ashchaf.bsky.social

NEWS: The U.S. State Department says it will give U.S. visas to defeated Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro and his family who have fled Brazil after Bolsonaro's loss

Marco Rubio, harboring a fugitive

706 corporations raked in $198 billion in tax breaks last year. That's on top of $263 billion in tax breaks from the corporate rate cut in 2017. Their collective tax rate for 2025 is the lowest we've ever tracked.

A reminder for Corporate Democrats: New research from Yale found that Medicare for All would save over 114,000 lives and $1 trillion a year. It's no surprise why the majority of Americans — including 90% of Democratic voters — support it.

NEW: Transgender Texas Student Union has retained counsel in response to the Travis County filing related to the fake transgender mailers. It's Chris Hilton, who previously worked for Ken Paxton at the Texas Attorney General's office and left temporarily to defend Paxton in his impeachment trial.

Very useful history here, delivered very efficiently:

The great Oleksandra Matviichuk is absolutely right to draw attention to the horrible humanitarian crisis in Oleshky. All Putin, Witkoff, and Kushner can do is invert and traduce the meaning of “humanitarianism,” in the best traditions of Russian propaganda.

no matter how sure you are that these guys have broken a whole bunch of laws, you aren't nearly as certain as they are

1. I am very tired of being asked to be stupid. I know that is not the most important thing right now. There are many more serious consequences to electing a criminal president who is burning up the economy.

Jared’s father, Charles Kushner, pleaded guilty to 18 counts of tax evasion and witness tampering. He hired a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law, videotaped it, and mailed the tape to his sister. Trump pardoned him and made him Ambassador to France and Monaco. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles...

Once again, the White House, Musk and the Kremlin all in lock-step that Ukraine must be destroyed.

Elon Musk has spent over $400 million to boost Republicans ahead of the 2026 midterms. That dwarfs the $290 million he spent in 2024. But this time around, Republicans aren’t putting him center stage. Why?

Again: Why does Musk have operational control over any *military grade* version of anything. That’s not how DOD contracts work.

Trump called Elon Musk on Wednesday and asked him to lift restrictions on a military-grade version of Starlink in Ukraine that the SpaceX chief had throttled, U.S. officials said. The system was working more normally Thursday, shortly after their conversation, U.S. and Ukrainian officials said.

“.. the document .. cements the power of a small group of people handpicked by the Trump administration to govern and profit from the deal. The role of the Venezuelan government and the potential benefits to its people are largely absent ..” @propublica.org www.propublica.org/article/trum...

By moving to the “center,” Democrats have failed to fight the forces that led us to Donald Trump: widening inequality, economic insecurity, and the unchecked political power of corporations and the rich. Political centrism is nonsense. There is no middle ground between democracy and oligarchy.

Rein in data centers. Block corporations from mass layoffs. Make the AI economy benefit everyone. Stop AI abuses of our data. Require government approval for new AI products. Together, these five guardrails will protect us from an AI-powered dystopia.

Cause our legacy media owned by billionaires and corporations is broken?

BREAKING NYT: A billionaire wanted a Trump pardon. His family gave Alina Habba a $50 million deal. Julio Herrera Velutini, a prominent Venezuelan, was seeking clemency. He got it not long after his daughter gave Habba, a lawyer close to Trump, an extraordinarily lucrative job.

If Zohran Mamdani or Abdul El-Sayed had used the word “Shylock” as an insult, the ADL would be attacking them by name relentlessly. But Donald Trump used it, so we get a generic condemnation of the word without any specific reference to who actually used it, and with no assumption of intent.

I can think of a few things I need to report. 1. Trump’s reflecting pool scam 2. Kashyap Pramod Vinod Patel’s use of government assets for personal matters 3. Kristi Noem’s DHS contracts to friends

Trump’s own appointees asked the government’s election security agency to secretly hack a voting machine and send the results to the White House. Thankfully, the career staff refused. And the people who actually could have done it had been laid off by DOGE. open.substack.com/pub/adamkinz...

Mr. President, our state is not yours to rename. Our history is not yours to erase. Our culture and identity run deep, shaped by generations of New Mexicans long before you or the U.S. were here at all. We are proud of who we are and where we come from. Because we are New Mexicans.

I honestly don't know what to do with my replies sometimes.

Ten years ago today. In just the last few days: Trump made a deal for the U.S. to buy Russian diesel, an economic lifeline for Putin; he and Elon Musk blamed each other for an order that slowed down Starlink satellite connectivity over Ukraine...

I've convicted over 350 fraudsters, one every 8 days. Ron knowingly took donations from fraudsters who stole $1.6 million from the government. Who do you think is really serious about fighting fraud?

There’s no bottom to Paxton’s corruption. Story: buff.ly/KW18HGD

👇👇👇👇

Carl Quintanilla: Real average hourly earnings down 0.7% on the month, that's the sixth straight month... Jim Cramer: Look, rich people are making a lot of money. God, I sound like Marx. I really don't want to sound like Marx. It's just, look at the data.

BREAKING: " Videos collected by local investigators make it “pretty obvious” that an ICE officer intentionally ran over Miguel Parra Hernandez during an immigration stop Saturday, which could lead to assault charges, the district attorney said Tuesday."

Trump has canceled Biden-era law enforcement actions against 200+ corporations accused of wrongdoing, according to Public Citizen. Corporations that have benefited have previously given $210 million in contributions and pledges to Trump's super PAC and GOP PACs. Everything is for sale.

ICE agent Brenden Cuni still has a job because he’s exactly the kind of person Stephen Miller wants. I’ll dig into his background at NOON PT on @meidastouch.com youtube.com/live/pV2vbKf...

I keep reading that there have been no public executions in the United States for decades. Not true.

Trump praises Fetterman and encourages him to switch parties

It’s wild this January 6er actually sat for this interview and said she deserves restitution for her crimes on that day because Trump pardoned her. She can go to hell.

"Targeting those who bankroll the Russian war machine through oil purchases will crush Putin's ability to fund his war." — Senate GOP, July 28 Ten weeks later, Trump is making oil deals with Putin. A brief history of Republicans being against this, until they weren't 👇

Billionaire families have spent $1.7 BILLION on the 2026 midterms so far — a 5,200% increase since the 2010 midterms. Citizens United is among the worst decisions in history. It corrupts our system every day. Big Money is the root of our dysfunction.

With Trump’s latest betrayal of Ukraine, MAGA Republicans who continue to defend Trump when he licks Putin’s balls can all go fuck themselves. Trump is a feckless, pathetic traitor — and he has the blood of innocent Ukrainian children on his hands.

Republicans in Congress: “IT’s the aDviSoRs.” bsky.app/profile/atru...

Just five giant conglomerates now control 90 percent of the media. The reason this is so dangerous might not be what you think.

Senate Banking just launched the Trumpflation Tracker. The affordability crisis is not a “hoax” like Donald Trump says. See for yourself how much more you’re paying because of Trump’s failed economic agenda

In April, Brookings researchers found 205,000 children affected by ICE 71 % are US citizens. Most lost one parent, but 35,000 kids are left with no parent at all. Since April ICE arrests increased. In July, they arrested 49,000 ppl, most have no criminal record www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

The richest man owns X. The second richest man owns The Washington Post. The third and fifth richest men control Google. The sixth richest man owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. And the eighth richest man now owns both Paramount and Warner Bros. See the problem here?

"We are headed in a direction where what comes after Trump...It’s going to be even nastier, it’s going to be even more corrupt, it’s going to be even more hateful. You can lose people by behaving this way. And Texas GOP is showing that." — Alan Elrod, political theorist 🧾 t2m.co/RvmBhCY

Really great/smart tool from @juddlegum.bsky.social: shining daylight on the mysterious backers of the Super Pacs behind campaign mailers: popular.info/p/this-tool-...

Former Republican Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert died this morning. For 16 years, while he was a coach and government teacher at Yorkville High School in Yorkville, Illinois, Hastert sexually abused at least four boys (and likely more). (thread)