The
2026 ceremony will be the first time in 53 years that the award for
best album cover will be presented. Previously, the award for a
recording package included the album’s visuals and physical materials.
Last year, Charli XCX earned the accolade for the virality of “brat” and
its distinct mucus-y green.
However, this
year, the categories for boxed/special limited-edition packages will be
combined into a single recording package category, with album covers
receiving their own trophy.
This category isn’t
exactly new. At the first Grammys in 1959, Frank Sinatra’s “Only the
Lonely” received the award for album cover. It was presented every year
until 1973, when the Siegel-Schwall Band won for its self-titled album.
After that, the category was renamed album package and then changed
again in 1994 to recording package.
The
nominees this year include CHROMAKOPIA (Tyler the Creator), THE CRUX
(Djo), MOISTURIZER (Wet Leg), GLORY (Perfume Genius) and DEBI TIRAR MAS
FOTOS (Bad Bunny). And in addition to nominees in the competitive
categories, there will also be a handful of performers awarded the
Special Merit Honors: Cher, Chaka Khan, the late Whitney Houston, Paul
Simon and Santana.
Lou Gramm has been rocking for more than five decades, and he figures that is just about long enough.
So, the 75-year-old former frontman of Foreigner has decided that 2026 will mark the end of his touring career.
“I’ve
been doing this for over 54 years, (including initial group) Black
Sheep,” Gramm told Ultimate Classic Rock late last year. “You know that
was a professional band. We had two albums out on Capitol Records (and)
did some serious touring.”
Eighties
pop legends Duran Duran paid their respects to 37-year-old mother Renee
Nicole Good during a concert in Sacramento, California, on Friday.
Frontman Simon Le Bon took a moment to dedicate the band’s 1993 hit
“Ordinary World” to Good, who was shot and killed by ICE agent Jonathan
Ross in Minneapolis on Wednesday. Amid the Trump Administration’s
repeated insults toward Good, her widow, Becca Good, has shared that
“kindness radiated out of” her late wife. A video of Duran Duran’s
tribute to Good was uploaded to Threads. In it, Le Bon is shown
addressing the ICE killing before beginning the song. “This song is
dedicated to the memory of Renee Good,” he began, to audience applause.
“We believe that people in this world have a right to live their lives
in peace and lives of freedom and happiness in their own country,” Le
Bon told the crowd. “For all the ordinary people in this world, we wish
upon you an ordinary world.”
Tuesday, January 13, 2026. Senator Mark Kelly is suing social media
maven Pete Hegseth, Chump continues to misuse the Justice Dept to
persecute Fed Chair Jerome Powell, only 1% (per Pam Bondi) of The
Epstein files has been released, Chump continues attempting to smear the
name of the late Renee Nicole Good and much more.
Today on MS NOW's MORNING JOE, Joe reviewed how Donald Chump's has elected to start the new year.
/div>
Convicted
Felon Donald Chump uses the Justice Dept to go after his rivals. He
thought attacking Fed Chair Jerome Powell was the thing to do. He was
wrong, so wrong.
Let’s
be absolutely clear about what’s happening here. Powell is being
punished for refusing to bend monetary policy to the whims of an
authoritarian president who believes the entire machinery of government
exists to serve his personal interests and ambitions.
Even
by Trump’s standards, the brazenness of this assault is staggering. The
Federal Reserve was deliberately designed to be independent to avoid
exactly this scenario. The Banking Act of 1935 created the modern
structure of the Fed and explicitly placed monetary policy decisions
beyond presidential reach. Central banks in nearly every major democracy
operate on the same principle of independence — precisely because the
alternative could lead to inflation and instability. Trump has never
accepted the basic premise that the Fed was designed to be independent
of presidents to avoid political business cycles and cronyism. The idea
that someone else can say no to him — as Powell has in the past by
refusing to take action on the economy according to Trump’s whims — is
intolerable, so, true to form, the president has escalated.
Trump
has been ramping up his attacks on Powell for months. He has called for
the Fed chair to be fired, accused him of incompetence, mocked him
publicly and repeatedly demanded lower interest rates as if the Federal
Reserve exists simply to do the boss’ bidding. When Powell refused to
comply, Trump and his enablers went searching for a pretext to exact
revenge. They found it in the building renovation project.
Andrew
Levin, a Dartmouth economist and former Federal Reserve official, first
published a policy brief on the central bank’s building renovations for
the libertarian think tank Mercatus Center. After Trump allies pounced,
the report became fodder for a New York Post story sneering about a
supposed “Palace of Versailles.” The Fed, for its part, kept Congress
informed about the project, with Powell testifying at a Senate hearing
that the renovation included no VIP dining room, no new marble, no
special elevators, no water features and no roof terrace gardens.
But facts don’t matter when the goal is intimidation.
Chris Blackhurst (INDEPENDENT) observes,
"What this shows, not for the first time, is that the Trump
administration is no longer operating according to any principles of
objectivity, and that it is entirely subjugated to its master,
compliantly anticipating and carrying out his wishes. In some instances,
that may not matter greatly. But with the Fed, Trumpian officials are
playing with fire. If there is one arena that Trump cannot control, it
is the markets. They do not do emotion. They do not idolise him or
anyone else, nor are they swept along in his wake. And they are not
American. They’re global, unsentimental and unforgiving." Elizabeth Schulze, Benjamin Siegel, Fritz Farrow and Allison Pecorin (ABC NEWS) note pushback, "The
Justice Department investigation into Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome
Powell is drawing backlash from former Federal Reserve and Treasury
officials as well as current members of Congress, including those in
President Donald Trump's own party. A bipartisan group of top economic
officials released a blistering statement on Monday calling the probe an
"unprecedented attempt to use prosecutorial attacks to undermine" the
central bank's independence" and they quote a statement from Alan
Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, Janet Yellen, Tim Geithner, Jacob Lew, Hank
Paulson and others stating, "This is how monetary policy is made in
emerging markets with weak institutions, with highly negative
consequences for inflation and the functioning of their economies more
broadly. It has no place in the United States whose greatest strength is
the rule of law, which is at the foundation of our economic success." Sean James (MEDIAITE) adds, "Sen.
Thom Tillis (R-NC) said the criminal investigation into Fed Chair
Jerome Powell has called the 'independence and credibility' of the
Justice Department under President Donald Trump into question following
the president’s consistent criticism of Powell’s leadership."
Investors
took one look at the Trump administration’s criminal investigation of
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and decided to resuscitate the “Sell
America” trade, selling off US stocks, bonds and the dollar.
Stocks
opened lower Monday morning. The Dow was down 409 points, or 0.83%. The
broader S&P 500 fell 0.37%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq slid 0.23%.
The
US dollar weakened against other major currencies. The dollar index,
which tracks the dollar’s strength against six major currencies, was
down almost 0.4% — a sharp move for the greenback.
Treasuries
fell somewhat, too. The benchmark 10-year yield, which trades in
opposite direction to prices, rose to just under 4.2%, near a one-month
high. Bond yields’ move higher suggests the Trump administration’s
action against the Fed could backfire, and rates may not start sinking
as the president has demanded.
Fed independence
is considered a cornerstone of what makes US financial markets
exceptional. Investors, economists and historians all regard an
independent central bank as key to stable financial markets, as
policymakers can set monetary policy without regard to political
interests.
Jim Edwards (FORTUNE) elaborates,
"Markets moved back into 'Sell America' mode overnight as traders
digested the prospect of an incoming Fed chair who lacks independent
credibility: The dollar sank 0.32% against a basket of international
currencies; the yield on 5-year Treasuries moved sharply up, a sign that
investors now regard U.S. government bonds as being suddenly more
risky; gold futures -- the traditional safe haven -- rose 2.21% today to
hit a new record high over $4,600 per troy ounce; and S&P 500
futures are down 0.66% this morning prior to the opening bell." Medha Singh and Pranav Kashyap (REUTERS) note, "Goldman
Sachs' Jan Hatzius said the indictment threat against Powell has
heightened concerns over the Fed's independence, though he expects the
policy decisions to remain data‑driven."
Chump and his stupidity keep destroying our economy. MARKETWATCH's Mike Murphy adds,
"West Texas Intermediate crude, the U.S. benchmark, was flat after
giving up sharp early gains amid uncertainty around Venezuela’s oil
industry following Trump’s assertion that the U.S. will control the
nation’s oil after U.S. military action that deposed President Nicolás
Maduro last weekend, and unrest in Iran that has seen hundreds of
demonstrators reportedly killed, leading the U.S. to consider a military
response. Oil prices rose more than 3% last week." Ed Carson (INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY) notes, "Credit-card and card-issuing stocks fell after President Trump called for a one-year cap on credit card rates to 10%."
President Donald Trump’s long-running war against Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has escalated.
The
U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District of Columbia has opened a
criminal investigation into Powell over the renovation of the Central
Bank’s headquarters, according to The New York Times. The probe includes a review of Powell’s public statements and an examination of spending records.
The
U.S. Supreme Court has indicated that even if President Donald Trump
can fire the heads of independent agencies, it may ensure there are
protections to stop these powers applying to the Federal Reserve.
The
Trump vs. Slaughter case is being heard by the Supreme Court, which, if
approved, could give the president the power to dismiss the heads of
independent agencies at will, changing a 90-year-old policy.
It
stems from Trump firing Democratic FTC commissioner Rebecca Slaughter
in March, whose term was not set to expire until 2029, but the findings
could be applied to whether Trump can fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome
Powell, as tensions between Powell and the Trump administration
escalate.
Turning to the Jeffrey Epstein files which remain unreleased, December 23rd the US Justice Dept issued this statement:
A.
Tysen Duva serves as the Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal
Division. In this capacity, Mr. Duva supervises the Division’s more
than 1,100 federal prosecutors and staff members who conduct
investigations and prosecutions involving violent crime, sex
trafficking, cartels and transnational criminal organizations, human
smuggling and trafficking offenses, cybercrime, fraud, corruption, money
laundering, child exploitation and other crimes, as well as matters
involving international affairs and sensitive law enforcement
techniques.
Today, Ben Penn (BLOOMBERG NEWS) reports
the latest on the Jeffrey Epstein files which is that the DOJ put a new
"expanded team" over the files January 5th headed by . . . Tyson Duva:
A
supervisor in an office within the Criminal Division that’s been
deluged with Epstein review relayed to staff that DOJ leadership is
“well aware that the project got off to a very rocky start and numerous
issues continue to be flagged for more concrete guidance,” according to a
Jan. 8 email obtained by Bloomberg Law.
Tysen
Duva, who was sworn in last month as head of the Criminal Division,
acknowledged the challenging task at hand, telling employees Jan. 9 that
he knows this isn’t how they wanted to start their year, said the
individual, who like others spoke anonymously about internal
communications.
Duva commended
the division for increasing its daily output through the week, saying
they collectively surpassed 200,000 pages on Jan. 8. But Duva also said
reviewers needed to improve their individual metrics the following week.
The
Criminal Division, home to about 600 lawyers in Washington focused on
white collar and violent crime cases, was enlisted to support previously
assigned reviewers at the FBI, National Security Division and US
attorney’s offices in Manhattan and Miami after more than two million
documents were identified late last year related to the late financier
and convicted sex offender.
Attorney
General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche informed a
federal judge Jan. 5 of plans to divert 400 attorneys across the
department to dedicate all or most of their workdays to complying with
the Epstein Files Transparency Act. But even with additional reviewers,
the complexities remain in protecting victim identities, as required by
the law.
Congress voted The Epstein
Files Transparency Act into law and then (November 19, 2025) Chump
singed the law. The law gave 30 days for the Justice Dept to release
the files. That was December 19th and Pam da Bimbo Bondi missed that
deadline -- well, blew it off. Blew it off? Pam told the court last
week that the Justice Dept had thus far only released about 1% of the
files.
Where are the documents?
And if help was needed, shouldn't Pam Bondi have known that before the
December 19th deadline? But they didn't appoint someone to head the
release until December 23rd -- four days after everything was supposed
to have been released. US House Rep Ro Khanna's office released the
following near the end of last week:
Today, Representatives Ro Khanna (CA-17)
and Thomas Massie (KY-04), the leaders of the Epstein Files Transparency
Act, sent a letter to Judge Paul Engelmayer of the United States
District Court for the Southern District of New York, requesting the
appointment of a Special Master to compel the Department of Justice to
release the full Epstein files as required under Rep. Khanna and Rep.
Massie’s law.
“The Department of
Justice is openly defying the law by refusing to release the full
Epstein files. Millions of files are being kept from the public,” said Rep. Ro Khanna. "The
DOJ has failed to make the necessary redactions to protect survivors
while removing records after publication without any explanation. That
is why we are requesting the appointment of a Special Master to oversee
the release of the files and ensure that the DOJ is following the law.”
"Attorney General Pam Bondi is egregiously violating the requirements of the Epstein Files Transparency Act," said Rep. Thomas Massie.
"Under her leadership, the Department of Justice is missing statutory
disclosure deadlines, making excessive redactions, and illegally
withholding the Department's internal communications. Because the
Department of Justice has shown it cannot be trusted with making the
disclosures required by law, a Special Master should be appointed to
oversee the release of the Epstein files.”
We
write jointly as Members of the United States House of Representatives
who sponsored the Epstein Files Transparency Act, Public Law 119-38 and
as amici curiae in the above-caption manner. We respectfully request permission to file this brief as amici curiae given
our unique expertise as the leads of the Epstein Files Transparency
Act. We are writing to suggest the appointment of a Special Master and
Independent Monitor to compel the Department of Justice (DOJ) to make
mandatory production under the Act.
As
the leads of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, we have urgent and
grave concerns about DOJ’s failure to comply with the Act as well as the
Department’s violations of this Court’s order.
On
December 19, 2025, the Department of Justice released only a portion of
responsive materials. That release, however, did not comply with the
statute as written. The Department failed to meet the Act’s requirements
in multiple respects, including missing the statutory deadline,
asserting common-law privileges that the Act does not permit, and
applying extensive redactions that appear inconsistent with the Act’s
expressed prohibition on withholding or redacting records to protect
politically exposed persons.
Several
federal courts, including this District, have already recognized that
the Act’s disclosure mandate is clear and that its specific statutory
language supersedes pre-existing secrecy rules and generalized privilege
doctrines. Nonetheless, the Department has continued to rely on
arguments that courts have rejected, including the claim that Congress
did not “speak clearly” enough to require disclosure of unclassified
investigative and internal materials, despite Section 2(a)’s unequivocal
language.
Compliance concerns
have been further heightened by the Department’s handling of records
after their release. Independent investigators identified numerous files
that were publicly released on December 19, 2025, and later removed,
including file EFTA00000468. While removal may have been undertaken to
protect victims depicted in the material, an objective that is both
appropriate and required, the Department’s own statements underscore
that this issue is more significant than DOJ has suggested.
DOJ
has acknowledged that, despite tens of thousands of manual redactions
and quality control checks, information that victims believe should have
been redacted was nonetheless posted publicly. DOJ also represented to
the Court that it interprets the Act to require publication of grand
jury and discovery materials unless a statutory basis for withholding
applies, with victim privacy protected through appropriate redactions
rather than categorical withholding. Consistent with those
representations, and with the Court’s order directing DOJ to certify
that victim-identifying information is being protected, the Act allows
narrowly tailored and consistently applied redactions, not the wholesale
removal of records after release or assertions of privilege
inconsistent with the Act. Whether the Department’s actions complied
with those limits is a fact-specific question that would benefit from
neutral, independent review.
We
have reviewed the DOJ’s most recent submission to this Court on January
5, 2026, Dkt. 826, where the DOJ states that it has only produced
“approximately 12,285 documents (compromising approximately 125,575
pages).” The DOJ claims that there is still “more than 2 million
documents potentially responsive to the Act in various phases of
review.” Other reports suggest that the DOJ may be reviewing more than 5
million pages. Because these figures are self-reported and internally
inconsistent with prior representations, there is reasonable suspicion
that the DOJ has overstated the scope of responsive materials, thereby
portraying compliance as unmanageable and effectively delaying
disclosure.
The conduct by the
DOJ is not only a flagrant violation of the mandatory disclosure
obligations under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, but as this Court
has recognized in its previous rulings, the behavior by the DOJ has
caused serious trauma to survivors.
In
addition, the DOJ has not complied with Section 3 of the Act, which
requires the Attorney General, within fifteen days of the deadline for
release, to submit a report to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees
identifying the categories of records released and withheld and
summarizing all redactions and their legal bases. To date, no such
report has been provided. Without it, there is no authoritative
accounting of what records exist, what has been withheld, or why, making
effective oversight and judicial review far more difficult.
Put simply, the DOJ cannot be trusted with making mandatory disclosures under the Act.
While
we believe that criminal violations have taken place and must be
addressed, the most urgent need now is for the DOJ to produce all the
documents and electronically stored information required by the Act. In
its November 26, 2025, letter (Dkt.813), the DOJ represented to this
Court the categories of documents in its possession, much of which has
not been produced.
Thus, in our capacity as amici curiae, we
suggest pursuant to its inherent authority and Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 53, this Court appoint Special Master and/or Independent
Monitor for the purpose of ensuring all the documents and electronically
stored information are immediately made public to be in accordance with
the Epstein Files Transparency Act. We also suggest the Independent
Monitor be given authority to notify and prepare reports to this Court
about the true nature and extent of the document production and if
improper redactions or other improper conduct is taking place. We also
suggest this Court compel testimony from the person or persons most
knowledgeable from the DOJ SDNY office about the production that has
been made, the pending productions, and the representations that have
previously been made to this Court.
Absent
an independent process, as outlined above, we do not believe the DOJ
will produce the records that are required by the Act and what it has
represented to this Court.
We
appreciate the Court’s attention to this letter. We can make ourselves
available to the Court at a future hearing or participate in a briefing
on the need for a Special Master or Independent Monitor or any topic
this court deems helpful for the full and fair administration of
justice.
###
Khanna
then went on MS NOW's THE LAST WORD WITH LAWRENCE O'DONNELL to discuss
the issues and the lack of progress on the part of DOJ.
Meanwhile,
US Senator Mark Kelly took to the Senate floor to announce that the
whims of Pete Looselips Hegseth were not going to be the final words.
Michael Kunzelman (AP) reports,
"Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly sued the Pentagon on Monday over attempts
to punish him for his warnings about illegal orders. Kelly, a former
Navy pilot, is seeking to block his censure from Defense Secretary Pete
Hegseth last week. Hegseth announced last Monday that he censured Kelly
over the former Navy pilot’s participation in a video that called on
troops to resist unlawful orders." Alex Woodward (INDEPENDENT) reports the filings note, "It
appears that never in our nation’s history has the Executive Branch
imposed military sanctions on a member of Congress for engaging in
disfavored political speech" and that this is put at risk “protected
speech, chill legislative oversight, and threaten reductions in rank and
pay. . . . Each of these actions also signals to retired service
members and members of Congress that criticism of the Executive’s use of
the armed forces may be met with retaliation through military
channels."
The senator spoke with Lawrence last night about the lawsuit.
The US government murdered Renee Nicole Good on January 7th in
Minneapolis, Minnesota. ICE agent Jonathan Ross, a man with years of
training in using a firearm and who provided training to others ("a firearms instructor, an active shooter instructor"),
shot and killed the mother of three who was unarmed. Ross, apparently
needing to make social content while on the clock, filmed her and when
the video was released, the world saw that her last words to him were, "I'm not mad at you." By contrast, he or one of his fellow agents immediately called Renee a "f**king bitch"
after plugged her with three bullets. The federal government
immediately began attacking Good -- even though they should be stating
"I can't comment on an ongoing federal investigation."
Instead, as NPR's Martin Kaste observed on January 9th, ALL THINGS CONSIDERED,
"And I think what's not
normal here is the way the federal officials have been publicly passing
judgment on a case that's still being investigated. For instance, just
today, the vice president posted a video that appears to have come from a
device being held by the agent who shot Renee Good on Wednesday. It
shows Good smiling and saying she's not mad at the officer. But Vance
called the video evidence that the officer was in danger. So there seems
to be a real disconnect right now on the basic level of what the
evidence means."
Billie
Eilish has joined a growing number of artists criticizing U.S.
immigration enforcement following the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole
Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minneapolis,
prompting a sharp response from the Department of Homeland Security.
In
a series of posts shared with her millions of followers, Billie Eilish
described ICE as a "federally funded and supported terrorist group" and
urged Americans to contact their members of Congress to demand that the
agency be defunded. She also called for the arrest and prosecution of
the officer involved in the shooting and circulated a list of people who
reportedly died in ICE custody last year.
Serial
liar Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin is quoted and we don't quote
her. She's lying and that's her pattern. You lie to the courts, no
one needs to believe you anymore. She's lied to the press repeatedly.
She also has a husband who got a sweetheart -- and unethical deal --
from Kristi Noem. Was the pay off for that unethical deal that she has
to lie now? I have no idea. But known and repeat liars don't get
quoted here.
“At a very minimum, that woman was very, very disrespectful to law enforcement,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One.
In the days since Good (37) was shot and killed by Jonathan Ross, an Ice agent, Trump administration officials have used a variety of arguments as they have tried to justify the episode.
They have called it an act of self-defence,
and Trump has falsely claimed Good “ran over” the agent. JD Vance, the
vice-president, has argued that Ross has “absolute immunity.”
Remember the roundtable in
Friday's gina & krista round-robin? C.i. told everyone to stop
worrying. Chump wasn't getting the Nobel Prize. Compared it to Roger
getting the physical statue Cuba Gooding Jr. wonfor JERRY MCGURIE on
AMERICAN DAD and Stan pointing out that Roger might have the trophy but
he didn't actually win it? C.I. said it would be like that. Machado
might give Chump her statue but he'd just have the trophy, not the
honor. Machado can refuse to accept it but she does not have the right
to pass the honor on to someone else.
The
organizers of the Nobel Peace Prize have told winner María Corina
Machado it “cannot be revoked, shared or transferred” after she
suggested giving Donald Trump her 2025 award.
The
institute said in a statement the decision to award a Nobel Prize is
“final and stands for all time”, citing the statutes of the Nobel
Foundation, which do not allow appeals.
The warning
comes after the U.S. president said he would be honored to accept the
prize if offered by the Venezuelan opposition leader during a planned
meeting in Washington next week.
Machado’s win
in October was reported to have sparked resentment for Trump, who has
long expressed interest in winning the prize and has at times linked it
to diplomatic achievements, even though she has been effusive in her
support and dedicated her win to him.
Some comments on the article:
dlep law
19 hours ago
She's
the winner. That concept can't be shared or given away. If he wants the
"trophy" or "Certificate," or whatever it is that the winner gets, she
can give it to him. He will still NOT be the winner.
Jon Belt
1 day ago
The
fact that Machado would trade the Nobel Peace Prize for political
purposes says a lot about her. Maybe the Peace Prize committee needs to
reevaluate who it awards the gift to.
Michael Wilbur
23 hours ago
This
is beyond pathetic. He accepts a Purple Heart from a veteran; he puts
his name on another president's memorial and now is begging for a
second-hand Nobel Peace Prize.
Chuck Schwartz
6 hours ago
He's dissed the woman and yet she still wants to give him the award. What lengths WON'T people go to, to suck up to the man?
She can give him the physical trophy. It won't make him a Nobel Peace Prize winner. He's such a loser.
Monday, January 12, 2026. Chump and his administration continue to
smear the woman dead as a result of their actions, Chump's gunning for
Powell yet again, The Epstein Scandal is so widely known that Nikki
Glaser can joke about it on the Golden Globes (no, it's still not going
away, Donald) and much more.
What won't Kristi Noem do?
I
understand she'll do anything for Mardi Gras beads -- anything. But for
the next four weeks, she's mainly going to keep attacking an American
citizen shot dead by Chump's gestapo forces that she overseas.
Taking time away from both her husband and also her long alleged
boyfriend, Homeland Security Tramp and Monster Kristi Noem appeared on
CNN's STATE OF THE UNION. John Bowden (INDEPENDENT) reports:
The shooting of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, prompted hundreds of thousands of Americans to protest across the country this weekend.
Ross
can be heard on his own cell phone video calling Good a “f***ing b****”
before firing into the vehicle as it appears to turn away from his
direction. Whether the officer was struck by the side of the car is
unclear.
The secretary attempted to blame Democrats and the media for prejudging the officer’s guilt, but had no response when the State of the Union host questioned whether the administration’s stalwart defense of the officer’s actions would harm future investigations.
The
whore wants to set the standard for what's allowed. I don't take
standard recommendations from 'family values' politicians who are
married and have public allegations -- even published in THE NEW YORK POST
--
that they are having an ongoing, years-plus affair with another man -- a
man that they have brought in as their co-worker at Homeland Security.
If I wanted to know a really good mattress, I'd take Kristi's opinion
on that or even some really good lubricants. Maybe she's got something
to share if you end up with a venereal disease? But I'm not interested
in a
tramp giving me lectures on standards and what's wrong.
As
Mika noted in the MORNING JOE video protests took place around the
country over the weekend as a result of the US government murdering
Renee Nicole Good.
The US government murdered Renee Nicole Good on January 7th in
Minneapolis, Minnesota. ICE agent Jonathan Ross, a man with years of
training in using a firearm and who provided training to others ("a firearms instructor, an active shooter instructor"),
shot and killed the mother of three who was unarmed. Ross, apparently
needing to make social content while on the clock, filmed her and when
the video was released, the world saw that her last words to him were, "I'm not mad at you." By contrast, he or one of his fellow agents immediately called Renee a "f**king bitch"
after plugged her with three bullets. The federal government
immediately began attacking Good -- even though they should be stating
"I can't comment on an ongoing federal investigation."
Instead, as NPR's Martin Kaste observed on January 9th, ALL THINGS CONSIDERED,
"And I think what's not
normal here is the way the federal officials have been publicly passing
judgment on a case that's still being investigated. For instance, just
today, the vice president posted a video that appears to have come from a
device being held by the agent who shot Renee Good on Wednesday. It
shows Good smiling and saying she's not mad at the officer. But Vance
called the video evidence that the officer was in danger. So there seems
to be a real disconnect right now on the basic level of what the
evidence means." Fat and little Vice president JD Vance is a
professional troll but his efforts this time are especially outrageous.
John Grosso (NATIONAL CATHOLIC REPORTER) observed:
Yesterday (Jan. 7), 37-year-old Renee Good was shot and killed in a
residential Minneapolis neighborhood by an Immigration and Customs
Enforcement officer. Good was a mother of three and an U.S. citizen.
Today, JD Vance has taken to social media to justify the shooting and blame Good for her own death.
Though the full circumstances of the situation are still coming to
light, widely available video evidence shows the horrific moments
before, during and after shots were fired into Good's car. Videos of the
shooting and the ensuing aftermath are graphic and disturbing. After
Good was shot, her car accelerates, slamming into another car and a
pole. In one video, a person can be heard identifying themselves as a physician and offering to help only to be angrily denied by an unidentified ICE agent saying: "I don't care."
The Trump administration was quick to demonize Good. Within hours of
the event and before a formal investigation could even be launched,
Homeland Security Director Kristi Noem labeled Good's actions as an "act
of domestic terrorism." President Donald Trump on Jan. 7 labeled
her as "disorderly, obstructing and resisting, who then violently,
willfully, and viciously ran over the ICE Officer." Trump went on to say
that the ICE officer was lucky to be alive and "is now recovering in
the hospital."
[. . .]
As a Catholic, Vance knows better than to peddle this brand of
gaslighting and agitation. Vance knows that, by virtue of her humanity,
Good was endowed with inherent dignity, made in the image and likeness
of God. Vance knows that only God can take life. Vance knows that
protesting, fleeing or even interfering in an ICE investigation (which
there is no evidence that Good did) does not carry a death sentence.
Vance knows that lying and killing are sins.
Vance knows. He doesn't care. Vance’s twisted and wrongheaded view of Christianity has been repudiated by two popes. His Catholicism seems to be little more than a political prop, a tool only for his career ambitions and desire for power.
The vice president's comments justifying the death of Renee Good are a
moral stain on the collective witness of our Catholic faith. His
repeated attempts to blame Good for her own death are fundamentally
incompatible with the Gospel. Our only recourse is to pray for his
conversion of heart.
Mike's response to Vance's outrageous lies, "As a Catholic, I'm sick of this
little bitch distorting my religion. He needs to be excommunicated.
I'm not joking. He is presenting as a Catholic -- he's been a Catholic
for about five minutes -- and he is distorting our beliefs and our
teaching. Two popes have repudiated him -- Pope Francis and now Pope
Leo. Excommunicate Vance, don't let him speak for the Church or pose as
a Catholic. Whatever crap he was raised before distorted his damn
mind. We cannot allow him to pervert the Catholic faith."
After Renee Nicole Good was shot and killed in her minivan by an
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minneapolis on Jan. 7,
Vice President JD Vance called her murder “a tragedy of her own making”
and claimed that Ms. Good, a community activist and a mother of three,
was “part of a broader left-wing network to attack, to dox, to assault
and to make it impossible for our ICE officers to do their job.”
Mr. Vance claimed further that Ms. Good “viciously ran over the ICE
officer” who shot and killed her, an assertion contradicted by video evidence taken from multiple angles.
Why the obvious lie? Because, similar to Ms. Kirkpatrick and Mr.
Haig, Mr. Vance recognizes the potential for this atrocity to turn
American public opinion against President Trump’s brutal campaign
against undocumented immigrants, particularly because Ms. Good is an
American citizen, was apparently denied medical assistance by ICE agents
after the shooting and, according to the video evidence, posed no real
threat to the shooter. Not even the most fervent supporter of the arrest
and deportation of undocumented migrants, one assumes, would defend
such Gestapo-like tactics.
The answer? Blame Ms. Good for her own murder.
Mr. Vance’s boss, President Trump, has engaged in further deceit and hyperbole in support of that same goal, claiming
that Ms. Good “violently, willfully, and viciously ran over the ICE
officer, who seems to have shot her in self-defense.” She made for an
easy culprit for a man desperate to justify ICE’s actions. After all,
she was already dead.
The murder of the churchwomen in El Salvador in 1980 was not an
isolated incident; they shared the fate of tens of thousands of other
Salvadorans, including Rutilio Grande, S.J., St. Oscar Romero, and the
six Jesuits and two laywomen who were murdered by the Salvadoran
military in 1989 in San Salvador. Eventually, the overwhelming evidence
of these murders became too much for American politicians to justify,
and U.S. funding for the Salvadoran military government dried up. It
just became impossible to believe the lie anymore.
On the 40th anniversary of the martyrdom of the churchwomen of El Salvador, Cardinal Michael Czerny, S.J., preached at a memorial Mass
in Rome on the impact of their witness. “Theirs, mysteriously but
without doubt, is the triumph because vigorous, courageous acts of
solidarity and compassion persist in dreadful, risky conditions,” he
said. “Brutal claims failed and fail to stop the evangelizing.”
Let us hope the same will happen in Minneapolis. Nothing can bring
Renee Good back; her 6-year-old son is without his mother now, her
partner a widow. The masked man who killed her simply drove away. Nor is
her death an isolated incident: All over the country, we hear and see
more and more examples of violent attacks by masked ICE agents who seem
to face no accountability for their crimes. And we hear the brutal
claims used after the fact to justify them.
How long before it simply becomes impossible to believe the lie anymore?
Whitney Curry Wimbish (TAP) notes of Kristi Noem, "Noem repeated the lie that the officer who shot Good to death had done
nothing wrong and that officers had been “surrounded, assaulted, and
blocked in by protesters,” something contradicted by video and
eyewitness evidence. She also said that Good had been following officers
all day prior to her murder, but would not say for how long or whether
there had been earlier interactions, or how many, between Good and the
officers."
I’m Kelly Hayes. I’ve been organizing for justice for years in this
city, and I’ve had the honor of working and thinking alongside many of
you in recent months as we’ve held our ground in defense of our
neighbors. We are gathered here tonight in the cold, among people of
conscience, among neighbors who see themselves in the person who was
gunned down in Minneapolis today. She was 37 years old and her name was
Renee Nicole Good. She was the mother of a six-year-old child. Her
mother described her as “loving, forgiving and affectionate,” and called
her “an amazing human being.”
We grieve for Renee, her family,
and her community, but even before we knew anything about Renee —
including her name — many of us were shaken by her violent death,
because a moment that feels inevitable can still be shocking.
Even
though we know ICE has killed before — and will again — even though
they shot a woman in Chicago and told lies like the lies they are
telling now, even though they are fascist purveyors of violence — their
brutality has not hardened or corrupted us. We are still shaken and
heartbroken by their violence. That is the cost of staying human in
inhuman times — and it’s a cost we pay in defense of our neighbors and
in defense of our own humanity. We feel what they would have us ignore,
and we grieve the violence that their cultish followers applaud.
There
is power in grief, because grief draws us together in moments when our
enemies would tear us apart. Trump, Miller, Bovino, and DHS want us to
believe their violence is inevitable. They want it to become the
background noise of our lives — not something we respond to with love,
tears, and action. They want us to give up on what the world could be,
abandon our decency, and abandon each other. They want us to submit to
their violence, and to accept that the cost of disrupting their attacks
on our communities is death. And if we refuse to forget our neighbors —
if we refuse to become dead inside — they want us to live in fear. They
want us terrorized, afraid to show up for each other the way the people
of Minneapolis have shown up — and the way Chicago has shown up.
And
while this violence didn’t occur in our city, we know what it’s like to
have their guns drawn on us. We understand the terror Minneapolis is
facing, and we feel their loss deeply. A federal agent shot and killed
Renee Nicole Good. And with that shot, ICE took aim at every city where
people have dared to organize against their violence, every place where
neighbors have chosen each other over fear. But people of conscience
will not be cowed. Today, I saw our siblings in struggle in Minneapolis
chanting, “You can’t kill us all.”
I am grateful to the people of
Minneapolis tonight. Their courage in the wake of this violence is a
bright light for us to rally around. They have mobilized — just as we
have mobilized — to protect one another, to love one another, and to
tell ICE to get the fuck out of their communities. And what they have
found together — what we have found together, what so many communities
have found together through collective efforts to create as much safety
and justice as possible — will not be destroyed by acts of violence and
repression.
They want us to scatter in fear, to give up hope, and
to give up on each other. But we will hold more tightly to one another,
plan more strategically, and care even more deeply. We will resist the
normalization of their violence, the immobilization of fear, and the
sense of inevitability they would impose upon us. We will do what our
courageous friends in Minneapolis have done today. We will be a light to
all those who resist — to those forced to hide or live in fear, to
those who want to love and practice care bravely. We will be a reminder
of what people can do when they refuse to give up, and when they refuse
to give up on each other.
Renee was not a
terrorist. She is an American citizen who was murdered. And the liars
in this administration took to the Sunday chat & chews to lie about a
dead American who the government killed. Tom Holman and Kristi were
among the liars who showed up on the Sunday chat & chews. Some
truth tellers also showed up. On NBC's MEET THE PRESS this morning, Senator Chris Murphy called for ICE to stop breaking the law and return to pre-Kristi Noem policies:
We're simply talking about, you know, essentially going back to the way
that ICE was operating when they cared about legality, right?
Identification of officers, that's something that has been standard
practice in every law enforcement agency all across the country. CBP,
who are supposed to be at the border, protecting us at the border,
operating in the interior with no training on how to deal with complex
urban environments, that's brand new. So we just need to get back to a
Department of Homeland Security that is prioritizing the law and
prioritizing keeping people safe. And yes, I think it is reasonable for
Democrats speaking on behalf of the majority of the American public who
don't approve of what ICE is doing to say, "If you want to fund the
Department of Homeland Security, I want to fund a Department of Homeland
Security that is operating in a safe and legal manner."
"I think what we are seeing here is the federal government --
[Department of Homeland Security Secretary] Kristi Noem, Vice President
[JD] Vance, [President] Donald Trump -- attempting to cover up what
happened here in the Twin Cities, and I don't think that people here and
around the country are believing it," Senator Tina Smith declared to host Martha Raddatz on ABC THIS WEEK:
"You are saying
the administration is trying to cover up this shooting. That's a pretty
serious charge. What do you mean exactly," Raddatz asked.
"What
I mean by that is that you can see everything that they are doing is
trying to shape the narrative, to say what happened, without any
investigation," Smith said.
Smith went on to criticize the administration for its response to the shooting.
"What
I think is essential to keep in mind here is that if we're going to
trust the federal government, how can we trust the federal government to
do an objective, unbiassed investigation, without prejudice, when at
the beginning of that investigation they have already announced exactly
what they saw -- what they think happened."
Rep. Ilhan Omar said Sunday that it is "not acceptable" for President
Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi
Noem to have issued public statements condemning the women shot by an ICE agent in Minneapolis "without a full investigation."
"If
they're saying we shouldn't believe our eyes, then let the
investigation take place before you characterize this mother of three as
a domestic terrorist," Omar, a Democrat from Minnesota, said Sunday on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan."
"Prove to us what documentation you have that one, she was paid and
two, that she was agitating when you can hear saying she's not mad,
she's not upset, she's clearly trying to waive cars to bypass her. And
so it's just this level of rhetoric is unjustifiable to the American
people."
This morning, Ben has a new MEIDASTOUCH NEWS video.
The
Golden Globes were handed out last night. Host Nikki Glaser noted,
"There's so many A-listers. And by A-listers, I do mean people who are
on a list that has been heavily redacted. And the Golden Globe for Best
Editing goes to: . . . the Justice Department." No, The Epstein
Scandal is not forgotten, nor is it going away.
Mark Epstein is again disputing the official finding that his brother, disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, died by suicide, insisting new evidence will soon emerge that proves he was murdered, RadarOnline.com can report.
Jeffrey,
a convicted sex trafficker awaiting trial on federal charges, was found
dead in his cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York on
Aug. 10, 2019. Authorities ruled his death a suicide by hanging and
Mark, Jeffrey's younger brother, identified the body.
In the immediate aftermath, widespread public speculation surrounded the circumstances of Jeffrey's death.
Despite
years of investigations, the Department of Justice and the FBI
concluded in a June 2023 report that there was no credible evidence of
foul play. Officials reaffirmed that determination, saying systemic
failures at the jail allowed Jeffrey to take his own life.
Mark
has continued to challenge that conclusion. In a July 2025 interview
with NBC News, he said, "More and more, I believe he was murdered."
He added, "And everyone who looks at all the information that's out there on facts comes to the same conclusion."
I
wasn't there. Nor did I follow the coverage of his death. Chump wants
it to go away now but he's the one who fostered conspiracy talk. Six
months ago, Ali Swenson and Nicholas Riccardi (AP) observed:
His
problem? That nothing-to-see-here approach doesn’t work for those
who've learned from him they must not give up until the government’s
deepest, darkest secrets are exposed.
The online reaction was swift, with followers calling the Republican president “out of touch” and demanding transparency.
Trump's comments to reporters Tuesday while returning to Washington from
a brief Pittsburgh trip were just the latest in a days-long campaign to
quell the uproar. He called the Epstein case “pretty boring” and said
"the credible information has been given."
[. . .]
The
political crisis is especially challenging for Trump because it’s one
of his own making. The president has spent years stoking dark theories
and embracing QAnon-tinged propaganda that casts him as the only savior who can demolish the “deep state."
Now that he's running the federal government, the community he helped build is coming back to haunt him. It's demanding answers he either isn’t able to or doesn't want to provide.
The credibility issue? It's not helped being unable to follow a Congressional order to release the information.
Convicted Felon Donald Chump was never fit to be in the White House
and he's demonstrated it throughout his second term as he continues to
abuse the power of the office of president by using them to seek
retribution. For example, Miacel Spotted Elk (MOTHER JONES) reports:
On Thursday, Republicans in the House failed to override President Donald Trump’s first two vetoes in office: a pipeline project that
would bring safe drinking water to rural Colorado, and another that
would return land to the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians in Florida. Their
inability to block the president’s move signals their commitment to the
White House over their prior support for the measures.
The Miccosukee have always considered the Florida Everglades their home. So when Republicans in Congress voted to expand the tribe’s land base under
the Miccosukee Reserved Area Act—legislation that would transfer 30
acres of land in the Everglades to tribal control—the Miccosukee were
thrilled. After years of work, the move would have allowed the tribe to
begin environmental restoration activities in the area and better
protect it from climate change impacts as extreme flooding and tropical storms threaten the land.
“The measure reflected years of bipartisan work and was intended to
clarify land status and support basic protections for tribal members who
have lived in this area for generations,” wrote Chairman Cypress in a statement last week, “before the roads and canals were built, and before Everglades National Park was created.”
The act was passed on
December 11, but on December 30, President Donald Trump vetoed it; one
of only two vetoes made by the administration since he took office. In a statement,
Trump explained that the tribe “actively sought to obstruct reasonable
immigration policies that the American people decisively voted for when I
was elected,” after the tribe’s July lawsuit challenging the
construction of “Alligator Alcatraz,” an immigration detention center in
the Everglades.
“It is rare for an administration to veto a bill for reasons wholly
unrelated to the merits of the bill,” said Kevin Washburn, a law
professor at University of California Berkeley Law and former assistant
secretary of Indian affairs for the Department of the Interior. Washburn
added that while denying land return to a tribe is a political act,
Trump’s move is “highly unusual.”
The U.S. attorney’s office in the
District of Columbia has opened a criminal investigation into Jerome H.
Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, over the central bank’s renovation
of its Washington headquarters and whether Mr. Powell lied to Congress
about the scope of the project, according to officials briefed on the
situation.
The inquiry, which includes
an analysis of Mr. Powell’s public statements and an examination of
spending records, was approved in November by Jeanine Pirro, a longtime
ally of President Trump who was appointed to run the office last year,
the officials said.
The investigation escalates Mr. Trump’s long-running feud with Mr.
Powell, whom the president has continually attacked for resisting his
demands to slash interest rates significantly. The president has
threatened to fire the Fed chair — even though he nominated Mr. Powell
for the position in 2017 — and raised the prospect of a lawsuit against
him related to the $2.5 billion renovation, citing “incompetence.”
[. . .]
Mr. Powell, in a rare video message released by the Fed, acknowledged on Sunday that the Justice Department had served the central bank with grand jury subpoenas days earlier. He described the investigation as “unprecedented”
and questioned the motivation for the move, even as he affirmed that he
carried out his duties as chair “without political fear or favor.”
The
Fed chair warned that the investigation signaled a broader battle over
the Fed’s independence. “The threat of criminal charges is a consequence
of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best
assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the
preferences of the president,” Mr. Powell added. “This is about whether
the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence
and economic conditions — or whether instead monetary policy will be
directed by political pressure or intimidation.”
AP adds,
"The move represents an unprecedented escalation in President Donald
Trump's battle with the Fed, an independent agency he has repeatedly
attacked for not cutting its key interest rate as quickly as Trump
prefers. The subpoena relates to his testimony before the Senate Banking
Committee in June, Powell said, regarding the Fed's $2.5 billion
renovation of two office buildings, a project that Trump criticized as
excessive."
