Ned Ryun explains the importance of Trump’s effort to crush the ‘unconstitutional…

Ned Ryun explains the importance of Trump’s effort to crush the ‘unconstitutional administrative state’

Ryun, the creator of the new "American Leviathan" documentary, urged Americans to demand the "representative government" they were promised, not "the rule of the bureaucrat."

By Liz Collin March 24, 20251/2

Ned Ryun discusses his new documentary with Alpha News reporter Liz Collin. A new documentary explains the danger of bureaucrats and what Americans can do to dismantle the administrative state. Ned Ryun, the founder of American Majority, joined Liz Collin on her podcast to discuss the new film.

The must-see documentary is based on Ryun’s 2024 book, “American Leviathan: The Birth of the Administrative State and Progressive Authoritarianism.”

“The first definition is obviously this demonic sea creature that Yahweh defeats in the Old Testament. Thesecond definition, though, is why I used it,because Leviathan refers to a massive, sprawling bureaucracy that tends to be totalitarian,”said Ryun.

“Really, when you think about it, we haveour own American Leviathan that really has been in place for the last 100 years=, in which a massive, sprawling bureaucracy filled with unelected bureaucrats think that they should be governing and quite frankly, that was always theintent from progressives who constructed the administrative state in the early 20th century, that we would have the rule of the bureaucrat,” he explained.

He believes Elon Musk, who is leading a new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in the Trump administration, is slowly coming to realize just how deep the problem goes.

“I think Elon Musk, when he made that comment a few weeks ago in the Oval Office, DOGE was about waste, fraud and abuse, it’s kind of a slow epiphany that’s taking place with Elon,that the waste, fraud and abuse really is probably just the poisonous fruit of a poisonous tree. And we might be dealing with somemore fundamental issues about who’s actually doing the governing in this country,”Ryun said.

The purpose of his book and documentary, he said, is to help the American people understand that“we do have two very different competing forms of government in this country.”

On one hand, there’s the administrative state, Ryun explained, in which “the unelected bureaucrats are to do the real governing.” This “has nothing to do with representative democracy, has nothing to do with a constitutional republic,” he said.

On the other is a constitutional republic, “which has been more of an illusion the last decades, last century, in which we are to have a government of, by, for the people, in which all power flows from the people to their duly-elected representatives, who we then make stewards of the money and power given to them to actually construct a government that advances and protects the interests of the American people,” Ryun said.

Watch the documentary here:https://www.americanleviathan.com/p/the-wait-is-overamerican-leviathan

https://alphanews.org/ned-ryun-explains-the-importance-of-trumps-effort-to-crush-the-unconstitutional-administrative-state/

>>22819976

2/2

“And the conflict between these two different forms of government kind of was under the surface because too many Republicans accepted the premise that it was legitimate,” Ryun added.

He said it took Donald Trump to show up and say that he rejects the premise for things to accelerate.

“That’s really what accelerated where I think we are today.When Donald Trump said, ‘No, I decide. I’m the one who decides.’ And the administrative state actors and their allies in theDemocratic party and the corporate propaganda said, ‘No, you don’t, we decide.’And that really is the basis of the conflict you see playing out right now in DC,” Ryun said.

Despite Trump’s return to the White House, Ryun warned Americans to“not underestimate the power that the corporate propaganda still have.”

“They’re not media.I just want to be very clear on that front. We do not have a free and honest press. It has been captured as an auxiliary of the Democratic Party and quite frankly,the administrative state. Corporate propagandists still have a lot of power in this country to be able to influence the low-information voters with their propaganda and shaping the narrative. And so I think that’s going to be a real problem not only this year, butmoving forward with Donald Trump in the battle of the narratives, who’s going to win out,” he added.

He said he hasurged Trumpto deliver a speech on the subject and explain that “this is what we are discussing. We are discussingthe end of a unconstitutional administrative state.”

Alpha News asked Ryun if he has any advice to Minnesotans as Gov. Tim Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison and others seem to spend their days fighting against Trump and his agenda.

“Sometimes all that’s required of us is to have the courage to stand up and say, ‘No, we reject the premise. We do not think this is legitimate,’ and to really begin to communicate that and have the courage to stand up and say, ‘This is not what was intended at the state level. It’s not intended at the federal level.’The promise of what we were given, this is really our heritage, our legacy as freeborn American people,” he said.

“We were supposed to have representative government that was responsive to the American people to prioritize and protect and advance the interests of the American people. We should have the courage in our own communities and states and at the national level to stand up and go, ‘No, we reject the premise.’I think Donald Trump’s courage on that front, I hope, is infectious.”

Watch the documentary here:https://www.americanleviathan.com/p/the-wait-is-overamerican-leviathan

https://alphanews.org/ned-ryun-explains-the-importance-of-trumps-effort-to-crush-the-unconstitutional-administrative-state/

(thanks anon from last bread that pointed this out, posting the article for you)

25 Mar, 2025 16:36

US state media gets emergency cash injection

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty is set to receive $7.46 million from its parent US government agency, the broadcaster says

Cash-strapped US state broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is set to receive a portion of a grant which was withheld by the administration of US President Donald Trump, the broadcaster announced on Monday.A sum of $7.46 million will be released by the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM).(I thought they were closed down too?)

Kari Lake, Trump-appointed special adviser to USAGM, has pledged to shrink the agency to its minimum possible legal size, describing the body as “a giant rot and burden to the American taxpayer” and arguing that it is “not salvageable.” She has also claimed to have uncovered assorted irregularities within the agency,including “massive national security violations” and alleged infiltration by spies and terrorist sympathizers.

The money to be released covers the period between March 1 and 14, a day before US President Donald Trump signed an executive effectively dismantling USAGM operations.

“We hope the imminent disbursement of two weeks’ worth of funding that Congress appropriated to RFE/RL will keep our lights on until the court rules on the broader case,” RFE/RL President and CEO Stephen Capus said in a statement.

“It is unlawful to deny us the funds that Congress has already appropriated to RFE/RL for the rest of this fiscal year,” he added.

A US Justice Department lawyer representing theUSAGM, Abigail Stout, however, argued that the agency is within its right to terminate the grant should RFE/RL breachthe provisions outlined in the International Broadcasting Act.“The statute actually contemplates that the agency could terminate a grant,”she said.

Founded in the early 1950s by the CIA front organizations, Radio Free Europe (RFE) broadcast pro-Western propaganda into the Eastern bloc in Europe, while Radio Liberty (RL) focused on the Soviet Union itself. In the 1970s, they merged into a single entity.

USAGM has been overseeing US state-funded international media outlets, including RFE/RL, Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Asia, and several other foreign focused not-for-profit media entities that are funded by the US budget. While the outlets insist they provide unbiased coverage in around 100 countries, they have been widely regarded as Washington’s propaganda arms.

https://www.rt.com/news/614747-us-state-media-funds/

(Guaranteed they won't either get it or keep it.DS at work.)

Trump stands by national security adviser Mike Waltz despite disclosing military plans, saying he’s ‘learned a lesson’

Trump said that even though a journalist from The Atlantic was inadvertently added to a private chat about military plans, his presence had “no impact” on the military strikes in Yemen.

March 25, 2025, 9:58 AM By Garrett Haake and Megan Lebowitz1/2

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump stood by his national security adviser, Mike Waltz, after The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief was accidentally added to a private, high-level chat on the messaging app Signal where military plans were being discussed.

"Michael Waltz has learned a lesson, and he’s a good man," Trump said Tuesday in a phone interview with NBC News.

Trump's comments were his first substantive remarks since The Atlantic broke the story, which detailed how journalist Jeffrey Goldberg was inadvertently added to a group chat on a private messaging app where plans for military strikes in Yemen were discussed. Goldberg said he was added to the discussion after receiving a request from a user identified as Waltz.

When asked what he was told about how Goldberg came to be added to the Signal chat, Trump said, “It was one of Michael’s people on the phone. A staffer had his number on there.”(Trump and Waltz know it was his assistant that put Goldberg on the call, wonder what Waltz asst got paid for that.))

Trump said Goldberg’s presence in the chat had “no impact at all” on the military operation.

The president expressed confidence in his team, saying he was not frustrated by the events leading up to The Atlantic's story. The situation, Trump said, was "the only glitch in two months, and it turned out not to be a serious one."

The Atlantic’s story sent shockwaves across Washington on Monday. Democratic lawmakers demanded answers from the White House in multiple letters, with one from a group of Senate Democrats calling the situation “an astonishingly cavalier approach to national security.”

Top Democrats on the House Armed Services, Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Oversight committees wrote a separate letter, pushing for answers about other instances in which senior officials discussed national security issues “using the Signal messaging service or any other messaging service application that has not been approved for the transmission of classified information.”

White House officials defended the chat, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth claiming on Monday that “nobody was texting war plans.” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Tuesday also claimed war plans were not discussed and "no classified material was sent to the thread."

"As the National Security Council stated, the White House is looking into how Goldberg’s number was inadvertently added to the thread,"she added.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/trump-stands-national-security-adviser-leaked-military-plans-saying-mi-rcna197944

(Have you noticed FOX, NBC and other stations are trying to depict PDJT has white hair, I see it all the time.)

>>22820041

2/2

In a statement about the incident, the National Security Council said the thread “is a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials. The ongoing success of the Houthi operation demonstrates that there were no threats to our servicemembers or our national security.”

Trump and Waltz spoke on Monday about The Atlantic’s story, according to two sources familiar with their conversation. Waltz has not yet commented publicly on the story.

The news of the group chat mishap came 10 years ago to the month after it was revealed that Hillary Clinton used a private email server at times during her tenure as secretary of state in the Obama administration. That revelation prompted staunch criticism from Republicans, several of whom appeared to be part of the Signal chat, according to The Atlantic. (Seriously NBC is trying to equate this leak that was not serious, to HRC setting up a server in her bathroom, where she sold top secret security information to every enemy country?Only they can do this.)

Goldberg reported that he was skeptical about the Signal chat's authenticity at first. But when bombs began falling in Yemen at the time officials in the group chat had discussed it, Goldberg concluded that the chat was “almost certainly real” and left shortly after.

Trump briefly responded to a question about The Atlantic’s story on Monday, saying,“I don’t know anything about it” and noting that the reporter asking him about the story was “telling me about it for the first time.”(I’m sure he got advice to say he didn’t know about that, because he sure uses it a lot. But I can understand and would say the same.)

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/trump-stands-national-security-adviser-leaked-military-plans-saying-mi-rcna197944

Judges are trying to ‘USURP’ Trump’s authority, Bill Barr warns(No Shit Shylock!)

11:16

https://youtu.be/_Xn7uSOL7YE

==The traitor returned when the plan didn't kill Trump, so he comes back as a bold supporter of the presidency…he deserves whatever judgement God gives him)

(Shylock (/ʃaɪˈlɒk/) is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's play The Merchant of Venice (c. 1600). A Venetian Jewish moneylender, Shylock is the play's principal villain. His defeat and forced conversion to Christianity form the climax of the story. Shylock's characterisation is composed of stereotypes, for instance greediness and vengefulness, although there were no legally practising Jews who lived in England during Shakespeare's time. Jews were expelled from the country in 1290 by Edward I in the Edict of Expulsion; this was not reversed until the mid-17th century (the Cromwell Era).

>>22820076

Barr looks very uncomfortable, while the blond fawns all over him.

>>22820076

I have to admit Barr has been helpful

25 Mar, 2025 18:56

Russia and US agree list of energy facilities for truce with Ukraine – Kremlin

The list includes nuclear power plants, oil and gas facilities, hydroelectric power plants, and other installations

The Kremlin has released a comprehensive list of energy facilitiessubject to a temporary US-brokered truce between Russia and Ukraine. The pause in long-range strikes against such targets took effect on March 18 and will last for 30 days, Moscow said.

The types of facilities that fall under the truceinclude oil and gas processing and storage facilities, including pumping stations and pipelines, electricity producing and distributing sites, nuclear power plants, and dams of hydroelectric plants.

The trucemay be prolonged beyond the 30-day period should both sides agree, Moscow noted.If either party violates the deal, the other can consider itself free from its obligations, it added.

The suspension of strikes was originally proposed by Trump to Russian President Vladimir Putin during a phone call last week. The Russian leader agreed to it and immediately ordering the country’s military to halt attacks on Ukrainian energy facilities. The Russian military later said it had to shoot down seven kamikaze drones that were already en route to targets in Ukraine in order to implement the order.

Zelensky publicly backed the idea of the truce shortly after it was first announced. However, Moscow accused Kiev of violating the ceasefire almost immediately, claiming that multiple energy facilities in Russia had been targeted by Ukrainian drones over the past week.

https://www.rt.com/news/614763-russia-us-agree-list-truce/

(this is accelerating with the US and Russia, I wonder if Kiev will come along. Doubtful)

25 Mar, 2025 13:54

Kiev ramping up attacks on Russian civilians – senior diplomat

Sixteen people have been killed and 134 injuredin Ukrainian strikesover the past week alone, Rodion Miroshnik has said

Ukraine has stepped up its attacks on Russian civilians in frontline and border regions, resulting in over 150 casualties in the past week alone, Rodion Miroshnik, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s ambassador-at-large tasked with tracking Kiev’s war crimes, has said. This comes amid ongoing Russia-US efforts to settle the Ukraine conflict.

In a statement posted on Telegram on Tuesday, Miroshnik accused Kiev of attacking civilian targets “in the midst of talks about the desire for a peaceful settlement.” He stated that from March 17 to 23, 16 civilians were killed and 134 were injured in Ukrainian attacks.

The bulk of the casualties were recorded in the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, and the regions of Belgorod, Kursk, and Kherson, he added, claiming that over the week,Ukraine fired almost 2,000 munitions of various kinds at civilian targets.

He also provided examples of the most devastating attacks, including a strike in the village of Gorlovka in Donbass which injured 12 civilians. According to Miroshnik,the strike used cluster munitions, which are banned in more than 100 countries. Ukraine is not a signatory to the treaty that bars their use.

Another reported incident was a drone attack in the village of Chubarevka in Russia’s Zaporozhye Region, which killed a paramedic, he added. While most of the attacks targeted border and frontline regions, one UAV strike hit targets in Russia’s Saratov Region – hundreds of kilometers from the battlefield – and injured ten civilians, Miroshnik said.

Russia has accused Ukraine of targeting civilians throughout the conflict, especially in regions near the border. Miroshnik’s comments come as Russia and the US are engaging in diplomacy to explore options for settling the conflict.

As part of the process, Moscow agreed to a 30-day ceasefire on strikes targeting energy infrastructure after a phone call between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart, Donald Trump, last week. Russian officials, however, have said Ukraine violated the agreement almost immediately by targeting oil infrastructure in several locations.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov signaled that Russia plans to abide by the moratorium despite Kiev’s violations. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has warned, however, that Moscow reserves the right to respond to Ukraine’s attacks, including “symmetrically,” if Kiev continues its “destructive course.”

https://www.rt.com/russia/614748-ukraine-ramping-up-attacks-civilians/

25 Mar, 2025 16:55

UK energy giant discloses details of Russian lawsuit

Moscow is seeking $1.6 billion in damages from Shell over the Sakhalin-2 LNG joint venture that the latter quit in 2022

Russia is seeking over $1.6 billion in damages from British energy giant Shellover a failed joint venture, the company revealed in its annual report published on Tuesday.Shell walked away from the Sakhalin-2 liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, a major oil and gas development on Sakhalin Island in Russia’s Far East, in 2022, after the escalation of the Ukraine conflict and ensuing Western sanctions on Moscow.

The Russian Prosecutor General’s Office launched the legal action against eight Shell group units last October, although no details of the claim were made public at the time. Gazprom Export, the Russian Energy Ministry, the government of Sakhalin Region, as well as the companies Sakhalin Energy Investment and Sakhalin Energy were named as also being party to the claim.

According to the London-based energy giant,Russia is seeking a declaration that Shell illegally abandoned its support for the project. It is also seeking “monetary relief” of approximately €1.5 billion from Shell Energy Europe Limited to Gazprom Export for “alleged unpaid gas deliveries in 2022,” and a declaration thatGazprom Export can take the 94 billion rubles ($1.1 billion) reserved in escrow for Shell as compensation for relinquishing its share in Sakhalin-2.

The company filed a postponement notice in January and a new hearing in the Moscow Arbitration Court is scheduled for April 14, the report added. The energy giant noted that it was currently impossible to estimate “the magnitude and timing” of any possible obligations arising from the lawsuit.

“There remains a high degree of uncertainty regarding the ultimate outcomes, as well as the potential effect on future operations, earnings, cash flows and Shell’s financial condition,” it added.

In 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree transferring the assets of Sakhalin Energy, the former operator of Sakhalin-2,to a new Russia-based operator, Sakhalin Energy LLC. The government allowed foreign owners, which included Japanese companies Mitsui and Mitsubishi, to take a stake in the new operator proportionate to their previous holding.

The Japanese firms decided to retain their stakes, but Shell, which owned 27.5% minus one share in Sakhalin Energy, refused to join the new entity, prompting Moscow to sell off its stake to a Gazprom subsidiary for roughly $1 billion.

The funds remain frozen in Russia in a type of escrow account called Type C that was introduced in response to Western sanctions.The main purpose of such accounts was to prevent the movement of funds out of the country by entities from “unfriendly nations.”

https://www.rt.com/business/614757-shell-discloses-details-russia-lawsuit/

100s of companies that abandoned Russia on Bidan's orders or due to be afraid, lost billions of dollars in income, only the smart companies, said F' this, it's ridiculous.

Michael Johns🇺🇸

@michaeljohns

On Russia:

1. In final years of the Cold War, as a leading proponent of the Reagan Doctrine, I distinctly remember a moment in 1989 when many of us began to conclude that the doctrine was proving so effectual that the entire Soviet empire faced a realistic prospect of collapse;

1. I then recall our internal discussions shifting quickly to a new question: What do we now do to ensure that the Kremlin, facing an imminent collapse of its empire and with little to lose, does not lash out with a final kinetic burst of military aggression against the West?

1. We concluded that Gorbachev needed to be assured publicly and privately that, in exchange for allowing the Cold War to end peacefully and allowing a united Germany in NATO, we would not seek any further eastern expansion of NATO;

1. I recall feeling then that, given the magnitude of the stakes, this was the least we could offer.And for eight years, from 1991 until 1999, we kept this promise until Clinton, GWB, and Obama violated it repeatedly, adding about a dozen Warsaw Pact and Baltic nations to NATO;

1. Prior to Russia's Crimea and Ukraine invasions in 2014 and 2022 respectively,Putin and Russia described NATO's eastern expansions as provocative and threatening. Supporters of the Ukraine War, in turn, predictably later labeled this response "Russian propaganda"; and

1. But the fact that we issued such assurances is now beyond dispute.In December 2017, these declassified documents available @NSArchive and elsewhere, demonstrate that we made such assurances publicly and privately at many levels and did so repeatedly:

attached 29 pages of evidence in Word DOC attached

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1903969798611976526.html

Link to archives:

https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017-12-12/nato-expansion-what-gorbachev-heard-western-leaders-early

Alina Habba struts onto the front lines of the war against lawfare—heels on, gloves off, ready to swing…March 25, 2025 (5 hours ago) 1/2

President Trump’s 2024 campaign is nothing like 2016. This time, he’s not walking in blind. He’s learned from past mistakes—and one of the biggest lessons was trusting Swamp creatures just because they pretended not to be lurking beneath the murky waters.

A hard lesson—but one that many would argue has made him politically wiser.

Now, as he gets settled back into the White House, he’s flanked on both sides by an America First posse, ready to take a sledgehammer to the chaos and confusion erected during Biden’s installation.

Because honestly, the key to Making America Great Again starts with putting the right people in the right places.

And so far, Trump’s been making bold, strategic moves with fighters like Pete Hegseth, Tulsi Gabbard, RFK Jr., Kash Patel, and Dan Bongino, just to name a few.

But it’s not just the big names making waves. Even the lower-profile promotions are packing a serious punch—and this latest one is no exception.

President Trump just named Alina Habba the interim US Attorney for the great state of New Jersey—and naturally, any move toward actual justice and an end to the Left’s lawfare machine has the regime-run media in a full-blown meltdown.

And the moment she got her marching orders, Alina didn’t flinch—she got to work, ready to root out corruption and clean house.

The mainstream media is so blinded by Stage 5 TDS, they’ve forgotten that presidents always appoint people they trust to key positions.This isn’t some Wild West social club, like that MSNBC reporter tried to frame it—it’s politics. And honestly, it’s just smart business, to boot.

But once again, our media proves it’s completely incapable of being rational—or even acting like normal human beings at this point.

MSNBC:

When Donald Trump has an important personnel decision to make, the president too often looks to people he knows personally, as if he were the head of a social club and its members are entitled to certain perks — such as powerful positions in the executive branch of a global superpower.

This is especially true for the Republican’s former lawyers. Pam Bondi was part of one of Trump’s legal teams, and she’s the attorney general. Todd Blanche was one of his criminal defense attorneys, and he’s now also helping lead the Justice Department. Emil Bove represented Trump before being tapped to serve as the principal associate deputy attorney general. D. John Sauer was also a Trump lawyer, and the president tapped him to serve as the solicitor general.

https://revolver.news/2025/03/alina-habba-struts-onto-the-front-lines-of-the-war-against-lawfare-heels-on-gloves-off-ready-to-swing/

(They always sound arrogant but they are frightened.)

>>22820567

2/2

In case the list weren’t already long, as NBC News reported, it just got longer.

Trump announced to Truth Social that Alina Habba, who is serving as counselor to the president, will be the interim U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey. … The move is “effective immediately,” Trump said. He said John Giordano, the current interim U.S. attorney in New Jersey, is being nominated as the ambassador toNamibia.(that sound odd for a US Atty)

To be sure, Habba’s work has not been limited to serving as a member of Trump’s legal team. The Republican lawyer — who has no experience as a prosecutor, butwho’ll now oversee a federal office with 150 prosecutors— also worked at the pro-Trump Save America PAC, before also working as a campaign spokesperson last year.

Let’s not forget: according to an IRS whistleblower, Joe Biden’s sister, Valerie, is said to be his “final gut check” on every major political decision.

And of course, that’s considered perfectly normal by Beltway standards. Nothing to see here, right?

Just an emotionally unhinged sister—who’s built her entire adult life off her brother’s political career—serving as the last line of judgment for the so-called “Leader of the Free World.” Not to mention the rest of the Biden clan, a family so bloated with grifters, it’s practically a walking episode of Succession.

The New York Post:

The IRS was stopped from questioning Joe Biden’s sister, Valerie Biden Owens — said to be the president’s “final gut-check” in decision-making — about cash she received from Hunter Biden, a whistleblower has claimed.

Biden Owens received a payment via Venmo from the first son, according to an interview with IRS whistleblower Joseph Ziegler, a 13-year IRS veteran who gave testimony to the House Committee on Ways and Means last month.

“So I continually ask, ‘Can I go and interview them?’ And those were always met with ‘no,’” said Ziegler, who was known as “whistleblower #2” in the Ways and Means transcripts. “And I think one of them was Valerie Owens that we talked about that I wasn’t allowed to go and interview.”

Ziegler, a Democrat and the lead investigator in the agency’s IRS investigation into Hunter Biden, testified Wednesday at the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability about how efforts to interview Biden family members were rejected — and the probe into the first son’s lucrative consulting work with foreign countries was blocked by prosecutors at the US Attorney’s Office in Delaware.

We’re thrilled to see Alina’s expertise, hard work, and loyalty get the recognition they deserve—and we’re looking forward to watching her do big things in the fight against lawfare and injustice in New Jersey.

https://revolver.news/2025/03/alina-habba-struts-onto-the-front-lines-of-the-war-against-lawfare-heels-on-gloves-off-ready-to-swing/

Mar 24, 2025 -Business

FCC threatens blocking media mergers based on DEI policies

Dan Primack

The Federal Communications Commission is threatening to block media mergers based on corporate DEI policies.

Why it matters:This creates new layers of complexity and uncertainty for dealmakers, and reflects how the Trump administration is willing to pull novel levers to end what most CEOs viewed as sensible policies until two months ago.

Driving the news:FCC chair Brendan Carr tells Bloomberg that he only can "approve a transaction if we find that doing so serves the public interest … If there's businesses out there that are still promoting invidious forms of DEI discrimination, I really don't see a path forward where the FCC could reach the conclusion that approving the transaction is going to be in the public interest."

• He also mentioned several pending transactions, including Paramount's merger with Skydance, Verizon's $20 billion deal for Frontier Communications, and U.S. Cellular's $4.4 billion wireless unit sale to T-Mobile US.

• The Federal Trade Commission declined to comment when asked by Axios if it plans to take a similar tact.

Zoom in:The FCC doesn't have antitrust regulation powers like the FTC or DOJ, but does need to approve broadcast license transfers and the ability to launch investigations that can drown deals via delay.

• In an interesting twist, however, the FCC also is legally required to "prevent digital discrimination of access to broadband services based on income level, race, ethnicity, color, religion, or national origin."

The bottom line:It's not clear that President Trump's executive order on DEI gives federal agencies the legal authority to block mergers on such grounds.

• But all sorts of institutions — from universities to law firms — have been choosing protection over principle. No reason to think that dealmakers will act any different.

https://www.axios.com/2025/03/24/fcc-dei-media-mergers-trump

Trump signs executive order that will upend US voter registration processes

Joseph Gedeon in Washington and Sam Levine in New York

Tue 25 March 2025at 5:03 pm GMT-1/2

Donald Trump has signed a far-reaching executive order that promises to fundamentally disrupt American voter registration processes, introducing measures so restrictive they could in effect disenfranchise millions of citizens if enacted.

Described by Will Scharf, the White House staff secretary, on Tuesday as “the farthest reaching executive action taken” in the nation’s history, the order represents the latest in a long list of assaults against immigration, but also on current voting systems.

The sweeping order amends the federal voter registration form to require proof of citizenship in order to vote. It demands documentary proof for citizenship such as a passport to be eligible to vote in federal elections, empowers federal agencies to cut funding to states deemed non-compliant and instructs the Department of Justice to prosecute what the White House paints as “election crimes”.

The measure also seeks to block states from accepting mail-in ballots after election day, regardless of when they are mailed in.

Many of the provisions in the order are likely to be quickly challenged and are legally suspect. The US constitution explicitly gives states and Congress the authority to set the rules for election and does not authorize the president to do so.

“The short answer is that this executive order, like all too many that we’ve seen before, is lawless and asserts all sorts of executive authority that he most assuredly does not have,” said Danielle Lang, a voting rights lawyer at the non-profit Campaign Legal Center.

Republicans have long sought to add a citizenship to the federal form and been stymied by the courts. In a 7-2 decision in 2013, for example, the US supreme court said that Arizona could not require proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections. The power to set the requirements on the federal form is left to the bipartisan Election Assistance Commission. Courts have also blocked efforts to short-circuit efforts to add the question.

The order tracks with a controversial bill in Congress Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (Save) Act, which would require Americans to prove citizenship in person –a requirement that could immediately eliminate mail-in and online voter registration already across 42 states, as well as DC and Guam.

All metrics point to these actions making it harder, not easier, for Americans to vote. According to the state department in 2023, fewer than half of all Americans had a valid passport, and nearly 69 million women who have changed their names would struggle to produce matching documentation, according to a Center for American Progress analysis.

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/trump-signs-executive-order-upend-210330860.html

>>22820704

2/2

Kansas had a law requiring proof of citizenship in effect between 2013 and 2016. It wound up putting the registrations of 30,000 people in jeopardy – the vast majority of whom were eligible to vote.

The Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement reported in 2024 that roughly 21 million voting-age Americans, about 9% of the population, do not have a current, valid ID.

Despite Trump’s claims of widespread election fraud, federal law already prohibits non-citizens from voting, with penalties including up to five years in prison. Current election systems already use multiple federal databases to verify voter eligibility, including citizenship data from the Department of Homeland Security.

A day after the 2024 elections, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency(Cisa) director, Jen Easterly – the agency in charge of overseeing election security in the United States – said: “Our election infrastructure has never been more secure and the election community never better prepared to deliver safe, secure, free and fair elections for the American people. (don't mention her she might be arrested very soon)

“Importantly, we have no evidence of any malicious activity that had a material impact on the security or integrity of our election infrastructure,” Easterly added.

Still, Trump framed the order as a critical step in “straightening out our election”, claiming the country is “sick” from what he termed “fake elections.” He added that “there are other steps that we will be taking as the next in the coming weeks” when it comes to the electoral process.

This action continues Trump’s long-term efforts to reshape democratic participation, a throwback to his 2020 memo to exclude non-citizens from census population counts that would be used to shape congressional districts. The rhetoric and subsequent follow through represents a potentially transformative – and deeply controversial – approach to voter eligibility that could redefine access to the ballot box.

“Perhaps some people think I shouldn’t be complaining because we won in a landslide, but we got to straighten out our election,” Trump said as he signed Tuesday’s order.

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/trump-signs-executive-order-upend-210330860.html

Trump Signs Order in Attempt to Vastly Reshape U.S. Elections

By Jacob Knutson March 25, 2025Marc Elias Freaking out1/2

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday commanding wide-ranging changes to how U.S. elections are administered, a move that will be swiftly challenged by voting rights organizations across the country.

Since the beginning of his second term, Trump has repeatedly outlined his extreme vision for U.S. elections, and his administration has taken actions that would, if permitted, vastly increase federal control over elections.

Tuesday’s executive order is an extension of those efforts by attempting to make it more difficult for Americans to register to vote, to vastly increase federal supervision over state registration rolls and to punish states that do not comply with the order.

Democracy Docket founder Marc Elias said he will sue over Trump’s order.

The Trump administration claimed the executive order was necessary to prevent election fraud, specifically noncitizens voting in federal elections. However, election fraud, including noncitizens voting, is exceptionally rare.

Democratic election officials quickly decried the order.

“Trump’s executive order is unlawful,”Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold saidin a statement. “It would prevent eligible Americans from exercising their sacred right to vote. The Trump administration is weaponizing the federal government and trying to make it harder for voters to fight back at the ballot box.”

“This is not a statute,” Arizona Secretary ofState Adrian Fontes told Democracy Docket. “This is an edict by fiat from the executive branch, and so every piece of it can be challenged through the regular judicial process.”

“But what is most disturbing is the attitude behind it, and that is that it appears as though this is another one of the administration’s building blocks in an attempt to avoid having to face the voters in 2026,” Fontes added. “I genuinely believe that the Trump administration wants to cancel the 2026 elections so that he and his party can stay in power, and we have to fight like hell against that by every means available.”

Among the changes, Trump’s order would punish states that count ballots received after Election Day and would make significant modifications to voting systems and security standards for voting equipment. (What security standards? They are all gone, that's the reason for the EO)

https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/trump-voting-elections-executive-order/

>>22820759

2/2

It would also require proof of citizenshipfor Americans who attempt to register to vote or to update registration information through a federal form, a move that would make it much harder for eligible voters to use the form.

The Department of Justice must go after states that count absentee or mail-in ballotsreceived for federal elections after Election Day under the order,while those states would also lose access to grants to improve their election systems.

The Social Security commissioner must share federal databaseswith state and local election officials verifying the eligibility of registered voters and those attempting to register, the order directs. It also charges the Department of Homeland Security and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency to review state voter registration lists.

The order directs the Election Assistance Commission (EAC), an agency created by Congress to operate without direct control from the White House, to carry out many of these changes.

The EAC normally assists stateand local officials in improving how elections are conducted,by distributing grants to improve election infrastructure and certifying voting equipment.

The EAC would be required to amend the guidelines it uses to determine if voting systems are accessible and secure then re-certify voting systems under those new standards.

The order comes after Trump in recent weeks has repeatedly called on state leaders to pass laws eliminating mail and electronic votingwhile falsely claiming they are sources of election fraud.

https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/trump-voting-elections-executive-order/

I can't wait until these guy is thoroughly investigated and prosecuted for all the harm he's done.

>>22820766

Judge Boasberg is all over the corruption in the whole thing.TRUMP figured out a way to get rid of Boasberg