that anyone in a photo be placed into scantily clad garments, posed in suggestive positions, or undressed completely.”

ICE: The Epitome of Toxic Masculinity

Dr. Cynthia Miller-Idriss joined Jen to discuss the latest in harmful masculinities, violent extremism, and prevention tactics. “What we see is that ‘us versus them’ thinking: the existential threat, the dehumanization, and then ultimately the belief that you’re a martyr acting heroically to thwart this threat.”

Keeping Up the Good Fight

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw ICE Out protests in Minnesota, Boston, San Diego, Chicago, and elsewhere, a nurses’ strike and a general nationwide strike on Friday, vigils across the country for Alex Pretti, and more.

See what you can do right now in our weekly Contrarian Calls to Action, mark your calendars for the next NO KINGS protest on March 28, and as always, get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week our cartoonists took on the “justifications” for ICE’s terror campaign (Big Brother, Open Up!, Nick Anderson; The Rittenhouse Test, Michael de Adder); the MAGA reception (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling); the state of democracy (250 Years In The Making, Obey — Or Else!, RJ Matson); and a guy definitely not standing in Trump’s way (Missing: Mike Johnson, Calder Robinson).

Mel Brooks has Been Fighting the Good Fight for Nearly a Century

Culture columnist Meredith Blake wrote on The 99 Year Old Man!, a new documentary that looks at how legendary comedian Mel Brooks has used humor to make light of the unspeakable for going on a century.

Everything About ‘Melania’ is Unprecedented, and Not in a Good Way

Meredith also covered Amazon’s $75 million ‘documentary,’ directed by an alleged sexual predator and raising questions of influence buying. “The goal isn’t capturing some elusive truth about our remarkably inscrutable first lady, but rather getting in good with her husband—and his loyalists at the FCC.”

The Radical Act of Sloppy Hosting

Emily Beyda gave us the timely gift of Pantry Pasta: “the ultimate meal for disorganized organizers.”

We are not taking all this lying down. Thanks to your paid subscriptions, my colleagues and I at Democracy Defenders Fund are fighting against this corruption in both the courts of law and of public opinion. We will not stop until we pop the files free — all of them.

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How Did We Get Here

The Epstein Files Transparency Act (EFTA) had to be brought before the House by discharge petition — an extraordinary measure that bypasses normal procedure — given Speaker Mike Johnson’s obstinate refusal to bring legislation to the floor. That discharge petition itself was stymied by Johnson’s weeks-long delay of swearing in Rep. Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ) during the government shutdown. Nonetheless, the EFTA passed nearly unanimously, with only one member of the house, Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA), voting against it. Donald Trump signed the bill on Nov. 19.

Once signed into law, the EFTA required the full release of the Epstein files by Dec. 19, 2025. On the evening of Dec. 19, Democracy Defenders Fund was prepared to review the “several hundred thousand” documents Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche affirmed would be released. Instead, only 12,285 documents totaling 125,575 pages have been disclosed. The DOJ has since stated that it has uncovered many more documents and is reviewing 5.2 million pages. Some were apparently in the offices of the U.S. attorneys, notwithstanding the fact that the department had previously advised Democracy Defenders Fund in response to our FOIA requests that no such records existed.

The existence of these new records brings into sharp relief the mischaracterizations by the DOJ, including the FBI director’s assertion that the FBI had done a systematic review of all Epstein records. And it gets worse. Our initial review of the files that were released identified serious issues.

First, it became abundantly clear that Justice overly redacted information in defiance of the EFTA. Names, email addresses, faces, whole pages were blacked out.

Second, these redactions lacked the required justification. Congress made it clear that every redaction must be “accompanied by” an explanation in the official journal of the government, the Federal Register. The DOJ has yet to file a single justification for specific redactions.

Third, regardless of Justice’s over-redaction of almost all identifying information of any person, the department released photos of former President Bill Clinton unredacted. The disparate treatment of the former president raises concerns about gamemanship.

Based on that initial review, DDF filed an extensive request to the Department of Justice’s Office of the Inspector General on Jan. 7, seeking a comprehensive review of the department’s non-compliance. Importantly, we provided significant legal arguments against DOJ’s use of expansive non-statutory redactions.

More DOJ Malpractice

We have not stopped there.

Following our initial review, our expert team has compared documents DOJ previously released against documents currently in DOJ’s online Epstein Library. This week, our review identified over 70 records that had been updated with new or different redactions. The DOJ’s retroactive removals stretch from redactions of nude images to the removal of the name of a U.K. law enforcement liaison officer on official correspondence to hiding the names of several Department of Justice officials.

Do these redactions matter? Who knows — so much other material is missing that it is hard to say for certain. Sure, these changes may turn out to be benign, but the process is not. No notice that we can find was provided to the public, no justification was given for the redactions, and no markings were applied to show these post-release changes. If it were not for our careful review, the American public would have no way of knowing that Justice was altering the original release of the Epstein files before our very eyes.

This surreptitious amendment of already-released files raises profound questions about the integrity and transparency of the department’s review. So, on Friday, we submitted a follow-up request to the OIG and to Congress.

We are, of course, not alone in making noise. Others have called the Department of Justice to account as well. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) — who threatened in December to sue the department for failing to release the Epstein files — has called the DOJ’s actions a “blatant disregard of the law.” He is seeking legislation to authorize court action.

Reps. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Ro Khanna (D-CA), the authors of the EFTA, have also sharply criticized the Justice Department. Massie explained that the release “grossly fails to comply with both the spirit and the letter of the law.” Subsequently, Massie and Khanna requested that a judge appoint an independent monitor to enforce the department’s obligations, but the request was denied because the judge didn’t have oversight over the EFTA.

Is that the end of the story? Not hardly.

Enter Our (and Your) FOIA Litigation

We suspected shenanigans and filed FOIA requests even before the EFTA became law. We demanded documents related to the investigation of Epstein and Ghislane Maxwell. But we also insisted on documents related to the Department of Justice’s refusal to release those investigative documents, its purported search for Trump’s name in the record, and any sweetheart deal Maxwell received to move her to a minimum-security prison camp against Bureau of Prisons policy. Since July, we have filed three tranches of FOIAs, totaling nearly a dozen individual requests.

When the administration gave us the cold shoulder, we initiated a lawsuit in August challenging DOJ’s refusal to release the records. We expanded that lawsuit and filed a motion for summary judgment on the department’s failure to expedite its review of our request. It is pending before the court.

We will not accept the administration’s obfuscation, slow-walking, and out-and-out non-compliance with the law. We expect a favorable outcome in our most recent motion for summary judgment. And we will continue to push the Department of Justice for compliance with the EFTA and call attention to its missteps.

As I highlighted last week, the democracy coalition is overwhelmingly winning in the court of law and in the court of public opinion. The victims of the heinous crimes perpetrated by Epstein and his co-conspirators deserve more than the Justice Department’s abject failure to abide by the law. We won’t stop until we’ve ensured that the Justice Department provides justice to the victims of Epstein and his friends and to the American people.

Your paid subscriptions make that — together with our 248 other cases and matters — possible. Not to mention our unsurpassed Contrarian coverage. Just take a look at this week’s highlights, authored by my wonderful colleagues Meghan Houser, Jamie Riley, Lily Conway, and our Contrarian team.

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Civil Rights on Trial

Supreme Court Considers Axing Voting Rights

Janai Nelson spoke to Jen Rubin about what’s at stake in Louisiana v. Callais: Will the Supreme Court cement its MAGA allegiance and gut the Voting Rights Act? Or will it clear the lowest bar in preserving a cornerstone of American democracy and MLK Jr.’s greatest achievement?

Trump’s Assertion of Power Threatens Black Workers

Craig Becker and Joseph A. McCartin analyzed Donald Trump’s claims of absolute authority to fire any federal employee for any reason — including blatant racial, gender, religious or other discrimination — as a threat to “the central principle of the civil service system and a unique threat to Black workers.” See also: Katie Phang’s live reporting on the oral arguments in the Lisa Cook v. Trump case.

Jack Smith Reminds us What Real Prosecutors Sound Like

Andrew Weissmann joined Jen to reveal the hope hidden in the spectacle that was special counsel Jack Smith’s hearing before the House Judiciary Committee this week to defend his investigations into Trump’s 2020 election meddling and the stolen documents. “The government writ large is filled with people like him who are there for the right reasons, who follow the facts and the law.”

The End of the Lawsuit But Not the End of the Fight

Former Federal Labor Relations Authority chair Susan Tsui Grundmann wrote on her lawsuit against the president for wrongful termination — a suit with the natural end of her rightful term — and its place in a larger fight against Trump’s authoritarian power grab. “These firings are intended to concentrate all executive power in one person: him.”

NATO No More?

Trump’s Insane Greenland Plot

Jeff Nesbit wrote on Trump’s grasping demands for Greenland this week, calling his threats to take over an ally “a 19th-century solution to a 21st-century problem.” “Seizing Greenland wouldn’t make America great; it would make America alone.”

An Open Letter to European Leaders

Brian O’Neill addressed European leaders directly, apropos of Trump’s militaristic antics at Davos, with the reality check that appeasement has only taught Trump to expect compliance. “The wager was that careful engagement would blunt the edge — keep him inside the guardrails, keep the alliance intact, keep the temperature down. That wager has failed.”

Disaster in Davos

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse joined Jen to discuss a question getting less hypothetical every day, thanks to Trump’s provocations on the world stage: Who is America without its allies? “Once you put into the minds of our allies that the United States … is willing to publicly contemplate invading a fellow member of NATO, they’re going to have to take steps in that vein.”

Cracks in the ICE?

“ICE Is A Modern Day Slave Patrol”

Latosha Brown of the Black Voters Matter Fund joined Jen to expose how the dehumanization of Americans is nothing new, and that there are constructive lessons in facing history head-on. “This notion that America was exceptional and that somehow our systems could not be eroded or somehow democracy was ever infallible…. One lesson I think we should take in is that all systems are created by people.”

Kristi Noem is Cold as Ice. She’s No Barbie.

Shalise Manza Young took issue with the trend of disparaging Kristi Noem as “ICE Barbie”—not because the MAGA secretary doesn’t deserve the implied insult, but because Barbie doesn’t. “Barbie … has never been a sociopathic shrew.”

Will ICE Target World Cup Fans Too?

On the latest episode of Offsides, Pablo Torre wonders whether America can guarantee other countries that immigration agents will not harass or detain their citizens visiting for the World Cup. (He suspects not.) “You’re going on a vacation. You want to go to a sporting event. Who wants to have that in the back of your mind?”

Misogyny & Persisting Nevertheless

Move Over Childless Cat Ladies. There’s a New Broad in Town.

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf introduced us to right’s favorite new bogey(wo)man: AWFUL, aka “Affluent White Female Urban Liberals,” aka, per Fox News, “organized gangs of wine moms us[ing] Antifa tactics to harass and impede” ICE. The horror.

Split Screen: A Year Since Trump 2.0

Azza Cohen looked back at a year in images of both destruction and resistance. ‘We have lost so much this year, and we will continue to lose more for the next three years of this awful administration. But we cannot lose our hope that the arc of history is long, and it’s up to us to keep bending it toward justice.”

Undaunted Women

For this week’s Undaunted column, Jen highlighted a democratic — and Democratic — bright spot: the inauguration of two women as state governors, Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger, who are poised to serve as shining examples of the leadership our nation deserves.

Fighting back

So, You Want to Run for President?

Jen offered a guide to what 2028 aspirants should consider before running in what will be (yet again) the most important election of our lifetimes. “Democratic hopefuls have to rebuild public trust on the tough everyday issues.”

A Guide to Resisting Violent Extremism

Dr. Mike Jensen discussed his work at PERIL (the Polarization and Extremism Research and Innovation Lab) researching effective ways to “pre-bunk” individuals against potentially radicalizing content online. “It’s not unlike research [into] vaccines.”

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw ICE protests in Minnesota, Washington, D.C., Illinois, Arizona, and much more, culminating on Friday with a National Day of Solidarity with Minnesota organized by ICE Out for Good. As always, get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists took on Trump’s Greenlandic ambitions (‘I Will Have My Vengeance’ and Promises, Promises, Michael de Adder), the view from our allies (Taco, Trump?, Nick Anderson), the view with historic eyes (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling), and more.

Lucinda Williams Wants to Push Our Buttons

Alan Light gave us an interview with country legend Lucinda Williams on the advent of her new album, World’s Gone Wrong, in which “the three-time Grammy winner returns to her folk singer and activist roots.”

Scandinavian-Style Spice Cake

Marissa Rothkopf gave us a little baking diplomacy and self care for trying times.

Part of the reason I’m hopeful is because of the success pro-democracy litigators have enjoyed across the board in so many other matters that I have tracked across 49 prior publisher’s notes. I quantified that earlier this week in a Contrarian essay, “Donald Trump Is Losing in Court.” Josh Kolb and I explained that pro-democracy advocates like my colleagues at Democracy Defenders Action are part of the coalition winning two-thirds of the time. If you include the over 300 immigration cases, that winning percentage goes up to 76%. Your paid subscriptions support all that.

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More cause for hope: just after we published that essay, my colleagues and I helped secure two additional major litigation wins. By a 2-1 majority, the U.S. District Court of the Central District of California rejected the GOP effort to block the Prop 50 California redistricting—successfully countering Donald Trump’s theft of congressional seats. In addition, we and great partners rebuffed Trump’s effort to invalidate the collective bargaining agreement between the AFGE union and the TSA.

Now, we are already turning to the next wave of cases. In recent weeks, I worked on two that have a particularly personal resonance for me. Both involve fighting antisemitism. As the child of Holocaust survivors, I could not imagine two more important matters.

The first is representing Imran Ahmed, the CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH). He is one of the world’s premier fighters against antisemitism (and the exploitation of kids) in the digital space. Despite that, he was targeted by the administration with the threat of yanking away his green card because of his battle against disinformation. That would tear him away from his wife and infant daughter and undermine the fight against antisemitism.

I was very proud to work with Robbie Kaplan and other great colleagues to secure a temporary restraining order protecting Imran. I used to admire Imran from afar, but, thanks to the case, I’ve gotten to know him as a person—and I am blown away that he has chosen antisemitism as one of the issues to which he is dedicating his professional life.

Imran is the grandson of an Afghan Pashtun soldier who fought the Nazis in World War II and then immigrated to England. Imran helped lead the pushback against antisemitism within the Labour Party and then started CCDH, which, in the years since, has done some of the most extraordinary work on exposing digital hate. Imran has worked with those across the political spectrum in that mission.

In the time we’ve spent together I’ve been amazed by his dedication and integrity. He is a mensch. And it is great to work with Robbie, who secured the Charlottesville verdict against white supremacists and is one of our outstanding courtroom advocates.

Also on the antisemitism front, my colleagues and I this week filed to join a suit against the Trump administration for demanding lists of Jews from a university. Yes, you read that right. The Trump administration asked the University of Pennsylvania to put together and hand over lists of people involved in Jewish Studies and Jewish-affiliated campus groups, including their personal contact information and addresses.

Needless to say, the Jewish people of Penn were not too excited about this, and we were proud to represent the American Academy of Jewish Research, the Jewish Law Students Association of the University’s Law School, the National and University of Pennsylvania chapters of the American Association of University Professors, and the Penn Association of Senior and Emeritus Faculty in joining the litigation in order to stop these lists from ever being turned over.

Given my family history, you can imagine how I reacted when I heard that these lists were being demanded of the university. It flies in the face of constitutional protections, common sense and history. When coupled with other data points, such as administration appointees with antisemitic connections, it is ominous. We will not rest until there is a permanent injunction against these demands.

All this is supported by your paid subscriptions. As we near the one year mark of Trump’s return to office, the death and destruction is vast and increasing at home and abroad. But there are so many victories as we look back on 2025–and we hope so many lie ahead. Thank you for making that possible.

And now for this week’s Contrarian round up, authored by my wonderful colleagues Meghan Houser, Jamie Riley, Lily Conway, and our Contrarian team.

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ICE Brutality Continues

Democrats Must Seize the Opportunity to Control ICE

In the wake of the murder of Renee Good and further escalation of ICE’s brutality, Jen Rubin called on Congress to use the spending fight to defend Americans’ lives. “Democrats can bring the same attention and pressure to bear on Republicans as they did in the healthcare fight.”

What Is ICE Hiding in Minneapolis?

Tim Dickinson reported on the black box that is the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis, where captured immigrants and protesters alike are currently being detained by federal authorities. “Members of Congress have been banned from oversight. Religious leaders have been blocked from ministering. And the administration’s track record on providing adequate food, water, and hygiene … is egregious.” Are the horrors of immigrant detention from Chicago being replayed in Minnesota?

ICE Wants 10,000 More Agents on Our Streets

Jeff Nesbit wrote on Trump’s inordinate call for Congress to fund 44,500 ICE detention beds and 10,000 more agents on the streets—expanding his state of terror with our own tax dollars. “Good’s death must be a turning point. We cannot allow the normalization of…a system that is creating a humanitarian catastrophe on our own soil.”

Will the Supreme Court Allow Trump to Use the Insurrection Act?

Erwin Chemerinsky broke down Trump’s aspirations to use the Insurrection Act to send troops to American cities—a possibility left open by the Supreme Court that would “exacerbate tensions and set a dangerous precedent.”

America’s Place on the World Stage

A Gift to Moscow

Brian O’Neill wrote on Trump’s latest object of imperial desire, Greenland, and how turning the territory into a trophy would make the world less safe. “The danger is not that Greenland is insecure. The danger is that Washington is handing Moscow the one thing it wants most: proof that NATO can be weakened from the inside….”

An Opportunist in Dove’s Clothing

Jill Lawrence analyzed Trump’s long career in pretending to care about peace—while looking for the right political opening to play hawk for conquest and content. “For anyone who hasn’t gotten the message yet: Never trust Trump, even on war and peace. Especially on war and peace.”

Another Castro Fiasco In The Making

In an interview with Jen, Rep. Adam Smith broke down the Venezuela crisis along the lines of new possibilities for global instability, thanks to Trump thinking precisely nothing through. “Another Castro fiasco in the making.”

America is a Rogue State

Rep. Greg Meeks spoke to Jen about Trump’s hunger for invading other nations, why a U.S. strike on Iran remains a real threat, and how what’s unfolding in Qatar should concern everyone.

The Economy on Shaky Ground

Lookahead to the 2026 Economy

Jared Bernstein wrote on the uncertain year ahead for an economy roiled by industrial fragility and an administration bent on doing things such as, say, threatening criminal indictment of the Federal Reserve chair. “As usual, there are upside and downside risks, one of which is our increasingly untethered and unchecked leader.”

Big Business Should Wake Up to the Trump Threat

Jen wrote on the need for Democrats to engage corporate leaders who have stayed maddeningly—if not predictably—mute in the face of Trump’s attacks on the foundations of economic stability–and democracy. “Chalk up the relative quiet to sheer cowardice.”

Donald Trump’s Wrong Turn on Affordability

Former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau director Rich Cordray wrote on Trump’s desperate attempt to show he “cares” about affordability—and how he showed his hand by picking the CFPB as one of DOGE’s first targets. “Nothing encourages abusive conduct like companies knowing that if they rip people off, the officials … will no longer stand in their way.”

One Battle After Another

Breaking Down the Legal Battles Against the Trump Administration

On the podcast this week, April Ryan and legal expert Katie Phang looked at what’s in the courts. Also this week, Joshua Kolb and I looked back at the year in legal fights and reported the fortifying news that Donald Trump Is Losing in Court—2/3 of all cases, and about 75% if you include immigration!

The Battle For 2026 Midterms

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Suzan DelBene joined Jen to discuss the Democrats’ approach to this year’s all-important midterm elections, breaking down which House seats are up this cycle and how the party plans to defend them—and win more. “The number one big theme across the country is affordability.”

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week saw brave, angry, civil anti-ICE protests nationwide, from a demonstration outside the Customs and Border Protection headquarters in Washington, to ICE Out protests in New Jersey, California, Oregon and many more states, to the mourning of Renee Good in Minneapolis and elsewhere, and much more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Cartoons, Culture & Fun Stuff

This week our cartoonists covered the president’s Peace Prize delusions (Nobel Dreams, Nick Anderson), our violent reality (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling), and what else is under attack (Capital Punishment, RJ Matson; By the Neck, Nick Anderson).

The Cognitive Dissonance of the Golden Globes

Meredith Blake covered the head-in-the-sand normality of “Hollywood’s most corrupt awards show,” where “it was virtually impossible to tell that anything was amiss in the country, even after one of the bleakest weeks so far in Donald Trump’s second term in office.”

Getting the Story Right Was Never Easy

Meredith also wrote on Cover-Up, a documentary about the indefatigable investigative reporter Seymour Hersh, which shows how difficult it has always been to hold power to account—and provides a stark contrast with “the dire state of journalism in 2026, particularly at the legacy media outlets that gave rise to reporters like Hersh and are now controlled by Trump-friendly oligarchs.”

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What a difference a year makes! Yes, the devastation, destruction, and even death Donald Trump has wrought have been vast. But we and the entire democracy movement have again and again frustrated his efforts to impose dictatorship. You have helped make that possible, dear Contrarians, through your paid subscriptions that not only fund our coverage but also my and my colleagues’ pro-democracy litigation. As I like to say, we have met Trump’s flood-the-zone autocratic approach with rule-of-law shock and awe.

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Trump initially pursued his authoritarian aspirations using the traditional tools of the presidency. That included, for example, the power of the pen, surging an unprecedented number of illegal executive orders, such as those purporting to end birthright citizenship or asserting control of American elections.

We covered all of that here at The Contrarian–unabashedly, as promised. And you Contrarians also supported me and the coalition of democracy, civil rights, and other nonprofit groups to push back in one of the most extraordinary litigation campaigns in American history. In about 200 cases in this and parallel areas (including his abuse of spending authority and firing authority), federal judges again and again stopped Trump from capturing the dictator flag. (Yes, he fared better at the Supreme Court, but it takes only a small fraction of the cases.)

Those birthright citizenship and elections EOs were among the many that my colleagues and I and our wonderful partners and clients went to court to help stop. We also blocked the firing of tens of thousands of government employees and kept multiple government agencies open, all fueled by your paid subscriptions. Because we at The Contrarian are a not-for-profit, all proceeds go to support our scintillating coverage and this kind of pro-democracy advocacy.

All of that losing was very frustrating for Trump, so he looked to other outlets for his dictatorial energies. Having confronted failure again and again in civil litigation, he turned to exercise his criminal-justice powers, where an administration typically has broader leeway. The old saying goes that a prosecutor can get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich, and Trump deployed hand-picked cronies, including his former defense lawyer Alina Habba, to occupy once-distinguished federal prosecutorial offices.

Here, too, Trump met failure. Charges against two principal adversaries, Letitia James and Jim Comey, were tossed out because another one of those hand-picked cronies, Lindsay Halligan, was illegally installed by Trump. Contrarians, you were again a part of that. My litigation colleagues and I helped secure the very first precedent that these appointments were illegal. Then we filed a brief in support of Comey and James that helped their wonderful counsel get those cases dismissed.

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Then there was a third area of Trump flexing and ultimate frustration: deployment of the National Guard. For all of the other disappointments at the Supreme Court (extensively covered here at The Contrarian), it finally did the right thing at the end of the year when it ruled that he had overreached his powers in Chicago. Trump was forced to admit defeat and pull back the Guard from multiple big cities, including Los Angeles—which my litigation colleagues and I are proud to represent pro bono, again made possible by your paid subscriptions.

As presidents often do when they’re facing domestic defeat, Trump has turned his autocratic attention abroad. This week, I wrote for The Contrarian with colleagues about the illegality of his Venezuela campaign and broke the news of our legal campaign to push back on it. Judging from the chaos surrounding Venezuela and the unpopularity of the invasion in the United States, Trump has another flop on his hands. That includes this week’s War Powers resolution, which passed the Senate with members of his own party breaking off to oppose him.

And that’s just a few of the examples of our coverage and legal pushback on all this and so much more, made possible by you. It has been the privilege of a lifetime to share the journalistic and litigation fight of the past year with over half a million Contrarians. Yes, as you will see from this week’s Contrarian roundup below, Trump is as dangerous as ever, but he’s much less powerful. That is thanks in no small part to each of you. Happy anniversary Contrarians!

And now for this week’s roundup, authored by my wonderful colleague Meghan Houser, Jamie Riley, Lily Conway and our Contrarian team.

Maduro’s Capture

Congress In The Dark

Sen. Mark Warner joined Jen Rubin to discuss the dangerous precedent the United States just set by kidnapping a world leader. “How would [Trump] respond if Putin does that, not only in Ukraine, but elsewhere? Or Xi takes Taiwan? How do we have any moral standing to push back?”

Making a Mockery of Checks and Balances

Erwin Chemerinsky wrote on the Venezuela operation as a chilling mark of how far we have deviated from constitutional restraints. “A country that is ruled by someone who can do anything is not a constitutional democracy under the rule of law.”

Split Screen: The Reality Show Presidency and the Maduro Capture

Azza Cohen wrote on the White House’s social-media-obsessed communication strategy around Maduro’s capture, which reveals “the transformation of military operations into reality television content, with Donald Trump as the main character.”

Maduro’s Arrest Made WHO 400k Richer?

Rep. Richie Torres joined Jen to discuss the MAGA Republicans’ guide to earning $400k through insider trading—and how he plans to ban prediction market profiteering. “It not only corrupts the market, it corrupts the government itself.”

The “Donroe Doctrine” and the Coming Oil War

The Coming Legal and Congressional Action to Fight ‘The Donroe Doctrine’

This week, Richard Painter, Virginia Canter, Christopher Swartz and I, wrote about the Democracy Defenders Fund launching two parallel legal campaigns to fight back against Trump’s profiteering in Venezuela.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries on the future in Venezuela and more

On the podcast this week, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries spoke with April Ryan about the uncertain future of action in Venezuela, and Carlos Eduardo Espina joined Jen to discuss what Maduro’s capture means for Venezuelans on the ground.

A Brilliant Operation Can Still Be a Bad Bet

Brian O’Neill looked ahead to the consequences of the administration’s “hemispheric demonstration.” “If Trump is now taking ownership of what happens inside Venezuela, the real test won’t be whether the first wave succeeded. It will be whether the United States can define—and exit—an end state that Venezuela and the region will accept.”

Anniversary of the Jan. 6 Riot

24 Hours at the Capitol...

Jen spoke with author Nora Neus, whose new book offers a meticulously researched, minute-by-minute account of the January 6 insurrection. “I was really surprised by how many of the rioters felt duped by President Trump … and after the fact felt really let down by this man that they had, for many of them (until the pardons came through), given up so much for.”

J6ers: Where Are They Now?

Tim Dickinson caught us up on some of the most notorious insurrection offenders—or “great patriots”—a year after Trump’s pardon spree. Spoiler: at least six have been charged with child sex crimes.

ICE in Our Cities

ICE Killed Another Person

Jen Rubin wrote on ICE’s killing of a young woman in Minneapolis. “This tragedy was entirely predictable.”

ICE and Lethal Force

Jenn Borchetta, the ACLU’s deputy project director on policing, joined Jen to unpack what we should know as ICE’s militarization escalates. “When law enforcement leadership casts vast members of the community as enemies, we have seen that that leads to the misuse of force.”

ICE and Our Communities

In conversation with Jen, Ezra Levin of Indivisible demanded action against ICE. “When a regime like this comes for us, attacks our communities, murders Americans, and asks us to not protest, you know what we do? We protest. It is our job as Americans to express our outrage peacefully but powerfully in this moment.”

The Continuing Healthcare Crisis

A Threat To Every American

Jeff Nesbit sounded the alarm on the new CDC childhood vaccine schedule, which slashes the number of universally recommended childhood vaccines from 17 to 11—even as the United States just reached its highest measles case total in 34 years. The CDC’s work “is being poisoned by rhetoric that treats life-saving medicine as a lifestyle choice.”

Undaunted

Jen wrote on the House vote to advance extension of ACA subsidies for three years—secured with a remarkable 17 Republicans joining Democrats—and highlighted the role of Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who “kept the focus on healthcare, maintained his nerve during the shutdown, and continued to make the case to voters even after Senate Democrats caved.”

My Predictions for Women’s Health in 2026

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf warned us to brace for another year in which the federal government itself is hazardous to women’s health. “We can expect continued attacks on bodily autonomy and additional barriers to care.”

Looking Ahead in 2026

Trump’s 2026 Government Agenda

Max Stier forecasted a year that promises a continuation of Trump’s destabilizing and antidemocratic efforts and urged Congress and the public to use the remaining levers of democracy to hold the administration accountable.

Republicans Want Taxation Without Representation

Max Flugrath wrote on Republicans’ three-vector plan to lock in power without winning more votes, which hinges on a case now before the Supreme Court. If the GOP has its way, say hello to higher taxes — and goodbye to voting rights.

The Contrarian covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw protests against ICE in Minneapolis, Washington, D.C, Jacksonville, Fla., Philadelphia, and more, plus nationwide protests against Trump’s attack on Venezuela, and this weekend we’re tracking hundreds more events planned through Indivisible. Find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Find Your Joy.

Shalise Manza Young gave us an essential reminder of what “might be the most important thing” we do any given day: find the kind of joy that sustains and nourishes. “You can’t fight when you’re exhausted, and there’s a vicious fight in front of us.”

Cartoons, Culture & Fun Stuff

This week our cartoonists took on Trump’s shiny new toy war (Tom the Dancing Bug, Ruben Bolling), his crude motivations (My Precious, Michael de Adder; The Next Cold War, Nick Anderson), and law enforcement priorities back home (Weak on Crime, Nick Anderson; Portrait of a Terrorist; Michael de Adder).

Subject to Debate: MTV Isn’t Dead Yet. But It Might As Well Be.

Meredith Blake wrote on last week’s impromptu social media eulogizing of MTV, an iconic cable network that’s technically still alive but hasn’t felt relevant in years. “What [fans] were upset about was the loss of something much bigger than a single network: a shared touchstone in a popular culture.”

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For our final Top 10 Worst of 2025, we detail the most egregious of Trump’s abuses of the pardon and other clemency powers. They are atrocious–so much so that we cannot rule out even worse pardons ahead, such as of Jeffrey Epstein’s co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell. Neither does Trump rule it out; when asked after the Supreme Court rejected her final appeal in October whether he would consider a pardon for her, Trump dodged the question by stating “I’d have to take a look at it.”

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As the country reviews the Justice Department’s most recent Epstein files document release, more light might be shed upon the matter. Or not, if as it so far appears, material has been overwithheld. Thanks to you, we won’t have to take the DOJ’s word for it; your paid subscriptions support our democracy litigation and related work, including our pending case to force the release of all the Epstein files. With your support, we stand ready to go to court as needed to ensure full transparency.

In the meantime, let’s have a look back at Trump’s 10 worst pardons of 2025, followed by our usual round up of all the Contrarian coverage of the week.

1. Capitol Clemency Catastrophe

We begin our putrid pardon-palooza on Day One of Trump, when he granted clemency to over 1,500 insurrectionists who stormed the capitol in his name on Jan. 6, 2021. Among those pardoned for their crimes on the “day of love,” as he puts it, were 608 people who were charged with violent crimes and approximately 174 who were “charged with using a deadly or dangerous weapon or causing serious bodily injury to an officer.” Trump defended the pardons on the grounds that “these people have already served a long period of time” and that many sentences were “ridiculous and excessive.” Tell that to the cops who were targeted.

2. Juan Orlando Hernández

Despite all his bluster about fighting drug trafficking in Central and South America, Trump pardoned former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández, who was serving a 45-year sentence for pumping poison on a “cocaine superhighway” into our communities. Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the prosecution was the result of a “weaponized” Justice Department, which brought the case because Hernández was “opposed to the values of the previous administration.” But the case was pushed by then-prosecutor Emil Bove, later Trump’s defense lawyer, senior DOJ official, and now Third Circuit judge!

3. Ross Ulbricht

More drug hypocrisy: Ross Ulbricht, who operated the Silk Road, a notorious underground online market used by drug dealers, landed one of the first pardons Trump signed. Ulbricht was sentenced to life in prison for his role in facilitating the flow of heroin and other illicit drugs into our communities. Trump defended the pardon because Ulbricht was put in jail by “the same lunatics who were involved in the modern day weaponization of the government against me.” Yet Trump just declared that illicit fentanyl is a “weapon of mass destruction.”

4. Changpen “CZ” Zhao

As we discussed last week, CZ is one of Trump’s crypto cronies. That includes CZ’s crypto exchange Binance using a Trump-supported tablecoin, USD1, to finance a $2 billion transaction (potentially generating huge revenue for the Trumps). CZ, who spent nearly four months in jail for money laundering issues at Binance, scored clemency a few months after the USD1 deal. Binance announced that it would launch trading of the USD1 stablecoin and another Trump-linked crypto product on its exchange a week after Trump signed CZ’s pardon. When asked about the pardon, Trump said, “I have no idea who he is. I was told that he was a victim, just like I was and just like many other people, of a vicious, horrible group of people in the Biden administration.” Sure.

5. Giuliani, Meadows, and the Election Co-Conspirators

Trump’s decision to issue pardons for 77 people involved in the scheme to overturn the 2020 election results and keep Trump in power was no surprise. His pardon attorney, Ed Martin, revealed the clemencies by replying to his own May post on X in which he said, “No MAGA Left Behind.” The only real shock here is that it took so long for Trump to protect Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Mark Meadows, Sidney Powell, and company from future accountability (none is facing federal charges). Just like the Jan. 6 mass pardons, this grant of clemency was yet another attempt to re-write the history of the attempted coup–and convey to future would-be plotters that they will not face consequences if they try again.

6. Rep. Henry Cuellar

Trump suggested that his decision to pardon Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) and his wife for allegedly engaging in a bribery scheme was mostly about politics: namely, hoping the congressman would switch parties or retire. But when Rep. Cuellar refused to jump ship, Trump exploded in a Truth Social rant, accusing Cuellar of “a lack of LOYALTY, something that Texas Voters, and Henry’s daughters, will not like.” For his part, Cuellar clapped back by paraphrasing the words of his fellow Texan and former president Lyndon B. Johnson, with Cuellar saying, “I’m an American, I’m a Texan, and I’m a Democrat, in that order … and I think anybody that puts party before their country is doing a disservice to their country.”

7. Todd and Julie Chrisley

It is possible that Trump saw some of himself in Todd and Julie Chrisley, former millionaire stars of the reality show Chrisley Knows Best, who received pardons after being convicted of fraud by an Atlanta jury in federal court in 2022? The pardon follows lobbying from the Chrisleys’ daughter Savannah, including a prime-time appearance at the 2024 Republican National Convention, where she argued that her parents were the victims of (you guessed it) political persecution. Trump’s pardon also fully relieved the Chrisleys of the more than $22 million they owed to victims of their tax fraud and tax evasion scheme. Not a bad deal– except for the victims.

8. BitMEX Co-Founders–and BitMEX

Trump appears to have made history in March when he used the pardon power to grant clemency to a corporation: crypto exchange BitMEX. The exchange pleaded guilty to “wilfully” failing to “establish, implement, and maintain an adequate anti-money laundering” program; Trump’s pardon coincided with a surge of activity on the exchange. The grant also extended to the exchange’s founders, Benjamin Delo, Arthur Hayes, and Samuel Reed, and employee Gregory Dwyer for their participation in similar schemes to flout U.S. laws. For its part, the company celebrated the pardon, thanking the president and boosting itself as “the safest, most trusted, financially-stable, and professionally operated crypto derivatives exchange.”

9. Scott Jenkins

Trump’s decision to pardon Scott Jenkins, an ardent MAGA supporter who was convicted of bribery and honest services fraud for running a “cash for badges” scheme, is one of the best examples of Trump’s putrid pardon philosophy. If you’re a MAGA official convicted of corruption offenses, you’re pardon eligible. Jenkins “displayed a shocking disregard for his ethical and legal responsibilities,” according to prosecutor Zachary T. Lee (who was then Trump’s acting U.S. Attorney before resigning in October). No matter. The day before the pardon was announced, Martin dropped his infamous “No MAGA left behind” post on X. Trump, as usual, defended the pardon because Jenkins “is a victim of an overzealous Biden Department of Justice”--even though it was his DOJ that secured Jenkins’ 10-year sentence.

10. Trevor Milton

Trevor Milton, convicted of defrauding investors in his electric car startup in 2022, received a pardon in March. Trump labeled Milton, who was represented at his trial by Attorney General Pam Bondi’s brother, Brad Bondi, as yet another victim of persecution: “the thing that he did wrong was he was one of the first people that supported a gentleman named Donald Trump for a president.” He certainly did support Trump and his agenda–to the tune of at least $930,000 to the Trump campaign or Trump-aligned PACs and $750,000 to the MAHA Alliance, a PAC designed to convince Robert F. Kennedy Jr. supporters to vote for Trump in 2024. Milton bombastically declared that the pardon is really about “every American who has been railroaded by the government.”

Dishonorable mention: George Santos

Trump loves those who have made their support for him clear. And few people have been better at that than George Santos, the disgraced former congressman and conman whose sentence Trump commuted in October. Santos was serving a seven-year sentence for wire fraud and identity theft. The commutation also relieved him of his requirement to pay more than $370,000 in restitution to his victims. Trump even called him “somewhat of a ‘rogue’” who “lied like hell”--but there are “many rogues throughout our Country that aren’t forced to serve seven years in prison.” This commutation, despite not technically being a pardon, makes the list as a dishonorable mention.

And now here’s something far more honorable: all this week’s Contrarian coverage.

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A Devastating Weekend: Gun Violence Across the World

Two Countries

Jen Rubin wrote on the divergent responses in America and Australia to the shootings that rocked our respective nations last weekend—the Bondi Beach massacre and the tragedy at Brown University—and how America is once again choosing the wrong path. “Australia shows us there is another way for democracies to function. Perpetual slaughter of our children is a choice—one no civilized country should make.”

America Refuses to Prevent School Shootings

Angela Ferrell-Zabala, executive director of Moms Demand Action, joined Jen to discuss how the violence at Brown University could have been avoided and why it wasn’t, calling out the gun industry and demanding accountability for the deadly violence tearing through our communities. “Guns are the #1 thing killing young people & nothing is being done about it.”

Hanukkah Celebration Turns to Tragedy

Halie Soifer, CEO of Jewish Democratic Council of America, joined Jen to update us on the Bondi Beach shooting and discuss the global uptick in violent antisemitism. “This is how our ability to fight hatred is slipping away.”

What Parents Can Do When Their Child Is in an Active-Shooter Lockdown

Dara Kass lived every parent’s nightmare this past weekend as she waited for confirmation that her daughter, a student at Brown, was safe. “I want to share what I learned, because on Saturday…I realized how unprepared we are for this side of the experience.”

2025 Was Awful for Healthcare

The 15-Year-Old Ghost Haunting the Republican Party

Jeff Nesbit wrote on why the GOP’s healthcare sabotage will dominate the 2026 midterms. “The GOP has spent 15 years looking for an alternative to the ACA. On Jan. 1, the American people will finally see what that alternative is: higher costs, fewer doctors, and millions left behind.”

A Very Bad Year for Women’s Health

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf looked back on a year’s worth of reporting on the depth of damage this administration has wreaked on women’s health. “When I started writing for The Contrarian, a funny-not-funny inside joke was whether there would be enough fodder for a weekly democracy column that overtly centers gender. I think you already know the punchline.”

How 2025 Changed American Healthcare

Dara Kass wrote on the healthcare stories that defined 2025, from coverage loss to crumbling trust. “What worries me most is the lasting damage from conspiracy theories and disinformation spread by the secretary of Health and Human Services and his appointees.”

2025 in Global Health

Roberto Valadéz took a global view on the year in healthcare, tracing devastating setbacks—but also new innovation and striking resilience. “The tools to save millions of lives exist. What remains is the collective resolve to deploy them strategically, equitably, and at scale.”

America’s Place in the World

America Abroad in 2025

Brian O’Neill broke down a year of Trump’s drastic reshaping of America’s place in the world. He argued that the administration’s reckless, inexperienced handling of national security has destabilized more than many realize. “America remains strong but is increasingly treated as the variable everyone else must manage.”

America’s Global Power Is Flickering

Steve Cook joined Jen Rubin to review the year in Trump’s foreign policy (or lack thereof) and look ahead to 2026, breaking down the humanitarian cuts, curdling goodwill, and economic fallout now reshaping the world.

Is a U.S.-Venezuela War on the Horizon?

Rep. Jim Hines joined Jen Rubin to discuss the real and evident reason Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth won’t release the Caribbean boat strike footage—because he has something to hide—and gives his take on any future escalation in Venezuela and elsewhere.

The White House Team of Villains

The ‘Second Nadir,’ Indeed: The Year in Race

Shalise Manza Young wrote on a year in which dismantling civil rights and erasing evidence of Black history and achievement became an open top priority of our federal government. “Trump, his Cabinet members, and advisers are transparently working toward instituting a Christian white nationalist agenda.”

The Five Worst Things We Learned About Susie Wiles

Tim Dickinson pressed the Vanity Fair exposé—er, profile—of Trump’s chief of staff, Susie Wiles, for all its stickiest juices, finding the tale of a U.S. chief of staff who never says “no.” “Wiles’ ability to articulate a problem doesn’t seem to be matched by a willingness to, you know, fix it.”

When Public Servants Became Public Enemies

The Contrarian’s own Ciera Stone, a former federal worker, gave us an eyewitness account of the DOGE-fueled destruction of the civil service. “Our government is filled with dedicated civil servants who proudly took an oath to serve our country and constitution. We did not deserve to be treated as an enemy. Certainly not by the President of the United States.”

Retaining Hope & Fighting Back

Dispatch From Chicago: ‘Standing up to the Worst’

Lorraine Forte updated us from the city that, far from becoming “ground zero” for a Donald Trump victory-lap on mass deportations, this year became the model for fighting back. “Chicago was bruised by Midway Blitz. But we weren’t broken.”

The Contrarian covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw protests in Oregon, Georgia, Brazil, Russia, and more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org. See also A Year in Protest. So many of us showed up and showed out this year. We’ll be there next year, too.

Top 10 Moments of Hope from 2025

Ben Sheehan spotlighted the optimism we need to keep going.

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week our cartoonists took on the administration’s blame game (No Room at the Inn and The Media Did It by Michael de Adder), creative uses of fossil fuel (Gaslighting and Merry Christmas to Oil ... by RJ Matson), the not-so-fine print (Font of Trouble by Nick Anderson), and an original war on Christmas (Tom the Dancing Bug by Ruben Bolling).

Rob Reiner Left a Remarkable Pop Culture Legacy. His Work as an Activist Was Just as Impressive.

As the nation mourned a Hollywood icon (everyone except the president, that is), Meredith Blake gave tribute to both Rob Reiner’s timeless filmography and his dauntless progressive activism. “Reiner’s death marks an incongruously tragic end for an artist who exuded warmth and whose work, even at its darkest, seemed to reflect a belief in essential human decency.” See also Michael de Adder’s Thank you, Mr. Reiner.

The Best of the Jane Austen Cinematic Universe

Meredith also gave us a rundown of Austen adaptation classics in celebration of the author’s 250^th birthday, and a binge-worthy gay hockey romance to boot. It is a truth universally acknowledged that her recs are worth reading.

Chocolate Linzertorte

Marissa Rothkopf gave us a traditional Austrian dessert improved with a little cocoa.

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There you have it Contrarians—another amazing week of content, not to mention the legal action made possible by your paid subscriptions. We look forward to seeing you on Coffee with the Contrarians Monday morning at 9:15 AM ET. Until then, have a great weekend. Warmly, Norm

That’s why we’ve had a hard time picking the worst instances of his corrupt self-enrichment, not to mention that of his cronies and family. So if you don’t see your favorite scheme on this list, don’t worry—there are too many! Here’s our latest Top 10 Worst list, followed, as usual, by this week’s brilliant Contrarian coverage.

If these incidents infuriate you, there is something you can do about it. As a paid Contrarian subscriber, you support our efforts to push back against all of this wrongdoing through litigation, such as our complaint to fight the very first gold-plated item on our list.

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1. Trump’s Qatari Boeing

In May, Qatar presented Trump and his administration with a $400 million Boeing 747, ostensibly to use as Air Force One—a present reportedly worth more than all foreign gifts bestowed on all former American presidents combined. As my colleagues and I noted in a legal complaint, the Trump administration is apparently illegally transferring the nearly $1 billion from a nuclear weapons program at the Defense Department to retrofit the jet, a gross mismanagement of key federal funds. And it will barely have time in the air before Trump’s term ends and it gets “donated” to Trump’s presidential library for his continued use. Meanwhile, after the transfer, Qatar got a guarantee that the United States will defend Qatar through “diplomatic, economic, and, if necessary, military” measures and a new “military facility” for Qatar’s Air Force at the Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho. Trump has defended the transfer of the plane as a legitimate “gift” and the White House said that “any gift given by a foreign government is always accepted in full compliance with all applicable laws. President Trump’s administration is committed to full transparency.”

Current Status: We’re waiting for the Government Accountability Office to act on our complaint—but it’s hard to imagine a clearer conflict of interest.

2. World Liberty Financial

After the Trump family helped promote cryptocurrency company World Liberty Financial (WLFI), it began encouraging foreign investors to buy into the venture. The conflicts of interest have since gotten only worse, as we discuss in our report on Trump’s crypto conflicts. This includes the involvement of alleged fraudster Justin Sun (see No. 6 below). Then there is “shadowy” United Arab Emirates-based Aqua1 Foundation, which invested $100 million in WLFI in June. WLFI also sold its tokens to at least 62 users that also used TornadoCash, an Office of Foreign Asset Control-sanctioned crypto mixing service that the Justice Department alleged helped criminals and hackers “launder more than $1 billion of illicit assets.” The Biden administration sanctioned Tornado Cash in 2022, but the Trump administration lifted the sanctions in March 2025. Donald Trump Jr. has said that the idea that WLFI investors may be seeking favor with the Trump administration is “complete nonsense.”

Current Status: Not only is WLFI—and Trump’s crypto empire—flourishing, but Congress is rushing to pass legislation creating a market structure for cryptocurrency without any checks on Trump’s ability to influence the market to his benefit. Our legal team is working night and day to stop that from happening.

3. The Meme Coin Grift

Trump’s meme coin represents perhaps his most brash self-enrichment scheme, one unlike anything we have ever seen from an American president. According to the website, the token is “intended to function as an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol “$TRUMP“—and not as an investment or security. But of course this slice of code was listed on various crypto exchanges and immediately surged in price. Since its launch, the coin’s value closely followed Trump’s announcements, with wild fluctuations. The president even hosted an exclusive dinner for meme coin “investors” who spent tens of thousands to buy the digital token. This access auction was a scheme so brazen—even for Trump—that it left ethics experts like us stunned. The White House denies any conflicts of interest.

Current Status: The Trump-dominated Securities and Exchange Commission has shown zero interest in examining Trump’s meme coin activities. This makes defeating the new crypto market bill even more important. Our fight continues.

4. Trump’s Foreign Real Estate Boom

Trump is set to more than triple his foreign properties during this term, as real estate developers are working on at least 23 Trump-branded projects. These projects are a global feeding frenzy for foreign governments looking to curry favor with the president. To take only a few examples, Trump is building a hotel, golf course, and residences in Oman on property owned by the government. A Saudi real estate firm (with close ties to the Saudi government) is the Trump Organization’s partner in various real estate deals, including a new Trump Hotel in Dubai and a residential tower in Jeddah. In November, the Trump Organization announced a project in the Maldives with the same Saudi firm. The very next day, Trump met with Saudi Crown Prince and Jared Kushner buddy Mohammed bin Salman and announced an “Economic and Defense Partnership” with the kingdom. Hard to come up with better reasons why the Constitution prohibits the president from accepting foreign emoluments. When asked about possible conflicts of interest in the context of Trump’s then-upcoming trip to the Middle East, Press Secretary Karoline Levitt claimed that it was, “ridiculous that anyone in this room would even suggest that President Trump is doing anything for his own benefit.”

Current Status: Each individual property may constitute an emoluments clause violation. We at Democracy Defenders Fund include leaders of the team that won multiple emoluments cases against Trump in his first term, and we are evaluating how to fight back now. Watch this space!

5. The USD1 Binance-UAE Deal

Less than two months after Trump’s WLFI launched USD1, its stablecoin, a UAE state-backed investment firm announced that it would use USD1 to finance a $2 billion investment in crypto exchange Binance, which was then under SEC investigation. In May, Binance decided to list USD1–and, days after the announcement, Trump’s SEC dropped its securities case against the exchange. And then there’s Trump’s treatment of Binance’s head Changpen “CZ” Zhao. He pleaded guilty to money laundering in 2023 and got a Trump pardon in October of this year. The White House defended Zhao, criticized his prosecution, and blamed the Biden administration for creating a “war on cryptocurrency.“

Current Status: Expect to keep hearing about this one—especially as campaign season approaches.

6. Justin Sun’s “Investment” in Trump Crypto

Justin Sun is a cryptocurrency entrepreneur facing SEC fraud charges. Sun loudly bought $75 million of WLFI tokens starting in November 2024. The SEC in March 2025 delayed its fraud case against Sun. Come May 2025, Sun—also loudly—purchased $20 million of Trump’s meme coin, gaining entrance to a personal dinner with the president. The timing and scale of the investments raise questions about whether Sun is trying to buy his way out of federal trouble—and into Trump’s good graces. When pressed about the ethics of the crypto dinner, Leavitt attempted to assuage fears, “I can assure you, the president acts with only the interests of the American public in mind.”

Current Status: Sun continues expanding his cryptocurrency empire while his case remains delayed according to the most recent entry in the court docket.

7. Tom Homan’s $50,000

In September 2024, before Trump’s election, his future Border Czar Tom Homan allegedly accepted a $50,000 payment from undercover federal agents posing as business executives. Homan reportedly indicated he could assist them to secure government contracts should Trump win—and there is said to be a tape in government hands. After the Trump team took over, the investigation was reportedly closed. Homan says that he did “nothing criminal” and that “I recused myself from any discussions of any contract or any monetary decisions like that….”

Current Status: My Democracy Defenders colleagues and I stepped in, launching an investigation in September. It is continuing and all legal remedies are on the table.

8. The $300 Million Ballroom Boondoggle

In the middle of the longest government shutdown ever, as federal workers were going without pay and standing in bread lines, Trump ordered the destruction of the historic East Wing to build a massive, $300 million-plus ballroom. Trump says he’s funding the ballroom through private sponsorships. What a kind, altruistic gesture from the corporate donors, who have over the years received billions in federal contracts–and 14 of whom are currently facing federal enforcement actions. The White House has advised journalists concerned about the lack of oversight to, “trust the process,” and said that, “a submission is not required legally,” to tear down the East Wing.

Current Status: A lawsuit has just been filed to stop construction because of alleged legal violations and a TRO hearing is set for next week.

9. The Executive Branch Club

After his father was sworn in, Donald Trump Jr. and business partners Zach and Alex Witkoff (the sons of Trump envoy Steve Witkoff) and others, launched a new private club in D.C. They brazenly named it “The Executive Branch.” This tacky tavern–whose “coat of arms” is topped by an ersatz presidential eagle–raises serious ethics concerns. Members are lining the pockets of the Trump and Witkoff families with reported huge initiation fees (said to be up to $500,000) plus additional annual dues for the well-heeled to mingle with government officials and their kin–not unlike its likely inspiration, Mar-a-Lago.

Current Status: The venue continues to serve as a potential influence-peddling hotspot.

10. Amazon Prime Video Presents: Melania

About two weeks before Trump’s inauguration, Amazon Prime Video announced that it was releasing a documentary about Melania Trump—a $40 million bargain for Amazon. It’s hard to imagine Amazon picking up this project at this hefty price point without considering the company’s relationship with the Trumps. Amazon just settled one major case brought against it by the Biden Federal Trade Commission for $2.5 billion, with another potentially even larger case ongoing, and the company is also a large federal contractor (it received another $1 billion in expanded cloud computing contracts in August). An Amazon spokesperson stated, “We licensed the upcoming Melania Trump documentary film and series for one reason and one reason only—because we think customers are going to love it.”

Current Status: The film is set to hit theaters in January, kicking off what promises to be another year of the Trump family’s shameless profiteering off the presidency. Amazon has released a still image of Melania peering out a car window onto a nondescript tarmac—not exactly a $40 million view.

And now, onto a much nicer list…the best of this week’s Contrarian coverage!

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Trump & Kennedy’s Healthcare Hell

When Public Health Fails Our Children: Dr. Dara Kass offered urgent medical and personal testimony on why the CDC advisory board’s decision to roll back the hepatitis B vaccine recommendation will be devastating. “[This] isn’t just about one vaccine. It’s that our public health infrastructure has been corrupted by ideologues pursuing an agenda unrelated to public health or science.”

Healthcare Isn’t a Luxury! Natasha Murphy on Looming ACA Deadline: Natasha Murphy, director of Health Policy at the Center for American Progress, joined Jen to paint a clear picture of what a country without affordable healthcare looks like: much like the one we’re already living in, with high potential to get worse. “The reality is, people just won’t be able to afford coverage and will have to drop coverage altogether.”

How RFK Jr. is Making America Sick: Colette Delawalla of Stand Up for Science joined Jen to lay out the damage Health Secretary RFK Jr. has caused to make America anything but healthy again. “We are not in a place to be able to afford more illness.”

Deadly Disparities: April Ryan spoke with Dr. Roger Mitchell, president of the National Medical Association, about medical racism, the Affordable Care Act stakes, and the anti-vax madness. “Trump’s regime is weaponizing public health.”

Excuse Me, Your Racism Is Showing

A Depraved President Attacks Again: Shalise Manza-Young wrote on the new low in a decades-long campaign of racist, xenophobic vilifications. “For all the Trump regime’s inhumane talk of non-white immigrants broadly and ‘illegals’ more specifically, his targeted attack on the Somali community and Omar feels different, more sinister.”

The Meaning of the Birthright Citizenship Case: María Pérez wrote on the Supreme Court reviewing birthright citizenship, an issue constitutionally settled for more than 150 years. “If the court overturns part of the 14th Amendment, the government would have license to restrict where Black and brown people live, what they can own, which jobs they can hold, and who gets to participate fully in public life.”

Trump’s Anti-Diversity Crusade Claims Two Campus Magazines: Jennifer Weiss-Wolf shone a spotlight on the University of Alabama, which shuttered two student-run publications in capitulation to Trump’s anti-DEI agenda—obeying in advance “well before a fight with the federal government had begun in earnest.”

Caribbean Strike Updates

Venezuela, Western Dominance, & Regime Change: Rep. Adam Smith’s Striking Updates: In a must-watch interview with Jen Rubin, Rep. Smith shared shocking details about the September strikes on a Venezuelan “drug boat,” gleaned in part from a hearing with the U.S. commander who oversaw the operation. “We could have easily come in with a helicopter and plucked these two guys off the top of that boat.”

The second strike isn’t the only problem: Jen started off the week by putting those Caribbean boat strikes in a sobering geopolitical and strategic context, in which these extrajudicial killings may lead to another regime-change war of the very type Trump vowed never to start. “We are on the cusp of another unjustified, unauthorized war.”

More Global Trump Chaos

Trump’s “Back to the Future” Approach to National Security: Brian O’Neill analyzed the White House’s newest National Security Strategy, which, he says, reads like a 1930s revival. “Trump has been eager to say, in effect, ‘Where we’re going, we don’t need roads’—no allies, no institutions, no guardrails, just American leverage and will. The problem is that everyone else sees the potholes ahead.”

The Inevitable, Trumpian Betrayal of Ukraine: Tim Mak spoke with Jen Rubin on all things Ukraine, Venezuela, and European allies, breaking down how and why the rift between the U.S. and its closest partners keeps widening.

From Soft Power to Hard Profit on Global Health: Roberto Valadéz wrote on the Trump regime’s replacement for U.S. AID—the “America First Global Health Strategy”—which is not only already incurring a global death toll, but that also does everything BUT put America first in terms of smart policy.

Corruption & Selling Out

FIFA Played a False Nine on Trump: Carron J. Phillips was equally unimpressed with the FIFA Peace Prize and Trump happily accepting the “pacifier on a ribbon.” “The governing body of the world’s biggest sport bent the knee to America’s smallest man.”

Hollywood Stars Flock to Saudi Film Festival: Meredith Blake wrote on the latest spectacle of celebrity hypocrisy to rival the Riyadh Comedy Festival, yet which has strangely brought less flak to its A-list attendees. “To paraphrase Dakota Johnson, things in the U.S. are, indeed, really grim. But a whole bunch of Saudi money can only make it worse.”

Ex-NBA Player, Congressman—& Friend of Epstein?: In this week’s “Offsides” episode, Pablo Torre updated on an ex-NBA player—and ex-congressman—who happens to be in the Epstein files. “People are making choices about what to ignore, when they’re associating with someone, when they’re taking donations from somebody, when they’re using someone’s network to enrich themselves.”

Eyes On 2026 & Beyond

We Say, “Only Voters” Will Save Us. Then We Forget About Them: Laura Brill outlined a key strategy to overcome the voter registration hurdle: bring it to high school civics class. “If the ballot box is the ultimate check on authoritarianism, we need to build and maintain the onramp, and we need to do it now.”

New Year, New Party? Simon Rosenberg on Dems’ Strategy: Simon considered the year past—and ahead, breaking down what the party got wrong, who’s doing it right, and what’s to come. “The reason our approval rating has been low is because Democrats are disappointed in us—not Republicans and Independents.”

The Contrarian covers the Democracy Movement: This week, we saw protests in Oregon, North Carolina, Bulgaria, Iran, and Honduras, and more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Culture, Cartoons, Pets, & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists took on Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s murky war crimes justice (The Fog of War by RJ Matson, Tom the Dancing Bug by Ruben Bolling); the administration’s worst gifts for this holidays (Stocking Stuffers and He’s Making a List by RJ Matson, The War on Christmas by Nick Anderson); and the ironies of Trump calling anything “garbage” (Garbage Man by Michael de Adder, MAGA Jesus by Nick Anderson).

Subject to Debate: Should Stars Like Sabrina Carpenter Respond to Presidential Trolling?: Meredith Blake wrote on Carpenter’s decision to fight back when the White House used her music to promote ICE—and how it differs from the approach of stars like Taylor Swift. “Did she fall for rage bait, or do the right thing?”

Chocolate Chestnut Bûche de Noël: Jamie Schler gives us the recipe for a sumptuous holiday treat and a prescription for moments of joy, beauty, and grace every day.

Contrarian Holiday Pets: This week, we featured a roundup of reader-submitted photos of their pets celebrating the winter holidays. Submit yours to submit@contrariannews.org with Holiday Pets in the subject line to be considered for the second installment, coming next week.

All that amazing content and our pro-democracy legal actions were made possible by your paid subscriptions. Thank you, and if you aren’t a paid subscription, please consider joining our community as one.

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We look forward to seeing you on Coffee with the Contrarians on Monday morning at 9:15 a.m. ET. In the meantime, have a wonderful weekend. Warmly, Norm

We start this week with one of the very worst manifestations of that corruption: Trump’s and his administration’s retaliatory or otherwise wrongful prosecutions. Sometimes it can be hard to keep track of the larger pattern of the president’s authoritarian wrongdoing because of his flood-the-zone approach, but we hope this and our other Top 10 lists will help you Contrarians do just that.

In the weeks ahead, Gabe and I will be surveying Trump’s most corrupt pardons, his most outrageous financial self-enrichment and corruption–and the good news of his top legal defeats in my democracy cases supported by our paid Contrarian subscribers!

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These Top 10 lists will be refreshed weekly and will have their own tab on the Contrarian homepage. Here’s our first one, followed as usual by my rundown of all of this week’s indispensable coverage in The Contrarian,

1. New York Attorney General Letitia James

Trump has had a long-running grudge against AG James and went so far as to post on social media what seemed to have been intended as a direct message to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi demanding James be prosecuted. The resulting bogus charges that James committed mortgage fraud were thrown out by a judge who determined that Trump’s handpicked crony Lindsey Halligan was not authorized to file the indictment. Then, when the DOJ tried to bring the case again this week, a grand jury reportedly refused to charge.

Next: Trump should give up, but he probably won’t. Expect another stab at a grand jury in weeks ahead.

2. Judge Hannah Dugan

The Trump administration is prosecuting Wisconsin state Judge Hannah Dugan for simply doing what jurists do every day: controlling her court. They claim that by excusing a defendant–who was an undocumented migrant–from her courtroom, she was attempting to hide him from federal officials, and thus interfering with their case against him. It’s hard to imagine any prior administration bringing this case–or the jury finding her guilty.

Next: The trial begins Dec. 15.

3. Former FBI Director James Comey

Comey is also a long-time target of Trump’s revenge, dating all the way to the end of the 2016 campaign when Comey announced that Democratic presidential nominee and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s emails weren’t worthy of further criminal investigation. Laughable claims that Comey perjured himself before Congress were brought by the same unauthorized prosecutor as in the James case, and tossed by the same judge (see item 1 above). The statute of limitations has run, so this one is bound for the graveyard.

Next: Despite its moribund nature, expect Trump to try to bring the case back from the dead. That will likely fail.

4. U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver

Trump went after McIver, a sitting member of Congress, for doing her constitutional duty: conducting congressional oversight. McIver tried to visit a detention center in her own district–and federal agents charged her with forcibly interfering with their work. The video shows her basically trying to de-escalate while agents ramped things up. It seems unlikely that a jury will fall for these preposterously overstated charges.

Next: The trial date is pending. Supplemental briefing on whether one of the three counts should be dismissed is due on Tuesday, December 9.

5. Union Leader David Huerta

Huerta, president of the Service Employees International Union California, was “part of a group that arrived…as federal officers arrested dozens of garment workers” on June 6 in Los Angeles. He was hit with a felony for allegedly interfering with the federal agents. Tellingly, prosecutors later downgraded it to a misdemeanor. Huerta pleaded not guilty, stating “These charges are baseless. They are an attempt to silence anyone who dares to speak out.” He has a point. (Note: my Democracy Defenders Fund colleagues and I are among the counsel team representing Huerta in this case).

Next: There will be a pretrial conference on January 6. The trial will begin on January 20th.

6. Former National Security Advisor John Bolton

Bolton, Trump’s former National Security Advisor, wrote a tell-all book about Trump’s deranged behavior during his first term–and has been charged with 18 counts of mishandling national defense information. Bolton’s book was cleared by former National Security Council career staff, but we don’t know as much about what’s going on under the hood here because much information relating to the case remains classified. We do know that Trump has spent years publicly seething about Bolton. This prosecution screams “selective and vindictive,” and Bolton’s lawyers will likely argue exactly that.

Next: Pre-trial proceedings are underway. In last week’s status conference, the Government indicated it might add new charges The Court also granted a joint request to toll the speedy trial clock until October 5, 2026.

7. U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff.

Schiff, a longtime Trump foe and impeachment manager, reportedly faces investigation for mortgage fraud—the same type of baseless claim Trump tried to use against James. Reports indicate prosecutors are hesitant to bring charges–presumably because the evidence just doesn’t measure up (also like with James). But, as this top 10 list demonstrates, bogus charges based on flimsy evidence have not stopped this regime from pursuing its perceived political enemies.

Next: With prosecutors dragging their feet, this one might not go the distance.

8. U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell

Swalwell is yet another Trump foe facing a dubious mortgage investigation. This one comes at the hands of Bill Pulte, Trump’s director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, who, in a very Trumpean move, allegedly used his position to illegally obtain Swalwell’s records–and decided to play prosecutor, referring the congressman to DOJ. Swalwell fought back with a lawsuit claiming Pulte violated his privacy rights. This attempt to use government access to settle political scores might end up backfiring, as it’s alleged Pulte overstepped substantially.

Next: Swalwell’s lawsuit against Pulte moves forward; the investigation into Swalwell? Not so much.

9. Former CIA Director John Brennan and Others

Brennan is another of Trump’s old first-term nemeses who’s facing criminal investigation for his role in the Russia investigation–which, to be clear, found that Russia did indeed tamper in the 2016 election on Trump’s behalf. Trump sycophant and suit jacket hater Rep. Jim Jordan referred Brennan to the DOJ for allegedly lying to Congress about the role the CIA played in that investigation, and, in November, a grand jury reportedly subpoenaed Brennan and others for records. There’s no there here.

Next: The investigation continues with grand jury activity in Florida.

10. Kilmar Abrego Garcia

Garcia was illegally deported to El Salvador’s most notorious prison after Immigration and Customs Enforcement violated a judge’s protective order. The Trump cabal later admitted it was an “administrative error“ (oops!), and a judge ordered him returned. Garcia reunited with his family in August, only for ICE to snatch him up again–after he was indicted by the administration for human smuggling. The courts have been sharply critical of the case, including stating that there is a “realistic likelihood” the prosecution is vindictive and allowing discovery on point. Garcia remains in custody while pleading not guilty.

Next: In the criminal case, the final pretrial conference is January 20, 2026 and the trial is scheduled to begin on January 27.

Honorable Mention: D.C. Sandwich Guy

Sean Dunn, AKA “Sandwich Guy,” was originally targeted with a federal felony for chucking a hoagie at a CBP officer who was patrolling the Subway Sandwich location at 14th and U Streets NW in Washington, D.C. A federal grand jury refused to bite on this particular ham sandwich; and ultimately a D.C. petit jury didn’t even find a misdemeanor meatball in this sub. Bondi proudly announced Dunn’s dismissal from his role as a DOJ paralegal, but, if this mural on U Street is any indication, he’ll be eating for free around D.C. for a while.

Next: DOJ has some bacon, lettuce, and tomato to wipe off their shirts–and egg off their faces.

And now, onto all our great Contrarian coverage this week:

Hegseth’s “Fog of War”

Our troops are in a morally untenable position [podcast]

On the Contrarian Podcast this week, Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO) and Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ) discussed the legality of the boat strikes in the Caribbean and the Defense Secretary’s mounting failures. “It turns out that appointing an incompetent, reckless individual with no relevant experience … is not a good idea.”

Hegseth’s Deadly Fiasco: Eugene Fidell Explains

Military justice expert Eugene Fidell joined Jen Rubin to discuss the role Hegseth played in the lethal boat strike in Venezuela. “What actually happened here? Who’s responsible for it? How do we get to ground truth? And what is to be done?”

The Fog of Accountability

As Hegseth ducks responsibility, the United States risks losing the moral ground that is the foundation of our national defense, writes Jeff Nesbit. “The ‘fog of war’ is a real and terrible phenomenon, but it is not a ‘get out jail free’ card for extrajudicial killings.”

Split Screen: Pete Hegseth and the Visual War Machine

Azza Cohen analyzed the media’s consistent visual portrayals of the secretary of defense as serious and capable—a commitment to dignity that stands in sharp contrast to how other political figures are portrayed, and in even further contrast to Hegseth’s conduct in office.

The Looming Healthcare Crisis

The Privatization of American Morality

Jeff Nesbit wrote on the State Department’s new “America First” global health strategy: a transactional gamble putting millions of lives at risk. “The administration has replaced the mission of saving lives with the mission of securing contracts.”

The Caregiving Crisis Upon Us

Jennifer Weiss-Wolf highlighted the unequal burden of caregiving—exacerbated by a lack of paid time off, elder- and childcare subsidies, and affordable healthcare—and how overwhelmed women are making their voices heard this holiday season. “The cost of caregiving itself is a national crisis.”

The Political Contagion Threatening Public Health

Roberto Valadéz wrote on the ongoing rise of measles outbreaks across North America, the product of vaccination mistrust and the dramatic weakening of public health guardrails under Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s leadership of DHHS and Trump’s withdrawal from the WHO.

The Economy Still Stinks

How Trump’s ‘Energy Dominance’ Agenda Is Dominating You With Dirty Energy

Tim Dickinson analyzed the bad policy trifecta of Trump’s “Energy Dominance” agenda: raising costs, killing the climate, and helping China. “Trump is giving fossil-fuel producers a license to dominate American consumers, leaving them with less choice, higher energy bills, and an overheating climate—even as it clears a path for China to dominate the next generation of energy production.”

It’s the Economy, Fascist

Jesse Ferguson wrote on the economic path to defeating Trump’s authoritarianism from within, with lessons from the collapse of the USSR. “Authoritarianism doesn’t fall because people reject it in the abstract. It falls when it fails to put food on the table.”

Constitutional Crises (Both Real and MAGA-Made)

An Unconstitutional Vestige of Monarchical Rule

Austin Sarat analyzed the serious threat to legislative independence embedded in Trump’s threat to prosecute Sens. Mark Kelly, Elissa Slotkin, and other Democrats for “sedition.” “Legislators who are afraid to speak out cannot do their jobs. They cannot keep their focus on doing what is best for the country and hold the executive accountable for its actions.”

The Damning Dismissal of Trump’s Election Interference Case in Georgia

Carron J. Phillips explored the anti-democratic significance of a decision last week to throw out Donald Trump’s last remaining criminal case over the 2020 election. “A new precedent has been set. Now others will try to circumvent the system.”

The First Amendment Can’t Get You Out of Following Class Instructions

Shalise Manza Young wrote on the case of a University of Oklahoma student who failed an assessment and seemingly blamed it on her professor being a trans woman—after which the professor was put on leave. “A failing grade for not understanding the assignment isn’t a constitutional crisis.”

Media, Discourse, & Misinformation

The Media Helped Trump Spread a Lie After the National Guard Shooting

Josh Levs analyzed the media narrative surrounding the shooting of two National Guard troops in Washington, D.C., last week. It was a tragedy that instead of leading to bipartisan action became a pretense for furthering the president’s anti-immigration agenda. “The job of the media is to provide truth, which equals facts plus context.”

The Executive Order No One Is Talking About

Julie Sweetland wrote on Trump’s declaration of English as the “official language” of the United States, a move with deep roots in nativist xenophobia and a favorite tactic of authoritarian regimes. “Making English our official language does not make us stronger as a nation; it makes us smaller, colder, and less humane.”

We All Have a Role to Play: Seth Limmer on Preventing Violent Extremism

Seth Limmer joined Jen Rubin to discuss how young adults and children are exposed to extremist ideology online and how we can curb its hateful influence. “There don’t need to be endless cycles of rising hate crimes, and we don’t need to take away free speech to make that happen.”

How to Build AI for Democracy

Bruce Schneier and Nathan E. Sanders gave us a blueprint for approaching responsible governance of artificial intelligence. “We need transparency into how AI systems are built, when they are used, and what biases they encode in democratic processes.”

Fighting Back

Planning for the Next Blue Wave: Jason Berlin on Getting Voters to the Polls in 2026

In the wake of big Democratic wins in November, Jason Berlin joined Jen Rubin to share how his 35,000 volunteers plan to register even more Democratic voters ahead of the midterms. “Our mission is ‘register Democrats, save the world’.”

The Contrarian Covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw protests in Ohio, Vermont, North Carolina, Croatia, and much more. Keep checking to see how Americans all across the country(and the world) are protecting and defending democracy. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Culture, Cartoons, Pets & Fun Stuff

Mira Nair, the Creative Visionary Who Shaped New York’s Next Mayor

A must-read from Meredith Blake on the trailblazing, Oscar-nominated director of Monsoon Wedding, Salaam Bombay!, and Mississippi Masala, a feminist visionary who has spent her life telling the stories of marginalized communities—and who raised Zohran Mamdani.

This week our cartoonists took on blame games (A Sinking Ship, RJ Matson; Sleepy Don and A Pat on the Back, Michael de Adder), congressional cowardice (Time to take a stand, Nick Anderson), and who the buck is actually stopping with (Tariff Tuesday, RJ Matson).

Syrian Lentil Soup Brings the Holidays Home

Emily Beyda shared her Syrian Red Lentil soup with us, “an affirmation of…simplicity and ease.” This soup comes together in less than ten minutes of active time–perfect for the lazy winter season.

Pet of the Week

This week’s Pet of the Week is the sweet Bertie. He is an American short hair Tuxedo who loves to eat houseplants and cut flowers. His favorite is tulips. Everyone say hi to Bertie!

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Well there you are Contrarians—another great week of content and of legal action made possible by your paid subscriptions. We are so grateful! We look forward to seeing you on Coffee with the Contrarians Monday morning at 9:15 AM ET. Until then, have a great weekend. Warmly, Norm

The most dramatic evidence of democracy’s resilience and Trump’s dictatorial frustration was his getting steamrolled on the bill requiring the release of the government’s Epstein files, including those relating to Trump. He has for months fought the disclosure of these files and the remainder of his administration’s materials about the child rape and sex trafficking ring run by his long-time associate Jeffrey Epstein. Trump went so far as to privately lobby or publicly attack the handful of Republicans who originally joined all Democrats in the House in forcing a vote on a bill to release the files.

He ultimately failed—and abysmally so, with the bill passing both houses of Congress with just one vote against it (the execrable Rep. Clay Higgins). It was a sign of just how potent the Epstein scandal is and how politically shaky the president is at the moment.

Trump’s lack of strongman cred was further revealed when, in the span of 24 hours, we went from wondering whether Trump’s allies would block consideration of the bill in the Senate to unanimous consent to pass the legislation as soon as it arrived from the House. That was an indication of Trump’s weakness, sure, but credit where credit is due: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer read the room and pounced on the opportunity to move the bill.

We’ll cover in the weeks ahead both what we expect to happen with implementation of the document disclosure under the bill—and how my litigation colleagues and I are going to prevent Trump and his administration from cheating by holding back documents, or parts of documents, that are inconvenient for them. The latter includes our parallel federal litigation to force disclosure that you Contrarians support through your paid subscriptions.

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But the signs of Trump’s weakness did not stop there. We saw an unhinged tantrum from him that can be explained by his own feelings of inadequacy. It came after members of Congress cut a video telling service members that they should not follow illegal orders.

Trump went haywire threatening the six members of the House and Senate who cut the video, all veterans: Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona, Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado, Rep. Chris DeLuzio of Pennsylvania, Rep. Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire, and Rep. Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania. He called the video “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL” and called the lawmakers “traitors” who “should be ARRESTED AND PUT ON TRIAL.”

A video by members of Congress urging that the law be followed hardly amounts to sedition. But, given Trump’s other bizarre and baseless criminal investigations, we need to take his threats seriously. This whole controversy shows just how unhinged he has become with his continued losses. And it appears that more defeats are ahead for Trump in his wave of unfounded revenge prosecutions. Perhaps most notable are the problems afflicting the charges against James Comey, which we covered on Legal Fight Club on the Contrarian YouTube channel:

Those were capped off when it emerged that the supremely unqualified acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Lindsey Halligan, might have failed to properly present the final indictment to the grand jury in the Comey case. The revenge prosecution against Comey now appears to be circling the drain.

All across the nation, judges have been doing their jobs, as have defense attorneys, the media, and other stakeholders—including you Contrarians. Your paid subscriptions have made it possible for me and my pro-democracy colleagues to file legal briefs challenging the Comey prosecution and to work on over 200 other legal cases and matters, criminal and civil alike. As I was writing this column, we just notched another win, with a California federal court allowing us to intervene to defend Prop. 50’s creation of five new pro-democracy congressional districts against Trump administration and GOP attacks.

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But it’s not just legal matters that are unsettling Trump. Compounding his struggles is his historic unpopularity. His favorability ratings are in the 30s and 40s in poll after poll, lower than all presidents at this point in their tenure.

Perhaps that explains his change of tone on New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani. After months of viciously savaging Mamdani as a “communist” who would devastate the city, Trump cordially welcomed him to the White House and lavished praise on him, declaring “We agree on a lot more than I would have thought.” Who would have imagined that this week would feature Trump handling Mamdani with kid gloves and his long-time ally Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) with boxing gloves. Tellingly, as The New York Times noted, “Mr. Mamdani’s allies on the left were cautiously optimistic about the meeting, hoping that he might have prevented some attacks on the city. Mr. Trump’s Republican allies were less positive. Some of them said they disagreed with the president’s approach and wished he had been more confrontational about Mr. Mamdani’s criticism of Israel.”

Trump’s Mamdani flip-flop and his allies’ dismay and disarray (including his erstwhile partner Greene’s announcement that she’s resigning from Congress in January) doesn’t mean that the danger is past. Trump is wreaking vast harm, and we can expect that to continue. For example, instead of honestly acknowledging our nation’s affordability and healthcare crises, he’s pushing propaganda and trying to tell the American people that things are more affordable or shift the blame on healthcare when everyone can see that’s baloney. That’s a recipe for disaster, and so is doubling down on his corruption by pushing ahead on the unfounded prosecution of Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James and others.

But the terrifying dictatorial momentum of Jan. 20 is weakened and this week, starting with the votes on the Epstein files, will I think be remembered as an important juncture on the long road back to restoring democracy.

We covered it all here at the Contrarian. Just see for yourself in my weekly roundup:

ICE Invasion

‘It’s as if Jesus Is Locked Up in Broadview’

Tim Dickinson interviewed the Rev. Michael Woolf, who last week was violently arrested by the Illinois State Police while demonstrating against ‘torture’ at Chicagoland’s ICE facility.

Dispatch from Chicago: the Border Patrol has left town, but what if they return?

Lorraine Forte reported on the Customs and Border Protection agents leaving Chicago just as failure, embarrassment, and winter set in–while many residents are left in fear of what will happen when they return. “I’m not the only Chicagoan concerned about what might happen … as the campaign for next year’s midterm elections starts in earnest.”

North Carolina: the latest “Border State” battleground

The Contrarian’s own Ciera Stone reported on the newest target of immigration overreach: North Carolina, where local grassroots leaders are rising to the occasion as federal agents terrorize neighborhoods.

Shutdown Aftermath & Economic Shocks

Senate Republicans added insult to injury in the bill to end the shutdown

Austin Sarat analyzed the callow, deeply irresponsible allocation of funds in the bill that reopened the government that provided not a penny to protect affordable healthcare—but did include a provision that could let senators claim $500,000+ if their phone records were subpoenaed in the investigation into Jan. 6, 2021.

We do not want to go back to sham health insurance plans and denials

Norm Ornstein wrote on what’s at stake if the Affordable Care Act loses all power, as healthcare remains top of mind for many with premiums set to skyrocket. “Obamacare isn’t perfect, but it’s better than what we had—and what the GOP proposes.”

A program that helps keep women- and minority-owned businesses afloat is on the ropes

Jaime Lodge wrote on the Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) program, and how repeated setbacks from the Trump administration are threatening the economy writ large.“When small businesses like mine win federal contracts, the jobs—and the dollars—stay in the community instead of going to non-local workers hired by larger firms.”

Elections Essentials

Two People Have Figured Out How to Win Pivotal Elections [podcast]

On the podcast this week, Jen Rubin spoke with Swing Left’s Yasmin Radjy and Tennessee state Rep. Aftyn Behn about the upcoming midterm elections, winning strategies, and what’s at stake. “The numbers themselves tell a really, really powerful story.”

The GOP Isn’t Being Subtle About Rigging the 2026 Midterms

Tianna Mays of Democracy Defenders Action wrote on the GOP’s blatant racial gerrymandering attempts across multiple states, and how its suit against California—a state that lawfully voted for its proposed redistricting—is a smoking gun in the Republican Party’s hypocritical hands.

Resistance & Resisters

The Calculus of Climate Change

Roberto Valadez wrote on COP30, where, despite the conspicuous absence of high-level U.S. leadership, climate champions remain undeterred in confronting our most global challenge. “Our climate crisis may already be the largest economic opportunity of the 21st century.”

Swalwell Could be a Worthy Successor to Newsom

Ahead of Eric Swalwell’s declaration as a California gubernatorial candidate, Jen Rubin wrote on the representative who has emerged as one of Trump’s fiercest critics and who might already be a “rising star” in the race—and by extension, national party leadership. “As important as the California governor’s race may be for the state itself, the race also has huge implications for 2026, 2028, and beyond.”

America’s love for Jesse Jackson comes pouring out

April Ryan gave us a tribute to the icon now resting in a Chicago area hospital, as political, religious and civil rights leaders reach out to celebrate his legacy. “Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson told me, ‘I continue to draw strength from Rev. Jackson.’”

The Contrarian covers the Democracy Movement

This week we saw protests in Washington, D.C., Chicago, Georgia, the Philippines, and more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

This Guy Again…

The House must vote to release the Epstein files

Rachel Foster argued that the choice before Congress is clear: release the rest of the Epstein files, or keep protecting those who committed sex crimes against at least 1,000 victims. “The number of files that have been released may sound large to a layperson, but it barely scratches the surface of what exists. What remains sealed are the documents that show how Epstein built and maintained his network.”

Trump’s Epstein call is coming from inside the house

Josh Levs wrote on the failures in coverage of the latest Epstein Files dispatch. “This isn’t a story of Democrats vs. Republicans. It isn’t even just a story of Trump loyalists against other Republicans who want the files released. It’s a situation Trump brought on himself.”

Haven’t we seen enough? Senator Alsobrooks on the Epstein files & RFK. Jr’s incompetence

April Ryan sat down with Sen. Angela Alsobrooks to unpack what comes next for the Epstein files, RFK Jr. ‘s failures as HHS secretary, and the power voters hold heading into next year’s midterms. “These women deserve justice—that’s all they’ve ever been asking for.”

Media Makers & Fakers

From “fake news” to “quiet, piggy”: the dark evolution of a decade-long war on truth

Jeff Nesbit drew a clear, sobering trendline from the first Trump administration’s attempts to discredit the message of responsible reporting to Trump’s more recent, baldly authoritarian attempts to dehumanize the messengers. “When Trump calls journalists, in this case women, ‘insubordinate’ and ‘piggy,’ it’s not just crude disrespect—it’s a loud warning.”

Please don’t fall for Marjorie Taylor Greene’s convenient rebrand

Carron J. Phillips has not been convinced by Marjorie Taylor Greene’s recent gestures at empathy, arguing that doing the “bare minimum” isn’t proof of rehabilitation. “A few sensible remarks and a new sullen tone do not suffice to suggest that Greene’s actions reflect any genuine progress.”

Split screen: ‘MySafeSpace’ and the collapse of whitehouse.gov

Azza Cohen dissected the Trump administration’s consistent embrace of racist, sexist, and conspiratorial views in its online presence—the official White House website included. “The goal is not to entertain. It is to confuse. To degrade. To turn the government’s own communication apparatus into an arm of political bullying.”

Megyn Kelly was a #MeToo profiteer, not a hero

Apropos of Megyn Kelly’s latest showing of her true colors—by trying to minimize Jeffrey Epstein’s predation—Meredith Blake took a look at the cynically opportunistic arc of Kelly’s career, a decade after she was celebrated as an “unlikely feminist hero.”

Culture, Cartoons & Fun Stuff

This week, our cartoonists cast a gimlet eye on double standards (Nick Anderson), inadequate cover-ups (Michael de Adder), seeing no evil (Ruben Bolling), obvious bribes (RJ Matson), and more fresh deplorability from the world of our would-be king.

Pear-almond cake and French apple cake

Jamie Schler offered up two simple and traditional French cakes this week in honor of the Thanksgiving season. The first is a pear-almond cake that is “delicately flavored with almond and a hint of dark rum. The second is a French apple cake–the epitome of French home baking: simple, rustic, and homey, yet somehow quite elegant.

Pet of The Week

This week’s Pet of the Week is the lovely Gary. He is a 5-month-old poodle who loves to chew up everything (especially shoes). Good boy, Gary!

That’s it for now, Contrarians—another amazing week of content. We will see you at 9:15 a.m. ET on Monday for Coffee with the Contrarians on Substack. In the meantime, have a wonderful weekend. Warmly, Norm

We must fight this—and you Contrarians are playing a central part in making sure we do!

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Trump’s relationship with Epstein

But before we get to where we are going, let’s review how we got here. Epstein was a wealthy financier who trafficked and raped underage girls. He was a neighbor of Trump’s in Palm Beach, Fla., and the two were friends from the late 1980s through the early to mid-2000s. In this video, Trump is whispering with Epstein as they ogled women dancing at Mar-a-Lago. Trump told New York Magazine in 2002 that Epstein was a “terrific guy” and that “It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it—Jeffrey enjoys his social life.” In September, the Wall Street Journal reported that a book given to Epstein for his 50^th birthday contained a note allegedly from Trump that depicted the figure of a nude woman containing statements like “We have certain things in common, Jeffrey” and Trump’s signature scrawled in a suggestive location. Trump has denied that the note was from him.

Part of the reason that the emails that dropped this week came as a bombshell is that, if true, they provide more evidence that Trump was aware of Epstein’s misconduct well before he was busted. (Epstein got a lenient plea deal in 2008: He pleaded guilty to state prostitution charges after having been investigated for sexual exploitation of dozens of minor girls.)

On Wednesday, Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) released several emails from over 23,000 documents from Jeffrey Epstein’s estate, including some that directly reference Trump. In a 2011 email to Maxwell, for instance, Epstein wrote about Trump as the “dog that hasn’t barked,” stating that a sex trafficking victim “spent hours at my house with him” but Trump “has never once been mentioned” in any of the investigations into Epstein’s child abuse. Maxwell responded that she had been “thinking about that.”

Then, in a 2019 email to author Michael Wolff, Epstein explicitly wrote of Trump: “Of course he knew about the girls as he asked Ghislaine to stop”—apparently indicating that Trump had asked Maxwell to stop recruiting women from Mar-a-Lago.

Trump’s worst corruption scandal

The emails are terrible in their own right because, if true, they provide evidence that Trump was aware of a shocking pattern of conduct and that he and the White House were lying when they “said the President knew nothing of the convicted sex offender’s conduct.”

But the emails also had an explosive impact because they highlight a theme of the Trump administration: corruption. Trump’s other wrongful behavior, such as the wanton destruction of the East Wing, captivated the nation. The Trump-Epstein case, however, is not about the mere demolition of buildings, memory, history, and culture—it’s about the destruction of humans, vulnerable ones.

Corruption is the abuse of entrusted power for private gain—and that is exactly what we have here. We know from public reporting that the administration is covering up Epstein-related documents referencing Trump.

And this scandal is even worse because of the Trump regime’s dealings with Maxwell. Epstein’s accomplice, who is serving a 20-year sentence for sex trafficking, was moved to a minimum-security facility after two meetings with Deputy U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche. The emails released this week challenge what she said in those interviews and suggest that she’s a liar—as the DOJ had previously said (before Blanche, Trump’s former personal defense attorney, came along).

For example, Maxwell told Blanche that she did not “recall ever seeing [Trump] in his house.” But Epstein wrote that a sex-trafficking victim “spent hours at my house with him [Trump].” Republicans identified that victim as Giuffre, who had denied witnessing improper behavior by Trump. Maxwell also told Blanche that she “never recruited a masseuse from Mar-a-Lago,” contradicting Giuffre’s deposition and the new email evidence.

Even before we knew of these contradictions, moving Maxwell to a country club-like prison stunk to high heaven. Now that move truly reeks. She should be sent back to her prior prison. Her presence in the low-security facility where she is reportedly getting concierge-like service, including snacks for her visitors, is beyond outrageous.

Friday brought another outrage. Trump selectively demanded that his DOJ investigate Democrats mentioned in the Epstein emails, and AG Pam Bondi immediately complied. But she announced no similar investigation of Trump despite the fact that he, too, is discussed in those documents. The hypocrisy and abuse of power are shocking.

Accountability in Congress—and in court

This summer, with DOJ continuing to refuse to release files related to Epstein, Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) introduced a resolution to try to force DOJ to release the files. Despite the bipartisan resolution attracting 50 co-sponsors, House Republican leadership refused to act on the measure, so Massie and Khanna introduced a discharge petition in early September to force a vote on the bill to release the files. If a discharge petition reaches 218 signatures, it can go directly to a floor vote in the House.

The Epstein discharge petition previously had 217 signatures, putting it one short of a floor vote. And despite apparent efforts from House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to prevent the petition from getting the needed 218 signatures, including by refusing to swear in Rep. Adelita Grijalva after she won Arizona’s 7^th Congressional District, Grijalva was finally sworn in on Wednesday. She immediately signed the discharge petition.

There will be a vote as soon as Tuesday, before the matter moves to the Senate, where it is likely to die; Trump’s grip on his party means the 60 votes needed to open debate in the GOP-controlled Senate are not there.

But that will not be the end of the story, and, indeed, this is where you Contrarians come in. Thanks to the support you provide for my democracy litigation through your paid subscriptions, my colleagues and I are suing under the Freedom of Information Act for those same documents. Our case is moving quickly, and we will not rest until we get the documents. The law is on our side because the Trump administration has admitted in other litigation that the release of Epstein documents is in the public interest!

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We’re confident that, with your support, we will be successful in uncovering the truth. In the meantime, we’re going to continue to talk about the Trump-Epstein files as the defining corruption scandal of the Trump administration.

This week at The Contrarian, we covered that—and so much more. See for yourself:

The end of the shutdown

What did Dems get in the shutdown fight? [podcast]

On the Contrarian podcast this week, Ezra Levin and Colin Seeburger joined Jen Rubin to discuss Sunday’s shocking vote to re-open the government with no written deal to protect affordable health care and no guarantee Republicans will keep their word about a vote on continuing Obamacare subsidies. “There is something deeply broken within the Democrat system,” said Levin. See also Jen’s conversations on the end of the shutdown with Rep. Richie Torres and Rep. Chellie Pingree.

When will Democrats learn that mollifying bullies is a fool’s errand?

Norm Ornstein wrote on the shutdown’s “cringeworthy” end, which at least firmly established the blame for the healthcare debacle, but at the cost of submitting to bullies—a strategy that rarely works in the long run. “The same dilemma might well raise its ugly head again in 11 weeks.”

Learning the right lessons from the government shutdown

Max Stier wrote on the untenability of shutdowns as a political stress lever, especially as wielded by a president who is perfectly ready to sacrifice the livelihoods of thousands of federal workers to serve his power-grabbing personal agenda. “Public resources and government power should be used only for the public good.”

Celebrating Veterans’ Day

Quiet service in a noisy political year

Brian O’Neill offered his thoughts on the irony of a holiday marked by a federal government that has spent the year turning military service into another loyalty test and making the lives and jobs of veterans harder. “When a commander in chief and a Defense secretary spend the year sidelining combat-tested officers because of who they once worked for…the line has already been crossed from their side.”

From War to Reconciliation

John F. Terzano gave us a beautiful, searing essay on his story of service. “For me and other veterans, returning to Vietnam has been a deeply personal and emotional journey—one that has evolved over the years from war, anger, and sorrow to reconciliation, peace, justice, and friendship. That journey continues.”

Elections: What’s next

Where We Go from Here

Jen Rubin wrote on the Democrats’ one-two (gut)punch of winning big and selling out–and what happens next as we look ahead to the midterms. “Democrats will need to find the best possible fighters in 2026. The 8 sellouts have at least clarified what is unacceptable in today’s party, thereby increasing the chances that incoming senators in 2027 will find new leaders.”

The GOP’s 2025 playbook to steal House seats

Jeff Nesbit wrote on Republicans’ shameless unlawful election plan: instead of changing the message, change the maps. “Trump’s GOP is redrawing districts to stay in power—because they know they can’t win any other way.”

Bringing a Survey to a Gun Fight, Part II

Anat Shenker-Osario argued that “pollingism” has failed Democrats and voters, while last Tuesday’s election sweep showed the power of magnetism. “Most Republicans are more successful than most Democrats at telling stories that have credibility with their voters…. The world defined by Pollingism simply doesn’t include these kinds of real-world consequences and feedback loops.”

Adelita Grijalva on Mike Johnson, Jeffrey Epstein, and the Senate’s Bad Deal

Tim Dickinson sat down with Adelita Grijalva, the Arizona representative who was finally sworn in this week after months of delay tactics from Speaker Mike Johnson, to discuss everything from her deliberately delayed swearing-in to the Epstein files. See here for video of his interview. “The larger picture for me is justice for the survivors and consequences for people who committed crimes against children and women.”

Media

Critics say this is the best essay you’ll read all year

Shalise Manza Young made the case that pundits should not get to be anonymous in news articles, in an age in which the unaccountability of so-called critics is eroding what little trust remains between the public and mainstream media. “Critics say it’s a grave disservice to journalism writ large and the American people specifically.”

What we learned from newly released Epstein emails

Mimi Rocah wrote on the latest break in the scandal that won’t—and shouldn’t—die. “When they knew no one else was listening/reading, when they had no reason to suspect these would ever become public, Epstein and Maxwell talked about Trump being present in his house with a known sex trafficking victim, Giuffre; they stated “of course he knew” about the “girls.”

The next war might start on Truth Social

Brian O’Neill wrote on Trump’s bizarre, hyper-online posturing over Nigeria and how it exposes the peril of a president ruled by impulse and enabled by the hair-trigger of social media.

On the Ground

Looped In With Lynn Sweet: Chicago Kicks Bovino & Border Patrol OUT!

Lynn Sweet checked in with Jen Rubin on the latest on ICE in Chicago, diving into the horrific conditions in the Broadview immigration detention facility and more. “Trump is an asymmetrical president and doesn’t suffer from consequences the way other politicians do.”

The Day of the Disappeared

Ciera Stone reported on an event honoring the countless people disappeared and terrorized by ICE’s assault on immigrant communities, honoring hope and action in the face of fear and hate. “The voices of community can overpower the drums of authoritarianism.”

The Contrarian covers the Democracy Movement

This week we covered veterans calling on the MAGA administration to “remember your oath,” more action against ICE, a protest supporting health and science, continuing Tesla takedowns, planning ahead, and more. Get help organizing from Indivisible, find protests in your area at mobilize.us, and send us your protest photos at submit@contrariannews.org.

Culture, cartoons, pets & fun stuff

This week’s cartoons featured a hungry crocodile, flying monkeys, a costly white flag, an even costlier blueprint (Michael de Adder), an elephant in hot water (Nick Anderson), and the man behind the curtain (Ruben Bolling). Oh my!

100 years ago, an all-Black team beat the KKK on a baseball diamond

Fred Frommer wrote on the centenary of a remarkable baseball game—and the shameful modern legacy of an anti-KKK law has led to the end of a Black college scholarship.

Who Knew James Garfield was This Interesting?

Culture columnist Meredith Blake reviewed the Netflix series “Death by Lightning,” which sheds light on a forgotten president—and America’s long history of political violence—over “four fast-paced and darkly funny episodes.” She also recommended Ken Burns’ latest magnum documentarian opus, on the American Revolution, and more.

Labor Lasagna

Emily Beyda gave us a recipe for when you need a reward for a job well done.

Contrarian Pet of the Week

And last but never least, meet Ella! Riley Pynnonen’s 12-year-old fur-friend enjoys naps in the sun and the McDonald’s drive-through.

Both that stellar content and my pro-democracy legal actions were made possible by your paid subscriptions. Thanks for that, and if you haven’t taken out a paid subscription, please consider one. We look forward to seeing you on Coffee with the Contrarians on Monday morning at 9:15 a.m. ET. In the meantime, have a wonderful weekend. Warmly, Norm