Judge Smacks Down ICE and Orders NYC Street Vendors Released

Federal judges have ordered the release of at least three of 10 West African immigrants who were swarmed by federal agents in multiple immigration raids in October and November on New York City’s Canal Street, a popular site for street vendors.

Serigne Diop, Mamdou Ndoye, and Abdou Tall will be released, while the other seven men remain in ICE detention centers in Louisiana and New Jersey.

Manhattan District Judge Vernon S. Broderick noted that Immigration and Customs Enforcement failed to provide a warrant or probable cause to arrest Ndoye, in particular, writing, “Absent such procedures, the agency will be free to either engage in preplanned decisions to unlawfully detain individuals and then come up with post hoc rationalizations, or merely randomly stage ‘encounters’ without the intent to unlawfully detain individuals and then create post hoc rationalizations for these unlawful detentions.”

“The court-ordered releases for these three individuals confirm what we all know, which is that federal law enforcement officers carried out illegal and unconstitutional roundups on the streets of Chinatown,” said Elora Mukherjee, the director of Columbia Law School’s Immigrants’ Rights Clinic.

The Department of Homeland Security insists that the arrests were justified.

“Despite activist judges, President Trump and Secretary (Kristi) Noem will continue fighting for the arrest, detention, and removal of criminal illegal aliens who have no right to terrorize our communities,” DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement.

The Department of Justice’s headquarters in Washington now features a banner of Donald Trump.

The Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building, also called Main Justice, on Thursday became the latest federal building to get plastered with a portrait of the Supreme Leader—in a symbolic blow to the agency’s independence.

After the Watergate scandal, the Department of Justice installed new safeguards to ensure the DOJ remained a “neutral zone” from the politics of the White House, and made assurances that the department’s attorneys “must always be committed to good judgment and integrity,” according to the Brenner Center for Justice.

Seeing Trump’s face on the facade of Main Justice simply verifies what Americans have been witnessing for months: Trump has completely taken over the federal agency intended to implement an impartial—and nonpartisan—rule of law.

Earlier this month, DOJ officials began to hold daily meetings to discuss Trump’s efforts to investigate and punish his perceived political enemies, such as former special counsel Jack Smith, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, and New York Attorney General Letitia James. The president later joked that he had a “right” to weaponize the DOJ.

Meanwhile, the Department of Justice appears to be engaged in a large-scale cover-up to protect many of the individuals implicated in the government’s files on Jeffrey Epstein—including the president himself. The agency’s leader, Attorney General Pam Bondi, has repeatedly lied about Trump’s alleged wrongdoing, and reoriented her department to exact his revenge fantasies and defend his billionaire buddies.

It won’t be bigger or better, but the Trump administration is reportedly working to create a U.S. dupe of the World Health Organization.

The Department of Health and Human Services is proposing a plan that would cost taxpayers $2 billion a year to recreate the same systems that the country had access to when it was a member of the WHO, according to officials that spoke with The Washington Post Thursday.

The Trump administration pulled the United States out of the WHO on January 22. In a statement, DHS blamed the exit on the global public health entity’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet Donald Trump—who railed against the WHO for years—saw it differently. On his first day back in office, Trump chalked the withdrawal up to “unfairly onerous payments,” claiming that the cost of membership within the WHO was disproportionately shouldered by the U.S.

But the federal directive has not quelled nationwide demand for health data. Over the last several weeks, Illinois and California both sidestepped the government to independently join the WHO’s Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network, or GOARN, in newly localized efforts to stay abreast of changes in global health.

The White House’s plan to recreate the WHO’s health surveillance operation would involve the creation of laboratories, data-sharing networks, and rapid-response systems that the U.S. abandoned when it withdrew from the WHO last month—only this time, it will cost Americans much, much more.

The total cost could be as much as three times the price of America’s WHO membership. Citing figures in the proposal, U.S. officials told the Post that America’s contributions to the WHO fell somewhere between 15 and 18 percent of the entity’s total annual funding of $3.7 billion. On the high end, that would represent a $666 million annual membership fee.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration worked decisively last year to gut USAID, which did much of the work that the White House is planning to do with its slapdash WHO replacement.

But the Trump administration would apparently prefer to spend more, not less, for an inferior product.

Public health researchers were appalled by the initiative, arguing that the U.S.-led operation would not serve as an adequate or effective replacement to the WHO’s data-sharing program.

“Spending two to three times the cost to create what we already had access to makes absolutely no sense in terms of fiscal stewardship,” Tom Inglesby, director of the Center for Health Security at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told the Post. “We’re not going to get the same quality or breadth of information we would have by being in the WHO, or have anywhere the influence we had.”

President Trump wants to build a 5,000-person military base in Gaza.

Board of Peace contracting records viewed by The Guardian show that the Trump administration plans to use more than 350 acres of desolate land in southern Gaza full of twisted metal from multiple Israeli bombing campaigns to construct a massive base with 26 armored watchtowers, bunkers, an arms range, and a storage warehouse—all encircled in barbed wire.

The base will serve as the headquarters for the upcoming International Stabilization Force, which the Trump and the Jared Kushner–led Board of Peace say will have de facto control of Gaza. It is unclear what the rules of engagement for this force will be, and whether they will collaborate with the United Nations in any way.

“The Board of Peace is a kind of legal fiction, nominally with its own international legal personality separate from both the UN and the United States, but in reality it’s just an empty shell for the United States to use as it sees fit,” Rutgers law professor Adil Haque told The Guardian.

More importantly, this move shows once again that even amid the destruction and violence of Israel’s genocide, Palestinian sovereignty is still of no concern to the Trump administration, or any parties involved in this so-called Board of Peace.

“Whose permission did they get to build that military base?” asked Palestinian Canadian lawyer Diana Buttu.

Donald Trump announced Thursday that he wants the United States to contribute $10 billion to his so-called Board of Peace—essentially forming a slush fund of taxpayer money the president can use however he likes.

Speaking at the board’s inaugural meeting in Washington, Trump assured the folks watching at home that $10 billion was “a very small number when you look at that compared to the cost of war.”

There’s just one problem: Transferring billions of taxpayer dollars would require congressional approval. And Trump has not gotten that.

So far, Trump’s foreign policy has been nothing short of an assault on Congress’s power of the purse. The president has unilaterally declared war against foreign drug smugglers, launching a series of deadly extrajudicial strikes on vessels the government claims—but refuses to prove—are carrying drugs. (These strikes are still ongoing: 11 people were killed as recently as Monday.) Not to mention the massive military operation Trump mounted to depose a foreign leader and steal that country’s oil—all without Congress’s ever declaring war.

Now Trump wants to use U.S. money to facilitate Jared Kushner’s master plan for Gaza—just another luxury real estate grift.

Even if Trump did ask Congress for the funds, it doesn’t seem likely that it would approve. Currently, Democrats and the White House remain in a deadlock over funding for the Department of Homeland Security, resulting in a partial government shutdown. With midterm elections (and a potential upheaval in Congress) on the horizon, now isn’t exactly the best time for the president to make a major foreign policy slush fund, as Republicans may be hoping to convince their constituents they still put America first.

There is one other source of money Trump could potentially dip into. The president previously sold permanent seats on his board for $1 billion a head, but refused to say where that money was going.

President Trump has once again dozed off on camera at his own event.

Footage shows Trump looking extremely drowsy at his inaugural “Board of Peace” meeting on Thursday at the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C. His eyelids grew heavy during Major General Jasper Jeffers III’s presentation, and if he didn’t fall asleep completely, he at least looked incredibly disinterested in his own creation.

Trump continued to doze as several international dignitaries spoke.

The “bored of peace” jokes write themselves.

This is only the most recent instance of Trump’s drowsiness getting the best of him. The 79-year-old’s eyes were completely shut at multiple points of his whole-milk legislation signing ceremony last month. He struggled to stay awake during a marijuana rescheduling executive order signing, looked absolutely exhausted at his own Cabinet meeting in December, and fell asleep once again at a Rwanda–Democratic Republic of the Congo peace agreement signing.

This is clearly a pattern of behavior that wouldn’t be out of the ordinary for the average 79-year-old man, but this is the president. Questions of cognitive decline and fitness for office are valid, and should be raised as midterms approach.

Even Florida cops are pulling their support from Representative Randy Fine over the Republican’s recent Islamophobic tirade.

Just days before Ramadan, Fine turned a simple joke about Islam’s prohibition against dogs into plain old bigotry, writing on X that “if they force us to choose, the choice between dogs and Muslims is not a difficult one.”

Fine’s blatant religious intolerance inspired Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood to rescind his endorsement Thursday, writing on Facebook that Fine’s anti-Muslim commentary had carved “a path I just can’t follow.”

“I respect his fight for his faith and his beliefs. But I have to part ways when that fight turns into an attack on our Muslim neighbors,” Chitwood wrote, adding that Fine’s hatred doesn’t “align with my responsibility to stand up and protect the entire community.”

There are two Islamic congregations in Volusia County, compared to thousands of Protestant and Catholic parishioners, according to data from the Association of Religious Data Archives. Yet Chitwood—unlike Fine—recognizes that his public office requires him to protect and represent all religious bodies with equal fervor. In his missive, Chitwood noted that the county’s Muslim residents, who include business leaders, philanthropists, doctors, and teachers, had provided significant contributions to the community.

But it’s far from the first time that Fine has made vile, xenophobic remarks. The Arizonan-born MAGA diehard—who boasted last year that he was AIPAC’s “fastest-ever endorsement”—has come out in favor of starving Gazans, advocated for the mass deportation of Muslim American citizens from the U.S., and pushed for a bill that would allow drivers to mow down pro-Palestinian protesters if they blocked the road.

Chitwood noted in his post that he “[appreciates] the good work Rep. Fine has done to protect our Jewish neighbors, but as Sheriff I just can’t turn a blind eye to the harm he’s doing to our Muslim community.”

“In Volusia County, that community is small, but no less deserving of protection,” he wrote.

After a “frank” conversation with Fine, Chitwood posted another statement to his page, this time penned by Fine, at the lawmaker’s request.

“I respect Sheriff Chitwood and every thing he’s done to keep Volusia County safe, no matter your religious faith,” Fine said, according to Chitwood’s post. “We agree that no one should face discrimination for who they are and that no one should be able to use their faith to force their values on others.”

President Donald Trump won’t stop bragging about saving lives while making plans for war behind the scenes.

Speaking at the inaugural meeting of his so-called Board of Peace in Washington Thursday, Trump boasted to world leaders about ending foreign wars around the world and saving millions of lives.

Across the world, however, the supposed peacemaker president has overseen a massive military buildup in the Middle East, with the U.S. military deploying 13 warships and a large fleet of aircraft. A second aircraft carrier is on the way. Trump has officially mobilized the second-greatest collection of air power in the Middle East since the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, according to The Wall Street Journal.

At the meeting Thursday, Trump urged Iran to reach a deal through diplomacy or face military action. “We have to make a meaningful deal, otherwise bad things happen,” Trump said.

Trump has reportedly yet to make a final ruling, but Israel raised its alert level Wednesday, indicating a joint attack could be imminent.

While playing peacemaker, Trump didn’t shy away from threats altogether. Like a true mafioso, he warned dignitaries who’d refused his invitation to join the Board of Peace not to “play cute” with him. The list of countries that have rejected his offer isn’t short: It includes France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the Vatican, to name a few.

Trump’s self-proclaimed reputation as a peacemaker is nothing short of preposterous. In January, he ordered a deadly military operation in Venezuela in order to kidnap President Nicolás Maduro and swipe the country’s wealth of oil. Trump’s Pentagon has also mounted an ongoing series of deadly military strikes on boats the U.S. government claims—but refuses to prove—are smuggling drugs.

Jean-Luc Brunel was ready to testify against Jeffrey Epstein in 2016 in exchange for immunity from his own alleged crimes against women and girls.

But when Epstein heard of Brunel’s plans, he reached out to attorney and former Obama White House counsel Kathryn Rummler, and Brunel went quiet, according to The Wall Street Journal. Epstein would walk free for three more years.

Recently released files from the Justice Department show that Brunel, a high-powered modeling scout, was working with lawyers representing Epstein victims in February 2016.

“One of Epstein’s bfs, Jean Luc Brunel, has helped get girls. He is wanting to cooperate,” according to a federal prosecutor’s notes. “Brunel is afraid of being prosecuted.”

Separate files indicate that Epstein found out about Brunel’s potential move against him in May 2016, and sent a typo-ridden email to an alleged girlfriend, former Obama White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler.

“I spoke to Mic=el Kodesch. jean lucs friend.? he said that boies&=bsp; got jean luc full immunity and was taking him in to the us attny nxt t=esday. last week they said it was this week, &=bsp; he asked for 3 million dollars so that jean luc . would no= go in, [sic]” Epstein wrote, indicating that Brunel was offered $3 million by someone to keep quiet. “Neither he nor Jean luc lawyer titone are capable of t=lling the truth. howver he said that jean luc was worried=that if he didnt go in on tuesday they woudl arrest him.”

Ruemmler responded to Epstein a few hours later asking him to call and explain, which is understandable given the incoherence of the email. The next day, she sent Epstein an email that read: “Awake now. Talking to Poe in 20 mins.” Poe likely referred to Gregory Poe, Epstein’s attorney in Washington, D.C.

It’s unclear what Poe and Ruemmler discussed, but whatever it was, it seems to have been enough to shut Brunel up and keep Epstein a free man for three more years. Poe insists that he never talked to Ruemmler or Epstein about Brunel.

“It set us back a couple of years,” said attorney David Boies, who filed lawsuits on behalf of some Epstein victims. “We know from our lawsuits that there were more than 50 girls that were trafficked after this.”

A close colleague of Epstein’s, Brunel likely used his position to traffic young women. He was charged in 2020 with rape of minors in France, but was later found dead in his cell in 2022 before any trial could begin. And Ruemmler, who spent significant time with Epstein well after his 2008 conviction, tagging along on “lunches and dinners with celebrities, apartment hunting, and personal beauty appointments,” announced last week that she was resigning from Goldman Sachs.

Four journalists and a lawyer were arrested in Cameroon trying to cover Donald Trump’s secret deportation program.

The journalists were interviewing deported immigrants at a government detention center in the capital, Yaoundé, when they were detained by police along with a lawyer representing most of the 15 detainees. The compound was known to house African immigrants deported by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The detainees, none of whom are Cameroonian citizens, all had protection orders from U.S. courts barring them from being sent to their home countries for fear of persecution, The New York Times reported. The journalists were separated from the lawyer and taken to the country’s judicial police headquarters to be interrogated.

Three of the journalists are based in Cameroon and were on assignment for the Associated Press. The other journalist is Randy Joe Sa’ah, a freelancer who has worker for the BBC. The AP told the Times that the reporter was slapped but not seriously injured, although Sa’ah and the attorney, Joseph Awah Fru, said that the reporter appeared to have been beaten up and told him that he was attacked by police.

Some of the journalists were held in a cell for hours, Fru and Sa’ah said. Police took their cameras, laptops and phones before releasing them, claiming they contained sensitive government information. The Times unsuccessfully tried to reach police and the Cameroonian Ministry of Justice, and it’s not known if any of the five men face legal charges.

Neither the White House nor the State Department have publicly announced any kind of deal with Cameroon to accept deported immigrants. Some of the migrants held in Cameroon told the Times that they were pressured by local authorities to return to their home countries or be detained indefinitely in Cameroon.

“The state cannot prevent the public from knowing where they are keeping deportees who are not even citizens,” Fru said to the Times. “That goes to the whole idea of shady deals in the dark.”

Third-country deportations to countries like El Salvador were struck down in federal court last week, with U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg ruling that the immigrants were denied proper notice, due process, or court hearings. Did the immigrants in Cameroon face similar treatment?