FEED Validator

Congratulations!

This is a valid RSS feed.

Recommendations

This feed is valid, but interoperability with the widest range of feed readers could be improved by implementing the following recommendations.

• line 30, column 0: Use of unknown namespace: com-wordpress:feed-additions:1 (21 occurrences) [help]

  <site xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">210803858</site>	<item>
  

• line 56, column 0: content:encoded should not contain data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c attribute (45 occurrences) [help]

  										<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p class="has-drop-cap">On Thursday, <a  ...
  

• line 62, column 0: content:encoded should not contain data-fuse attribute [help]

  	<div id="ad_slot_22724279127_1" class="ad-slot ad-slot--article-hrec-1" dat ...
  

• line 62, column 0: content:encoded should not contain data-fuse-slot-code attribute [help]

  	<div id="ad_slot_22724279127_1" class="ad-slot ad-slot--article-hrec-1" dat ...
  

• line 231, column 0: content:encoded should not contain fetchpriority attribute [help]

• line 231, column 0: content:encoded should not contain decoding attribute (22 occurrences) [help]

• line 231, column 0: content:encoded should not contain sizes attribute (22 occurrences) [help]

• line 231, column 0: content:encoded should not contain data-recalc-dims attribute (20 occurrences) [help]

• line 610, column 0: content:encoded should not contain loading attribute (19 occurrences) [help]

• line 1004, column 0: content:encoded should not contain iframe tag (41 occurrences) [help]

  <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-emb ...
  

Source: https://www.truthdig.com/feed/

1. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss version="2.0"
2. xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
3. xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"
4. xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
5. xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"
6. xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/"
7. xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/"
8. xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/">
9.  
10. <channel>
11. <title>Truthdig</title>
12. <atom:link href="https://www.truthdig.com/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
13. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/</link>
14. <description>An Independent, Progressive Journal of News and Opinion.</description>
15. <lastBuildDate>Fri, 07 Nov 2025 23:21:34 +0000</lastBuildDate>
16. <language>en-US</language>
17. <sy:updatePeriod>
18. hourly </sy:updatePeriod>
19. <sy:updateFrequency>
20. 1 </sy:updateFrequency>
21. <generator>https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.3</generator>
22.  
23. <image>
24. <url>https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/cropped-favicon.png?fit=32,32</url>
25. <title>Truthdig</title>
26. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/</link>
27. <width>32</width>
28. <height>32</height>
29. </image>
30. <site xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">210803858</site> <item>
31. <title>You Can’t Spell Groyper Without G-O-P</title>
32. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/you-cant-spell-groyper-without-g-o-p/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=you-cant-spell-groyper-without-g-o-p</link>
33. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/you-cant-spell-groyper-without-g-o-p/#respond</comments>
35. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Jeb Lund]]></dc:creator>
36. <pubDate>Fri, 07 Nov 2025 21:50:38 +0000</pubDate>
37. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
38. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
39. <category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
40. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
41. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
42. <category><![CDATA[TD Column]]></category>
43. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
44. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
45. <category><![CDATA[donald trump]]></category>
46. <category><![CDATA[gop]]></category>
47. <category><![CDATA[groyper]]></category>
48. <category><![CDATA[JD Vance]]></category>
49. <category><![CDATA[nick fuentes]]></category>
50. <category><![CDATA[tucker carlson]]></category>
51. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313278</guid>
52.  
53. <description><![CDATA[<p>From Nick Fuentes to Zohran Mamdani, recent events suggest the future of a headless, increasingly neo-Nazi Republican Party is screwed.</p>
54. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/you-cant-spell-groyper-without-g-o-p/">You Can’t Spell Groyper Without G-O-P</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
55. ]]></description>
56. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p class="has-drop-cap">On Thursday, <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> stood frozen in the Oval Office, an insipid smirk on his face, his back to members of his Cabinet clustering around a man who had just keeled over. It’s a metaphor a minute in that place. The night before — in a video that looked like it took a panicked staffer, a copy of iMovie and an AI video-editor free trial to get it down to only mostly deranged — a slurring, bellowing Trump threatened war on Nigeria. “Leave them alone!” he shouted. “WARNING!”&#8221;</p><p>The problem is, a mind like this is irreplaceable.</p><p>This week’s elections underlined the pesky reality that, while tacky is forever, Trump is still mortal, and some repellent goon who wasn’t on NBC’s best-rated reality TV show for years will have to follow him. The president’s obviously increasing dementia, frailty and the fact that blood is coiling above his ankles like the midsection of the Michelin Man already justified an increasing sense of urgency about what comes next for a <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/republican-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="11" title="republican party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">GOP</a> completely remade in his image. Seeing <a href="https://www.gelliottmorris.com/p/trumps-winning-2024-coalition-has" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Trump’s demographic inroads vanish</a> — as Democrats improved in every county in Virginia, won two off-year races in Georgia and elected a Muslim democratic socialist New York City mayor — moved the discussion’s timeline up to tomorrow.</p><p>As it happens, <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/republican-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="11" title="republican party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the GOP</a> was already in the middle of a debate you might summarize as “<a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/tucker-carlson/next-phase-fuentes-carlson-saga-targets-lindsey-grahams-senate-seat" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">How Nazi should we be?,</a>” whose terms are vastly more appealing to most Americans than its other functional expression: “<a href="https://goodpoliticsbadpolitics.substack.com/p/groyper-trouble?utm_medium=ios" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">How much do we like JD Vance</a>?” Ordinarily, such a discussion is called CPAC. This week, you might call it survival. </p><p>Spend enough time with postwar American conservatism, and you hear the greatest hits over and over, retitled and in cover versions. The &#8220;Know Your Enemy&#8221; podcast could be retitled “Guess What’s Back,” without editing a second of run time. Rick Perlstein’s four-volume history of American conservatism from Goldwater to Reagan reads at times like a generations-long story of what happens when an unamended list meets a thesaurus. Pick up a random history — Jessica Mitford’s “The American Way of Death,” say — and there’s the Obamacare backlash cast back in time, a few words changed, only it’s defending your liberty to be charged a 4,000% markup on a coffin that can’t do anything it promises. </p><figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left">
57. <blockquote>
58. <p>A smarter GOP would let the electorate decide and permit themselves another outsider.</p>
59. </blockquote>
60. </figure><p>Which is to say that — <em>pace</em> Lee Atwater — the party’s great ideological debates have long amounted to tweaking the racism dial and looking back at the audience to see how they respond. The out-groups change a little, as does the intensity of their demonization. But otherwise you might picture a Klan hood motionless and unchanging, as pop culture whirls around it, haircuts and lapels and skirts shortening and lengthening and kitchens remodeling in constant flux, like the “We Didn’t Start the Fire” video about a cross burning. </p><p>And why should it not be? Winning is winning. Racism began eroding the promise of the New Deal from the start. Conservative eminence William F. Buckley Jr. supposedly wrestled from the beginning with the radical racist elements of his party, and set the template for the resolution of that conflict: appearing to ostracize them while co-opting their message and rebranding it with an extended pinky. Four and a half decades of conservative dominance began with a guy telling fables about welfare queens and a campaign launch endorsing states’ rights to a white audience in the same place they murdered Freedom Riders. No sane strategist would respond to nearly a half-century of rewriting the zeitgeist with any message but, “Keep going.”</p><p>Thus <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8h8lpGoDWCA" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">we’re on to Cincinnati</a> — or Middletown, halfway to Dayton — the sort of place middle Americans can settle down with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/01/jd-vance-usha-christianity" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">a nice Indian girl</a> and disavow her. Despite <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/jd-vance/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="9" title="JD Vance" target="_blank" rel="noopener">JD Vance</a>’s complete want of personality and obvious need to clone one from any paternal figure profitable to him, the Republican Party’s perpetual radical-versus-establishment racist debate seems determined to woo the vice president as the obvious dauphin of the MAGA monarchy. The need to attenuate just the right embrace of racism <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/11/06/heritage-foundation-tucker-carlson/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">eats away daily at the Heritage Foundation</a>, cradle of Reaganism, just as TV dinner dandy Tucker Carlson and sexually ambiguous goose-stepper Nick Fuentes try to pump more internet groyperism into the building. That neither side has simply used a few select billionaires to effectively kidnap Vance and let him Stockholm Syndrome himself into espousing the right strategy and platform says more about the rot of the party than anything else.</p><div id="ad_slot_wrapper_22724279127_1" class="max-w-td m-auto p-6 ad-slot--wrapper ad-slot--wrapper--article-hrec-1">
61. <!-- 71161633/article_hrec_1/article_hrec_1 -->
62. <div id="ad_slot_22724279127_1" class="ad-slot ad-slot--article-hrec-1" data-fuse="22724279127" data-fuse-slot-code="fuse-slot-227242791271">
63. </div>
64. </div>
65. <p>The persistent category error of Republican officials aping Trump and the strategists trying to shape the course of the next generation of the party is that neither the people nor the policies proposed come attached to a person who already spent over 30 years being famous and regularly on TV for the last stretch of media monoculture. A smarter GOP would let the electorate decide and permit themselves another outsider, but they are determined to cement a line of succession for the same reason geriatric Democrats do: because they’re just mortal mediocrities without it. </p><p>That this is all repellent should be immediately apparent even to the lay viewer. Fuentes is more or less “What if YouTube, 8Chan and the husband who beats Connie in ‘The Godfather’ stepped into the teleporter?” and is exactly as appealing as that sounds to normal people. But, as we learned from <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-life-and-legacy-of-charlie-4chan/">Fuentes’ rival Charlie Kirk</a> — whose Buckleyesque absorption of the former’s schtick to stay relevant was halted only by his death — the Republicans’ bench for the next generation is made up of people brain-poisoned by the same internet diet and supplemented for 15 years by whatever came out of Trump’s brain full of soup. The next bow tied Heritage fellow started out alt-right curious and followed the tiki torch marchers into the darkness; that obsolete term represents the decency ceiling.</p><figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left">
66. <blockquote>
67. <p>There’s a great patriotic war to fight; there are no authorities left to order who may pick up arms.</p>
68. </blockquote>
69. </figure><p>What presents as a personality problem is a symptom of a policy problem. The debate remains stuck at “Is our favorite character from the HBO movie about the Wannsee Conference Reinhard Heydrich going full death’s head, or is it Colin Firth’s dreamy racial-purity lawyer?,” because it can’t change the channel and it can’t move leftward. When you ideologically refuse to offer material opportunities to young people outside of getting in at the bottom of Racism Inc.’s org chart, and when you offer no accelerated advancement except for those who can keep pushing back the rightmost edge, these are your employees. This is a purely capitalist expression of a product meeting its clientele that remains taboo to acknowledge in mainstream media, in a way that an observation like “this biker bar is full of bikers” and “Yankees fans go to Yankee Stadium” is not. </p><p>Trump’s ability to control the party will end with his death. An already increasingly impotent president can’t scheme amongst factions to guarantee a future whose possibility only begins when he ends. Donald Trump’s body politic and body physical rapidly entering their lame-duck period were to be expected. But there is no fill-in for the blank in “long live the____” after the king is dead. To paraphrase Rick Pitino, Trump II is not walking through that door. </p><p>Parties used to plan and game for the last gasps of second terms in the way Russian general staffs thought about German offensives, but as with the pitfalls common to Nazi invasions, Trump thought he could only stay at the top by shooting his generals. There’s a great patriotic war to fight; there are no authorities left to order who may pick up arms. And the only thing left on the ground is white supremacy. </p><p class="is-td-marked">It sounds vile on paper, and it should be received as vile the more it is broadcast to an America where two-thirds of citizens already disapprove of the Trump administration across the board. May it sound even more vile the louder it gets. As it is, the various court tastemakers and pretenders to the throne are largely famous by the standards of C-Span and the more rancid wings of the rancid former Twitter. If this week’s elections are any indication, we can’t wait for the rest of America to meet them.</p>
70. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/you-cant-spell-groyper-without-g-o-p/">You Can’t Spell Groyper Without G-O-P</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
71. ]]></content:encoded>
73. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/you-cant-spell-groyper-without-g-o-p/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
74. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
77. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313278</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/NickFuentesGroyper.png?width=878&#038;height=585" length="1795857" type="image/png" />
78. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/NickFuentesGroyper.png?width=878&#038;height=585" />
79. </item>
80. <item>
81. <title>The Camps and the Gallows</title>
82. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-camps-and-the-gallows/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=the-camps-and-the-gallows</link>
83. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-camps-and-the-gallows/#respond</comments>
85. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Patrick Sauer]]></dc:creator>
86. <pubDate>Fri, 07 Nov 2025 21:28:33 +0000</pubDate>
87. <category><![CDATA[Arts & Culture]]></category>
88. <category><![CDATA[Film]]></category>
89. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
90. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
91. <category><![CDATA[holocaust]]></category>
92. <category><![CDATA[Nazi occupation]]></category>
93. <category><![CDATA[nuremberg]]></category>
94. <category><![CDATA[war crimes]]></category>
95. <category><![CDATA[world war ii]]></category>
96. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313272</guid>
97.  
98. <description><![CDATA[<p>James Vanderbilt’s ‘Nuremberg’ revisits the trial of Hermann Göring.</p>
99. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-camps-and-the-gallows/">The Camps and the Gallows</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
100. ]]></description>
101. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
102. <p class="has-drop-cap">There is a haunting and wordless scene in Stanley Kramer’s 1961 film “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3taV43-lGc" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Judgment at Nuremberg</a>” that’s easy to miss. It takes place in a darkened courtroom, where Spencer Tracy is playing retired American judge <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HB9b-ttI3I" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Dan Haywood</a>, a member of a three-man tribunal overseeing a fictionalized version of the so-called Judge’s Trial, the third of 12 held in the years following World War II to prosecute Nazi leaders and sympathizers accused of war crimes. The prosecution is playing <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCy02267X8A" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">a filmstrip</a> compilation as evidence. As images of children displaying their tattoos and corpses being bulldozed into massive graves flicker past, we get a harrowing close-up of Tracy, who looks away from the screen for a moment, straight down at the table before him. It’s an incredible beat or two of acting in which Tracy serves as proxy for all moviegoers bearing initial cinematic witness to Nazi savagery. Although released nearly a full generation after V-E Day, “Judgment at Nuremberg” was the first mainstream Hollywood movie to feature authentic concentration camp footage. </p>
103.  
104.  
105.  
106. <p>The 15-minute sequence almost didn’t make it into the film. Preview audiences were vehement that the footage be cut, with viewers leaving notes that read, “Eliminate concentration camp films,” and, “Atrocities should not be shown.” But Kramer and screenwriter Abby Mann held firm. “One of Kramer’s goals for the film was to convey the horror of what the Nazis did,” says Jennifer Frost, author of “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Producer-Controversy-Hollywood-Liberalism-Cultureamerica/dp/0700624961" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Producer of Controversy: Stanley Kramer, Hollywood Liberalism, and the Cold War</a>.” “He did not want to shield the audience from that. It was an important contribution to public discussions at the time.” </p>
107.  
108.  
109.  
110. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Unlike “Judgment at Nuremberg,” it is less a traditional courtroom drama than a psychological thriller.</p></blockquote></figure>
111.  
112.  
113.  
114. <p>Released in the U.S. on Dec. 19, 1961, a week after Adolf Eichmann was found guilty in Jerusalem of crimes against humanity and subsequently sentenced to death by hanging, “Judgment at Nuremberg” paved the way for the Holocaust-themed films to come. “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUyY_ybALSw" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">The Pawnbroker</a>” (1964) and “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eiud6lixkE" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Sophie’s Choice</a>” (1982) were critical and commercial hits. In 1978, at the height of network television power, ABC aired the five-part miniseries “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8syufS98LYw" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Holocaust.”</a> In 1997, three years after “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gG22XNhtnoY" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Schindler’s List” </a>took home the best picture Oscar, NBC aired it uncut and without commercials. </p>
115.  
116.  
117.  
118. <p>Almost from the beginning of their use, images of and stories about the camps were forced to contend with the forces of Holocaust denial. Until recently, these forces were a minor strain in American life, with neo-Nazis forced to trade xeroxed pamphlets among themselves and cluster around fringe websites. Today, the siloed algorithmic nationalist stream delivers a perpetual and ever-heavier barrage of pro-Nazi, anti-Holocaust vomit, feeding a growing <a href="https://missouriindependent.com/2024/06/05/white-nationalist-anti-lgbtq-activity-on-the-rise-annual-hate-report-shows/." rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">number of homegrown American hate groups</a>. The horrifying details that stopped “Judgment at Nuremberg” audiences <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-53327890" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">have become grist for the darkest meme grotesquerie mills</a>.</p>
119.  
120.  
121.  
122. <p>Into this dark scramble of misinformation and far-right ascendency comes “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvAy9C-bipY" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Nuremberg</a>,” which hits theaters this weekend. Directed by James Vanderbilt, it is a chronological prequel to Kramer’s 1961 classic, and concerns the first Nuremberg trial, a historic, nearly yearlong prosecution of 24 Nazi defendants, including Adolf Hitler’s second-in-command, Hermann Göring. It is based on Jack El-Hai&#8217;s gripping 2013 nonfiction book “<a href="https://www.el-hai.com/the-nazi-the-psychiatrist" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">The Nazi and the Psychiatrist,</a>” about the California shrink and amateur magician Dr. Douglas Kelly, who is sent to Nuremberg prior to the tribunal to determine if Göring is sane enough to be put to death. </p>
123.  
124.  
125.  
126. <p>Late in “Nuremberg,” the trial takes center stage, but unlike “Judgment at Nuremberg,” it is less a traditional courtroom drama than a psychological thriller based on the sessions between doctor and patient. The intellectual Kelly seeks to understand the psychology of how one participates in genocide. Göring is adamant that while he was a devoted Nazi, he played no part in the extermination camps and would surely be found not guilty. Throughout El-Hai’s book and Vanderbilt’s adaptation, the question lingers as to whether the 33-year-old officer in the Society of American Magicians is getting played by the infamous reischmarschall in his care.  </p>
127.  
128.  
129.  
130. <p>As the trial progresses, their relationship evolves into something like collegial camaraderie. Kelly comes to believe that Göring and other Nazis aren’t psychopaths or “monsters,” but rather ordinary men who believed in, or decided to go along with, the Third Reich. It’s a precursor to Hannah Arendt’s description of Adolf Eichmann as personifying the “banality of evil,” a mediocrity without deep malice or hatred. Although not a Nazi apologist, Kelly’s intense individual work with Göring, coupled with his professional opinion that no “Nazi mind” exists, ran him afoul of the American military’s goal of quickly labeling them psychos en masse and expediting their trip to the gallows. Kelly was relieved of his duties before prosecutors broke Göring and sentenced him, along with 10 fellow Nazis, to death by hanging. In the hours before his execution, Göring outfoxed the Allies one last time, committing suicide with a clandestine cyanide capsule. A tragic combination of his time in Germany, a thwarted career, paranoia, alcoholism and mental illness led Kelly to mirror his former patient. On New Year’s Day 1958, he also committed suicide by cyanide pill.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>
131.  
132.  
133.  
134. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>A reminder of how quickly evil can triumph when people go quiet and look away.</p></blockquote></figure>
135.  
136.  
137.  
138. <p>As in “Judgment at Nuremberg,” the suspense in “Nuremberg” builds to a virtuous climax that follows history through to the nooses. At its core, “Nuremberg” is a two-hander between Kelly and Göring in the fashion of Clarice Starling and Hannibal Lecter, a dichotomy that never favors the righteous straitlaced character. As Dr. Kelly, Rami Malek can’t command the screen with the same malevolent glee as Russell Crowe’s terrifying, drug-addled and lumbering Göring packed into decorated Nazi finery. However, as with “Judgment at Nuremberg,” the film’s flaws seem less important when the courtroom lights dim and the same concentration camp filmstrip begins to roll. </p>
139.  
140.  
141.  
142. <p class="is-td-marked">Can such a film — or the filmstrip within it — have an impact in 2025? Holocaust movies struggle to find audiences these days. “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFNtVaAuVYY" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">The Zone of Influence</a>,” Jonathan Glazer’s masterful 2023 depiction of another Nazi officer’s depraved adherence to Arendt’s “banality of evil,” was a global festival award winner, but it made about as much cultural and box office noise as Hedwig Höss in her garden. It’s hard to imagine “Nuremberg” breaking through, but one hopes that it will be widely seen, and be felt in the conversation around the resurgent far right. Like “Judgment at Nuremberg,” the timely core of &#8220;Nuremberg&#8221; is a reminder of how quickly evil can triumph when people go quiet and look away. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgvR67Ktwio" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">In his sentencing speech</a>, Judge Haywood calls upon us all to stand up for “justice, truth and the value of a single human being.” It would be heartening if either of these films stirred the inner-Spencer Tracy in a nation that seems to be forgetting that the Nazis were and remain the enemy. Judge Haywood may have looked away, but he never closed his eyes.</p>
143. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-camps-and-the-gallows/">The Camps and the Gallows</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
144. ]]></content:encoded>
146. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-camps-and-the-gallows/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
147. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
150. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313272</post-id> <enclosure url="https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/im-39435366-878x585.jpg" length="35856" type="image/avif" />
151. <media:thumbnail url="https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/im-39435366-878x585.jpg" />
152. </item>
153. <item>
154. <title>Venezolanos se alistan voluntariamente en milicias mientras Estados Unidos continúa con sus ataques</title>
155. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/venezolanos-se-alistan-voluntariamente-en-milicias-mientras-estados-unidos-continua-con-sus-ataques/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=venezolanos-se-alistan-voluntariamente-en-milicias-mientras-estados-unidos-continua-con-sus-ataques</link>
156. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/venezolanos-se-alistan-voluntariamente-en-milicias-mientras-estados-unidos-continua-con-sus-ataques/#respond</comments>
158. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Jessica Dos Santos Jardim]]></dc:creator>
159. <pubDate>Fri, 07 Nov 2025 17:03:23 +0000</pubDate>
160. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
161. <category><![CDATA[Americas]]></category>
162. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
163. <category><![CDATA[Global Voices]]></category>
164. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
165. <category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
166. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
167. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
168. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
169. <category><![CDATA[donald trump]]></category>
170. <category><![CDATA[extrajudicial killings]]></category>
171. <category><![CDATA[nicolas maduro]]></category>
172. <category><![CDATA[pete hegseth]]></category>
173. <category><![CDATA[war on drugs]]></category>
174. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313253</guid>
175.  
176. <description><![CDATA[<p>Tras una década de sanciones económicas contra Venezuela, los ataques militares de Estados Unidos en realidad no tienen como objetivo detener el tráfico de drogas.</p>
177. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/venezolanos-se-alistan-voluntariamente-en-milicias-mientras-estados-unidos-continua-con-sus-ataques/">Venezolanos se alistan voluntariamente en milicias mientras Estados Unidos continúa con sus ataques</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
178. ]]></description>
179. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
180. <p class="has-drop-cap">CARACAS, Venezuela – En las instalaciones militares de Venezuela, hombres y mujeres de todas las edades y con distintas condiciones físicas apuntan y disparan en busca de la precisión, cruzan ríos agarrados a una soga, se ocultan entre montículos o trepan a los árboles para ver qué les depara el horizonte. Son más de 8 millones de venezolanos, sin experiencia militar, que decidieron alistarse en la milicia por si <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a> decide atacar a su país.&nbsp;</p>
181.  
182.  
183.  
184. <p>A finales de agosto, el gobierno de Estados Unidos ordenó un incremento de sus fuerzas militares en el Caribe. El despliegue incluyó una flota compuesta por destructores de misiles guiados, buques anfibios, un submarino nuclear y más de 4.500 infantes de marina, además de cazas furtivos F-35 estacionados en Puerto Rico. A este contingente anunciaron que se sumará “próximamente” un <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/10/24/us-deploys-aircraft-carrier-amid-hardening-stance-towards-venezuela" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">portaaviones</a> con otro grupo de destructores. Pasados tres meses de crecientes tensiones, ¿cuál es la realidad en el terreno y qué le espera a Venezuela?&nbsp;</p>
185.  
186.  
187.  
188. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Escalada y narrativa</h3>
189.  
190.  
191.  
192. <p>De acuerdo con Washington, se trata de una “misión oficial para luchar contra el narcotráfico”, algo que incluye supuestos cárteles vinculados al gobierno venezolano. Sin embargo, expertos en distintos medios de comunicación <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/opinions/2025/10/24/the-us-warships-off-venezuela-arent-there-to-fight-drugs" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">aseguran</a> que este despliegue, el más grande en la región en más de medio siglo, pretende desestabilizar y eventualmente derrocar al presidente Nicolás Maduro.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>
193.  
194.  
195.  
196. <p>Desde el 2 de septiembre, Estados Unidos ha <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/10/28/us-kills-14-people-in-three-strikes-on-alleged-drug-smuggling-boats" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reportado</a> el ataque a quince embarcaciones en el Caribe y en el Pacífico oriental, matando a <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2025/11/02/politics/timeline-us-strikes-caribbean-pacific-vis" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">64</a> tripulantes, cuyos nombres y nacionalidades se desconocen, pero a quienes ha acusado, sin pruebas, de ser narcotraficantes.&nbsp;</p>
197.  
198.  
199.  
200. <p>Además de estos ataques letales, catalogados por el embajador permanente de Venezuela ante las Naciones Unidas, Samuel Moncada, como ejecuciones <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/venezuela-condemns-us-caribbean-strikes-at-the-un/a-74393376" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">extrajudiciales</a>, se han registrado provocaciones con aviones de guerra norteamericanos entrando en el espacio aéreo venezolano.</p>
201.  
202.  
203.  
204. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Desde el 2 de septiembre, Estados Unidos ha <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/10/28/us-kills-14-people-in-three-strikes-on-alleged-drug-smuggling-boats" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reportado</a> el ataque a quince embarcaciones en el Caribe y en el Pacífico oriental.</p></blockquote></figure>
205.  
206.  
207.  
208. <p>Estos episodios han hecho que la opinión pública nacional e internacional se pregunte si se aproxima o no una intervención militar. Durante la primera administración de <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a>, el mandatario aseguró que &nbsp;&#8220;todas las opciones estaban sobre la mesa&#8221;. Ahora, cuestionado sobre si busca el “cambio de régimen”, <a href="https://www.dw.com/es/trump-rechaza-carta-de-maduro-con-invitaci%C3%B3n-al-di%C3%A1logo/a-74101455" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">ha dicho</a>: “Ya veremos qué pasa”.&nbsp;</p>
209.  
210.  
211.  
212. <p>Sus declaraciones son ambiguas pero en el terreno de lo fáctico el escenario del año 2019, cuando el diputado opositor Juan Guaidó se autojuramentó como &#8220;presidente encargado&#8221; de Venezuela obteniendo el reconocimiento de 60 países, y el actual, poseen grandes diferencias. Ya la oposición no tiene un &#8220;gobierno paralelo&#8221; y Trump <a href="https://youtu.be/ojORlHXgFUQ" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">asegura</a> no saber quién es María Corina Machado.&nbsp;</p>
213.  
214.  
215.  
216. <p>“A partir de 2019 vimos una ofensiva mucho más diplomática y mediática. Todos los medios internacionales hablaron de Venezuela diariamente durante dos años”, dijo a Truthdig Ociel&nbsp;Alí&nbsp;López, sociólogo, analista político y profesor de la Universidad Central de Venezuela. “Ahora no es el caso. Hoy Venezuela no tiene ese protagonismo, pero ahora sí hay una amenaza militar cercana, un teatro de operaciones en marcha”.</p>
217.  
218.  
219.  
220. <p>Como guinda para el pastel, Trump dijo que Estados Unidos está evaluando posibles “ataques contra objetivos terrestres” en territorio venezolano. Además, lo hizo en medio de una comparecencia en la que confirmó que <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/us/politics/trump-covert-cia-action-venezuela.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">autorizó</a> a la CIA a realizar operaciones encubiertas en Venezuela.</p>
221.  
222.  
223.  
224. <p>El analista destacó también los cambios en la región, con gobiernos actuales en Colombia y Brasil que no apoyan un ataque militar contra Venezuela, y el hecho de que se mantienen ciertos vínculos comerciales con Estados Unidos con la licencia de la empresa Chevron para extraer y exportar petróleo de Venezuela.</p>
225.  
226.  
227.  
228. <p>“La gente en Venezuela también parece menos interesada en el tema. No veo que haya tanto miedo ni personas yéndose del país. En 2019 lo que iba a ocurrir parecía más inminente y al final no ocurrió; ya algunos no lo ven factible”, concluyó.</p>
229.  
230.  
231.  
232. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313210" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=683 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=608&amp;height=405 608w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=878&amp;height=585 878w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=2000 2000w" sizes="(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">En la Plaza Bolívar en Caracas, se respira un ambiente festivo y relajado. Foto: Jessica Dos Santos Jardim.</figcaption></figure>
233.  
234.  
235.  
236. <p>En resumen, Estados Unidos ha incrementado la amenaza directa aunque no cuente con una fuerza opositora visible y organizada. De hecho, el candidato presidencial de la oposición, Edmundo González, se encuentra exiliado en España y María Corina está “en la clandestinidad”. En el último llamado a la calle de esta oposición, el 9 de enero del 2025, no aglutinó la cantidad de gente que esperaban y desde entonces no existe ninguna manifestación activa.&nbsp;</p>
237.  
238.  
239.  
240. <p>Hoy un eventual ataque traería a Trump un costo diplomático y también un costo interno dentro de su propia base de apoyo.. Pero predecir las intenciones del presidente estadounidense es un ejercicio fútil.</p>
241.  
242.  
243.  
244. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Argumentos falaces</h3>
245.  
246.  
247.  
248. <p>El Ministro del Interior y Justicia, Diosdado Cabello, <a href="https://redradiove.com/cuanto-gasta-ee-uu-en-la-operacion-militar-en-el-caribe/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">señaló</a> que, según estimaciones basadas en reportes presupuestarios de interdicción del&nbsp;Departamento de Defensa&nbsp;y la&nbsp;Guardia Costera de EE.UU., el despliegue militar podría costar de 10 a 15 millones de dólares diarios.</p>
249.  
250.  
251.  
252. <p>¿Todo esto para hundir lanchas en el mar? Pero su objetivo es crear una narrativa con un enemigo que solo puede ser detenido con ataques de esta índole. Ese mismo discurso se extiende al plano interno también para justificar la persecución de migrantes.</p>
253.  
254.  
255.  
256. <p>La Casa Blanca ha creado la tesis de que el crecimiento de sobredosis en el país representa un “ataque <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/02/trump-administration-caribbean-drug-cartels" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">armado</a>” por parte de los carteles, apuntando el dedo a Venezuela, para así justificar el uso de la fuerza letal. El problema es que los datos existentes contradicen la tesis de que Venezuela representa una amenaza “narcoterrorista”.</p>
257.  
258.  
259.  
260. <p>Las sobredosis en Estados Unidos, que no ha disminuido después de la declaratoria de “guerra contra las drogas” de Trump, se debe sobre todo al consumo de <a href="https://www.gao.gov/blog/fentanyl-continues-be-leading-cause-overdose-deaths.-whats-being-done-combat-trafficking-united-states" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">fentanilo</a>, que proviene de México con precursores de China. Y en lo que toca a la cocaína, Venezuela no es un país productor y su rol en el flujo es muy reducido.</p>
261.  
262.  
263.  
264. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>El problema es que los datos existentes contradicen la tesis de que Venezuela representa una amenaza “narcoterrorista”.</p></blockquote></figure>
265.  
266.  
267.  
268. <p>“Las cifras que entregan las Naciones Unidas, la misma Agencia Antidrogas de Estados Unidos (DEA), los estudios entre comillas independientes dentro de Estados Unidos, dicen que entre 80 y 90 % de la cocaína que llega al país viene por el Pacífico”, aseguró a Truthdig María Fernanda Barreto, analista política colombo-venezolana.</p>
269.  
270.  
271.  
272. <p>Los <a href="https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/Previous-reports.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Informes</a> Anuales de Drogas de la Organización de las Naciones Unidas contra la Droga y el Delito (UNODC) desde 1999 hasta 2025 fueron examinados por el gobierno venezolano y durante estos 27 años seguidos Venezuela no aparece como un país de relevancia en materia de drogas ilícitas, de estupefacientes ni de narcóticos.&nbsp;</p>
273.  
274.  
275.  
276. <p>La propia DEA ni menciona a Venezuela en su <a href="https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2025-02/508_5.23.2024%20NDTA-updated.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">informe</a> anual de 2024. A lo largo de los años, la ruta por el este del mar Caribe ha representado entre el 5 y el 10% del flujo de cocaína hacia Estados Unidos.</p>
277.  
278.  
279.  
280. <p>Al respecto, Pino Arlacchi, exsecretario general de la UNODC, <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/opinion/the-great-hoax-against-venezuela-oil-geopolitics-disguised-as-war-on-drugs/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">dijo</a> abiertamente que la campaña de Estados Unidos tiene como objetivo apoderarse de las reservas petroleras venezolanas, las <a href="https://www.worldometers.info/oil/oil-reserves-by-country/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">mayores</a> del mundo.</p>
281.  
282.  
283.  
284. <p>Sobre el tablero también están otras preguntas: ¿por qué, <a href="https://orinocotribune.com/venezuelas-vp-rodriguez-85-of-drug-trafficking-profits-remain-in-the-united-states/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">según</a> la vicepresidenta Delcy Rodríguez, el desempeño antidroga de Venezuela mejoró tras la expulsión de la DEA en 2005? ¿Por qué la mayoría de la droga fluye por países aliados de Washington y con fuerte presencia de agencias estadounidenses? ¿Quién se queda con la mayor parte de las ganancias por el tráfico de narcóticos?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>
285.  
286.  
287.  
288. <p>“Estados Unidos, específicamente la DEA y la CIA, es quien administra el negocio del narcotráfico en América”, aseguró Barreto. “Son sus centros económicos, sus bancos, quienes además lavan los capitales. Ese lavado de capitales es una de sus principales herramientas para sobrevivir a las crisis económicas cíclicas propias de su sistema”.</p>
289.  
290.  
291.  
292. <p>En efecto, bancos como <a href="https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias/2012/07/120717_hsbc_mexico_escandalo_analisis_lav" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">HSBC</a>, <a href="https://www.eleconomista.com.mx/ultimas-noticias/Wells-Fargo-involucrado-en-lavado-del-narco-mexicano-20100317-0107.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Wells Fargo</a> y <a href="https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/2024/10/10/multa-3-000-millones-td-bank-blanqueo-dinero-carteles-droga-trax" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">TD Bank</a> recibieron multas históricas por su vinculación con el lavado de capitales provenientes del narcotráfico.</p>
293.  
294.  
295.  
296. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Hablan las calles</h3>
297.  
298.  
299.  
300. <p>Mientras tanto, en las calles de Venezuela se respiran dos climas: uno de tensión y miedo versus otro de desconocimiento e incredulidad. Pero ambos sectores celebraron la beatificación de los ahora santos José Gregorio Hernández y Carmen Rendiles y planean las fiestas decembrinas.</p>
301.  
302.  
303.  
304. <p>Especular sobre las intenciones y los próximos pasos de la administración Trump no lleva muy lejos. Así que en las calles reinan temas más cotidianos. Por ejemplo: ¿cuánto costará preparar el plato típico navideño en un contexto de devaluación cambiaria diaria junto a un marcador paralelo casi 50% más alto?</p>
305.  
306.  
307.  
308. <p>Mientras la presión militar es un fenómeno nuevo, Venezuela ha sufrido ataques económicos incesantes en los últimos 10 años, con sanciones unilaterales por parte de Estados Unidos hacia varios sectores económicos especialmente la <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/infographics/us-sanctions-against-the-venezuelan-oil-industry/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">industria petrolera</a>.&nbsp;</p>
309.  
310.  
311.  
312. <p>En 2021, la Relatora Especial de la ONU sobre el impacto negativo de las medidas coercitivas unilaterales, Alena Douhan, <a href="https://observatorio.gob.ve/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Informe-de-Relatora-Especial-de-la-ONU-Alena-Douhan-1.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">advirtió que</a>, debido a las sanciones, la disponibilidad de alimentos disminuyó en un 73%, 180.000 cirugías no pudieron realizarse por falta de antibióticos o anestesia; 2,6 millones de niños fueron privados de vacunas contra la meningitis, el rotavirus, la malaria, el sarampión, la fiebre amarilla y la influenza mientras que 80.000 pacientes de VIH/SIDA tuvieron que suspender su tratamiento.</p>
313.  
314.  
315.  
316. <p>Actualmente, Venezuela produce el <a href="https://www.sunagro.gob.ve/venezuela-produce-97-de-los-alimentos-de-su-consumo-interno/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">97%</a> de los alimentos que consume y la fabricación nacional de medicamentos alcanza el <a href="https://www.telesurtv.net/medicamentos-venezuela-produccion-nacional/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">80%</a>. Hay disponibilidad pero no los suficientes recursos económicos. De hecho, una buena parte de los venezolanos tiene varios trabajos para cubrir sus gastos básicos.&nbsp;</p>
317.  
318.  
319.  
320. <p>En este contexto, el gobierno venezolano ha tenido que manejar equilibrios difíciles, adoptando una visión más liberal en su intento de estabilizar la economía.</p>
321.  
322.  
323.  
324. <p>Desde octubre del año pasado, el Banco Central de Venezuela (BCV) viene devaluando progresivamente la moneda nacional. La tasa de cambio entre el dólar y el bolívar creció de <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DBhMuW8NLBN/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">1:40</a> a más de <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DQKu5z3k_bv/?hl=es&amp;img_index=1" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">1:200 </a>en estos 12 meses.&nbsp;</p>
325.  
326.  
327.  
328. <p>La presión cambiaria se debe también a una nueva licencia <a href="https://www.reuters.com/latam/negocio/VKN3HKJC2BISLA2BOW33X4NJ6Y-2025-07-30/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">emitida</a> de forma privada a Chevron a finales de julio, que permite a la empresa operar en Venezuela pero limita los pagos en divisas. En este sentido, el BCV ha otorgado a través de las mesas cambiarias una cantidad de divisas <a href="https://www.bancaynegocios.com/dolar-oficial-se-cotizara-en-bs-205con68-el-lunes-20-luego-de-registrar-un-aumento-semanal-de-6con40-porciento/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">32,26% </a>por debajo del monto correspondiente el año pasado.</p>
329.  
330.  
331.  
332. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313208" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=683 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=608&amp;height=405 608w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=878&amp;height=585 878w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=2000 2000w" sizes="(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">En el Mercado de Guaicaipuro en Caracas, la gente se prepara para las festividades de fin de año. Foto: Jessica Dos Santos Jardim.</figcaption></figure>
333.  
334.  
335.  
336. <p>Según López, la amenaza militar ha exigido al gobierno destinar recursos a la defensa, reduciendo el aporte de divisas al resto de la economía. “El diferencial entre la tasa oficial y la paralela es casi del 50%. Eso está teniendo un efecto tremendo en los precios, sobre todo en los alimentos”, agregó.&nbsp;</p>
337.  
338.  
339.  
340. <p>Entre agosto y septiembre, el precio de la carne de primera en los mercados de Caracas saltó de $9,80 a $12,5 por kilo, un alza de 27,5 %. Hoy supera los $15. A esta dinámica se suma el ajuste en el transporte público, que tras permanecer congelado desde abril, subió 60% en moneda local.</p>
341.  
342.  
343.  
344. <p>En cambio, economistas como Tony Boza tienen una lectura distinta. Para el diputado del Partido Socialista Unido de Venezuela, la economía venezolana sufre las consecuencias de la dolarización y de una visión monetarista de los decisores. Aunque reconoce que las sanciones estadounidenses han golpeado la industria petrolera y aislado al país, defiende que la política actual prioriza el control de la inflación sobre el bienestar de la mayoría.&nbsp;</p>
345.  
346.  
347.  
348. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>La economía venezolana sufre las consecuencias de la dolarización y de una visión monetarista de los decisores.</p></blockquote></figure>
349.  
350.  
351.  
352. <p>“Según cifras de algunos analistas privados, porque el BCV no lo publica, el tamaño de nuestra economía actual está alrededor de los 140.000 millones de dólares pero la liquidez actual no llega al 3%”, detalló Boza a Truthdig. “En el peor momento, que fue en 1950, circulaba una liquidez que equivalía al 10% del PIB”.&nbsp;</p>
353.  
354.  
355.  
356. <p>Según el economista, la obsesión por reducir la liquidez para que no genere inflación se traduce en los bajos salarios y pensiones que reinan en el país. El salario mínimo mensual en Venezuela es menor a 1 dólar, y la mayor parte del ingreso se percibe a través de bonos. Desde el 1 de mayo, por <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuela-maduro-govt-announces-may-day-bonus-increase-maintains-wage-freeze/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">decreto</a> del gobierno, los funcionarios públicos reciben 160 dólares mensuales provenientes mayormente del denominado “Bono de guerra económica”.</p>
357.  
358.  
359.  
360. <p>Además, Boza señala que la entrega de divisas por parte del BCV es un mecanismo poco transparente. “No sabemos si se están entregando los dólares a empresarios que traen insumos para su producción o a empresas de maletín que especulan y generan la brecha cambiaria”, explicó.</p>
361.  
362.  
363.  
364. <p>El diputado del estado Zulia argumentó que el Estado venezolano “se desentendió” de temas fundamentales como la distribución de la riqueza.&nbsp;</p>
365.  
366.  
367.  
368. <p>“Se dejó de publicar el coeficiente de Gini porque el salario es el pivote de la distribución de la riqueza y tiene impacto, no solamente en la administración pública, sino también en la privada”, resaltó.</p>
369.  
370.  
371.  
372. <p>A su juicio, en términos económicos, y en este contexto de creciente presión externa, el país vive un “sálvese quien pueda” que el gobierno debe rectificar.</p>
373.  
374.  
375.  
376. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">La respuesta oficial y popular a los ataques estadounidenses</h3>
377.  
378.  
379.  
380. <p>El gobierno, en efecto, ha priorizado el crecimiento económico en su discurso, buscando presentar una imagen de estabilidad propicia a la inversión extranjera. Pero el tema principal en las últimas semanas ha sido la defensa de la soberanía frente a las amenazas crecientes.&nbsp;</p>
381.  
382.  
383.  
384. <p>En consonancia con esto, el 29 de septiembre se <a href="https://www.swissinfo.ch/spa/maduro-firma-decreto-de-conmoci%c3%b3n-externa-ante-%22amenazas%22-de-ee.uu.%2c-dice-vicepresidenta/90088843" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">decretó</a> un estado de conmoción externa que se activaría ante cualquier agresión contra el país y otorgaría poderes extraordinarios para la administración y la defensa nacional durante 90 días prorrogables.&nbsp;</p>
385.  
386.  
387.  
388. <p>La medida fue acompañada por grandes ejercicios militares en La Orchila con la participación de miles de soldados y milicianos, desplegados en maniobras conjuntas, navales y aéreas. Recientemente, Maduro <a href="https://www.france24.com/es/minuto-a-minuto/20251023-maduro-dice-que-venezuela-tiene-5-000-misiles-antia%C3%A9reos-port%C3%A1tiles-rusos-ante-las-amenazas-de-eeuu" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">resaltó</a> el poderío del arsenal venezolano de Igla-S, un sistema portátil de defensa antiaérea diseñado por Rusia para derribar aviones, helicópteros y drones a baja altitud.</p>
389.  
390.  
391.  
392. <p>En simultáneo, Caracas ha acudido a la diplomacia, convocando una reunión de emergencia del Consejo de Seguridad de Naciones Unidas. En las últimas semanas, países como Rusia y China, así como organizaciones multilaterales como el Movimiento de Países No Alineados, han <a href="https://humanidadenred.org/comunicado-movimiento-de-paises-no-alineados-rechaza-despliegue-militar-de-eeuu-en-el-caribe/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">condenado</a> las amenazas de Estados Unidos contra la nación caribeña.</p>
393.  
394.  
395.  
396. <p>A nivel interno, el gobierno de Maduro también ha apostado por una campaña de movilización y <a href="https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x9ptit0" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">asegura</a> que un total de 8.200.000 venezolanos participaron en las dos primeras jornadas de alistamiento militar en la Milicia Bolivariana, un cuerpo voluntario complementario a las fuerzas armadas convencionales.</p>
397.  
398.  
399.  
400. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313209" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=683 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=608&amp;height=405 608w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=878&amp;height=585 878w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=2000 2000w" sizes="(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Anaís Márquez. Foto: Jessica Dos Santos Jardim.</figcaption></figure>
401.  
402.  
403.  
404. <p>Anaís Márquez, vocera de la Comuna 5 de Marzo Comandante Eterno en Caracas e integrante de la Dirección Nacional de la <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89Y0XYwWriM" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Unión Comunera</a>, afirmó a Truthdig que las bases organizadas, incluyendo a milicianos y comuneros, están al pie del cañón.&nbsp;</p>
405.  
406.  
407.  
408. <p>“Acudimos al llamado que nos hizo el presidente, nos alistamos y nos estamos preparando tanto física como psicológicamente”, explicó. “Este nuevo tipo de episodio de guerra contra Venezuela ha sido una novedad y no podemos negar que nos tiene nerviosos, pero confiamos en un gobierno que ha sabido ser estratega y dar la cara”.</p>
409.  
410.  
411.  
412. <p>Al respecto, Márquez detalla que todos los sábados se llevan adelante las “preparaciones físicas” en Fuerte Tiuna, una de las instalaciones militares más conocidas de Caracas. “Estos ejercicios están dirigidos a todos los que quieran participar pero asisten los que más tienen conciencia de lo que está ocurriendo. Mientras que la preparación psicológica se enfoca en talleres para desmontar las falsas noticias que se generan especialmente en las redes”.</p>
413.  
414.  
415.  
416. <p>A su juicio, “si llegasen a tomar a Venezuela por tierra”, el pueblo organizado se desplegaría como la última fuerza. “Preparados no estamos, pero andamos en eso”. En este sentido, Márquez rechaza que Trump y algunos medios hayan optado por <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115248712390172467" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">burlarse</a> del pueblo venezolano, especialmente de las comuneras y milicianas.&nbsp;</p>
417.  
418.  
419.  
420. <p>“Es normal que en ese contexto capitalista y patriarcal se busque desprestigiar la conciencia que tenemos para defender a nuestra patria”, declaró. El poder popular en Venezuela ha reivindicado el proyecto y el horizonte socialista en contextos adversos, y Márquez cree que la coyuntura actual no será excepción. “La respuesta, frente a las amenazas y las burlas, será seguir organizándonos”.</p>
421.  
422.  
423.  
424. <p>La activista de base aseveró que la mayoría del pueblo venezolano “apuesta a que nuestro país siga siendo un territorio de paz, donde se trabaja para lograr sueños”, y que solo la oposición aboga por una intervención militar.&nbsp;</p>
425.  
426.  
427.  
428. <p>En efecto, encuestadoras como Datanálisis, <a href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOdh-pGjf0N/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">arrojan</a> que, aunque un sector de la población venezolana quiere un cambio político,&nbsp;sólo 3% apoyaría una intervención militar extranjera.&nbsp;</p>
429.  
430.  
431.  
432. <p>Las próximas semanas serán decisivas para el resultado de los ataques de Estados Unidos.</p>
433.  
434.  
435.  
436. <p class="is-td-marked">Las <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2025/10/24/politics/venezuela-cocaine-trafficking-routes-trump" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">intenciones</a> de Trump, construidas en base a una narrativa infundada, son todo menos claras, y habrá que ver hasta dónde llega la influencia de <em>neocons</em> como Marco Rubio. Mientras, del otro lado, el gobierno venezolano tiene el reto de mantener el país tan estable como preparado. Por eso, a la desventaja militar intenta responder con la unidad y movilización del pueblo organizado.</p>
437. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/venezolanos-se-alistan-voluntariamente-en-milicias-mientras-estados-unidos-continua-con-sus-ataques/">Venezolanos se alistan voluntariamente en milicias mientras Estados Unidos continúa con sus ataques</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
438. ]]></content:encoded>
440. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/venezolanos-se-alistan-voluntariamente-en-milicias-mientras-estados-unidos-continua-con-sus-ataques/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
441. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
444. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313253</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25235761586131-scaled.jpg?width=877&#038;height=585" length="462488" type="image/jpeg" />
445. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25235761586131-scaled.jpg?width=877&#038;height=585" />
446. </item>
447. <item>
448. <title>Zohran Mamdani, Eugene V. Debs and the Dawn</title>
449. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/zohran-mamdani-eugene-v-debs-and-the-dawn/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=zohran-mamdani-eugene-v-debs-and-the-dawn</link>
450. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/zohran-mamdani-eugene-v-debs-and-the-dawn/#respond</comments>
452. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Amy Goodman, Denis Moynihan /  Democracy Now!]]></dc:creator>
453. <pubDate>Fri, 07 Nov 2025 16:50:05 +0000</pubDate>
454. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
455. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
456. <category><![CDATA[Economic Justice]]></category>
457. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
458. <category><![CDATA[Labor]]></category>
459. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
460. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
461. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
462. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
463. <category><![CDATA[eugene debs]]></category>
464. <category><![CDATA[mayor]]></category>
465. <category><![CDATA[new york city]]></category>
466. <category><![CDATA[socialism]]></category>
467. <category><![CDATA[zohran mamdani]]></category>
468. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313248</guid>
469.  
470. <description><![CDATA[<p>The mayor-elect chose his words carefully on election night—signaling his Democratic socialist beliefs and issuing a call to action.</p>
471. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/zohran-mamdani-eugene-v-debs-and-the-dawn/">Zohran Mamdani, Eugene V. Debs and the Dawn</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
472. ]]></description>
473. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
474. <p><strong>Zohran Mamdani made history</strong>, winning the race to be the next mayor of New York City. The democratic socialist is the first Muslim and the first person of South Asian descent elected to lead the largest city in the United States. At 34 years old, he is the youngest elected to the office in over a century. His meteoric rise from a little-known state assemblymember to his stunning upset on Tuesday has sent shockwaves through the <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Democratic Party</a>. With over 100,000 volunteers, a savvy social media presence and a platform of making New York affordable, Zohran Mamdani charted a path to victory, defeating the state’s disgraced former governor, Andrew Cuomo.</p>
475.  
476.  
477.  
478. <p>At his victory party at the Brooklyn Paramount music hall late Tuesday night, Mamdani was welcomed on stage by a cheering crowd of jubilant supporters.</p>
479.  
480.  
481.  
482. <p>He opened his rousing speech saying, “The sun may have set over our city this evening, but, as Eugene Debs once said, I can see the dawn of a better day for humanity,” quoting one of the most famous socialists in U.S. history.</p>
483.  
484.  
485.  
486. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>&#8220;I can see the dawn of a better day for humanity.”</p></blockquote></figure>
487.  
488.  
489.  
490. <p>Eugene V. Debs was born to immigrant parents in Indiana on Nov. 5, 1855. He started working at 14, laboring as a fireman on the railroads shoveling coal on steam-powered locomotives. He joined the fireman’s union, rising in its ranks. He then formed the American Railway Union (ARU), to organize all railway industry workers, including, he hoped, women and African Americans.</p>
491.  
492.  
493.  
494. <p>In 1894, the ARU struck against the Pullman Co., owned by George Pullman, who had built and operated a massive fleet of luxury railroad sleeper cars, amassing a fortune while keeping his workers in near-indentured status in his company town of Pullman, Illinois. The strike went national, hobbling the rail industry. President William Howard Taft called in the military, violently breaking the strike, killing over 30 strikers. As the public face of the strike, Debs was targeted for prosecution. He was convicted and sentenced to six months in a county jail. As he read and wrote in his cell, Debs became more radicalized, and left jail a committed socialist.</p>
495.  
496.  
497.  
498. <p>By 1900, he ran as the Socialist Party of America&#8217;s candidate for president, the first of five such runs. In 1905 he co-founded the IWW, the Industrial Workers of the World, seeking to organize workers across industries into “One Big Union.” During his presidential run in 1912, he built so much momentum that establishment candidates like Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt were seriously concerned he could win.</p>
499.  
500.  
501.  
502. <p>After the U.S. entered World War I, patriotic fervor swept the nation. Congress passed the Espionage Act in 1917, then the Sedition Act in 1918, making it a crime to speak out against the war. Despite this, Debs spoke at an outdoor mass meeting in Canton, Ohio, criticizing the war. No known recordings of Debs’ voice exist, but actor Tim Robbins read the speech in a 2009 performance of &#8220;Voices of the People’s History of the United States,&#8221; produced by Anthony Arnove and the late historian Howard Zinn. Debs said, accusing Wall Street tycoons of warmaking:</p>
503.  
504.  
505.  
506. <p>“Every solitary one of these aristocratic conspirators and would-be murderers claims to be an arch patriot. Every one of them insists that the war is being waged to make the world safe for democracy. What humbug. What rot. What false pretense. Wars throughout history have been waged for conquest and plunder.”</p>
507.  
508.  
509.  
510. <p>Debs was arrested under the Sedition Act, tried, convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison. His address to the court at his sentencing, on Sept. 18, 1918, is considered one of the most eloquent speeches in modern English. That’s the speech Mamdani quoted. Debs opened with perhaps his most famous words (performed at a different &#8220;Voices&#8221; event by actor David Strathairn):</p>
511.  
512.  
513.  
514. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>In quoting Eugene Debs, he not only signaled his Democratic socialist beliefs; he was also issuing a call to action.</p></blockquote></figure>
515.  
516.  
517.  
518. <p>“While there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.”</p>
519.  
520.  
521.  
522. <p>Debs served three years in federal prison — running his final presidential campaign, in 1920, from his cell.</p>
523.  
524.  
525.  
526. <p>New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani chooses his words carefully. In quoting Eugene Debs, he not only signaled his democratic socialist beliefs; he was also issuing a call to action. Like Debs, Mamdani understands, and his campaign embodied, that the struggle for justice requires mass organizing.</p>
527.  
528.  
529.  
530. <p>President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> has threatened to punish New York City for electing Mamdani by cutting off federal funds. Like Taft did more than a century ago, Trump has deployed the military to several cities, and promises more. Mamdani replied to Trump in his speech with a challenge:</p>
531.  
532.  
533.  
534. <p>“To get to any of us, you will have to get through all of us.” He went on, “New York will remain a city of immigrants: a city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants and, as of tonight, led by an immigrant.”</p>
535. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/zohran-mamdani-eugene-v-debs-and-the-dawn/">Zohran Mamdani, Eugene V. Debs and the Dawn</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
536. ]]></content:encoded>
538. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/zohran-mamdani-eugene-v-debs-and-the-dawn/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
539. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
542. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313248</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/debs-prisoner.jpg?width=1000&#038;height=568" length="175597" type="image/jpeg" />
543. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/debs-prisoner.jpg?width=1000&#038;height=568" />
544. </item>
545. <item>
546. <title>Bill Gates Gave $3.5M to Climate Denier Bjørn Lomborg’s Think Tank</title>
547. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bill-gates-gave-3-5m-to-climate-denier-bjorn-lomborgs-think-tank/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=bill-gates-gave-3-5m-to-climate-denier-bjorn-lomborgs-think-tank</link>
548. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bill-gates-gave-3-5m-to-climate-denier-bjorn-lomborgs-think-tank/#respond</comments>
550. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Rei Takver /  DeSmog ]]></dc:creator>
551. <pubDate>Fri, 07 Nov 2025 16:39:38 +0000</pubDate>
552. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
553. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
554. <category><![CDATA[Environment]]></category>
555. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
556. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
557. <category><![CDATA[Science]]></category>
558. <category><![CDATA[Technology]]></category>
559. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
560. <category><![CDATA[bill gates]]></category>
561. <category><![CDATA[Bjorn Lomborg]]></category>
562. <category><![CDATA[climate change]]></category>
563. <category><![CDATA[COP30]]></category>
564. <category><![CDATA[gates foundation]]></category>
565. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313243</guid>
566.  
567. <description><![CDATA[<p>Tax records reveal that the billionaire’s foundation has donated for years to Lomborg’s Copenhagen Consensus Center.</p>
568. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bill-gates-gave-3-5m-to-climate-denier-bjorn-lomborgs-think-tank/">Bill Gates Gave $3.5M to Climate Denier Bjørn Lomborg’s Think Tank</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
569. ]]></description>
570. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
571. <p><strong>Bill Gates’ charity</strong> has donated more than $3.5 million to a think tank run by the Danish academic and climate crisis denier&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmog.com/bjorn-lomborg/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Bjørn Lomborg</a>, according to U.S. tax records reviewed by DeSmog.</p>
572.  
573.  
574.  
575. <p>The donations, made between 2017 and 2022, were listed on IRS 990 forms filed by the Gates Foundation. Those donations went to the <a href="https://www.desmog.com/copenhagen-consensus-center/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Copenhagen Consensus Center</a>, which describes itself as a “think tank that researches the smartest solutions for the world’s biggest problems, advising policy-makers and philanthropists how to spend their money most effectively.”</p>
576.  
577.  
578.  
579. <p>The center was created by Lomborg, who for years has argued in op-eds, lectures and broadcast media that there are more important global issues to prioritize than climate change, writing in April that “it is not the existential threat that some would have us believe.”</p>
580.  
581.  
582.  
583. <p>Those views align closely with a controversial memo <a href="https://www.gatesnotes.com/home/home-page-topic/reader/three-tough-truths-about-climate" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Gates recently published</a> during the lead-up to the United Nations COP30 climate summit now underway in Belém, Brazil, in which the philanthropist, who is worth an <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/billionaires/profiles/william-h-gates/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">estimated</a> $118 billion, argued that climate change “will not lead to humanity’s demise.”</p>
584.  
585.  
586.  
587. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Those views align closely with a controversial memo Gates recently published.</p></blockquote></figure>
588.  
589.  
590.  
591. <p>The Microsoft founder&nbsp;and longtime public health philanthropist&nbsp;claimed that a “doomsday outlook” about the future of the climate is “causing much of the climate community to focus too much on near-term emissions goals” and that is “diverting resources from the most effective things we should be doing to improve life in a warming world.”</p>
592.  
593.  
594.  
595. <p>Gates’ “tough truths” post came on the heels of the <a href="https://www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/statements/2025-11-04/secretary-generals-video-message-for-the-2025-emissions-gap-report" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres noting</a> that it is now “inevitable” that the world is on track to at least temporarily burst past the 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) warming target of the Paris Agreement, with “dramatic consequences.”</p>
596.  
597.  
598.  
599. <p>Gates’ arguments have drawn <a href="https://futurism.com/science-energy/bill-gates-climate-change-isnt-so-bad" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">outcries</a> of <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/weatherwest.bsky.social/post/3m4ggvyhdyv2w" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">dismay</a> from some of the world’s top climate scientists, who have pointed out that “this memo is already being championed by those seeking to misinform and sow doubt about climate change and delay climate progress — up to and including the executive branch of the United States government,” as tweeted by climate scientist Daniel Swain.</p>
600.  
601.  
602.  
603. <p>But Lomborg is full of praise for the billionaire who has frequently donated to his think tank.</p>
604.  
605.  
606.  
607. <p>“Revolutionary climate truth: @BillGates nails it,”&nbsp;<a href="https://x.com/BjornLomborg/status/1983131783223820776" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">he posted on X</a>.</p>
608.  
609.  
610.  
611. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="895" height="1024" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=895&#038;height=1024" alt="" class="wp-image-313244" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=895&amp;height=1024 895w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=262&amp;height=300 262w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=768&amp;height=878 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=157&amp;height=180 157w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=236&amp;height=270 236w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=354&amp;height=405 354w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=511&amp;height=585 511w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-bill-gates-oct-28-climate-memo-tweet.png?width=974 974w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 895px) 100vw, 895px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Bjørn Lomborg praises Bill Gates’ climate memo in a <a href="https://archive.ph/8KJ8H" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">tweet</a>.</figcaption></figure>
612.  
613.  
614.  
615. <p>The Gates Foundation and the Copenhagen Consensus Center didn’t respond to a request for comment.</p>
616.  
617.  
618.  
619. <h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-he-s-read-some-of-my-stuff">“He’s read some of my stuff”</h3>
620.  
621.  
622.  
623. <p>In total, the Gates Foundation (formerly known as the the Bill &amp; Melinda Gates Foundation) has donated $3,519,491 to Lomborg’s think tank. The <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/562618866/202303179349101020/full" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">most recent tax filing on record</a> includes a 2022 donation to the Copenhagen Consensus Center worth $1.25 million, which went to support “community engagement grantmaking.”</p>
624.  
625.  
626.  
627. <p>Lomborg’s center credits the Gates Foundation with providing financial support for a <a href="https://copenhagenconsensus.com/sites/default/files/documents/identifying_best_buys_-_copenhagen_consensus_center_2021.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">2021 report</a> identifying development priorities for Africa. That report ranked climate solutions such as “resilience to drought” and “solar energy for unreliable grids” in the bottom third of a list of investment opportunities for the continent.</p>
628.  
629.  
630.  
631. <p>The report ranked objectives such as “family planning,” “R&amp;D for agricultural yield increase,” and “tobacco control” at the top of the list. “All other things equal, the policies producing high returns should be funded before the ones with low return,” it noted.</p>
632.  
633.  
634.  
635. <p>Africa faces unfairly high costs to adapt to climate extremes, such as droughts, heat waves and floods, <a href="https://wmo.int/news/media-centre/africa-faces-disproportionate-burden-from-climate-change-and-adaptation-costs" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">according to a 2024 World Meteorological Organization report</a>.</p>
636.  
637.  
638.  
639. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>In total, the Gates Foundation has donated $3,519,491 to Lomborg’s think tank.</p></blockquote></figure>
640.  
641.  
642.  
643. <p>The relationship between Lomborg and Gates goes back to at least 2014.</p>
644.  
645.  
646.  
647. <p>That year, DeSmog <a href="https://www.desmog.com/2014/10/28/how-bill-gates-and-peabody-energy-share-vision-coal-powered-future-through-views-bjorn-lomborg/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported </a>that Gates had published a blog post promoting Lomborg’s views. In that post, Gates argued that, as rich countries “<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20140630002429/https:/www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/Two-Videos-Illuminate-Energy-Poverty-Bjorn-Lomborg" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">push to get serious about confronting climate change</a>,” telling poorer countries not to rely on fossil fuels is wrong.</p>
648.  
649.  
650.  
651. <p>“For one thing, poor countries represent a small part of the carbon-emissions problem. And they desperately need cheap sources of energy now to fuel the economic growth that lifts families out of poverty. They can’t afford today’s expensive clean energy solutions, and we can’t expect them wait for the technology to get&nbsp;cheaper,” Gates wrote.</p>
652.  
653.  
654.  
655. <p><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20140630002429/https:/www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/Two-Videos-Illuminate-Energy-Poverty-Bjorn-Lomborg" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Alongside Gates’ 2014 post was a “GatesNotes”-branded video</a> in which Lomborg said it was “hypocritical” for the developed world to deny poor countries access to fossil fuels when so much of the developed world is still powered by them. </p>
656.  
657.  
658.  
659. <p>In the video, Lomborg can be seen climbing a staircase with the words “Fighting poverty with fossil fuels” painted behind him.</p>
660.  
661.  
662.  
663. <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="974" height="591" src="https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif" alt="" class="wp-image-313245" srcset="https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif 974w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif?width=300&amp;height=182 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif?width=768&amp;height=466 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif?width=297&amp;height=180 297w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif?width=445&amp;height=270 445w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif?width=667&amp;height=405 667w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/bjorn-lomborg-gatesnotes-ff-poverty.png.avif?width=964&amp;height=585 964w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 974px) 100vw, 974px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">In a Bill Gates &#8220;GatesNotes&#8221; video, climate crisis denier Bjørn Lomborg said it was “hypocritical” for the developed world to deny poor countries access to fossil fuels when so much of the developed world still relies on them.</figcaption></figure>
664.  
665.  
666.  
667. <p>As recently as 2023, Lomborg co-authored a GatesNotes post with Gates arguing that the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals are “too much of a good thing” because they say the world is not “stepping up to fund all of them.”</p>
668.  
669.  
670.  
671. <p>In response to Gates&#8217; latest memo, released Oct. 28, Lomborg <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/bill-gates-delivers-tough-truths-on-climate-before-u-n-talks-10951942" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">told Newsweek</a>, “I’ve met with Mr. Gates himself several times. He’s read some of my stuff.” However, Lomborg did not directly take credit for influencing Gates’ views in the “Three Tough Truths About Climate” memo.</p>
672.  
673.  
674.  
675. <h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-deniers-celebrate-gates">Deniers Celebrate Gates</h3>
676.  
677.  
678.  
679. <p>Shortly after the memo’s release, <a href="https://www.desmog.com/donald-trump/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">President Donald Trump</a> <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115459641125796285" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">declared</a> on his social media platform Truth Social: “I (WE!) just won the War on the Climate Change Hoax. Bill Gates has finally admitted that he was completely WRONG on the issue. It took courage to do so, and for that we are all grateful. MAGA!!!”</p>
680.  
681.  
682.  
683. <p><a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a> is not alone in his celebration. Several longtime climate crisis deniers are cheering the statement from Gates, including <a href="https://www.desmog.com/robert-l-bradley-jr/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Robert Bradley</a> of the <a href="https://www.desmog.com/institute-energy-research/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Institute for Energy Research</a>, a nonprofit that attacks renewables and criticizes decarbonization plans.</p>
684.  
685.  
686.  
687. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Several longtime climate crisis deniers are cheering the statement from Gates.</p></blockquote></figure>
688.  
689.  
690.  
691. <p><a href="https://www.desmog.com/alex-epstein/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Alex Epstein</a>, who himself has cited Lomborg as an influence, <a href="https://rclutz.com/2025/10/30/bill-gates-returns-to-energy-pragmatism/comment-page-1/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">said last week</a> that “we should celebrate that Bill Gates has seen the light.” Epstein, the “fossil fuel philosopher” who helped <a href="https://www.desmog.com/2025/07/01/alex-epstein-fossil-fuel-philosopher-trump-megabill-clean-energy-cuts/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">shape the cuts to clean energy initiatives in Trump’s domestic policy bill</a>, claimed that Gates’ memo is in part a response to a <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a> administration that “that is pro-fossil fuel and very anti-climate catastrophist.”</p>
692.  
693.  
694.  
695. <p>Gates’ backsliding on climate is not just words, it’s money and resources. For instance, in March he made <a href="https://www.geekwire.com/2025/report-bill-gates-breakthrough-energy-cuts-climate-policy-team-and-partnership-support/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">deep cuts</a> to the climate policy staff of <a href="https://www.breakthroughenergy.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Breakthrough Energy</a>, the clean energy organization he founded in 2015 and whose work he touted in his Oct. 28 memo.</p>
696.  
697.  
698.  
699. <p>Explaining his “pivot” on climate change during an interview on CNBC, Gates <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/science/climate-change/bill-gates-climate-change-memo-rcna240225" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">said</a>, “I’ll let the temperature go up 0.1 degree to get rid of malaria. People don’t understand the suffering that exists today.” Afterward, Lomborg took to X to <a href="https://x.com/BjornLomborg/status/1983201271130849575" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">praise</a> Gates, writing, “Exactly right!”<br> <br>Arguments like this have garnered sharp criticism from climate leaders.<br> <br>Gates is <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/katharinehayhoe.com/post/3m4g4bbo2fk2x" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">wrong to frame</a> climate change and human well-being as disconnected, zero-sum issues, argues climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe. “We are nowhere near maxing out investment in &amp; implementation of [solutions] that benefit people, health, climate and nature at the same time,” the Texas Tech professor and chief scientist at the Nature Conservancy <a href="https://onlyoffice.infomaniak.com/9.1.0-0107b4088ba49fe44924fe9769171b50/web-apps/apps/documenteditor/main/index.html?_dc=9.1.0-168&amp;lang=en&amp;customer=ONLYOFFICE&amp;headerlogodark=https%3A%2F%2Fkdrive.infomaniak.com%2Fimages%2Foffice_logo_word_dark.svg&amp;headerlogolight=https%3A%2F%2Fkdrive.infomaniak.com%2Fimages%2Foffice_logo_word_light.svg&amp;type=desktop&amp;frameEditorId=container-iframe-inside&amp;isForm=false&amp;parentOrigin=https://kdrive.infomaniak.com&amp;fileType=docx" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">posted on Bluesky</a>. “[The climate, pollution, and nature crises] are already actively amplifying poverty, hunger, and division.”</p>
700.  
701.  
702.  
703. <p>“There is no greater threat to developing nations than the climate crisis,” Michael Mann, University of Pennsylvania climate scientist,&nbsp;<a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2025/10/28/business/bill-gates-climate-change" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">told</a>&nbsp;CNN in response to the Gates memo. “He’s got this all backwards.”&nbsp;</p>
704. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bill-gates-gave-3-5m-to-climate-denier-bjorn-lomborgs-think-tank/">Bill Gates Gave $3.5M to Climate Denier Bjørn Lomborg’s Think Tank</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
705. ]]></content:encoded>
707. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/bill-gates-gave-3-5m-to-climate-denier-bjorn-lomborgs-think-tank/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
708. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
711. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313243</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25247851202875-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" length="536300" type="image/jpeg" />
712. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25247851202875-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" />
713. </item>
714. <item>
715. <title>Millions of Venezuelans Join Volunteer Militias as US Attacks Continue</title>
716. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/millions-of-venezuelans-join-volunteer-militias-as-us-attacks-continue/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=millions-of-venezuelans-join-volunteer-militias-as-us-attacks-continue</link>
717. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/millions-of-venezuelans-join-volunteer-militias-as-us-attacks-continue/#respond</comments>
719. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Jessica Dos Santos Jardim]]></dc:creator>
720. <pubDate>Thu, 06 Nov 2025 19:32:07 +0000</pubDate>
721. <category><![CDATA[Americas]]></category>
722. <category><![CDATA[Global Voices]]></category>
723. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
724. <category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
725. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
726. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
727. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
728. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
729. <category><![CDATA[donald trump]]></category>
730. <category><![CDATA[extrajudicial killings]]></category>
731. <category><![CDATA[nicolas maduro]]></category>
732. <category><![CDATA[venezuela]]></category>
733. <category><![CDATA[war on drugs]]></category>
734. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313199</guid>
735.  
736. <description><![CDATA[<p>Following a decade of economic sanctions on Venezuela, the current wave of U.S. boat strikes isn't actually aimed at stopping drug trafficking.</p>
737. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/millions-of-venezuelans-join-volunteer-militias-as-us-attacks-continue/">Millions of Venezuelans Join Volunteer Militias as US Attacks Continue</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
738. ]]></description>
739. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
740. <p class="has-drop-cap">CARACAS, Venezuela – At the Fort Tiuna military base in Venezuela’s capital, people of varied ages and physical conditions take target practice. They swing across rivers on ropes, dash and hide between mounds and climb trees to analyze the terrain. They are some of the over 8 million Venezuelans who have no military experience, but who have voluntarily enlisted in the Bolivarian National Militia in case President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> decides to attack their country.</p>
741.  
742.  
743.  
744. <p>On Sept. 29, the Venezuelan government signed a <a href="https://www.swissinfo.ch/spa/maduro-firma-decreto-de-conmoci%c3%b3n-externa-ante-%22amenazas%22-de-ee.uu.%2c-dice-vicepresidenta/90088843" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">decree</a> of “external commotion,” to be activated in the event of any aggression against the country. The emergency measure would grant special powers of national administration and defense for a renewable 90-day period. The announcement of the measure was accompanied by large-scale military exercises in La Orchila, an island military base off the Venezuelan coast, involving thousands of soldiers and militia members in joint naval and aerial maneuvers. President Nicolás Maduro also recently <a href="https://www.france24.com/es/minuto-a-minuto/20251023-maduro-dice-que-venezuela-tiene-5-000-misiles-antia%C3%A9reos-port%C3%A1tiles-rusos-ante-las-amenazas-de-eeuu" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">highlighted</a> the power of Venezuela&#8217;s Igla-S arsenal, a portable air defense system designed by Russia to shoot down low-altitude aircraft, helicopters and drones.</p>
745.  
746.  
747.  
748. <p>Venezuela is responding to U.S. strikes against civilian boats in its coastal waters. In late August, the U.S. government ordered a massive deployment to the Caribbean Sea that included guided missile destroyers, amphibious assault ships, a nuclear submarine and more than 4,500 Marines, and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-f-35s-seen-landing-puerto-rico-amid-venezuela-tensions-2025-09-14/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">10 F-35 stealth fighters</a> stationed in Puerto Rico. With the cost of its military operations in the Caribbean estimated at <a href="https://peoplesdispatch.org/2025/10/31/people-in-the-us-go-hungry-as-trump-spends-millions-to-invade-venezuela/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">$18 million</a> per day, the U.S. government has <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/10/24/us-deploys-aircraft-carrier-amid-hardening-stance-towards-venezuela" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">announced</a> that an aircraft carrier with another group of destroyers would join this contingent &#8220;soon.&#8221; </p>
749.  
750.  
751.  
752. <p>Since Sept. 2, the United States has attacked 15 vessels in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2025/11/02/politics/timeline-us-strikes-caribbean-pacific-vis" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">killing 64</a> crew members whose names and nationalities are unknown. The Trump administration argues that its ships are on an “official mission to combat drug trafficking” and alleged cartels linked to the Venezuelan government, but hasn’t provided any proof that the attacked vessels were trafficking drugs. </p>
753.  
754.  
755.  
756. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Since Sept. 2, the United States has attacked 15 vessels in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific.</p></blockquote></figure>
757.  
758.  
759.  
760. <p>In addition to these lethal attacks — described by Venezuela’s ambassador to the United Nations, Samuel Moncada, as <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/venezuela-condemns-us-caribbean-strikes-at-the-un/a-74393376" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">extrajudicial</a> killings — there have been provocations involving U.S. warplanes <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2025/10/03/venezuela-slams-illegal-incursion-by-us-fighter-jets_6746042_4.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">entering</a> Venezuelan airspace. Trump stated that the United States is evaluating potential “attacks on land-based targets” in Venezuelan territory and he <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/us/politics/trump-covert-cia-action-venezuela.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">confirmed</a> he had authorized the CIA to conduct covert operations in Venezuela.</p>
761.  
762.  
763.  
764. <p>Experts <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/opinions/2025/10/24/the-us-warships-off-venezuela-arent-there-to-fight-drugs" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">assert </a>in several media outlets that this deployment — the largest in the region in over half a century — actually aims to destabilize and eventually overthrow Maduro. During his first term, Trump stated that “all options are on the table.” Now, when questioned about whether he seeks “regime change,” he has <a href="https://www.dw.com/es/trump-rechaza-carta-de-maduro-con-invitaci%C3%B3n-al-di%C3%A1logo/a-74101455" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">said</a>, “We’ll see what happens.”</p>
765.  
766.  
767.  
768. <p>The current scenario is very different from 2019, when opposition legislator Juan Guaidó swore himself in as “interim president” of Venezuela and his unelected leadership was recognized by 60 countries, including the U.S. Six years later, the opposition no longer has a “parallel” government, and Trump <a href="https://www.youtube.com/shorts/i7pI0vTfnFo" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">claims</a> he does not know who opposition leader, and recent Nobel Peace Prize winner, María Corina Machado is. The opposition’s presidential candidate, Edmundo González, is in exile in Spain.</p>
769.  
770.  
771.  
772. <p>Essentially, the United States has increased its direct threat against Venezuela, but without a visible and organized opposition force to support it. The last time the opposition called for a protest, in January, the turnout was well below their expectations, and there has been no active public protest movement since.</p>
773.  
774.  
775.  
776. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313210" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=683 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=608&amp;height=405 608w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=878&amp;height=585 878w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6833-scaled.jpg?width=2000 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">In Bolívar Square in Caracas there is a relaxed, festive atmosphere despite the current hostilities. (Jessica Dos Santos Jardim)</figcaption></figure>
777.  
778.  
779.  
780. <p>“After 2019, we saw a much more diplomatic and media-driven offensive against Venezuela. The international media talked about Venezuela daily for two years,” Ociel Alí López, a sociologist and professor at the Central University of Venezuela, tells Truthdig. “That is not the case now. Today, Venezuela is not in the spotlight, but now there is a real military threat.”</p>
781.  
782.  
783.  
784. <p>López highlights the changes in the region, with the Colombian and Brazilian governments opposing a military attack on Venezuela, and Venezuela now maintaining commercial ties with the U.S. via a license granted to Chevron to extract and export Venezuela’s oil.</p>
785.  
786.  
787.  
788. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Venezuela doesn’t produce illegal drugs</h3>
789.  
790.  
791.  
792. <p>Washington justifies its deadly attacks on Venezuelan boats with the <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/11/03/trump-boat-strikes-venezuela-deaths/86704147007/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">allegation</a> that the boats carry narcotics, and has put forward the theory that the rise in overdose deaths in the U.S. constitutes an “armed <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/02/trump-administration-caribbean-drug-cartels" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">attack</a>” by cartels, pointing the finger at Venezuela to justify the use of lethal force. However, the data doesn’t support the notion of Venezuela as a narco-terrorist threat.</p>
793.  
794.  
795.  
796. <p>The overdose crisis in the United States is primarily based on the consumption of <a href="https://www.gao.gov/blog/fentanyl-continues-be-leading-cause-overdose-deaths.-whats-being-done-combat-trafficking-united-states" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">fentanyl</a>, and much of the illicit fentanyl comes from Mexico, with precursor chemicals legally supplied by companies based in China. As for cocaine, Venezuela is not a producer country, and the Caribbean Sea route has accounted for only a tiny <a href="https://www.wola.org/analysis/facts-to-inform-the-debate-about-the-u-s-governments-anti-drug-offensive-in-the-americas/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">proportion</a> of the cocaine flow into the United States.</p>
797.  
798.  
799.  
800. <p>“The figures provided by the United Nations, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration itself, and so-called independent studies within the United States, state that between 80% and 90% of the cocaine that reaches the country comes via the Pacific,&#8221; María Fernanda Barreto, a Colombian Venezuelan political analyst, tells Truthdig.</p>
801.  
802.  
803.  
804. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The data doesn’t support the notion of  Venezuela as a narco-terrorist threat.</p></blockquote></figure>
805.  
806.  
807.  
808. <p>In the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime <a href="https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/Previous-reports.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reports</a> from 1999 to 2025, Venezuela does not appear as a country of significance in the realm of illicit drugs, narcotics or stimulants. Not even the DEA’s 2024 annual <a href="https://www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2025-02/508_5.23.2024%20NDTA-updated.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">report</a> mentions Venezuela.&nbsp;</p>
809.  
810.  
811.  
812. <p>Pino Arlacchi, the former secretary-general of the U.N. office, <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/opinion/the-great-hoax-against-venezuela-oil-geopolitics-disguised-as-war-on-drugs/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">stated</a> that the U.S.’ real goal is to seize control of Venezuela’s oil reserves, the <a href="https://www.worldometers.info/oil/oil-reserves-by-country/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">largest</a> in the world. It’s also worth asking, as Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez <a href="https://orinocotribune.com/venezuelas-vp-rodriguez-85-of-drug-trafficking-profits-remain-in-the-united-states/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">did</a>, why did Venezuela’s anti-drug performance improve after the DEA was expelled from the country in 2005? </p>
813.  
814.  
815.  
816. <p>U.S. institutions also play a key role in managing the drug trade, Barreto argues, saying, “U.S. banks launder the capital.” Indeed, banks such as <a href="https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias/2012/07/120717_hsbc_mexico_escandalo_analisis_lav" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">HSBC</a>, <a href="https://www.eleconomista.com.mx/ultimas-noticias/Wells-Fargo-involucrado-en-lavado-del-narco-mexicano-20100317-0107.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Wells Fargo</a> and <a href="https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/2024/10/10/multa-3-000-millones-td-bank-blanqueo-dinero-carteles-droga-trax" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">TD Bank</a> have received record fines for their involvement in laundering money from drug trafficking.</p>
817.  
818.  
819.  
820. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Life for ordinary Venezuelans</h3>
821.  
822.  
823.  
824. <p>Two distinct moods are palpable on the streets of Venezuela: tension mixed with fear, and disinterest tinged with disbelief. Despite this, people are also continuing with everyday life, participating in celebrations of the beatification of Venezuela’s first saints, José Gregorio Hernández and Carmen Rendiles, and planning their Christmas festivities. Most are at least as concerned about the cost of preparing our traditional Christmas dishes as they are about speculating over Trump’s intentions.</p>
825.  
826.  
827.  
828. <p>The sudden military pressure from the U.S. only compounds the effects of a decade of economic and media-based attacks. The U.S.’ unilateral sanctions, especially on the country’s <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/infographics/us-sanctions-against-the-venezuelan-oil-industry/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">oil industry</a>, have led to extreme hardship. In 2021, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on unilateral coercive measures, Alena Douhan, <a href="https://observatorio.gob.ve/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Informe-de-Relatora-Especial-de-la-ONU-Alena-Douhan-1.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">warned</a> that, due to the sanctions, food availability had decreased by 73%; 180,000 surgeries could not be performed due to a lack of antibiotics or anesthesia; 2.6 million children were deprived of vaccines for meningitis, rotavirus, malaria, measles, yellow fever and influenza; and 80,000 HIV/AIDS patients had to suspend their treatment.</p>
829.  
830.  
831.  
832. <p>This has forced Venezuela to develop its local production capacity, and it is now able to produce <a href="https://www.sunagro.gob.ve/venezuela-produce-97-de-los-alimentos-de-su-consumo-interno/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">97% of the food</a> it consumes, while domestic medicine manufacturing <a href="https://www.telesurtv.net/medicamentos-venezuela-produccion-nacional/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">has reached 80%</a>. But even if the basics are available now, people often lack the means to acquire them, with many working multiple jobs or struggling to save amid persistent inflation.</p>
833.  
834.  
835.  
836. <p>The Venezuelan government has had to perform a difficult balancing act in its attempt to stabilize the economy. Since October last year, the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV) has been progressively devaluing the national currency. The exchange rate between the U.S. dollar and the bolivar has increased from <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DBhMuW8NLBN/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">1 to 40</a> to over <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DBhMuW8NLBN/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">1 to 200</a> over the past year — a loss of 80% of the bolivar’s value.</p>
837.  
838.  
839.  
840. <p>The exchange rate has also been affected by the terms of a new license <a href="https://www.reuters.com/latam/negocio/VKN3HKJC2BISLA2BOW33X4NJ6Y-2025-07-30/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">issued</a> to Chevron at the end of July that allows the company to operate in Venezuela but limits its payments in foreign currency. In this regard, the amount of foreign currency that the BCV has provided through its foreign exchange desks is <a href="https://www.bancaynegocios.com/dolar-oficial-se-cotizara-en-bs-205con68-el-lunes-20-luego-de-registrar-un-aumento-semanal-de-6con40-porciento/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">32.26%</a> lower than last year, likely due to limited international reserves.</p>
841.  
842.  
843.  
844. <p>López said the U.S. military attacks have forced the government to allocate resources to defense, reducing the amount of foreign currency available for the rest of the economy. “The gap between the official exchange rate and the parallel rate is almost 50%. That is having a tremendous effect on prices, especially on food,” he added.</p>
845.  
846.  
847.  
848. <p>Since August, the price of meat in Caracas stores jumped from $9.80 per kilo to at least $15 per kilo. In addition, public transportation fares, which had been frozen since April, rose by 60%.</p>
849.  
850.  
851.  
852. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313208" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=683 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=608&amp;height=405 608w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=878&amp;height=585 878w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6811-scaled.jpg?width=2000 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">In the Guaicaipuro Market in Caracas, people are starting to shop for end-of-year festivities. (Jessica Dos Santos Jardim)</figcaption></figure>
853.  
854.  
855.  
856. <p>Tony Boza, an economist and United Socialist Party of Venezuela legislator, believes the Venezuelan economy is suffering the consequences of dollarization and the government’s “monetarist vision.” While he acknowledges that the U.S. sanctions have hit the oil industry and isolated the country, he maintains that current policies prioritize inflation control over the well-being of the majority.</p>
857.  
858.  
859.  
860. <p>“According to figures from some private analysts — because the BCV does not publish them — the size of our current economy is around $140 billion, but the current liquidity is less than 3%,” Boza tells Truthdig. “At the worst moment, which was in 1950, the liquidity in circulation was equivalent to 10% of GDP.”</p>
861.  
862.  
863.  
864. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The Venezuelan economy is suffering the consequences of dollarization.</p></blockquote></figure>
865.  
866.  
867.  
868. <p>According to Boza, the focus on reducing liquidity to prevent inflation is leading to low wages and pensions. The monthly minimum wage in Venezuela is less than one U.S. dollar, and most income is received as bonuses. Pensioners get about $50 a month in bonuses, for example. Since May 1, public sector workers have been <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuela-maduro-govt-announces-may-day-bonus-increase-maintains-wage-freeze/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">receiving</a> $160 a month, which mostly comes from the Economic War Bonus.</p>
869.  
870.  
871.  
872. <p>Furthermore, Boza points out that the distribution of foreign currency by the BCV is a nontransparent mechanism. “We don’t know if the U.S. dollars are being given to businesspeople who bring in supplies for their production or to shell companies that speculate and create the exchange rate gap,” he says.</p>
873.  
874.  
875.  
876. <p>The legislator from Zulia state argues that the Venezuelan government has “neglected” fundamental issues such as the distribution of wealth.</p>
877.  
878.  
879.  
880. <p>“The publication of the Gini coefficient was discontinued because wages are the pivot point for wealth distribution and have an impact not only on the public sector but also on the private sector,” he says. In his view, in economic terms and within this context of growing external pressure, the country is experiencing a “free-for-all” that the government must correct.</p>
881.  
882.  
883.  
884. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">People and government act in response to the U.S. boat strikes</h3>
885.  
886.  
887.  
888. <p>The government has sought to project an image of stability conducive to foreign investment. But now, as it prepares to protect its sovereignty, its attention has turned to defense and diplomacy. Venezuela convened an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council and over the past few weeks, countries like Russia and China, as well as multilateral organizations like the Non-Aligned Movement, have condemned the United States’ <a href="https://humanidadenred.org/comunicado-movimiento-de-paises-no-alineados-rechaza-despliegue-militar-de-eeuu-en-el-caribe/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">attacks</a>. One Russian legislator <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/moscow-just-gave-venezuela-air-215921985.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reportedly said</a> on Tuesday that his country has sent air defense systems to Venezuela.</p>
889.  
890.  
891.  
892. <p>Domestically, the Maduro government has focused on a mobilization campaign and says a total of <a href="https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x9ptit0" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">8.2 million</a> Venezuelans participated in the first two days of military readiness activities for the Bolivarian Militia, a voluntary corps that complements the conventional armed forces. The militia was initially created in <a href="https://www.comunas.gob.ve/2022/04/13/milicia-nacional-bolivariana-legado-comandante-chavez-defensa-patria/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">2005</a> as the National Reserve, then in 2009 it took on its current name.</p>
893.  
894.  
895.  
896. <p>Anaís Márquez, a spokesperson for the 5 de Marzo Comandante Eterno Commune in Caracas and a member of the National Directorate of the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89Y0XYwWriM" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Communes</a> Union, tells Truthdig that the organized grassroots, including militias and commune members, are ready for what may come.</p>
897.  
898.  
899.  
900. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313209" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=683 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=608&amp;height=405 608w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=878&amp;height=585 878w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_6838-scaled.jpg?width=2000 2000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Anaís Márquez, a spokesperson for the 5 de Marzo Comandante Eterno Commune in Caracas, said Venezuelan volunteers &#8220;are preparing ourselves both physically and psychologically” for a possible U.S. invasion. (Jessica Dos Santos Jardim</figcaption></figure>
901.  
902.  
903.  
904. <p>“We have answered the call from our president, we have enlisted, and we are preparing ourselves both physically and psychologically,” she says. “This is a new kind of war against Venezuela … and we cannot deny that it has us on edge, but we trust in a government that has known how to be strategic and stand its ground.”</p>
905.  
906.  
907.  
908. <p>Márquez said that the volunteers hold “physical preparedness” drills every Saturday at Fort Tiuna, one of the best-known military bases in Caracas. “These exercises are open to all who wish to participate, but those who are most aware of what is happening are the ones who attend. And, the psychological preparation focuses on workshops to debunk the fake news that is generated, especially on social media.”</p>
909.  
910.  
911.  
912. <p>In her opinion, “If they were to try and take Venezuela by land,” the organized grassroots would deploy as the final line of defense. “We are not fully prepared, but we are working on it.” However, Márquez rejects the way Trump and some media outlets have <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115248712390172467" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">mocked</a> the Venezuelan people, especially the women in the communes and militia.</p>
913.  
914.  
915.  
916. <p>She says the majority of the Venezuelan people want “our country to remain a territory of peace, where one works to achieve dreams,” and that only some members of the opposition advocate for military intervention.</p>
917.  
918.  
919.  
920. <p class="is-td-marked">National private polling firms like Datanálisis show that, although a sector of the Venezuelan population wants political change, only <a href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOdh-pGjf0N/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">3% would support</a> a foreign military intervention.</p>
921. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/millions-of-venezuelans-join-volunteer-militias-as-us-attacks-continue/">Millions of Venezuelans Join Volunteer Militias as US Attacks Continue</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
922. ]]></content:encoded>
924. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/millions-of-venezuelans-join-volunteer-militias-as-us-attacks-continue/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
925. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
928. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313199</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25235761586131-scaled.jpg?width=877&#038;height=585" length="462488" type="image/jpeg" />
929. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25235761586131-scaled.jpg?width=877&#038;height=585" />
930. </item>
931. <item>
932. <title>Chicago Child Care Worker Detained by ICE as Children Watched</title>
933. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/chicago-child-care-worker-detained-by-ice-as-children-watched/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=chicago-child-care-worker-detained-by-ice-as-children-watched</link>
934. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/chicago-child-care-worker-detained-by-ice-as-children-watched/#respond</comments>
936. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Chabeli Carrazana /  The 19th ]]></dc:creator>
937. <pubDate>Thu, 06 Nov 2025 16:28:55 +0000</pubDate>
938. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
939. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
940. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
941. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
942. <category><![CDATA[Race]]></category>
943. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
944. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
945. <category><![CDATA[chicago]]></category>
946. <category><![CDATA[day care]]></category>
947. <category><![CDATA[department of homeland security]]></category>
948. <category><![CDATA[ICE raids]]></category>
949. <category><![CDATA[immigration and customs enforcement]]></category>
950. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313161</guid>
951.  
952. <description><![CDATA[<p>Raids inside day cares had been off limits until this year, when, on his first day in office, President Donald Trump removed that protection.</p>
953. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/chicago-child-care-worker-detained-by-ice-as-children-watched/">Chicago Child Care Worker Detained by ICE as Children Watched</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
954. ]]></description>
955. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
956. <p class="has-small-font-size">This story was originally published by The 19th.</p>
957.  
958.  
959.  
960. <p><strong>As parents dropped their children</strong> inside a Spanish immersion day care center in Chicago on Wednesday morning, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers stormed the building to detain a child care worker, a scene that before this year would have been unheard of in the United States.</p>
961.  
962.  
963.  
964. <p>Child care centers were previously protected under a “sensitive locations” directive that advised ICE to not conduct enforcement in places like schools and day cares. But President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> removed that protection on his <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-scraps-guidance-limiting-immigration-arrests-near-certain-locations-2025-01-21/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">first day in office</a>. Arrests near centers have increased across the country, but few reports have surfaced of arrests inside a facility in front of children.</p>
965.  
966.  
967.  
968. <p>Video capturing a portion of the arrest shows two ICE agents aggressively detaining the worker inside Rayito de Sol Spanish Immersion Learning Center on Chicago’s North Side at about 7 a.m., shortly after the center opened. The agents pull her outside the center and push her against a gray sedan while she shouts. Then one of the agents heads back inside.&nbsp;</p>
969.  
970.  
971.  
972. <p>“I have papers,” she tells them in Spanish.</p>
973.  
974.  
975.  
976. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“This woman is a trusted, loved member of her community with a work permit who has dedicated her life to caring for children.&#8221;</p></blockquote></figure>
977.  
978.  
979.  
980. <p>Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Ill., said ICE agents followed the teacher into the school “without a warrant and abducted her in front of her students.”</p>
981.  
982.  
983.  
984. <p>“This woman is a trusted, loved member of her community with a work permit who has dedicated her life to caring for children,” Quigley said at a press conference Wednesday afternoon.&nbsp;</p>
985.  
986.  
987.  
988. <p>The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that ICE agents were pursuing two people, including the teacher, after a traffic stop.&nbsp;</p>
989.  
990.  
991.  
992. <p>“They ran into the daycare and attempted to barricade themselves inside the daycare — recklessly endangering the children inside. The illegal alien female was arrested inside a vestibule, not in the school,” the DHS said. </p>
993.  
994.  
995.  
996. <p>Alderman Matt Martin, who represents Chicago’s 47th Ward, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/chicago/video/47th-ward-ald-matt-martin-speaks-about-teacher-detained-at-north-center-daycare/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">said at a press conference</a> that video he saw from inside the building is “some of the most chilling video footage I have ever seen, certainly in my time in office.”  </p>
997.  
998.  
999.  
1000. <p>“We had agents with guns who were walking around the facility with teachers inside, with children inside, and so, we are, of course, demanding that she be released immediately,” Martin said. “I saw dozens of parents and educators weeping, hugging each other, consoling one another. Children who are crying as well who thankfully are too young to understand the whole gravity of what happened this morning.”</p>
1001.  
1002.  
1003.  
1004. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-9-16 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
1005. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ymmhhrp-0LQ?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
1006. </div></figure>
1007.  
1008.  
1009.  
1010. <p>As the arrest unfolded, Martin said other teachers pleaded with the agents to leave, telling them the teacher had a work permit and that they couldn’t be inside the school. The agents went into multiple rooms looking for teachers while children were present, Rep. Delia Ramirez, another Illinois Democrat, added during a press conference. One teacher hid with a child while the agents stormed the facility, “afraid that she may die today,” Ramirez said.</p>
1011.  
1012.  
1013.  
1014. <p>The school closed for the day.</p>
1015.  
1016.  
1017.  
1018. <p>Tara Goodarzi, parent of a child at the center, <a href="https://blockclubchicago.org/2025/11/05/daycare-worker-pulled-out-of-school-by-armed-federal-agents-traumatizing-parents-say/?fbclid=IwY2xjawN4YItleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFzNjVWS0dsdHR2N1hFT2Rkc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHnCqFTKQkHxKPrA3QKq74MpCJ6o7CM8_99nPf5w9mWDOS6kSF6H5FVZ3fp0c_aem_3DFOlxQA_0HJsnPONsTVHg" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">told Block Club Chicago</a> that the teacher who was arrested was a mother herself. </p>
1019.  
1020.  
1021.  
1022. <p>“Our community has been shattered. Our families have been traumatized. The children were crying, the parents were crying,” Goodarzi said. “It’s a scene that I don’t think any of us have ever witnessed before and will ever forget.”</p>
1023.  
1024.  
1025.  
1026. <p>Parents sent their children to Rayito de Sol to expose them to Latin American culture and the Spanish language, said Maria Guzman, a parent with children at the school, during a press conference. </p>
1027.  
1028.  
1029.  
1030. <p>Parents “want their kids to have access to diversity and access to other experiences. That is what founded this country,” Guzman said. “We are a country of immigrants, and it is absurd and horrific that they have now targeted our day care centers.”</p>
1031.  
1032.  
1033.  
1034. <p>In recent weeks, ICE enforcement in Chicago has ramped up, with multiple violent arrests taking place across the city, as well as clashes between protesters and agents.&nbsp;</p>
1035.  
1036.  
1037.  
1038. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The agents went into multiple rooms looking for teachers while children were present.</p></blockquote></figure>
1039.  
1040.  
1041.  
1042. <p>Nationwide, 1 in 5 child care workers are immigrants, most of them Latinas. In Chicago, it’s&nbsp;<a href="https://nwlc.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Immigrant-Care-How-Immigrant-Early-Educators-Hold-Up-the-Care-Economy.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">1 in 4</a>. Increased ICE enforcement has created significant fear for workers, some of whom have&nbsp;<a href="https://19thnews.org/2025/09/child-care-workers-ice-dc-immigration/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">stopped showing up to work</a>&nbsp;for fear of getting caught in a raid.&nbsp;</p>
1043.  
1044.  
1045.  
1046. <p>Many of the arrests this year have been taking place in parking lots near child care centers or schools and parents have been detained on the way to drop off their kids. </p>
1047.  
1048.  
1049.  
1050. <p>Wendy Cervantes, the director of immigration and immigrant families at the Center for Law and Social Policy, an anti-poverty nonprofit, said the center has long been working to inform child care providers that they have protections under the Fourth Amendment, including a requirement that agents have a signed judicial warrant with a person’s name and address before they raid a private space.</p>
1051.  
1052.  
1053.  
1054. <p>This year, however, providers have faced more questions about what to do if ICE doesn’t follow the law.</p>
1055.  
1056.  
1057.  
1058. <p>“Over the past few months, ICE’s aggressive tactics have increased, making it much more difficult to advise child care providers on how to implement procedures for keeping their staff and children safe,” Cervantes said. “Providers can no longer guarantee that their locations are safe havens, and instead are increasingly relying on how to best document enforcement actions near their locations and creating procedures for how to notify parents or staff about ICE presence. The fear is real.”</p>
1059. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/chicago-child-care-worker-detained-by-ice-as-children-watched/">Chicago Child Care Worker Detained by ICE as Children Watched</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1060. ]]></content:encoded>
1062. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/chicago-child-care-worker-detained-by-ice-as-children-watched/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
1063. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
1066. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313161</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25309662592297-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" length="501201" type="image/jpeg" />
1067. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25309662592297-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" />
1068. </item>
1069. <item>
1070. <title>Rising Energy Bills Are Rewiring American Politics</title>
1071. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/rising-energy-bills-are-rewiring-american-politics/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=rising-energy-bills-are-rewiring-american-politics</link>
1072. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/rising-energy-bills-are-rewiring-american-politics/#respond</comments>
1074. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Tik Root /  Grist ]]></dc:creator>
1075. <pubDate>Thu, 06 Nov 2025 16:20:28 +0000</pubDate>
1076. <category><![CDATA[Business & Economy]]></category>
1077. <category><![CDATA[Economic Justice]]></category>
1078. <category><![CDATA[Environment]]></category>
1079. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
1080. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
1081. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
1082. <category><![CDATA[election day]]></category>
1083. <category><![CDATA[energy costs]]></category>
1084. <category><![CDATA[energy star]]></category>
1085. <category><![CDATA[epa]]></category>
1086. <category><![CDATA[lee zeldin]]></category>
1087. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313158</guid>
1088.  
1089. <description><![CDATA[<p>Resounding wins at the polls for efficiency advocates and backlash against plans to kill the Energy Star program give Democrats an opening.</p>
1090. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/rising-energy-bills-are-rewiring-american-politics/">Rising Energy Bills Are Rewiring American Politics</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1091. ]]></description>
1092. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
1093. <p class="has-small-font-size">This story was originally published by&nbsp;<a href="https://grist.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Grist</a>. Sign up for Grist’s&nbsp;<a href="https://go.grist.org/signup/weekly/partner?utm_campaign=republish-content&amp;utm_medium=syndication&amp;utm_source=partner" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">weekly newsletter here</a>.</p>
1094.  
1095.  
1096.  
1097. <p><strong>It has been a big week </strong>in energy news, with several resounding wins for efficiency and climate advocates.</p>
1098.  
1099.  
1100.  
1101. <p>On Tuesday, voters in Georgia flipped two seats on the state’s&nbsp;<a href="https://grist.org/georgia-public-service-commission-guide/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Public Service Commission</a>, which oversees utilities and sets rates. They installed a pair of Democrats on this little known, yet powerful, body for the first time in nearly two decades. To the north, Democratic gubernatorial candidates in Virginia and New Jersey handily won after making rising energy prices a centerpiece of their campaigns. The victories came just a few days after&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/01/climate/epa-energy-star-program.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">The New York Times reported</a>&nbsp;that the Environmental Protection Agency is quietly reconsidering plans to eliminate the popular Energy Star program.&nbsp;</p>
1102.  
1103.  
1104.  
1105. <p>Taken together, these developments suggest that energy costs could be moving the political needle in ways that other issues, like climate change, have not. And, with next year’s midterms on the horizon, it’s an issue both political parties will increasingly have to grapple with.&nbsp;</p>
1106.  
1107.  
1108.  
1109. <p>“When the costs of climate change become evident, there’s a political necessity to find policy that works,” said&nbsp;<a href="https://republicen.org/bob" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Bob Inglis</a>, a former Republican congressman who represented South Carolina and has become a leading conservative voice on climate change. “When people see them on their utility bills and they see them in their property tax bills, that’s when they start asking, is there any way to head this off?”</p>
1110.  
1111.  
1112.  
1113. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The EPA is quietly backing off its plans to fully shutter the decades-long initiative.</p></blockquote></figure>
1114.  
1115.  
1116.  
1117. <p>The <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a> administration’s potential reversal on Energy Star is one example of the political power that energy prices can have. In May, EPA officials&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/06/climate/epa-energy-star-eliminated.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">announced at a staff meeting that</a>&nbsp;Energy Star would be “eliminated.” The backlash was swift. Within weeks,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.rer.org/wp-content/uploads/FINAL_060625_Energy_Star_Multi_Sector_Letter_.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">a coalition of industry groups wrote</a>&nbsp;to congressional leaders in support of a program that saves Americans some $40 billion a year in utility bills. They called minimizing that financial burden “a clear priority across party lines.”</p>
1118.  
1119.  
1120.  
1121. <p>Republicans, Democrats, appliance manufacturers and corporate giants like Home Depot lined up in defense of Energy Star and, according to the Times, the EPA is quietly backing off its plans to fully shutter the decades-long initiative, widely<a href="https://grist.org/business/how-trumps-latest-rollback-could-raise-your-utility-bills/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">&nbsp;considered among the most successful government programs in modern history</a>. Its signature blue label is now nearly as recognizable as the Nike swoosh or a Coca-Cola can.&nbsp;</p>
1122.  
1123.  
1124.  
1125. <p>The EPA says the future of Energy Star is still being finalized, and many of the people who work on the program have been laid off or left. But the potential walk-back is a notable change of course for a presidential administration that has, by and large, moved to gut federal climate and environmental policies. “This is a classic Lee Zeldin leap before you look at the situation,” said Jeremy Symons, a senior adviser at the nonprofit Environmental Protection Network, about the EPA’s administrator. When industry argued that the Energy Star label helps them sell appliances, Zeldin appears to have listened.&nbsp;</p>
1126.  
1127.  
1128.  
1129. <p>“Energy Star is an American success story,” said Symons. “It’s really a no-brainer.”</p>
1130.  
1131.  
1132.  
1133. <p>Energy costs played a large role in several key political races as well, most notably in Georgia, where the campaign for public utility commission seats revolved around affordability. Republicans argued that fossil fuels offer the best route to stable and affordable power prices in the state. Democrats pointed to a string of rate increases — six in the past two years — to contend that alternatives, such as renewable energy, are the way forward. “We need to invest in a smarter, more resilient grid that’s capable of handling the extreme weather that Georgia experiences while also expanding that access to clean energy,” then-commission candidate Alicia Johnson <a href="https://www.wabe.org/the-georgia-psc-election-is-about-power-bills-and-political-control-of-the-state/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">told Grist in June</a>.</p>
1134.  
1135.  
1136.  
1137. <p>On Tuesday, Johnson and fellow Democrat Peter Hubbard, who is a clean energy consultant, flipped two Republican seats by 20-point margins in <a href="https://www.wabe.org/democratic-national-committee-invests-in-georgia-psc-election/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">races that drew national attention and funding</a>. The wins are <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the Democrats</a>’ first statewide victories in a nonfederal election since 2006.&nbsp;</p>
1138.  
1139.  
1140.  
1141. <p>High energy costs were also a theme of gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia. In the Garden State, Democrat Mikie Sherrill vowed to declare “<a href="https://www.mikiesherrill.com/utilities.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">a state of emergency on energy costs</a>.” In Virginia, Abigail Spanberger, also a Democrat, campaigned on&nbsp;<a href="https://abigailspanberger.com/issue/abigails-affordable-virginia-plan/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">a platform</a>&nbsp;that included expanding clean energy generation and promoting home weatherization to ease consumption. Despite President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> trying to pin surging prices in those states on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the Democrats</a>, both Sherrill and Spanberger beat out their Republican opponents.&nbsp;<br><br>In New Jersey, the local chapter of the League of Conservation Voters funded a campaign ad that attacked the Republican candidate, Jack Ciattarelli, for spiraling electricity rates.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGmFGk1dzB0" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">The video&nbsp;</a>has 6.9 million views on YouTube, and Sara Schreiber, the national organization’s senior vice president of campaigns, said&nbsp;<a href="https://www.lcv.org/media-center/memo-nj-va-election-update-energy-affordability-is-on-the-ballot-and-on-tuesday-voters-will-decide/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">internal polling showed</a>&nbsp;the ad drove up Ciattarelli’s unfavorable rating among all voters by 6%, and a staggering 8% with Trump voters.</p>
1142.  
1143.  
1144.  
1145. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>&#8220;They are siding with the candidates who are offering clean energy solutions to help lower their costs.”</p></blockquote></figure>
1146.  
1147.  
1148.  
1149. <p>“People care about this issue, they hear what the candidates are saying, and they are siding with the candidates who are offering clean energy solutions to help lower their costs,” said Schreiber.&nbsp;</p>
1150.  
1151.  
1152.  
1153. <p>Dan Jasper, of the climate nonprofit Project Drawdown, said it’s not surprising that framing climate as an affordability issue helps win elections. “When you say &#8216;climate,&#8217; I think that just seems too far in the future for people,” he said. “But when you put it in terms of everyday expenditures, people start to listen for sure.”</p>
1154.  
1155.  
1156.  
1157. <p>As attention turns to next year’s midterm races, election watchers say utility bills could again be a centerpiece of campaigns across the country. It’s a concern that Trump has already repeatedly brought up, including with promises to cut prices in half. But with energy demand on the rise for the first time in decades and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2025/09/04/business/power-prices-trump-inflation" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">prices, instead of falling, rising twice as fast as inflation</a>, Inglis said,&nbsp; “I would think that Democrats should really make an issue out of that.”&nbsp;</p>
1158.  
1159.  
1160.  
1161. <p>Energy Secretary Chris Wright&nbsp;<a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/19/trump-energy-power-prices-00512230" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">acknowledged the risk in August</a>, saying, “[M]omentum is pushing prices up right now. And who’s going to get blamed for it? We’re going to get blamed because we’re in office.”</p>
1162.  
1163.  
1164.  
1165. <p>Jesse Lee, a senior adviser with the climate-politics nonprofit Climate Power, said the impact of rising costs is so widespread that it could become an issue almost anywhere. But he’s particularly watching states that have seen large rate increases in recent years, such as Texas, Arizona and Pennsylvania. Incumbent moderate Republicans without much of a buffer could also be at risk, he said, pointing to Rep. Mike Lawler of New York as one example.&nbsp;</p>
1166.  
1167.  
1168.  
1169. <p>Building out the supply of clean energy in the U.S. is a clear antidote to rising demand, Lee said. While Democrats have generally embraced a path lined with renewable energy, many Republicans, including Trump, have panned that approach.&nbsp;</p>
1170.  
1171.  
1172.  
1173. <p>“Anybody with eyes can see that this is a glaring vulnerability for [Republicans],” Lee said. “Democrats should be embracing it.”</p>
1174. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/rising-energy-bills-are-rewiring-american-politics/">Rising Energy Bills Are Rewiring American Politics</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1175. ]]></content:encoded>
1177. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/rising-energy-bills-are-rewiring-american-politics/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
1178. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
1181. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313158</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/election-energy-electricity-rates-prices-issue-climate.webp?width=1040&#038;height=585" length="34134" type="image/webp" />
1182. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/election-energy-electricity-rates-prices-issue-climate.webp?width=1040&#038;height=585" />
1183. </item>
1184. <item>
1185. <title>Why Mamdani’s Win Isn’t a Total Victory</title>
1186. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/mamdanis-impressive-win-isnt-quite-a-victory/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=mamdanis-impressive-win-isnt-quite-a-victory</link>
1187. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/mamdanis-impressive-win-isnt-quite-a-victory/#respond</comments>
1189. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Conor Lynch]]></dc:creator>
1190. <pubDate>Thu, 06 Nov 2025 16:07:09 +0000</pubDate>
1191. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
1192. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
1193. <category><![CDATA[Economic Justice]]></category>
1194. <category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
1195. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
1196. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
1197. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
1198. <category><![CDATA[TD Column]]></category>
1199. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
1200. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
1201. <category><![CDATA[billionaires]]></category>
1202. <category><![CDATA[capitalism]]></category>
1203. <category><![CDATA[democratic party]]></category>
1204. <category><![CDATA[new york city]]></category>
1205. <category><![CDATA[zohran mamdani]]></category>
1206. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313152</guid>
1207.  
1208. <description><![CDATA[<p>The billionaire class' opposition has just begun.</p>
1209. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/mamdanis-impressive-win-isnt-quite-a-victory/">Why Mamdani’s Win Isn’t a Total Victory</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1210. ]]></description>
1211. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
1212. <p class="has-drop-cap">On Tuesday, voters in New York City sent a clear message to the city’s ruling class when they elected 34-year-old democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani as the city’s next mayor. After trouncing Andrew Cuomo by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/01/nyregion/mamdani-wins-mayor-primary-nyc.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">12 points</a> in the primaries — with <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/07/08/us-news/zohran-mamdani-won-most-votes-of-a-candidate-nyc-primary-history/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">more votes</a> than any mayoral candidate in New York primary history — he again defeated Cuomo and the city’s power elite in the general election with the biggest vote tally in half a century. </p>
1213.  
1214.  
1215.  
1216. <p>Mamdani’s elite detractors spent the last four months downplaying his popularity and painting him as an imposter. After refusing to bow out of the race, Cuomo and his supporters doubled down on the same tactics and arguments that Democratic voters rejected in June, hoping that his dog whistles would play better with the general electorate. They branded Mamdani a <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2025/10/29/maria_bartiromo_will_mamdani_change_new_york_to_look_more_like_london.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">fake New Yorker</a> and a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/26/zohran-mamdani-republicans-push-investigate-citizenship" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">fake American</a> and unleashed <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/23/nyregion/cuomo-mamdani-sept-11.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Islamophobic attacks</a> reminiscent of the worst post-9/11 bigotry. They also cast Mamdani as a <a href="https://www.cityandstateny.com/politics/2025/10/david-paterson-andrew-cuomo-and-eric-adams-we-are-democrats/409132/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">fake Democrat</a>, even as Cuomo courted Republicans and earned an endorsement from the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c231e284345o" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">big man himself</a>. During a press conference last week with current Mayor Eric Adams and former Gov. David Patterson, the trio maintained that they were the <em>true</em> Democrats while Mamdani was “a socialist masquerading as a Democrat” who did not hold “core Democratic values.” The charges held echoes of intraparty carping from Southern Democrats at the dawn of the Civil Rights era. </p>
1217.  
1218.  
1219.  
1220. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Their collective panic over Mamdani was itself a ringing endorsement of his campaign.</p></blockquote></figure>
1221.  
1222.  
1223.  
1224. <p>The anti-Mamdani coalition attempted to portray the Democratic nominee as a far-left extremist who would destroy the city with his socialist policies. The prospect of a “democratic socialist” mayor of New York City — the “capital of capitalism” — triggered the latest of many Red Scares in America, with Republicans and Cuomo <a href="https://www.cityandstateny.com/politics/2025/10/david-paterson-andrew-cuomo-and-eric-adams-we-are-democrats/409132/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">stoking fear</a> about the terrifying <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/gop-lawmaker-says-backing-cuomo-over-communist-mamdani-no-brainer" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">specter</a> of <a href="https://www.jpost.com/american-politics/article-872013" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">communism</a>. This red-baiting played very well with the city’s 1%, who <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/kylemullins/2025/10/24/anyone-but-mamdani-these-billionaires-are-spending-big-to-stop-him-from-becoming-nycs-mayor/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">opened up their wallets</a> in a last-ditch effort to deny Mamdani the mayorship, raising <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/30/mamdani-cuomo-nyc-mayor-bid-billionaire-spending.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">over $40 million</a> in support of the former governor. Dozens of billionaires <a href="https://atfactionfund.org/billionaires-buying-gracie-mansion/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">contributed financially</a> to the anti-Mamdani effort, while many others vocally supported Cuomo and threatened to leave the city if his opponent won. In the end, however, this overwhelming show of support from the billionaire class likely backfired. Indeed, their collective panic over Mamdani was itself a ringing endorsement of his campaign and a validation of his populist critique of New York as an unaffordable playground for the rich.</p>
1225.  
1226.  
1227.  
1228. <p>It is not a coincidence that Mamdani’s triumph comes at a time when the billionaire class is more powerful than ever before, with modern-day robber barons eclipsing their 19th-century predecessors, not just in the size of their fortunes, but also in their vast reach over American life and culture. Scarcely any corner of modern life escapes their reach, from the social media platforms that serve as public squares to the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2022/may/03/billionaires-extra-power-media-ownership-elon-musk" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">major news outlets</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/oct/29/cbs-tiktok-us-media-donald-trump-allies-democracy" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">television networks</a> that manufacture consent to the elections that have largely <a href="https://americansfortaxfairness.org/billionaires-buying-elections-theyve-come-to-collect/?doing_wp_cron=1761765223.9880580902099609375000" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">devolved</a> into contests between different billionaire-backed candidates. </p>
1229.  
1230.  
1231.  
1232. <p>It has never been a better time to be ultrarich — and things have only gotten better under President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a>, whose policies have ushered in a golden age for the billionaire class and brought the country closer than ever before to outright oligarchy. According to a <a href="https://webassets.oxfamamerica.org/media/documents/Oxfam_Unequal_US_inequality_report_2025_1.pdf?_gl=1*548wtw*_gcl_au*MTYzMzE0MTIwOS4xNzYwOTUzMzE3*_ga*MTUyOTI2Mjc0LjE3MDEzNTg1MTA.*_ga_R58YETD6XK*czE3NjIxNzc2MzkkbzI5MCRnMSR0MTc2MjE3ODg3MyRqNDEkbDAkaDE3Njc5OTA0MzQ.*_fplc*U0JDckV4S0UlMkI1MW5NM3RyWUpUUEJ6dG5uY0hseCUyRmNUVUhUV04yZllIVGk2NmJOa0olMkJ5WWV3NVdteEhmZUlMNWZIZ1o5UkF2a2MxU2ZRUTEyZWc4elNzcTlldmtVbWIlMkJVSGRFaldiTHc5VnF2SXk4bDhrZ0hFd2FwazR5ZXclM0QlM0Q." rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">recent report</a> from Oxfam, the 10 richest men in the world — nearly all Americans, including several top Republican donors — have added nearly $700 billion to their fortunes since Trump’s election last year, while the share of total assets held by the top 0.1% have hit a record high at 12.6%. The rest of the 1% has also done exceedingly well: Collectively, the wealth of America’s richest percentile has swelled by <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/03/the-wealth-of-the-top-1percent-reaches-a-record-52-trillion.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">over $4 trillion</a> in 2025 alone. </p>
1233.  
1234.  
1235.  
1236. <p>The meteoric rise of Mamdani delivered the first major blow to the corrupt oligarchy that has taken shape in the Trump era. As <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/04/05/us-news/nyc-has-the-most-billionaires-in-the-world/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">home to more billionaires</a> than any other city on Earth, it is fitting that New York has become ground zero for a budding revolt. Yet it also signals the great challenges that lie ahead. While the city’s power elite lost the electoral battle, their opposition to Mamdani is only just beginning — and they have every intention of winning the war.&nbsp;</p>
1237.  
1238.  
1239.  
1240. <p>Sadly, the odds remain in their favor.&nbsp;</p>
1241.  
1242.  
1243.  
1244. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>As mayor, Mamdani will encounter resistance every step of the way.</p></blockquote></figure>
1245.  
1246.  
1247.  
1248. <p>As mayor, Mamdani will encounter resistance every step of the way, from Albany to Washington to Wall Street. The president has already threatened to withhold federal funds owed to the city and will almost certainly send troops into the city in the near future, while Mamdani’s big policies largely hinge on whether he can convince Albany to sign off on his proposed tax increases for millionaires and corporations. Yet the biggest threat to Mamdani’s new mayorship comes from the same plutocrats who have spent the last several months trying to derail his campaign.&nbsp;</p>
1249.  
1250.  
1251.  
1252. <p>As historian Michael Beyea Reagan recently <a href="https://inthesetimes.com/article/zohran-mamdani-trump-cuomo-nyc-wall-street" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">explained</a>, the same neoliberal forces that ended New York City’s mid-20th-century experiment in social democracy remain deeply entrenched and will be very difficult to overcome for a lone progressive mayor, particularly in the face of a hostile president and an <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/5577159-hochul-mamdani-rally-chant/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">obstructive governor</a>: </p>
1253.  
1254.  
1255.  
1256. <p>“When public programs are financed through the private sector, banks hold the ultimate veto power,” said Reagan. “This is what happened in the fiscal crisis of 1975, when Wall Street locked the city out of the credit market and forced New York to make cuts to the satisfaction of the banking sector. This is the structural veto that Wall Street holds over our very democracy.”&nbsp;</p>
1257.  
1258.  
1259.  
1260. <p>The left should have no illusions about the enormous challenges ahead. As Reagan notes, “capital holds all the cards” in a “capitalist democracy” such as ours. The only way progressives can hope to overcome the structural barriers and elite resistance to their project is to organize and cultivate a popular movement that outlasts Election Day. </p>
1261.  
1262.  
1263.  
1264. <p class="is-td-marked">The good news is that Mamdani’s success was based on his campaign’s ability to mobilize an <a href="https://www.thecity.nyc/2025/09/30/mamdani-canvass-canarsie-cuomo-mayor-election/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">army of volunteers</a> who knocked on nearly <a href="https://www.thecity.nyc/2025/11/04/mamdani-cuomo-nyc-mayor-general-election-results/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">3 million doors</a> ahead of the general election. This ultimately helped him garner over 1 million votes and drove <a href="https://gothamist.com/news/nyc-mayors-race-gets-record-early-turnout-fueled-by-young-voters" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">record turnout</a> among young voters and strong support from the city’s working-class residents. If the mayor-elect and his team can carry even a fraction of this popular energy forward, the odds of a successful administration will rise sharply.</p>
1265. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/mamdanis-impressive-win-isnt-quite-a-victory/">Why Mamdani’s Win Isn’t a Total Victory</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1266. ]]></content:encoded>
1268. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/mamdanis-impressive-win-isnt-quite-a-victory/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
1269. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
1272. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313152</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/ZohranElites.png?width=878&#038;height=585" length="1445349" type="image/png" />
1273. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/ZohranElites.png?width=878&#038;height=585" />
1274. </item>
1275. <item>
1276. <title>After a Decade of #MeToo Cinema, What Have We Learned?</title>
1277. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/after-a-decade-of-metoo-cinema-what-have-we-learned/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=after-a-decade-of-metoo-cinema-what-have-we-learned</link>
1278. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/after-a-decade-of-metoo-cinema-what-have-we-learned/#respond</comments>
1280. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Corey Atad]]></dc:creator>
1281. <pubDate>Wed, 05 Nov 2025 17:35:37 +0000</pubDate>
1282. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
1283. <category><![CDATA[Arts & Culture]]></category>
1284. <category><![CDATA[Film]]></category>
1285. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
1286. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
1287. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
1288. <category><![CDATA[Women]]></category>
1289. <category><![CDATA[#MeToo]]></category>
1290. <category><![CDATA[harvey weinstein]]></category>
1291. <category><![CDATA[hollywood]]></category>
1292. <category><![CDATA[Luca Guadagnino]]></category>
1293. <category><![CDATA[sexual assault]]></category>
1294. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313129</guid>
1295.  
1296. <description><![CDATA[<p>“After the Hunt” is a fitting bookend for a genre that feels less about a movement than the solipsistic impulses that emerged in its wake.</p>
1297. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/after-a-decade-of-metoo-cinema-what-have-we-learned/">After a Decade of #MeToo Cinema, What Have We Learned?</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1298. ]]></description>
1299. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
1300. <p class="has-drop-cap">In Kitty Green’s 2019 feature “The Assistant,” Jane, a recently hired junior assistant played by Julia Garner, attempts an intervention. Her boss, an unnamed, unseen, domineering film producer has brought aboard another young woman named Sienna. She’s new to the industry, from Idaho. This unsettles Jane, who asks for a meeting with the head of human resources. Too uncomfortable to take off her winter coat, Jane stumbles and stammers while trying to express her concerns, not over the new competition at the office, but for Sienna’s safety. Jane has experienced her boss’ verbal abuse, which would be bad enough, but she’s also seen signs of sexual exploits in his office. And she’s heard things. Predictably, her concerns fall on deaf ears, not merely rebuffed, but turned around on her by the HR guy, Wilcock, played to perfection by a banally disgusting Matthew Macfadyen. She’s putting her career on the line, he tells her, talking down, accusing her of jealousy while not-so-subtly making clear he knows exactly what Jane is talking about. It’s the futility that hits hardest; the insidious feeling that the deck is stacked, that everyone knows the truth, and that the only way to survive is to blind oneself.</p>
1301.  
1302.  
1303.  
1304. <p>“The Assistant” began as an idea about sexual misconduct on college campuses, but after dozens of women came forward accusing Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment, assault and rape in fall 2017, Green shifted gears. Weinstein’s name doesn’t need mentioning to know he’s the subject of “The Assistant,” but making him into a mere specter that looms over the office brings a clearer view of the systems of abuse people like him construct. The office is a complicity machine, where more minor abuses are routinized — a recurring bit in which Jane’s male co-workers help her craft emails apologizing to their boss are unsettlingly hilarious, or perhaps hilariously unsettling — providing the scaffolding for so much worse. When the Weinstein story broke, and the #MeToo movement exploded in its wake, it was inevitable that filmmakers would tackle it. Green was one of the first and boldest among them, though the film’s tiny budget and tinier box office take suggest the public wasn’t quite ready for her blunt, clinical honesty about the nature of institutional sexual abuse.</p>
1305.  
1306.  
1307.  
1308. <p>Six years later, Luca Guadagnino’s new film, “After the Hunt,” featuring big stars like Julia Roberts and Andrew Garfield, has crashed and burned at the box office. It tells the story of a Yale ethics professor, Alma Imhoff, whose student Maggie, played by Ayo Edebiri, comes to her with an allegation of sexual assault against Hank, a friend and colleague in the philosophy department played by Garfield. The ensuing he said/she said drama stretches beyond the assault itself, exploring the warring interests of every party involved amid typical “cancel culture” paranoia and questions of ethical responsibility. Questions of abuse and complicity take a back seat to Guadagnino’s jaundiced view of human self-preservation and striving, where no character is noble and everyone is constantly balancing the complexity of their interior life with the perceived necessities of public performance. This is the end state of #MeToo cinema, less about the movement or the abuses it exposed than the solipsistic impulses that emerged in its wake.</p>
1309.  
1310.  
1311.  
1312. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>This is the end state of #MeToo cinema.</p></blockquote></figure>
1313.  
1314.  
1315.  
1316. <p>It’s been a long road to get there, both for the movement itself, whose journalistic roots lay in the shock over <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a>’s initial election, and the culture it attempted to reshape. The extent of that reshaping is debatable, with general awareness of sexual abuses greatly increased and many workplaces introducing tougher standards, but a concurrent backlash that has seen many abusers escape true accountability and the return of Trump to the White House. It is perhaps a nasty sign of where everything was headed, that the other big, early entry in the #MeToo canon was 2019’s “Bombshell,” the Jay Roach film starring Charlize Theron as Megyn Kelly, alongside Nicole Kidman and Margot Robbie, in a dramatization of the women at Fox News who exposed CEO Roger Ailes’ serial sexual harassment. At $32 million, its budget dwarfs the $1.4 million Kitty Green had to work with, visible in its glossy Hollywood charms. Its well-earned Academy Award for makeup and hairstyling attests to the superficiality of its creation, even as a film about that very superficiality. Received reasonably well at the time, the movie is now practically forgotten, its papering-over of Kelly’s own unsavory attitudes appearing only more farcical by the day amid her continuing far-right lurch.</p>
1317.  
1318.  
1319.  
1320. <p>“Bombshell” attempted to expose the ways image-oriented concerns of a propaganda factory hid the kinds of abuses it often publicly defended or obscured, as though this was some kind of revelation rather than an exercise in liberal schadenfreude. That it succumbed to surface-level sensationalism speaks to the ways Hollywood had yet to reckon with the rot in its own backyard, never mind what goes on other industries, including adjacent ones like news media.</p>
1321.  
1322.  
1323.  
1324. <p>A year later, Hollywood’s embrace of “Promising Young Woman,” the feature debut from “Saltburn” writer-director Emerald Fennell, only further exemplified the industry’s cluelessness. Zippy and stylish in an Instagram story way, the 2020 film stars Carey Mulligan as a med school dropout who spends her nights pretending to be drunk, letting men take her home and then, just as they’re about to assault her, revealing her ruse and … telling them not to do it again. The film’s grating visual references to exploitation cinema — drawn more from Quentin Tarantino’s appropriations of the genre than any evident familiarity on Fennell’s part — play up its twist on the traditional rape-revenge fantasy. That the offensively graphic assaults on women, and subsequent orgiastic violence wrought upon lascivious men, in ’70s and ’80s trash masterpieces like “Ms. 45,” “I Spit on Your Grave” and “The Last House on the Left” — all made by men — was deliberately designed to startle audiences out of complacency did not occur to Fennell. Instead, she crafted a film so dulled down that the characters who end up punished most harshly are the women, at the hands of Mulligan’s protagonist, Cassie. A particularly sickening sequence involves Cassie tricking an old classmate into thinking she’s been raped after getting day drunk together. Cassie, it turns out, hired a guy to take her blacked-out former friend back to a hotel room and leave her there.</p>
1325.  
1326.  
1327.  
1328. <p>When “Promising Young Woman” won the Oscar for original screenplay, many critics scoffed at the coronation of such a response to #MeToo, which wore the guise of a progressive fantasy, but whose moral compass was wildly askew. It’s the male lawyer, who spent his entire career defaming woman who’d accused men of sexual assault, that receives the warm touch of redemption, literally crying into Cassie’s lap as she tearfully offers him forgiveness. Meanwhile, Cassie purposely allows herself to be murdered, presumably allowing her a heavenly reunion with her best friend, who took her own life in the aftermath of her rape. The murderer, you see, was also the rapist, and at last he’s been arrested. Justice: Done. The charitable read here is a cynical commentary on the finality of violence women must endure in order for men’s crimes against them to be taken seriously, but that doesn’t really add up when you consider how Cassie lets most men off the hook while furthering the torment and degradation of women. In its way, the reactionary streak in “Promising Young Woman,” and the inability of Academy voters to recognize it, foretold the new status quo.</p>
1329.  
1330.  
1331.  
1332. <p>Less averse to violence was 2021’s “The Last Duel,” directed by Ridley Scott and co-written by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon and collaborator Nicole Holofcener. The medieval drama tells the story of the real-life assault of a French knight’s wife, Marguerite, played by Jodie Comer, and the judicially approved duel between her husband and assailant to settle the affront. By turns a funny, dramatic and harrowing film, its key gambit is its “Rashomon”-like structure, telling the story first from the husband’s perspective, then the rapist and finally Marguerite’s, all leading to the big, bone-crunching duel. Unlike Kurosawa’s classic, “The Last Duel” makes clear that Marguerite’s side of the story is the one to be believed, an approach given extra weight by Affleck and Damon bringing Holofcener on to write that section, a very post-#MeToo acknowledgement of their limited male perspective. Better known for writing wonderful indie dramedies like “Lovely &amp; Amazing” and “Enough Said,” Holofcener’s contribution to the film is deeply felt. Where the earlier chapters evince a masculine interest in the dynamics of fraternity and honor, Marguerite’s chapter centers its attention on the troubling reality of simply existing in these men’s world, a perfect lead-up to the battle, in which the violence done to her explodes in a public spectacle of brutality. Her victimization is their contest in the end.</p>
1333.  
1334.  
1335.  
1336. <p>By 2022 — five years, a pandemic and another presidential election after the Weinstein story hit the pages of The New York Times — Hollywood was not finished addressing #MeToo, and in the most direct way. “She Said,” directed by Maria Schrader and written by Rebecca Lenkiewicz, stars Zoe Kazan and Carey Mulligan as Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, respectively, the journalists at the Times who broke the Weinstein story. Attempting what “Spotlight” had done for the Boston Globe’s reporting on the child sexual abuses in the Catholic Church, “She Said” falls victim to both pedestrian craft and a nagging feeling that there’s something very back-patting about its fascination with Hollywood and celebrity. Not only starring famous actresses, the film features famous Weinstein victims like Ashley Judd and Gwyneth Paltrow playing themselves — Judd appears onscreen while Paltrow’s voice is heard. </p>
1337.  
1338.  
1339.  
1340. <p>As a movement, #MeToo was questioned from the start for the fact that it took the victimization of famous white women to lend credibility to the abuse of those lower down the ladder. In “She Said,” though this uncomfortable fact is brought up, the production can’t help falling for the same unfortunate tendency. The result is a bland, often poorly written and acted display of self-congratulation for a Hollywood looking to move past the crimes and misconduct all that reporting uncovered. That it was produced by Brad Pitt — who by then had already been credibly accused of serious domestic violence by his ex-wife, Angelina Jolie, and had continued working with Weinstein even after learning that he’d harassed Paltrow, his girlfriend at the time — only adds to the unpleasant air pervading the film.</p>
1341.  
1342.  
1343.  
1344. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The abuses themselves are simply facts to be debated, but the psychology of the abuser is the meat of it.</p></blockquote></figure>
1345.  
1346.  
1347.  
1348. <p>The far more well-received “Tár,” released the same year, better satisfied everyone’s urge for a film about #MeToo that dealt with where the discourse had gone by that point. “Cancel culture” was the topic of the day, and Todd Field’s return to feature filmmaking 16 years after “Little Children” was greeted with widespread acclaim for its Kubrickian style and its tremendous central performance by Cate Blanchett, along with plenty of debate over its meaning and intentions. Crafted with an extreme sense of verisimilitude — to the point that many mistakenly assumed it was based on a true story — the film is about an orchestra conductor, Lydia Tár, a commanding, acerbic woman, who finds herself accused of blacklisting a former mentee and causing her suicide. Along with implications that Tár abused her position to engage in affairs with young women she employed, she also becomes the target of a smear campaign after she furiously derided a male student for his very “woke” perspective on music and life.</p>
1349.  
1350.  
1351.  
1352. <p>A handsome, thorny film, the success of “Tár” was also an indication of where cultural interests had moved. The abuses themselves are simply facts to be debated, but the psychology of the abuser is the meat of it. Making the abuser a woman — and a lesbian to boot — separates #MeToo from its more clearly feminist origins to make it a matter, simply, of power. What kind of person seeks such power? What kind of person contorts themselves beyond recognition to achieve it? How are they then haunted by their actions? What does their comeuppance look like? Aren’t they, ultimately, just absurd, laughable creatures doomed by their own narcissism? This presupposes that such people are regularly caught out, but reality begs to differ.</p>
1353.  
1354.  
1355.  
1356. <p class="is-td-marked">The influence of “Tár” on “After the Hunt” is unmistakable to the point that Guadagnino almost seems to poke at that film, dressing Roberts in similar clothing and having her ream out a too-woke student during a philosophy seminar. Its aims are different, though, not least because its central character is a bystander, neither victim nor abuser. Taking more after Woody Allen films than Stanley Kubrick — Guadagnino, ever the impish provocateur, made the film’s title credits resemble an Allen film — “After the Hunt” looks on the surface like a relitigation of by now well-worn arguments over #MeToo and cancel culture. In a way, it’s about both and neither. The original script for the film, by Nora Garrett, ended with Roberts’ character Alma doing “the right thing” and testifying on her student’s behalf. Guadagnino had Garrett drastically alter the film, both to maintain a small degree of ambiguity around the incident at the film’s center, but also to have Alma and the student fully fall out. In the film’s epilogue, Hank has landed on his feet somewhere less than prestigious, while Alma and Maggie have managed to do well for themselves in the wake of their sniping. Its final shot, of a $20 bill on a restaurant table, the sum total of their final interaction, tells the story. Years after the Weinstein exposé, the hunt now over and #MeToo fading in the rearview, what’s left is a few men who got punished, dashed hopes of female solidarity and the structures of power marching on.</p>
1357. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/after-a-decade-of-metoo-cinema-what-have-we-learned/">After a Decade of #MeToo Cinema, What Have We Learned?</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1358. ]]></content:encoded>
1360. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/after-a-decade-of-metoo-cinema-what-have-we-learned/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
1361. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
1364. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313129</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/MeTooCinema.png?width=878&#038;height=585" length="2125468" type="image/png" />
1365. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/MeTooCinema.png?width=878&#038;height=585" />
1366. </item>
1367. <item>
1368. <title>The True Test of Our Progress</title>
1369. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-true-test-of-our-progress/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=the-true-test-of-our-progress</link>
1370. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-true-test-of-our-progress/#respond</comments>
1372. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Robert Reich /  Substack ]]></dc:creator>
1373. <pubDate>Wed, 05 Nov 2025 16:56:15 +0000</pubDate>
1374. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
1375. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
1376. <category><![CDATA[Economic Justice]]></category>
1377. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
1378. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
1379. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
1380. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
1381. <category><![CDATA[donald trump]]></category>
1382. <category><![CDATA[fdr]]></category>
1383. <category><![CDATA[government shutdown]]></category>
1384. <category><![CDATA[snap]]></category>
1385. <category><![CDATA[zohran mamdani]]></category>
1386. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313124</guid>
1387.  
1388. <description><![CDATA[<p>A great day at the polls lights a path forward for Democrats and away from a world of  Gatsby-themed billionaires’ balls.</p>
1389. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-true-test-of-our-progress/">The True Test of Our Progress</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1390. ]]></description>
1391. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
1392. <p><strong><a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Democrats</a></strong> had a great day Tuesday. It’s crucial that they hone their economic message for next year’s midterms on affordability, based in fairness.</p>
1393.  
1394.  
1395.  
1396. <p>President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> is doing the opposite. Although a federal court ordered Trump to continue to provide food assistance to about 42 million low-income Americans who depend on them, Trump on Tuesday threatened to deny them anyway until the end of the government shutdown.</p>
1397.  
1398.  
1399.  
1400. <p>In a post on social media, he said benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as food stamps, “will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up the government, which they can easily do, and not before!”</p>
1401.  
1402.  
1403.  
1404. <p>How low Trump has sunk.</p>
1405.  
1406.  
1407.  
1408. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The Trump regime has adopted the reverse metric.</p></blockquote></figure>
1409.  
1410.  
1411.  
1412. <p>Eighty-eight years ago, in his second inaugural address, Franklin D. Roosevelt told America that “the test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”</p>
1413.  
1414.  
1415.  
1416. <p>It was not a test of the nation’s military might or of the size of the national economy. It was a test of our moral authority. We had a duty to comfort the afflicted, even if that required afflicting the comfortable.</p>
1417.  
1418.  
1419.  
1420. <p>The Trump regime has adopted the reverse metric. The test of&nbsp;<em>its&nbsp;</em>progress is whether it adds to the abundance of those who have much and provides less for those who have too little. It is passing&nbsp;<em>this&nbsp;</em>test with flying colors.</p>
1421.  
1422.  
1423.  
1424. <p>The regime initially signaled its willingness to tap $4.65 billion in emergency money to fund food stamps, which would cover about half of this month’s benefits. As a result, some food aid would have started to go to American families who need it, but not nearly as much as they require — and not for weeks.&nbsp;<em>New</em>&nbsp;applicants this month wouldn’t get any.</p>
1425.  
1426.  
1427.  
1428. <p>Now, in direct defiance of the judge’s order, Trump is saying no food stamps will be provided at all — unless congressional Democrats relent on their demand.</p>
1429.  
1430.  
1431.  
1432. <p>And what is that demand? That lower-income Americans continue to receive subsidized health care. Otherwise, health care insurance premiums for millions of lower-income Americans will skyrocket next year by an average of 30% because the Trump Republican “Big Beautiful” (Big Ugly) bill slashed Obamacare subsidies.</p>
1433.  
1434.  
1435.  
1436. <p>Republicans had rammed the Big Ugly through Congress without giving Senate Democrats an opportunity to filibuster it because Republicans used the process called reconciliation, which requires only a majority vote of the Senate rather than the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster.</p>
1437.  
1438.  
1439.  
1440. <p>The Big Ugly also requires Medicaid applicants and enrollees — also low-income — to document at least 80 hours per month of work.</p>
1441.  
1442.  
1443.  
1444. <p>Many people dependent on Medicaid won’t be able to do this, either because they’re incapable of working or won’t be able to do the required paperwork to qualify for an exemption from the work requirement.</p>
1445.  
1446.  
1447.  
1448. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The shutdown is the only practical leverage Democrats have.</p></blockquote></figure>
1449.  
1450.  
1451.  
1452. <p>The Congressional Budget Office estimates the work requirement will be the largest source of future savings by Medicaid, reducing federal spending on the needy by $<a href="https://www.cbo.gov/publication/61461" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">326 billion</a> over 10 years and causing millions to become uninsured.</p>
1453.  
1454.  
1455.  
1456. <p>All told, the Big Ugly cuts roughly&nbsp;<a href="https://democrats-budget.house.gov/resources/fact-sheet/trumps-big-ugly-law-steals-poor-give-ultra-rich" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">$1 trillion</a>&nbsp;over the next decade from programs for which the main beneficiaries are the poor and working class, and gives about&nbsp;<a href="https://democrats-budget.house.gov/resources/fact-sheet/trumps-big-ugly-law-steals-poor-give-ultra-rich" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">$1 trillion</a>&nbsp;in tax benefits to the richest members of our society.</p>
1457.  
1458.  
1459.  
1460. <p>It is the most dramatic reversal of FDR’s moral test in American history.</p>
1461.  
1462.  
1463.  
1464. <p>In the face of this outrage, the shutdown is the only practical leverage Democrats have.</p>
1465.  
1466.  
1467.  
1468. <p>By the time of FDR’s second inaugural in 1937, most of the country was still ill-housed, ill-fed and ill-clothed. Yet we were all in it together. The fortunes of the robber barons of the Gilded Age had mostly been leveled by the Great Crash of 1929.</p>
1469.  
1470.  
1471.  
1472. <p>Perhaps it was easier under those circumstances to accept the idea that the test of our progress wasn’t whether we added more to the abundance of those who had much but provided enough for those who had too little.</p>
1473.  
1474.  
1475.  
1476. <p>Today, though, the moneyed interests lord it over America — exerting so much economic and political power that the nation is badly failing FDR’s test.</p>
1477.  
1478.  
1479.  
1480. <p>Last weekend, just as millions of low-income Americans were losing their food stamps, Trump threw a lush “Great Gatsby”-themed party at his Mar-a-Lago estate, replete with 1920s flappers and Gatsby-inspired music from the Roaring Twenties.</p>
1481.  
1482.  
1483.  
1484. <p>Some critics have called it “tone deaf,” but it was an accurate rendition of the tone Trump has set for America.</p>
1485.  
1486.  
1487.  
1488. <p>Trump is throwing a huge party for America’s wealthy — giving them tax cuts and regulatory rollbacks to ensure that their wealth (and support for him) continues to grow.</p>
1489.  
1490.  
1491.  
1492. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Trump is throwing a huge party for America’s wealthy.</p></blockquote></figure>
1493.  
1494.  
1495.  
1496. <p>Meanwhile, he is throwing to poor and working-class Americans the red meat of hatefulness — hate of immigrants, people of color, the “deep state,” “socialists,” “communists,” transgender people and Democrats.</p>
1497.  
1498.  
1499.  
1500. <p>This is the formula strongmen have used for a century — more wealth for the wealthy, more bigotry for the working-class and poor — until the entire facade crumbles under the weight of its own hypocrisy.</p>
1501.  
1502.  
1503.  
1504. <p>But Tuesday, millions of American voters refused to go along with this unfairness. They repudiated, loudly and clearly, the formula Trump and his regime have used.</p>
1505.  
1506.  
1507.  
1508. <p>It is now the responsibility of all of us — whether Democrat or Republican or independent, whether wealthy or middle class or working class or poor, whether conservative or progressive — to return the nation to a path that is morally sustainable.</p>
1509. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-true-test-of-our-progress/">The True Test of Our Progress</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1510. ]]></content:encoded>
1512. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-true-test-of-our-progress/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
1513. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
1516. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313124</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AdobeStock_550936504_Editorial_Use_Only-scaled.jpeg?width=878&#038;height=585" length="963216" type="image/jpeg" />
1517. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AdobeStock_550936504_Editorial_Use_Only-scaled.jpeg?width=878&#038;height=585" />
1518. </item>
1519. <item>
1520. <title>Cheney, Architect of Endless War, Helped Kill Our Faith in Leaders</title>
1521. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/cheney-architect-of-endless-war-helped-kill-our-faith-in-leaders/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=cheney-architect-of-endless-war-helped-kill-our-faith-in-leaders</link>
1522. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/cheney-architect-of-endless-war-helped-kill-our-faith-in-leaders/#respond</comments>
1524. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Kelley Beaucar Vlahos, Jim Lobe /  Responsible Statecraft ]]></dc:creator>
1525. <pubDate>Wed, 05 Nov 2025 16:46:40 +0000</pubDate>
1526. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
1527. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
1528. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
1529. <category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
1530. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
1531. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
1532. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
1533. <category><![CDATA[Wounds of War]]></category>
1534. <category><![CDATA[9/11]]></category>
1535. <category><![CDATA[dick cheney]]></category>
1536. <category><![CDATA[george w bush]]></category>
1537. <category><![CDATA[iraq war]]></category>
1538. <category><![CDATA[war on terror]]></category>
1539. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313120</guid>
1540.  
1541. <description><![CDATA[<p>George W. Bush's vice president was probably the most powerful veep in history, but at America's expense.</p>
1542. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/cheney-architect-of-endless-war-helped-kill-our-faith-in-leaders/">Cheney, Architect of Endless War, Helped Kill Our Faith in Leaders</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1543. ]]></description>
1544. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<span id="block_fb054c047145049abf53c892ed8abbe0" class="td-article-related-box-block block md:inline md:float-right w-[350px] max-w-full border-4 border-black p-6 md:ml-5 !my-12 !md:my-6">
1545. <span class="text-red block font-proxima-nova absolute -translate-y-11 pt-2 pb-1.5 px-3 bg-white font-semibold uppercase tracking-widest text-lg leading-none">Related</span>
1546. <span class="flex flex-col gap-2 font-semibold font-news-gothic-std">
1547. <span class="block">
1548. <span class="block">
1549. <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/dig/the-last-letter/" class="!border-0">
1550. The Last Letter </a>
1551. </span>
1552. <span class="block mt-2">
1553. <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/dig/the-last-letter/"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="480" height="256" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/IMG_7389-tomas-young-dig-804-cropped.jpg?width=480&amp;height=256" class="attachment-16:9-medium size-16:9-medium wp-post-image" alt="" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/IMG_7389-tomas-young-dig-804-cropped.jpg?width=804 804w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/IMG_7389-tomas-young-dig-804-cropped.jpg?width=300&amp;height=160 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/IMG_7389-tomas-young-dig-804-cropped.jpg?width=768&amp;height=409 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 480px) 100vw, 480px" /></a>
1554. </span>
1555. </span>
1556. </span>
1557. </span>
1558.  
1559.  
1560.  
1561. <p><strong>Dick Cheney has died</strong>, according to reports Tuesday morning, at the age of 84.</p>
1562.  
1563.  
1564.  
1565. <p>A formidable White House and Defense Department aide (under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford) who left to head an equally formidable Texas-based oil company (with vast federal contracts) and then back in Washington as vice president to George W. Bush, Cheney is probably the most symbolic figure of the failure of the post-9/11 wars. In particular, the Iraq War.&nbsp;<a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2005/11/how-dick-cheney-runs-national-security.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">It was his amassed power and special cadre of operators known as neoconservatives</a>&nbsp;inside the Old Executive Office building and E Ring at the Pentagon that with strategic treachery dominated the politics and intelligence necessary to march Washington into the invasion of 2003 and to proliferate a &#8220;Global War on Terror&#8221; that lasted well beyond his tenure in office.</p>
1566.  
1567.  
1568.  
1569. <p>By all accounts it was his midwifed lies over weapons of mass destruction that got us there, followed by the blunders (not anticipating the Iraqi insurgency), the loss of life (<a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2023/05/16/the-war-on-terror-led-to-over-4-5-million-deaths-report/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">millions</a>), the cost to our Treasury, and the emergence of a new warfare marked by extrajudicial killing, torture, secrecy and endless war that transformed American society and politics, perhaps forever.</p>
1570.  
1571.  
1572.  
1573. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Cheney is probably the most symbolic figure of the failure of the post-9/11 wars.</p></blockquote></figure>
1574.  
1575.  
1576.  
1577. <p>For it was the exploitation of American grief, fear and patriotism after 9/11 to pursue neoconservative wars in the&nbsp;Middle East&nbsp;that zapped the people&#8217;s faith in government institutions. It pretty much destroyed <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/republican-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="11" title="republican party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the Republican Party</a> and gave rise to populist movements on both sides of the aisle. It created a generation of veterans harboring more mistrust in elites and Washington than even the Vietnam War era. On the other end of the spectrum, it unleashed mercenary warfare, killer drones, civil wars and police powers in the United States that have only served make the people less free and more fearful of their government. Thanks in part to Dick Cheney, the executive, i.e., the president,&nbsp;<a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/trump-911/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">has more power than ever</a>&nbsp;— to bomb, detain, and &#8220;decapitate&#8221; any government leader he does not like.</p>
1578.  
1579.  
1580.  
1581. <p>Many obituaries will have been written for Dick Cheney, all scarred with his role in the Iraq War. For a time he was a very, very powerful man, and then he went away to retire and help raise his grandchildren. How many hundreds of thousands of American families were unable to do the same — plagued by death, disease, mental injuries, sterility, divorce, addiction, suicide — because of a war that he so relentlessly pushed but should never have been.</p>
1582.  
1583.  
1584.  
1585. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Cheney&#8217;s quest for more executive power and &#8216;Machtpolitik&#8217;</h3>
1586.  
1587.  
1588.  
1589. <p>Cheney first came to national prominence when he served as White House Chief of Staff (1975-77) to President Gerald Ford. In that position, he worked closely with Defense Secretary&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/donald-rumsfeld/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Donald Rumsfeld</a>&nbsp;to counter and eventually&nbsp;<a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9781118907634.ch8" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">derail Henry Kissinger&#8217;s strategy of &#8220;detente&#8221;</a>&nbsp;with the Soviet Union.</p>
1590.  
1591.  
1592.  
1593. <p>In that initiative, Cheney and Rumsfeld also worked closely with the Washington-based leaders of the emergent&nbsp;<a href="https://lobelog.com/neoconservativism-in-a-nutshell/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">neoconservative movement</a>, a number of them, including&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/richard-perle/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Richard Perle</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/elliott-abrams/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Elliott Abrams</a>, working in the office of Sen. Henry &#8220;Scoop&#8221; Jackson, D-Wash., chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, to promote, among other things,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/reassessing-jackson-vanik-amendment" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Jewish emigration</a>&nbsp;from the Soviet Union to Israel, and to persuade Ford to convene an ultra-hawkish<a href="https://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/403488/team-b/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">&nbsp;&#8220;Team B&#8221;</a>&nbsp;outside the established intelligence community to hype the alleged military threat posed by Moscow in order to sabotage a nuclear arms control agreement.</p>
1594.  
1595.  
1596.  
1597. <p>Their mutual interest in pursuing a massive U.S. arms build-up and an aggressive foreign policy more generally would form the basis of an alliance between the aggressive nationalism and machtpolitik of Cheney and Rumsfeld on the one hand, and the Israel-centered neoconservatives on the other, that more than two decades later in 1997 would blossom into the notorious&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/project_for_the_new_american_century/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Project for the New American Century</a>, whose ideas and associates would ultimately dominate George W. Bush&#8217;s first-term, post-9/11 &#8220;global war on terror&#8221; (GWOT) and the 2003 Iraq invasion for which he always remained unrepentant.</p>
1598.  
1599.  
1600.  
1601. <p>In the 1980s, Cheney, who chafed at Congress&#8217; post-Watergate restrictions on presidential power, particularly regarding foreign policy, served as Wyoming’s single representative in the U.S. House, where he became a staunch and powerful defender of both President Ronald Reagan’s anti-Soviet policies and the&nbsp;<a href="https://time.com/archive/6709711/essay-the-reagan-doctrine/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">“Reagan Doctrine”</a>&nbsp;of rolling back leftist regimes and movements in the Global South, notably in Central America and southern&nbsp;<a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/regions/africa/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Africa</a>. A staunch defender of the protagonists of what became the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/reagan-iran/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Iran-Contra scandal</a>, a secret operation to sell weapons to&nbsp;Iran&nbsp;and use the proceeds to fund the Nicaraguan Contras (for whom Congress had&nbsp;<a href="https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/october-18/u-s-aid-to-contras-signed-into-law" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">expressly prohibited any U.S assistance</a>), he later prevailed on President George H.W. Bush, for whom he served as Defense secretary, to issue pardons to those, like Abrams, who were prosecuted or convicted of crimes as a result of their roles in the affair.</p>
1602.  
1603.  
1604.  
1605. <p>In the wake of the first Gulf War, Cheney directed his undersecretary of Defense for policy,&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/paul-wolfowitz/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Paul Wolfowitz</a>, to draft a long-term U.S. strategy, called the&nbsp;<a href="https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/09/11/how-9-11-enabled-a-preconceived-vision-of-an-imperial-us-foreign-policy/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank"><u>Defense Planning Guidance (DPG)</u></a>, whose global ambitions, when leaked to The Washington Post, provoked a flurry of controversy about the future U.S. role in the world.</p>
1606.  
1607.  
1608.  
1609. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Thanks in part to Dick Cheney, the executive, i.e., the president, has more power than ever.</p></blockquote></figure>
1610.  
1611.  
1612.  
1613. <p>Among other things, the draft called for Washington to maintain permanent military dominance of Eurasia, to be achieved by “deterring potential competitors from even aspiring to a larger regional or global role,” and by preempting, using whatever means necessary, foreign states believed to be developing weapons of mass destruction. It foretold a world in which U.S military intervention would become a “constant fixture” of the geopolitical landscape, and Washington would act as the ultimate guarantor of international peace and security.</p>
1614.  
1615.  
1616.  
1617. <p>One of the document’s principal drafters,&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/lewis-libby/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby</a>, would later become Vice President Cheney’s highly effective chief of staff and national security adviser during George W. Bush’s first term, until he was indicted in October 2005 for perjury in connection with the leak of the identity of a CIA clandestine officer.</p>
1618.  
1619.  
1620.  
1621. <p>The draft DPG would essentially become the inspiration for what became in 1997 the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), a letterhead organization launched by neoconservatives&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/william-kristol/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Bill Kristol</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/robert-kagan/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Robert Kagan</a>&nbsp;that in some ways formalized the coalition of machtpolitikers like Cheney, Rumsfeld and&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/john-bolton/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">John Bolton</a>; pro-Israel neoconservatives like Perle, Abrams, Libby,&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/eliot-cohen/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Eliot Cohen</a> and&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/frank-gaffney/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Frank Gaffney;</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://politicalresearch.org/2024/04/24/101-christian-zionism" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Christian Zionists</a> such as&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/gary-bauer/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Gary Bauer</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/william-bennett/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">William Bennett</a>.</p>
1622.  
1623.  
1624.  
1625. <p>The PNAC subsequently published a series of hawkish statements and open letters demanding substantial increases in the U.S. defense budget and stronger U.S. action against perceived adversaries, notably Iraq, Syria and&nbsp;China. Led by Cheney as vice president and Rumsfeld as Defense secretary, many PNAC associates, particularly neoconservatives, took key posts in the George W. Bush administration in 2001, while the PNAC, along with the&nbsp;<a href="https://militarist-monitor.org/profile/american_enterprise_institute/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">American Enterprise Institute</a>, became the leading group outside the administration banging the drum for invading Iraq and aggressively prosecuting the GWOT.</p>
1626.  
1627.  
1628.  
1629. <p>Cheney&#8217;s influence over foreign policy began to decline in 2005, when it had become clear that the U.S. faced a serious insurgency in Iraq. Several key neoconservatives, including Wolfowitz as deputy secretary of Defense, were dropped as Bush&#8217;s second term opened, and Libby&#8217;s departure that October marked a clear setback. Pressed by the Israeli government, Cheney pushed very hard beginning in 2007 on Bush to attack nuclear and other targets in Iran, but his appeals were&nbsp;<a href="https://www.haaretz.com/2009-08-30/ty-article/cheney-advocated-attack-on-iran-but-bush-wanted-diplomacy/0000017f-dc4d-df62-a9ff-dcdf851c0000" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">reportedly rejected outright</a>.</p>
1630.  
1631.  
1632.  
1633. <p>Cheney&#8217;s legacy, however, lives on. His efforts to concentrate power in a &#8220;unitary executive&#8221; to reverse what he believed constituted a disastrous encroachment by Congress to limit presidential power and his belief that the United States should retain and exercise a right to unilaterally intervene militarily anywhere and anytime in pursuit of its own interests clearly have survived his passing.</p>
1634. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/cheney-architect-of-endless-war-helped-kill-our-faith-in-leaders/">Cheney, Architect of Endless War, Helped Kill Our Faith in Leaders</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1635. ]]></content:encoded>
1637. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/cheney-architect-of-endless-war-helped-kill-our-faith-in-leaders/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
1638. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
1641. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313120</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP23047069508970.jpg?width=898&#038;height=585" length="1885926" type="image/jpeg" />
1642. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP23047069508970.jpg?width=898&#038;height=585" />
1643. </item>
1644. <item>
1645. <title>New York&#8217;s Working Class Elects a Movement Mayor</title>
1646. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/new-yorks-working-class-elects-a-movement-mayor/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=new-yorks-working-class-elects-a-movement-mayor</link>
1647. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/new-yorks-working-class-elects-a-movement-mayor/#respond</comments>
1649. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Luis Feliz Leon /  Labor Notes ]]></dc:creator>
1650. <pubDate>Wed, 05 Nov 2025 16:39:04 +0000</pubDate>
1651. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
1652. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
1653. <category><![CDATA[Labor]]></category>
1654. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
1655. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
1656. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
1657. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
1658. <category><![CDATA[andrew cuomo]]></category>
1659. <category><![CDATA[donald trump]]></category>
1660. <category><![CDATA[mayor]]></category>
1661. <category><![CDATA[new york city]]></category>
1662. <category><![CDATA[zohran mamdani]]></category>
1663. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313117</guid>
1664.  
1665. <description><![CDATA[<p>How Zohran Mamdani beat the odds with a vision of municipal governance that serves the needs of working-class people in the style of Fiorello La Guardia.</p>
1666. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/new-yorks-working-class-elects-a-movement-mayor/">New York&#8217;s Working Class Elects a Movement Mayor</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1667. ]]></description>
1668. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
1669. <p><strong>Zohran Kwame Mamdani</strong>, a Democratic Socialist and the Democratic nominee, will be New York City’s next mayor, after trouncing former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in a primary and general election double whammy.</p>
1670.  
1671.  
1672.  
1673. <p>“The working people of New York have been told by the wealthy and the well-connected that power does not belong in their hands,” Mamdani told a roaring crowd at his victory party in Brooklyn on Tuesday night.</p>
1674.  
1675.  
1676.  
1677. <p>“Fingers bruised from lifting boxes on the warehouse floor; palms calloused from delivery bike handlebars; knuckles scarred with kitchen burns — these are not hands that have been allowed to hold power. And yet, over the last 12 months, you have dared to reach for something greater. Tonight, against all odds, we have grasped it .… We have toppled a political dynasty.”</p>
1678.  
1679.  
1680.  
1681. <p>But the fight is just beginning. &#8220;This is part of a lifelong struggle,” Mamdani told the campaign’s legions of volunteers in&nbsp;<a href="https://x.com/zohrankmamdani/status/1985691331948388823?s=46" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">his closing message</a>. “Not an electoral one. You have joined a movement for the rest of your life. Now, however you want to be a part of that movement is your decision, just as long as you continue to be a part of it.”</p>
1682.  
1683.  
1684.  
1685. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>&#8220;Tonight, against all odds, we have grasped it .… We have toppled a political dynasty.”</p></blockquote></figure>
1686.  
1687.  
1688.  
1689. <p>Leading call-and-response chants at the victory party, he called out: “Together, New York, we’re going to freeze the …” “Rent!” roared the crowd. “Together, New York, we’re going to make buses fast and …” “Free!” “Together, New York, we’re going to deliver universal…” “Child care!”</p>
1690.  
1691.  
1692.  
1693. <p>“Let the words we’ve spoken together, the dreams we’ve dreamt together, become the agenda we deliver together,” Mamdani said.</p>
1694.  
1695.  
1696.  
1697. <p>“Zohran has the same expectation [to deliver] of a Tom Brady, a LeBron James, an Aaron Rodgers,” said yellow cabbie Kadir Gaurab on the eve of the election. “He’s a historic figure.”</p>
1698.  
1699.  
1700.  
1701. <p>Mamdani, a state assemblymember from Queens and a stalwart of the Democratic Socialists of America, will be New York’s first Muslim mayor.</p>
1702.  
1703.  
1704.  
1705. <p>The 11,000-member <a href="https://socialists.nyc/about/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">New York City DSA</a> spearheaded Mamdani’s massive canvassing operation, marshaling an army of 104,400 volunteers who knocked on 3 million doors. (Disclosure: I have canvassed for Mamdani’s election bid and I am a DSA member.) Two million New Yorkers cast a ballot in the election, a turnout number not seen in half a century, according to the Board of Elections.</p>
1706.  
1707.  
1708.  
1709. <p>Volunteers were galvanized by Mamdani’s relentless focus on the affordability crisis and principled stand against Israel’s unfolding genocide in Gaza. His platform includes a rent freeze for 2.5 million people living in rent-stabilized apartments, fast and free buses, city-owned grocery stores to lower the cost of food, free universal child care starting at 6 weeks old, and building affordable housing.</p>
1710.  
1711.  
1712.  
1713. <p>But up until February, Mamdani was a statistical nonentity, polling at 1% in a tie with a hypothetical candidate “someone else.” “I always knew we could beat him,” <a href="https://jacobin.com/2025/10/mamdani-nyc-mayor-election-speech" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Mamdani told a crowd of 13,000</a> last month while rallying with Vermont Sen. <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/bernie-sanders/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="7" title="Bernie Sanders" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bernie Sanders</a> and Rep. <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/alexandria-ocasio-cortez/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="1" title="Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez</a> in Queens. “When we launched this campaign on Oct. 23, one year and three days ago, there was not a single television camera there to cover it.”</p>
1714.  
1715.  
1716.  
1717. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">‘IT’S VERY REFRESHING’</h3>
1718.  
1719.  
1720.  
1721. <p>Brian Levy, a city employee, librarian and member of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees District Council 37, said he backed Mamdani from the very beginning, but it was clear the campaign was struggling to break through. “I remember not being very optimistic about the Zohran campaign at all last November,” said Levy. “He’s talking about affordability, but I don’t know .… If Cuomo enters the race, he’s toast. And the Democratic establishment ain’t behind him. There’s a lot of cards stacked against him.”</p>
1722.  
1723.  
1724.  
1725. <p>But by May, <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2025/05/30/mamdani-and-his-campaign-doubted-viability-early-on-00375873" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Mamdani’s longshot campaign was surging</a>, maxing out the city’s public finance system and clinching key progressive endorsements. The New York City DSA had learned from previous campaigns to spin milestones like reaching 25,000 volunteers into fresh momentum to go even further. Levy said the turning point came when Mamdani and City Comptroller Brad Lander, who was also running in the mayoral primary, endorsed each other (the primary used a ranked-choice system where voters could rank more than one candidate), spurring left and progressive blocs of activists to consolidate instead of fracturing as they did in the last mayoral race.</p>
1726.  
1727.  
1728.  
1729. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>&#8220;He’s built a really great political machine.”</p></blockquote></figure>
1730.  
1731.  
1732.  
1733. <p>Steve Beck, a retired District 37 member, said Mamdani’s victory is an example of coalition-building. Beck, who is 76, came into politics in the 1960s when the <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Democratic Party</a> had “precinct captains and Democratic committee people in every neighborhood, in every building,” he said. “And now it’s nothing but chasing money. If you donate a little bit to a campaign, you get these endless emails.”</p>
1734.  
1735.  
1736.  
1737. <p>Shortly after <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/kamala-harris/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="3" title="Kamala Harris" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kamala Harris</a> lost the presidential election to <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a>, Beck went to the local <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Democratic Party</a> organization in Queens to see what he could do to volunteer. A woman came on the intercom, “and she says, ‘We’re not open to the public,’” he recalls. “Truer words were never spoken.”</p>
1738.  
1739.  
1740.  
1741. <p>At this point, he said, the Democratic Party is a hollow institution that can’t be called a party in any meaningful sense. “I get emails from the New York state Democrats, and you look at the list of meetings, and all it is is fundraisers. There are no meetings. And who holds meetings? The Democratic Socialists of America holds meetings. The Working Families Party holds meetings. Zohran has gone back to the old playbook of politics, which is canvassing and people on the street and people in the neighborhoods, and it’s very refreshing.”</p>
1742.  
1743.  
1744.  
1745. <p>From Beck’s perspective, it’s “very New York” to see a growing South Asian and Muslim voting bloc following in the footsteps of many immigrant groups that came before them. Their political reasoning: “If the Jews and Italians can do it, I can do it,” he said. “And that’s just completely typical, rather than being told to be afraid of each other. That’s what the wealthy always do, is trying to divide us from each other.</p>
1746.  
1747.  
1748.  
1749. <p>“So that’s the way I see it,” Beck said. “I’m a Jewish American. I’m very proud of that, and I don’t see anything to be afraid of from some kid from Uganda jumping into politics,” a reference to Mamdani’s place of birth. “He’s been wildly successful, I think, because he’s a really great candidate, and because he’s built a really great political machine.”</p>
1750.  
1751.  
1752.  
1753. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">‘FOCUSED ON IMMIGRANTS AND WORKERS’</h3>
1754.  
1755.  
1756.  
1757. <p>Mamdani’s victory should put to rest the lie that workers are drawn only to simpleminded economic populism that casts social justice questions as distractions. In reality, workers are people with genders, identities and religious beliefs that shape their relationships with one another and the world — and that’s part of what can spur them to action. &#8220;I am young. I am Muslim. I am a Democratic Socialist. And most damning of all, I refuse to apologize for any of this,&#8221; said Mamdani in his victory speech.</p>
1758.  
1759.  
1760.  
1761. <p>The campaign cut across ethnic and racial divides not by ignoring these differences but by building a unified political platform wrapped around good public services and a strong labor movement. “We can demand a government that makes our lives better,” Mamdani said. He appealed to the working class in its splendor of variety: “Thank you to those so often forgotten by the politics of our city, who made this movement their own. I speak of Yemeni bodega owners and Mexican abuelas. Senegalese taxi drivers and Uzbek nurses. Trinidadian line cooks and Ethiopian aunties.</p>
1762.  
1763.  
1764.  
1765. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>&#8220;They see Mamdani carrying the working class with him in every step he takes toward power.”</p></blockquote></figure>
1766.  
1767.  
1768.  
1769. <p>“In this moment of political darkness, New York will be the light. Here, we believe in standing up for those we love, whether you are an immigrant, a member of the trans community, one of the many Black women that Donald Trump has fired from a federal job, a single mom still waiting for the cost of groceries to go down, or anyone else with their back against the wall. Your struggle is ours, too.</p>
1770.  
1771.  
1772.  
1773. <p>“And it’s about people like Richard, the taxi driver I went on a 15-day hunger strike with outside of City Hall, who still has to drive his cab seven days a week. My brother, we are in City Hall now.&#8221;</p>
1774.  
1775.  
1776.  
1777. <p>On the eve of the election, <a href="https://inthesetimes.com/article/zohran-mamdani-night-shift-nyc-mayor-healthcare-cab-drivers-laguardia-workers-multiracial-class-democratic-socialists-america-nyc-election" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">he walked the taxi line</a> at LaGuardia Airport, canvassing drivers to vote, posing for photos, chatting with Bangladeshi, Senegalese, Algerian and Indian workers. He greeted them in English, Arabic, Hindi and Urdu. In the final stretch of the campaign, he released a GOTV video in Arabic, after recording others in Spanish, Urdu and Hindi.</p>
1778.  
1779.  
1780.  
1781. <p>Bhairavi Desai, president of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, said Mamdani won the trust of taxi drivers during their fight for debt relief and <a href="https://thebaffler.com/latest/taxis-take-a-stand-leon" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">15 days of hunger strike</a> in 2021. “Members witnessed this humble state Assembly member insist on being the last in line behind them to be checked by physicians during the hunger strike,” she said, “huddle in circles with them during campaign updates and strategy sessions, and introduce them by name to other elected officials.</p>
1782.  
1783.  
1784.  
1785. <p>“So, of course drivers feel that Mamdani is one of their own. They see themselves reflected in a campaign focused on immigrants and workers, and they see Mamdani carrying the working class with him in every step he takes toward power.”</p>
1786.  
1787.  
1788.  
1789. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">HOW UNION SUPPORT GREW</h3>
1790.  
1791.  
1792.  
1793. <p>Now Mamdani is a national name. He has found success by translating a broad agenda of affordability into a platform that can unite across various divides.</p>
1794.  
1795.  
1796.  
1797. <p>One of these divides was among the big unions. In the primary, only AFSCME District Council 37 (representing city workers), the Professional Staff Congress at the City University of New York (PSC-CUNY) and United Auto Workers Region 9A supported him. Most unions backed Cuomo.</p>
1798.  
1799.  
1800.  
1801. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“He&#8217;s been front and center at every single one of our fights.&#8221;</p></blockquote></figure>
1802.  
1803.  
1804.  
1805. <p>“Much of the problems of the Democratic establishment are reflected in the union establishment,” Desai said. “The ‘endorsement industrial complex’ has pitted unions against each other, because each wants to be the first to place a winning bet on a candidate. Too many leaders in the labor movement think their power comes from being political kingmakers rather than from raising consciousness. With authoritarianism on the rise, unions cannot afford to fall back on zero-sum politics. It’s time for unions to reclaim their muscle by joining together across industries and affiliation to move candidates and platforms that serve the working class.”</p>
1806.  
1807.  
1808.  
1809. <p>The UAW was the first union to endorse Mamdani, after starting discussions among members last fall. Region 9A Director Brandon Mancilla said both members and leaders were excited about the candidate, bringing their arguments in favor of an endorsement through the union’s political council: “He&#8217;s been front and center at every single one of our fights, whether it’s in higher education at Columbia or at the Mercedes-Benz first contract rally.”</p>
1810.  
1811.  
1812.  
1813. <p>Then the union lobbied for Mamdani among other leaders at the NYC Central Labor Council. “We were proud to be the first union to endorse him, but we also got to work to make sure that it didn’t make us special,” said Mancilla.</p>
1814.  
1815.  
1816.  
1817. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">MORE THAN A TURNOUT MACHINE</h3>
1818.  
1819.  
1820.  
1821. <p>After Mamdani won the primary with 56% of the vote, the Hotel and Gaming Trades Council, the New York State Nurses Association, and 32BJ Service Employees International Union, representing doormen and other building workers, united behind Mamdani.</p>
1822.  
1823.  
1824.  
1825. <p>Soon followed endorsements from many other unions. Among the biggest: 1199SEIU, the largest health care union in the country with 450,000 members in the Northeast; the United Federation of Teachers, the largest local in the American Federation of Teachers; the Communications Workers of America (CWA) District 1; and the NYC Central Labor Council, representing 1 million workers from 300 unions.</p>
1826.  
1827.  
1828.  
1829. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“We should be electing people that are about us.&#8221;</p></blockquote></figure>
1830.  
1831.  
1832.  
1833. <p>The Laborers Union didn’t endorse Mamdani, but didn’t endorse Cuomo either. A source inside the union, who would only speak to me on condition of anonymity, reports signs of a gradual shift in thinking. Some members and leaders have begun to question the pay-to-play model of politics, where access and influence are based on financial contributions rather than shared values.</p>
1834.  
1835.  
1836.  
1837. <p>People are sick and tired of being a turnout machine for elections but sidelined when it comes to deciding the platform, this person said: “We should be electing people that are about us, not whenever they need us. What we used to think was extreme under Bernie is not that extreme, because people have gravitated to him.” For instance: “We’ve got to build affordable housing; we can’t just be building luxury homes.”</p>
1838.  
1839.  
1840.  
1841. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">TAX THE RICH</h3>
1842.  
1843.  
1844.  
1845. <p>In office, the UAW’s Mancilla said, Mamdani should “continue building a working-class movement that not only supports his campaign agenda but actually empowers working people and puts them front and center of the politics of the city.”</p>
1846.  
1847.  
1848.  
1849. <p>The UAW is well-positioned to organize support for affordability measures statewide. “We’re going to have a common agenda going into the next legislative session in Albany to fight not just for Zohran’s priorities for the city that our members in the city really care about,” Mancilla said, “but some of those things, like child care and the cost-of-living crisis, that all workers in places like Buffalo and Rochester and Ithaca all care about.”</p>
1850.  
1851.  
1852.  
1853. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Mamdani will need Gov. Kathy Hochul and state legislators to tax the rich.</p></blockquote></figure>
1854.  
1855.  
1856.  
1857. <p>A November Siena poll commissioned by Invest in Our New York found that <a href="https://www.investinourny.org/post/new-poll-78-of-new-yorkers-support-taxing-corporations-and-wealthy-to-address-federal-cuts" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">78% of statewide voters support taxing corporations and the wealthiest 5%</a> to pay for universal child care, affordable housing and public transportation.</p>
1858.  
1859.  
1860.  
1861. <p>To <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/14-aM9DKG337SDMilmfQtLRR-pDwyWSTc/view?usp=drivesdk" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">fund his plans for free child care and fast, free buses</a>, Mamdani will need Gov. Kathy Hochul and state legislators to tax the rich. When Hochul rallied alongside Mamdani in Queens last month, the crowd of 13,000 chanted: “<a href="https://youtu.be/g0rWvWdVxDk?si=0sVhSP37kEZ7BIex" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Tax the rich</a>!” If the message wasn’t clear then, it’ll become louder amplified from the bully pulpit at City Hall. Unions and other grassroots organizations are already organizing to be the troops that win the agenda they voted for.</p>
1862.  
1863.  
1864.  
1865. <p>Mamdani can also use his profile to promote more workplace organizing, Mancilla said: “This is a great moment to get serious about organizing thousands of workers who want a union and don’t have one. This is a time to go on the offensive against bad employers, corporate greed, the concentration of wealth and power and the disempowerment of working people in the city, in any industry.</p>
1866.  
1867.  
1868.  
1869. <p>“A lot of unions that are in deep fights right now, whether it’s us or the nurses or the taxi workers, or with fights to come, are going to see a shift in the political system,” Mancilla said “No. 1, having a mayor that will actually speak out and be on their side, but also someone who’s willing to think creatively alongside them about what their priorities are, beyond their everyday struggles. It’s a really important moment for labor to come together across a common set of goals.”</p>
1870.  
1871.  
1872.  
1873. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">‘WE ALL GET TO BE FREE’</h3>
1874.  
1875.  
1876.  
1877. <p>Midori Hills, a PSC-CUNY member who works at a nonprofit assisting immigrants to become citizens, was out canvassing Nov. 2 in Queens. The last time she did voter turnout for a candidate was 2013. “The energy and enthusiasm around Zohran Mamdani has been really contagious,” she said, “and so it made me actually excited to vote, instead of voting because it’s what you’re supposed to do.”</p>
1878.  
1879.  
1880.  
1881. <p>Mamdani beat Cuomo even after the disgraced former governor was <a href="https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/campaign-spending-mamdani-cuomo-billionaires-bill-ackman-new-york-city-mayoral-race" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">bankrolled to the tune of $50 million</a> by the wealthiest few. He’s heir apparent to the democratic socialism of <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/bernie-sanders/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="7" title="Bernie Sanders" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bernie Sanders</a> and a throwback to a vision of municipal governance that serves the needs of working-class people in <a href="https://jacobin.com/2025/04/fiorello-la-guardia-nyc-mayor" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">the style of 1934-46 New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia</a>. La Guardia built the public subway system, the city’s first airport, hundreds of playgrounds, zoos, beaches, swimming pools, schools and health centers, and thousands of units of public housing.</p>
1882.  
1883.  
1884.  
1885. <p>“We can be free and we can be fed,”&nbsp;<a href="https://jacobin.com/2025/06/mamdani-nyc-mayoral-election-speech" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Mamdani told supporters</a>&nbsp;after his primary victory in June. Throughout his campaign he staked out a future of possibilities, blending the themes of civil and labor rights. To those under the spell of cynicism, he offered a jovial confidence in a better tomorrow, rooted in a fierce determination to take on the wealthy.</p>
1886.  
1887.  
1888.  
1889. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“We can be free and we can be fed.”</p></blockquote></figure>
1890.  
1891.  
1892.  
1893. <p>“When organized labor won the weekend, so that working people would have time to rest — that was power won, not given,” he said in <a href="https://jacobin.com/2025/10/mamdani-mayor-nyc-campaign-speech" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">a speech in October</a>. “When those who came before us marched for voting rights and civil rights, they triumphed because they dared to dream, not because they were given permission by a political establishment content with the status quo. When millions of seniors were lifted from lives of poverty with Social Security, that’s because Americans were sick of a bad deal and wanted a new one instead. When we shake loose the shackles of small expectations, our city builds parks and hospitals, and we show the world that ambition and compassion are in fact intertwined.”</p>
1894.  
1895.  
1896.  
1897. <p>Mamdani has tapped into unifying ideals of equality, dignity and freedom, connecting them to class. “For too long, freedom has belonged only to those who can afford to buy it,” he said <a href="https://jacobin.com/2025/10/mamdani-nyc-mayor-election-speech" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">in the final stretch of the election</a>. “The oligarchs of New York are the wealthiest people in the wealthiest city in the wealthiest nation in the history of the world. They do not want the equation to change. They will do everything they can to prevent their grip from weakening.</p>
1898.  
1899.  
1900.  
1901. <p>“The truth is as simple as it is nonnegotiable: We are all allowed freedom,” he said. “Each one of us, the working people of this city, the taxi drivers, the line cooks, the nurses, all those seeking lives of grace, not greed — we all get to be free.”</p>
1902.  
1903.  
1904.  
1905. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">HANDS OFF NYC</h3>
1906.  
1907.  
1908.  
1909. <p>Still, “a politician can’t save us, so as great as Mamdani is, we will need to keep organizing to win his bold agenda,” said labor scholar Stephanie Luce, a PSC-CUNY member. “He will be facing a lot of pressure from billionaires and other politicians. That’s why a group of unions and community organizations came together to form a citywide alliance called the <a href="https://socialists.nyc/press-releases/labor-dsa-tenant-organizations-launch-peoples-majority-alliance-to-win-the-general-and-mamdanis-affordability-agenda/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">People’s Majority Alliance</a> — to be ready to go into the streets, to lobby the City Council and state Legislature and to keep up the organizing we need to bring a bold agenda into being.”</p>
1910.  
1911.  
1912.  
1913. <p>Among unions, this multiracial alliance includes Teamsters Local 804, the Committee of Interns and Residents (SEIU), PSC-CUNY, Stagehands (IATSE) Local 161, the Doctors Council SEIU, and the UAW.</p>
1914.  
1915.  
1916.  
1917. <p>According to the <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/11/01/us-news/house-republicans-latest-push-to-keep-mandani-out-of-office/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">New York Post</a>, a House Republican from Tennessee has been urging the Trump administration to investigate Mamdani’s citizenship and deport him. On Nov. 3, Trump said “you really have no choice” but to back Cuomo for mayor.</p>
1918.  
1919.  
1920.  
1921. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>&#8220;I have four words for you: Turn the volume up.”</p></blockquote></figure>
1922.  
1923.  
1924.  
1925. <p>There’s also the threat that Trump may send in federal agents and National Guard troops, as he has done to Chicago. This seems even more likely now that Mamdani has won office. To prepare against a possible occupation, unions and community groups have created the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.handsoffnyc.com/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Hands Off NYC</a>&nbsp;coalition. A recent webinar drew thousands of participants.</p>
1926.  
1927.  
1928.  
1929. <p>“NYC is doing just fine without masked goons kidnapping hardworking immigrants off our streets,” said Hae-Lin Choi, a political director for the CWA. “We don’t need them here, we don’t want them here, and every time they show up they’re going to get the same welcome they got on Canal Street,” a reference to coordinated immigrant worker defense after <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/immigration-and-customs-enforcement/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="20" title="immigration and customs enforcement">Immigration and Customs Enforcement</a> agents deployed last month to terrorize street vendors in Chinatown.</p>
1930.  
1931.  
1932.  
1933. <p>“Trump’s troops have no business here,” Choi said. “Hands Off NYC is training thousands of New Yorkers to make sure we’re ready for whatever comes next.”</p>
1934.  
1935.  
1936.  
1937. <p>“So Donald Trump, since I know you’re watching, I have four words for you: Turn the volume up,” said Mamdani. (“AND SO IT BEGINS!&#8221; Trump wrote on Truth Social, confirming the assumption.)</p>
1938.  
1939.  
1940.  
1941. <p>“New York will remain a city of immigrants, a city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants, and as of tonight, led by an immigrant,&#8221; said Mamdani. &#8220;To get to any of us, you will have to get through all of us.</p>
1942.  
1943.  
1944.  
1945. <p>“And if we embrace this brave new course, rather than fleeing from it, we can respond to oligarchy and authoritarianism with the strength it fears, not the appeasement it craves. If anyone can show a nation betrayed by Donald Trump how to defeat him, it is the city that gave rise to him. And if there is any way to terrify a despot, it is by dismantling the very conditions that allowed him to accumulate power.</p>
1946.  
1947.  
1948.  
1949. <p>&#8220;The sun may have set over our city this evening, but as Eugene Debs once said, &#8216;I can see the dawn of a better day for humanity.'&#8221;</p>
1950. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/new-yorks-working-class-elects-a-movement-mayor/">New York&#8217;s Working Class Elects a Movement Mayor</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1951. ]]></content:encoded>
1953. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/new-yorks-working-class-elects-a-movement-mayor/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
1954. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
1957. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313117</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25309163715647-scaled.jpg?width=877&#038;height=585" length="492096" type="image/jpeg" />
1958. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25309163715647-scaled.jpg?width=877&#038;height=585" />
1959. </item>
1960. <item>
1961. <title>Sovereignty for Some: Racism, Immigration and the Global Tax Order</title>
1962. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/sovereignty-for-some-racism-immigration-and-the-global-tax-order/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=sovereignty-for-some-racism-immigration-and-the-global-tax-order</link>
1963. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/sovereignty-for-some-racism-immigration-and-the-global-tax-order/#respond</comments>
1965. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Steven Dean]]></dc:creator>
1966. <pubDate>Tue, 04 Nov 2025 18:11:32 +0000</pubDate>
1967. <category><![CDATA[Africa]]></category>
1968. <category><![CDATA[Americas]]></category>
1969. <category><![CDATA[Business & Economy]]></category>
1970. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
1971. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
1972. <category><![CDATA[Economic Justice]]></category>
1973. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
1974. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
1975. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
1976. <category><![CDATA[Race]]></category>
1977. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
1978. <category><![CDATA[TD Column]]></category>
1979. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
1980. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
1981. <category><![CDATA[World]]></category>
1982. <category><![CDATA[colonialism]]></category>
1983. <category><![CDATA[Edwin Seligman]]></category>
1984. <category><![CDATA[global south]]></category>
1985. <category><![CDATA[globalization]]></category>
1986. <category><![CDATA[league of nations]]></category>
1987. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313098</guid>
1988.  
1989. <description><![CDATA[<p>How an obscure 20th-century tax rule ensured that newly decolonized nations would never fully escape the orbit of their colonizers.</p>
1990. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/sovereignty-for-some-racism-immigration-and-the-global-tax-order/">Sovereignty for Some: Racism, Immigration and the Global Tax Order</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
1991. ]]></description>
1992. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
1993. <p class="has-drop-cap">President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/30/us/politics/trump-refugee-admissions-white-south-africans.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">has reimagined refugee admissions in the United States</a>. His plan to slash the program by nearly 95% would gut what was once the world’s most generous resettlement program. Even more chilling than the scale of the reduction are the priorities that shape it. Trump’s new approach envisions an admissions system that overwhelmingly favors white refugees — <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/10/31/2025-19752/presidential-determination-on-refugee-admissions-for-fiscal-year-2026" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">particularly Afrikaners from South Africa</a>. This represents a deliberate inversion of the moral logic that once guided U.S. refugee policy: the idea that the world’s most powerful nation had a duty to protect the most vulnerable.&nbsp;</p>
1994.  
1995.  
1996.  
1997. <p>The cruelty of such an abrupt reversal is easy to see. Slamming the door on tens of thousands of desperate families because they are not white is an act of racialized exclusion that echoes earlier eras of American immigration law. But the irony of this moment takes longer to see, and it runs deeper. The same United States that now refuses to admit nonwhite refugees <a href="https://digitalcommons.du.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=7325&amp;context=dlr" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">has long helped to create the very conditions that produce them</a>. The machinery of global inequality — and death — that drives people to flee their homelands runs, quite literally, on tax law.</p>
1998.  
1999.  
2000.  
2001. <p>For decades, our international tax system has quietly structured the flow of wealth and power in ways that have stunted the Global South’s ability to build hospitals, schools and basic infrastructure. It has, in short, made certain kinds of death — avoidable deaths — inevitable. Racism is the reason why.</p>
2002.  
2003.  
2004.  
2005. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Racism curdled the global tax regime much as we can now see it reshaping U.S. refugee policy.</p></blockquote></figure>
2006.  
2007.  
2008.  
2009. <p>Whenever we explain that the global tax system we now take for granted emerged from a racial panic — one triggered by the decolonization of Africa — we get the same question: “There’s a global tax system?” And that’s fair. We don’t have a world government, so how could there be a world tax system?&nbsp;Yet one exists, and it was designed by powerful nations to preserve control over capital long after formal empires had supposedly ended.</p>
2010.  
2011.  
2012.  
2013. <p>Tax experts, of course, know all about this system. Some have built lucrative careers helping multinational corporations exploit it. They call it a “<a href="https://its.law.nyu.edu/faculty/profiles/representiveFiles/rosenbloom%20-intltaxarbitrage_73241ED2-07BE-9DCA-4E00F7B87FF147CE.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">triumph</a>.” If those same experts knew as much about its history as they do about its loopholes, they might hesitate before celebrating. Because once upon a time, the rules of international taxation looked very different.</p>
2014.  
2015.  
2016.  
2017. <p>Experts designed them to favor vulnerable nations rather than the wealthy multinationals that now grow fat by exploiting the system. The transformation from a system that protected the weak to one that enriches the powerful was neither accidental nor benign. Racism curdled the global tax regime much as we can now see it reshaping U.S. refugee policy.</p>
2018.  
2019.  
2020.  
2021. <p>In the 1920s, the League of Nations — a forerunner of the United Nations — sought to create mechanisms that preserved colonial hierarchies under the guise of international cooperation. Its Mandate System, which granted Germany’s former colonies “independence” under the supervision of European powers, was sovereignty in name only. <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/imperialism-sovereignty-and-the-making-of-international-law/introduction/1012E1F5F788CA342E354E6EA03E7896" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Nauru</a>, for instance, was technically independent but functioned for decades as an Australian colony in all but name.</p>
2022.  
2023.  
2024.  
2025. <p>At the same time, under the supervision of Columbia University economist Edwin Seligman, the league developed a set of tax treaties that worked much the same way. Seligman believed in empire. He sought to limit the ability of newly sovereign nations to tax multinational enterprises. Like the Mandate System, these treaties combined the appearance of autonomy with potent external controls.</p>
2026.  
2027.  
2028.  
2029. <p>For decades, Seligman’s treaties remained of “<a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1589132" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">limited practical significance</a>.” But that changed in 1960, when the world observed what was called the Year of Africa. Seventeen African colonies achieved independence that year. For the first time, Seligman’s tax vision came fully to life. It now had a target: Black sovereignty.</p>
2030.  
2031.  
2032.  
2033. <p>Seligman had once worried — without irony — that international tax rules might put the U.S. Treasury “at the complete mercy of” foreign countries. When the beneficiaries were European, such vulnerability was apparently tolerable. When they became African, it became unthinkable.</p>
2034.  
2035.  
2036.  
2037. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Seligman’s handiwork ensured that their sovereignty came preemptively hollowed out.</p></blockquote></figure>
2038.  
2039.  
2040.  
2041. <p>The newly independent African states that emerged in 1960 faced monumental tasks: to build schools, hospitals and democratic institutions in lands&nbsp;stripped bare by centuries of colonial exploitation. But as historian Leigh Gardner has shown, the colonial tax systems they inherited were ill-equipped for the demands of self-government. These nations needed to tax multinational corporations to survive. Instead, Seligman’s handiwork ensured that their sovereignty came preemptively hollowed out.</p>
2042.  
2043.  
2044.  
2045. <p>To understand the scale of this betrayal, consider what happened in Europe a few decades earlier. After World War I, with European cities in ruins, the United States offered a lifeline through a humble tax provision known as the foreign tax credit. This mechanism — the rule that prompted Seligman’s outburst — allowed U.S. companies to claim credit for taxes paid to foreign governments against their U.S. tax bills. The policy invited European countries to tax American investments. It was enormously generous and transformative, effectively encouraging investment abroad and helping devastated European economies rebuild.</p>
2046.  
2047.  
2048.  
2049. <p>Seligman hated it. To him, such unfettered generosity was dangerous. He preferred a system in which the United States maintained control. For the newly decolonized nations of Africa, that preference proved disastrous. The generosity extended to Europe after both World Wars was never offered to Africa after its liberation.</p>
2050.  
2051.  
2052.  
2053. <p>The result is the world we inhabit now: where tax rules written a century ago to comfort colonial powers govern the distribution of global prosperity. The wealth of nations continues to flow upward and northward, while the consequences — poverty, instability, displacement — flow south.</p>
2054.  
2055.  
2056.  
2057. <p>That is where the irony of Trump’s policies reveals itself in full. During his first term, Trump made it clear that he wanted no immigrants from what he called “<a href="https://apnews.com/article/immigration-north-america-donald-trump-ap-top-news-international-news-fdda2ff0b877416c8ae1c1a77a3cc425" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">shithole countries</a>” in Africa. Yet the economic and political conditions he decries are not accidents of geography or culture. They are the predictable outcome of a global financial architecture built to ensure that formerly colonized nations would never fully escape the orbit of their colonizers. If not for a remarkable transformation of the international tax regime, those “shithole countries” might look very different.</p>
2058.  
2059.  
2060.  
2061. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The cruelty is not new. It is merely more visible now.</p></blockquote></figure>
2062.  
2063.  
2064.  
2065. <p>Now, as Trump’s refugee policy promises to welcome white Africans while rejecting Black ones, we witness the circle complete itself. The United States helped design a global system that undermined Black sovereignty abroad; now it blames the resulting misery to justify racial exclusion at home. In a twist that would make a Hollywood screenwriter proud, the roughly 100 Afrikaners already admitted have complained about the lack of support once they arrived. Trump, of course, had already gutted refugee services.</p>
2066.  
2067.  
2068.  
2069. <p>Death, immigration and taxes: they are connected by the same historical throughline. The fear of Black self-determination that helped 20th-century tax treaties flourish and immigration quotas harden continues to define the boundaries of belonging today. The cruelty is not new. It is merely more visible now.</p>
2070.  
2071.  
2072.  
2073. <p>As we debate the morality of immigration, we rarely acknowledge the fiscal scaffolding beneath it. Tax law, more than almost any other system, determines who has the means to survive. The right to collect revenue is the right to govern, the right to imagine a future. Denying that right to postcolonial states was a way of denying their independence. Denying asylum to the people who flee those conditions is a way of denying our complicity.</p>
2074.  
2075.  
2076.  
2077. <p class="is-td-marked">If we are to confront the racial politics of immigration honestly, we must also confront the racial politics of taxation. The story of global tax law is not a technical footnote to globalization. It is the story of how empire survived its abolition.</p>
2078. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/sovereignty-for-some-racism-immigration-and-the-global-tax-order/">Sovereignty for Some: Racism, Immigration and the Global Tax Order</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2079. ]]></content:encoded>
2081. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/sovereignty-for-some-racism-immigration-and-the-global-tax-order/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
2082. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
2085. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313098</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Trump_Seligman.png?width=878&#038;height=585" length="823533" type="image/png" />
2086. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Trump_Seligman.png?width=878&#038;height=585" />
2087. </item>
2088. <item>
2089. <title>‘A Pretty Ugly History’: How Exxon Exported Climate Denial to the Global South</title>
2090. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/a-pretty-ugly-history-how-exxon-exported-climate-denial-to-the-global-south/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=a-pretty-ugly-history-how-exxon-exported-climate-denial-to-the-global-south</link>
2091. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/a-pretty-ugly-history-how-exxon-exported-climate-denial-to-the-global-south/#respond</comments>
2093. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Geoff Dembicki /  DeSmog ]]></dc:creator>
2094. <pubDate>Tue, 04 Nov 2025 17:05:28 +0000</pubDate>
2095. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
2096. <category><![CDATA[Americas]]></category>
2097. <category><![CDATA[Business & Economy]]></category>
2098. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
2099. <category><![CDATA[Environment]]></category>
2100. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
2101. <category><![CDATA[Science]]></category>
2102. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
2103. <category><![CDATA[brazil]]></category>
2104. <category><![CDATA[climate denial]]></category>
2105. <category><![CDATA[COP30]]></category>
2106. <category><![CDATA[exxon mobil]]></category>
2107. <category><![CDATA[global south]]></category>
2108. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313075</guid>
2109.  
2110. <description><![CDATA[<p>With Brazil about to host COP30, evidence emerges of checks Exxon mailed to the right-wing Atlas Network in the 1990s to turn Latin America against climate treaties.</p>
2111. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/a-pretty-ugly-history-how-exxon-exported-climate-denial-to-the-global-south/">‘A Pretty Ugly History’: How Exxon Exported Climate Denial to the Global South</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2112. ]]></description>
2113. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
2114. <p><strong>In early September</strong>, the Danish climate crisis denier <a href="https://www.desmog.com/bjorn-lomborg/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Bjørn Lomborg</a> traveled to São Paulo to deliver a stark warning. On the sidelines of a conference called the Forum Caminhos da Liberdade (Paths of Freedom Forum), happening just as Brazil was gearing up to host the annual global climate talks known as COP30 in November, Lomborg <a href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/DORxKOhjnCu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">claimed that</a> if implemented poorly, government efforts to address climate change could “destroy economic growth.”</p>
2115.  
2116.  
2117.  
2118. <p>Lomborg had some behind-the-scenes assistance to help his message land, because one of the top 2025 sponsors of the conference (whose speakers in previous years have included Silicon Valley billionaire and <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> ally <a href="https://www.desmog.com/peter-thiel/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Peter Thiel</a>), was the <a href="https://www.desmog.com/atlas-economic-research-foundation/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Atlas Network</a>, a U.S.-based worldwide coalition of more than 500 free-market think tanks and allied partners. This wasn’t the first time that a foreign conservative activist aimed to stir up doubts in Latin America about climate action on the eve of global climate talks.</p>
2119.  
2120.  
2121.  
2122. <p>Starting in earnest around 1997, during the early years of United Nations-led efforts to forge a global climate pact, the Atlas Network and its partners created and executed a playbook to sabotage support for international treaties across the Global South, according to hundreds of Atlas Network documents obtained by DeSmog. </p>
2123.  
2124.  
2125.  
2126. <p>A key early funder of this strategy:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.desmog.com/exxonmobil-funding-climate-science-denial/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">ExxonMobil</a>.</p>
2127.  
2128.  
2129.  
2130. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>The Atlas Network and its partners created and executed a playbook to sabotage support for international treaties across the Global South.</p></blockquote></figure>
2131.  
2132.  
2133.  
2134. <p>It’s now public knowledge that throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Exxon helped fund and lead a constellation of U.S.-based organizations that sought to discredit climate science, assure the public that it was safe to burn fossil fuels and block America’s participation in the international climate treaty — a campaign that is now the subject of <a href="https://climateintegrity.org/lawsuits" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">dozens of lawsuits</a> across the U.S. accusing the company of deceiving the public. </p>
2135.  
2136.  
2137.  
2138. <p>DeSmog’s newly obtained documents, which included copies of checks mailed to the Atlas Network for amounts ranging from $15,000 to $50,000 at a time, show that Exxon, with the help of Atlas Network partners, was also quietly financing climate denial in developing countries.</p>
2139.  
2140.  
2141.  
2142. <p>These strategy memos, funding proposals, personal letters and progress reports reveal in specific detail how Exxon and the Atlas Network (formerly known as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation) sought to amplify diplomatic tensions ahead of climate treaty summits, which are focused on bringing countries with vastly differing economic and social needs to consensus on reducing carbon emissions.</p>
2143.  
2144.  
2145.  
2146. <p>In stoking confusion and doubt about climate change among developing nations during critical early moments of climate diplomacy, Exxon and the Atlas Network exacerbated geopolitical fault lines and raised economic fears that persist to this day, according to Kert Davies, director of special investigations at the nonprofit Center for Climate Integrity, who is a longtime expert on Exxon’s climate denial campaigns.</p>
2147.  
2148.  
2149.  
2150. <p>“That’s a pretty ugly history,” Davies said. “Exxon seemed to think that if you could make developing nations, and all nations, skeptical that climate change was a crisis then you’d never have a global climate treaty.”</p>
2151.  
2152.  
2153.  
2154. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="470" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png-1024x470.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=470" alt="" class="wp-image-313076" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif?width=1024&amp;height=470 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif?width=300&amp;height=138 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif?width=768&amp;height=353 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif?width=320&amp;height=147 320w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif?width=480&amp;height=220 480w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif?width=720&amp;height=331 720w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif?width=1040&amp;height=477 1040w, https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-Check-Image.png.avif 1272w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">A $50,000 contribution that Exxon mailed to the Atlas Network in early 1998. (DeSmog)</figcaption></figure>
2155.  
2156.  
2157.  
2158. <p>The checks Exxon wrote to Atlas financed activities ranging from Spanish translations of English-language books denying the reality of climate change, to flights to Latin American cities for U.S. climate deniers. They funded public events that enabled those deniers to reach local media and network with policymakers, as well as Atlas Network partner reports warning of dire economic consequences from climate policy.</p>
2159.  
2160.  
2161.  
2162. <p>The goal was to&nbsp;make countries across the region “less inclined” to support treaties on cutting carbon emissions, even though&nbsp;these agreements would be essential to stopping global temperature rise from spiraling out of control.</p>
2163.  
2164.  
2165.  
2166. <p>Three decades later, the consequences of insufficient global climate action are impossible to ignore. Scientists announced in mid-October that worldwide carbon emissions are so high that the planet has passed the tipping point&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03316-w" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">where a mass die-off</a>&nbsp;of the planet’s coral reefs is likely irreversible, and that unless there are drastic global cuts to emissions and deforestation within the next 10 to 20 years,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/amazon-rainforest-is-approaching-tipping-points-that-could-transform-it-into-a-drier-savanna" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">a collapse of the Amazon rainforest</a>&nbsp;could be locked&nbsp;in.</p>
2167.  
2168.  
2169.  
2170. <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-never-an-important-donor">‘Never an Important Donor’</h2>
2171.  
2172.  
2173.  
2174. <p>Exxon’s climate obstruction in the Global South had the potential to increase profits, <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207549-1997-oct-8-letter-from-chafuen-at-atlas-foundation-to-william-hale-at-exxon/?q=returns&amp;mode=document#document/p6" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">according to a 1997 strategy plan</a> “dealing specifically with the problems of international treaties” that Atlas sent by mail to the company’s headquarters in Irving, Texas. “This investment in market-oriented public policies is a vital key to our future prosperity and well-being — and to continued strong returns to Exxon’s investors,” the Atlas Network explained.</p>
2175.  
2176.  
2177.  
2178. <p>Asked about this document and others viewed by DeSmog, Atlas Network spokesperson Adam Weinberg replied that “these questions deal with memos and materials drafted by former employees from more than a quarter-century ago, addressed to a corporation that was never an important donor to our organization, and which indeed has not been a donor at all for close to two decades.”</p>
2179.  
2180.  
2181.  
2182. <p>But considering <a href="https://ieep.eu/news/more-than-half-of-all-co2-emissions-since-1751-emitted-in-the-last-30-years/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">that over 50%</a> of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions since 1751 have been released since the early 1990s, Exxon and the Atlas Network&#8217;s efforts to stall carbon cuts are extremely relevant to where the world finds itself today.  </p>
2183.  
2184.  
2185.  
2186. <p>“What happened 30 years ago&nbsp;matters very much,” said&nbsp;Carlos Milani, a professor of international relations at Rio de Janeiro State University’s Institute for Social and Political Studies. “The atmosphere has a huge historical memory when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions.”</p>
2187.  
2188.  
2189.  
2190. <p>Exxon did not respond to a request for comment.</p>
2191.  
2192.  
2193.  
2194. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="492" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png-1024x492.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=492" alt="" class="wp-image-313077" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif?width=1024&amp;height=492 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif?width=300&amp;height=144 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif?width=768&amp;height=369 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif?width=320&amp;height=154 320w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif?width=480&amp;height=231 480w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif?width=720&amp;height=346 720w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif?width=1040&amp;height=500 1040w, https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-strong-returns-image.png.avif 1398w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">In a 1997 strategy plan sent to Exxon, the Atlas Network requested $75,000, saying that “this investment in market-oriented public policies is a vital key to our future prosperity and well-being — and to continued strong returns to Exxon’s investors.” (DeSmog)</figcaption></figure>
2195.  
2196.  
2197.  
2198. <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-influence-government-policies">‘Influence Government Policies’</h2>
2199.  
2200.  
2201.  
2202. <p>During his September trip to Brazil, in addition to attending the Forum Caminhos da Liberdade, Lomborg gave a lecture at a private research university in Belo Horizonte known as IBMEC, which he later said in his newsletter was “broadcast to hundreds of students unable to fit into the auditorium.”</p>
2203.  
2204.  
2205.  
2206. <p>Lomborg <a href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/DORxKOhjnCu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">had been described</a> in Brazilian promotional materials as one of the world’s leading experts on environmental issues and other global challenges, even though many actual climate scientists regard his statements on climate change as misrepresentative of the mainstream consensus that global temperature rise is an urgent and escalating crisis.</p>
2207.  
2208.  
2209.  
2210. <p>Lomborg did not reply to detailed questions about his activities in Brazil. The university event was hosted by IBMEC professor Adriano Gianturco, who is a board member of the Instituto Liberal, a Rio-based think tank and Atlas Network partner with a history of spreading climate disinformation throughout Latin America.</p>
2211.  
2212.  
2213.  
2214. <p>In <a href="https://www.facebook.com/institutoliberal/videos/1242775867523019/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">videos</a> posted to social media during the summer, Instituto Liberal repeated in Portuguese the long-standing climate denier trope that COP30 is merely an expensive get-together for the United Nations’ globe-trotting technocratic elites that will leave nothing but debt for ordinary Brazilians.</p>
2215.  
2216.  
2217.  
2218. <p>Instituto Liberal did not respond to a request for information. “We did not convene any of the meetings or activities with Bjørn Lomborg,” Weinberg of the Atlas Network said in email. “We do not take institutional positions on topics like COP30.”</p>
2219.  
2220.  
2221.  
2222. <p>Instituto Liberal has been fine-tuning its critique of the international climate treaty process since at least 1997, when <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207539-1997-nov-24-fax-from-pedro-isern-at-atlas-foundation-to-roberto-fendt-at-instituto-liberal-re-potential-donor/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">it was contacted by the Atlas Network</a> about “an important new donor” looking to foster think tanks in the Global South.</p>
2223.  
2224.  
2225.  
2226. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Exxon was prepared to give Atlas “up to $50,000.”</p></blockquote></figure>
2227.  
2228.  
2229.  
2230. <p>The proposal explained that the donor was particularly interested in “international treaties and agreements that force Latin and other developing countries to adopt stringent labor, environmental or other laws that may not reflect the developing nation’s own needs, priorities or viewpoints on these issues.”</p>
2231.  
2232.  
2233.  
2234. <p>That donor was Exxon, which — <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207838-1997-nov-21-letter-from-william-hale-to-alejandro-chafuen-re-25000-check-to-atlas-foundation-from-exxon/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">as detailed in a 1997 letter</a> from Exxon executive William Hale to the Atlas Network — was “interested in nurturing free-market think tanks outside the United States,” particularly in Asia, the former Soviet Union, Europe and Latin America. Exxon was prepared to give Atlas “up to $50,000” — adjusted for inflation, roughly $100,000 in today’s money — to grow “international groups which have the ability to influence government policies.”</p>
2235.  
2236.  
2237.  
2238. <p>In <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207543-1998-dec-20-letter-from-chafuen-and-driessen-at-atlas-foundation-to-hale-at-exxon/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">a 1998 letter to Exxon’s Hale</a>, then-Atlas Network President Alejandro Chafuen spelled out how its partner organizations could amplify the company’s influence in the Global South. They would provide “entrees to government officials,” “access to local and national TV and radio programs,” “a distant early warning system on emerging issues,” “an improved ability to respond to legislative and regulatory initiatives” and “a greatly expanded ability to carry corporate messages … beyond Washington and the United States.”</p>
2239.  
2240.  
2241.  
2242. <p>Latin American academics who study the Atlas Network see in such activities a coordinated effort to create favorable political conditions for big business and foreign investors. “It is a movement,” Ana Lúcia Faria and Vera Chaia <a href="https://journalspress.com/LJRHSS_Volume23/Liberal-Institutes-and-the-Consolidation-of-Neoliberal-Hegemony-in-Latin-America-and-Brazil.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">wrote in a 2023 paper</a>, “to legitimize and pave the the way for the unbridled escalation of capital.” The research was published in the London Journal of Research Humanities and Social Sciences. </p>
2243.  
2244.  
2245.  
2246. <p>The Atlas Network, in its <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207548-1998-atlas-foundation-proposal-for-funding-energy-and-the-environment-market-based-solutions/?q=small+investment&amp;mode=document#document/p5" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">1998 funding proposal to Exxon</a>, stressed “that even relatively small investments in developing nations can produce substantial results.” The proposal explained that Exxon funding would “enable new and established think tanks to undertake or expand studies of vital importance to business in general and the petroleum industry in particular.”</p>
2247.  
2248.  
2249.  
2250. <p>In March 1998, <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207547-1998-mar-5-letter-from-hale-at-exxon-to-chafuen-at-atlas-foundation-re-enclosed-50000-check/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Exxon mailed a $50,000 check</a> to the Atlas Network.</p>
2251.  
2252.  
2253.  
2254. <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-adverse-consequences">‘Adverse Consequences’</h2>
2255.  
2256.  
2257.  
2258. <p>Exxon’s financial support of the Atlas Network came at a crucial early moment in global climate diplomacy.</p>
2259.  
2260.  
2261.  
2262. <p>World leaders had met in Japan&nbsp;in 1997 to negotiate the Kyoto Protocol, the first-ever legally binding international treaty designed to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions.</p>
2263.  
2264.  
2265.  
2266. <p>Over two weeks of negotiations, tensions surfaced&nbsp;about which countries should bear the costs of addressing the mounting climate crisis. The wealthiest nations had created most of the climate-heating pollution over two centuries of coal- and oil-fired industrialization, but emissions from developing nations were rising in the present as they industrialized their economies and pulled their citizens out of poverty.</p>
2267.  
2268.  
2269.  
2270. <p>Countries were planning to convene in Buenos Aires in November 1998 to find a solution that could help unite the Global North and South more decisively in the worldwide climate fight. It would be just the fourth annual “conference of the parties” to the United Nations climate treaty process, thus known as “COP4.”</p>
2271.  
2272.  
2273.  
2274. <p>To the Atlas Network, <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207902-1997-dec-10-letter-excerpt-from-atlas-foundation-to-rene-santos-at-mobil-corporation-re-recent-developments-in-kyoto/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">this meeting would be</a> “a rare opportunity” to create opposition to the Kyoto Protocol for those “who doubt the claims behind the global warming theory, and worry about the devastating results that any treaty could have on the United States, the world economy and the energy industry.” With Exxon’s support, Atlas believed it <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207548-1998-atlas-foundation-proposal-for-funding-energy-and-the-environment-market-based-solutions/?q=adverse&amp;mode=document#document/p11" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">could help persuade</a> the developing world of “the adverse effects of global climate change treaties.”</p>
2275.  
2276.  
2277.  
2278. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>To the Atlas Network, this meeting would be “a rare opportunity” to create opposition to the Kyoto Protocol.</p></blockquote></figure>
2279.  
2280.  
2281.  
2282. <p>In September 1998, just two months before global delegates were due to meet, the Atlas Network <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207544-1998-sept-16-letter-from-paul-driessen-at-atlas-foundation-to-william-hale-at-exxon-re-budget-for-global-warming-seminars-in-argentina/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">requested supplementary financing</a> from Exxon to fund a series of global warming seminars. The money would pay for Atlas to fly <a href="https://www.desmog.com/patrick-michaels/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Patrick Michaels</a>, a U.S. climate denier, to Buenos Aires to speak at the events. Michaels was connected to several think tanks and groups that had previously received money from Exxon.</p>
2283.  
2284.  
2285.  
2286. <p>Earlier that year, Michaels had erroneously stated in a short film that “the entire global climate change hysteria is driven by computer models; it is not driven by reality.”</p>
2287.  
2288.  
2289.  
2290. <p>The Atlas Network pitched to Exxon that the additional funding would also help several think tanks in the network facilitate meetings between Michaels, as well as other seminar speakers, and “ministers, politicians, editorial boards [and] business leaders in Argentina.”</p>
2291.  
2292.  
2293.  
2294. <p>This wouldn’t be difficult to organize, as the Atlas Network <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207548-1998-atlas-foundation-proposal-for-funding-energy-and-the-environment-market-based-solutions/?q=enjoy&amp;mode=document#document/p9" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">had explained to Exxon in an earlier funding proposal</a>, because “the many free market think tanks in Argentina, Brazil and other Latin countries enjoy excellent relationships with the news media and high level government officials.” Those think tanks, in turn, were also connected to “bankers, owners of investment funds, and party advisors,” <a href="https://globaldialogue.isa-sociology.org/articles/the-brazilian-neoliberal-think-tank-network" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">according to</a> Brazil-based researcher Hernán Ramírez.</p>
2295.  
2296.  
2297.  
2298. <p>Further, the extra money from Exxon would pay for analysts at Instituto Liberal and other Atlas Network think tanks in the region to produce a report about the “trade, economic and political implications of Kyoto Protocol on Latin American and other developing nations,” which could then be turned into commentaries that were “placed with key U.S. and Latin papers.”  </p>
2299.  
2300.  
2301.  
2302. <p>In this pre-digital era, the Atlas Network conceived the seminars as global distribution hubs for talking points, data and narratives attacking the legitimacy of climate treaties. It <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207542-1998-aug-20-memo-from-paul-driessen-at-atlas-foundation-to-bill-hale-at-exxon-re-argentine-workshops/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">explained to Exxon in a 1998 memo</a> that one of its institutes in Latin America had produced a Spanish translation of a booklet by the U.S. climate denier <a href="https://www.desmog.com/s-fred-singer/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Fred Singer</a> titled “The Scientific Case Against the Global Climate Treaty,” which it planned to distribute at the Argentina workshops.</p>
2303.  
2304.  
2305.  
2306. <p>Singer’s booklet claimed “there is no significant scientific support for a global ‘threat’ of climate warming,” and that “developing countries will suffer” from any global treaty “since their well-being and economic stability depend on international trade and general world prosperity.”</p>
2307.  
2308.  
2309.  
2310. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="1010" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png-1024x1010.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=1010" alt="" class="wp-image-313078" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif?width=1024&amp;height=1010 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif?width=300&amp;height=296 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif?width=768&amp;height=758 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif?width=182&amp;height=180 182w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif?width=274&amp;height=270 274w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif?width=410&amp;height=405 410w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif?width=593&amp;height=585 593w, https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Exxon-letter-to-Atlas-image.png.avif 1202w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Exxon sent the Atlas Network a $15,000 check in October 1998 to fund seminars ahead of COP4 that would highlight &#8220;the negative consequences&#8221; of the Kyoto Protocol. (DeSmog)</figcaption></figure>
2311.  
2312.  
2313.  
2314. <p>Atlas expected participants at the workshops to produce new papers, which it would then distribute “all over South America, including Mexico, and send them over to China and India, as well.”</p>
2315.  
2316.  
2317.  
2318. <p>Exxon signed off on the plan and on Oct. 6, 1998, <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207550-1998-oct-6-letter-from-gary-ehlig-of-exxon-to-paul-driessen-of-atlas-foundation/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">mailed an additional $15,000</a> to Atlas “in support of your planned global warming seminars in Argentina in advance of COP-4.” The letter, authored by Exxon executive Gary Ehlig, predicted the seminars could lead to “increased understanding of the negative consequences that Latin American nations would face if the Kyoto Protocol were ever implemented.”</p>
2319.  
2320.  
2321.  
2322. <p>He added, “I look forward to hearing about the outcome.”</p>
2323.  
2324.  
2325.  
2326. <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-wouldn-t-have-been-obvious">‘Wouldn’t Have Been Obvious’</h2>
2327.  
2328.  
2329.  
2330. <p>Exxon explained in its correspondence that it was eager to support Atlas Network groups abroad because the company already felt like it had the political and communications infrastructure in place to protect its interests at home. “We are comfortable with the support we provide to U.S.-based organizations and on U.S.-related issues,” the company told the Atlas Network <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207838-1997-nov-21-letter-from-william-hale-to-alejandro-chafuen-re-25000-check-to-atlas-foundation-from-exxon/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">in a 1997 letter</a>.</p>
2331.  
2332.  
2333.  
2334. <p>By this time Exxon already had a track record of creating and spreading climate disinformation, even though its internal scientists, from the 1970s onward, had made highly accurate predictions about future warming caused by fossil fuels.&nbsp;</p>
2335.  
2336.  
2337.  
2338. <p>Exxon was a founding member of the <a href="https://www.desmog.com/global-climate-coalition/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Global Climate Coalition (GCC)</a>, a lobbying and communications group representing fossil fuel producers, automakers and other large industrial companies. Throughout the 1990s, the GCC ran media campaigns attempting to convince the public and policymakers that human-caused climate change wasn’t real.</p>
2339.  
2340.  
2341.  
2342. <p>The Global Climate Coalition itself&nbsp;had doubts about the deniers it was promoting, with&nbsp;<a href="https://www.climatefiles.com/denial-groups/global-climate-coalition-collection/global-climate-coalition-draft-primer/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">one internal document</a>&nbsp;during this period describing the “contrarian theories” of global warming as “not convincing.”</p>
2343.  
2344.  
2345.  
2346. <p>Nevertheless, on the eve of the 1997 climate negotiations in Kyoto, the Global Climate Coalition successfully lobbied the U.S. Senate to pass the Byrd-Hagel Resolution, which banned signing on to an international climate treaty that gave any concessions to developing countries, such as more lenient timelines for lowering their emissions — in effect, leveraging a central geopolitical fault line of the COP process to prevent the U.S. from taking leadership.</p>
2347.  
2348.  
2349.  
2350. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“Few of these accomplishments would have been possible without Exxon Corporation’s generous financial assistance.”</p></blockquote></figure>
2351.  
2352.  
2353.  
2354. <p>Exxon then joined with fossil fuel companies and climate denial organizations such as the <a href="https://www.desmog.com/george-c-marshall-institute/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">George C. Marshall Institute</a> to create a communications plan targeting media, policymakers and teachers, disseminating <a href="https://www.climatefiles.com/trade-group/american-petroleum-institute/1998-global-climate-science-communications-team-action-plan/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">a now-infamous memo in April 1998</a> stating that “victory will be achieved when average citizens understand uncertainties in climate science.”</p>
2355.  
2356.  
2357.  
2358. <p>Efforts like this reflected a deliberate financial calculation on the part of oil and gas producers, argued&nbsp;Milani, the&nbsp;Rio de Janeiro State University academic. “They are aware of the fact that we need to transition away from oil and gas, and the later we do this the better for them, because they’ll still make lots of money from it,” he said.</p>
2359.  
2360.  
2361.  
2362. <p>Six months after the “victory will be achieved” memo, six Latin American Atlas Network partners “sponsored a series of seminars, briefings and media interviews in five Argentine cities, to present information of global climate change science and economics prior to the COP4 summit in Buenos Aires,”&nbsp;<a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207545-1998-atlas-foundation-report-on-1998-programs-supported-by-the-exxon-corporation/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">according to an Atlas Network update</a>&nbsp;to Exxon on the organization’s activities.</p>
2363.  
2364.  
2365.  
2366. <p>These events “drew several hundred people” to hear “several well-known specialists from USA” discuss the “global warming scare.” All in all, Atlas reported, “media coverage included 8 television and radio appearances, over 12 articles in newspapers and magazines, and 19 interviews.”</p>
2367.  
2368.  
2369.  
2370. <p>The Atlas Network noted in the same update that a partner in Beijing, the Institute of World Economics and Politics, had translated Singer’s book into Chinese. Atlaswas also sending materials about climate change to think tanks in India.</p>
2371.  
2372.  
2373.  
2374. <p>“Few of these accomplishments would have been possible without Exxon Corporation’s generous financial assistance,” Atlas told its benefactor.</p>
2375.  
2376.  
2377.  
2378. <p>Exxon itself was barely visible at the COP4 climate talks, recalled Kert Davies, a climate disinformation expert who attended the 1998 Buenos Aires negotiations with the nonprofit Ozone Action. Davies recalled walking the venue’s hallways to try to get a sense of who had come to push for the strongest climate deal, and who was there to obstruct it.</p>
2379.  
2380.  
2381.  
2382. <p>Exxon’s only representative inside the event was Brian Flannery, Davies said, and his affiliation with Exxon wasn’t included on the official list of COP4 delegates. That the oil company was financing efforts to obstruct the talks “wouldn’t have been obvious to anyone,” Davies said. “I think it was intentionally not obvious.”</p>
2383.  
2384.  
2385.  
2386. <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-strategizing-with-exxon">Strategizing With Exxon</h2>
2387.  
2388.  
2389.  
2390. <p>In mid-February 2000, the Atlas Network’s Jo Kwong met with Exxon executives William Hale and Lynn Russo. The meeting was a strategy session to “advance understanding of the international picture to see what is needed and how the company can ‘sensibly’ help,” according to <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207541-2000-feb-17-atlas-jit-update-internal-report-on-meeting-with-exxon/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">an internal Atlas Network update</a> submitted by Kwong.</p>
2391.  
2392.  
2393.  
2394. <p>Hale stressed during the meeting that Exxon had to have anonymity in its financing of Atlas groups and programs. “The approach has been behind-the-scenes, intentionally not seeking public kudos for its efforts,” he said.&nbsp;Hale also explained that this was a strategic choice. Exxon’s goal was “to help, but not be known for its help,” according to the update. “By keeping away from the ‘drama,’ Bill believes the groups that it funds will be more effective.”</p>
2395.  
2396.  
2397.  
2398. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="229" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png-1024x229.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=229" alt="" class="wp-image-313079" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif?width=1024&amp;height=229 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif?width=300&amp;height=67 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif?width=768&amp;height=172 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif?width=320&amp;height=72 320w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif?width=480&amp;height=108 480w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif?width=720&amp;height=161 720w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif?width=1040&amp;height=233 1040w, https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Not-be-known-Exxon-image.png.avif 1134w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">At a 2000 meeting with the Atlas Network, Exxon stressed that it wanted anonymity in its financing of Atlas groups and programs. (DeSmog)</figcaption></figure>
2399.  
2400.  
2401.  
2402. <p><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207540-2000-feb-23-letter-from-jo-kwong-at-atlas-to-william-hale-at-exxon/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">In a follow-up letter to Hale</a>&nbsp;after the meeting, Kwong said she “felt very honored” that the Exxon executive made time in his busy schedule for “so many hours” of strategizing with Atlas, and expressed her admiration for Exxon’s “commitment to furthering our joint interests.”</p>
2403.  
2404.  
2405.  
2406. <p>Kwong wished Hale, who was transitioning out of his role as an Exxon liaison with Atlas, “good luck in your new position at the company.”</p>
2407.  
2408.  
2409.  
2410. <p>In his new role working on “communications and other public relations,” Hale would be helping to create “advertorials in The New York Times,” according to the Atlas update.</p>
2411.  
2412.  
2413.  
2414. <p>The following month, Exxon <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/22/opinion/exxon-climate-change-.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">ran a now-infamous</a> full-page advertorial in The New York Times headlined “Unsettled Science.” In the advert, Exxon took the position that “it is impossible for scientists to attribute the recent small surface temperature increase [in the atmosphere] to human causes” — even though years of high-quality internal climate research had found otherwise.</p>
2415.  
2416.  
2417.  
2418. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Exxon’s goal was “to help, but not be known for its help.”</p></blockquote></figure>
2419.  
2420.  
2421.  
2422. <p>Five months after the meeting with the Exxon executives, Kwong went on a media and speaking tour in Argentina. The tour’s “major objective was to introduce the concept of free market environmentalism,” Kwong explained <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26207572-2000-aug-8-atlas-foundation-jo-kwong-argentina-trip-report/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">in a 2000 trip report for Atlas</a>.</p>
2423.  
2424.  
2425.  
2426. <p>During talks hosted by&nbsp;network partners Fundacion Global and Fundacion Libertad, Kwong delivered this message to business leaders, government officials, policymakers, and environmental groups. She also gave “several press interviews with newspapers and television.”</p>
2427.  
2428.  
2429.  
2430. <p>Kwong summarized her main takeaways from the trip, saying that the reporters she encountered in Latin America invariably wanted to hear her views on whether to prioritize environmental protection or economic growth. “They were very surprised to hear my response: that countries must be rich before they can invest in the environment — that environmental amenities are a luxury good,” Kwong wrote.</p>
2431.  
2432.  
2433.  
2434. <p>This free-market environmentalism was, Kwong said, “quite the contrary to everything else they have heard.”</p>
2435.  
2436.  
2437.  
2438. <p>More than 25 years later,&nbsp;with global temperatures rising to historic levels and another key climate summit on the horizon, Bjørn&nbsp;Lomborg&nbsp;would&nbsp;echo essentially the same message.&nbsp;</p>
2439.  
2440.  
2441.  
2442. <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-achieve-quick-results">‘Achieve Quick Results’</h2>
2443.  
2444.  
2445.  
2446. <p>During September’s Climate Week in New York City, Lomborg authored an op-ed for the New York Post in which he described the global climate fight as an intractable stalemate, framing it as&nbsp;“rich-world elites obsessed with climate change versus developing nations battling poverty, hunger and disease.”&nbsp;</p>
2447.  
2448.  
2449.  
2450. <p>Climate experts say Lomborg’s divisive attacks on climate policy are&nbsp;<a href="https://www.lse.ac.uk/granthaminstitute/news/more-misinformation-and-nonsense-on-climate-from-lomborg-and-tol/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">propaganda</a>&nbsp;designed to dampen enthusiasm among the public and policymakers for effective action to slow the climate crisis. The Danish economist&nbsp;<a href="https://lomborg.com/response-bob-ward" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">has referred to</a>&nbsp;these charges as a “smear.”</p>
2451.  
2452.  
2453.  
2454. <p>In Brazil, the same messages are being amplified by Leandro Narloch, an author and influencer with more than 100,000 followers on Instagram.</p>
2455.  
2456.  
2457.  
2458. <p>In an August episode of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlZ3TtimA0o&amp;t=1s" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">the Brazilian podcast &#8220;Tubacast</a>&#8221; titled “COP30 — What’s Going to Happen Is Terrible,” Narloch launched into a familiar populist jab at climate conference delegates, criticizing the emissions released from their flights to the talks. “I also love parties, I love free flights, I love hotels, I love feeling like I’m part of the enlightened, but, damn, it’s kind of hypocritical,” he said, according to an English translation of his remarks.</p>
2459.  
2460.  
2461.  
2462. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="658" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png-1024x658.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=658" alt="" class="wp-image-313080" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif?width=1024&amp;height=658 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif?width=300&amp;height=193 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif?width=768&amp;height=494 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif?width=280&amp;height=180 280w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif?width=420&amp;height=270 420w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif?width=630&amp;height=405 630w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif?width=910&amp;height=585 910w, https://www.truthdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Narloch-Instagram-screenshot.png.avif 1590w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">In a Sept. 14, 2025, Instagram post, Brazilian author Leandro Narloch, second from left, wrote that it had been “an honor” to dine with visiting Danish economist Bjørn Lomborg, second from right, with whom he shares a disdain for efforts to reverse climate change, and other free-market advocates. (Instagram)</figcaption></figure>
2463.  
2464.  
2465.  
2466. <p>Narloch&#8217;s and Lomborg’s paths crossed while Lomborg was in Brazil, at an intimate dinner with other free-market advocates such as Wagner Lenhardt, executive director of the Atlas Network partner Instituto Millenium, and Antonia Tallarida, president of Instituto de Formação de Líderes de SP, another Atlas partner. Narloch told his followers afterwards that it had been “an honor” to dine with Lomborg, the “author of False Alarm and so many other books on the exaggerations of climate debates,” <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DOldLIYkYmx/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">posting a photo of the smiling group at a restaurant.</a></p>
2467.  
2468.  
2469.  
2470. <p>Narloch himself recently published a book titled “The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Environment,” and is using promotional appearances as an opportunity to attack the upcoming climate talks in Belém, Brazil.</p>
2471.  
2472.  
2473.  
2474. <p>Carlos Alexandre Da Costa, an economist who served in the Ministry of Economy under the far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro, also attended the dinner, and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/cajdacosta/p/DOkOC0AgNKc/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">shared the same photo</a> on Instagram. </p>
2475.  
2476.  
2477.  
2478. <p>As nice as it was to enjoy the “pleasant companies” of fellow activists in the free-market movement, he posted, the meeting was also an opportunity to strategize. “We came out with several concrete actions to promote these ideas and achieve quick results,” he wrote.</p>
2479. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/a-pretty-ugly-history-how-exxon-exported-climate-denial-to-the-global-south/">‘A Pretty Ugly History’: How Exxon Exported Climate Denial to the Global South</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2480. ]]></content:encoded>
2482. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/a-pretty-ugly-history-how-exxon-exported-climate-denial-to-the-global-south/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
2483. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
2486. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313075</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/ExxonClimateDenial.png?width=878&#038;height=585" length="2538398" type="image/png" />
2487. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/ExxonClimateDenial.png?width=878&#038;height=585" />
2488. </item>
2489. <item>
2490. <title>Relax, Wall Street Journal, Health Insurers Are Still Looting</title>
2491. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/relax-wall-street-journal-health-insurers-are-still-looting/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=relax-wall-street-journal-health-insurers-are-still-looting</link>
2492. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/relax-wall-street-journal-health-insurers-are-still-looting/#respond</comments>
2494. <dc:creator><![CDATA[John Canham-Clyne /  FAIR ]]></dc:creator>
2495. <pubDate>Tue, 04 Nov 2025 16:47:03 +0000</pubDate>
2496. <category><![CDATA[Business & Economy]]></category>
2497. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
2498. <category><![CDATA[Economic Justice]]></category>
2499. <category><![CDATA[Health & Wellness]]></category>
2500. <category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
2501. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
2502. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
2503. <category><![CDATA[affordable care act]]></category>
2504. <category><![CDATA[elevance health]]></category>
2505. <category><![CDATA[health insurance]]></category>
2506. <category><![CDATA[united health group]]></category>
2507. <category><![CDATA[wall street journal]]></category>
2508. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313070</guid>
2509.  
2510. <description><![CDATA[<p>When insurance companies' stock prices dropped sharply, business journalists fretted about the future profitability of the sector.</p>
2511. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/relax-wall-street-journal-health-insurers-are-still-looting/">Relax, Wall Street Journal, Health Insurers Are Still Looting</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2512. ]]></description>
2513. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
2514. <p><strong>On Oct. 21</strong>, Elevance Health (the rebrand of for-profit health insurer Anthem) <a href="http://www.elevancehealth.com/newsroom/elv-quarterly-earnings-q3-2025" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">announced</a> its third-quarter financial results. Operating revenue went up 12% from the same three-month period last year, and profits as measured by normal accounting rules rose 17%. UnitedHealth Group, the nation’s largest insurer, went one better, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/unitedhealth-lifts-2025-profit-forecast-ceo-eyes-growth-2026-2025-10-28/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">raising</a> its expectations for how much profit it will make this year, as it eased Wall Street’s worries by increasing the premiums it will charge for coverage in 2026.</p>
2515.  
2516.  
2517.  
2518. <p>Please let the anxious folks at The Wall Street Journal know. They’ve been so worried.</p>
2519.  
2520.  
2521.  
2522. <p>Over the past year, older Americans, low-income people who enroll in private Medicare and Medicaid insurance plans, and people covered by health insurance purchased from the Affordable Care Act exchanges have been doing something that private insurance companies and their Wall Street investors find disturbing: They’re actually going to the doctor and getting the healthcare they need.</p>
2523.  
2524.  
2525.  
2526. <p>The public’s desire to get medical treatment that they’ve already paid insurance companies for triggered a Wall Street meltdown earlier this year, with stock prices dropping sharply as investment analysts and business journalists fretted that private looting of the healthcare system might end.</p>
2527.  
2528.  
2529.  
2530. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Insurers in ‘rough shape’&nbsp;</h3>
2531.  
2532.  
2533.  
2534. <p>In January, the Associated Press <a href="https://apnews.com/article/unitedhealth-unitedhealthcare-profit-brian-thompson-shooting-8ac445eb083e41d4f2e25b5d3ed80dc5" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported</a>, “UnitedHealth posted a better-than-expected profit in the final quarter of 2024, but a nagging rise in medical costs and care utilization surprised Wall Street.” The article noted that this “nagging rise” meant the company’s revenue only “climbed about 7% to $100.8 billion, which missed expectations.” This report came under a headline announcing, with no apparent sense of its own absurdity, that “Medical Costs Linger” for the company whose business it is to pay for people’s medical costs.</p>
2535.  
2536.  
2537.  
2538. <p>In February, Healthcare Dive <a href="https://www.healthcaredive.com/news/health-insurer-medical-costs-climbing-ma-medicaid/740611/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">said</a> health insurers had “wrapped up 2024 in rough shape, recording falling profits from insurance businesses and releasing guidance suggesting that medical costs could continue climbing this year.” What reporter Rebecca Pifer meant by “rising medical costs” was a decline in the portion of every dollar in premiums that insurers skim off the top.</p>
2539.  
2540.  
2541.  
2542. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>This “nagging rise” meant the company’s revenue only “climbed about 7% to $100.8 billion.&#8221;</p></blockquote></figure>
2543.  
2544.  
2545.  
2546. <p>According to Pifer, “major publicly traded insurers’ medical loss ratios” — a standard euphemism for what insurers spend on actual healthcare — “rose an average of 2.8 percentage points from the fourth quarter of 2023 to the fourth quarter of 2024.” The skim taken off the top of premium dollars by the top seven health insurers declined from 12.1% to 9.3%, a “massive change,” according to Pifer, because “even one-tenth of a percentage point can translate to significant changes in the profits companies rake in from offering insurance.”</p>
2547.  
2548.  
2549.  
2550. <p>In April, UnitedHealth&nbsp;<a href="https://www.unitedhealthgroup.com/content/dam/UHG/PDF/investors/2025/UNH-Reports-Q1-2025-Results-Revises-Full-Year-Guidance.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">announced</a>&nbsp;that it had discovered “heightened care activity” by people enrolled in its Medicare Advantage plans, and “changes in the profile” of patients treated by the company’s physician practice and pharmaceutical insurance subsidiary Optum. English translation: Our members are sicker than we thought, and getting more healthcare than we expected. United changed its “guidance” from anticipating profits of roughly $26 billion over the full year 2025 to just under $23 billion.</p>
2551.  
2552.  
2553.  
2554. <p>Over the next three months, Fortune 500 insurers <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1071739/000107173925000128/a7012025formex991pressrele.htm" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Centene</a>, <a href="https://investors.molinahealthcare.com/news-releases/news-release-details/molina-healthcare-announces-preliminary-second-quarter-financial" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Molina</a> and <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1156039/000115603925000111/a2q2025elvearningsrelease.htm" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Elevance</a> reduced their profit predictions for 2025 based on their second-quarter (April-June) financial results. Each company said the skim was declining.</p>
2555.  
2556.  
2557.  
2558. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Panic over ‘medical costs’</h3>
2559.  
2560.  
2561.  
2562. <p>Wall Street panicked. In June, Fitch Ratings, one of the three major U.S. credit rating agencies, <a href="https://www.fitchratings.com/research/insurance/us-health-non-life-personal-line-insurers-sector-outlooks-lowered-17-06-2025" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">downgraded its evaluation</a> of the health insurance industry from “neutral” to “deteriorating.”</p>
2563.  
2564.  
2565.  
2566. <p>The panic-stricken Wall Street mood helped frame media reporting of the industry’s finances. In late July, United announced that its April-June profits fell from $7.9 billion in 2024 to a paltry $5.2 billion, an apparent catastrophe that led investors to drive the price of the company&#8217;s stock <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/unitedhealth-stocks-fall-forecast-cut-rising-care-use/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">down 22%</a> in 24 hours. The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/health/unitedhealth-earnings-profits.html?searchResultPosition=4" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported</a> that United’s profit “fell sharply,” amid “rising medical costs and disappointing profits” across the industry, noting that Centene also blamed “rising expenses for poor financial results.”</p>
2567.  
2568.  
2569.  
2570. <p>As I <a href="https://healingandstealing.substack.com/p/insurers-quit-and-when-they-have" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported</a> in my <a href="https://healingandstealing.substack.com/p/more-insurers-face-medical-loss-crises" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">newsletter</a>, Healing and Stealing, even though <a href="https://healingandstealing.substack.com/p/elevance-expect-a-54-billion-2025" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">profits were down</a> over 2024, not a single company said it would actually lose money, just that they expected their profits to be less for the year than they had predicted in January. For example, Elevance saw its stock drop 20% in two days when it announced that it only expected to earn $5.4 billion instead of $6.4 billion for 2025.</p>
2571.  
2572.  
2573.  
2574. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Public insurance more efficient</h3>
2575.  
2576.  
2577.  
2578. <p>No matter how much their skim shrinks, private insurers can’t compete with Medicare for efficiency.&nbsp;Healthcare Dive’s reporting on the dire state of companies’ 2024 “medical loss ratios” in February included a chart showing that all but two of the major insurers were still skimming between 8% and 13% of every premium dollar in the fourth quarter of the year.</p>
2579.  
2580.  
2581.  
2582. <p>CVS, the drugstore chain that also owns Aetna, had the lowest skim in the fourth quarter last year, but at 5.2% still spent more than five times the 1.1% that Medicare did in overhead — the amount it takes from customers’ premiums to spend on things other than actual medical care (Medicare Trustees Report, Table II.B1, <a href="https://www.cms.gov/oact/tr/2024" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">2024</a>).</p>
2583.  
2584.  
2585.  
2586. <p>The dynamic between healthcare media and their Wall Street analyst sources keeps readers focused on the insurance companies’ need to&nbsp;<em>not</em>&nbsp;spend the money they collect in premiums, rather than paying for what their customers think they paid for.</p>
2587.  
2588.  
2589.  
2590. <p>In its January report on United’s woes, the AP reported:</p>
2591.  
2592.  
2593.  
2594. <blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">
2595. <p>In the recently concluded fourth quarter, more than 87% of the premiums UnitedHealth collected went back out the door to cover medical costs. That was “well above” what analysts expected, TD Cowen analyst Ryan Langston said in a research note.</p>
2596. </blockquote>
2597.  
2598.  
2599.  
2600. <p>The fact that Medicare manages to direct 99% of its premiums (in the form of taxes) to paying doctors, hospitals, labs, therapists, drug companies, technicians aides and the insurers themselves was absent from the story, as it nearly invariably is. Missing, too, was how the privatization of Medicare has loaded up the program with unnecessary bureaucracy: When Medicare pays private insurers instead of covering people directly, the companies skim their 10%-plus off the top, money that Medicare spends on patient care when they cover people directly.</p>
2601.  
2602.  
2603.  
2604. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Insurers’ deadly tools&nbsp;</h3>
2605.  
2606.  
2607.  
2608. <p>The most important missing context of profit panic coverage is the fact that private insurers have plenty of market-based tools to return to profitability, and there’s no evidence that governments at any level will rein them in. Even as media hyped the impact on insurance profits of people getting healthcare, companies were quitting “markets” they didn’t like and jacking up premium prices, while fending off regulation of, and lawsuits against, their most powerful tools: denying payment for needed coverage and defrauding the government.</p>
2609.  
2610.  
2611.  
2612. <p>CVS/Aetna decided to get out of the Affordable Care Act exchanges because, as Modern Healthcare <a href="https://www.modernhealthcare.com/insurance/aetna-exchange-aca-market-exit/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">explained</a>, their “medical losses” on those policies had grown to 96% in states where they offered ACA plans, reducing the skim in that business line to 4%. Insurers get to pick and choose whether to keep selling plans in the various “markets” for ACA coverage and privatized Medicare Advantage plans without heed to the impact on patients, who are forced to switch plans and, often, providers.</p>
2613.  
2614.  
2615.  
2616. <p>Faced with somewhat lower profits, most insurers have simply raised prices through the roof. Recent coverage of Affordable Care Act premiums has focused on the impact of the potential end of the premium subsidies at the heart of the government shutdown, but large increases were already on the way. Last July, Centene&nbsp;<a href="https://www.healthcaredive.com/news/centene-q2-2025-loss-medicaid-aca/754014/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">told</a>&nbsp;investors and reporters that it had already withdrawn its initial ACA rate proposals for 2026 and was preparing to submit new, even higher proposed rates in response to people getting healthcare.</p>
2617.  
2618.  
2619.  
2620. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Faced with somewhat lower profits, most insurers have simply raised prices through the roof.</p></blockquote></figure>
2621.  
2622.  
2623.  
2624. <p>Beyond the government programs, Wall Street consultant Mercer’s annual employer <a href="https://www.mercer.com/en-us/insights/us-health-news/employers-prepare-for-the-highest-health-benefit-cost-increase-in-15-years/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">surveys predict</a> an average 6.5% premium increase, “the highest increase since 2010.” In the business context, reporters report those increases with a straight face, or even applaud them.</p>
2625.  
2626.  
2627.  
2628. <p>In its story on United’s recent upbeat profit projections, Reuters <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/unitedhealth-lifts-2025-profit-forecast-ceo-eyes-growth-2026-2025-10-28/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">quoted</a> CEO Stephen Helmsley, “I am confident we will return to solid earnings growth next year given the operational rigor and more prudent pricing.” “Operational rigor” means avoiding sick patients and denying claims, while United’s pricing is only “prudent” for its investors.</p>
2629.  
2630.  
2631.  
2632. <p>For context,&nbsp;Reuters&nbsp;quoted a stock analyst and a healthcare stock portfolio manager, who were quite pleased with the company’s “prudent” pricing.&nbsp; “Overall, the results, the EPS guidance increase and management commentary were all highly encouraging,” Daniel Barasa of investment firm Gabelli Funds told the news agency.</p>
2633.  
2634.  
2635.  
2636. <p>Meanwhile, private health insurers also generate profits by denying care. Seventeen percent of all Medicare Advantage claims are denied initially, with 8% ultimately denied, Health Affairs <a href="https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/10.1377/hlthaff.2024.01485" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported</a>. The Reuters story clearly illustrates the dynamic between business coverage of healthcare and sources who demand wealth extraction.</p>
2637.  
2638.  
2639.  
2640. <p>During the panic, the Lever <a href="https://www.levernews.com/wall-street-to-insurers-keep-denying-care/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">made this point</a> in a story headlined “Wall Street to Insurers: Keep Denying Care.” Reporter Katya Schwenk pointed out how, beyond price increases, Wall Street’s preferred solution to “lingering” healthcare costs is to use bureaucracy to deny healthcare, and placed the profit panic in the context of five years of high profits.</p>
2641.  
2642.  
2643.  
2644. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Outright fraud</h3>
2645.  
2646.  
2647.  
2648. <p>Outright fraud can also help boost profits. The irony in the entire Wall Street panic over sicker people enrolling in health plans is that health insurance companies have been under investigation for fraudulently claiming that patients are sicker than they are for years.</p>
2649.  
2650.  
2651.  
2652. <p>In September 2023, the Cigna Group settled three whistleblower <a href="https://www.justice.gov/usao-edpa/pr/cigna-group-pay-172-million-resolve-false-claims-act-allegations" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">lawsuits</a> with the Justice Department for $172 million after the company was accused of seeking higher reimbursements by adding diagnoses to patients’ records to boost their “risk scores,” which determine some forms of Medicare Advantage payments. The Department of Health and Human Services inspector general <a href="https://oig.hhs.gov/reports/all/2024/medicare-advantage-questionable-use-of-health-risk-assessments-continues-to-drive-up-payments-to-plans-by-billions/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">concluded</a> last year that these company-generated diagnoses resulted in $7.5 billion in payments to health plans as part of risk-based reimbursement.</p>
2653.  
2654.  
2655.  
2656. <p>On the one hand, the insurance industry can make money by claiming that patients are sicker than they really are, but whistleblowers also allege that the industry illegally tries to avoid patients who are likely to actually need treatment. In May, the Justice Department&nbsp;<a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/united-states-files-false-claims-act-complaint-against-three-national-health-insurance" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">filed</a>&nbsp;False Claims Act lawsuits against CVS/Aetna, Elevance and Humana, alleging they had paid hundreds of millions of dollars in kickbacks to brokers to steer patients into their plans. Aetna and Humana were also accused of having the brokers limit the number of disabled people steered to them. The federal government’s action was spurred by private lawsuits from industry whistleblowers; the allegations haven’t been decided in court.</p>
2657.  
2658.  
2659.  
2660. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Absolving insurers</h3>
2661.  
2662.  
2663.  
2664. <p>Media outlets cover fraud and claims denials episodically, but reporters and editors sometimes frame stories in a way that absolves the actors of responsibility. The day before her New York Times story on United’s falling profits, reporter Reed Abelson <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/28/health/unitedhealth-backlash.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">wrote a detailed recap</a> of UnitedHealth Group’s recent business history for the paper. Abelson used the passive voice to turn United from an accused agent of fraud and a failed custodian of patient data into a passive victim of “misfortunes” that mysteriously befell the company:</p>
2665.  
2666.  
2667.  
2668. <blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">
2669. <p>UnitedHealth Group emerged as a healthcare colossus over the past decade and a half, earning one of the highest stock market values in the nation. But in the last two years, it has been hit with just about every misfortune that can befall a company:</p>
2670.  
2671.  
2672.  
2673. <p>A gargantuan cyberattack. Federal investigations, including a criminal inquiry into one of its most important businesses. The killing of a top executive. A public relations crisis. Disappointing profits. A plummeting stock price.</p>
2674. </blockquote>
2675.  
2676.  
2677.  
2678. <p>The framing focuses attention on the misfortunes of United rather than on the problems of the patients who are denied care, or whose data was compromised in the massive ransomware attack on United’s Change Healthcare subsidiary. Nor did it highlight the providers who spend hours fighting for approval and payment from United bureaucrats — payments that, when approved, were delayed by the cyberattack.</p>
2679.  
2680.  
2681.  
2682. <p>Insurance companies wield all the industry’s profit-earning business tools actively. What they don’t do is address the core cost problems in U.S. healthcare — <a href="https://healthcostinstitute.org/hcci-originals-dropdown/all-hcci-reports/international-comparisons-of-health-care-prices-from-the-2019-ifhp-study" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">extreme prices</a> for hospital care, physician visits and prescription drugs, and metastatic private bureaucracy that <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31905376/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">consumes more than a third</a> of U.S. healthcare spending. Those systemic cost drivers tend to be absent when journalists focus on corporate financial results.</p>
2683.  
2684.  
2685.  
2686. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Peak Panic at WSJ</h3>
2687.  
2688.  
2689.  
2690. <p>With these tools at their disposal, the health insurance industry is hardly in trouble as a long-term investment. As the panic built between April and June, legendary long-term investor Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway quietly <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1067983/000095012325008343/xslForm13F_X02/43977.xml" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">purchased</a> 5 million shares of UnitedHealth Group stock, worth more than $5 billion. Yet, The Wall Street Journal still <a href="https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/health-insurers-are-becoming-chronically-uninvestable-c0b5be8c" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">sounded an alarm</a>, slapping a headline declaring, “Health Insurers Are Becoming Chronically Uninvestable,” on a column by David Wainer.</p>
2691.  
2692.  
2693.  
2694. <p>Perhaps unwittingly, Wainer’s piece summarized the core problem with entrusting access to healthcare to investor-based insurance companies. Investors expect health insurers not only to generate profits, but to produce <em>ever-increasing </em>profits and stock prices<em>.</em></p>
2695.  
2696.  
2697.  
2698. <p>For many years, he wrote, health insurance stocks offered “steady, dependable returns, fueled by the expansion of government programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and the Obamacare exchanges.” Recently, though, “Wall Street has a problem with America’s health insurers: They keep missing their numbers.“ It’s not that insurers are losing money, but that investors can’t expect&nbsp;<em>constantly rising</em>&nbsp;profits and, by extension, stock prices.</p>
2699.  
2700.  
2701.  
2702. <p>Indeed, the numbers that insurers were “missing” earlier this year are expectations set by predictions from the companies themselves. Profits alone aren’t enough for the hamster-wheel mindset on Wall Street:</p>
2703.  
2704.  
2705.  
2706. <blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">
2707. <p>With 2024 and 2025 already looking bad, 2026 is unlikely to be much better, as many insurers look to retrench. UnitedHealth might not grow earnings over its 2024 levels until 2027, according to analyst estimates on FactSet. Humana might not return to its 2023 profit peak until 2028.</p>
2708. </blockquote>
2709.  
2710.  
2711.  
2712. <p>The Wall Street Journal has done some outstanding healthcare reporting, as have other media organs. A year before Wainer’s meltdown, three Journal reporters <a href="https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/medicare-health-insurance-diagnosis-payments-b4d99a5d?mod=article_inline" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">analyzed billions</a> of Medicare claims for the years 2018 through 2021 and uncovered $50 billion in payments to various insurers based on diagnoses added to patient records by the insurers themselves, like those in the lawsuit settled by Cigna.</p>
2713.  
2714.  
2715.  
2716. <p>But in coverage of the business of health insurance, the&nbsp;Journal, like too many other media outlets, normalizes the idea that health insurers should be expected to constantly extract more and more wealth from patients.</p>
2717. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/relax-wall-street-journal-health-insurers-are-still-looting/">Relax, Wall Street Journal, Health Insurers Are Still Looting</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2718. ]]></content:encoded>
2720. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/relax-wall-street-journal-health-insurers-are-still-looting/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
2721. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
2724. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313070</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AdobeStock_1577688106-scaled.jpeg?width=1040&#038;height=585" length="618221" type="image/jpeg" />
2725. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AdobeStock_1577688106-scaled.jpeg?width=1040&#038;height=585" />
2726. </item>
2727. <item>
2728. <title>The Race for D.C.’s Delegate</title>
2729. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-race-for-d-c-s-delegate/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=the-race-for-d-c-s-delegate</link>
2730. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-race-for-d-c-s-delegate/#respond</comments>
2732. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Pete Tucker]]></dc:creator>
2733. <pubDate>Mon, 03 Nov 2025 15:56:53 +0000</pubDate>
2734. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
2735. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
2736. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
2737. <category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
2738. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
2739. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
2740. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
2741. <category><![CDATA[Brooke Pinto]]></category>
2742. <category><![CDATA[dementia]]></category>
2743. <category><![CDATA[democrats]]></category>
2744. <category><![CDATA[Eleanor Holmes Norton]]></category>
2745. <category><![CDATA[washington d.c.]]></category>
2746. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313010</guid>
2747.  
2748. <description><![CDATA[<p>To understand the Democratic Party’s troubles, look no further than the race for D.C.’s nonvoting congressional representative.</p>
2749. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-race-for-d-c-s-delegate/">The Race for D.C.’s Delegate</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2750. ]]></description>
2751. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
2752. <p><em>The following story is co-published with&nbsp;<a href="https://petetucker.substack.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">Pete Tucker’s Substack</a>.</em></p>
2753.  
2754.  
2755.  
2756. <p class="has-drop-cap">I’m not sure who better epitomizes the sorry state of the <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Democratic Party</a>, D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton or her opponent, D.C. Councilmember Brooke Pinto. Fortunately Washington’s congressional race has other candidates, but let’s stick with these two for a moment.</p>
2757.  
2758.  
2759.  
2760. <p>Norton, at 88, is the oldest member of the House of Representatives, and she’s faltering like we saw with former <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/joe-biden/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="5" title="Joe Biden" target="_blank" rel="noopener">President Joe Biden</a>, who’s six years younger. Also like Biden, Norton stubbornly refuses to step aside and is running to retain the seat she first won back in 1991 — when the George Bush invading Iraq had “H.W.” for middle initials.</p>
2761.  
2762.  
2763.  
2764. <p>Norton came out of the civil rights movement, and for many years she fought tirelessly for the District, earning the moniker “warrior on the Hill.” Those days, however, are long gone.</p>
2765.  
2766.  
2767.  
2768. <p>According to a recent D.C. police report that the local NBC station WRC-TV <a href="https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/del-eleanor-holmes-norton-scammed-at-home-by-group-claiming-to-be-cleaning-crew/4006388/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">got its hands on</a>, Norton now suffers from “early stages of dementia” and has a caretaker with power of attorney. Norton’s office denies both counts, although not necessarily convincingly. “Norton’s spokesperson declined to say whether Norton has had any diagnosis, telling News4 her office does not comment on the congresswoman’s health,” the WRC reported.</p>
2769.  
2770.  
2771.  
2772. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="957" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=957" alt="" class="wp-image-313011" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=957 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=300&amp;height=280 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=768&amp;height=718 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=193&amp;height=180 193w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=289&amp;height=270 289w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=433&amp;height=405 433w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=626&amp;height=585 626w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.jpg?width=1198 1198w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /></figure>
2773.  
2774.  
2775.  
2776. <p>The police report was filed last month after Norton welcomed into her home individuals claiming they were there to work on the ventilation system. But they did no work and charged Norton’s credit card nearly $4,400. While Norton was apparently unaware of the scam underway, a caretaker with access to Norton’s home security cameras saw what was going on and called the police.</p>
2777.  
2778.  
2779.  
2780. <p>Norton’s diminished state appears to threaten not only her own well-being, but also her constituents’. This was made clear by her performance at a September committee hearing on D.C.’s imperiled sovereignty, which The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/10/us/politics/eleanor-holmes-norton-dc.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">described</a> like this:</p>
2781.  
2782.  
2783.  
2784. <blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">
2785. <p>The 88-year-old congresswoman was escorted into the hearing room by a staff member who held her by the arm and helped her to her seat on the dais, where she sat alone reading a newspaper until the proceedings began<em>.&nbsp;</em>When recognized, she read haltingly from a script that it appeared she sometimes did not understand.</p>
2786. </blockquote>
2787.  
2788.  
2789.  
2790. <p>As an enfeebled stalwart who refuses to step aside, Norton represents one archetype of the lackluster <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/democratic-party/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="12" title="democratic party" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Democratic Party</a>. Norton’s 33-year-old opponent represents another.<a href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!NGkj!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.heic" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a></p>
2791.  
2792.  
2793.  
2794. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="743" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=743" alt="" class="wp-image-313012" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=743 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=300&amp;height=218 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=768&amp;height=557 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=248&amp;height=180 248w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=372&amp;height=270 372w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=558&amp;height=405 558w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=806&amp;height=585 806w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/fc41895f-af01-418c-91bc-d4a4a5059a58_1742x1264.jpg?width=1742 1742w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /></figure>
2795.  
2796.  
2797.  
2798. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Nepo baby</h3>
2799.  
2800.  
2801.  
2802. <p>In 202 at the age of 28, Brooke Pinto won a seat on the D.C. Council in no small part thanks to her wealthy parents, their friends and The&nbsp;Washington Post.</p>
2803.  
2804.  
2805.  
2806. <p>“Early poll numbers had Pinto at just 2 or 3%, but the tides appeared to shift when The&nbsp;Washington Post&nbsp;editorial board announced its unexpected&nbsp;<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-posts-2020-endorsements-for-the-dc-council/2020/04/30/d1136ecc-84fb-11ea-ae26-989cfce1c7c7_story.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">endorsement</a>&nbsp;of her campaign,”&nbsp;City Paper&nbsp;<a href="https://washingtoncitypaper.com/article/304316/how-did-brooke-pinto-win-the-ward-2-council-primary/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported</a>&nbsp;at the time.</p>
2807.  
2808.  
2809.  
2810. <p>D.C.’s Ward 2, which stretches from downtown to wealthy Georgetown, is lousy with&nbsp;Post&nbsp;readers. Pinto somehow secured the&nbsp;Post’s endorsement for the seat even though she had&nbsp;never voted in D.C. (Yep, her first vote in D.C. was for herself.)</p>
2811.  
2812.  
2813.  
2814. <p>Also key to Pinto’s 379-vote win in 2020 was her war chest — shockingly little of which came from D.C. donors. Keith Ivey, a local politico, crunched the numbers and found Pinto received less than 14% of her campaign funding from D.C. residents other than herself, and less than 9% from Ward 2 residents.</p>
2815.  
2816.  
2817.  
2818. <p>But Pinto made up for that by hitting up wealthy friends and family across the country; her top two donor ZIP codes were&nbsp;both in Greenwich, Connecticut, where Pinto grew up.</p>
2819.  
2820.  
2821.  
2822. <p>In addition to their Greenwich home, Pinto’s parents also owned a house in Palm Beach, Florida, just four miles up the road from <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a>’s Mar-a-Lago. This must have proved convenient on New Year’s Eve of 2015-16, when the Pintos joined <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a> — who six months earlier had kicked off his racist bid for the White House — at his annual Mar-a-Lago celebration, according to Instagram posts.<a target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Hrf3!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.heic" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a><a href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!m3Hv!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa3f9d2b9-1f2d-4b81-824e-301c7144fb17_1198x1120.heic" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a></p>
2823.  
2824.  
2825.  
2826. <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="917" height="610" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=917&#038;height=610" alt="" class="wp-image-313013" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=917 917w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=768&amp;height=511 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=271&amp;height=180 271w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=406&amp;height=270 406w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=609&amp;height=405 609w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a33bb377-0541-4e66-aecf-38017434cf20_917x610.webp?width=879&amp;height=585 879w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 917px) 100vw, 917px" data-recalc-dims="1" /></figure>
2827.  
2828.  
2829.  
2830. <p>Those posts were quickly taken down after I published one of them in a 2020&nbsp;<a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/07/31/did-a-wealthy-family-which-may-have-ties-to-trumps-mar-a-lago-buy-a-seat-on-the-dc-council/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">story</a>&nbsp;at&nbsp;Counterpunch. The story noted:</p>
2831.  
2832.  
2833.  
2834. <blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">
2835. <p>At his New Year’s Eve bash, Trump, then the Republican presidential front-runner, glad-handed guests and in brief remarks pledged to “make America great again!” Then just before midnight, with his family and the Mar-a-Lago party as his backdrop, Trump touted his candidacy&nbsp;<a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2016/01/01/trump_rings_in_new_years_on_fox_news_i_look_forward_to_running_against_hillary.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">live on Fox News</a>.</p>
2836.  
2837.  
2838.  
2839. <p>The nearly 700 guests at the party, according to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3385758/Truffle-ricotta-ravioli-surf-turf-trusted-friends-secret-service-agents-struggling-open-bejeweled-clutch-purses-search-weapons-New-Year-s-Eve-dinner-good-times-Donald-Trump.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">a first-person account</a>, were an exclusive bunch consisting of “club members and old friends [of Trump].” It’s unclear which of these categories the Pintos may fall into.</p>
2840. </blockquote>
2841.  
2842.  
2843.  
2844. <p>Before publishing my 2020 story, I reached out to Pinto for comment about her presence at Trump’s party — which doubled as a campaign event — and she issued a non-denial denial, saying via email, “I am not a member of Mar-a-Lago.”</p>
2845.  
2846.  
2847.  
2848. <p>After publication, however, Pinto had more to say,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUrrzAIJPuA" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">dismissing</a>&nbsp;me as “a person who is clearly not interested in my success,” and “clearly engaged in some conspiracy thinking.”</p>
2849.  
2850.  
2851.  
2852. <p>Having now served five years on the D.C. Council, Pinto is seeking a promotion to Congress. Her campaign got an early boost when, days before she announced, Pinto’s Council office spent $85,000 on a flier sent far beyond her ward, a potential campaign finance violation first&nbsp;<a href="https://x.com/tomsherwood/status/1975634011054866657" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported</a>&nbsp;by veteran D.C. journalists Mark Segraves and Tom Sherwood. (Pinto’s first campaign was also marked by campaign finance<a href="https://washingtoncitypaper.com/article/304316/how-did-brooke-pinto-win-the-ward-2-council-primary/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">&nbsp;irregularities</a>.)</p>
2853.  
2854.  
2855.  
2856. <p>Pinto is once again raking in an impressive haul, saying she&nbsp;<a href="https://x.com/metzgov/status/1975599331752157560" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">raised</a>&nbsp;an eye-popping $300,000 on the first day of her campaign. Meanwhile, WAMU-FM radio&nbsp;<a href="https://wamu.org/story/25/10/28/d-c-del-eleanor-holmes-norton-sees-her-first-serious-primary-challengers-in-decades/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">reported</a>&nbsp;that part of Pinto’s pitch to D.C. voters is that “she’ll be able to assuage Trump and Republicans.” And she has a point; after all, what other candidate can say they partied with Trump at Mar-a-Lago?<a href="https://x.com/tomsherwood/status/1975634011054866657" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a></p>
2857.  
2858.  
2859.  
2860. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="442" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=1024&#038;height=442" alt="" class="wp-image-313014" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=1024&amp;height=442 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=300&amp;height=130 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=768&amp;height=332 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=320&amp;height=138 320w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=480&amp;height=207 480w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=720&amp;height=311 720w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=1040&amp;height=449 1040w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/a690dc57-edf6-4be3-93ca-ac0731c65c16_1186x512.webp?width=1186 1186w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /></figure>
2861.  
2862.  
2863.  
2864. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">The rest of the field</h3>
2865.  
2866.  
2867.  
2868. <p>In addition to Pinto and Norton, the race for D.C. delegate has other candidates, chief among them Robert White, a three-term at-large D.C. councilmember and former Norton staffer.</p>
2869.  
2870.  
2871.  
2872. <p>In 2022, White ran for mayor, finishing second to incumbent Mayor Muriel Bowser. Political insiders expected White to run for mayor again in 2026, but he’s instead running for Congress because he questions “how much longer we’re going to have a local government if we can’t start to turn back this federal momentum,” White&nbsp;told&nbsp;WAMU, referring to Trump’s military takeover of D.C., which began in August and continues to today, albeit in less intense form.</p>
2873.  
2874.  
2875.  
2876. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="973" height="1024" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=973&#038;height=1024" alt="" class="wp-image-313015" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=973&amp;height=1024 973w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=285&amp;height=300 285w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=768&amp;height=808 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=171&amp;height=180 171w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=257&amp;height=270 257w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=385&amp;height=405 385w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=556&amp;height=585 556w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.webp?width=1292 1292w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 973px) 100vw, 973px" data-recalc-dims="1" /></figure>
2877.  
2878.  
2879.  
2880. <p>Among the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.washingtoninformer.com/eleanor-holmes-norton-reelection-bid/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">other Democrats</a>&nbsp;running for Norton’s seat are Jacque Patterson, president of the D.C. State Board of Education; Deirde Brown, chair of the Ward 3 Democrats; Kinney Zalesne, a former <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/dnc/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="6" title="DNC" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Democratic National Committee</a> official; and Gordon Chafin, a dog walker and advocate.</p>
2881.  
2882.  
2883.  
2884. <p>Among non-Democrats is my friend Kymone Freeman, a D.C. Statehood Green Party candidate. Freeman, co-founder of We Act Radio, also ran against Norton in 2024.</p>
2885.  
2886.  
2887.  
2888. <p class="is-td-marked">Of course whoever wins the race will only sort of be in Congress. D.C.’s lack of statehood means the city’s representative — referred to as “delegate” — can’t actually vote.<a href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!QWc8!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa4d4adb3-0bc5-48f5-bda0-bd79b4a2efae_1200x675.heic" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a><a href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!qrLN!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8ecc8277-e36e-42a3-bd0e-cda46048db86_1292x1360.heic" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a></p>
2889. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-race-for-d-c-s-delegate/">The Race for D.C.’s Delegate</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2890. ]]></content:encoded>
2892. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-race-for-d-c-s-delegate/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
2893. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
2896. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313010</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25283861540546-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" length="415283" type="image/jpeg" />
2897. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25283861540546-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" />
2898. </item>
2899. <item>
2900. <title>Trump’s Deportations Are Causing Farm Labor Issues</title>
2901. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/trumps-deportations-are-causing-farm-labor-issues/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=trumps-deportations-are-causing-farm-labor-issues</link>
2902. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/trumps-deportations-are-causing-farm-labor-issues/#respond</comments>
2904. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Sky Chadde /  Investigate Midwest ]]></dc:creator>
2905. <pubDate>Mon, 03 Nov 2025 15:48:02 +0000</pubDate>
2906. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
2907. <category><![CDATA[Business & Economy]]></category>
2908. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
2909. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
2910. <category><![CDATA[Labor]]></category>
2911. <category><![CDATA[News]]></category>
2912. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
2913. <category><![CDATA[Race]]></category>
2914. <category><![CDATA[Social Justice]]></category>
2915. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
2916. <category><![CDATA[donald trump]]></category>
2917. <category><![CDATA[farm workers]]></category>
2918. <category><![CDATA[h-2A visa]]></category>
2919. <category><![CDATA[mass deportation]]></category>
2920. <category><![CDATA[migrant labor]]></category>
2921. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=313003</guid>
2922.  
2923. <description><![CDATA[<p>Trump has cast the H-2A program as a quick help for farmers. At the same time, the program has been suspended during the government shutdown, which could cause production problems.</p>
2924. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/trumps-deportations-are-causing-farm-labor-issues/">Trump’s Deportations Are Causing Farm Labor Issues</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
2925. ]]></description>
2926. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
2927. <p class="has-small-font-size"><em>This story is is supported by funding from the Chicago Region Food Systems Fund.</em></p>
2928.  
2929.  
2930.  
2931. <p><strong>President <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a>’s deportation</strong> of more than half a million people, along with his ending of several programs that allowed immigrants to work in the U.S. legally, has created labor issues across the agriculture sector, including for farmers, an important political constituency.</p>
2932.  
2933.  
2934.  
2935. <p>While experts <a href="https://investigatemidwest.org/2024/09/11/deportations-raids-visa-election-immigrant-farmworkers/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">warned</a> that mass deportation would result in agricultural labor shortages, which could then lead to food shortages, Trump officials predicted U.S.-born workers would happily fill those vacant jobs. So far, that hasn’t happened.</p>
2936.  
2937.  
2938.  
2939. <p>There has also been a lack of movement by the Trump administration and his congressional allies toward creating a viable, long-term solution for the immigration system.&nbsp;</p>
2940.  
2941.  
2942.  
2943. <p>Corporate agriculture has often pursued lax safety standards, few labor protections and low wages. In many cases, only immigrants and undocumented workers are willing to toil long hours in extremely hot fields and to cut animal carcasses in hazardous meatpacking plants.</p>
2944.  
2945.  
2946.  
2947. <p>In recent months, to increase the number of farmworkers in the country, the administration has tinkered with the H-2A visa program, which allows some agricultural employers to hire foreign nationals for months at a time. The administration said it has streamlined the process to apply to bring workers to the U.S., and it’s trying to allow farmers to pay foreign visa workers less.</p>
2948.  
2949.  
2950.  
2951. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“The H-2A program is not the sustainable solution, but it is a short-term solution.”</p></blockquote></figure>
2952.  
2953.  
2954.  
2955. <p>But full-scale reforms — the kind industry groups say are necessary — have not yet materialized, even as the administration ramps up immigration enforcement. Also, some agricultural industries, such as dairy, are not eligible to hire through the program.</p>
2956.  
2957.  
2958.  
2959. <p>“The H-2A program is not the sustainable solution, but it is a short-term solution,” said John Walt Boatright, the director of government affairs at the American Farm Bureau Federation, the leading farmer advocacy group. “I do foresee the H-2A program continuing to increase in use, but by no means is that a measure of its popularity.”</p>
2960.  
2961.  
2962.  
2963. <p>While the Trump administration is relying on the H-2A program to help a vital voting bloc, its approach to government funding has also created problems for those who need it.</p>
2964.  
2965.  
2966.  
2967. <p>As Trump and his congressional allies battled over federal funding with Democrats, the government shut down Oct. 1. That day, the Department of Labor, which oversees the H-2A program, <a href="https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/ETA/advisories/TEN/2025/TEN%2002-25/TEN%2002-25%20%28complete%20document%29.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">said</a> the resulting cut-off in funds resulted in the program’s suspension.</p>
2968.  
2969.  
2970.  
2971. <p>“A prolonged lapse of funding,” the Labor Department stated in a notice, “will exacerbate processing delays … especially” for the H-2A program.</p>
2972.  
2973.  
2974.  
2975. <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313005" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=1024 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=607&amp;height=405 607w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/49445527446_6213a6cfbf_k.webp?width=877&amp;height=585 877w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Farmworkers begin the morning apple harvest at Apex Farm in Shelburne, Mass., on Oct. 16, 2019. (USDA photo via Flickr/Lance Cheung)</figcaption></figure>
2976.  
2977.  
2978.  
2979. <p>In mid-October, more than two weeks into the shutdown, the Florida Fruit and Vegetable Association sent a letter to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins saying the delays “imminently threaten agricultural production,”&nbsp;<a href="https://civileats.com/2025/10/21/florida-growers-ask-trump-administration-to-grant-worker-visas-amid-shutdown/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to Civil Eats</a>. The association did not respond to a request for comment.</p>
2980.  
2981.  
2982.  
2983. <p>While farmers are dealing with roadblocks to one labor source, the Trump administration continues to crack down on another.</p>
2984.  
2985.  
2986.  
2987. <p>Out of about 2 million farmworkers in the U.S., government surveys show about 44% are undocumented. Hundreds of thousands of others in the food supply chain — meatpacking plants, grocery stores, restaurants — are also undocumented.</p>
2988.  
2989.  
2990.  
2991. <p>Trump’s policies have also created more undocumented immigrants in the country. He <a href="https://investigatemidwest.org/2025/09/03/immigrants-helped-save-this-illinois-meatpacking-town-trump-cut-hundreds-from-its-workforce/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">ended</a> humanitarian parole programs that allowed immigrants escaping unsafe environments to work in the U.S. The move left some meatpacking plants without a reliable labor pool.</p>
2992.  
2993.  
2994.  
2995. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Out of about 2 million farmworkers in the U.S., government surveys show about 44% are undocumented.</p></blockquote></figure>
2996.  
2997.  
2998.  
2999. <p>Immigration raids, or the threat of them, have led to worker shortages across the country. In Pennsylvania, some dairy farmers, who often have to rely on undocumented laborers, have sold off their herds because they could not find any interested workers,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2025/09/15/farm-labor-shortage-pennsylvania-trump-immigration-00560820" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to Politico</a>. In California this summer, some fields were not harvested because many workers stayed home,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/immigration-raids-leave-crops-unharvested-california-farms-risk-2025-06-30/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to Reuters</a>. In Idaho, similar&nbsp;<a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/family-farm-idaho-faces-worker-shortage-trump-administration/story?id=126542964" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">concerns</a>&nbsp;pervade farm country.</p>
3000.  
3001.  
3002.  
3003. <p>It’s difficult to know exactly how many undocumented farmworkers have left the labor force, but the country has seen a decline in immigrant workers overall. About 750,000 immigrants have left the labor force since January, the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan organization,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/08/21/key-findings-about-us-immigrants/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">estimated</a>&nbsp;in August. The decline in the immigrant workforce is likely to reduce the overall labor force, which could harm the country’s economy,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2025/08/21/trump-immigration-policy-labor-force.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to CNBC</a>.</p>
3004.  
3005.  
3006.  
3007. <p>The cumulative effect of the Trump administration’s actions will likely lead to fewer small farms and a trend toward larger industrial-sized farms, which will have the ability to access visa workers and explore options for mechanization, said Mary Jo Dudley, former director of the Cornell Farmworker Program and current director of the nonprofit group Migrant Advocacy and Support.</p>
3008.  
3009.  
3010.  
3011. <p>“As more people are detained, farms are going to lose workers,” she said. “Dairy producers who don’t have access to H-2A workers are faced with hard decisions: Should they just sell their cows if their workers are going to disappear any day? The possibilities for small family farms are quickly slipping away.”</p>
3012.  
3013.  
3014.  
3015. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Despite farmer concerns, immigration raids continue</h3>
3016.  
3017.  
3018.  
3019. <p>For months, Trump has said a solution is in the works. During a July 4 speech, he said, “We have some great stuff being written.”</p>
3020.  
3021.  
3022.  
3023. <p>However, Trump’s main goal and the platform he ran on — mass deportation — has always taken precedence.</p>
3024.  
3025.  
3026.  
3027. <p>Over the summer, Rollins pushed Trump to pause enforcement on farms, citing farmers’ concerns, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/14/us/politics/trump-immigration-raids-workers.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to The New York Times</a>. A few days later, raids resumed. Stephen Miller, a top Trump aide, has told the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the home of Immigration Customs and Enforcement, it needs to arrest 3,000 people a day, <a href="https://www.axios.com/2025/05/28/immigration-ice-deportations-stephen-miller" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to Axios</a>.</p>
3028.  
3029.  
3030.  
3031. <p>In mid-September, Tom Homan, Trump’s border czar,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wwnytv.com/2025/09/16/border-czar-hints-new-farm-worker-program-could-be-coming/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">told local TV station WWNY</a>&nbsp;that “there are discussions going on now” about raids affecting farm labor. But he made clear the increased enforcement would continue.&nbsp;</p>
3032.  
3033.  
3034.  
3035. <p>“President has said there won’t be amnesty,” Homan said. “But he is looking at options for farms.”</p>
3036.  
3037.  
3038.  
3039. <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=1024&#038;height=683" alt="" class="wp-image-313004" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=1024 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=300&amp;height=200 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=768&amp;height=512 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=270&amp;height=180 270w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=405&amp;height=270 405w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=607&amp;height=405 607w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/54627346844_7bc871d323_k.webp?width=877&amp;height=585 877w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">President Donald Trump tours the “Alligator Alcatraz” immigration detention center in Ochopee, Fla., on July 1, 2025, amid expanded immigration enforcement efforts. (White House photo via Flickr/Daniel Torok)</figcaption></figure>
3040.  
3041.  
3042.  
3043. <p>In early October, the administration itself acknowledged its immigration crackdown was causing worker shortages and, potentially, food shortages.</p>
3044.  
3045.  
3046.  
3047. <p>The acknowledgment is tied to how visa workers are paid. Farmers employing H-2A workers are supposed to pay what’s called the “adverse effect wage rate,” or AEWR. The rate is purposefully set above a state’s minimum wage to incentivize farmers to hire U.S. residents, not foreign nationals.</p>
3048.  
3049.  
3050.  
3051. <p>But in a proposed rule filed Oct. 2, the Labor Department argued the rate needs to be cut. That’s <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/10/02/2025-19365/adverse-effect-wage-rate-methodology-for-the-temporary-employment-of-h-2a-nonimmigrants-in-non-range#citation-53-p47920" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">because</a> the “current and imminent labor shortage exacerbated by the near total cessation of the inflow of illegal aliens, increased enforcement of existing immigration law, and global competitiveness pressures … presents a sufficient risk of supply shock-induced food shortages.”</p>
3052.  
3053.  
3054.  
3055. <p>The Labor Department did not respond to a request for comment on the statement in the proposed rule. When a spokesperson was contacted via email, she said she’d have to wait to respond until the government shutdown was over.</p>
3056.  
3057.  
3058.  
3059. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Differing views of agriculture labor source</h3>
3060.  
3061.  
3062.  
3063. <p>The Labor secretary, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, said during a June speech that the H-2A program will help solve farmers’ labor concerns, <a href="https://www.thepacker.com/news/industry/dol-secretary-pushes-one-stop-shop-h-2a-processing" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to The Packer</a>, which covers the agriculture industry.</p>
3064.  
3065.  
3066.  
3067. <p>“I would love for Americans to want to do those jobs,” she said over the summer to the Western Governors Association. “I can just tell you, none of the Americans I know want to do some of these jobs.”</p>
3068.  
3069.  
3070.  
3071. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“The mass deportations continue, but in a strategic way.&#8221;</p></blockquote></figure>
3072.  
3073.  
3074.  
3075. <p>Her comment stands in contrast to other Trump officials, who have consistently said the objective is to replace immigrant farmworkers with U.S.-born workers. About two weeks after Chavez-DeRemer’s comments, Rollins contradicted her.</p>
3076.  
3077.  
3078.  
3079. <p>She said Medicaid participants, who often physically cannot work but now face expanded work requirements under a new Trump policy, would fill the gap left by immigrants.</p>
3080.  
3081.  
3082.  
3083. <p>“The mass deportations continue, but in a strategic way, and we move the workforce towards automation and 100% American participation,” Rollins said, <a href="https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2025/07/08/congress/rollins-says-able-bodied-medicaid-recipients-should-replace-immigrant-farm-workforce-00442065" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to Politico</a>. “With 34 million people, able-bodied adults on Medicaid, we should be able to do that fairly quickly.” (Before Rollins became Agriculture secretary, she told Congress that labor shortages from increased enforcement were a “<a href="https://investigatemidwest.org/2025/01/24/trump-ag-secretary-nominee-says-food-issues-from-mass-deportations-are-hypothetical/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">hypothetical</a>” issue.)</p>
3084.  
3085.  
3086.  
3087. <p>When asked whether Rollins’ position had changed, given the Labor Department’s stance on the immigration crackdown, the USDA, in an unattributed comment, said Trump was “strengthening the farm workforce and streamlining” the H-2A program.&nbsp;</p>
3088.  
3089.  
3090.  
3091. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">With Congress in recess, no deliberation on possible labor solutions&nbsp;</h3>
3092.  
3093.  
3094.  
3095. <p>The Agriculture Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives has <a href="https://agriculture.house.gov/policy/agricultural-labor-working-group.htm" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">studied</a> the H-2A program, and last year it offered a <a href="https://agriculture.house.gov/uploadedfiles/alwg_final_report_-_3.7.23.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">template</a> for reforms. </p>
3096.  
3097.  
3098.  
3099. <p>Currently, employers — or specialty firms that employers hire — must file paperwork with three federal departments to bring foreign farmworkers to the U.S. The committee recommended creating a single portal for employers to use. It also suggested lowering how much employers spend on wages and housing.</p>
3100.  
3101.  
3102.  
3103. <p>This summer, a bill was&nbsp;<a href="https://delacruz.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=2887" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">introduced</a>&nbsp;based on the template, but it has not received a committee hearing.</p>
3104.  
3105.  
3106.  
3107. <p>The House has not convened since Sept. 19, and it’s unclear when it will resume. Republican Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana has faced criticism from his own party for the long delay, <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5550435-pressure-mike-johnson-house-shutdown/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to The Hill</a>. While the House stands at recess, no reforms to the H-2A program can be debated or voted on. </p>
3108.  
3109.  
3110.  
3111. <p>With Republicans controlling both houses of Congress and the White House, Investigate Midwest contacted all 30 Republicans on the House Agriculture Committee to ask for their perspective on how the shutdown is affecting a possible labor solution for farmers hurt by increased immigration enforcement. </p>
3112.  
3113.  
3114.  
3115. <p>However, most did not respond, and a few said they would not comment. The chair of the Agriculture Committee, Glenn “GT” Thompson, a Pennsylvania Republican, did not respond to repeated requests for comment.</p>
3116.  
3117.  
3118.  
3119. <h3 class="wp-block-heading">Labor Department creates new office; unclear if old issues addressed</h3>
3120.  
3121.  
3122.  
3123. <p>The Trump administration has sought to curtail other visas and legal statuses in its effort to severely limit the number of immigrants in the country, but it has backed expanding the H-2A program, which is only for agriculture employers.</p>
3124.  
3125.  
3126.  
3127. <p>In addition to ending humanitarian parole programs, the administration has proposed requiring employers who hire through another worker visa program, H-1B, to pay a $100,000 fee per application. H-1B holders are considered “highly skilled” immigrants who work in high-paying industries, such as tech. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has <a href="https://www.uschamber.com/workforce/u-s-chamber-files-lawsuit-to-support-businesses-use-of-h-1b-visas" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">sued</a> over the fee.</p>
3128.  
3129.  
3130.  
3131. <p>On the other hand, H-2A farmworkers are typically paid slightly more than minimum wage for jobs that don’t last long, and wage theft is a well-documented problem.&nbsp;</p>
3132.  
3133.  
3134.  
3135. <p>The Trump administration could be attempting to replace many undocumented farmworkers with foreigners who spend just months at a time in the U.S., said Daniel Costa, a lead immigration researcher at the nonpartisan Economic Policy Institute.</p>
3136.  
3137.  
3138.  
3139. <p>“Basically, they’re saying, ‘We want workers, but we don’t want people,’” he&nbsp;<a href="https://investigatemidwest.org/2025/09/19/immigration-panel-food-labor-foreign-workers-trump-immigration-policy/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">said</a>.</p>
3140.  
3141.  
3142.  
3143. <p>This summer, the Department of Labor created a new office it said would help increase the number of farmers participating in the H-2A program. However, it’s unclear how the office is addressing issues created by the program’s popularity.</p>
3144.  
3145.  
3146.  
3147. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>“Basically, they’re saying, ‘We want workers, but we don’t want people.’”</p></blockquote></figure>
3148.  
3149.  
3150.  
3151. <p>During the June speech to governors of Western states, Chavez-DeRemer, the Labor secretary, said she was creating a “one-stop shop” for the H-2A program. The new office would help address a backlog of applications, as well as speed up approvals for farmers who need workers quickly, she said, <a href="https://www.thepacker.com/news/industry/dol-secretary-pushes-one-stop-shop-h-2a-processing" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to The Packer</a>.</p>
3152.  
3153.  
3154.  
3155. <p>“We’re finally going to lean in,” she said, “and then we’ll work with Congress on the longer-term issues of immigration reform as it needs to be addressed.”</p>
3156.  
3157.  
3158.  
3159. <p>The new office, named the Office of Immigration Policy, will set “strategic oversight,” “strategic management” and “strategic priority” for visa programs,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/OPA/memorandum/Memorandum-Office-of-Immigration-Policy.pdf" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to Chavez-DeRemer’s memo</a>.</p>
3160.  
3161.  
3162.  
3163. <p>The man tapped to run the office, Brian Pasternak, has worked as a civil servant at the Labor Department for more than 20 years. Most recently, he oversaw the Office of Foreign Labor Certification, which processes and approves H-2A visa applications submitted by employers.</p>
3164.  
3165.  
3166.  
3167. <p>Even before the current shutdown, the labor certification office&nbsp;<a href="https://investigatemidwest.org/2024/11/15/us-could-rely-more-on-foreign-ag-workers-under-trump-high-demand-is-already-straining-the-government/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">struggled</a>&nbsp;to keep pace with the increasingly high demand for H-2A workers, according to a 2024 Government Accountability Office report.</p>
3168.  
3169.  
3170.  
3171. <p>Staff members were shifted from their regular responsibilities to processing H-2A applications, which led to longer processing times for other visas. As the number of applications increased, regulators also dinged employers for fewer infractions, such as lacking proof of adequate housing, a longtime problem for farmworkers on visas.</p>
3172.  
3173.  
3174.  
3175. <p>Having enough staff was an issue before Trump assumed office, and it’s unclear if staffing cuts by <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/elon-musk/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="19" title="Elon Musk">Elon Musk</a>’s <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/doge/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="18" title="DOGE">Department of Government Efficiency</a> affected the processing of H-2A applications.</p>
3176.  
3177.  
3178.  
3179. <p>The Labor Department lost about 1% of its workforce in <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/doge/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="18" title="DOGE">DOGE</a>’s initial purge, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/28/us/politics/trump-doge-federal-job-cuts.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">according to The New York Times</a>, and more cuts <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/22/us/politics/trump-federal-workers.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">could be coming</a> during the government shutdown.</p>
3180.  
3181.  
3182.  
3183. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>It’s unclear if staffing cuts by <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/elon-musk/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="19" title="Elon Musk">Elon Musk</a>’s <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/doge/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="18" title="DOGE">DOGE</a> affected the processing of H-2A applications.</p></blockquote></figure>
3184.  
3185.  
3186.  
3187. <p>The Labor Department did not respond to a question about how many staffers handling H-2A applications were fired or took early retirement since January. It also did not respond when asked how it plans to handle the issues the Government Accountability Office identified.</p>
3188.  
3189.  
3190.  
3191. <p>The new office “will support President Trump’s efforts to prevent illegal immigration by helping employers access and navigate these programs — supporting legal pathways to work,” said Courtney Parella, a Labor Department spokesperson. “By establishing the [Office of Immigration Policy], which reports directly to the Secretary, the Department is cutting red tape and streamlining its ability to execute immigration-related policy priorities and administer foreign labor certification programs.”</p>
3192.  
3193.  
3194.  
3195. <p>Boatright, with the American Farm Bureau, said the Labor Department’s new office holds a lot of promise. However, at least so far, little has changed on the ground.</p>
3196.  
3197.  
3198.  
3199. <p>“No news yet,” he said, “but we’re anxious to see what this Office of Immigration Policy can do.”</p>
3200. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/trumps-deportations-are-causing-farm-labor-issues/">Trump’s Deportations Are Causing Farm Labor Issues</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
3201. ]]></content:encoded>
3203. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/trumps-deportations-are-causing-farm-labor-issues/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
3204. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
3207. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">313003</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/47075383914_5292d4a061_k.webp?width=1024&#038;height=576" length="68788" type="image/webp" />
3208. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/47075383914_5292d4a061_k.webp?width=1024&#038;height=576" />
3209. </item>
3210. <item>
3211. <title>Donald Trump&#8217;s Deep Nuclear Confusion</title>
3212. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/donald-trumps-deep-nuclear-confusion/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=donald-trumps-deep-nuclear-confusion</link>
3213. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/donald-trumps-deep-nuclear-confusion/#respond</comments>
3215. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Joe Cirincione]]></dc:creator>
3216. <pubDate>Mon, 03 Nov 2025 15:31:30 +0000</pubDate>
3217. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
3218. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
3219. <category><![CDATA[Courts & Law]]></category>
3220. <category><![CDATA[Military]]></category>
3221. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
3222. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
3223. <category><![CDATA[US]]></category>
3224. <category><![CDATA[Wounds of War]]></category>
3225. <category><![CDATA[department of war]]></category>
3226. <category><![CDATA[donald trump]]></category>
3227. <category><![CDATA[nuclear proliferation]]></category>
3228. <category><![CDATA[nuclear testing]]></category>
3229. <category><![CDATA[xi jinping]]></category>
3230. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=312998</guid>
3231.  
3232. <description><![CDATA[<p>The president is poised to make nuclear testing great again, despite not understanding his own argument—or the global consequences of his recklessness.</p>
3233. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/donald-trumps-deep-nuclear-confusion/">Donald Trump&#8217;s Deep Nuclear Confusion</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
3234. ]]></description>
3235. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
3236. <p><em>The following story is co-published with <a href="https://joecirincione.substack.com/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Joseph Cirincione</a><a href="https://freddiedeboer.substack.com/p/perhaps-liking-or-not-liking-taylor" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">’s Substack</a>.</em></p>
3237.  
3238.  
3239.  
3240. <p class="has-drop-cap"><a href="https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/news/trump-xi-see-eye-eye-negotiation-coercion-rcna240557" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">President Donald Trump</a>&nbsp;is confused. Just moments before he was to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-us-china-trade-deal-minerals-rcna240591" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">meet with China’s President Xi Jinping</a>, he posted a baffling message on his Truth Social site, claiming the U.S. would “immediately” resume the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/trump-orders-pentagon-to-start-testing-nuclear-weapons-on-an-equal-basis-with-other-countries-250971717955" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">testing of nuclear weapons</a>.</p>
3241.  
3242.  
3243.  
3244. <p>No one knew what he meant or why he was saying it.</p>
3245.  
3246.  
3247.  
3248. <p>“Because of other countries testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis,” <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a> said, “That process will begin immediately.” When questioned later by reporters aboard Air Force One, <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-orders-pentagon-begin-testing-nuclear-weapons-immediately-rcna240681" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">he added</a>: “We don’t do testing. We’ve halted it years, many years ago. But with others doing testing, I think it’s appropriate that we do also.”</p>
3249.  
3250.  
3251.  
3252. <p>That was hardly clarifying. Did he actually mean that the U.S. would resume exploding nuclear weapons at the old Nevada test site, something we have not done in more than 30 years? Or was he just reacting to<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/putin-russia-successfully-tested-nuclear-powered-missile-burevestnik-rcna119158" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">&nbsp;Russian tests</a>&nbsp;this week of a long-range cruise missile and an underwater drone?</p>
3253.  
3254.  
3255.  
3256. <p>To paraphrase Bill Clinton, it depends on what your definition of “nuclear” is.</p>
3257.  
3258.  
3259.  
3260. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>Did he actually mean that the U.S. would resume exploding nuclear weapons at the old Nevada test site?</p></blockquote></figure>
3261.  
3262.  
3263.  
3264. <p>The U.S. has conducted 1,054 explosive tests of nuclear weapons beginning with the world’s very first test of an atomic bomb in 1945. This is more nuclear explosions than all other nations combined. As a result, the nation has a vast scientific understanding of the dynamics of nuclear fission (the splitting of atoms), nuclear fusion (the fusing of atoms) and the complex hydrodynamics of the hot plasma created in the first microseconds of a nuclear detonation.</p>
3265.  
3266.  
3267.  
3268. <p>Our knowledge is so deep that in 1992, we stopped testing. All other countries followed suit.</p>
3269.  
3270.  
3271.  
3272. <p>In 1996, the nations of the world, led by the U.S., negotiated the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, or CTBT, banning nuclear explosive tests worldwide. One hundred eighty-seven nations have signed the accord. No nation has tested nuclear weapons in this century, save for North Korea, which conducted six tests between 2006 and 2017. Those tests are one of the reasons North Korea is considered a rogue state, outside of international norms.</p>
3273.  
3274.  
3275.  
3276. <p>Using the data from previous tests and ever-advancing supercomputers, we can now simulate nuclear explosions without an actual physical explosion. We conduct “sub-critical” experiments involving nuclear materials that stop just short of a full chain reaction. The directors of our national weapons laboratories annually certify that the more than 5,000 nuclear weapons in our stockpile are safe, reliable and effective.</p>
3277.  
3278.  
3279.  
3280. <p>Although fiercely contested at the time — and still not ratified by the U.S. Senate — the test ban treaty ended the further<a href="https://www.americanscientist.org/article/fallout-from-nuclear-weapons-tests-and-cancer-risks" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank"> radiation poisoning</a> of people near or downwind from test sites in Nevada and the South Pacific. It’s no wonder that members of Nevada’s congressional delegation reacted sharply to <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/tag/donald-trump/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="4" title="Donald Trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trump</a>’s threat.</p>
3281.  
3282.  
3283.  
3284. <p>“Absolutely not,” said Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., <a href="https://x.com/repdinatitus/status/1983709442609967410" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">who vowed</a> to introduce a bill to forbid the resumption of nuclear testing. Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., was<a href="https://x.com/SenJackyRosen/status/1983726510025666999" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank"> equally firm</a>, “This directly contradicts the commitments I secured from Trump nominees — and the opinion of Administration officials who certify our nuclear stockpile — who’ve told me explosive nuclear testing would not happen and is unnecessary. I’ll fight to stop this.”</p>
3285.  
3286.  
3287.  
3288. <p>Banning nuclear tests in 1996 was not just the right moral and humane choice, but it also locked in an American advantage in nuclear knowledge. Resuming nuclear testing would allow other nations to catch up. If Trump began testing, other nations would quickly follow.</p>
3289.  
3290.  
3291.  
3292. <p>Russian spokesman Dmitry Peskov <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-orders-pentagon-begin-testing-nuclear-weapons-immediately-rcna240681" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">dryly responded to Trump</a>, “Until now, we were not aware that anyone was testing anything.” He added, “But I want to recall President [Vladimir] Putin’s statement, which has been repeated many times: that, of course, if someone abandons the moratorium, Russia will act accordingly.”</p>
3293.  
3294.  
3295.  
3296. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft has-text-align-left"><blockquote><p>If Trump began testing, other nations would quickly follow.</p></blockquote></figure>
3297.  
3298.  
3299.  
3300. <p>China — which has conducted only 45 test explosions, and none since 1996 — would leap at the chance to develop new nuclear weapons and experiment with new designs. India and Pakistan would certainly follow. Even Israel, which has never admitted to possessing nuclear weapons, though it is widely believed to have a small arsenal, might join the nuclear testing parade.</p>
3301.  
3302.  
3303.  
3304. <p>Trump is poised to make nuclear testing great again — all across the world.</p>
3305.  
3306.  
3307.  
3308. <p>Does Trump understand this? When he says “immediately,” does he understand that the Nevada test site has been closed for more than 30 years? That it <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/10/29/trump-nuclear-test-plans/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">would take almost three years</a> to refurbish the facility — now known as the Nevada National Security Site — and get it in shape to explode weapons again?</p>
3309.  
3310.  
3311.  
3312. <p>Does he even know that the cruise missile and underwater drone that Russia tested did not carry nuclear warheads? That they were tests of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/26/world/europe/russia-burevestnik-missile.html" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">experimental delivery vehicles</a> with small nuclear reactors providing propulsion, but that they did not carry nuclear warheads?</p>
3313.  
3314.  
3315.  
3316. <p>He may not. Trump’s knowledge of nuclear issues is alarmingly thin. His purges of top scientists, generals and experienced national security experts have left him dangerously ill-advised. It is not as if Secretary of “War” Pete Hegseth can help.<a href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!-9iJ!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.heic" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a></p>
3317.  
3318.  
3319.  
3320. <figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="819" src="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=1024&#038;height=819" alt="" class="wp-image-312999" srcset="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=1024&amp;height=819 1024w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=300&amp;height=240 300w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=768&amp;height=615 768w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=225&amp;height=180 225w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=337&amp;height=270 337w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=506&amp;height=405 506w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=731&amp;height=585 731w, https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9c779145-2458-43d2-ab92-2925ce38c953_1502x1202.jpg?width=1502 1502w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" data-recalc-dims="1" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Source:&nbsp;<a href="https://armscontrolcenter.org/fact-sheet-nuclear-testing-101/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation</a></figcaption></figure>
3321.  
3322.  
3323.  
3324. <p>Maybe this was just a boss move, Trump’s attempt to assert male dominance as he met a powerful rival. Let us hope it was just a rhetorical flex. But it may not be. Nuclear hawks in the Pentagon and conservative bastions such as the Heritage Foundation have long pushed for&nbsp;<a href="https://www.heritage.org/defense/report/america-must-prepare-test-nuclear-weapons" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">restarting nuclear tests</a>&nbsp;— including as part of its&nbsp;<a href="https://thebulletin.org/2024/09/project-2025s-stance-on-nuclear-testing-a-dangerous-step-back/" rel="nofollow external" target="_blank">Project 2025 policy blueprint</a>. They may have gotten to Trump.</p>
3325.  
3326.  
3327.  
3328. <p class="is-td-marked">As MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell might say, the most profoundly ignorant president in American history may have just kicked off a new, treacherous nuclear arms race — and not even realize what he has done.</p>
3329.  
3330.  
3331.  
3332. <p><a href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!xIHL!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F21a3e66b-a31a-4d76-a466-32465af48413_2400x1607.heic" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow"></a></p>
3333. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/donald-trumps-deep-nuclear-confusion/">Donald Trump&#8217;s Deep Nuclear Confusion</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
3334. ]]></content:encoded>
3336. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/donald-trumps-deep-nuclear-confusion/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
3337. <slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
3340. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">312998</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25302097522710-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" length="409597" type="image/jpeg" />
3341. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/AP25302097522710-scaled.jpg?width=878&#038;height=585" />
3342. </item>
3343. <item>
3344. <title>Boogey, Man!: Resurrecting Our All Hallows Eve Top 40</title>
3345. <link>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/music-to-die-for-an-all-hallows-eve-top-40/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=music-to-die-for-an-all-hallows-eve-top-40</link>
3346. <comments>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/music-to-die-for-an-all-hallows-eve-top-40/#comments</comments>
3348. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Jim Knipfel]]></dc:creator>
3349. <pubDate>Fri, 31 Oct 2025 23:01:19 +0000</pubDate>
3350. <category><![CDATA[Arts & Culture]]></category>
3351. <category><![CDATA[Column]]></category>
3352. <category><![CDATA[Humor]]></category>
3353. <category><![CDATA[Music]]></category>
3354. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
3355. <category><![CDATA[TD Column]]></category>
3356. <category><![CDATA[TD Original]]></category>
3357. <category><![CDATA[halloween]]></category>
3358. <category><![CDATA[monster mash]]></category>
3359. <category><![CDATA[screamin jay hawkins]]></category>
3360. <category><![CDATA[tom waits]]></category>
3361. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://www.truthdig.com/?p=289280</guid>
3362.  
3363. <description><![CDATA[<p>The definitive Halloween soundtrack (that doesn’t include “Monster Mash").</p>
3364. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/music-to-die-for-an-all-hallows-eve-top-40/">Boogey, Man!: Resurrecting Our All Hallows Eve Top 40</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
3365. ]]></description>
3366. <content:encoded><![CDATA[
3367. <p class="has-small-font-size"><em>Originally published on Oct. 31, 2023</em></p>
3368.  
3369.  
3370.  
3371. <p class="has-drop-cap">For some of us, Halloween is the only holiday that matters. A pagan holiday during which <em>not</em> watching slasher movie sequels is a federal offense? That’s a holiday I can get behind. The rituals are better than Christmas, the food’s better, the movies are better, and lord knows, the music’s better. To prove it, below is a hand-picked Top 40 guaranteed to add life to your own <em>danse macabre</em>, deejayed by the rotting reanimated corpse of Casey Kasem. There are tens of thousands of songs to choose from, so the criteria for inclusion consisted of three simple rules. Any included song must:</p>
3372.  
3373.  
3374.  
3375. <p>1. Not be Warren Zevon’s “Werewolves of London.”<br>2. Not be Bauhaus’ “Bela Lugosi’s Dead.”<br>3. Not be, lord help us all, Bobby Pickett’s “Monster Mash.”</p>
3376.  
3377.  
3378.  
3379. <p>This leaves a vast and haunted landscape that spans eras and genres, from R&amp;B to classical, punk, creepy commercial jingles, metal, avant-garde and shadowy, indefinable genres no one has yet to name. So, enjoy, and to avoid fainting, keep repeating, “It’s only a pop song … only a pop song … only a pop song …”</p>
3380.  
3381.  
3382.  
3383. <p><strong>The Silver Shamrock jingle, Tommy Lee Wallace&nbsp;</strong></p>
3384.  
3385.  
3386.  
3387. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3388. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mAA-xbhMuBI?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3389. </div></figure>
3390.  
3391.  
3392.  
3393. <p>A commercial jingle advertising diabolical Halloween masks is as perfect an invocation as they come. This grating ditty slithers throughout 1983’s “Halloween III: Season of the Witch,” a countdown to doom composed and performed by director Tommy Lee Wallace. Long after you’ve forgotten all the other songs on this list, this one will still be stuck in your head. I’m sorry.</p>
3394.  
3395.  
3396.  
3397. <p><strong>“Horror Story,” G.B.H.</strong></p>
3398.  
3399.  
3400.  
3401. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3402. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/6w5Ut24WANM?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3403. </div></figure>
3404.  
3405.  
3406.  
3407. <p>G.B.H. was a third-generation British punk band often cited as a major influence on some far more successful punk and metal bands who followed. Thanks to their towering mohawks, the debate in the early ’80s was whether their name was short for “grievous bodily harm” or “Great Big Haircuts.” In this context, it might also stand for “Going Balmy on Halloween.” This 1986 track kicks things off nicely (and loudly), rounding up some familiar names (Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll and the like) to celebrate the fun of being scared.</p>
3408.  
3409.  
3410.  
3411. <p><strong>“Green Slime,” Richard Delvy</strong></p>
3412.  
3413.  
3414.  
3415. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3416. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UtV_LeN7B1g?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3417. </div></figure>
3418.  
3419.  
3420.  
3421. <p>Richard Delvy was a founding member of legendary surf bands the Challengers and the Bel Airs. “The Green Slime” was a 1970 Japanese/American co-production about a space station overrun with one-eyed Sid and Marty Krofft rejects. The highlight of the former’s short-lived solo career involved recording the theme song for the latter. Apart from being the Greatest Movie Theme Song of All Time, it’s also a formidable piece of post-surf psychedelia. Better still, it’s a formidable piece of post-surf psychedelia about … <em>GRE-EN SLIIIIIIIME!</em></p>
3422.  
3423.  
3424.  
3425. <p><strong>“Burn the Flames,” Roky Erickson</strong></p>
3426.  
3427.  
3428.  
3429. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3430. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/MvG8t4dIncU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3431. </div></figure>
3432.  
3433.  
3434.  
3435. <p>After he left the 13th Floor Elevators to go solo (and kooky in the head) most of Erickson’s output focused on horror-themed songs, meaning he has landed a spot on every last Halloween Music list ever compiled. While “Three-Headed Dog” and “I Walked With a Zombie” are the standard go-to choices, I chose “Burn the Flames” because it’s less well known, it’s a catch-all and it’s just plain silly.</p>
3436.  
3437.  
3438.  
3439. <p><strong>“Black Wings,” Tom Waits</strong></p>
3440.  
3441.  
3442.  
3443. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3444. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gu-oI2OzRuw?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3445. </div></figure>
3446.  
3447.  
3448.  
3449. <p>The Devil has made his way into several Waits’ songs under various guises, but never like this. His most stalwart fans seem to consider 1992’s “Bone Machine” a second or third-tier offering. That’s their prerogative, but tucked there in the middle is this sinister little number in which Waits, with uncharacteristic hissing, whispered vocals, admits that as scary as he can be, some people think the Prince of Lies isn’t such a bad guy after all.</p>
3450.  
3451.  
3452.  
3453. <p><strong>“The Witch,” The Sonics</strong></p>
3454.  
3455.  
3456.  
3457. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3458. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Uj4fEqavRgE?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3459. </div></figure>
3460.  
3461.  
3462.  
3463. <p>This may be blasphemy, but if not for this one song, the Sonics would probably be considered a fairly tame, forgettable early-’60s garage band, and a cover band to boot. So, thank god for this primitive, staccato wonderment which predated all those witch songs that would come along a decade later. It’s a cautionary tale about the new girl in town, the one with the long black hair and long black car who may or may not be a witch. </p>
3464.  
3465.  
3466.  
3467. <p><strong>“He’s a Vampire,” Archie King</strong></p>
3468.  
3469.  
3470.  
3471. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3472. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_rjMQAJsAwA?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3473. </div></figure>
3474.  
3475.  
3476.  
3477. <p>Archie King was man-years ahead of his time. OK, so it’s just another R&amp;B curiosity from 1959, and not a particularly great one, but a few years before The Sonics he’d already provided “The Witch” with a companion song. And 20 years before Bauhaus he used all the same damn imagery those mopey Brits would turn into their biggest hit. Yet does he ever get any credit?</p>
3478.  
3479.  
3480.  
3481. <p><strong>“Year Zero,” Ghost</strong></p>
3482.  
3483.  
3484.  
3485. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3486. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_Mbxe33BYW8?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3487. </div></figure>
3488.  
3489.  
3490.  
3491. <p>Swiss pop metal band Ghost may have lifted every facet of their shtick from other, better acts, but I still love these costumed Satan-happy goofballs. In terms of undiluted, overblown and hilarious pomposity, nothing can touch this anthem to Ol’ Scratch. Funny story. In 2012, they were recording their second album, “Infestissumam” (a concept album inspired by “Rosemary’s Baby”), in Nashville. They had to relocate to L.A. on account of this song, as no large Tennessee-based chorus would agree to provide backing vocals for a song whose refrain mostly consisted of “Hail Satan!” They had less trouble finding a cooperative choral group in L.A.</p>
3492.  
3493.  
3494.  
3495. <p><strong>“Hello Skinny,” The Residents</strong></p>
3496.  
3497.  
3498.  
3499. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3500. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AvJiyOPmsJs?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3501. </div></figure>
3502.  
3503.  
3504.  
3505. <p>In their odd, otherworldly way, for the past half-century the Residents have turned Halloween into a year-round celebration through their shifting array of disguises and in the playful darkness that permeates most of their music. There’s nothing overtly Halloweeny about 1978’s “Hello Skinny,” no witches or vampires, it’s simply a character sketch of a skinny fellow who sells things. But there’s something sinister about the music and performance, the indefinable creepiness ratcheted up a notch when you add the video, that it tops a lot of the entries here on the heebie-jeebies scale. </p>
3506.  
3507.  
3508.  
3509. <p><strong>“Because,” Alice Cooper</strong></p>
3510.  
3511.  
3512.  
3513. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3514. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9YxMYWGhWls?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3515. </div></figure>
3516.  
3517.  
3518.  
3519. <p>Alice Cooper’s penchant for horror-themed songs has made him another familiar face on lists like this, usually with “Welcome to My Nightmare” or “No More Mr. Nice Guy.” I love Alice Cooper, but yawn, right? For my money his sneering cover of The Beatles’ “Because,” which appeared on the 1978 “Sgt. Pepper” movie soundtrack, is a helluva lot scarier. And if you want to see something <em>really </em>scary, try sitting through the movie.</p>
3520.  
3521.  
3522.  
3523. <p><strong>&nbsp;“Zombie Stomp,” The Del Aires&nbsp;</strong></p>
3524.  
3525.  
3526.  
3527. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3528. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/x4ReD0kKJUM?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3529. </div></figure>
3530.  
3531.  
3532.  
3533. <p>The no-budget 1964 beach party/comedy/monster picture, “The Horror of Party Beach,” wasn’t exactly what you’d call “good,” save for the Del-Aires. The Del-Aires were a surf rock band who formed in the late fifties and mostly played the small clubs around Patterson, New Jersey. As far as I can tell they never released any records, but when director Del Tenney saw them and asked them to appear (as themselves!) in his new movie, they agreed. It may be the only solid proof we have that they ever existed at all. This is a good thing, because “Zombie Stomp” is killer-diller. </p>
3534.  
3535.  
3536.  
3537. <p><strong>“The Silent Hedges,” Bauhaus</strong></p>
3538.  
3539.  
3540.  
3541. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3542. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iMm5WovO9zo?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3543. </div></figure>
3544.  
3545.  
3546.  
3547. <p>Bauhaus were just so damnably if unintentionally silly in their deadly serious Goth kings pose, you gotta admire them. Their first single, the ludicrous “Bela Lugosi’s Dead,” became a big Goth disco hit in 1979, appeared in the all-star vampire movie<em> “</em>The Hunger,” and cemented a place on every Halloween music roundup. That’s why I refuse to include it here (see the three criteria above). But “The Silent Hedges”? I mean, who the hell knows what they’re talking about? Shrubbery? Shrubbery can be much more frightening than vampires, But I guess it doesn’t really matter. It may be just as silly as “Bela Lugosi’s Dead,” but in a much more unnerving way.&nbsp;</p>
3548.  
3549.  
3550.  
3551. <p><strong>“The Human Bash,” Billy Kelly</strong></p>
3552.  
3553.  
3554.  
3555. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3556. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/6eoYkeQ_34o?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3557. </div></figure>
3558.  
3559.  
3560.  
3561. <p>If I never hear “Monster Mash” again, I will consider myself blessed. And if you see anyone including it on a list of top Halloween hits, you know you’re dealing with a lazy, unimaginative dolt. I will. However, include Billy Kelli’s parody, off his 2007 album “Ha Ha Halloween.” It’s pretty freaking great, because suburban cocktail parties are the most horrifying things on earth.</p>
3562.  
3563.  
3564.  
3565. <p><strong>“Done Gone Gomorrah!,” David E. Williams</strong></p>
3566.  
3567.  
3568.  
3569. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3570. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rWejUaO9Dik?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3571. </div></figure>
3572.  
3573.  
3574.  
3575. <p>David E. Williams is a charter member of my own personal musical Pantheon. His songs are black as pitch, funny, catchy, intelligent and marked by unexpectedly subtle musical flourishes and wordplay. “I Have Forgotten How to Love You” (1996) his second album, is chock-full of smash hits like “Me and My Girl and the Cold Gray World” and “That Skirt’s Too Short for a Funeral, Honey,” but this portrait of a dysfunctional family’s stab at a Halloween party seemed the appropriate selection for our purposes here. A classic blend of humor, despair and iron lungs.</p>
3576.  
3577.  
3578.  
3579. <p><strong>“Crazy Date,” The Crazy Teens</strong></p>
3580.  
3581.  
3582.  
3583. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3584. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/B7qFsy2SxRU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3585. </div></figure>
3586.  
3587.  
3588.  
3589. <p>This 1959 weirdie doesn’t sound like something that would be recorded in 1959, but it was. Apart from this one single and the fact they were from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, virtually nothing is known about the Crazy Teens. Maybe they were all forcibly institutionalized two days after this came out, and remain Locked away to this day. Again, there are no specific horrors afoot here, but that creeping, palpable sense of foreboding, that knowledge that something <em>really bad</em> is going to happen, is scary as hell.</p>
3590.  
3591.  
3592.  
3593. <p><strong>“Die, you Zombie Bastards!,” Count Smokula</strong></p>
3594.  
3595.  
3596.  
3597. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3598. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/atjEoE90Tek?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3599. </div></figure>
3600.  
3601.  
3602.  
3603. <p>Caleb Emerson’s 2005 horror/love story/superhero/gross-out comedy with the Greatest Title Ever was aiming for Troma territory, but just missed the cut. That’s okay. It’s so profoundly, deliberately dumb that it’s profoundly, deliberately hilarious. To accompany the film, Emerson released a kind-of soundtrack album featuring about a dozen bands, each playing their own unique original song called, yes, “Die, You Zombie Bastards!” Most of the entries, not surprisingly, are from punk and metal bands, which makes the Count Smokula (comedian Robert “Smokey” Miles) solo accordion iteration a charming standout — or at least as charming as a song about slaughtering zombies can be.   </p>
3604.  
3605.  
3606.  
3607. <p><strong>“Tonight (We’ll Make Love Until We Die),” SSQ</strong></p>
3608.  
3609.  
3610.  
3611. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3612. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UvGMlSw-lqk?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3613. </div></figure>
3614.  
3615.  
3616.  
3617. <p>I’ve been informed that by refusing to include “Bela Lugosi’s Dead,” I was still left contractually obligated to add one crowd-pleasing Goth disco hit. SSQ, while not technically a Goth disco band, does a passable impersonation of one here. The 1984 song was one of two tracks they contributed to the “Return of the Living Dead” soundtrack. The song appears to be told from the perspective of a zombie nymphomaniac. Not to be all purist here, but if I’m correct in my interpretation, if the narrator really is a zombie, then that title and chorus don’t make much sense.</p>
3618.  
3619.  
3620.  
3621. <p><strong>&nbsp;“Joan Crawford,” Blue Oyster Cult</strong></p>
3622.  
3623.  
3624.  
3625. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3626. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YQBJfQhpw_U?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3627. </div></figure>
3628.  
3629.  
3630.  
3631. <p>Yes, yes, yes, “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper” is the obvious choice here, the one on everyone’s list right below “Monster Mash.” Great as the song is, if you scan back through BOC’s entire catalog it’s obvious about three-fifths of their output would be appropriate, from the party stomp of “Godzilla” to the arcane mysticism of “Astronomy” to the tattooed vampires of “Tattoo Vampire.” So why be limited to the one damn song that’s been done to death (so to speak)? As the thinking man’s Sabbath, from the beginning BOC’s been tickling the dark side, but never quite so weirdly as here. Inspired by Christina Crawford’s 1978 memoir “Mommie Dearest,” it’s a zombified bit of celebrity gossip which asks the musical question, “what would happen if Joan Crawford rose from the grave and went on a rampage”? And who among us <em>hasn’t</em> asked that question?</p>
3632.  
3633.  
3634.  
3635. <p><strong>“Black Sabbath,” Black Sabbath</strong></p>
3636.  
3637.  
3638.  
3639. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3640. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0lVdMbUx1_k?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3641. </div></figure>
3642.  
3643.  
3644.  
3645. <p>Likewise, where do you even begin with Sabbath? With the possible (and only possible) exception of “Changes,” they were just one long, loud, rolling Halloween party. Might as well slap every album up here and call it a day. Instead, I chose “Black Sabbath” off the first album to keep things simple.&nbsp;</p>
3646.  
3647.  
3648.  
3649. <p><strong>The Mr. Yuk jingle</strong></p>
3650.  
3651.  
3652.  
3653. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3654. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/kVU6uTADf9w?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3655. </div></figure>
3656.  
3657.  
3658.  
3659. <p>Richard Moriarty died earlier this year. He was the fellow who created Mr. Yuk stickers, the green, scowling, yucky-faced evil cousin to the iconic and inescapable “Smiley Face” buttons of the &#8217;70s. The hope was seeing the sticker would dissuade youngsters from drinking delicious household cleaners. I don’t know how effective they were, but if you were a kid when the Mr. Yuk P.S.A. blitz launched in 1971, I have to believe this jingle inflicted far more damage on America’s youth than half a bottle of Sani-Flush.</p>
3660.  
3661.  
3662.  
3663. <p><strong>“Dig Up Her Bones,”The Misfits</strong></p>
3664.  
3665.  
3666.  
3667. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3668. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/lgSLz5FeXUg?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3669. </div></figure>
3670.  
3671.  
3672.  
3673. <p>What list of Halloween ditties would be complete without at least one love song about grave robbing and necrophilia? Make it a song by punk’s answer to Bauhaus in the ol’ goofiness parade, all the better. Then to top it off, open the song with some cartoon sound effects to set the proper graveyard atmosphere, and by gum you’re good to go!</p>
3674.  
3675.  
3676.  
3677. <p><strong>“The Maddest Story Ever Told (<em>Spider Baby</em> Theme),” Lon Chaney Jr.</strong></p>
3678.  
3679.  
3680.  
3681. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3682. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/v7RT9OGzXL4?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3683. </div></figure>
3684.  
3685.  
3686.  
3687. <p>It’s one of the top five Greatest Movie Theme Songs of All Time. The credits sequence of Jack Hill’s low-budget 1967 cannibal comedy is accompanied by star Lon Chaney Jr. himself growling and cackling his way through a musical Halloween poem. Over the course of the poem he calls up all the usual suspects, vampires, mummies, spiders, ghouls, werewolves and Frankensteins, inviting them all to a “cannibal orgy.” While the song is intentionally goofy and sets the perfect tone for the film to come, it’s also (unintentionally) a stand-alone Halloween novelty song that could and should give that doink Bobby “Boris” Pickett a run for his money.</p>
3688.  
3689.  
3690.  
3691. <p><strong>“Werewolf,” Five Man Electrical Band</strong></p>
3692.  
3693.  
3694.  
3695. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3696. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XHTc5n8aY-g?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3697. </div></figure>
3698.  
3699.  
3700.  
3701. <p>There are almost as many werewolf songs out there as vampire songs, but this is among the best. The Five Man Electrical Band was a hippie country rock outfit from Ottawa who were around from the mid-sixties to the mid-seventies. They were much bigger In Canada than they were in the United States, though even then “big” is a relative term. This 1974 single about a rural family trying to figure out what to do with their lycanthropic son — a less than characteristic release for them — should’ve fit right in with all the story songs coming out at the time. Well, songs about truckers, soldiers and housewives proved to be more popular, so it got a little airplay, then vanished. Unlike most werewolf songs it wasn’t played for cheap yuks, and its atmospheric Northern Gothic vibe makes it eerily effective to this day.</p>
3702.  
3703.  
3704.  
3705. <p><strong>“I Don’t Wanna Go Down to the Basement,” The Ramones</strong></p>
3706.  
3707.  
3708.  
3709. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3710. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yxT_0btLHJQ?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3711. </div></figure>
3712.  
3713.  
3714.  
3715. <p>The basement of the house I grew up in was dark and dank, with cement floors, gray brick walls and too many hidden corners tucked away in the deep shadows. I was too terrified to venture down there alone. Maybe that’s why this Ramones song always struck home. There’s nothing overt here, no monsters or witches, no specific horror imagery. Still it manages to tap into the deepest of childhood fears. There’s something down there, alright, and it’ll get you, daddy-o.</p>
3716.  
3717.  
3718.  
3719. <p><strong>“What’s Behind the Mask?” The Cramps</strong></p>
3720.  
3721.  
3722.  
3723. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3724. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Id_iVOf8nWU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3725. </div></figure>
3726.  
3727.  
3728.  
3729. <p>If you’re born into this world looking like zombie Elvis, what choice do you have but to perform psychobilly inspired by B horror films? The Cramps make a lot of lists like this, usually with “Human Fly” or their cover of “Goo Goo Muck.” Still, of all those great, great Cramps songs to choose from, “What’s Behind the Mask?,” a question a lot of people will be asking at drunken Halloween parties the world over, seemed the most appropriate. And Lux Interior’s closing line is probably the same response all those people will be feeling when they find out.</p>
3730.  
3731.  
3732.  
3733. <p><strong>“Rockin’ in the Graveyard,” Jackie Morningstar</strong></p>
3734.  
3735.  
3736.  
3737. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3738. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oaOfVDxsYSI?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3739. </div></figure>
3740.  
3741.  
3742.  
3743. <p>There were an unusual number of songs released in the ’50s and early ’60s about the crazy shit people saw while walking past a graveyard at midnight. The Revels’ “Midnight Stroll” from 1959 comes to mind. Usually there was a party or jam session of some kind involved. What gets me about Jackie Morningstar’s 1956 rockabilly take is that it’s the only “walking past the graveyard” song in which the narrator is struck in the head with a rock thrown by a ghost.</p>
3744.  
3745.  
3746.  
3747. <p><strong>“Evil,” 45 Grave</strong></p>
3748.  
3749.  
3750.  
3751. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3752. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/q48Ebu3rExE?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3753. </div></figure>
3754.  
3755.  
3756.  
3757. <p>I suppose “Partytime” would’ve been the obvious 45 Grave song to choose after it played such an important role in “The Return of the Living Dead.” “Evil” is not just simpler and more fundamental, it’s also, well, funnier. Pasty-faced Death Rock princess Dinah Cancer gives it her all to sound tough and scary, but lines like “You’re just plain ol’ evil” don’t really cut it, even when you’re sixteen. Fortunately, the band itself was always very good, and the guitar here rips out a neat little dour riff that’ll keep your toes a-twitchin’. (Note: The link is to a later re-recording of the song, after Ms. Cancer, maybe recognizing the silliness of the “plain ol’ evil” line, replaced it with “You’re evil! You’re evil! You’re evil!”)</p>
3758.  
3759.  
3760.  
3761. <p><strong>“Swamp Witch,” Jim Stafford</strong></p>
3762.  
3763.  
3764.  
3765. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3766. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/IB0SxXTR_UI?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3767. </div></figure>
3768.  
3769.  
3770.  
3771. <p>Most of the witch songs that came out in the early &#8217;70s (and there were a bunch) were played for laughs. Most involved swamps, too. In contrast, Jim Stafford’s minor 1974 hit was, and remains, downright creepy. Stafford had a brief run of lighthearted novelty hits (enough to get him his own short-lived variety show), which made this dark turn all the weirder. With its talk of snakes hanging thick in the cypress trees and mosquitoes spreading plague in a local town and a witch named Hattie who lived deep in the bayou, it was a long way from “My Girl Bill.” This was one of the first singles I ever bought, and the damned song still gives me the willies.</p>
3772.  
3773.  
3774.  
3775. <p><strong>“Little Demon,” Screamin’ Jay Hawkins</strong></p>
3776.  
3777.  
3778.  
3779. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3780. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/SKd4EpQPRbg?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3781. </div></figure>
3782.  
3783.  
3784.  
3785. <p>Screamin’ Jay is another one who has a knack for making it onto Halloween-themed compilations, usually with tired old standards like “I Put a Spell on You” or “Feast of the Mau-Mau,” but this wild-eyed early rock ’n’ roll screamer puts them both to shame. What makes this story of a demon trapped on earth trying to find his way back to Hell so perfect is that in the song’s chorus (if you could call it that) Screamin’ Jay, swear to god, is literally channeling a demon’s voice. It’s hilarious and scary as hell all at the same time.</p>
3786.  
3787.  
3788.  
3789. <p><strong>“Frankenstein’s Den,” The Hollywood Flames</strong></p>
3790.  
3791.  
3792.  
3793. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3794. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/uX_NXJ6aBhc?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3795. </div></figure>
3796.  
3797.  
3798.  
3799. <p>The Hollywood Flames were one of hundreds of cookie-cutter R&amp;B outfits coming out of the West Coast in the mid-’50s, all of them with the bop-doo-wops and the hand claps and the love songs. Then in ’57 the Flames went a little funny in the head for a minute there and recorded this novelty weirdie. It not only predated “Monster Mash” by a good five years, but also presaged everything Screamin’ Jay Hawkins would become over the next three decades. In fact, when I first heard this I assumed it WAS Screamin’ Jay. Just compare this with Hawkins’ 1969 “Feast of the Mau-Mau.” What sorts of refreshments would be served while you were sitting around Frankenstein’s den waiting for him to show up? Well, the Hollywood Flames told us first, in between refrains of its head-scratcher of a chorus.&nbsp;</p>
3800.  
3801.  
3802.  
3803. <p><strong>“Frankenstein,” Edgar Winter Group</strong></p>
3804.  
3805.  
3806.  
3807. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3808. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NIldF-pGUCU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3809. </div></figure>
3810.  
3811.  
3812.  
3813. <p>When it was released in ’72, the extended hard rock instrumental was a ready-made soundtrack for stoners whose rooms were filled with black light posters, red lightbulbs and strobes. At the time, I was too young to realize this. When it came on the radio while I was trying to fall asleep in a dark room with the Aurora Classic Monster models on the shelf and the pictures of the Apollo 11 command module up on the wall, it scared the shit out of me. All I knew was the song’s title. Figuring that must be of some significance, my tiny brain took to creating its own Frankenstein movie to go along with the music. It got a little out of hand, with not only the monster, but some flying saucers and lots of machine guns. Thinking back on it now, my imaginary Frankenstein movie wasn’t all that different from the final few minutes of Ken Russell’s “Lisztomania.” To this day I still can’t listen to this song in the dark.</p>
3814.  
3815.  
3816.  
3817. <p><strong>“Subway Song,” The Cure</strong></p>
3818.  
3819.  
3820.  
3821. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3822. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/OQP6XQGSoaY?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3823. </div></figure>
3824.  
3825.  
3826.  
3827. <p>Back on their first album and before they went all fruity, the Cure was still more or less a garage band. While this quick little number isn’t exactly a discordant rocker (more a whisper, actually), it is very Halloween friendly in terms of its creepiness quotient and one cheap scare. Just keep in mind that here “subway” refers to a pedestrian underpass. That’s all I dare tell you about it.</p>
3828.  
3829.  
3830.  
3831. <p><strong>“In Nomine Satanas,” Venom</strong></p>
3832.  
3833.  
3834.  
3835. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3836. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8LKvzUB2_H4?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3837. </div></figure>
3838.  
3839.  
3840.  
3841. <p>Apart from those deeply involved with the speed, dark, doom, Satanic, death or black metal scenes, Venom’s influence on the course of heavy metal would follow over the next four decades has gone mostly unheralded. Without Venom there would be no Metallica or Anthrax. The black metal subgenre even took its moniker from a Venom song. Founded in England in the late ’70s, Venom borrowed Motorhead’s bone-crushing thrash and pushed Black Sabbath’s affinity for the Satanic to new and giddy levels. A quick sampling of song titles includes “welcome to hell,” “in league with satan,” “at war with satan,” “women leather and hell,” “sons of Satan,” “7 gates of hell,” “hounds of hell,” “leave me in hell” and, well, you get the picture. It was a model (minus the “Motorhead” part) Ghost would adopt in the 21st century with flashier costumes and much more commercial success. Anyway, “In Nomine Satanas” is a personal favorite and a real toe-tapper. Hint: it’s about Satan!</p>
3842.  
3843.  
3844.  
3845. <p><strong>“Haunted House,” Johnny Fuller</strong></p>
3846.  
3847.  
3848.  
3849. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3850. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ExfhYQFaSt0?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3851. </div></figure>
3852.  
3853.  
3854.  
3855. <p>There are so many versions of this song floating around that it’s hard to keep them straight. Jerry Lee Lewis covered it, as did John Fogarty, Jumpin’ Gene Simmons and about a dozen others. But I always find myself returning to Johnny Fuller’s 1958 original. Part of it’s the chain-rattling sound effects. Part of it’s the spare instrumentation. Most of all, though, it’s Fuller himself. Face it, when you’re dealing with the story of a man confronted with a one-eyed monster who eats his food, drinks hot grease and demands he vacate his own home by sunrise, you want to hear that mix of terror, awe and righteous defiance that only Fuller delivers.</p>
3856.  
3857.  
3858.  
3859. <p><strong>“A Haunted Landscape,” George Crumb&nbsp;</strong></p>
3860.  
3861.  
3862.  
3863. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3864. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/WuhotjDmRZU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3865. </div></figure>
3866.  
3867.  
3868.  
3869. <p>When revered avant-garde composer George Crumb released this atonal masterpiece in 1984, the original album cover art featured a stylized skeletal horse galloping across a gray and barren landscape dotted with oddly shaped, well, things. Okay, now try to imagine that in musical terms. For the more adventurous, it’s the ultimate Halloween soundtrack. Just set it on “repeat.”</p>
3870.  
3871.  
3872.  
3873. <p><strong>“Little Ghoul Blue,” Frankie Stein and His Ghouls</strong></p>
3874.  
3875.  
3876.  
3877. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3878. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/A3A1mJMahwU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3879. </div></figure>
3880.  
3881.  
3882.  
3883. <p>Given they were a one-note novelty act, it’s hard to believe Frankie Stein and His Ghouls released as much as they did. Sure enough, in the mid-’60s they put out some six full albums worth of comic horror-themed surf instrumentals. They may not have given The Ventures a run for their money, but they did give us classic numbers like “Dinner With Drac,” “Dr. Spook Twist,” “Goon River,” “Who’s Afraid of Weirdo Wolf,” and this one, one of the very few of their tunes to include vocals. Or what might pass for vocals in some other demented universe.</p>
3884.  
3885.  
3886.  
3887. <p><strong>“Tupelo,” Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds</strong></p>
3888.  
3889.  
3890.  
3891. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3892. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oSl4KX7zBTQ?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3893. </div></figure>
3894.  
3895.  
3896.  
3897. <p>Pretty much everything Nick Cave did with the Birthday Party and the Bad Seeds fits neatly somewhere along the “menacing” spectrum, but rarely was it this terrifying. Through growls, chants, yelps and whispers he describes a great evil moving relentlessly toward the town where Elvis was born. It’s up to each listener to decide what the particular evil might be, but I always like to believe it’s Elvis himself. Either that or tourists. </p>
3898.  
3899.  
3900.  
3901. <p><strong>“The Hell of It,” Paul Williams&nbsp;</strong></p>
3902.  
3903.  
3904.  
3905. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3906. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/U6rzVVwvlLU?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3907. </div></figure>
3908.  
3909.  
3910.  
3911. <p>I’m not sure why, but Mr. Williams’ closing credits number for Brian De Palma’s 1974 darkly satirical rock opera, “The Phantom of the Paradise,” became a big hit with his fans. It’s even harder to believe he would be asked to perform the song on &#8220;The Brady Bunch Hour.&#8221; With lines like “Nobody liked you, you’re better off dead,” and “If I could’ live my life half as worthlessly as you, I’m convinced that I’d wind up burning too,” it’s, simply put, a musical eulogy for an asshole. I have already made arrangements to ensure that after my death, “The Hell of It” will be performed at my memorial service. </p>
3912.  
3913.  
3914.  
3915. <p><strong>“Spooktacular Finale,” Spike Jones</strong></p>
3916.  
3917.  
3918.  
3919. <figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3920. <span class="aspect-w-16 aspect-h-9 block relative"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zO_3gfiIDJk?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></span>
3921. </div></figure>
3922.  
3923.  
3924.  
3925. <p class="is-td-marked">Well, I couldn’t very well end things on such a minor chord, could I? After all, this is a happy occasion where we can sit down and share a drink with various demons, skeletons and ghosts, both the personal variety and those of others. So, here’s something off Spike Jones’ 1959 collection of musical horror spoofs, “Spike Jones in Stereo” (aka “Spike Jones in Hi-Fi” and “A Spooktacular in Screaming Sound”). With luck it’ll brighten the mood a bit and help us forget that tomorrow we’ll all be one day closer to the grave.</p>
3926.  
3927.  
3928.  
3929. <figure class="wp-block-embed aligncenter is-type-rich is-provider-spotify wp-block-embed-spotify wp-embed-aspect-21-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
3930. <iframe title="Spotify Embed: Music to Die For: An All Hallows Eve Top40, by Jim Knipfel" style="border-radius: 12px" width="100%" height="352" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen allow="autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture" loading="lazy" src="https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/3fdvfJqZAUi5TwLuYfe8ui?utm_source=oembed"></iframe></span>
3931. </div></figure>
3932. <p>The post <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/music-to-die-for-an-all-hallows-eve-top-40/">Boogey, Man!: Resurrecting Our All Hallows Eve Top 40</a> appeared first on <a href="https://www.truthdig.com">Truthdig</a>.</p>
3933. ]]></content:encoded>
3935. <wfw:commentRss>https://www.truthdig.com/articles/music-to-die-for-an-all-hallows-eve-top-40/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
3936. <slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
3939. <post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">289280</post-id> <enclosure url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/HWEEN_TOP40_HAWKINS_edit.jpg?width=931&#038;height=585" length="203748" type="image/jpeg" />
3940. <media:thumbnail url="https://truthdig.b-cdn.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/HWEEN_TOP40_HAWKINS_edit.jpg?width=931&#038;height=585" />
3941. </item>
3942. </channel>
3943. </rss>
3944.