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      ‘A slap in the face’: activists reel as Trump administration removes crucial missing Indigenous peoples report

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      Since January, Donald Trump’s presidency has been marked by a series of radical changes. Of note is the way troves of previously publicly available information on government websites such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) or National Institutes of Health (NIH) have quietly gone dark.One such page is the Not Invisible Act Commission’s final report from November 2023. The Not Invisible Act Commission was mandated by bipartisan legislation and signed into law by Trump himself. The report was a collaboration between the justice department and the interior department to address, document and respond to the missing and murdered Indigenous peoples (MMIP) crisis, in which Indigenous communities experience disproportionate rates of abduction, assault and murder. Accurate statistics about the MMIP and missing and murdered Indigenous women (MMIW) crises can be limited and dated, but, as of 2019, homicide was the third most common cause of death for Indigenous girls aged 15 to 19 and Indigenous women aged 20 to 24.The Not Invisible Act Commission’s final report was a culmination of seven in-person field hearings held across the country and a one-day virtual national hearing. Nearly 600 people attended the hearings and 260 people, including survivors, victims, family members, advocates and law enforcement gave testimony to the commission. As a result of those hearings, the commission issued its final report of recommendations to address the crisis.Having a resource like the Not Invisible Act Commission’s final report provided Indigenous people and governments, as well as federal, state and local branches of the US government, with data and suggestions on how to reduce the crises. The act itself was historic, not only because it shed light on an issue that Indian Country has faced for decades, but also because it was the first bill that was introduced and passed by four Indigenous US congressional members.Despite the report no longer being available online, advocates say the fight to bring light to and end the MMIP and MMIW crises continues.Tracking numbersCharolette Gonzales, the policy and advocacy director of the Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women (CSVANW) said that she and other staffers were shocked when the Not Invisible Act Commission’s report was removed from the federal website.“They were like, ‘What does this mean for the future of other information that supports our work?’” said Gonzales, who is Diné and San Ildefonso Pueblo. “[We] make sure that our communities are informed. What does that mean for them?”The coalition focuses on preventive work, or trying to stop violence against Indigenous women before it happens.“When doing this education, we are better able to equip them with the ability to advocate for themselves, and that work is really important as we move forward, especially with these unprecedented times of this current presidential administration,” she said.Karrisa Newkirk, of the Oklahoma-based MMIW Chahta, an organization that supports affected families through financial assistance, provides training opportunities for law enforcement agencies, and works with victims to help them heal after experiencing violence, said that the work doesn’t stop just because of a decision made in Washington.“When it comes to our work and what we do, I don’t feel like we’ve missed a step,” she said. “We’re going to continue to serve our families exactly how we should and always have. When it comes to other MMIWs across the United States, I truly feel like it kind of puts us back in time a little bit, where people aren’t going to see what a real crisis it is.”Newkirk said that after the commission collected the data, it should have been used to make tangible changes. Still, having a national database that tracked MMIW cases was vital.“Even though there were great strides in the last couple years, them removing that was like a slap in the face. It was a huge step back.” she said. “It felt like we were being heard and recognized, and then all of a sudden it felt like that was no longer what it was any more … When you think about that as someone that’s in the work and you know how many people already don’t know about it, and then it’s removed from the United States website, it’s definitely disheartening.”The CSVANW has begun discussing creating a database of its own, one built with information that the organization has collected over the years, including documents and reports that the Department of Justice previously issued. This method of ensuring that vital documents and resources are stored somewhere other than on government agencies’ websites is something that some advocates have been pushing for since the website purges began.The National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center, Inc (NIWRC), a non-profit organization that works to end violence against Native women, children and communities, for example, has a version of the Not Invisible Act Commission’s report that is still accessible.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“We’re taking it upon ourselves to collect as much information as we can as it slowly becomes unavailable to us on purpose,” Gonzales said. “I think the censorship is a really hard hit to our communities, especially to our work. We already have limited resources as not only just a Native organization and survivor-led organization, but also as tribal people who live in these pueblos and work with our people.”MMIW Chahta also tracks its own numbers, and is trying to overcome racial misclassification by law enforcement.Tribal communities are also concerned about whether treaties, agreements made between sovereign nations, will be upheld by the US government, Gonzales said. The US has had a long history of violating treaties even before Trump’s election.Since he was sworn in, Trump and Elon Musk have called on the General Services Administration to terminate the leases of roughly 7,500 federal offices, including 25 regional offices of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. On Friday, Trump rescinded a Biden-era executive order, which aimed to strengthen tribal sovereignty for the 574 federally recognized tribes in the nation.Following the removal of the Not Invisible Act Commission’s final report page, federal agencies have flagged hundreds of words to limit or avoid, including, “indigenous community”, “tribal”, and “Native American”. Defense department websites removed pages about Indigenous code talkers, whose usage of Choctaw and Navajo languages to communicate messages were vital for winning the first and second world wars.Of the extreme changes being made by the administration and their implications for Indigenous people, Gonzales said: “A lot of community members, along with our staff, are emotionally exhausted every day we hear about new executive orders coming out.“Our survivors and our resources truly help decrease the violence that happens in our communities … And so, once we heard this, I think our mind instantly went to the fact that Native women will die if we don’t have federal funding. That’s just a fact.” More

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      Gavin Newsom’s podcast has featured Steve Bannon and Charlie Kirk. Is this the way to the White House?

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      On the latest episode of This Is Gavin Newsom, the California governor interviewed his Minnesota counterpart, the 2024 Democratic vice-presidential nominee Tim Walz. “Thanks for having me,” Walz said, flashing a cheeky smile. “I’m kinda wondering where I fall on this list of guests.”Walz was not only the first Democrat to make an appearance on Newsom’s splashy new podcast, but also the first participant who had not cast doubt on the 2020 presidential election results or expressed sympathy for the mob that stormed the capitol on January 6.Newsom has billed his podcast, launched at the beginning of March, as a platform for “honest discussions” with those who “agree AND disagree with us”. Many Democrats share his desire to expand their reach and influence across platforms – but his critics recoil at the approach. Newsom doesn’t seem to conduct the interviews as a blue-state leader raring to defend progressive values – or even as a governor whose response to one of the costliest and most destructive natural disasters in recent memory was undermined by a relentless rightwing campaign of rumors and lies. Instead, he seems to take on the role of an anthropologist conducting fieldwork on the forces fueling Maga fervor – and Democrats’ descent into the political wilderness.It’s a potentially high-stakes gambit for the term-limited governor widely believed to have national ambitions.“You’re taking a risk, doing a podcast, doing something to try to fill a void that’s out there and hopefully using it as a platform to try and articulate our values to a broader audience,” Walz told Newsom. “But we’ve not figured this out yet.”Since launching the podcast earlier this month, Newsom has taped a trio of friendly chats with rightwing figures reviled by the left: Steve Bannon, an architect of Donald Trump’s political rise; Charlie Kirk, the founder of the conservative youth group Turning Point USA and a Maga-world darling; and Michael Savage, a longtime conservative talk-radio host whose Trumpian rhetoric preceded the president’s rise. (According to the Wall Street Journal, Newsom sought help from his ex-wife and Trumpworld insider Kimberly Guilfoyle to connect with Kirk and Bannon.)Then came Walz. But the parade of conservatives on the Newsom podcast isn’t likely to stop. At one point during the second episode, Savage suggested another guest: Tucker Carlson. “I agree,” Newsom concurred. “I’m fascinated by him.”Media watchdogs have criticized the lineup, arguing Newsom is elevating and legitimizing rightwing extremists like Kirk, who once suggested Joe Biden should face the death penalty for unspecified “crimes against America”. They were baffled by his praise of Bannon, whom he commended for his “advocacy” and calling “balls and strikes” on the Trump administration.Many Democrats meanwhile have been infuriated by Newsom’s lack of pushback against his guests’ false or misleading claims, and his agreement with them on issues they had long thought he opposed. Newsom didn’t challenge the baseless assertion by Bannon that Trump won the 2020 election. And in his conversation with Kirk, he shocked longtime allies when he agreed that allowing transgender women and girls to compete in female sports was “deeply unfair”.Newsom and his representatives did not answer questions from the Guardian about his podcast. But he has said previously that the idea for it was born from a private conversation with a conservative figure he wished had been recorded. A cross-partisan conversation, he had said, could show that “we don’t hate each other”, despite holding deeply opposing political views.“The world’s changed. We need to change with it in terms of how we communicate,” Newsom told reporters at a press conference in Los Angeles last month. “We’d be as dumb as we want to be if we continue down the old status quo and try to pave over the old cow path. We’ve got to do things differently.”After the 2024 election, Democrats offered many theories about why they lost. There was widespread agreement that to win again, Democrats needed to do a better job of breaking out of their ideological bubbles and reaching voters the party had alienated in recent years. What they needed, some strategists argued, was a “Joe Rogan of the left”.Who is Newsom’s intended audience?For many Democrats and critics of the Maga movement, Newsom’s overtures have gone too far. His chats are doing little to diagnose the problem, and even less to position himself as a solution, they argue.“If you’re running to be a Republican nominee, this is a great strategy,” the California state assembly member Alex Lee, a member of the LGBTQ+ caucus, said earlier this month in response to the governor’s comments on trans athletes. “But if you want to run as a Democrat and someone who is pro-human rights, this is a terrible look.”“Cuddling up to the Charlie Kirks and Steve Bannons of the world and truckling to the Michael Savages … is a strange way to try to build national support among fellow Democrats,” the Los Angeles’s Times longtime political columnist, Mark Barabak, wrote.Andy Beshear, the governor of Kentucky who is also seen as a presidential hopeful, told reporters that the left should be willing to debate “just about anyone” – but that turning over the mic to Bannon was a bridge too far. “Bannon espouses hatred and anger and even at some points violence, and I don’t think we should give him oxygen on any platform, ever, anywhere,” Beshear said.And Adam Kinzinger, a Republican former representative from Illinois turned anti-Trump campaigner who sat on the January 6 committee, said it was “stupid” to talk to Bannon.“Bannon is the author of this chaos we’re seeing right now,” he said in a video posted on X.“Many of us on the right sacrificed our careers taking these people on and Newsom’s trying to make a career with them,” Kinzinger continued. “This is insane.”But perhaps progressive Democrats, and never-Trump Republicans, aren’t Newsom’s intended audience – at least for the moment.“He wants to be in the national conversation for the possibility of running for president,” said David McCuan, a political science professor at Sonoma State University.If he does seek the White House, Newsom will need to prove to his skeptics that he is more nuanced than the rightwing caricature of him as a “knee-jerk liberal”, McCuan argued, the same attack conservatives leveled against Newsom’s “political cousin”, Kamala Harris, in last year’s election.View image in fullscreenThe podcast is the latest iteration in a much broader effort by the governor’s team to show that Newsom has matured politically, McCuan said, and make the case that he is capable of taking on Trump and the heir to Maga.It has certainly catapulted Newsom into the national political conversation, at a moment when his party appears rudderless, divided and desperate for new leadership.Each episode has generated headlines and the endeavor has sparked a wider debate about whether the governor is being savvy, cynical – or both.Howard Polskin, who documents rightwing media on his website TheRighting, said Newsom’s podcast is more about marketing and public relations for Newsom himself than a platform for making content or clearly articulating his political views.“Its value is that he’s getting people talking about himself,” he said. “This is like a page out of the Trump playbook. Doesn’t matter what they’re saying, they are talking about Gavin Newsom.”His conservative guests don’t gain converts from their appearances on Newsom’s show – they already have far larger audiences than the governor anyway, Polskin said, while the governor’s supporters are likely turned off by the rightwing figures he has invited on.But his guests gain something else: access. “Who wouldn’t want a relationship with the governor of California?” Polskin said. “It’s power. It’s proximity to power, someone who could arguably become the next president of the United States.”Polskin said it’s a smart move for Newsom as a branding play, and it’s “gutsy” for him to engage directly with top Magaworld influencers and try to have civil discussions. Whatever Democrats have been doing before clearly wasn’t working, he argued, so why not try something new?It’s a play he expects more Democrats to attempt in the run-up to the next presidential election. “He’s taken a controversial stand here. He’s getting a lot of attention for it. I think that’s smart,” he said.From antagonistic to calculatedWhen asked by a reporter whether the podcast was a “distraction” from his day job as a governor, Newsom said it was not. Opening new lines of communication with constituents – and providing a forum for civil dialogue between political opponents – was “essential” and “important” in an era defined by deep polarization and media fragmentation, he argued.It reflects a slight shift in tactics for the California governor.During Trump’s first term, Newsom, the leader of the largest blue state, embraced the role of liberal antagonist, holding up California as a bulwark against the administration’s attacks on immigrants and the environment.After soundly defeating a Republican recall effort in 2021, and handily winning re-election in 2022, an emboldened Newsom grew his national profile, acting as a prominent surrogate for Joe Biden and frequently taking the fight directly to the right.Before the 2022 congressional midterms, he implored Democrats to launch a “counteroffensive” to defend abortion rights and LGBTQ+ protections. He debated the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, on Fox News. His political action committee ran ads in Republican states – including ones a Democratic nominee would never hope to win, such as Alabama.But he’s also hedged his bets, barring state legislation that might have wound up in ads fueling California’s ultra-liberal image: Newsom has used his veto pen to reject bills that would have required a warning label on gas stoves and provided free condoms in schools. California’s prison system has long cooperated with federal immigration authorities, and this year the governor vetoed a bill that would have limited state prison officials’ cooperation with Ice.Newsom is taking a far more cautious approach with Trump, too, in the president’s second term. As Trump threatened to withhold federal disaster aid for the state following the devastating wildfires in Los Angeles, Newsom greeted Trump warmly on the tarmac when Trump came to survey the damage. Shortly after, Newsom traveled to Washington for a lengthy Oval Office meeting. “We’re getting along, Trump and I,” he said in one of his podcast episodes.Mike Madrid, a California-based Republican consultant and podcast host, has argued that Newsom not only grasps the depth of Democrats’ engagement deficit but also the the urgency of creating a liberal “media infrastructure” to counter the right’s influence.“He knows he needs to get into that cultural space to be relevant,” Madrid said, noting that the governor is a longtime observer of rightwing media. “It doesn’t necessarily need to be the rightwing media ecosystem, but he’s keenly aware that you can’t just have a large Twitter account like he does and be a dominant national force.” He pointed out that it’s not Newsom’s first foray into podcasting. He also hosts Politickin’ with the former NFL star Marshawn Lynch and his agent, Doug Hendrickson.In an opinion piece for Fox News, Kirk wrote that his invitation to appear on Newsom’s podcast had been part of a “calculated play” by the governor to “present as a centrist” and shed his image in conservative media as the well-coifed leader of liberal America.“It might work,” Kirk warned. “One thing I learned in my podcast experience: the governor isn’t a joke. He has a shark’s instincts and is hoping that voters will have a goldfish’s memory.”Barabak, the LA Times columnist, couldn’t disagree more: “If Newsom really hopes to be president someday, the best thing he could do is a bang-up job in his final 22 months as governor, not waste time on glib and self-flattering diversions.” More

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      What to know about the El Salvador mega-prison where Trump sent deported Venezuelans

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      The US has sent hundreds of mostly Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador to be held without trial in a controversial mega-prison known for its harsh conditions. The facility has drawn praise from hardline law-and-order politicians at home and abroad and ire from human rights organizations.Here’s what we know about the mega-prison called Cecot, an acronym for Terrorism Confinement Centre in Spanish.What is the Cecot prison?In February 2023, El Salvador opened what it claims is Latin America’s biggest prison with capacity for 40,000 inmates. The 23-hectare prison is isolated in a rural region 70 km east of capital San Salvador.Bukele in November said the prison cost $115m to develop and equip.This prison is part of Bukele’s highly popular hardline security policy which has resulted in a sharp drop in homicides.Calling himself the world’s “coolest dictator,” Bukele, 43, declared a state of emergency in March 2022 that remains in effect and has entailed the arrest of more than 84,000 people.This includes alleged members of El Salvador’s Mara Salvatrucha gan, also known as MS-13, and its rival, Barrio 18.Government reports put the prison population at 14,500 inmates in August 2024, but a government spokesperson said in March 2025 that the statistic was outdated. A current figure was not disclosed security reasons, the spokesperson said.View image in fullscreenWhy are migrants held at the prison?During a visit from the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, in February, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele offered to incarcerate criminals deported from the US in the mega-prison.The Trump administration deported 261 people to El Salvador on 15 March. For 137 of them, the US government justified the move under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, saying the men were members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua but providing few details about their cases.A US official said in a court filing that “many” of those 137 has no US convictions but still posed a serious threat.Those people along with 101 additional Venezuelans were sent to Cecot for a one-year term that can be renewed, Bukele said. The US government paid El Salvador about $6m to receive the deportees, the White House said.The remaining 23 deportees were Salvadoran gang members, the White House said.What is it like in the prison?Images taken inside the facility often show prisoners packed tightly together with their heads shaved and wearing only shorts.The prison has no outdoor recreational space and no family visits are allowed.View image in fullscreenA report from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in September 2024 expressed concerns about overcrowding in the Cecot, citing a study that found inmates had an average 0.60 square metres (6.45 square feet) of space, below international standards.Civil society organisations and advocates have reported over 6,000alleged human rights violations in the country since the state of emergency was declared in 2022, including arbitrary detentions, torture and 366 deaths in state custody. The government denies the allegations.Why is the prison controversial?Cecot has attracted global attention, both positive and negative. Argentine security minister Patricia Bullrich praised the facility in a June 2024 social media post that said: “This is the way. Tough on criminals.”A US Republican party delegation from the House of Representatives, led by then-Representative Matt Gaetz, visited the prison a month later.YouTube personalities have had millions of views for their prison visit videos that highlighted harsh conditions in the prison.Many human rights organisations have criticised El Salvador’s prisons and especially Cecot. Groups have reported alleged human rights violations like torture, inmate deaths and mass trials.Bukele said in August that “gang members will spend their entire lives in prison.” Justice minister Gustavo Villatoro vowed in 2023 that officials “will make sure none of those who enter the Cecot ever leave on foot.”View image in fullscreen More

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      Mahmoud Khalil and Trump’s assault on free speech – podcast

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      This month Mahmoud Khalil, a recent Columbia University graduate who had worked with human rights groups and even the UK government, was detained in New York. His wife, who is eight months pregnant, said her husband was not told why he was being detained and that officers assumed he was on a visa – but actually he has a green card, allowing him to stay in the US and protecting his constitutional rights.Khalil says his detention is part of a crackdown on dissent – and to deter others from protesting. During pro-Palestine protests on the Columbia campus last year he acted as a mediator between the university and the demonstrators, and, unlike many students, left his face uncovered. Then Donald Trump was elected US president and promised to clamp down on student protests.Prof Joseph Howley, who knows Khalil, says he is “conspicuously committed to non-violent resolution of conflict, conspicuously committed to an inclusive vision of liberation and peace”. He tells Michael Safi why the implications of the government’s efforts to detain and deport Khalil are “incredibly chilling”.Chris McGreal, who writes for Guardian US, explains the background to the case and whether free speech and the right to protest are safe in Trump’s America. More

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      Trump administration plans for militarized border in New Mexico – report

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      The Trump administration is working on a plan to create what conservatives have long demanded: a militarized buffer zone along the southern border in New Mexico that would be occupied by active-duty US troops, empowered to detain migrants who cross into the United States unlawfully, the Washington Post reports.According to the Post, recent internal discussions have centered on deploying troops to a section of the border in New Mexico that would be turned into a kind of military installation, which would give the soldiers a legal right to detain migrants who “trespass” on the elongated base. Unauthorized migrants would then be held until they can be turned over to immigration officers.The planning appears to focus on creating a vast military installation as a way around the Posse Comitatus Act, a federal law that bars soldiers from participating in most civilian law enforcement missions.Calls to militarize the southern border are not new, but so far they have existed more in the realm of political rhetoric than reality.In 2022, Blake Masters, an Arizona Senate candidate enthusiastically backed by Peter Thiel, the same tech billionaire who bankrolled JD Vance’s campaign that year, ran a campaign ad promising to do just that.In 2018, Trump abruptly announced during a White House meeting with then defense secretary Jim Mattis: “We are going to be guarding our border with our military. That’s a big step.”Although the US president’s announcement sparked a flurry of reports, in the Washington Post and elsewhere, that he was serious about the proposal, it was never enacted at scale.Seven months later, as Trump focused on the supposed threat of a migrant “caravan” on the eve of the 2018 midterm elections, Mattis defended the limited presence of troops at the southern border by saying: “We don’t do stunts in this department”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionMattis’s successor, Mark Esper, revealed in his memoir that Trump had apparently asked him to violate the Posse Comitatus Act in 2020. According to Esper, Trump asked him, a week after the murder of George Floyd, to deploy 10,000 active-duty troops to the streets of the nation’s capital and have them open fire on protesters. “Can’t you just shoot them?” Trump asked, in an Oval Office meeting. “Just shoot them in the legs or something?” Esper declined to do so.One big difference between 2018, 2020 and 2025, however, is that Trump will not have to convince a sober, former general like Mattis or a West Point graduate like Esper to carry out his plan to divert military resources to domestic law enforcement, since his current defense secretary is a former weekend TV host who is far less likely to object. More

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      Trump administration briefing: deportation heartbreak for Venezuelan family; Fed cuts economic forecast

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      Donald Trump’s White House has described the Venezuelan migrants deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador as “heinous monsters” and terrorists who “rape, maim and murder for sport”.But relatives of Francisco Javier García Casique, a 24-year-old from the city of Maracay, say he was a hairdresser, not a crook.“He has never been in prison, he is innocent, and he has always supported us with his work as a barber,” his younger brother, Sebastián García Casique, said from their family home in Venezuela.Here are the main stories from Wednesday:Families of deported Venezuelans rebuke Trump claimsIn recent days, a succession of Venezuelan families have gone public to demand the release of their loved ones: young working men whose main “crimes” appear to have been their nationality and having tattoos that US immigration authorities deemed a sign of affiliation to the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua.Experts in South American organized crime reject the idea that tattoos are a meaningful indicator of gang membership in Venezuela.Read the full storyTrump and Zelenskyy have ‘frank’ but ‘very good’ phone callDonald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy had a “very good telephone call” on Wednesday, according to Trump, in the first conversation between the US president and his Ukrainian counterpart since their disastrous showdown in the White House three weeks ago.Zelenskyy described the call as “positive, very substantive and frank”, and said he had signed up to a partial ceasefire that Trump agreed with Vladimir Putin a day earlier. The White House said Trump had promised to help with a Ukrainian request to source more air defence batteries for Kyiv.Read the full storyUS economic growth forecast cutOfficials at the US Federal Reserve cut their US economic growth forecasts and raised their projections for price growth as they kept interest rates on hold amid sweeping tariffs. Central bank policymakers expect inflation to increase by an average rate of 2.7% this year and US gross domestic product (GDP) to rise by 1.7% this year, down from an estimate of 2.1%.Read the full storyWhite House calls deportation judge a ‘Democrat activist’The White House on Wednesday labeled the federal judge challenging the Trump administration on whether it defied his court order to halt flights deporting migrants “a Democrat activist”.The press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, singled out federal judge James Boasberg, over his handling of the case of Venezuelans deported to El Salvador.Read the full storyMahmoud Khalil case to move to New JerseyA New York federal judge has denied the Trump administration’s bid to dismiss the legal challenge brought by Mahmoud Khalil, the recent Columbia graduate and Palestinian activist who was detained by immigration enforcement agents earlier this month, and has ordered the case transferred to New Jersey.Read the full storyFrench scientist denied US entry over Trump viewsA French scientist was denied entry to the US this month after immigration officers at an airport searched his phone and found messages in which he had expressed criticism of the Trump administration, France’s research minister said.Read the full story Fired trade watchdog chief raises concern over Trump billionaire tiesA day after his abrupt firing by Donald Trump from the Federal Trade Commission, Alvaro Bedoya raised questions about the US president’s relations with some of the country’s richest men.The ousted Democratic commissioner told a congressional hearing it was an “interesting coincidence” that his final public statement in the post had blasted Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder.Read the full storyMusk echoes rightwing social security conspiracy theoriesElon Musk is claiming, without evidence, that Democrats have been using fraud in entitlements like social security and Medicare to attract immigrants and boost their voting ranks – language that also echoes racist rightwing conspiracy theories.Read the full storyJudge orders two trans prisoners back to women’s facilitiesA judge on Wednesday ordered the federal Bureau of Prisons (BoP) to transfer two incarcerated transgender women back to federal women’s prisons after they had been sent to men’s facilities after Donald Trump’s executive order that truncated transgender protections.Read the full storyConservative ex-judge says Trump waging war on US rule of lawDonald Trump has “declared war on the rule of law in America” and is pitching the country into a constitutional crisis, a prominent former conservative federal judge J Michael Luttig has said.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      The University of California has imposed a hiring freeze in response to Trump cuts.

      The Trump administration has paused $175m in federal funding to the University of Pennsylvania over its inclusion of transgender athletes in women’s college sports.

      The justice department removed 11 guidelines for US businesses on compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), including some that deal with Covid-19 and masking and accessibility.

      The US Institute of Peace has sued the Trump administration to block a Doge takeover.

      A top teachers union has sued the US Department of Education after it stopped processing applications for affordable repayment plans on student loans.

      US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents have detained an undocumented woman who is a prominent immigration advocate in Colorado. Jeanette Vizguerra, 53, was reportedly taken into custody by Ice on Monday outside a Target store in the Denver area where she worked, according to her legal representatives, friends and family members. More

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      ‘He is innocent’: family of deported Venezuelan rebukes Trump claims

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      Donald Trump’s White House has described the Venezuelan migrants deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador as “heinous monsters” and terrorists who “rape, maim and murder for sport”.But relatives of Francisco Javier García Casique, a 24-year-old from the city of Maracay, say he was a hairdresser, not a crook.“He has never been in prison, he is innocent, and he has always supported us with his work as a barber,” his younger brother, Sebastián García Casique, said from their family home in Venezuela.Less than a week ago, the García brothers were preparing to be reunited, with Francisco telling relatives he expected to be deported from a US immigration detention facility to his South American homeland after being arrested by immigration officials on 2 March.The flight was scheduled for last Friday. A family gathering was planned in Maracay. On Sunday those plans were shattered when El Salvador’s authoritarian president, Nayib Bukele, published a cinematographic propaganda video on social media showing scores of Venezuelan prisoners being frog-marched off planes and into custody in his country’s “terrorism confinement centre”.“It’s him,” a shell-shocked Sebastián told their mother after spotting his sibling among those shackled men.“I never in my life thought I would see my brother like that – handcuffed, his head shaved, in a prison for murderers, where they put rapists and kidnappers. It is very painful because he is innocent,” he said of his brother, who travelled to the US in late 2023 chasing a better future.Lindsay Toczylowski, a California-based immigration lawyer, was another person who found herself scouring Bukele’s sensationalist video for any sign of her client, another Venezuelan migrant she feared had also been unjustly dispatched to El Salvador after seeking shelter from political persecution in the US.“I felt sick … absolute shock,” Toczylowski said of the moment she saw those pictures in which detainees are shown being forced to their knees to have their heads shaved by masked security forces with batons and guns.“It really is such an escalation … and to see it paraded and celebrated by the White House and by Bukele was just an absolutely shocking escalation of human rights abuses against migrants,” said the lawyer who works for the Immigrant Defenders Law Center (ImmDef) group.García and Toczylowski’s client – an LGBTQ+ asylum seeker she declined to name out of fears for his safety – appear not to be the only Venezuelans deported to El Salvador despite having no criminal history in their home country or the US. More than 260 people were deported to the Central American country last weekend, 137 of them under 227-year-old wartime powers invoked by the US president called the Alien Enemies Act.In recent days, a succession of Venezuelan families have gone public to demand the release of their loved-ones: young working men whose main “crimes” appear to have been their nationality and having tattoos that US immigration authorities deemed a sign of affiliation to the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. Experts in South American organized crime reject the idea that tattoos are a meaningful indicator of gang membership in Venezuela.García’s tattoos include one – inspired by a verse from the Book of Isaiah and inked onto his skin during a stint living in Peru – that reads: “God gives His toughest battles to his strongest warriors”. His brother, Sebastián, has the same tattoo.In a video plea posted on social media, Mercedes Yamarte, the mother of another migrant sent to El Salvador, Mervin Yamarte, described her 29-year-old son as “a good, hardworking boy” who had never been involved in crime. But Yamarte, who entered the US in 2023 and had lived in Dallas, also has tattoos – one with the name of his daughter, another paying tribute to his mum – which were seemingly interpreted as an indication of gang membership by US authorities.“Everyone close to him knows he has a big heart and NOTHING TO DO WITH TREN DE ARAGUA,” his brother, Francis Varela, wrote on social media. “My brother went in search of the American dream,” Varela added. “A dream that has now become a nightmare for us all.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionToczylowski’s client also has tattoos which she said immigration enforcement officials used to allege he was a Tren de Aragua member. “[But] they are not gang tattoos and he has no gang membership affiliation at all,” the lawyer insisted.García’s shock incarceration in El Salvador ended a six-year quest to build a better life for himself and his family, which the Venezuelan Zoomer documented on Instagram.After leaving his economically shattered country, in 2019, García migrated to Callao, a seaside city near Peru’s capital Lima, hoping to make enough money to help his family survive back home. “I miss you Venezuela,” he posted the following year, between photos and videos that highlighted his love for hairdressing, football and his numerous tattoos.In late 2023 García, like many Venezuelan migrants, decided to relocate to the US to escape the post-pandemic economic crisis in Peru. An Instagram photo shows him posing outside a train station in the Mexican state of Jalisco as he heads to the southern border. The post is accompanied by a song by the Mexican singer Peso Pluma called Nueva Vida” (New Life) which captured his aspirations.Two months later, another image shows him cutting hair at a Marvel-themed salon in Longview, Texas named after the Incredible Hulk. “May it be everything we dreamed of,” García wrote of his fresh start beside an emoji of the Stars and Stripes flag. Last weekend that dream came to an abrupt and unexpected end in Bukele’s mega prison near San Salvador.Immigration advocates have voiced outrage at the plight of men such as García and the lack of due process in their cases.“It’s enraging because they clearly don’t have any affiliation with Tren de Aragua at all,” said Adam Isacson, a migration expert from the Washington Office on Latin America thinktank.Isacson said that in the past such migrants tended to face detention in a “miserable [detention] centre here in the United States” or were “shipped back” home. “It did not mean that you were sent to some medieval jail of an authoritarian leader in another country. So we’re in brand new ground here,” Isacson warned, adding that while it was possible some of those deported to El Salvador were hardened criminals, many appeared to be innocent.Sebastián García Casique insisted that was the case of his older brother who their mother had raised to be an “honest and good” person. He urged Trump to review his brother’s case and free him.“I believe this is an injustice,” said García, 21. “Maybe one or two [of the prisoners] have criminal records, and if they did something, punish them for it … But the innocent should be sent to Venezuela … What is he doing in El Salvador if he committed no crime there? … Why don’t they say what crimes they are accused of?” More

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      Greenpeace says Dakota Access pipeline defamation verdict risks ‘destroying right to peaceful protest’ – live

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      Steven Donziger is perhaps the best-known member of the trial monitoring committee that has been in court throughout the Energy Transfer v Greenpeace case.Donziger is an environmental lawyer who won a multibillion-dollar judgment in Ecuador against Chevron over contamination in the Lago Agrio region, but ended up under house arrest for years, after the oil giant countersued him seeking $60bn in damages.Here, in a video released this week before the verdict, is how Donziger explains what is at stake in this legal effort to silence dissent he compares to the government’s arrest of Mahmoud Khalil:Here is some useful background on the lawsuit against Greenpeace, from an article published last month by our colleagues Nina Lakhani and Rachel Leingang.Energy Transfer Partners, a Dallas-based oil and gas company worth almost $70bn, had accused Greenpeace of defamation and orchestrating criminal behavior by protesters at the Dakota Access pipeline (Dapl).The anti-pipeline protests in 2016 and 2017 were organised by Standing Rock and other Sioux tribes and supported by more than 300 sovereign tribal nations, inspiring an international solidarity movement after Energy Transfer’s private security unleashed attack dogs and pepper spray against nonviolent protesters.Tens of thousands of people from across the country and world participated in the Dapl protests, and Greenpeace was among scores of non-profit groups that supported the Standing Rock tribe’s opposition to the pipeline.But Energy Transfer alleges in court filings that thousands of protestors were “incited” to come to North Dakota thanks to a “misinformation campaign” by Greenpeace.The lawsuit has been widely denounced as a classic strategic lawsuit against public participation (Slapp) – a form of civil litigation increasingly deployed by corporations, politicians and wealthy individuals to deliberately wear down and silence critics including journalists, activists and watchdog groups.For more, read the whole article, here:A team of 12 independent prominent civil rights attorneys and advocates who monitored the Greenpeace trial amid concerns about judicial bias and violations of due process released the following statement deploring the verdict:
      It is our collective assessment that the jury verdict against Greenpeace in North Dakota reflects a deeply flawed trial with multiple due process violations that denied Greenpeace the ability to present anything close to a full defense. Attorneys on our team monitored every minute of the proceedings and found multiple violations of due process that denied Greenpeace its right to a fair trial. The problems included a jury that was patently biased in favor of Energy Transfer, with many members working in the fossil fuel industry; a judge who lacked the requisite experience and legal knowledge to rule properly on the complex First Amendment and other evidentiary issues at the center of the case; and incendiary and prejudicial statements by lawyers for Energy Transfer that tried to criminalize Greenpeace and by extension the entire climate movement by attacking constitutionally-protected advocacy.
      Our fear that this was an illegitimate corporate-funded SLAPP harassment case was confirmed by our observations. We will be issuing a full report documenting these violations and larger flaws in the case in the coming weeks. While the trial court verdict is in, the case is far from over. Greenpeace has a right to appeal to the North Dakota Supreme Court and ultimately to the U.S. Supreme Court. Our committee will continue its work monitoring this critically important case that raises troubling concerns for all advocates in the country.
      The monitors who released the statement include: Marty Garbus, a trial attorney who has represented Nelson Mandela, Daniel Ellsberg, Cesar Chavez, and Vaclav Havel; Natali Segovia, director of Water Protector Legal Collective; Steven Donziger, an environmental and human rights advocate (and Guardian US columnist); Jeanne Mirer, president of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers; Scott Wilson Badenoch, Jr., a fellow of the American Bar Foundation; Wade McMullen, a distinguished fellow of the Human Rights Institute at Georgetown University Law Center.As our colleagues Rachel Leingang and Nina Lakhani report, a jury in North Dakota has decided that the environmental group Greenpeace must pay hundreds of millions of dollars to the pipeline company Energy Transfer and is liable over defamation and other claims over protests in the state nearly a decade ago.Greenpeace, which had denied the claims, said in a statement after the verdict that lawsuits like this were aimed at “destroying the right to peaceful protest”; constitutional rights experts had expressed fears that case could have a wider chilling effect on free speech.Here is the complete statement on the verdict from Deepa Padmanabha, senior legal advisor, Greenpeace USA, sent to the Guardian:
      What we saw over these three weeks was Energy Transfer’s blatant disregard for the voices of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. And while they also tried to distort the truth about Greenpeace’s role in the protests, we instead reaffirmed our unwavering commitment to non-violence in every action we take. After almost eight years, we were proud to share our story with the people of Mandan and beyond. To be clear, Greenpeace’s story is not the story of Standing Rock; that is not ours to tell, despite the allegations in the lawsuit. Our story is how an organization like Greenpeace USA can support critical fights to protect communities most impacted by the climate crisis, as well as continued attacks on Indigenous sovereignty. We should all be concerned about the future of the First Amendment, and lawsuits like this aimed at destroying our rights to peaceful protest and free speech. Greenpeace will continue to do its part to fight for the protection of these fundamental rights for everyone.
      Kristin Casper, the general counsel for Greenpeace International said:
      The fight against Big Oil isn’t over today, and we know that the truth and the law are on our side. Greenpeace International will continue to campaign for a green and peaceful future. Energy Transfer hasn’t heard the last of us in this fight. We’re just getting started with our anti-SLAPP lawsuit against Energy Transfer’s attacks on free speech and peaceful protest. We will see Energy Transfer in court this July in the Netherlands. We will not back down, we will not be silenced.
      Read Rachel and Nina’s detailed report on the verdict, and its implications here:A North Dakota jury has found Greenpeace liable for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages to an energy company over protests against a pipeline being constructed in the state.The verdict stems from a lawsuit filed by Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners, which sought $300m in damages from Greenpeace for defamation and orchestrating criminal behavior by protesters at the Dakota Access pipeline in 2016 and 2017. Greenpeace has warned paying such a large judgment could bankrupt their US operation.Here’s more on the verdict:Last week, the Trump administration asked the supreme court to quickly overturn lower court rulings that blocked its attempt to curtail birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants.The Associated Press reports that the request may also offer the conservative-dominated bench the opportunity to cut down on the practice of a single judge halting a policy nationwide. But, for whatever reason, the justices do not seem interested in ruling quickly on the issue.Here’s more, from the AP:
      The Supreme Court seems to be in no hurry to address an issue that has irritated Republican and Democratic administrations alike: the ability of a single judge to block a nationwide policy.
      Federal judges responding to a flurry of lawsuits have stopped or slowed one Trump administration action after another, from efforts to restrict birthright citizenship to freezes on domestic and international spending.
      While several justices have expressed concern about the use of so-called nationwide, or universal, injunctions, the high court has sidestepped multiple requests to do something about them.
      The latest plea comes in the form of an emergency appeal the Justice Department filed with the court last week, seeking to narrow orders issued by judges in Maryland, Massachusetts and Washington that prohibit the nationwide enforcement of an executive order signed by President Donald Trump to restrict birthright citizenship.
      The justices usually order the other side in an emergency appeal to respond in a few days or a week. But in this case, they have set a deadline of April 4, without offering any explanation.
      The Trump administration’s cancellation of an affordable repayment plan for student loans has prompted a lawsuit from the American Federal of Teachers, the Guardian’s Michael Sainato reports:A top teachers union has sued the US Department of Education after it stopped processing applications for affordable repayment plans of student loans last month and disabled the online application for the programs.The American Federation of Teachers, or AFT – one the country’s largest unions, representing 1.8 million workers – filed a lawsuit alleging the sweeping action violates federal law.The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Washington DC, seeks a court order to restore access to these programs.Another court order last month shut out borrowers of student loans from participating in four income-driven repayment (IDR) plans, which tie income to student loan payments, designed to keep payments affordable and avoid defaults on loans.“By effectively freezing the nation’s student loan system, the new administration seems intent on making life harder for working people, including for millions of borrowers who have taken on student debt so they can go to college,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the AFT. “The former president tried to fix the system for 45 million Americans, but the new president is breaking it again.”The Democratic Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, is standing by his vote to fund the government, even as the calls for him to step aside grow.“I believe so strongly I did the right thing for all the flack I’m getting,” Schumer said in an interview on Morning Joe.He said he understood Democrats’ desire to stand up to Trump, but warned that forcing a shutdown was not the way to do it. “Let’s stand up to him smart. Let’s not give him the keys to the kingdom.”One major activist group, Indivisible, has already called on Schumer to resign as leader and constituents are raising the issue at town halls. According to Axios, at least two House Democrats responded yes when asked at a town hall whether Senate Democrats need new leadership.Schumer this weekend cancelled several stops on a tour for his forthcoming book, citing security concerns after progressive groups announced plans to protest the New York Democrat’s decision to lend his vote to a Republican funding bill.Schumer has argued that he does not support the bill, but feared a government shutdown at the exact moment Donald Trump and Elon Musk are trying to downsize the federal workforce would have been a far worse outcome.“If we shut down the government and they started doing all these bad things, in a month, those folks would be saying, hey, save Medicaid, save our rural hospitals, save this, save that, and we’ll say we can’t, there’s a government shutdown. And then they would come to us and say, so why’d you let it happen?” Schumer argued on Morning Joe. “I prevented that from happening, and I think my caucus, no matter which way they voted, understands that.The House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, has declined to say publicly whether he continues to support Schumer. On Tuesday the former House speaker Nancy Pelosi offered a sharp critique of Schumer’s strategy: “I myself don’t give away anything for nothing. I think that’s what happened the other day,” she said, according to Politico. Unlike Jeffries, Pelosi said she still has confidence in Schumer’s leadership.Officials at the US Federal Reserve cut their US economic growth forecasts and raised their projections for price growth as they kept interest rates on hold.“Uncertainty around the economic outlook has increased,” the central bank said in a statement, as Donald Trump’s bid to overhaul the global economy with sweeping tariffs sparks concern over inflation and growth.Policymakers at the Fed expect inflation to increase by an average rate of 2.7% this year, according to projections released on Wednesday, up from a previous estimate of 2.5%.They expect US gross domestic product (GDP) – a broad measure of economic health – to rise by 1.7% this year, down from an estimate of 2.1% in December. Officials also revised down their projections for GDP growth in 2026 and 2027, to 1.8%.Uncertainty is “unusually elevated”, the Fed chair, Jerome Powell, cautioned, as the Trump administration attempts to engineer radical economic change. Some of the increase in the Fed’s inflation expectations was “clearly” due to tariffs, he said. More