After his categorical announcement terminating the DACA “dreamers” program that helps hundreds of thousands of young undocumented immigrants on a path to education, jobs, and potentially citizenship, the ever-unpredictable Donald then did an about-face and he’ll be working with Democrats (his new BFFs “Chuck and Nancy”) to help pass legislation that protects them. Despite Paul Ryan’s bleated denials and cautions, this is great news for these “dreamers,” nearly half of whom came here before they were six years old and many who have known no home but the United States, and great news for our country: our undocumented immigrants contribute 11.74 billion in taxes (as opposed to the zero tax dollars Donald paid in the sole year of his released returns) and contribute to our society in a wide array of roles in our workforce and military. Even more good news: according to Pelosi and Schumer, these negotiations will include tightening border security—but stop short of building Donald’s ridiculous, exorbitantly expensive wall. And this may finally be the thing that begins to crack support from Donald’s die-hard core base.
Donald’s unconstitutional pardon of Joe Arpaio, the sheriff who repeatedly violated prisoners’ civil and human rights as well as his indictment for doing so, may not stand. At least four separate coalitions have filed motions protesting the pardon, and Arpaio’s conviction may yet be upheld—including objections from the federal judge who found him guilty.
Though many in this administration and the GOP continue to deny climate change, in the wake of devastating storms, fires, and earthquakes, the political conversation seems to at least be shifting toward how we can protect ourselves from its inevitable effects (even if deniers aren’t yet ready to admit what’s causing them), and many Republicans are speaking out and urging the administration to reconsider its climate policies.
Speaking of Republicans finally getting woke—the Republican-led Senate Judiciary Committee is considering legislation to make it harder for Donald to fire special counsel Robert Mueller in his investigation.
The California legislature passed a bill requiring all presidential candidates to release their tax returns in order to appear on the California ballot. If it passes in the senate it will head to the governor for his signature into law.
Meanwhile, if you want to keep track of all the Russia developments flying around (or any of the multitude of Donald’s transgressions against our country and democracy), Amy Siskind has a new searchable chart of every one of her weekly list of changes (“Experts in authoritarianism advise to keep a list of things subtly changing around you, so you’ll remember”)—enter a keyword (may I suggest “Russia,” for example?) to get an exhaustive list of all developments regarding that topic.
Finally, if you find yourself twisted into knots of anxiety over the current administration, the New York Times published this excellent brief articleon the futility of worrying and the Zen wisdom of taking action instead. Resisting is not only not futile…it’s how we’ll overcome the forces acting against our democracy and our country, and we will win.