With Jack Smith’s Latest Move, Trump Escapes Accountability for Jan. 6

A federal judge on Friday granted special counsel Jack Smith’s request to vacate the remaining deadlines in Donald Trump’s election interference case.

In a new filing earlier Friday, Smith requested that “the Court vacate the remaining deadlines in the pretrial schedule to afford the Government time to assess this unprecedented circumstance and determine the course going forward consistent with Department of Justice policy.”

Department of Justice policy prohibits the government from pursuing charges against a sitting president. Smith’s request cites that Trump is “expected to be certified as president-elect on Jan. 6, 2025, and inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2025.”

Prosecutors asked for the government to file “a status report or otherwise inform the court of the result of its deliberations” by December 2.

Judge Tanya Chutkan granted Smith’s unopposed request shortly after it was filed.

With this latest development, it seems Trump will escape all culpability for his role in interfering with the certification of the 2020 presidential election and allegedly inciting the January 6 riot at the U.S Capitol.

The same fate is likely for Smith’s other case against Trump, which concerns the president-elect’s alleged mishandling of classified documents during and after his first administration. That case landed in the lap of a pro-Trump judge who dismissed the case—landing her on the short list for Trump’s next attorney general.

As Smith scrambles to wind down his two cases against Trump, it’s worth noting that the former president has promised to fire Smith on his first day in office, and even threatened to have him deported.

This story has been updated.

Reports of a Latino Democratic exodus may be slightly exaggerated.

Anxiety was high after exit polls showed that 46 percent of Latinos, and 55 percent of Latino men, voted for Donald Trump. While it is a significant blow—Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton won Latinos at 65 and 66 percent respectively—a more detailed breakdown by heritage offered some pushback to the generalized narrative.

The Americas Society Council of the Americas research showed that of the largest Latino groups in the United States, Cuban Americans were the only one in which over half of voters chose Trump, as they went for him by a decisive 58 percent. Mexican Americans—by far the largest Latino community in the country—only went 33 percent for Trump, with Puerto Ricans at 37 percent and Central Americans at 36 percent.

This poll reminds us that, like any group, Latinos are not a monolith. And the “new coalition” that Republicans are celebrating may not be as solid as they think. Democrats just need to sift through the rubble and reevaluate how they message to Latino voters.

Donald Trump plans to enact the largest deportation in U.S. history, and private prisons are already sniffing the air at the “unprecedented opportunity” for moneymaking that a second Trump administration will offer. 

It seems that investors are betting big on Trump’s plans to detain and then forcibly deport millions of both undocumented and legal immigrants—a move that could send the U.S. economy tumbling while making those who profit off of human suffering rich beyond their wildest dreams.

Geo Group, the country’s largest private prison company, was the biggest winner in the stock market after Trump’s victory was announced Wednesday, according to economic outlet Sherwood. The company saw a 40 percent jump in shares Wednesday alone, and its share price went from $14.18 the day before the election to $24.43 on Thursday.

In 2023, 43 percent of Geo Group’s top-line revenue, more than $2.4 billion, came from contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.  

George Zoley, the founder and executive chairman, could barely contain his excitement during an earnings call Thursday. “We expect the incoming Trump administration to take a much more aggressive approach regarding border security as well as interior enforcement, and to request additional funding from Congress to achieve these goals,” Zoley said, according to Bloomberg.

“This is to us an unprecedented opportunity,” he added.

Private prison executives also talked about expanding their services to meet the demand of the government’s plans. Zoley said that GEO Group was “well-positioned” to more than double its number of ICE detention beds, from 13,500 to “over 31,000 beds,” according to HuffPost. 

They also discussed expanding their prisoner transport services, as well as their Intensive Supervision Appearance Program, or ISAP, which presents surveillance programs as “alternatives to detention.”

CEO Brian Evans said that the GEO Group’s ISAP programs currently had around 182,000 participants but could be scaled way, way up, to “several hundreds of thousands of participants, and up to several million if necessary.”

Signs indicate that ICE is already looking to expand this program in anticipation of Trump’s administration. HuffPost reported that CoreCivic, another private prison group, said that ICE had posted a request for information about ISAPs on Thursday, a precursor for contract proposals down the road. 

It’s already begun: On Thursday, a Trump-appointed federal judge struck down a vital Biden-era immigration policy that provided a pathway to citizenship for the thousands of undocumented immigrants who are married to U.S. citizens.

The policy, which the Biden administration called “Keep Families Together,” applied to those who have been in the country for 10 years or more, were not a security threat, and were safe from deportation under the “parole in place” program. They just needed to be married to U.S. citizens and complete an application for permanent residency. The Department of Homeland Security estimated that the policy would help 500,000 spouses and 50,000 stepchildren.

“Without this process, hundreds of thousands of noncitizen spouses of U.S. citizens are likely to instead remain in the United States without lawful status, causing these families to live in fear and with uncertainty about their futures,” DHS wrote in an August statement.

Trump-appointed Texas-based U.S. District Judge J. Campbell Barker struck down the policy on the grounds that the Biden administration was abusing its power by circumventing Congress to enact the policy.

“The rule focuses on the wrong thing in identifying ‘significant public benefits’—the benefits of aliens’ new legal status, rather than their presence in this country,” Barker said in his decision. “The rule exceeds statutory authority and is not in accordance with law for this reason as well.”

This development is a grim precursor to an administration that has promised to break up more families in the “largest deportation program in American history.”

The Biden administration still has time to appeal the ruling.

Following Donald Trump’s presidential election victory, Black people across the country are receiving racist text messages from anonymous senders. 

Reports have come from locations as widespread as Washington, D.C., Alabama, Michigan, Georgia, South Carolina, and many, many other locations around the United States. The texts include messages telling the recipients that they have been “selected” to pick cotton “at the nearest plantation.” Some of the messages include the person’s name.

Many of the texts are targeting Black college students, with reports coming from schools like Clemson University, Ohio State, and the University of Alabama, among others. Students at historically Black colleges and universities, such as Fisk University, have also reported receiving the texts. Some of the texts have “A TRUMP SUPPORTER” as a signature. 

Many of the numbers seem to be tied to TextNow, a text messaging service that allows users to obtain untraceable, “burner” phone numbers, according to NBC News. TextNow said in a statement to the news network that it was aware of the racist campaign and was trying to prevent its service from being used to harass people.

“As soon as we became aware, our Trust & Safety team acted quickly, shutting down the accounts involved within the hour,” the statement read. “TextNow is proud to be an inclusive service offering free mobile text and data to millions of Americans. We do not tolerate or condone the use of our service to send harassing or spam messages and will work with the authorities to prevent these individuals from doing so in the future.” 

The Federal Communication Commission is also aware of the racist messages, and said in a statement that it “is looking into them alongside federal and state law enforcement.” Anyone who receives these messages can contact their local law enforcement office, or the FBI at 1-800-225-5324 or FBI.gov/tips.

Donald Trump’s team may already be having doubts about one of the most recent additions to its ranks: Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Ahead of Trump’s victory in the presidential race Tuesday, Kennedy was already talking about his plans as head of the Department of Health and Human Services, including removing fluoride from the U.S. supply of drinking water. Trump has signaled that he would be open to the idea, even though experts say that fluoridation prevents people from getting life-threatening infections.

After Trump won, Kennedy did an ominous interview on MSNBC, where he was pressed about his personal skepticism about vaccines and how that might factor into his future role overseeing the Food and Drug Administration. Trump transition co-chair Howard Lutnick had previously claimed that Kennedy had plans to strip even long-standing vaccines from the market.

When backed into a corner, Kennedy claimed that he was “not going to take away anybody’s vaccines,” but, apparently, some in the Trump camp weren’t thrilled by the optics of the conversation.

“That is not what we want people focused on today,” a source close to Trump told CNN.

Inside Trump’s camp, it seems concerns reach much further than bad press. There have been discussions that Kennedy would not pass a background check to obtain security clearance for his Cabinet-level position.

“If you dump a bear in Central Park and think you’re above the law, you don’t want to have to go through that gauntlet of political correctness,” one former Trump official who’d been briefed on those discussions told CNN.

In August, it was revealed that Kennedy had found a baby bear carcass in upstate New York and then dumped the carcass in Central Park because he ran out of time to dispose of it before going to the airport and thought staging it was funny. Kennedy has also gotten into trouble for chain-sawing the head off a beached whale.

He’s three months from taking the Oval Office, but Americans are already feeling the hurt from Donald Trump’s economic policies.

Home loan interest rates saw a sharp spike Thursday to nearly a 6.8 percent average for 30-year fixed mortgages, marking a startling shift for a country on the precipice of an aggressive new administration.

“That’s going in the wrong direction,” reported CNN’s Matt Egan. “That is happening because the bond market is getting more optimistic about the economy, but also starting to price in the trillions of dollars in debt that could get added from Trump’s plans to cut taxes.”

The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate by a quarter point on Thursday as it shifts its focus from fighting inflation to preserving the current job market. The cut follows a half-point reduction that arrived in September. During a press conference, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said that Trump’s election would “have no effects” on the central bank’s policymaking decisions “in the near term.”

Trump has promised to tackle inflation by imposing extreme tax cuts and tariffs. The MAGA leader has floated several tariff ideas—including one impossibly high hike on imported goods of between 200 and 2,000 percent. Businesses across the country have balked at his numbers, arguing that it will be Americans, not foreign countries, who pay the price. Readying themselves for a second Trump administration, companies whose business models rely on foreign suppliers—from the auto industry to some of the nation’s most popular clothing lines—are already planning to introduce price hikes on their products.

“We’re set to raise prices,” Timothy Boyle, chief executive of Columbia Sportswear, told The Washington Post. “We’re buying stuff today for delivery next fall. So we’re just going to deal with it and we’ll just raise the prices.… It’s going to be very, very difficult to keep products affordable for Americans.”

But that’s not what Trump has advertised to Americans. During an Economic Club of Chicago interview with Bloomberg News editor in chief John Micklethwait last month, Trump promised that American wallets would be relieved by the policy.

“The countries will pay,” he insisted, promising that it would encourage more companies to produce products inside the United States.

Trump has also proposed a more modest 20–60 plan, in which his second term would impose a 20 percent worldwide tariff alongside a 60 percent tariff on Chinese goods. But even that plan would prove devastating for the economy, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, which found that it would lower household incomes by an average of $3,000 in 2025.

In a joint letter released last month, nearly two dozen Nobel Prize–winning economists formally warned against Trump’s economic plan, arguing that the MAGA leader’s stiff tariff increases and tax cuts would spell disaster for the average American.

“His policies, including high tariffs even on goods from our friends and allies and regressive tax cuts for corporations and individuals, will lead to higher prices, larger deficits, and greater inequality,” the 23 economists wrote. “Among the most important determinants of economic success are the rule of law and economic and political certainty, and Trump threatens all of these.”

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Donald Trump promised would be given free rein over America’s health agencies, has vowed to gut those agencies.

In an interview with MSNBC Wednesday from Mar-a-Lago, Kennedy said he planned to root out “corruption” in U.S. health agencies—by clearing them out. 

“In some categories of worker there are entire departments, like the nutrition department and the FDA, that are … that have to go, that are not doing their jobs, they’re not protecting our kids,” Kennedy said, launching into a complaint about the number of ingredients in Froot Loops. 

When asked whether he would eliminate the agencies, Kennedy said he couldn’t do anything like that without congressional approval, but that he would go after “corruption.”

Kennedy did offer one slightly less depressing message: “I’m not going to take away anybody’s vaccines,” he claimed.

The failed presidential candidate has pushed back on the notion that he is “anti-vaccine” but has repeatedly elevated claims that vaccines have been linked to autism. He has also worked with the Children’s Health Defense, a leading anti-vaccine group. 

NPR reported that the Trump administration plans to provide “information” to citizens about vaccines, which might repeat and elevate these claims. 

That’s not all that Kennedy is planning. He posted on X over the weekend that the Trump White House planned to “advise all U.S. water systems to remove fluoride from public water” within the first month of a Trump presidency.  

Fluoride helps to prevent tooth decay, which can cause life-threatening infection, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has listed fluoridation as one of the 10 great public health achievements of the twentieth century.

To give some idea of what banning fluoride might look like, Calgary, Canada, banned fluoride in 2011. In the eight years afterward, the need for intravenous antibiotic therapy for children to avoid death from infection skyrocketed 700 percent at the Alberta Children’s Hospital.

A top Republican lawyer reportedly being considered for Donald Trump’s next attorney general has named one of his first targets: New York Attorney General and MAGA world villain Letitia James.

James, the lawyer who prosecuted both Trump and the Trump Organization for fraud, on Wednesday outlined next steps for Democratic attorney generals in the wake of Trump’s victory. James noted that they were prepared with “contingency plans.”

“So despite what has happened on the national stage, we will continue to stand tall in the face of injustice, revenge, or retribution,” the New York A.G. said. “We will continue to protect our most vulnerable and marginalized amongst us.… We are prepared, my friends, to fight back.”

This normal statement led right-wing activist and Trump attorney general hopeful Mike Davis to make sexist threats towards James.

“Let me just say this to Big Tish James.… I dare you to try to continue your lawfare against President Trump in his second term. Because listen here sweetheart, we’re not messing around this time,” Davis ranted on a podcast. “And we will put your fat ass in prison for conspiracy against rights, I promise you that.”

This comes just hours after Davis was tweeting about dragging “dead political bodies through the streets.” Davis has also threatened special counsel Jack Smith, who is leading the indictments on Trump’s hoarding of classified documents as well as his attempt to overturn the 2020 election, telling him to “lawyer up.”

This isn’t the last we’ll see of Davis. Even if he doesn’t end up getting the attorney general appointment, he will likely still play a crucial, attack dog style role in an administration that has been itching to go on the offensive for four years.

Donald Trump named one of his campaign co-chairs, Susie Wiles, as his White House chief of staff Thursday. But she also witnessed him break the law—and did nothing about it.

According to Trump’s indictment for mishandling classified documents, Trump showed Wiles a classified map during a 2021 meeting where he was discussing a military operation. The indictment didn’t name Wiles, but referred to a “PAC representative.” Later, ABC News, citing anonymous sources, identified Wiles as the representative.

Trump showed Wiles a map of an unidentified country, according to the indictment, while telling her about a military operation that he said “was not going well.” He said that he “should not be showing the map” to her and warned her “not to get too close.” Wiles did not have security clearance.

The indictment also mentioned that Wiles was part of a private chat on the secure messaging app Signal about whether Carlos De Oliveira, the property manager of the Mar-a-Lago estate, was loyal to Trump. De Oliveira was a co-defendant, along with Trump aide Walt Nauta, in the classified documents case for helping to move around and transport documents on the estate.

Wiles didn’t come forward after having seen classified documents that Trump shouldn’t have shown anyone, let alone possessed, calling into question whether she can attain the necessary security clearance for a high-level position in the White House. Her part in a discussion about loyalty hints at her making sure that De Oliveira wouldn’t provide damning information against Trump in his classified documents case.

In July, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, dismissed the classified documents case against Trump, claiming that the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith to handle that case as well as Trump’s attempt to overturn the election on January 6, 2021 was unconstitutional. Trump faced 42 felony charges in the classified docs case related to willful retention of national security information, corruptly concealing documents, and conspiracy to obstruct justice.

Now that Trump will be returning to the White House, his choice of Wiles to be chief of staff shows that he is looking for personal loyalty above all else in the administration’s top positions. Wiles has already shown that she is willing to look the other way when Trump breaks the law, which means Trump can trust her to protect him if, as president, he decides to push his authority to its limits.