Here’s where cosplaying homeland security chief will be performing next

It seemed like the Trump administration couldn’t go much lower than defying a court order and shipping hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to a notoriously inhumane prison in El Salvador. 

But always eager to find a new bottom, Trump has decided to send Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem south of the border to continue her cosplay parade alongside the prisoners. 

Noem is visiting Mexico, Colombia, and El Salvador this week to "underscore the importance of our partner countries to help remove violent criminal illegal aliens from the United States,” DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement obtained by Bloomberg. She will tour CECOT, the mega-prison in El Salvador now housing the alleged gang members for a cool $6 million in U.S. taxpayer dollars.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem earned the moniker “ICE Barbie” after her widely ridiculed video.

The former South Dakota governor has been working overtime to get the best photo ops possible as she gallivants around the country doing anything other than her actual job. In January, Noem went viral in all the wrong ways for the perfect blowout and impeccable makeup she sported while dressed up as an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.

“ICE Barbie” continued her career day shenanigans on March 17, when she was photographed as a firefighter operating a water hose. 

Even the usually Trump-friendly tabloid Daily Mail piled on to Noem’s PR stunts and said she was cosplaying as a “Border Patrol cowgirl” while visiting the southern border in February.

But while the unrepentant puppy-killer makes sure the cameras get her best angles, human beings are being held in CECOT, a so-called terrorism confinement center with a history of abuse. These immigrants are being shaved, shackled, dehumanized, and detained far away from their homes. 

While Donald Trump and his team are calling this a win and claiming the inmates are all members of the violent Tren de Aragua gang, one woman is crying out for help and insisting her imprisoned brother is innocent. 

“He was asking for help. And that help didn’t come from the lips. It came from the soul,” Jare Yamarte Fernandez told the Miami Herald after she recognized her brother Mervin in a video shared on social media. 

Adding that her brother has no previous criminal record, she told the outlet, “You know when someone has their soul broken.”

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem participates in a firefighting drill at U.S. Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak on March 17 in Kodiak, Alaska.

Over 200 Venezuelans were sent to the maximum security prison without a trial after Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act, which was last used to send Japanese Americans to internment camps after Pearl Harbor was bombed in 1941. He later denied invoking the 1798 law to send the immigrants to El Salvador—but paper doesn’t lie, and his signature was seen on official documents available to the public.

After U.S. District Judge James Boasberg blocked Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act, all hell seemed to break loose between the judicial system and Republicans. 

The president and his allies in Congress have been calling for Boasberg’s impeachment and disbarment, while the judge refuses to let up on his block. As of Monday afternoon, a federal appeals court was considering the Trump administration’s argument to overturn the initial ruling as they push to ship more undocumented immigrants to other prisons. 

"There were plane loads of people. There were no procedures in place to notify people," Judge Patricia Millett said during the hearing. "Nazis got better treatment under the Alien Enemies Act."

Related | Dog killer Noem pushes immigration and wildfire lies at Senate hearing

As for Noem, the disconnect in perspective is stark. During a Cabinet meeting Monday, she claimed that the intention of the Trump administration’s ongoing sweeping deportation effort is to “get people out of this country that don’t belong here and take them home.”

But when it came to those who have allegedly committed crimes, Noem turned cold. 

“We’re not only getting the worst of the worst out, we’re making sure there are consequences for being here and committing crimes in our communities,” she said. 

“If you are thinking about coming to America illegally, don’t do it,” Noem warned. “You are not welcome. America has changed, because we are putting Americans first.”

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Now they’re coming for judges who dare to enforce the law

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said a federal judge who attempted to block his administration from deporting hundreds of immigrants to an El Salvadoran gulag should be impeached and removed.

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg halted Trump's attempt to deport without due process the alleged Venezuelan immigrants he accused of being members of a violent gang. Trump already ignored Boasberg's order to turn around the planes, which were carrying the alleged immigrants to El Salvador.

But now he wants Boasberg removed altogether, saying in a deranged Truth Social post that Boasberg is a "Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge, a troublemaker and agitator who was sadly appointed by Barack Hussein Obama."

"He didn’t WIN the popular VOTE (by a lot!), he didn’t WIN ALL SEVEN SWING STATES, he didn’t WIN 2,750 to 525 Counties, HE DIDN’T WIN ANYTHING!" Trump wrote in his insane and lie-filled screed. "I WON FOR MANY REASONS, IN AN OVERWHELMING MANDATE, BUT FIGHTING ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION MAY HAVE BEEN THE NUMBER ONE REASON FOR THIS HISTORIC VICTORY. I’m just doing what the VOTERS wanted me to do. This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED!!! WE DON’T WANT VICIOUS, VIOLENT, AND DEMENTED CRIMINALS, MANY OF THEM DERANGED MURDERERS, IN OUR COUNTRY. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!"

Multiple House Republicans want to impeach judges who have ruled against Trump and his administration's other illegal actions, including those largely conducted through the so-called Department of Government Efficiency.

"I’m drafting articles of impeachment for US District Judge Paul Engelmayer. Partisan judges abusing their positions is a threat to democracy," Republican Rep. Eli Crane of Arizona said in a post on X in February, after the judge blocked DOGE staffers from accessing Treasury Department data. Shortly after that post, Crane introduced articles of impeachment against Engelmayer, accusing him of violating his oath and abusing his judicial powers.

And freshman Republican Rep. Brandon Gill of Texas said this past Saturday he was introducing articles of impeachment against Boasberg.

Co-President Elon Musk replied to Gill’s post, writing in an X post that Boasberg’s impeachment is “necessary.”

Elon Musk

But this is the first time Trump has publicly blessed Republican efforts to try to remove judges who are simply interpreting and applying the laws.

Trump got on the impeachment train after Musk, who has not just called for Boasberg’s impeachment but for the disposal of multiple other judges who have ruled against Trump.

“There needs to be an immediate wave of judicial impeachments, not just one,” Musk wrote in a post on X in February. 

Even the right-wing New York Post editorial board has told Republicans to cut it out with their thirst for ousting federal judges.

“Sorry, Elon: Even deporting illegal gangbangers must heed the rule of law,” the editorial board wrote on Sunday. It went on to say that it is “just plain silly for Musk to tweet ‘necessary’ of a Texas rep’s plan to file to impeach the judge.”

“It’s nothing of the kind, and cheering it only makes Musk look reckless—a reputation he doesn’t need when many DOGE actions also face court challenge,” the board wrote.

Meanwhile, the Republican impeachment efforts have led to warnings from sitting federal judges that the campaign to clear the federal bench of anyone who rules against Trump will chill the judicial branch from applying the law out of fear of retribution or even violence.

“Impeachment is not—shouldn’t be—a short circuiting of that process, and so it is concerning if impeachment is used in a way that is designed to do just that,” U.S. Appeals Court Judge Richard Sullivan said at a news conference earlier in March, according to a report from Bloomberg Law.

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, meanwhile, issued a statement condemning the calls for judicial impeachments.

"For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose,” Roberts said in a curt statement on Tuesday—a sign he thinks the impeachment talk is dangerous and not merely bluster.

But Trump doesn't care about any of that. He's been shredding the Constitution to carry out his dream of being a dictator. He's already ignoring court orders and is now backing up the House Republican efforts to impeach judges who stop their illegal actions.

It’s unclear if any of the impeachment efforts will make it to the House floor for a vote. But if they do, we will see just how many Republicans will shred the rule of law to blindly follow Dear Leader. 

Thank you to the Daily Kos community who continues to fight so hard with Daily Kos. Your reader support means everything. We will continue to have you covered and keep you informed, so please donate just $3 to help support the work we do.

ICYMI: Judge says woman can get abortion, Texas AG loses his mind

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is out of control

Only hours after a judge ruled to allow a Texas woman facing a nonviable, life-threatening pregnancy to seek an abortion, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton threatened hospitals and doctors with both civil and criminal penalties if they comply with the judge’s ruling.

When possible, Republicans have enacted some of the most extreme abortion bans, and Texas has among the worst. But cases like this one, which expose the GOP’s cruel and heartless attitudes toward women, have further galvanized national opposition to the bans. They’re also giving Democrats ammunition heaving into an election cycle with a generally favorable environment.

In fact, Paxton’s unhinged response is beyond absurd, and must be read to be believed.

More top stories

Venezuela is threatening war with Guyana, and the tankies approve

Here is everything you ever wanted to know about the next possible war, this one brewing in South America.

Gov. Tim Walz criticizes GOP's 'obsession' with strange and cruel issues

Yup. See the opening item above.

Carlson turns a sober warning of Russian threat into a false claim of extortion

Word is that Trump wants this propagandist as his running mate.

GOP impeachment resolution: A circus without substance

House Republicans seem hell-bent on moving forward with their sham “impeachment inquiry” against President Joe Biden, but they don’t even pretend to have a reason for doing so.

Senate Republicans hand Putin a propaganda victory

When Republicans aren’t busy inventing fake impeachments, they’re busy handing Russia and its murderous dictator Vladimir Putin propaganda victories.

This week’s most-read stories

  1. In late-night rant, George Santos shows he's determined to light the GOP on fire

  2. The Ziegler story gets more icky, but what it reveals about Republicans is just as bad

  3. Donald Trump is so thrown by his own shaky performance that he thinks it’s AI

  4. The Newsom-DeSantis debate did not go well. For Ron DeSantis

  5. George Santos was just expelled. Here's what happens to his seat

  6. Taylor Swift is Time's person of the year and the far right is big mad about it

  7. Justice Samuel Alito isolated in tax case he refused to recuse from

  8. White House has things to say as Speaker Johnson reverses course on impeachment inquiry

  9. The moment of reckoning: When DeSantis realizes Newsom just cleaned his clock

  10.  A House Republican tells the truth about the push to impeach Biden

Comic:

More comics.

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Matt Gaetz Confronts Joy Behar – Asks If She’s In Mourning Over Death Of Democratic Party As ‘Venezuela Wing’ Takes Over

Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-FL., appeared on the ABC talk show “The View” on Thursday morning, and chaos quickly ensued when he got into a verbal altercation with liberal cohost Joy Behar.

“I was just wondering if you were wearing black as a consequence of, like, the death of the political left in the debate last night,” Gaetz asked Behar, who fired back by telling the congressman not to “count the dead yet.”

This came after Behar had predicted that former Vice President Joe Biden would be the nominee, saying that former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg killed his own chances at last night’s debate. Gaetz disagreed with her, however, saying that Biden should be counted out of the race as well.

MORE NEWS: Buttigieg invokes scripture to slam Trump, but nobody is buying it

“What states is he going to win?” Gaetz asked, adding that the whole “premise of the Biden campaign” was his electability, yet he didn’t win in New Hampshire or Iowa.

“So, now you have socialist Bernie Sanders against billionaire Michael Bloomberg,” he said, going on to argue that Democrats will not nominate an actual Democrat.

“They’re either going to nominate a socialist or someone who some time ago was a Republican,” Gaetz continued.

Later on, the Florida congressman slammed what he described as the “Venezuela wing of the Democratic Party.”

“Oh, c’mon, the Venezuela wing!” an exacerbated Behar exclaimed.

One of the best moments of the show came when the panel talked about President Donald Trump’s decision to nominate Ambassador Richard Grenell to serve as acting director of national intelligence. When Behar claimed that Germany sees Grennel as “thin-skinned,” Gaetz fired back by insulting the talk show.

MORE NEWS: What if Biden drops out?

“Well, this is ‘The View,’ aren’t we all?” he asked, as Behar vehemently denied his statement.

Behar and her fellow liberals on “The View” are typically only challenged by Meghan McCain, the sole conservative on the show, so it was satisfying to see another conservative step in to show them who’s boss. In the end, Gaetz exposed Behar as the ignorant liberal sheep that she is, and viewers of “The View” won’t be forgetting that anytime soon.

This piece originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

Read more at LifeZette:
Trump and Barr pull a classic con on Democrats
Cher comes unglued—claims Trump is going to shoot someone in New York City
Nancy Pelosi interrupts CNN’s Christiane Amanpour to claim Trump was never acquitted in impeachment trial

The post Matt Gaetz Confronts Joy Behar – Asks If She’s In Mourning Over Death Of Democratic Party As ‘Venezuela Wing’ Takes Over appeared first on The Political Insider.

Warren Wants to Control Your Freedom of Speech

By David Kamioner | January 29, 2020

Have a problem with Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts?

She doesn’t want you to be allowed to express it online.

Freedom of speech?

To her, it’s to be torched in the bonfire of her desire to silence anything and any person who may oppose her.

RELATED: Alan Dershowitz Hits Back at Elizabeth Warren

Warren has, in her zest to play to the prejudices of the extreme hard left, gone all the way to the end of the leftist dial and embraced the theories of national socialism and indeed the brand of authoritarian socialism that ruled in the Soviet Union for decades and continues to hold sway in the modern Democrat ideological homelands of Cuba and Venezuela.

Specifically, Warren said in a press release she wants to make a crime out of “disseminating false information” online and would prosecute tech giants for “false information that disempowers voters and undermines democracy.”

Who would decide what constitutes “false information” and what “disempowers and undermines?”

She would.

In her own words, “I will push for new laws that impose tough civil and criminal penalties for knowingly disseminating this kind of information, which has the explicit purpose of undermining the basic right to vote. The stakes of this election are too high — we need to fight the spread of false information that disempowers voters and undermines democracy,” Warren said. “I’ll do my part — and I’m calling on my fellow candidates and big tech companies to do their part too.”

Criminal penalties for speaking online against the likes of Warren and her ilk?

I hope I get a nice cell, one with a decent wine cellar and a walk-in humidor.

Perhaps it should be lauded that the Senator has dropped her mask and now fully and publicly supports installing national criminal penalties for opposing what Warren personally deems false and disempowering.

RELATED: GOP Brings Out Three Big Guns in Senate Trial of Trump

Even putting aside the outright fascist tone of her statements, in this era of the PC Thought Police and identitarian lunacy no doubt taking issue with any insanity the left may spread would be considered illegal and subject to prosecution.

Just how would a real republic, where people can freely voice their views, be able to operate under these strictures?

That’s just it. The Democrats fully well know one can’t.

Because a functioning republic is not what they’re interested in. Their only ambition is raw power at any cost.

This piece originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

Read more at LifeZette:
Rocket Strikes U.S. Embassy in Baghdad
More GOP Senators Could Defect in Impeachment Trial
Bolton Manuscript Leaked, Romney and Collins May Vote Against the President

The post Warren Wants to Control Your Freedom of Speech appeared first on The Political Insider.