MAGA Rep.’s January 6 Commemoration Post Must Be Seen to Be Believed

Representative Mike Collins has taken the Republican rewrites of the January 6 riot to new heights.

“On #ThisDayInHistory in 2021, thousands of peaceful grandmothers gathered in Washington, D.C., to take a self-guided, albeit unauthorized, tour of the U.S. Capitol building,” Collins wrote in a particularly stupid post on X Monday. 

“Earlier that day, President Trump held a rally, where supporters walked to the Capitol to peacefully protest the certification of the 2020 election. During this time, some individuals entered the Capitol, took photos, and explored the building before leaving,” Collins continued,  sanewashing the violent siege that led to the deaths of five people, cost taxpayers more than $2 million, and set off a delayed-released coup that finally came to fruition with Trump’s return to the White House. 

The Georgia Republican stayed strapped to the soapbox, lamenting the “peaceful protestors” who’d been tried for their participation in the violent insurrection. 

“Since then, hundreds of peaceful protestors have been hunted down, arrested, held in solitary confinement, and treated unjustly. Countless hours and taxpayer dollars have been spent pursuing innocent grandmothers and raiding President Trump’s home, while terrorists and millions of illegal immigrants continue to cross our nation’s borders, causing havoc in our communities,” Collins wrote. “Thankfully, President Trump has announced that, on day one of his presidency, he will grant pardons to nonviolent defendants.”

Collins has a penchant for pathetic posting. In October, he inexplicably posted a highly-edited “Chad”-ified image of JD Vance that slimmed down his jaw and brought his chin to a point implant-like point. 

Trump has repeatedly vowed to mass-pardon his supporters who ransacked the U.S. Capitol within his first days in office, a promise that inspired his supporters to try—so far unsuccessfully—to get their sentences delayed until after he officially enters office later this month. 

One of the most dangerous people convicted in connection with the January 6, 2021 Capitol riots is asking for a pardon from Donald Trump.

Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the fascist Proud Boys organization, was convicted for seditious conspiracy for helping to orchestrate the attack on Congress during the certification of the 2020 presidential election and sentenced to 22 years in prison, the longest of any January 6 defendant.

Tarrio made a request for a pardon through his lawyer Nayib Hassan, who wrote a letter to the Department of Justice which was posted to X Monday morning by his mother, Zuny Tarrio.

In 2023, federal prosecutors described Tarrio as the main force behind bringing hundreds of Proud Boys to Washington in 2021 to protest the election results and march to the Capitol building. Several of the organization’s leaders were the first rioters to break into the Capitol, including one lieutenant, Dominic Pezzola.

Trump has repeatedly promised to pardon rioters involved in the attacks, even hiring one for his transition team, but has also said that some rioters were “out of control” and may still face consequences. However, as the leader of the Proud Boys at the time, Tarrio is arguably the most extreme of the defendants, and pardoning him would show that Trump wants to reward the insurrectionists rather than make a token gesture to his supporters.

Elon Musk wants to be the Italian government’s sole telecommunications provider. 

The billionaire’s SpaceX company is closing in on a $1.6 billion security contract after  Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni visited Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate on Saturday. The Italian government promises that Meloni didn’t talk to Musk about the deal while she was there. 

If enacted, Musk’s SpaceX would supply Italy with encryption services for government and military use. “Ready to provide Italy the most secure and advanced connectivity!” Musk wrote on his X platform.

Others within the Italian government aren’t as enthusiastic about the potential deal. 

“If 1.5 billion euros of Italian money to use the satellites of an American billionaire in our country is the price to pay for his friendship, we do not agree,” said center-left Democratic Party (PD) lead Elly Schlein. 

Musk’s eagerness to do business with the Italian government is unsurprising considering the right-wing neo-fascist who currently leads it. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni considers Musk a “genius.” Her crusades against immigration, same-sex marriage, reproductive rights, and anything else she considers “woke,” have endeared her to Musk, who has been attaching himself to the European right as of late. 

This telecommunications deal is just the latest installment in Musk’s attempted Eurozone takeover. The CEO has meddled in German elections, singing the praises of it’s own right-wing party (AfD) as German politicians denounce his involvement. And in the U.K. Musk has been calling for the release of Tommy Robinson, a popular far-right, Islamaphobic activist and founding member of the British National Party. He has also railed about how civil war is “inevitable” there. 

The world’s richest man is rapidly expanding his sphere of political influence—and raking in foreign cash in the process. Elon Musk is changing global politics. And he’s getting even richer in the process. 

Donald Trump’s pick to run the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., may receive some support, or at least an open mind, from some Senate Democrats.

The Hill reports that Senators John Fetterman and Bernie Sanders may consider voting to confirm the former presidential candidate’s appointment to Trump’s cabinet, citing Kennedy’s criticism of food additives, as well as corporate control of the U.S. food industry.

“I think Bernie will give him a fair review,” one anonymous source told the publication, and a different pro-Kennedy source said Fetterman is “definitely a swing vote for all of Trump’s nominees.”

Last week, Sanders wrote a column for The Guardian in which he criticized the U.S. health care industry and called for reform to the U.S. food industry, saying “Large food corporations should not make record-breaking profits making children addicted to processed foods, which make them overweight and prone to diabetes and other diseases.”

These criticisms overlap with parts of Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Initiative” plan, which includes promises to remove chemical additives from food and reduce federal funding for processed foods. Kennedy has said that Americans have been “mass poisoned by big pharma and big food,” and Trump has pledged to let Kennedy “go wild.”

But Kennedy’s longstanding opposition to vaccines and pledge to ban water fluoridation has drawn criticism from Democrats and Republicans alike, and he’ll have a tough time selling those parts of his ideology to the Senate. Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, a doctor, said on Fox News Sunday that Kennedy was “wrong” on vaccines, but still planned to meet with the nominee this week.

Kennedy has met with many senators in recent days to bolster his cabinet bid, including Republicans John Barrasso, Shelley Moore Capito, and Marsha Blackburn. But, in addition to concerns about his medical views, Kennedy also faces from the GOP over his support for abortion, which means his confirmation is far from a done deal.

Donald Trump is (unsurprisingly) trying to get out of his sentencing hearing for the 34 felony counts in his hush-money case.

In a 17-page filing Monday, Trump’s lawyers announced that the president-elect would seek an automatic stay on his sentencing, challenging New York State Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan’s rejection of presidential immunity claims.

Trump’s lawyers argued that the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. United States required a stay of all trial proceedings, as Trump had been granted presidential immunity for official acts. They also argued that Merchan had wrongly denied Trump’s request to have the verdict dismissed on those same grounds.

“Due to the fact that further criminal proceedings are automatically stayed by operation of federal constitutional law, the Court will lack authority to proceed with sentencing, must therefore immediately vacate the sentencing hearing scheduled for January 10, 2025, and suspend all proceedings in the case until the conclusion of President Trump’s appeal on Presidential immunity,” Trump’s lawyers wrote.

The lawyers requested a response from the court on whether they intend to proceed with the sentencing by the end of Monday.

Last week, Merchan ordered that Trump attend a sentencing hearing on January 10, a little more than a week before his inauguration. Merchan made clear in his order that he did not plan to levy a sentence of jail time, fines, or probation against the president-elect. Instead, Merchan said he plans to sentence Trump with “unconditional discharge,” which means he will receive no punishment.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg responded Monday in a 16-page filing, urging the judge not to postpone Trump’s sentencing. Bragg’s office argued that Trump’s claim that presidential immunity should spare him from trial proceedings was moot, considering that the trial itself ended several months ago, and emphasized Merchan’s intention to give an “unconditional discharge.”

“There is no risk here of an ‘extended proceeding’ that impairs the discharge of defendant’s official duties—duties he does not possess before January 20, 2025 in any event,” Bragg wrote.

Over the weekend, Trump published several angry posts ranting against the “RIGGED” case and claiming his innocence—to which a jury of his peers did not agree.

“I never falsified business records. It is a fake, made up charge by a corrupt judge who is just doing the work of the Biden/Harris Injustice Department, an attack on their political opponent, ME!” Trump wrote.

Lodged within Trump’s diatribes, the president-elect signaled his hopes to use his conviction as the pretext for a new authoritarian rule.

This story has been updated.

Trump’s promise to “drill baby drill” may be easier said than done. 

On Monday Joe Biden announced a buzzer-beater ban on new offshore drilling for oil and gas in 625 million acres of ocean. President-elect Trump wants to undo it immediately. 

“Drilling off these coasts could cause irreversible damage to places we hold dear and is unnecessary to meet our nation’s energy needs. It is not worth the risks,” the Biden White House said in a statement. “As the climate crisis continues to threaten communities across the country and we are transitioning to a clean energy economy, now is the time to protect these coasts for our children and grandchildren.”

This move left Trump and his team predictably incensed, as confirmed by his spokesperson Karoline Leavitt on X. 

“This is a disgraceful decision designed to exact political revenge on the American people who gave President Trump a mandate to increase drilling and lower gas prices,” Leavitt wrote. “Rest assured, Joe Biden will fail, and we will drill, baby, drill.”

But Trump may not be able to overturn this ban at all, at least not immediately. 

Biden passed this action using the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, which grants presidents sweeping privileges to save federal waters from being used for future oil and gas development. The act does not allow a president to overturn said law alone, meaning President-elect Trump would have to turn to an already fractured and tumultuous Congress to allow drilling to begin.  

In a bizarre move, Elon Musk has locked out a journalist from his X platform—after she published a story that seemed to exonerate him.

On Sunday, Jacqueline Sweet, a journalist writing for The Spectator, had her X account suspended after she posted an article claiming that Musk wasn’t using a burner account under the name “Adrian Dittman,” after she traced it to a German Musk fan in Fiji.

Responding to her post, Musk replied “I am Adrian Dittmann. It’s time the world knew,” before suspending her account for 30 days. The Dittman account has frequently responded to Musk’s posts and supported his political positions, and in videos and audio recordings, seemed to sound remarkably similar to Musk, complete with the tech mogul’s accent and unorthodox speaking cadence.

Sweet’s article has also been flagged on X, with users seeing a warning that the link “may be unsafe” if they click on it. Musk supporters have defended the move by claiming Sweet’s article included Dittman’s personal information—even though it contained no private identifying information whatsoever like his address or phone number—while critics have pointed out the irony of the self-proclaimed “free speech champion” Musk censoring an article that he doesn’t like, pointing out how the tech CEO complained about Twitter censoring stories on Hunter Biden’s laptop. The episode is only more bizarre because it’s not clear why Musk wants to bury this largely anodyne news story.

This is the latest absurd chapter in Musk’s ownership of the social media platform. It is, by recent standards, which include arguing with his far-right ex-supporters over immigration policy and subsequently penalizing their X accounts after they began to attack him, less destructive but it nevertheless underscores the dangers of having one very rich, deranged person in charge of content moderation on a social media platform used by millions.

Donald Trump may be planning to break one of his key—and most disastrous—campaign promises to implement “universal” tariffs on goods imported into the U.S., The Washington Post reported Monday.

Trump’s aides have been quietly prepping a plan to target only critical imports, rather than all imports from a country, three people familiar with discussions anonymously told the Post.

The tariffs would be levied on imports considered to be critical to national or economic security, the people said. While it was not immediately clear which imports those would be, the tariffs are intended to strengthen certain U.S. industries, including materials for the military supply industrial chain, medical supplies, and energy production, two of the three people said.

Trump had previously stated his intention to place a 25 percent tariff on all imports from Canada and Mexico, in addition to a 10 percent tariff on all imports from China—a plan that experts say would be disastrous for the U.S. economy, raising costs for consumers, ravaging the stock market, and severely damaging the America’s global economic standing.

Sector-based tariffs might be a “little bit easier for everybody to stomach out of the gate,” one of the people told the Post. “The thought is if you’re going to do universal tariffs, why not at least start with these targeted measures? And it would still give CEOs a massive incentive to start making their products here.”

It seems that some people inside the forthcoming Trump administration are hoping to avert some of the fallout of his outlandish, dangerous economic plan. In sharing this information, it seems insiders are hoping to float a more moderate approach to tariffs, despite what the president-elect may think. But Trump doesn’t seem to be ready to back down.

Trump immediately contradicted the reporting in a post on Truth Social. “The story in the Washington Post, quoting so-called anonymous sources, which don’t exist, incorrectly states that my tariff policy will be pared back. That is wrong,” Trump wrote. “The Washington Post knows it’s wrong. It’s just another example of Fake News.”

Donald Trump will avoid jail time in his New York hush-money criminal conviction—but that doesn’t mean he’s happy with the result.

In a Friday order, Judge Juan Merchan dealt the final blow to any suggestions of serious consequences for the president-elect’s guilty verdict. Merchan wrote that “unconditional discharge” had become the “the most viable solution” for Trump, indicating that the incoming president would not be hampered down with fines, court-appointed supervision, or incarceration.

But that outcome was, apparently, not satisfactory for the convicted felon, who took to Truth Social to rant about how the lingering effects of the trial still prevented him from bad-mouthing the judge.

“D.A. Alvin Bragg never wanted to bring this lawless case against me,” Trump wrote on his social media platform. “He was furious at the way it was handled, and especially angry at MARK POMERANTZ  for his behavior, and what he did. Ultimately, the Biden/Harris DOJ forced Bragg to concoct anything to embarrass TRUMP.” 

“But it was even more so what the CORRUPT and TOTALLY CONFLICTED POLITICAL HACK Judge did, and is doing, on this sham trial,” Trump continued. “I even have, STILL, an Unconstitutional Gag Order where I am not allowed to speak about the Judge’s highly disqualifying Conflicts of Interest. Virtually ever legal scholar and pundit says THERE IS NO (ZERO!) CASE AGAINST ME.” 

Trump also claimed that New York’s legal system was fundamentally corrupt and was contributing to the fleeing of businesses from the country’s banking capital. 

“The Judge fabricated the facts, and the law, no different than the other New York Judicial and Prosecutorial Witch Hunts,” Trump wrote. “That’s why businesses are fleeing New York, taking with them millions of jobs, and BILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN TAXES. The legal system is broken, and businesses can’t take a chance in getting caught up in this quicksand. IT’S ALL RIGGED, in this case against a political opponent, ME!!!”

Although Trump will face consequences more or less in name only, former U.S. District Attorney Joyce Vance argued in her legal column Civil Discourse that there could still be a light at the end of the tunnel in Merchan’s order. Rather than forcing sentencing before Trump’s inauguration, Merchan’s decision to release Trump with “unconditional discharge” effectively takes the wind out of Trump’s sails should he try to do away with the criminal conviction altogether, according to Vance. It could also help delay Trump’s sentencing until he’s out of office again, in which case, all bets are off.

Elon Musk is putting his nose in foreign politics yet again, but this time he’s setting a target on MP Nigel Farage, leader of the U.K.’s far-right Reform Party.

“The Reform Party needs a new leader. Farage doesn’t have what it takes,” Musk wrote in a post on X Sunday.

Farage, a key figure in Brexit, shared the post, commenting, “Well, this is a surprise!”

“Elon is a remarkable individual but on this I am afraid I disagree,” Farage continued. “My view remains that Tommy Robinson is not right for Reform and I never sell out my principles.”

Raheem Kassam, an editor who previously worked at Steve Bannon’s Breitbart and served as a former aide to Farage, replied to Musk slightly more bluntly. “You’re a fucking moron,” he wrote in a post on X.

Last week, Musk voiced his support for Robinson, a far-right, Islamaphobic activist who founded the British National Party and has been imprisoned for contempt of court, related to his repeated racially charged libel of a 15-year-old Syrian boy through social media posts.

Beneath Farage’s post, Grok, Musk’s heinously annoying generative artificial intelligence that’s been tacked into X’s user interface, offered a few leading questions for users to ask so that it might generate answers. “What leadership qualities does Farage lack?” Grok suggested. “Why does Elon Musk support Tommy Robinson?”

“How does this affect Reform UK’s image?” asked another prompt, implying that Musk’s opinion of the foreign government would have any bearing at all on the major party.

Early Monday morning, Musk posted on X again, this time creating a poll: “America should liberate the people of Britain from their tyrannical government,” with two options, yes or no.