Kristi Noem Refuses to Even Look at Photo of Abrego Garcia’s Tattoos

The Trump administration just became so much more Orwellian.

“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command,” George Orwell wrote in his cautionary tale about totalitarianism, 1984.

On Wednesday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem took that command a step further, refusing to even acknowledge a doctored photo depicting alleged gang tattoos on Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s knuckles, which the White House has repeatedly used to justify his deportation.

In a heated back-and-forth with Representative Eric Swalwell during a House Homeland Security Committee hearing, Noem repeatedly swerved away from answering direct questions about the photo, which was displayed on a massive poster board behind the California lawmaker.

Asked several times whether the photo was “doctored or not doctored,” Noem eventually said that she did not “have any knowledge of that photo you’re pointing to.”

But because she apparently refused to look at the image—which, in Swalwell’s photo, was held up by President Donald Trump—Swalwell decided to have one of his aides bring the image to her.

“My question is—the numbers and the letters: MS-13—can you look at the photo, please,” Swalwell said.

“Are you saying Abrego Garcia is not a wife beater? Is not a criminal? Is not a human trafficker?” asked Noem.

“It’s so telling that you won’t look at the photo,” said Swalwell. “Can you look to the right at the photo in front of you?”

“I have seen this photo as you held it behind you,” said Noem.

“The letters M-S and the numbers 13, are those doctored or not?” pressed Swalwell.

“You don’t want to talk about the facts? The importance of our national security?” tossed back Noem.

“Madame Secretary, this is not a hard question. Are those doctored or not? Is that actually on his hand or not?” Swalwell said.

Noem then said it was “unbelievable” to her that Swalwell was so focused on the photo, reiterating that she “did not have any knowledge” of it.

“OK, so it’s been hanging out there for four weeks,” Swalwell said, referring to Trump’s Truth Social page. “You are one of the chief law enforcement officials in the country. What have you done to investigate whether the president misrepresented the reason that this person has been detained? Have you done anything to try and figure out whether that was doctored or not?”

But Noem did not have an answer for that question. Instead, she repeated accusations that Abrego Garcia—who the Trump administration admitted had been deported as an “administrative error”—was a wife beater and a criminal.

“I’m a former prosecutor. I have put people away for life sentences who are gang members. I don’t need to wear costumes to show how tough I am,” Swalwell said, before yielding back his time. “What makes me different from you is when I put those people away, I did it with the weight of the law behind me.”

Abrego Garcia entered the United States illegally more than a decade ago, but he was allowed to remain in the U.S. and evade deportation back to El Salvador when an immigration judge ruled in October 2019 that a return to his home country could expose him to violence or persecution from a local gang, Barrio 18. Abrego Garcia was never charged with a crime, and the only alleged tie between the construction worker and MS-13 stemmed from a 2019 report by a since-fired Maryland police officer. The report also did not definitively link Abrego Garcia to the gang.

The Supreme Court ordered the executive branch to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return to the U.S., but the White House has since contested that ruling, arguing that Abrego Garcia “will never live” in America again.

Trump himself appears confused about Abrego Garcia’s connection to Latin American gangs. The president entered into a terse exchange with ABC News in late April when he insisted that the doctored photo of Abrego Garcia’s knuckles was real.

Experts say the photo was obviously photoshopped.

Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is once again refusing to divulge his views on vaccination, and, with no trace of self-awareness, saying that people shouldn’t seek medical advice from him.

Kennedy made the remarks at a House budget hearing Wednesday, in response to questions from Democratic Representative Mark Pocan, who sought Kennedy’s opinion given HHS’s role in providing health recommendations to the public.

“If you had a child today, would you vaccinate that child for measles?” Pocan asked Kennedy. His response was not encouraging.

“For measles? Um, probably for measles. What I would say is that my opinions about vaccines are irrelevant,” Kennedy said, adding that Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, the head of the National Institutes of Health, would be better suited to answer questions about vaccinations, despite Bhattacharya having his own controversial medical views.

“I don’t want to seem like I’m being evasive,” Kennedy continued, speaking over Pocan’s attempt to clarify his question. “I don’t think people should be taking advice, medical advice, from me.”

Kennedy then refused to answer Pocan’s questions on whether he would give his kids vaccines for chicken pox or polio, repeating that he didn’t “want to be giving advice,” despite the polio vaccine being so effective that the disease has been nearly eradicated around the world.

It’s a surprising, if not laughable, admission from a health influencer who shared exercise videos while running for president under the mission to “Make America Healthy Again” and now heads the country’s main public health agency. Kennedy has so far mishandled a measles outbreak, touting medical quacks while he continues to spread misinformation himself. If Kennedy doesn’t want to be responsible for offering medical advice, perhaps he should find a different job.

Donald Trump is trying to justify being gifted a brand-new private jet from Qatar because Air Force One is a “much less impressive” plane than the ones dictators use. 

The president is being slammed after reports surfaced Sunday that he planned to accept a $400 million “flying palace” from the Qatari royal family. If the plane, which is a Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet, is in fact given to Trump, it would be one of the largest gifts from a foreign government to a U.S. government in history. 

Speaking to Fox News’s Sean Hannity from Air Force One on Tuesday, Trump argued that Air Force One is “almost 40 years old” and nowhere near as cool as the planes used by monarchs in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar.

“This is like a totally different plane. It’s much smaller, it’s much less impressive—as impressive as it is. We are the United States of America. I believe that we should have the most impressive plane,” Trump said. 

“Some people say, ‘Oh, you shouldn’t accept gifts for the country,’” he continued. “My attitude is, why wouldn’t I accept a gift? We’re giving to everybody else, why wouldn’t I accept a gift?”

But the plane is much more of a personal gift to Trump himself than to the people of the United States, whose tax-paying dollars could end up funding the president’s “free” gift. 

In a press conference Monday, Trump told reporters the plane would be a temporary replacement for Air Force One and would go directly to his personal library once he leaves office. It’s an admission that clearly violates a 1966 law preventing presidents from keeping personal gifts worth more than $480 (they can accept gifts worth more but cannot keep them after leaving office).  

“A gift you use for four years and then deposit in your library is still a gift,” Representative Jamie Raskin wrote on X. 

In other words, accepting the jet is pretty blatant corruption.

The Donald Trump effect struck in Nebraska Tuesday night as Democrats snatched another public office away from Republicans by tying them to the president’s disastrous agenda.  

The people of Omaha elected John Ewing Jr. to be the city’s first Black mayor, in a surprising defeat for Jean Stothert, the city’s three-term Republican mayor who outraised Ewing by nearly double, according to The Washington Post. 

Although the seat itself is nonpartisan, Ewing’s campaign was able to channel the voters’ negative feelings about Trump’s wild first few months in office into a victory over his opponent, who had supported the president’s run in 2024.

“Let’s say no to the chaos and elect a mayor who will actually get things done,” said one ad run by Ewing’s campaign. 

Stothert got in trouble for using the same anti-trans Republican playbook that Trump employed in his campaign. One controversial mailer distributed by a PAC on behalf of her campaign claimed that “Ewing stands with radicals who want to allow boys in girls’ sports.”

But Ewing said he’d made no such statement. “Nobody’s ever brought that question up. So I believe it’s a made-up issue by Jean Stothert and the Republican Party,” Ewing said, and his campaign sent a cease-and-desist letter to Stothert for the misleading attack. 

Ewing’s campaign was then able to use his opponent’s attack to mock her focus on such a nonissue. “Jean is focused on potties. John is focused on fixing potholes,” read one ad. 

Stothert’s campaign stood by the mailer, saying that it referred to groups that had lent their support to Ewing. During a press event last week, Stothert tried to defend herself, comparing the ads from the two campaigns.

“I would bring it back to, ‘Why is John Ewing trying to relate me to Donald Trump and saying the city is in chaos?’” Stothert said. “Donald Trump has not called me and asked me for advice.”

Stothert has tried to distance herself from the Trump administration, which she initially supported. During an appearance on the daily podcast Omapod earlier this month, she said, “I can honestly say as a Republican, I don’t like everything [Trump’s] doing and decisions he’s making. I wish he’d slow down on a lot of these decisions he’s making. I don’t advise the president.”

This election indicated that Nebraska’s 2nd congressional district, which handily backed Kamala Harris during the 2024 presidential election, is emerging as one of the most contested battlegrounds for control of the U.S. House in the coming midterms. Republican Representative Don Bacon’s term will be up, and he will be forced to decide whether he will run for reelection in a district that includes the “Blue Dot” of Omaha. 

Michigan Representative Shri Thanedar pushed earlier this week for a vote on his articles of impeachment, causing an unwelcome stir among Democratic leadership, who were very much not on board with the rogue effort to oust President Donald Trump.

Thanedar took to the House floor Tuesday to recognize his seven articles as privileged, giving Republican leadership two days to commence a vote on the symbolic gesture.

“It’s never the wrong time to stand up for our Constitution,” Thanedar wrote on X Tuesday, calling on his colleagues to “take action.” But liberal lawmakers disagree with forcing the impeachment process.

“People are pissed,” a senior House Democrat told Axios, on the condition of anonymity in order to share their uncensored private reactions. “He’s really just doing it for himself.”

A second House Democrat referred to Thanedar as a “dumbshit.”

“This is the dumbest fucking thing,” a third unidentified House Democrat said, calling Thanedar’s limelight-grabbing actions “utterly selfish behavior.”

Thanedar’s articles accuse Trump of obstruction of justice, bribery and corruption, and tyrannical overreach. But despite Trump’s recent actions, Democrats have no power to actually advance the articles forward.

They’re also cynical about coming down hard on the president when the Republican-dominated system that is allowing Trump to advance his agenda is still actively doing his bidding. Other Democrats were concerned that Thanedar’s uncoordinated impeachment effort would take pressure off of Republican-driven tax cuts.

“We need to focus on reconciliation,” Representative Brad Schneider, the chair of the New Democrat Coalition, told Axios. “One hundred percent of our energy is on dealing with this.”

The whole impeachment crusade has been a wash since Thanedar announced it last week, seemingly without speaking to the teams of his alleged co-sponsors. The announcement also coincided with a bit of bad news for the Michigan lawmaker: He will face intraparty competition from state Representative Donavan McKinney in the midterms for his House seat.

In an apparent vote of no confidence on Thanedar, McKinney has already received support from the progressive PAC Justice Democrats, as well as Michigan Representative Rashida Tlaib, who endorsed McKinney Monday.

Still, Thanedar is refusing to back down from the articles, insisting that he won’t withdraw them unless “someone can convince me that many of my articles are incorrect.

“The rest of the members have to look into their own conscience and make a decision: is this impeachable conduct or not?” Thanedar told Axios.

The Trump administration has reportedly cut a deal with a former cartel boss in Mexico, with 17 family members being allowed to enter the United States.

Mexican Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch confirmed in a radio interview that the family of Ovidio Guzmán Lopez, the son of notorious cartel leader Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, were allowed to enter the U.S., the Associated Press reports.

Guzmán Lopez took over a faction of the Sinaloa cartel after his dad was captured and imprisoned, before he himself was extradited to the U.S. in 2023. Garcia Harfuch said that Guzmán Lopez had been sharing dirt on other criminal organizations as part of a likely cooperation agreement with the U.S.

“It is evident that his family is going to the U.S. because of a negotiation or an offer that the Department of Justice is giving him,” Garcia Harfuch said. Video reportedly surfaced of cartel family members carrying suitcases while crossing the border near Tijuana, Mexico, while U.S. officials waited.

The news comes on the same day that the Attorney General Pam Bondi’s office announced that top leaders of the Sinaloa cartel were being charged with “narcoterrorism.” U.S. Attorney Adam Gordon for the Southern District of California didn’t comment on the deal, but issued a threat.

“Let me be direct, to the leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel, you are no longer the hunters, you are the hunted. You will be betrayed by your friends, you will be hounded by your enemies, and you will ultimately find yourself and your face here in a courtroom in the Southern District of California,” Gordon said, according to the AP.

The deal is a shocking development considering that President Trump started his political career by saying, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending the best.”

“They’re not sending you, they’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems,” Trump said in his 2015 speech at Trump Tower in New York. “They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime. They’re rapists, and some, I assume, are good people, but I speak to border guards and they’re telling us what we’re getting.”

Now it seems that some people with connections to cartel leaders, who are guilty of those things, get the privilege of coming to the U.S. How does Trump explain this decision?

Donald Trump’s tax promises for the middle and working classes are actually not in his tax proposal.

The president has trumpeted the extension of his 2017 tax plan, attempting to make the bill more palatable to non-millionaires by claiming that it would end tax on tips, overtime, and Social Security benefits. But as it turns out, none of that is actually in the text of the bill.

During a heated exchange between Representative Tom Suozzi and Thomas Barthold, the chief of staff on the Joint Committee of Taxation, it became abundantly clear that none of those promises would be happening.

“On tips—the president said, ‘Your tips will be a 100 percent yours.’ Does this tax bill continue the payroll tax on people’s tips?” asked Suozzi.

“Yes it does,” said Barthold.

“Overtime. The president said, ‘Your overtime will be tax-free.’ Does this bill continue the payroll tax on overtime?” continued Suozzi.

“It does not exempt overtime from payroll tax,” said Barthold.

“The president said he’s going to remove taxes from Social Security,” pressed Suozzi. “Does this bill remove taxes on Social Security benefits?”

“The legislation provides an increased exception amount—” Barthold began, before Suozzi interrupted.

“But does it remove taxes on Social Security benefits?” reiterated Suozzi.

“It does not change Social Security,” Barthold said.

And while middle- and working-class Americans get shafted by the bill on what Trump promised them, the wealthy will continue to benefit from the president’s bill—even if it’s not what he claims he wants.

NBC reported Thursday that Trump pressed House Speaker Mike Johnson to raise the top income tax rate to close the carried interest loophole, raising the 37 percent tax rate to 2017 levels—39.6 percent—for Americans making $2.5 million or more.

But when Suozzi asked if the reconciliation bill included “an increase in the tax rate for the wealthiest people in the United States of America,” the answer wasn’t so promising.

“The legislation before you extends permanently the top bracket at 37 percent,” Barthold said.

“So it does not return it to what it was at 39.6 [percent]?” Suozzi continued.

“That is correct, Mr. Suozzi,” Barthold responded.

It seems that Donald Trump is starting to sweat after getting heat for accepting what appears to be a massive bribe from the Qatari government.

The claims of corruption cracked the president’s demeanor, as he took to Truth Social to try to defend receiving a luxury jet from Qatar’s Defense Ministry, which needs to be completely rebuilt into a new Air Force One at the taxpayer’s expense.

“The Boeing 747 is being given to the United States Air Force/Department of Defense, NOT TO ME! It is a gift from a Nation, Qatar, that we have successfully defended for many years,” Trump wrote. He claimed that the jet would be used in light of delays from Boeing and that it would somehow save money.

“Only a FOOL would not accept this gift on behalf of our Country,” Trump added.

A defensive Trump was clearly attempting to insulate himself from the backlash. He went on to repost several Truth Social posts from a few accounts praising him and defending his decision to accept the plane from Qatar. One Truth Social post shared by the president included an image of the Statue of Liberty wearing a sign that said, “Gift From a Foreign Nation.”

He shared another post from an account called Women for Trump comparing his decision to accept a luxury plane to foreign aid that the U.S. provided to countries around the world—before Trump, that is. “The Media and the left never have a problem with America giving billions of taxpayers dollars to foreign countries, but apparently getting a gift from another country is wrong!? Give me a break!” the post read.

In reality, Trump has received strong criticism from Democrats and Republicans alike. Even his far-right allies have decried the decision as clearly corrupt. But Trump’s claim that the plane wasn’t a gift to him personally isn’t true, and it isn’t even something the president actually believes.

On Tuesday, the president was asked about the gift while flying on the current Air Force One, which he complained was “much smaller, much less impressive” than the planes in the Gulf nations he was visiting this week.

“So they said to me, ‘We would like to, in effect, we would like to make a gift. You’ve done so many things and we’d like to make a gift to the Defense Department, which is where it’s going,’” Trump said.

Just because the plane is going to the Department of Defense doesn’t mean it’s not a gift to him, in return for the “many things” he’s supposedly done for Qatar. The DOD will be responsible for the expensive rebuild, as the plane needs to be outfitted with self-defense technology and electromagnetic shielding necessary for it to be used as Air Force One. As if that wasn’t already expensive enough, the plane’s software will also be subject to a pricey security sweep to ensure there is no embedded foreign technology.

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called out Republicans’ proposed cuts to Medicaid in a congressional hearing on Tuesday.

“The math is not adding up. They’re trying to convince people that they are cutting millions of undocumented people from [Medicaid],” Ocasio-Cortez said. She noted that the GOP is claiming that one million undocumented immigrants are collecting Medicaid payments, but their cuts would result in 13.7 million people losing their health insurance.

“They’ve asked us to read this bill, and we have. This bill bans the people that they kick off of Medicaid from even buying their own insurance from the Affordable Care Act exchange,” Ocasio-Cortez continued, adding that the bill “increases costs for people they do deem eligible and who are low income and forces them to pay even more.”

Ocasio-Cortez noted that people on private insurance wouldn’t be escaping consequences, either.

“And if you have a private insurer, don’t worry, you’re getting screwed over too. Because your health care premiums are going to skyrocket from the disaster that is happening from this bill,” the New York congresswoman added.

Ocasio-Cortez is correctly pointing out House Republicans’ budget plan will gut a social program that millions of Americans depend on, while also taking aim at the GOP bogeyman of Obamacare. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 8.6 million people will lose access to Medicaid, while millions more will lose health insurance by 2034 as other protections expire. Far from being a “big beautiful bill,” as Trump claims, it will worsen the quality of life for Americans who don’t have any other health care options.

The bill also punishes single parents by making it harder to receive the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as food stamps, and gives President Trump unprecedented power over nonprofit organizations. The cuts to Medicaid in the bill already face opposition from within the Republican Party. Will Congress open its eyes to the rest of the issues in the bill and say no to the GOP and the president’s cruel priorities?

Republicans contending with the prospective damage of their Medicaid cuts have decided to simply brush off the protests of their constituents as “misinformation.”

Members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee went back and forth Tuesday on who exactly would be affected if conservative lawmakers trudge forward with $880 billion in cuts to the public health insurance coverage. At one point, a wheelchair-bound protester identifying herself as from Youngstown, Ohio, interrupted Alabama Representative Gary Palmer to express her fears.

“You will kill me, I’m HIV-positive,” she shouted as security rolled her out. “I have survived on my meds that are $10,000 a month.”

“If you [got] all these cuts, how the hell would I be able to shop at your store?” she added.

But Palmer was unswayed, quickly throwing aside her plea for help.

“It’s unfortunate that people are so enraged by the misinformation that they’ve been given,” he said after the protester had been removed from the room. “It’s a commentary on this Congress and how we treat people.”

The Republican bill would kick 8.6 million Americans off Medicaid over the next 10 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office. (Republicans offered their own numbers, revealing shortly before the committee meeting was scheduled to begin that at least 7.6 million Americans would be affected.)

Republicans claim that the bulk of people who would be booted off the program include undocumented immigrants and non-disabled, jobless Americans. That could happen by way of adding a work requirement to Medicaid, which would ask recipients to navigate work-reporting and verification systems on a monthly basis—a detail that would require significant federal funding. The plans would also negate coverage for individuals who find themselves temporarily unemployed, for instance those who were recently fired or laid off.

But critics of the Republican measure argue that eligible Medicaid recipients could get strung up in these increasingly frequent eligibility checks, potentially lapsing their coverage and benefits. A February report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that introducing work requirements to the insurance program could strip upward of 36 million Americans of their health coverage—half of Medicaid’s 72 million enrollees.

Republicans have spent months attempting to pencil out an $880 billion cut to the program in order to extend Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts for corporations and billionaires, in an effort to make the tax cuts’ estimated $6.8 trillion deficit hike more palatable to their base.

“Republicans are trying to say this is kind of a moderate bill,” Energy and Commerce Ranking Member Frank Pallone told reporters Monday. “Nothing could be further from the truth.