Today in Politics, Bulletin 268. 12/11/25

… A contentious exchange took place today between Kristi Noem and Rep. Seth Magaziner (D-RI) in a House committee hearing. Magaziner: “How many US military veterans have you deported? Noem: Sir, we have not deported US citizens or military veterans.”

• Magaziner: “We are joined on zoom by a gentleman who is army combat veteran who was shot twice while serving our country in Panama in 1989. He is a combat vet, a Purple Heart recipient, he has sacrificed more for this country that most of us ever have. Can you please tell Mr. Park why you deported him to Korea, a country he hasn’t lived in since he was 7 years old? Noem: Every law needs to be enforced.”

• Magaziner: “An individual in the back - his name is Troy Brown from Missouri. He is a Navy combat vet who served in the Gulf War. He’s married to a woman named Donna who came here from Ireland legally when she was 11. She’s lived here 48 years. Because of you, Donna has been in prison for the last 4 months. Why did you lock up his wife? Noem: It is not my job to pick and choose which laws get enforced. People need to follow the law.”

• Magaziner: “The US veteran behind you - his father, Narcisco Barranco, is a landscaper in CA who has lived peacefully in our country for 30 years and has no criminal record. Last spring, while he was mowing the lawn at an IHOP, ICE agents tackled him in the street and imprisoned him for weeks. A peaceful, hard working man who raised 3 sons to be US Marines. We need men of that character in this country. Will you consider his father for parole in place to stay in our country? Noem: This is an opportunity to remind everybody that every person that’s in this country illegally has an opportunity to voluntarily go home and come back the right way.”

• Magaziner: “You promised America that you would go after the worst of the worst. But these people are not the worst of the worst. A Purple Heart recipient, a military spouse, the father of three Marines. And it’s not just veterans and military families. You are locking up and deporting children with cancer, mothers with babies in the NICU. There are many problems with your leadership, but the biggest problem is this you don’t seem to know how to tell the difference between the good guys and the bad guys.”

… Noem then ran out of the hearing in the middle of it, claiming she had to be at another hearing to testify. Rep. James Moskowitz (D-FL) did some fact checking on Noem’s rapid and sudden exit: “Noem said she had to go chair the FEMA Review Council meeting. BUT I’m told that meeting was previously canceled.”

… She just split because he was getting destroyed.

… Conservative talk-show host Erick Erickson: “Republicans got in by promising to deport all the criminals, gang bangers, and recent arrivals. Instead, they’re deporting everyone. The GOP says they’re all illegal so all must go. Hispanic voters who sided with them now feel targeted. If you want to keep the policy, you’ve got to replace the Hispanics in the coalition to hold power. But with whom? Or, nuance and focus on criminals, gang bangers, and the people who showed up in the last few years.”

… Long-time Republican latino voter consultant Mike Madrid on recent election results around the country that have show a big shift on the latino vote to Dems since 2024: “When Cubans in Miami are shifting the same direction as Puerto Ricans and Dominicans in NYC something significant is happening.

… Michael Glasheen, director of the national security branch of the FBI, also testified at the hearing: “Antifa is our primary concern right now. What you look at the domestic terrorist threat that we’re facing, that’s the most immediate violent threat we’re facing. Bennie Thompson: Where is Antifa headquartered? Glasheen: We are building out the infrastructure right now. Thompson: What does that mean? How many members do they have? Glasheen: That’s very fluid. The investigations are active.”

… Rep. James Walkinshaw (D-VA): “Are you familiar with the Proud Boys? Glasheen: I’m familiar with the name. Walkinshaw: Does the FBI still designate them as an extremist organization? They did during Trump’s first term. Glasheen: We are in the process right now of changing our, uh, categories for domestic terrorism.”

… Today was the big vote in the Indiana senate, which has been dragged into session under persistent threats from Trump and Gov. Mike Braun to do a mid-decade gerrymander when many of the Republicans has no interest in doing so. I have documented all the threats that they and their family members have received over the past few weeks in these Bulletins. There was a lot more today leading up to the vote.

… Heritage Foundation (Project 2025) posted this: “President Trump has made it clear to Indiana leaders: if the Indiana Senate fails to pass the map, all federal funding will be stripped from the state. Roads will not be paved. Guard bases will close. Major projects will stop. These are the stakes and every NO vote will be to blame.”

… Donald Trump, Jr: “If Indiana Republicans side with these Never Trumpers to do the dirty work of Democrats, I’ll be spending a lot of time in Indiana next year campaigning against every single one of them. PS: These RINO consultants sabotaging MAGA need to be rooted out of the GOP!!!”

… JD Vance: “Rod Bray, the Senate leader in Indiana, has consistently told us he wouldn’t fight redistricting while simultaneously whipping his members against it. That level of dishonesty cannot be rewarded, and the Indiana GOP needs to choose a side.”

… But none of the threats worked. The bill went down in flames by a vote of 31-19. This is no small thing. It seems that more and more Republicans around the country are slowly tiring of living under the thumb of the Mob Boss and his henchmen. Maybe, just maybe, this will start to happen more often in Congress. Trump’s dismal approval ratings and their poor prospects in the midterms have a lot of these cowards looking for cover.

… AP: “Trump’s approval on the economy and immigration have fallen substantially since March, the latest indication that two signature issues that got him elected barely a year ago could be turning into liabilities as his party begins to gear up for the 2026 midterms. Only 31% now approve of how Trump is handling the economy. That is down from 40% in March and marks the lowest economic approval he’s registered in an AP-NORC poll in either term.”

… Trump’s overall job approval rating fell to 36% with a 61% disapproval. His approval rating in the same poll last March was 42%.

… WSJ: “Fed Chair Jerome Powell pointed to a job-market risk that economists have been worried about for months: Official statistics could be drastically overstating recent hiring. Powell said that Fed staffers believe that federal data could be overestimating job creation by up to 60,000 jobs a month. Given that figures published so far show that the economy has added about 40,000 jobs a month since April, the real number could be something more like a loss of 20,000 jobs a month.”

… “Published data already show the labor market has slowed significantly this year, down from rapid hiring after the Covid-19 pandemic. This slower pace means big data revisions can more easily reveal the economy is shedding jobs, not adding them.”

… Powell: “We think there’s an overstatement in these numbers. It’s a complicated, unusual, and difficult situation, where the labor market is also under pressure, where job creation may actually be negative.”

… I also wrote in this Bulletin many times after Trump fired the BLS director that we would not be able to trust any of the data coming out of the govt. It appears that Powell is seeing evidence of shenanigans.

… Commerce Sec Howard Lutnick: “Jay Powell is too afraid to lead the greatest $30 trillion economy in the world. We should be leading with our front foot. Instead we are always leaning back as if something bad is happening. We are doing great. Nothing bad is happening. Greatness is happening.”

… Daily Beast: “Trump has now marked an entire week of sporting mysterious bandages on his problematic right hand. Trump headed to PA on Tues to front a rally addressing the cost of living. The Band-Aids on Trump’s hand were once again present at the event. It is now a week since Trump appeared at a lengthy Cabinet meeting with two Band-Aids on the back of his hand. The WH has yet to clarify why the president needs the medical bandages on his right hand. The Band-Aids have been applied over the usual lashings of flesh colored make-up which attempts to hide Trump’s persistent bruising.”

… Karoline Leavitt issued a statement in response to an inquiry about it: “President Trump is a man of the people and he meets more Americans and shakes their hands on a daily basis than any other President in history. His commitment is unwavering and he proves that every single day.”

… The Senate held votes on healthcare bills today, but nothing was accomplished as the deadline looms. HuffPost: “Both the Dem and GOP plans on health care got the same amount of votes in favor - 51. Still well short of the 60 needed to advance. Only 1 health care bill got bipartisan support and a majority of votes in the Senate today - the 3 year clean extension of ACA subsidies.”

… This is the vote that Democrats got in exchange for ending the shutdown.

… HuffPost: “Sen. Jim Justice says his party could suffer in midterms next year due to expiring ACA subsidies: ‘If you’re not concerned, then you’re living in a cave. If you’re not watching the elections that are happening all the time, then you’re living in a cave. For God’s sake of living, we can’t wait until 10 days before the end of the year and then repair healthcare. The messaging is not resonating with a lot of voters that we need to resonate with. Democrats are professionals at it, we’re not good at it.”

… I have to disagree. Dems strength is policy, Republican strength is messaging. But on some things the best messaging in the world won’t help you - and most of those things involve pocketbook issues like this. You can’t fool people about how much they are paying for things.

… Fox host Charlie Hurt: “Both chambers are gettable by Democrats in the midterm election. My fear is if Democrats do take control, everything Trump is trying to do will be ground down to a halt.”

… Don’t threaten us with a good time.

… Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS): “We want patients to become consumers again. We want patients to see what the actual prices are. We believe that if we would add the price tags to this bill, that it would save the country a trillion dollars a year.”

… Melanie D’Arrigo, Exec Dir of Campaign for NY Health: “There’s a lot of millionaires in Congress who will have govt-funded healthcare for the rest of their lives, and never have to worry about medical debt, claiming that $1,000 a year to cover tens of thousands of dollars in insurance and medical costs is a ‘healthcare plan.’”

… Connor Hafen: “They keep using this line about shopping for healthcare like it’s buying a car or plane tickets and not ‘there’s an extremely time sensitive and dramatic medical thing happening right now and you need to make decisions very quickly.’
Which is how it often works.”

… Rep. Jared Moskowitz (R-FL) in committee today: “Someone should tell the president that every time he says affordability is a hoax, another Democrat sprouts out of the ground and lands in the House of Reps. I really want to talk to whoever is putting the words in the teleprompter, because this is a Ron Burgundy situation. Every time he says ‘affordability is a hoax,’ it’s like saying, ‘Go f-yourself, San Diego.’”

… Moskowitz: “Gas prices are down - I’m being fair. But they’re not down as much as he’s projecting. The problem is, you can’t eat gasoline, unless RFK Jr. proposed that as some sort of way to get rid of Covid.”

… Sen. Bernie Sanders on MS NOW: “I think every time he opens his mouth telling the American people that what they are seeing is wrong, I think it makes people realize how far out of touch he is with reality. Now, what I will say is that the reality that he is living in, in fact, is a reality where the economy is doing very, very well for his billionaire friends.”

… Karoline Leavitt looked especially stressed and strung out in her press conference today. Habitual lying must be taking a toll on her soul. And all this time I thought she didn’t have one:

• Q - You acknowledge that the Consumer Price Index when you took office was 3%. In Sept, the last month which we have data, it was also 3%. Leavitt: No, it’s 2.5%. Reporter: Not in Sept. It’s 3%.”

… CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale: “The WH keeps trying to use ‘average’ inflation for the term to make it sound like inflation has come down even though the Sept. rate is the same 3% it was in Jan. Using ‘average’ lets them include the lower-tariff early months when it was falling; it’s now risen 5 straight months.”

• Q - Grocery prices have been up. Leavitt: Inflation is down. Reporter: It’s where it was when Trump took office. Leavitt: Everything I’m telling you is the truth, and you don’t want to report it because you want to push untrue narratives about the president.

• Q - If the economy is as strong as the president has said it is, why is he telling parents two weeks before Christmas that they should only buy two or three dolls for their children?

• Q - Why is the president willing to allow China to have access to one of America’s chief technological advantages on the sale of advanced chips? Leavitt: The president put out a statement on this. What you see from the president on Truth Social is most of the time what you hear from the president behind closed doors privately. These will only be sent to China after undergoing security inspections in the US.

• Q - When the president announced the farm relief program the other day, Ag Sec Rollins told us that the program would be paid for by the Commodity Credit Corp. The president is saying it’s paid with tariff revenue. Why does he keep saying that? Leavitt: He’s a business man who knows how to fix the economy and he’s doing it just like in his first time.

… House Intel Chair Rick Crawford to NewsNation on why he doesn’t want video of the second Sept 2 boat strike released: “What the trained eye can detect from these videos may reveal sources and methods that would imperil troops.”

… What a bunch of bs. Their excuses get lamer and lamer.

… Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) on MS NOW: “This admin, since they started striking these boats illegally, has been very happy to show their snuff films every time they took out one of these boats. Now suddenly they’re willing to show the first hit but not the second. Why is that? They’re afraid that the public is going to see that the military killed two men that had surrendered.”

… Howard Lutnick on CNBC talking about the new Trump Gold Card where people can buy US citizenship for $1 million: “We should be bringing in the best and brightest, and that’s what Trump is changing about our immigration system. Let’s expedite the best and brightest who are gonna give a million dollars to the US to prove they’re at the top of the list.”

… CNN: “The Trump admin is ruffling more feathers with some fans of America’s national parks - this time by replacing images of the picturesque parks on some annual passes with an image of Trump’s face. An environmental group, the Center for Biological Diversity, is suing the admin to prevent the change, set to happen on Jan 1, 2026. The Department of the Interior, which oversees national parks, announced recently it was unveiling ‘commemorative new designs’ for park passes - one of which features Trump’s face alongside George Washington.”

… The lawsuit states that it seeks “to prevent Trump from replacing a beautiful picture of Glacier National Park with a closeup of his own face on the America the Beautiful National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Annual Pass.” The group argues that federal law requires the main annual pass to feature the winning photo from the National Park Foundation’s annual photo contest, which for the upcoming year is an image of Glacier National Park in MT.”

… The group’s executive director Kieran Suckling: “Blotting out the majesty of America’s national parks with a closeup of his own face is Trump’s crassest, most ego-driven action yet. It’s disgusting of Trump to politicize America’s most sacred refuge by pasting his face over the national parks in the same way he slaps his corporate name on buildings, restaurants, and golf courses. The national parks are not a personal branding opportunity. They’re the pride and joy of the American people.”

… Reuters: “The Trump admin wants the International Criminal Court to amend its founding document to ensure it does not investigate the Republican president and his top officials, threatening new US sanctions on the court if it did not. If the court does not act on this US demand and two others - dropping investigations of Israeli leaders over the Gaza war and formally ending an earlier probe of US troops over their actions in Afghanistan - the US may penalize more ICC officials and could sanction the court itself.”

… Trump admin official: “There is growing concern that in 2029 the ICC will turn its attention to the President, to the VP, to the Secretary of War and others, and pursue prosecutions against them. That is unacceptable, and we will not allow it to happen.”

… NBC: The measles outbreak in SC is accelerating with no end in sight following Thanksgiving and other large gatherings, state health officials said. 27 new cases have been reported since Friday. Dr. Linda Bell with the SC Dept of Public Health: “We are faced with ongoing transmission that we anticipate will go on for many more weeks. That is a significant increase in our cases in a short period of time.”

… “Bell attributed the spike in part to holiday travel and get-togethers, as well as low vaccination rates. The K-12 vaccination rate for measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) in Spartanburg County was 90% for the 2024-25 school year, below the 95% level doctors say is needed to protect against an outbreak. In neighboring Greenville County, the MMR vaccination rate was 90.5%.”

… NYT: “Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn have moved to drop charges against a former Fox employee who was convicted of scheming to pay millions of dollars in bribes in exchange for the lucrative broadcast rights to soccer tournaments. It was the latest turnabout for a case that exposed corruption at the highest levels of international sports.”

… “Hernán López, who was CEO of a unit that was responsible for developing Fox’s sports broadcasting business in Latin America, was convicted in 2023 of money laundering conspiracy and wire fraud conspiracy. Prosecutors had said López conspired to pay off the heads of national federations to win the rights to broadcast two South American soccer tournaments.”

… “But Joseph Nocella Jr., the US Attorney for the E. District of NY, wrote in a letter to the judge who oversaw the case against López and the Argentine marketing firm convicted along with him, Full Play Group, that dismissing it was in the interest of justice. It was another dramatic swing in a case that arose from a DOJ investigation into corruption by international soccer officials. Federal investigators began probing corruption at FIFA in 2010, but the case burst into the open with a series of high-profile arrests in Switzerland in 2015.”

… “The investigation rocked the world of global soccer. López and Full Play were indicted 5 years later and convicted in March 2023. López helped Fox beat out ESPN to win the rights to broadcast the men’s World Cup in 2018 and 2022, prosecutors said. Fox has denied involvement in the scheme.”

… All it cost FIFA was a fake Peace Prize medal to the malignant narcissist in chief.

This was a packed news day, but overall I think one of the most positive days for Democrats politically. The momentum shift that has been taking place was obvious today in so many areas as people are really learning how to fight back effectively against this terrible regime. Still a long way to go, but today was encouraging.

If you missed my weekly podcast Uncovered yesterday, you can find it here.

… Axios: “The acrimony is so deep between Trump‘s border czar and his DHS Secretary that the 2 officials barely speak to or meet with each other. Tensions reached such a fever pitch last week that the WH was swamped with rumors and news stories claiming that Kristi Noem had lost Trump’s favor and was on her way out. Noem’s backers blamed the whisper campaign on supporters of her rival, Tom Homan.”

… “Noem has spent millions of department dollars on a controversial campaign-style ad blitz that some insiders believe promotes her as much as the dept’s mission. That rankles career immigration officials, many of whom are loyal to Homan, a 30-year immigration-enforcement vet. Insiders have personally complained to Trump about Noem’s management and the role of her top adviser, Trump campaign veteran Corey