Trump’s Plan to Gut Education Department Will Hit Red States Hardest

Trump is preparing an executive order to abolish the Department of Education—a move that will undoubtedly hurt teachers, students, and parents in red states the most.

The draft order will direct the department to slash spending and slash staff, according to The Washington Post. Such an aggressive decision on such a large scale would have sweeping consequences.

“The Dept of Education provides crucial funding for low-income public schools—eliminating it would result in the loss of 6% of teachers’ jobs nationwide,” former adviser for Barack Obama, Steven Rattner, wrote on X.

Rattner shared a chart based on data from the Center for American Progress on states’ K-12 education funding under Title I, the Education Department’s main federal program to help low-income students. Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Nevada, and Arizona—states that all went for Trump—are the most reliant on that funding, and the most likely to lose hundreds of teachers under Trump’s proposals. Many other red states are not far behind. This will likely lead to a devastating domino effect of educational instability in states that need it the most.

Donald Trump’s administration has removed thousands of pages of information from the U.S. government’s websites as part of its sweeping effort to remove references to diversity, gender, and environmental justice.

As part of the de-wokeification process, Trump’s administration has eviscerated more than 8,000 pages of materials just since Friday about a range of topics, from census methodology to resources about postpartum depression, according to an analysis from The New York Times.

The biggest targets have been the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Census Bureau, which each lost more than 3,000 pages.

In the past week, the CDC’s website saw the removal of resources about HIV and STI treatment guidelines, as well as a guide for young people seeking gender-affirming care.

Other information struck from the record included warning signs for Alzheimer’s disease, materials for overdose prevention training, and vaccine guidelines for pregnant people. The Times noted that the use of the phrase “pregnant people,” as opposed to “women,” may have contributed to the guidelines’ removal.

The CDC’s Social Vulnerability Index, which uses census data to determine how at risk someone is to experience a natural disaster through the lenses of geography, race, income level, and education, was also removed, according to The Guardian.

The National Institutes of Health removed a portal with information about maternal morbidity and mortality.

Some CDC files, not included in the Times’ analysis, were removed and then restored with information missing. The agency’s Youth Risk Behavior Survey data briefly disappeared, but then was restored with one of its gender columns missing and its data documentation deleted, the Associated Press reported.

Of the more than 3,000 articles removed from the Census Bureau site, most were filed under research and methodology, but other areas with missing pages included data stewardship and documentation for several data sets. On Monday, users hoping to retrieve data on certain topics from the census were greeted by a response that said the area was “unavailable due to maintenance,” according to the AP.

But that wasn’t all.

More than 1,000 pages were removed from the website for the Office of Justice Programs, a research and grant-making organization that works to provide local and state law enforcement with resources and training. All state-level data on hate crimes was removed from the Justice Department’s website (the months after Trump’s first election saw a significant spike in hate crimes, according to FBI data).

The Food and Drug administration removed nearly 100 pages, including 60 that mentioned expanding diversity in drug trials. The Department of the Interior deleted several pages mentioning “environmental justice.” Head Start, the IRS, and several other agencies also saw hundreds of pages scrubbed out of existence. There are links to archived versions of some of these pages here.

The Trump administration is deporting its first round of immigrants to Guantánamo Bay on Tuesday. 

“A flight is expected to transport migrant detainees to Guantanamo Bay today, a U.S. official tells CBS News,” Camilo Montoya-Galvez of CBS News wrote on X Tuesday. “This would be the first migrant detainee transfer since Pres. Trump directed officials to expand detention space at Guantanamo to hold as many as 30,000 migrants.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt later confirmed the news, saying on Fox Business that the flight was already underway.

“President Trump is not messing around, and he’s no longer going to allow America to be a dumping ground for illegal criminals from nations all over this world,” Leavitt said.

This sets in motion the executive order Trump signed last week, which makes the infamous detention center a holding facility for detained immigrants. 

“We have 30,000 beds in Guantánamo to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people, some of them are so bad we don’t even trust the countries to hold them because we don’t want them coming back,” Trump told reporters last week. “So we’re gonna send them out to Guantánamo. This will double our capacity immediately, and tough, that’s a tough place to get out of. Today’s signing brings us one step closer to eradicating the scourge of migrant crime in our communities once and for all.”

This news comes hours after Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that  El Salvador had agreed to detain prisoners from the United States, including American citizens, in its super-jail. Both Guantánamo Bay and El Salvador’s prisons are notorious for rampant human rights violations, including but not limited to mental and physical torture, sexual violence, and forced labor. 

One of Elon Musk’s handpicked operatives for his fake “Department of Government Efficiency” has been given complete access to critical payment systems at the Department of the Treasury, despite being only 25 years old.

Marko Elez, whose total work experience consists of working for Musk’s companies SpaceX and X (formerly Twitter), has administrator privileges on systems that are responsible for 95 percent of payments made by the U.S. government including Social Security checks, tax refunds, and virtually all contract payments, Wired reports. This contradicts earlier reports that Musk’s henchmen only had “read-only” access to Treasury data.

Wired, citing two unnamed sources, reports that Elez has the ability to write code on the Payment Automation Manager and Secure Payment System at the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, which control government payments that amount to more than a fifth of the U.S. economy. Elez’s level of access could allow him to bypass security measures and possibly cause irreversible damage to these systems. Talking Points Memo further reports that Elez has already used his power to significantly rewrite code for the payment systems.

“You could do anything with these privileges,” one source with knowledge of the systems told Wired, adding that they couldn’t see a reason that such access was necessary for hunting down fraud or assessing how payments are disbursed, as DOGE claims it is doing.

“Technically I don’t see why this couldn’t happen,” a federal IT worker told the magazine Monday regarding whether a DOGE worker would get such a level of government access. “If you would have asked me a week ago, I’d have told you that this kind of thing would never in a million years happen. But now, who the f*** knows.”

Musk and his cronies have already taken control of federal workers’ private data by installing an illegal commercial server at the Office of Personnel Management, giving them access to databases containing federal employees’ Social Security numbers, home addresses, medical histories, and other sensitive personal information. Senior government officials at OPM have even been locked out of employee databases.

Many, if not most, of Musk’s associates that he’s used in his government takeover are young and inexperienced young men between the ages of 19 and 26, like Elez. Whether the tech mogul or the people doing his bidding even have proper security clearances is not known, which would definitely make their efforts illegal, if they weren’t already. But with Donald Trump taking over federal law enforcement and prosecutors threatening critics of DOGE, who, if anyone, will take action?

Donald Trump’s eleventh-hour trade war with Canada and Mexico momentarily scrambled the U.S. economy in exchange for, apparently, nothing that America’s two neighbors weren’t already likely to offer.

Trump temporarily backed down Monday from imposing a 25 percent tariff hike on goods from Mexico after speaking with the nation’s leader, President Claudia Sheinbaum. In exchange for the dropped tariffs, Sheinbaum agreed to send 10,000 members of the country’s National Guard to deter drug trafficking between the two nations. But journalists were quick to point out that previous administrations had been able to get Mexico to send more troops and money without the volatile economic threat of tariffs.

“It seems like the trick to negotiating with Trump is to realize he doesn’t have any idea what the current facts are,” posted Washington Post columnist Catherine Rampell on BlueSky. “‘Oh you want 10,000 troops?’ says world leader who already deployed 15K. ‘Great 10k it is.’”

Issuing 10,000 troops to the U.S.-Mexico border is almost routine at this point for America’s southern neighbor. In 2019, Mexico sent 15,000 troops to the border, and sent another 10,000 in 2021 to help with migration. In 2022, Mexico agreed to invest $1.5 billion to help Joe Biden upgrade the border, and in 2023 implemented 15 administrative actions to assist in America’s deportation of migrants.

Trump was also roasted for his lackluster arrangement with Canada, which saw Prime Minister Justin Trudeau commit to a $1.3 billion border plan—that was arranged in December. Trudeau also pledged to appoint a “fentanyl czar” and list cartels as terrorists, though just a fraction of America’s black-market fentanyl imports cross the nation’s northern border. Approximately 0.2 percent of America’s fentanyl seizures occur at the Canadian border, according to federal statistics.

During an appearance on CNN, Rampell summed up the situation nicely, arguing during a network roundtable that “Trump is trying to repackage the status quo as a victory.”

“That’s what the leaders of these foreign countries are learning,” Rampell said. “You don’t actually have to give Trump anything. You have to let him announce victory on TV.”

Further still, Rampell posited that Trump had, almost overnight, “tarnished our relationships with our allies, whose help we need to rein in China,” all while destabilizing the economy and making it an unattractive landscape for future investment.

The Proud Boys have lost the legal rights to their name to a Black church they attacked.

D.C. Superior Court Judge Tanya Bosier ruled Monday that the Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church now owns the name and symbols of the violent white nationalist hate group, The New York Times reported.

The ruling is the outcome of an incident in December 2020. Fresh off a Supreme Court decision rejecting Texas’s bid to subvert the results of the 2020 presidential election for Donald Trump, the Proud Boys took to the streets of Washington, where a violent confrontation with counterprotesters broke out.

During their march, members of the Proud Boys, including their leader, Enrique Tarrio, trespassed onto the church’s property and set its Black Lives Matter banner ablaze. Tarrio was arrested on vandalism charges on January 4 and was consequently not present for the violent riot at the U.S. Capitol just days later. He was still sentenced with seditious conspiracy for helping plan the riot.

In June 2023, D.C. Superior Court Judge Neal Kravitz ruled that the destruction of property at Metropolitan AME had been “highly orchestrated” and “hateful and overtly racist conduct,” and granted a $2.8 million default judgment against the Proud Boys—but the group never handed over the money.

Lawyers for the church then sought to satisfy that judgment by having the group hand over something of value: its name. The decision bars the Proud Boys from selling any merchandise with its name or associated symbols without the express permission of the church.

Tarrio, who was serving a 22-year sentence until Donald Trump pardoned him last month, was less than thrilled about the decision. He said in a statement that the judge should be impeached, and that the church should forfeit its nonprofit status.

“Their actions are a betrayal of justice,” Tarrio wrote in his statement. “I hold in contempt any motions, judgments and orders issued against me.”

In an interview with Alex Jones shortly after being released from prison, Tarrio promised “retribution” for Trump supporters being imprisoned for their crimes related to the January 6 riot.

“We’ve got to do everything in our power to make sure that the next four years sets us up for the next 100 years,” Tarrio said.

Yet another Trump appointee is in bed with white nationalists.

On Monday, President Trump nominated Joe Kent as director of the National Counterterrorism Center.

“Joe has hunted down terrorists and criminals his entire adult life. Above all, Joe knows the terrible cost of terrorism, losing his wonderful wife, Shannon, a Great American Hero, who was killed in the fight against ISIS,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Joe continues to honor her legacy by staying in the fight. Joe will help us keep America safe by eradicating all terrorism, from the jihadists around the World, to the cartels in our backyard.”

Kent’s nomination immediately raised alarm, as multiple people pointed to reporting from years ago documenting his very real connections to extremist groups.  

Kent, who previously challenged Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington state in the August 2 primary, has “courted prominent white nationalists and posed recently for a photograph with a media personality who has previously described Adolf Hitler as a ‘complicated historical figure’ who ‘many people misunderstand,’” the Associated Press reported in 2022.

The media personality in question was none other than online white supremacist Nick Fuentes, who endorsed Kent’s congressional campaign in 2022. That same year, campaign finance disclosures showed that Kent paid known Proud Boy and formerly convicted stalker Graham Jorgensen $11,375 for “consulting.” Oath Keeper Wendy Rogers endorsed Kent, and Christian nationalist Joey Gibson spoke at one of his fundraisers.

These relationships are not coincidental. Kent shares many of the same hateful ideologies with these people.

“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with there being a white people special interest group,” he said in an interview with the American Populist Union.

Kent will likely bring these views and more to the counterterrorism position if confirmed by the Senate.

The Senate Finance Committee voted to advance Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination for secretary of health and human services Tuesday in a narrow 14–13 vote, with every Republican voting for the nomination and every Democrat voting against it.

Senator Bill Cassidy, a Republican and medical doctor, announced his support for Kennedy Tuesday morning in a shocking X post after previously being open about his reservations. Kennedy has a reputation as a staunch anti-vaxxer, and Cassidy had urged the nominee to disavow comments that vaccines cause autism, which has been thoroughly debunked.

Now Kennedy’s nomination will go to the full Senate, where he will likely be confirmed, as no Senate Republicans have publicly spoken out against him despite numerous allegations of sexual abuse, including a new revelation Monday that he paid nearly $1 million to settle a sexual misconduct claim from an employee at his anti-vaccination nonprofit, Children’s Health Defense, in 2020.

Former Vice President Mike Pence has been a staunch opponent of Kennedy’s nomination, attacking his wishy-washy views on abortion and even releasing a video montage last week highlighting Donald Trump’s criticisms of Kennedy when he was an independent candidate for president in early 2024.

In his confirmation hearings, though, Kennedy has hinted at restricting access to the abortion pill mifepristone, which indicates that he’s now fully behind Trump and the Republican Party’s anti-choice policies. That would be enough for Kennedy to be confirmed by the Republican-majority Senate, putting him in position to carry out his and the right wing’s extreme views on public health.

This story has been updated.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. paid nearly $1 million to settle a sexual misconduct case brought by one of the employees at his anti-vax nonprofit, Children’s Health Defense.

The woman who accused Kennedy was roped into a nondisclosure agreement in 2020, according to sources that spoke with Mediaite.

Kennedy was tapped by Donald Trump to head the Department of Health and Human Services. During his confirmation hearings last week, Kennedy categorically denied what he described as “frivolous, unfounded allegations” against him.

“I entered into confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements to prohibit these individuals from continuing to make these allegations,” Kennedy said at the time.

The 71-year-old was further pressed on the matter by Senate Democrats in a series of follow-up questions after the hearings. That’s when Kennedy plainly admitted to at least one incident in which he settled a case over inappropriate behavior.

Two of the questions submitted to Kennedy by Democrats read as follows:

“Yes or no, have you ever reached a settlement agreement with an individual or organization that accused you of misconduct or inappropriate behavior?”

“Yes or no, have you ever agreed to or been subject to a non-disclosure agreement with any individual or organization?”

Kennedy answered yes to each one, but volunteered no follow-up details.

It’s not the only time that sexual misconduct details have emerged about the conspiratorial political hopeful, however. In 2024, Kennedy was accused of (and sort of apologized for) groping his children’s babysitter, Eliza Cooney, in the late 1990s.

The myriad details of Kennedy’s private life—as well as his virulent anti-vax prerogatives—have given pause to a number of lawmakers on the Hill responsible for confirming him. Kennedy has publicly admitted to dumping a dead bear cub in Central Park, believed the 2004 presidential election was stolen from Democrat John Kerry, peddled conspiracies that the CIA killed his uncle, chainsawed off the head of a dead whale (per his daughter Kick Kennedy), and late last month was described by his cousin Caroline Kennedy as a “predator” who is “addicted to attention and power.”

In a disclosure form filed for his nomination, Kennedy claimed that he had resigned as chairman and chief legal counsel of Children’s Health Defense in December. He made roughly $326,000 for just three months of work at the nonprofit in 2023, according to the group’s 990 form that year. The same disclosure form revealed that the outspoken vaccine critic made roughly $10 million over the last year related to speaking fees, dividends from his vaccine lawsuits, and leading Children’s Health Defense.

China has retaliated with tariffs of its own on American products after Donald Trump’s 10 percent tariffs against the country went into effect Tuesday.

China’s Ministry of Finance announced the same day that it would levy a 15 percent tax on certain types of coal and liquefied natural gas, as well as a 10 percent tariff on agricultural machinery, crude oil, large-displacement cars, and pickup trucks coming from the United States.

In addition, China’s customs administration and Ministry of Commerce announced new export controls on several metal products and related technologies. These include tungsten, used in industrial and defense projects, and tellurium, which is used to make solar cells. The ministry also added two American companies to its unreliable entities list: the biotechnology firm Illumina and clothing company PVH Group, which owns Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger.

Also, China’s State Administration for Market Regulation said it had begun an investigation into Google for violating the country’s anti-monopoly laws. The search engine is not available in China and has minimal operations there.

While Trump’s tariffs target $450 billion worth of Chinese goods, China’s tariffs only target about $20 billion of American products, about 12 percent of the total imported from the U.S. to Beijing. Thus they appear to be more about sending a message to the U.S. and other countries. On Sunday, China pledged to take “corresponding countermeasures” by filing a complaint with the World Trade Organization and “resolutely defend its rights.”

On Monday, stocks took a slide as a result of Trump’s tariffs before Canada and Mexico secured one-month delays. The markets were volatile on Tuesday, although the full impact of China’s measures have yet to be felt. Trump said Monday that he would be speaking with Chinese Premier Xi Jinping soon and may either walk away claiming victory or vowing to take this trade war further.