Trump Supporters Have Second Thoughts as He Takes Over Government

Some of the MAGA faithful are having second thoughts after Trump’s all-out assault on the federal government in the early days of his administration.

Last month, The Wall Street Journal released a poll indicating that a sizeable chunk of Trump voters were looking for “MAGA lite” policies from the president. While 53 percent want significant changes to how the government is run, 60 percent are staunchly against his plan to purge the federal government of long-tenured bureaucrats with MAGA loyalists, 60 percent are against eliminating the Department of Education (one of Trump’s major promises), and a measly 18 percent actually want Trump to overrule Congress to give himself unlimited spending power.

These numbers suggest that even some of Trump’s staunchest supporters wanted more measured approaches to his campaign platform. Now, some of those same voters are feeling worried and disillusioned by the administration actually doing what it said it would do, according to the Journal.

“When we said safer borders, I thought he was thinking ‘let’s stop the drugs from coming into the country,’” Trump voter Staci White said. “I didn’t know he was going to start raiding places. Now I’m like: ‘Dang, why didn’t I just pick Kamala?’”

Emily Anderson called voting for Trump the “biggest mistake of my life,” as she was appalled by his implementation of Guantanamo Bay as a holding facility in his immigration crackdown.

“I feel so stupid, guilty, regretful—embarrassed is a huge one. I am absolutely embarrassed that I voted for Trump,” she said.

“He’s doing 80 miles an hour. I wouldn’t mind if he went around 55,” Trump supporter Gary Dixon told the Journal.

Recently released January 6, 2021 insurrectionists are trying to argue that their presidential pardons should apply to separate crimes they were charged with while they were being investigated for storming the Capitol, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Edward Kelley, who was pardoned after assaulting police at the Capitol, is also hoping to overturn a conviction for conspiring to murder FBI agents who investigated him, forming a “kill list.” He allegedly planned to use drones to bomb the FBI’s Knoxville, Tennessee, branch, and thinks that conviction should be thrown out.

“In this instance, there can be no dispute that Kelley’s case in this court is related to the events of January 6th and is covered by the President’s executive action,” his lawyer Mark Brown wrote in a motion on January 27.

Fellow rioter Andrew Taake, who served six months in prison for spraying officers at the Capitol with bear spray, was released from prison on January 27 even though he still had outstanding charges for solicitation of a minor in 2016. It took Houston police more than a week to track him down.

The lawyer for David Daniel, who is facing child pornography charges, stated that “pretty much all” of the evidence of his client’s pornography crimes stemmed from Daniel’s house being raided due to his January 6 involvement, which, the attorney argues, means those charges should be null and void since he was pardoned for his actions on January 6 four years ago.

“Anything that flowed from that case, given the pardon, should be excluded and inadmissible at trial,” Daniel’s lawyer William Terpening told the Journal.

This is a frightening line of argument—a literal get-out-of-jail-free card for dangerous, vindictive people who already got one from President Trump. Time will only tell how their unearned reintegration into society will impact the country if their requests are granted

Donald Trump’s border czar Tom Homan is desperate for the Department of Justice to scrape up some reason he can go after Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for making people aware of their rights.

During an appearance on Fox News last week, Homan suggested that Ocasio-Cortez might be in trouble over a webinar she’d held about immigrants’ legal rights when dealing with ICE.

“At what level is that impedement? Is that impedement? I’m not an attorney, I’m not a prosecutor. Is that impedement?” Homan asked, sounding increasingly untethered.

“Is that impeding our law enforcement efforts? And if so, what are we going to do about it? Is she crossing the line? So, I’m working with the Department of Justice and finding out. Where is that line that they cross? So, maybe AOC’s gonna be in trouble now,” Homan said.

Ocasio-Cortez dismissed Homan’s prattling. “‘MaYbe shE’s goiNg to be in TroUble nOw,’” she wrote in a post mocking him on X. “Maybe he can learn to read. The Constitution would be a good place to start.”

In a statement, Homan insisted he had actually read the U.S. Constitution, in which case, he must be simply choosing to ignore it.

There is no legal problem with informing individuals of their rights, like the Fifth Amendment right to remain silent, or the right to refuse ICE entry without a warrant signed by a judge. Still, the border czar doubled down on his comments when pressed on his threats against the New York congresswoman during CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday.

“Are you suggesting that she should be prosecuted?” asked CNN host Dana Bash.

“I’m suggesting that I would ask the Department of Justice, where’s that line on impediment, right? That’s a broad statute. So I know impeding, or someone stopping in front of me and putting their hands on my chest that you’re not coming in here to arrest that guy, that’s clearly impeding. But at what line—where’s the line on impeding?” Homan said.

“I’m asking the Department of Justice, who are the prosecutors and decide who they prosecute, and what the standards of that prosecution is. I simply says [sic], at what point is that impeding? Because you can call it ‘Know Your Rights’ all you want. We all know the bottom line is, the bottom line is how they evade law enforcement. Don’t open your door. Don’t answer questions.”

Unfortunately for Homan, and his plan to enact inhumane mass deportations, both of those methods are entirely legal.

During another appearance on Fox News Monday, Homan repeated his assertion that Ocasio-Cortez was trying to teach undocumented immigrants to “evade” ICE, and said that he’d request the DOJ let him know whether she’d crossed the “line.” Rather than requesting that she be investigated, it seemed that Homan was desperate for them to conjure some evidence that she had violated the law. Spoiler alert: She hadn’t.

In a rather pointless, sycophantic move, a New York member of Congress wants to make Donald Trump’s birthday a national holiday.

Republican Representative Claudia Tenney introduced the “Trump’s Birthday and Flag Day Holiday Establishment Act” Friday, hoping to designate the president’s June 14 birthday as a new federal holiday.

“Just as George Washington’s Birthday is codified as a federal holiday, this bill will add Trump’s Birthday to this list, recognizing him as the founder of America’s Golden Age,” Tenney said in a press release.

“By designating Trump’s Birthday and Flag Day as a federal holiday, we can ensure President Trump’s contributions to American greatness and the importance of the American Flag are forever enshrined into law,” the release states.

June 14 is already commemorated as Flag Day in the United States, signifying the date in 1777 when the Continental Congress decided how the country’s flag would look. But, it is not an official federal holiday, and Tenney seems to see an opportunity to curry favor with the present based on the fact that it coincides with Trump’s day of birth in 1946. (Trump’s birthday is also five days before Juneteenth, which commemorates the official end of slavery and which Biden made a federal holiday in 2021.)

Why is Tenney prioritizing this blatant attempt of brown-nosery instead of more pressing issues for her constituents, such as Trump’s game of chicken with Canada? Her upstate New York district includes areas right on the Canadian border, and tariffs could have drastic effects on those regions and on the state overall. Not to mention the lack of congressional oversight over Trump and Elon Musk’s overhaul of the federal government.

Congress hasn’t passed much legislation since Trump was sworn in as president last month, aside from an extreme immigration bill, even though Republicans control both the Senate and the House, and they are currently struggling through agreeing on a budget bill. Will passing vapid bills such as Tenney’s be what constitutes actual business for Republicans in Congress?

Self-professed free speech crusader Elon Musk seems to be trying to censor users on his own platform.

Matt Binder of Disruptionist reports that the billionaire DOGE head has blocked Signal links from appearing on X, citing researchers from cybersecurity company Mysk, who noticed the issue on Sunday and reached out to Binder through direct messages. Signal is a popular messaging app that encrypts texts between users, often allowing them to talk about sensitive topics that could otherwise be surveilled or intercepted.

“Elon Musk’s X appears to be blocking links to directly contact users on Signal,” Binder wrote on X. “Signal, the encrypted messaging app, has recently become a major tool for government workers looking to blow the whistle on DOGE.” Journalists are also using Signal to solicit tips from unhappy federal workers.

If a user on X tries to access a previously posted Signal link, they are shown a page warning them that they are visiting an unsafe link, but can choose to ignore the warning and click a link on the page to proceed to the Signal web address.

This move appears to be further confirmation that the free speech Musk seems to be so chiefly concerned with only applies to online right wing edgelords and neo-Nazis. People that draw his ire, such as journalists and embattled federal workers, don’t enjoy the same privileges.