Secessionist Pantomime: Israel Recognises Somaliland

by Binoy Kampmark / January 2nd, 2026

For a country so upset about recognition being afforded to people under their thumb and control, the Israelis have decided to get into the state recognition business with festive aplomb. Africa’s Somaliland presented itself as a suitable candidate, an entity that remains part of Somalia but has asserted its own autonomy since 1991.

Israel’s recognition on December 26 of that entity carried a vengeful sting. With a majority of UN Member States recognising the rubble and rump of a State of Palestine, despite arguments by the Netanyahu government that this was a reward for terrorism, the Israelis have clearly decided to turn the matter on its head.

Israel’s deputy ambassador to the United Nations, Jonathan Miller, captured the moment by saying that the recognition of Somaliland was not a “hostile step toward Somalia” when it evidently was, and did not “preclude future dialogue between the parties”, as well as it might. The salesman in Miller seemed to come through. “Recognition is not an act of defiance. It is an opportunity.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shamelessly plagiarised the lingo and language kit of those Member States of the UN who dared treat the Palestinians as a national group worthy of acknowledged sovereignty. In a call with Somaliland President Abdirhaman Mohamed Abdullahi on December 26, Netanyahu stressed the importance of Somaliland’s “right to self-determination” in recognising it.

In a paper published in November 2025 by the Israeli-based Institute for National Security Studies, Asher Lubotzky recommended that Israel, along with its sympathisers in Washington, push the United States towards recognition. While falling short of endorsing the recognition gambit, the paper notes the value of the territory in terms of offering “an operational area” for Israeli military operations. Israel required allies in the Red Sea area for various reasons, “among them the possibility of a future campaign against the Houthis.” There were also economic and reputational issues for Israel to advance, “given the minerals located in Somaliland and Israel’s interest in cultivating relationships with Muslim populations in the region.”

The prattle about Somaliland’s sound credentials is evident in the world of think tanking. The Australian Strategic Policy Institute can be found making the point through a Somilander Australian, Abdi Daud, who writes that the territory has had “consistent peaceful democratic government over the past two decades”. While “imperfect”, this made Somaliland “a role model for the global south.” Recognising it would fill the “diplomatic and strategic vacuum” all too ripe for exploitation by Yemen’s Houthis, “terrorist organisations, China and other authoritarian regimes.” Daud evidently fails to appreciate that Somaliland’s recognition can just as well create a situation inspiring secessionist and separatist movements across the African continent.

Opposition to the recognition of Somaliland came in a stern joint statement by 21 Arab, Islamic, and African nations made on December 27, 2025. The move would have “serious repercussions of such unprecedented measure on peace and security in the Horn of Africa, the Red Sea,” and have “serious effects on international peace and security as a whole, which also reflects Israel’s full and blatant disregard for international law.” To recognise “parts of states constitutes a serious precedent and threatens international peace and security, and violates the cardinal principles of international law and the United Nations Charter.”

Looming darkly in the motives behind Israeli foreign policy was the possibility that something far more sinister was afoot.  The joint statement finishes with “a full rejection between such measure and any attempts to forcibly expel the Palestinian people out of their land, which is unequivocally rejected in any form as a matter of principle.”

This was certainly the view of the Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim. Speaking at a special press conference held on December 30, 2025, Anwar declared that such actions would “violate international law and humanitarian principles, and would only perpetuate injustice rather than contribute to peace”. Using Somaliland “for the forced transfer of Palestinians is totally and wholly unacceptable.”

This concern is far from unreasonable: a number of news outlets reported in November that Israeli feelers had been put out to Somaliland on the possibility of relocating Palestinians. This chilling arrangement has many of the hallmarks of those debates from the 1930s on, where Jews made stateless by Nazi Germany might eventually be sent.

The Somaliland Foreign Ministry is playing dumb on the issue of becoming a dumping ground for Palestinians, effectively turning into a client state for Israeli interests. In a statement, it rejected “the false claims by Somalia’s president about resettling Palestinians or establishing military bases in Somaliland.” The relationship with Israel was of a diplomatic nature and cognisant of international law. “These accusations,” the ministry huffed, “are designed to mislead the international community and undermine Somaliland’s diplomatic progress.” As if giving the game away, the diplomatic arm affirmed its commitment “to regional stability, and peaceful international cooperation.”

Support for Israel’s chess play by member states has been skimpy, though any worthwhile mention was bound to come from Washington. The United States, showing itself to be utterly muddled in its entanglement with its ally, decided to treat recognition as a parlour game show. Tammy Bruce, US deputy ambassador to the United Nations, summed up the cheap mood in her address during an emergency session of the UN Security Council: “Earlier this year, several countries, including members of this Council, made a unilateral decision to recognise a non-existent Palestinian state, and yet no emergency meeting was called to express this Council’s outrage”. The merits of international law, in the current cut and thrust of statecraft, remain increasingly in the jaundiced eyes of the beholder.

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Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. Email: bkampmark@gmail.com. Read other articles by Binoy.

UN Human Rights Chief Rips Israeli Legislation to Execute Palestinians

“When it comes to the death penalty, the United Nations is very clear, and opposes it under all circumstances,” said Volker Türk.


United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk speaks about the Gaza Strip in Geneva, Switzerland on September 16, 2025.
(Photo by Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
Jan 02, 2026
COMMON DREAMS


The United Nations high commissioner for human rights on Friday forcefully denounced proposed Israeli legislation that would effectively “impose mandatory death sentences exclusively on Palestinians under certain circumstances, both in the occupied Palestinian territory and in Israel.”

The statement from the UN leader, Volker Türk, came after Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, advanced three bills in November—votes that drew widespread condemnation, including from Amnesty International, the Palestine Liberation Organization, and Hamas, which Israel considers a terrorist organization. The proposals would have to pass two more readings to take effect.

The bill pushed by the Otzma Yehudit or Jewish Power party would require courts to impose the death penalty on “a person who caused the death of an Israeli citizen deliberately or through indifference, from a motive of racism or hostility against a population, and with the aim of harming the state of Israel and the national revival of the Jewish people in its land.”

As Türk noted: “When it comes to the death penalty, the United Nations is very clear, and opposes it under all circumstances... It is profoundly difficult to reconcile such punishment with human dignity and raises the unacceptable risk of executing innocent people.”

“Such proposals are inconsistent with Israel’s obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,” he explained. “In particular, the introduction of mandatory death sentences, which leave no discretion to the courts, and violate the right to life.”

“The proposal also raises other human rights concerns, including on the basis that it is discriminatory given it will exclusively apply to Palestinians,” the high commissioner continued.

He also highlighted that Palestinians are already often convicted after unfair Israeli trials, and denying any Palestinian from the West Bank or Gaza Strip a fair trial as outlined in the Fourth Geneva Convention is a war crime.

Türk’s comments come after Amnesty’s senior director for research, advocacy, policy, and campaigns, Erika Guevara Rosas, argued last year that “the international community must exert maximum pressure on the Israeli government to immediately scrap this bill and dismantle all laws and practices that contribute to the system of apartheid against Palestinians.”

Israeli politicians are pushing for the death penalty legislation over two years into a war on Gaza that has been globally decried as genocide—and led to an ongoing case before the top UN tribunal, the International Court of Justice. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant are also wanted by the International Criminal Court.

Since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Israeli forces have killed at least 71,271 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded another 171,233, according to local health officials. Global experts warn the true toll is likely far higher. At least hundreds of those deaths have occurred since Hamas and Israel reached a ceasefire agreement nearly three months ago.

Israel has also continued to limit the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza, including a new ban on dozens of international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), which Türk sharply criticized on Wednesday.

“Israel’s suspension of numerous aid agencies from Gaza is outrageous,” he said. “This is the latest in a pattern of unlawful restrictions on humanitarian access, including Israel’s ban on UNRWA, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East, as well as attacks on Israeli and Palestinian NGOs amid broader access issues faced by the UN and other humanitarians.”

While Israel has slaughtered at least tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza over the past two years and starved many more, Israeli soldiers and settlers have also injured and killed a growing number of Palestinians in the illegally occupied West Bank—which Netanyahu has tried to downplay.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said last week that since the beginning of 2025, “a total of 238 Palestinians, including 56 children (24%), were killed by Israeli forces or settlers,” and over the past three years, “settler violence and access restrictions have driven displacement across 85 Palestinian communities and areas in the West Bank, with 33 fully emptied of their residents.”

‘New Year’s Eve Massacre’: Trump Administration Makes Deep Cuts at FEMA as Climate Crisis Accelerates

A former FEMA official said that the agency “can’t do disaster response and recovery without” the employees being terminated by the Trump administration.

The FEMA Colorado Task Force 1 navigates the Guadalupe River on a boat as search for victims continues on July 18, 2025 in Center Point, Texas.
(Photo by Brenda Bazán / The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Brad Reed
Jan 02, 2026
COMMON DREAMS

The Trump administration this week made abrupt cuts to the top federal disaster response agency, even as US communities face increased threats from natural disasters caused by the global climate crisis.

Independent journalist Marisa Kabas reported on Wednesday that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) “has begun issuing termination notices” to staff at the agency’s Cadre of On-Call Response and Recovery (CORE) that are effective as of January 2.

A FEMA staffer who spoke with Kabas described the terminations as “The New Year’s Eve Massacre,” and explained that “the driving force behind all CORE employees is supporting and enacting the mission of preparing for, responding to, and recovering from disasters.”

A Thursday report from CNN added some additional details to Kabas’ reporting, including that the decision to issue the layoffs was made by Acting Administrator Karen Evans, who was appointed to the role after former Acting Administrator David Richardson resigned in November.

One former FEMA official bluntly told CNN that the agency “can’t do disaster response and recovery without CORE employees” that are being laid off by the administration.

The former FEMA official added that regional agency offices throughout the US “are almost entirely CORE staff, so the first FEMA people who are usually onsite won’t be there,” which will mean that “states are on their own” when it comes to disaster response.

CNN also reported that there is anxiety among remaining FEMA staffers that these cuts could just be the start “of a larger effort” by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem “to shrink FEMA, potentially axing thousands of workers in the coming months who deploy during hurricanes, wildfires and other national emergencies.”

President Donald Trump has been targeting FEMA for potential termination for nearly a year now, and he said shortly after being inaugurated last January that a goal in his second term would be “fundamentally reforming and overhauling FEMA or maybe getting rid of FEMA,” while emphasizing that individual states should bear the cost of responding to natural disasters.

“I think, frankly, FEMA’s not good,” the president said. “I think when you have a problem like this, I think you want to go, and whether it’s a Democrat or Republican governor, you want to use your state to fix it and not waste time calling FEMA.”

The Trump administration’s deep cuts to FEMA come as the intensity of natural disasters is only projected to increase thanks to climate change.

According to a report published on Tuesday by the Yale School of the Environment, 2025 was the second hottest on record and was only surpassed by the previous year.

“The last three years have been, by a wide margin, the hottest ever recorded,” stressed the report. “Each of the last three years has measured more than 1.5°C warmer than preindustrial times, putting the world at least temporarily in breach of an international goal to limit warming below that level.”

As Billionaires Seethe, Organizers Say Proposed Wealth Tax in California Is ‘Not Radical’

“Asking the handful of wealthiest Californians to contribute less than the annual appreciation on their fortunes to mitigate these crises is a small, reasonable, and administrable request,” argued a group of experts.



Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman attends an event on May 22, 2025 in New York.
(Photo by Michael Ostuni/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)

Jake Johnson
Jan 02, 2026
COMMON DREAMS


Billionaire outrage against a proposed one-time wealth tax on the richest Californians reached a fever pitch in recent days as organizers began the process of gathering the hundreds of thousands of signatures needed to get the initiative on the November ballot.

Without providing specifics, billionaire Bay Area investor Chamath Palihapitiya claimed in a social media post that he knows people “with a collective net worth of $500 billion” who “scrambled and left California for good yesterday” to avoid the potential 5% wealth tax, which would apply to billionaires living in California as of January 1, 2026. (The evidence for significant billionaire tax avoidance via physical relocation is virtually nonexistent.)

Palihapitiya characterized the proposed ballot initiative, which is aimed at raising revenue to avert a healthcare crisis spurred by federal Medicaid cuts, as an “asset seizure tax.”

Bill Ackman, a billionaire hedge fund manager who lives in New York, similarly described the proposed tax as “an expropriation of private property.”

The Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post, meanwhile, published a hostile editorial on Thursday denouncing the proposed tax and mocking its supporters, including Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW).

“Many progressives think of taxation the way teenage boys think about cologne: If some is good, more must be great,” the editorial reads. “California, already reeks of overtaxation, but it’s thinking about trying out its most potent scent yet: a wealth tax. Just a whiff has some of the state’s wealthiest residents fleeing.”

The Wall Street Journal reported that “the firms of two high-profile California investors issued announcements on New Year’s Eve about establishing new offices out of state, without saying anything about the proposed Golden State tax.”

“Tech investor Peter Thiel’s investment firm, Thiel Capital, said it signed a lease in December for office space in Miami,” the newspaper added. “The office will ‘complement Thiel Capital’s existing operations in Los Angeles,’ the company said.”

Supporters say the response from billionaires and other opponents of the proposed tax—including California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is helping raise money to fight the initiative—badly misses the mark. According to organizers, most billionaires see larger capital gains increases in months than the amount they would pay if California voters approved the tax.

“Asking those who have benefited most from the economy to contribute more—particularly to stabilize healthcare systems under direct threat—is not radical. It is reasonable,” Suzanne Jimenez, the chief of staff of SEIU-UHW, told the Journal.

Earlier this week, as Common Dreams reported, US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) endorsed the proposed wealth tax, which proponents say would raise roughly $100 billion in revenue from around 200 California billionaires. Under the proposal, most of the resulting revenue would be allocated to a Billionaire Tax Health Account, while the rest would go toward an account to fund food assistance and education.

A new expert analysis of the proposal, authored by some of those involved in drafting the initiative, argues that the one-time tax is urgent because “decisions at the federal level have put—and will put—California’s healthcare system, education system, and broader economy under severe stress.”

“Asking the handful of wealthiest Californians to contribute less than the annual appreciation on their fortunes to mitigate these crises is a small, reasonable, and administrable request,” the experts write. “And that is all that this ballot measure does.”

US Billionaire Wealth Surges to $8.1 Trillion as Affordability Crisis Hammers Working Class

“Billionaires are raking in staggering profits off the backs of ordinary workers,” said Chuck Collins of the Institute for Policy Studies.


Elon Musk looks on as US President Donald Trump speaks at the US-Saudi Investment Forum in Washington, DC on November 19, 2025.
(Photo by Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

Jake Johnson
Jan 02, 2026

COMMON DREAMS

The collective wealth of US billionaires surged to $8.1 trillion in 2025 as working-class Americans faced a cost-of-living crisis made worse by President Donald Trump’s tariff regime and unprecedented assault on the social safety net.

An analysis released Friday by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) found that the top 15 US billionaires saw the largest wealth gains last year, with their collective fortune growing from $2.4 trillion to $3.2 trillion. That 33% gain was more than double the S&P 500’s 16% increase in 2025.



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Richest 0.001% Now Own Three Times More Wealth Than Poorest Half of Humanity Combined

What IPS describes as the “elite group” of US billionaires includes Tesla CEO Elon Musk, the richest man in the world; Google co-founder Larry Page; Amazon founder Jeff Bezos; and Oracle executive chairman Larry Ellison.

IPS emphasized that “these staggering combined billionaire wealth totals come as the Trump-GOP budget bill passed in 2025 defunded health insurance, food stamps, and other vital anti-poverty safety net programs, in order to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy and budget increases for militarism and mass deportations.”

“The affordability crisis is hitting ordinary Americans particularly hard as we head into the new year, but not everyone is feeling the pain: Billionaires are raking in staggering profits off the backs of ordinary workers,” Chuck Collins, director of the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at IPS, said in a statement.

“These extreme concentrations of wealth and power,” Collins added, “undermine our daily lives and further rig our economy in favor of the ultra-rich and corporations, while ordinary Americans get a raw deal once again.”

IPS released its analysis days after Bloomberg reported, based on its Billionaires Index, that the world’s 500 richest people gained a record $2.2 trillion in wealth last year.

Omar Ocampo, an IPS researcher, said that in the US, billionaires are “paying far less in taxes compared to the huge amount of wealth they amass,” allowing them to continue accumulating vast fortunes, supercharging inequality, and using their wealth and influence to subvert reform efforts.

“Not only are a small number of Americans holding more wealth than the rest of America, but they’re also not paying their fair share in taxes,” said Ocampo.

The new report comes as families across the US struggle to make ends meet amid high and still-rising prices for groceries, housing, and other necessities. A Century Foundation survey released last month found that “roughly three in 10 voters delayed or skipped medical care in the past year due to cost, while nearly two-thirds switched to cheaper groceries or bought less food altogether.”

 

The First Year of Trump’s Second Term Was Terrific—for US Billionaires

Over 2025, the combined wealth of all US billionaires climbed to $8.1 trillion, a 21% increase over 2025, up from $6.7 trillion exactly a year ago.



Guests including Mark Zuckerberg, Lauren Sanchez, Jeff Bezos, Sundar Pichai, and Elon Musk attend the inauguration of Donald J. Trump in the US Capitol Rotunda on January 20, 2025 in Washington, DC.
(Photo by Julia Demaree Nikhinson - Pool/Getty Images)

Chuck Collins
Jan 02, 2026

Common Dreams


The first year of the Trump administration was a very happy new year for the US billionaire class. The richest 15 billionaires, all with assets more than $100 billion, saw their combined wealth surge 33%, from $2.4 trillion to $3.2 trillion. This is double the growth of the S&P 500 over 2025, which was 16.4%.

Over 2025, the combined wealth of all US billionaires climbed to $8.1 trillion, a 21% increase over 2025, up from $6.7 trillion exactly a year ago.

Based on an Institute for Policy Studies analysis of data from the Forbes real time billionaire list from 2025, there are 935 billionaires in the United States with combined wealth totaling $8.1 trillion at the close of 2025 markets. This is an increase from 813 US billionaires at end close of 2024 markets, with combined wealth of $6.7 trillion.

The richest three American wealth dynasties—the Waltons, Mars, and Koch families—saw their wealth accelerate from $657.8 billion to $757 billion in one year.

Many top billionaires have seen their wealth surge during and after the Covid-19 pandemic at the beginning of 2020.

[Note: Bloomberg reported global billionaire wealth increased $2.2 trillion over 2025, in an analysis released several days before the market closed at 4:00 p.m. on December 31, 2025. The market fluctuated considerably in the final days of 2025.]

The top five current billionaires and their individual wealth on January 1, 2026, compared to January 1, 2025:Elon Musk of Tesla/X and SpaceX with $726 billion, up from $421 trillion a year ago.
Larry Page of Google, with $257 billion, up from $156 billion a year ago.
Larry Ellison of Oracle fame with $245.billion, up from $209 billion a year ago.
Jeff Bezos of Amazon with $242.billion, up from $233.5 billion a year ago.
Sergey Brin of Google with $237 billion, up from $148.9 billion a year ago.

The three wealthiest dynastic families in the US hold an estimated $757 billion, up from $657.8 billion at the end of 2024, a 16% gain. These are:Walton. Seven members of the Walton Family with combined wealth of $483 billion, up from $404.3 billion a year ago.
Mars. Six members of Mars family with combined wealth of $120 billion, down from $130.4 billion a year ago.
Koch. Two members of Koch family have a combined wealth of $154.8 billion, up from $121.1 billion a year ago.
Wealth Gains Since Beginning of Pandemic

Many top billionaires have seen their wealth surge during and after the Covid-19 pandemic at the beginning of 2020.

On March 18, 2020, Elon Musk had wealth valued just under $25 billion. Less than five years later, at the end of 2025, Musk’s wealth is $726 billion, a dizzying 2,800% increase from before the Covid-19 pandemic.

Jeff Bezos saw his wealth rise from $113 billion on March 18, 2020 to $242 billion at the end of 2025.

Three Walton family members—Jim, Alice, and Rob, saw their combined assets increase from $161.1 billion on March 18, 2020 to $378 billion at the end of 2025.



Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.


Chuck Collins
Chuck Collins is a senior scholar at the Institute for Policy Studies where he co-edits Inequality.org. His newest book is Burned by Billionaires: How Concentrated Wealth and Power is Ruining Our Lives and Planet (The New Press). His near future novel "Altar to An Erupting Sun” explores one community’s response to climate disruption. He is author of numerous books and reports on inequality and the racial wealth divide, including “The Wealth Hoarders: How Billionaires Spend Millions to Hide Trillions,” “Born on Third Base,” and, with Bill Gates Sr., of “Wealth and Our Commonwealth: Why American Should Tax Accumulated Fortunes.” See more of his writing at www.chuckcollinswrites.com.
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Trump DHS Post Calling for ‘100 Million Deportations’ Suggests Intent to Kick Out Nonwhite Citizens

One journalist called it “absolutely insane Nazi propaganda, posted by the US government.”



A post by the official X account of the US Department of Homeland Security portraying “America After 100 Million Deportations” as a paradise, on December 31, 2025.
(Artwork by Hiroshi Nagai, modified and posted by the Department of Homeland Security on X)

Stephen Prager
Jan 02, 2026

COMMON DREAMS

The Trump administration provoked horror this week with the suggestion that the United States could be turned into a paradise if over a quarter of the people in the country were deported.

On Wednesday, the official social media account for the Department of Homeland Security posted a piece of artwork depicting a pink late-1960s Cadillac Eldorado parked on a bright, idyllic beach. Over the clear blue sky are the words “America after 100 million deportations.”

‘Straight-Up Nazi Stuff’: Trump Admin Plans to Strip More Naturalized Americans of Citizenship



Trump’s Mass Deportation Agenda Could Kill 400,000 Direct Care Jobs in US: Report

The post was captioned by the agency: “The peace of a nation no longer besieged by the third world.”

Social media users later discovered that DHS had, ironically, stolen the image from the Japanese pop artist Hiroshi Nagai without giving credit.

It is hardly the first time the administration has used edgy and inflammatory social media posts to promote its agenda. But DHS has come under particular scrutiny for its style of communication, which often evokes white nationalist rhetoric and symbolism.

Posts by the agency have cheered “remigration,” a term that far-right parties in Europe have often used to describe the forced repatriation of nonwhite populations, including citizens. Other posts have referred to President Donald Trump’s “mass deportation” campaign as part of an effort to defend American “heritage” and “culture.”

The agency frequently evokes images of the American frontier and references “Manifest Destiny,” at times explicitly posting artwork glorifying the forced displacement of Native American populations.

An image by the agency, featuring a chiseled Uncle Sam calling on Americans to “REPORT ALL FOREIGN INVADERS,” was even directly sourced from an overt neo-Nazi account.

The agency has only continued to double down in the face of criticism this week. On Friday, it posted that “2026 will be the year of American Supremacy” over an image of then-Gen. George Washington crossing the Delaware River, which was emblazoned with the words “Return this Land,” a possible reference to a recently-founded “whites-only” town in rural Arkansas known as “Return to the Land.”



But Wednesday’s post calling for “100 million deportations” specifically was perhaps the most direct nod yet to those who believe the United States must be reconstituted as a white nation. As social media users were quick to point out, only about 47 million people living in America are foreign-born, according to the US Census Bureau.

Even if the administration kicked out every single immigrant—including legal residents and naturalized citizens—meeting such a goal would mean deporting 53 million people who were born in the US and are legally entitled to citizenship under the 14th Amendment.

If the use of the phrase “third world” did not make it obvious enough, the specific number—100 million—seems to betray the racial motivation behind the message.

Citing 2020 census data on the Wikipedia page for “Demographics of the United States,” one social media user pointed out that approximately 100 million people in the US identified as nonwhite.



The DHS post drew comparisons to one made earlier this year by the close Trump ally and unofficial White House operative Laura Loomer, who suggested that thanks to “Alligator Alcatraz,” the massive internment camp in Florida for those arrested by immigration agents, “the alligators are guaranteed at least 65 million meals,” which referenced the total number of Hispanic people in the United States.

While it’s almost certainly not possible for the administration to conduct a deportation campaign of such a staggering scale within Trump’s term of office, the administration’s latest post was frightening to many observers, even as they acknowledged that it was a “troll post” meant to rile people up.

It is still reflective of the Trump administration’s ideology with respect to immigration. Leaders of Trump’s deportation effort have acknowledged that they target people based on their appearance, and many nonwhite US citizens have been caught in the dragnet. Meanwhile, its refugee policy has welcomed only white South Africans, as Trump has enacted what he says is a “permanent pause on migration from all Third World Countries.”

During 2026, the administration has said it plans to target hundreds of US citizens each month for “denaturalization,” and Trump has called for it to be used against his most prominent critics, including the Somali-American Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and New York’s first Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani.

“This is absolutely insane Nazi propaganda, posted by the US government,” said Ben Norton, editor of the Geopolitical Economy Report in response to DHS’s call for“100 million deportations.”

“It makes it clear that the Trump administration’s mass deportation drive is not actually about ‘illegal immigration.’ There are estimated to be 14 million undocumented immigrants in the US. But the fascist DHS wants to deport 100 million people,” Norton continued. “This is a call by the US regime for ethnic cleansing of racial minorities, to create a white-supremacist regime without anyone with ‘third world’ heritage.”

Trump is clearly in the pocket of this fellow fascist thug — so why do we still look away?

D. Earl Stephens
January 1, 2026 

ALTERNET

Russian President Vladimir Putin is a mass-murderer and an enemy of the United States of America.

United States President Donald J. Trump has repeatedly appeased Putin, and is an enemy of the United States of America too.

That’s today’s column, and thank you for reading ...

Honestly, folks, I hoped to treat myself to a quiet holiday week, but simply must address the latest diabolical Putin-Trump phony attempt at a “peace deal” in Ukraine with some considerable urgency.

I also cannot look away from how this alleged “peace deal” is being reported by what’s left of our stinking garbage can of a legacy media, which is either complicit with Trump and Putin, or incredibly inept at journalism — but most likely both.

Once again, we are all being played for fools by these two dangerous skunks, whose lies echo freely in the vast, empty spaces of these major, bought-off media empires without challenge or context.


I have had more than enough of all of them.

So let’s get right down to it: Aided by a comatose American electorate in which only 59 percent of its voters bothered to show at the polls, Russia worked feverishly to install Trump as president in 2016.

Trump Campaign Chair Paul Manafort was actually passing internal campaign information to Russian intelligence officers during the election.


Go ahead: Read that again.

Trump himself asked for Russia’s help to hack Hillary Clinton’s email on the campaign trail, saying: “Russia, if you’re listening … I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”

Prescient, eh?


For what it’s worth Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan’s office condemned this public treason by saying in part, “Russia is a global menace led by a devious thug. Putin should stay out of this election.”

I add this because there actually was a time when some Republicans frowned on murdering fascists taking power, instead of courting them.

Look, Trump never even sniffs power without Putin’s help.


And hey, if you think I am typing just a little too fast and loose here to get back to my vacation, then I urge you to have a look at the infamous Mueller Report, which concluded among other damning things, that Russian interference in the 2016 election was “sweeping and systemic.” The report “identified numerous links between the Russian government and the Trump Campaign.”

Read that way, it’s a wonder Trump wasn’t removed from office and jailed on the spot, except Trump’s slimy personal lawyer, er, attorney general, Bill Barr, came to his own conclusions, which most of the media at the time were only too happy to lap up, spit out, and call good.

The Mueller Report was a complete mindblower, and after reading it, if anybody still willingly believes that Trump wasn’t aware of Moscow’s illegal interventions on his behalf, shouldn’t be trusted to dress themselves in the morning.


Then there’s the Republican-led Senate intelligence committee report in 2020 which concluded “the Trump campaign's interactions with Russian intelligence services during the 2016 presidential election posed a grave counterintelligence threat.”

Oh, and that committee’s chair? Well, that would be a guy named Marco Rubio, who lately has lowered himself to a level equal to the proximity of Trump’s ample ass.

You can’t make this up, because it’s all true, but has all but been conveniently forgotten by our ridiculous legacy media, whose reporting on Trump consistently includes little to no context for his myriad past offenses.


And let’s travel back in time to 2018, and Trump’s surrender in Helsinki where, in the words of the late Sen. John McCain, “(Trump) abased himself … abjectly before a tyrant.”

“Abased himself … abjectly before a tyrant.”

Finally, if you want all of this put in a tight package topped with a neat bow, I offer this showstopper penned by the Center for American Progress, dated Dec. 18, 2018: Following the Money: Trump and Russia-linked Transactions from the Campaign to the Presidential Inauguration.


It’s a mind-boggling piece of journalism that is painstakingly sourced and should be required reading for anybody (I’m looking at you, legacy media) who reports on Trump’s extensive interactions with Putin.

It concludes this way:
“If financial flows from Russia played a direct role in Trump’s campaign and transition, the potential implications for his presidency and America’s national security are far more immediate, urgent, and dangerous than those potentially resulting from his decadeslong business entanglements. Until we have a full accounting of what transpired — and how — we will not be sufficiently equipped to protect future elections against similar attacks from foreign powers.”


So why has our damn media seemingly quit working to get that accounting?


It is 2025, and we are still somehow trusting a guy who spurred a violent attack against the United States of America to have its best interests in mind while he snuggles up and deals dirty with Putin in private.

It’s absurd.

Look, there is no way — make that NO WAY — Trump will agree to anything with Russia and Putin that does not benefit Russia and Putin.

HE OWES THEM.

To believe otherwise defies common sense, and is an abuse of everybody who has had the gall to pay attention to this terrible tandem’s decades-long dealings.

Notice how Trump never begins any “peace” negotiations with Ukraine and Russia without talking to Putin first.

In 2013, Trump was like the fat kid who got trapped in the candy store, when Putin patted him on the head and allowed for his Miss Universe Pageant to descend on Moscow.

Trump tweeted this:

“I just got back from Russia-learned lots & lots. Moscow is a very interesting and amazing place! U.S. MUST BE VERY SMART AND VERY STRATEGIC.”

He later tweeted this that day:

“Do you think Putin will be going to The Miss Universe Pageant. If so, will he become my new best friend?”

Three years later, we all got our answer.

We can also assume that Russia was harvesting tons of kompromat on the big-mouthed Trump as he bragged about sidling up to one billionaire Russian oligarch after another in hopes of extending his real estate ventures there. “The Russian market is attractive to me,” he said at the time.

Lord knows what Putin has on Trump, but we do know this: Trump has never said a bad word about Putin — ever. He has, however, called him “smart” “savvy” “a strong leader” “a genius” and “charming.”

I guarantee you this miserable lowlife has never uttered these words about anybody besides himself in his miserable lifetime.

He has repeatedly bragged about how well the two thugs get along. The instances of this are too many to list here, but just sit with this beauty following Putin’s illegal attack on Ukraine:
“They say, ‘Trump said Putin’s smart.’ I mean, he’s taking over a country for two dollars’ worth of sanctions. I’d say that’s pretty smart. He’s taking over a country — really a vast, vast location, a great piece of land with a lot of people, and just walking right in.”


This, of course, is appalling, and I’ll ask again because I simply have to: How-in-the-hell could ANYBODY have voted for this fascist felon in 2024?

Like Putin, Trump does not have his country’s best interests in mind, he has HIS best interests on mind.

Trump and Putin are fascist thugs.

They worship power and money and will do anything to get it and keep it.

There will be no peace deals, only continuing crimes against humanity.

Words and actions back all this up.

It’s long past time it was reported this way.

(D. Earl Stephens is the author of “Toxic Tales: A Caustic Collection of Donald J. Trump’s Very Important Letters” and finished up a 30-year career in journalism as the Managing Editor of Stars and Stripes. You can find all his work here.)

This media tale goes beyond irony to tell us something very dark about America

Daniel Falcone,

 Common Dreams
January 2, 2026 

The Free Press's co-founders, Suzy Weiss, Bari Weiss, and Nellie Bowles, pose in this handout picture. Daniel Paik/Paramount/Handout via REUTERS

According to the concept of “manufactured consent,” elaborated by Noam Chomsky and Ed Herman in the 1980s, the media carries out a propaganda function in support of the dominant political system. In the United States, this consent has favored particular governments beyond the US government itself — for instance, Israel in its conflict with Palestinians. A recent example has been CBS, owned by David Ellison’s Paramount and under Bari Weiss’ editorial leadership, which has systematically suppressed Palestinian voices in favor of Israel and President Donald Trump.

In another example of manufactured consent, Weiss’ CBS rejected a 60 Minutes story that made the Trump administration look bad on El Salvador. Incidentally, since the end of last summer, the US State Department has dropped criticism of both Israel and El Salvador in its human rights reporting, merging the interests of CBS with the politics of the current administration. When journalist Sharyn Alfonsi wrote the segment about the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) in El Salvador and what life there is like, the content was pulled at the last minute because Weiss said it needed more reporting and balance, even when journalists at CBS invited all sides for a comment. They insisted that the decision was political and not editorial.

Jeffrey St. Clair for CounterPunch recently stated that “CBS under [Bari] Weiss may be worse than Fox News, because nobody takes Fox seriously as a news source and many do CBS, though not for much longer, one suspects.”

Andy Borowitz pointed out that, “When Bari Weiss and CBS decided to censor the report on El Salvador’s brutal prison, they didn’t realize that bootlegged copies would surface.” Indeed, as reported by Variety, the “report yanked by Weiss about the horrific treatment of detainees deported from the US to a prison in El Salvador … leaked online after appearing on a Canadian-TV app.”

Alfonsi did not hold back in her criticism:

Our story was screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and Standards and Practices. It is factually correct. In my view, pulling it now — after every rigorous internal check has been met is not an editorial decision, it is a political one. We requested responses to questions and/or interviews with DHS, the White House, and the State Department. Government silence is a statement, not a veto. Their refusal to be interviewed is a tactical maneuver designed to kill the story.

Alfonsi further explained:

If the administration’s refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a “kill switch” for any reporting they find inconvenient. If the standard for airing a story becomes “the government must agree to be interviewed,” then the government effectively gains control over the 60 Minutes broadcast. We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state. These men risked their lives to speak with us. We have a moral and professional obligation to the sources who entrusted us with their stories. Abandoning them now is a betrayal of the most basic tenet of journalism: giving voice to the voiceless.

Back in 2020, Weiss, in her resignation letter to the New York Times, stated that “self-censorship” and “fitting a predetermined narrative” to satisfy “a narrow audience rather than allowing a curious public read,” led her to quit.

Just before that, in 2018, she authored in the Times, “We’re All Fascists Now,” a right-wing lament that basically talks of a center-left discourse threatening free speech by its mere interrogation of the hard right.

In essence, Weiss complains of the left trivializing fascism only to cover up the fact that she accepts hard power and state authority and structural violence as forms of conventional wisdom beyond criticism. Cultural norms are not really “left leaning,” but it is certainly useful for her to present them this way. Weiss is in the business of providing security to dominant groups in advancing and advocating the consensus required by the state-corporate news nexus.

Weiss might discount how popular fascism was and is in the context of US history in the first place. When you factor in the popularity of the Ku Klux Klan, which peaked at 6 million-plus members in the early 20th century, American admiration for Mussolini, and the regional popularity of the German Bund, the United States has a horrific past with extreme right affiliation. Just over 1 in 3 Americans listened in the 1930s to Charles Coughlin, an outspoken supporter of Nazism.

But you don’t even need to go far back in history to see the US role in El Salvador’s deterioration or Trump’s subversion of US asylum law, all to promote fascism and militarism. Currently, the Trump administration’s deportation of Venezuelans in violation of international humanitarian law is well known as an emerging crime against humanity. A federal judge has just issued a ruling that requires the United States to grant due process to deported Venezuelans. Additionally, the entire matter has the potential to be examined by the International Criminal Court.

CBS certainly knows that CECOT is a large, high-security prison in El Salvador that has been cited by Human Rights Watch, the UN General Assembly, and the Yale Global Health Review for its harsh conditions and human-rights related concerns. HRW’s report in November 2025 was entitled “You Have Arrived in Hell,” a concept reiterated by Spiegel International. Amnesty International and Relief Web's coverage of the expulsions, which entail people deported from the U.S. and sent to CECOT. It is illegal under international humanitarian law to send refugees to known places of human rights abuse.


Weiss seems to believe that the flagrant nature of Trump’s actions requires the press to yield and to ignore facts that “seem radical.” Additionally, Weiss encourages apolitical journalists to engage in self-censorship and to dismiss the buried segment as a “workplace dispute.”

All the while, 60 Minutes remains entirely mainstream and conventional. As reporter Dave Zirin points out, 60 Minutes was never perfect, it’s been a mouthpiece for war and empire many times over the decades.” He aptly explains how Weiss canceled “the brave testimonials of Venezuelans, tortured in Trump’s El Salvadoran slave labor prison.”

To Zirin’s point, Weiss, a loyal commissar to corporate statism, has internalized the belief that her job is to reinforce the corporate rather than the contrarian brand of 60 Minutes and avoid coverage of geopolitical issues that might make her job more difficult. When she undermines actual reporting and denies the labor, dignity, and courage found in solid reporting, she is trafficking in the politics of organized forgetting and silence.


What Weiss does worst of all, of course, is to provide cover for Trumpian structural viciousness, what policy analyst Khury Petersen-Smith has called the “era for spectacular violence.” This all comes as International relations expert Stephen Zunes recently pointed out how “the United States is now ranked 57th in political freedom,” behind dozens of nations and territories according to Freedom House.

Weiss is only helping to contribute to the trend, and this backlash is likely to continue.

Daniel Falcone is a historian, teacher, and journalist. In addition to Foreign Policy in Focus, he has written for The Journal of Contemporary Iraq & the Arab World, The Nation, Jacobin, Truthout, CounterPunch, and Scalawag. He resides in New York City and is a member of The Democratic Socialists of America.

CBS Evening News under fire for ditching ethics handbook for 'empty-brain' patriotic vow

Matthew Chapman
January 2, 2026 

RAW STORY

Bari Weiss (Photo via Michael Blake for Reuters)

CBS Evening News unveiled a five-point mission statement on Friday, which the newscast claims will replace its previous 38-page handbook on journalistic ethics — but one particular element of the statement drew intense scrutiny.

"We love America. And we make no apologies for saying so," stated the section. "Our foundational values of liberty, equality and the rule of law make us the last best hope on Earth. We also believe in Franklin's famous line about America as a republic — if we can keep it. We aim to do our part every night: One way to think about our show is as a daily conversation about exactly where we are as a country and where we are going."

The oddly jingoistic nature of the mission statement prompted immediate concern and criticism, given that CBS News was just given a new right-wing boss, Bari Weiss, as part of a Trump administration-approved merger, and the network also just blocked reporting on torture being experienced by Trump-deported migrants at a foreign mega prison.

"In 2004 reporters at 60 Minutes had the story about how the US military was torturing & murdering prisoners at Abu Ghraib," wrote Investigative Post reporter J. Dale Shoemaker. "CBS execs refused to air it bc it would 'hurt the war effort.' Only after Sy Hersh threatened to report that did they air. Perhaps useful context for this."

"Any journalistic enterprise expressing a default love for the state is a very odd thing," wrote The Black List founder Franklin Leonard.

"This is such an empty-brain statement," wrote Chris Geidner of Law Dork. "The government murdering people on boats and sending people to CECOT are contrary to the rule of law, so what’s your point?"

"You don’t hold power accountable by wrapping 'news' in the flag and pretending it’s journalism," wrote Democratic strategist Matt McDermott.

"This rhetoric has creeped into a growing number of media mission statements," wrote Washington Post global affairs columnist Ishaan Tharoor. "Many of us MSM journalists like to believe that we perform a civic function; very few of us see our calling as a nationalistic one. The former ethos, at worst, may be naive. The latter is downright childish."

"I love America. I think it’s a great country," wrote MS NOW contributor Rotimi Adeoye. "But when America fails or harms [its] people, will CBS actually report that, or will they decide that because they 'love America' they can’t tell the full truth about what happened?"

Grok under fire after complaints it undressed minors in photos

By AFP
January 2, 2026


Grok parent xAI is being pressed for details about what it is doing to stop the artificial intelligence tool from being used to remove clothes from women or children in pictures - Copyright AFP Lionel BONAVENTURE

Elon Musk’s Grok on Friday said it was scrambling to fix flaws in the artificial intelligence tool after users claimed it turned pictures of children or women into erotic images.

“We’ve identified lapses in safeguards and are urgently fixing them,” Grok said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

“CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Material) is illegal and prohibited.”

Complaints of abuses began hitting X after an “edit image” button was rolled out on Grok in late December.

The button allows users to modify any image on the platform — with some users deciding to partially or completely remove clothing from women or children in pictures, according to complaints.

Grok maker xAI, run by Musk, replied to an AFP query with a terse, automated response that said: “the mainstream media lies.”

The Grok chatbot, however, did respond to an X user who queried it on the matter, after they said that a company in the United States could face criminal prosecution for knowingly facilitating or failing to prevent the creation or sharing of child porn.

Media outlets in India reported on Friday that government officials there are demanding X quickly provide them details of measures the company is taking to remove “obscene, nude, indecent, and sexually suggestive content” generated by Grok without the consent of those in such pictures.

The public prosecutor’s office in Paris meanwhile expanded an investigation into X to include new accusations that Grok was being used for generating and disseminating child pornography.

The initial investigation against X was opened in July following reports that the social network’s algorithm was being manipulated for the purpose of foreign interference.

Grok has been criticized in recent months for generating multiple controversial statements, from the war in Gaza and the India-Pakistan conflict to antisemitic remarks and spreading misinformation about a deadly shooting in Australia.

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Elon Musk in hot water as probe launched into AI chatbot over explicit images of kids

Brad Reed, 

Common Dreams
January 2, 2026 


FILE PHOTO: Elon Musk is seen with a bruised eye that Musk claimed he received at the hands of his son, X Æ A-12, as he attends a press conference with U.S. President Donald Trump in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 30, 2025. REUTERS/Nathan Howard/File Photo

Elon Musk is facing calls for legal ramifications after Grok, the AI chatbot used on his X social media platform, produced sexually suggestive images of children.

Politico reported on Friday that the Paris prosecutor’s office in France is opening an investigation into X after Grok, following prompts from users, created deepfake photographs of both adult women and underage girls that removed their clothes and replaced them with bikinis.

Politico added that the investigation into X over the images will “bolster” an ongoing investigation launched by French prosecutors last year into Grok’s dissemination of Holocaust denial propaganda.

France is not the only government putting pressure on Musk, as TechCrunch reported on Friday that India’s information technology ministry has given X 72 hours to restrict users’ ability to generate content deemed “obscene, pornographic, vulgar, indecent, sexually explicit, pedophilic, or otherwise prohibited under law.”

Failure to comply with this order, the ministry warned, could lead to the government ending X’s legal immunity from being sued over user-generated content.

In an interview with Indian cable news network CNBC TV18, cybersecurity expert Ritesh Bhatia argued that legal liability for the images generated by Grok should not just lie with the users whose prompts generated them, but with the creators of the chatbot itself.

“When a platform like Grok even allows such prompts to be executed, the responsibility squarely lies with the intermediary,” said Bhatia. “Technology is not neutral when it follows harmful commands. If a system can be instructed to violate dignity, the failure is not human behavior alone—it is design, governance, and ethical neglect. Creators of Grok need to take immediate action.”

Corey Rayburn Yung, a professor at the University of Kansas School of Law, argued on Bluesky that it was “unprecedented” for a digital platform to give “users a tool to actively create” child sexual abuse material (CSAM).

“There are no other instances of a major company affirmatively facilitating the production of child pornography,” Yung emphasized. “Treating this as the inevitable result of generative AI and social media is a harrowing mistake.”

Andy Craig, a fellow at the Institute for Humane Studies, said that US states should use their powers to investigate X over Grok’s generation of CSAM, given that it is unlikely the federal government under President Donald Trump will do so.

“Every state has its equivalent laws about this stuff,” Craig explained. “Musk is not cloaked in some federal immunity just because he’s off-again/on-again buddies with Trump.”

Grok first gained the ability to generate sexual content this past summer when Musk introduced a new “spicy mode” for the chatbot that was immediately used to generate deepfake nude photos of celebrities.

Weeks before this, Grok began calling itself “MechaHitler” after Musk ordered his team to make tweaks to the chatbot to make it more “politically incorrect.”