As Trump Targets AP, Media Urged to Resist Moves Like 'Gulf of America' Renaming

"It's at times like these that journalists need to put down their pens and advocate for accountable leadership," asserted one campaigner.

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters aboard Air Force One after signing a proclamation renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America on February 9, 2025.
(Photo: Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images)

Brett Wilkins
Feb 14, 2025

COMMON DREAMS

First Amendment defenders are calling on media organizations and journalists to stand up to bullying and intimidation by U.S. President Donald Trump, whose administration on Friday confirmed the indefinite exclusion of one of the world's largest news agencies from White House press briefings and Air Force One flights over its refusal to adopt the Republican leader's new name for the Gulf of Mexico.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Taylor Budowich said that because The Associated Press "continues to ignore the lawful geographic name change" of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, it will be indefinitely banned from White House news conferences and the president's official airplane.

"The level of pettiness displayed by the White House is so incredible that it almost hides the gravity of the situation."

The New York-based AP, which provides news content to roughly 15,000 media outlets in over 100 countries, has explained that, because the gulf is an international body of water, it will continue to call it the Gulf of Mexico because Mexico—whose president on Thursday threatened to sue Google for adopting Trump's name change—and other countries do not recognize the new name.

In contrast, the AP said it will call Denali, the highest peak in North America, Mt. McKinley following a name change by Trump because the Alaska mountain is located entirely inside the United States.

Budowich said the AP's decision on the Gulf of Mexico exposes the agency's "commitment to misinformation."

"While their right to irresponsible and dishonest reporting is protected by the First Amendment, it does not ensure their privilege of unfettered access to limited spaces," he argued.




But critics said the Trump administration's behavior is about a lot more than just a spat over a name change.

"Of course, this is just more petty behavior by a president seeking to punish any news organization that doesn't follow his dictates, regardless of how ridiculous they may be," Timothy Karr, the senior director of strategy and communications at Free Press, told Common Dreams on Friday.

"It's at times like these that journalists need to put down their pens and advocate for accountable leadership," Karr stressed. "They need to advocate for themselves, their colleagues, and for journalism writ large."

"The good news is that more than a dozen of the mass market news outlets have refused to adopt Trump's name change for the Gulf of Mexico," he added. "That's a start. They now need to speak out against his First Amendment threats, despite the consequences. There is much more at stake now than just having access to the White House."

"By defying Trump, the AP has created a rallying point for other organizations and individuals to find their spines and defy him as well."

Writing for Public Notice Friday, Noah Berlatsky commended the AP for "not changing their style to suit the whims of a would-be tin-pot dictator."

"And by defying Trump, the AP has created a rallying point for other organizations and individuals to find their spines and defy him as well," Berlatsky added.

Those include the heads of the White House Correspondents' Association (WHCA) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF), as well as groups like the Committee to Protect Journalists, National Press Club, PEN America, and Society of Professional Journalists.

"The White House cannot dictate how news organizations report the news, nor should it penalize working journalists because it is unhappy with their editors' decisions," WHCA president Eugene Daniels said earlier this week.

RSF USA executive director Clayton Weimers said in a statement that "the level of pettiness displayed by the White House is so incredible that it almost hides the gravity of the situation."

"A sitting president is punishing a major news outlet for its constitutionally protected choice of words," Weimers added. "Donald Trump has been trampling over press freedom since his first day in office."



Numerous experts highlighted what they called the unconstitutionality of banning a media outlet from press briefings for political reasons.

"The AP—a major news agency that produces and distributes reports to thousands of newspapers, radio stations, and TV broadcasters around the world—has had long-standing access to the White House," Aaron Terr, director of public advocacy at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, wrote on Friday.

"It is now losing that access because its exercise of editorial discretion doesn't align with the administration’s preferred messaging," Terr added. "That's viewpoint discrimination, and it's unconstitutional."

Berlatsky wrote: "As ABC, Meta, the LA Times, The Washington Post, and Google demonstrate, you lose 100% of the fights you preemptively and despicably surrender. The AP has already won an important victory by refusing to change the Gulf of Mexico to some random other name at the whim of a power-mad orange gasbag."

"If any portion of Trump's agenda is to be stopped, we need people and organizations who are willing to defy him and speak truths he doesn't want to hear," he added. "Despite Trump, the AP still calls the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of Mexico. In doing so, it's reminding us what freedom looks like. It's also demonstrating us that if you don't want to lose your freedoms, you have to use them."

Mexico threatens to sue Google over ‘Gulf of America’ name change


By AFP
February 13, 2025


Google has changed the name of the Gulf of Mexico to "Gulf of America" for map users in the United States - Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File 

USTIN SULLIVAN

Mexico on Thursday threatened to sue Google over its changing the Gulf of Mexico’s name to “Gulf of America” for Maps users in the United States to comply with President Donald Trump’s executive order.

“We do have a dispute with Google at the moment,” President Claudia Sheinbaum said at her morning news conference. “And if necessary, we will file a civil suit.”

Trump signed executive orders renaming the Gulf of Mexico and reverting the name of North America’s highest peak, Denali, back to Mount McKinley soon after his January 20 inauguration.

Sheinbaum argued that Trump’s order referred only to the part of the continental shelf belonging to the United States.

“What we are saying to Google is: check the order that was issued by the White House and signed by President Trump. You will see that it does not refer to the entire Gulf, but to the continental shelf,” she said.

Sheinbaum said Google had maintained its position even after her government sent it a letter objecting to the renaming.

“If they continue to insist, we will too,” she added.

“We are even thinking of a lawsuit, because they are even naming Mexican territory, which is our continental shelf,” she said.

In response to Trump, Sheinbaum has cheekily suggested calling the United States “Mexican America,” pointing to a map dating back to before 1848, when one-third of her country was seized by the United States.

Google, which is part of tech giant Alphabet, said users of its Maps app outside the United States would continue to see both the original and new name for the Gulf of Mexico, as is the case for other disputed locations.

“People using Maps in the US will see ‘Gulf of America,’ and people in Mexico will see ‘Gulf of Mexico.’ Everyone else will see both names,” the company said.

Apple has also renamed the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” for US users of its mapping application to comply with Trump’s order.

Trump’s renamings also sparked criticism from Indigenous groups in Alaska, who have long advocated for maintaining the Denali name.

Trump's teenage wonderboys and the axe his cronies just took to America’s nuclear watchdogs

XX-34 BADGER (yield 23 kt) - an atmospheric nuclear test performed by the U.S. on 18 April 1953 as part of Operation Upshot-Knothole at the Nevada Test Site.
(Image: U.S Government / public domain / Flickr)Image: U.S Government / public domain / Flickr)

Thom Hartmann

February 16, 2025
 AlterNet

— Are we seeing the beginnings of World War III brought to us by Trump and Putin? Trump’s reflexive ass-kissing of Putin is putting Europe at risk of war, repeating the big mistake that Neville Chamberlain made at the Munich conference on September 30, 1938. Expansionist dictators like Putin are not interested in peace unless it’s entirely on their own terms; Putin has already, since he became president of Russia on the last day of 1999, taken over or seized functional control via proxies of Belarus, Chechnya, Syria, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Crimea, and Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh region. Claiming that the breakup of the Soviet Union was “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century” (Прежде всего, следует признать, что крушение Советского Союза было крупнейшей геополитической катастрофой века), he’s now trying to get the old band together, which includes absorbing Ukraine.

Trump, Hegseth, and Vance all appear committed to helping Putin achieve his goal, kneecapping any effort to give Ukraine real security and ratifying the discredited doctrine that when a country invades a neighbor they should be able to keep whatever land and resources they can steal. Trump actually said: “Russia fought for that land in Ukraine and lost a lot of men doing it, so they should just keep it.” This is insanity. And it gives a green light to China on their quest to regain control of Taiwan by force, another event that could trigger a third world war.

This is such an extreme pro-Putin and anti-democracy position that Britain’s prime minister and politicians across Europe are calling it out, worried that Trump is quite literally walking that continent toward war with Russia. As the conservative Member of Parliament Sir Bernard Jenkin said, “Some of the defence chiefs have been expressing this, that we must be ready to fight a war with Russia if necessary, in order to be able to deter Russia.” Yes, European politicians are now openly discussing the possibility of war on the continent, all because Trump is so weak when it comes to Putin. Pathetic…and dangerous.

— Trump’s Cronies Just Took an Axe to America’s Nuclear Watchdogs—And It’s Exactly What Putin Wants. The Dogey crew have now, according to ABC News, begun to gut an agency most Americans don’t even know exists: the National Nuclear Security Administration. This agency of around 1800 people monitors Putin’s nuclear weaponry, keeps ours in tip-top shape, and investigates nuclear disasters and the proliferation of nuclear weapons around the world. As ABC News reported, “Two former staffers confirmed probationary employees began receiving termination notices late Thursday and worried the agency of only about 1,800 employees was losing the key nuclear arms expertise that cannot be replaced.” It appears that, for the moment, the gutting of this agency was paused after the news broke, but if Putin likes it, odds are they’ll be back with another axe to take to the agency. After all, Republicans need to lay off enough government employees to free up $4 trillion to pay for the tax cuts they have planned for people making over a quarter-million a year (and tax increases for everybody below), and if it helps Trump suck up to Putin, all the better…

— Seven Justice Department prosecutors have now resigned rather than being “enough of a fool or coward” to drop corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams. This is Nixon’s Saturday Night Massacre on steroids, and highlights how corrupt Pam Bondi and Emil Bove are willing to be to satisfy their orange overlord. One of the Justice Department prosecutors, Hagan Scotten, comes with solid conservative credentials, having served 3 combat tours in Iraq (earning two Bronze Stars) and clerking for both John Roberts and Brett Kavanaugh. Scotten was blunt in his resignation letter:
“I can even understand how a Chief Executive whose background is in business and politics might see the contemplated dismissal-with-leverage as a good, if distasteful, deal. But any assistant U.S. attorney would know that our laws and traditions do not allow using the prosecutorial power to influence other citizens, much less elected officials, in this way.
“If no lawyer within earshot of the President is willing to give him that advice, then I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool, or enough of a coward, to file your motion. But it was never going to be me.”

That said, Bove and Bondi finally found somebody who was retiring and did the deed so that his colleagues wouldn’t lose their jobs; it’s now just a matter of time before the entire DOJ has been corrupted and turned into Trump’s personal vengeance machine.

— JD Vance brings his culture war to Europe. Everybody at the Munich Security Conference this week wanted to hear what the vice president had to say about Trump’s and Hegseth’s bizarre surrender-monkey comments on Ukraine. Instead, Vance forced them to sit through an extended screed about how terrible it is that European countries censor or even punish people who openly promote Nazi propaganda and racist memes. Vance also went on and on about immigrants, bringing Trump’s and Vance’s naked racism into the continent’s media, much to the delight of white supremacists everywhere. As CNN’s foreign correspondent Nick Paton Walsh noted, the VP’s speech was “bizarre.” I’d add, it’s also dangerous.

— Musk’s teenage wonder-boys left a backdoor open on the DOGE website, leading to its capture by hackers. Noting that “this is a joke of a .gov site” and “THESE ‘EXPERTS’ LEFT THEIR DATABASE OPEN -roro,” a group of anonymous hackers briefly took control of the doge.gov website. They told 404 Media, that the Dogey website “is insecure and pulls from a database” called Cloudflare Pages that can be edited by anyone. And these are the guys inside our nuclear secrets, our spy agencies, our federal payroll records, and now Social Security and Medicare. What could possibly go wrong?

— California, Oregon, and Washington state have been invited to join Canada. In a tongue-in-cheek proclamation, Canadian Member of Parliament Elizabeth May suggested the three states could get “free healthcare” and “safe streets” by abandoning the US and joining Canada as their newest province or two or three. She pointed out that their Medicare-for-All system covers everybody so nobody would have to go on GoFundMe to beg for money for their kids’ hospitalization, and the NRA doesn’t run Canadian politics like it does here so there’s so few gun crimes that they don’t even traumatize children with school shooting drills. “We’ll also take Bernie Sanders off your hands,” she added as an afterthought, suggesting Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine could join Canada’s maritime provinces. Are you ready to sign on? Let me know what you think…

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'Deeply Concerned' Dems Want to Know If DOGE Can Access Nuclear Weapons Data

"The nation and the world need to know that U.S. nuclear secrets are robustly safeguarded," argue Sen. Ed Markey and Rep. Don Beyer.


U.S. Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) speaks while Congressman Don Beyer (D-Va.) looks on, during a nuclear arms control event outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on June 4, 2024.
(Photo: Sen. Ed Markey/X)

Brett Wilkins
Feb 12, 2025
COMMONDREAMS

A pair of Democratic U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday asked the Trump administration to clarify whether any members of Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency have access to classified information about the nation's nuclear arsenal.

Responding to U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright's admission that he granted DOGE associates access to the Department of Energy, and to reporting that a 23-year-old former intern at Musk's SpaceX was allowed into DOE's IT systems without the requisite security clearances, Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.)—both members of the congressional Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control Working Group—wrote to Wright to voice their concerns.

"The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), an integral part of the Department of Energy, is entrusted with protecting the nation's most sensitive nuclear weapons secrets. The nation and the world need to know that U.S. nuclear secrets are robustly safeguarded," the lawmakers wrote.

"It is, therefore, dangerously unacceptable that Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency—including individuals lacking adequate security clearances—has been granted access to DOE's information technology (IT) system despite legitimate security concerns inside the agency," they added.



"There is no justification for relaxing basic security procedures when it comes to our nuclear stockpile, but recent actions reflect a brazen disregard for DOE security policies," Markey and Beyer argued. "DOE must ensure that all personnel with access to classified information and systems surrounding our nation's nuclear arsenal follow the highest security standards."

The letter continues:
Recently, you were quoted as saying that three individuals involved with DOGE are at DOE and "have access to look around, talk to people, and give us some good feedback on how things are going." And, according to media reports, a 23-year-old former SpaceX intern, who does not have the appropriate security clearances needed to access DOE's IT system, received access over the objections of members of its general counsel and chief information offices. This incursion into some of the nation's most sensitive files is the latest in a series of Trump administration moves to plant unqualified Musk and DOGE staffers throughout the federal government, some of whom have records of leaking sensitive information and potentially wreaking havoc with vital information systems.

"As members of the congressional Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control Working Group, we are deeply concerned by this disregard of DOE security protocols and the potential impacts on our nuclear security," Markey and Beyer wrote.

The lawmakers asked Wright to answer the following questions by Friday:What is the process for granting, reviewing, and revoking security clearances for DOGE staffers at DOE?
Have any DOGE staffers been given access to NNSA classified nuclear weapons information?
Under what authority and justification was each instance of classified access granted to DOGE staffers?
Are DOGE staffers required to undergo training on the handling of classified information?
What security measures are in place to ensure DOGE staffers do not improperly access or inappropriately share sensitive nuclear secrets?
Have any DOGE staffers with access to classified information had significant outside financial interests, foreign contacts, or other affiliations that could pose security concerns?
Are NNSA employees included in the administration's buyout offer for federal employees?
If so, and if senior NNSA employees leave the organization, how do you plan to maintain the security and secrecy of nuclear weapons and related information?

Appearing on CNBC Friday, Wright dismissed "rumors" that DOGE members are "seeing our nuclear secrets."

How to find climate data and science the Trump administration doesn’t want you to see

The Conversation
February 16, 2025 

Earth melting [Shutterstock]

Information on the internet might seem like it’s there forever, but it’s only as permanent as people choose to make it.

That’s apparent as the second Trump administration “floods the zone” with efforts to dismantle science agencies and the data and websites they use to communicate with the public. The targets range from public health and demographics to climate science.

We are a research librarian and policy scholar who belong to a network called the Public Environmental Data Partners, a coalition of nonprofits, archivists and researchers who rely on federal data in our analysis, advocacy and litigation and are working to ensure that data remains available to the public.

In just the first three weeks of Trump’s term, we saw agencies remove access to at least a dozen climate and environmental justice analysis tools. The new administration also scrubbed the phrase “climate change” from government websites, as well as terms like “resilience.”

Here’s why and how Public Environmental Data Partners and others are making sure that the climate science the public depends on is available forever:

Why government websites and data matter

The internet and the availability of data are necessary for innovation, research and daily life.

Climate scientists analyze NASA satellite observations and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather records to understand changes underway in the Earth system, what’s causing them and how to protect the climates that economies were built on. Other researchers use these sources alongside Census Bureau data to understand who is most affected by climate change. And every day, people around the world log onto the Environmental Protection Agency’s website to learn how to protect themselves from hazards — and to find out what the government is or isn’t doing to help.

If the data and tools used to understand complex data are abruptly taken off the internet, the work of scientists, civil society organizations and government officials themselves can grind to a halt. The generation of scientific data and analysis by government scientists is also crucial. Many state governments run environmental protection and public health programs that depend on science and data collected by federal agencies.

Removing information from government websites also makes it harder for the public to effectively participate in key processes of democracy, including changes to regulations. When an agency proposes to repeal a rule, for example, it is required to solicit comments from the public, who often depend on government websites to find information relevant to the rule.

And when web resources are altered or taken offline, it breeds mistrust in both government and science. Government agencies have collected climate data, conducted complex analyses, provided funding and hosted data in a publicly accessible manner for years. People around the world understand climate change in large part because of U.S. federal data. Removing it deprives everyone of important information about their world.

Bye-bye data?

The first Trump administration removed discussions of climate change and climate policies widely across government websites. However, in our research with the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative over those first four years, we didn’t find evidence that datasets had been permanently deleted.

The second Trump administration seems different, with more rapid and pervasive removal of information.

In response, groups involved in Public Environmental Data Partners have been archiving climate datasets our community has prioritized, uploading copies to public repositories and cataloging where and how to find them if they go missing from government websites.


Most federal agencies decreased their use of the phrase ‘climate change’ on websites during the first Trump administration, 2017-2020.
Eric Nost, et al., 2021, CC BY


As of Feb. 13, 2025, we hadn’t seen the destruction of climate science records. Many of these data collection programs, such as those at NOAA or EPA’s Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, are required by Congress. However, the administration had limited or eliminated access to a lot of data.

Maintaining tools for understanding climate change

We’ve seen a targeted effort to systematically remove tools like dashboards that summarize and visualize the social dimensions of climate change. For instance, the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool mapped low-income and other marginalized communities that are expected to experience severe climate changes, such as crop losses and wildfires. The mapping tool was taken offline shortly after Trump’s first set of executive orders.


Most of the original data behind the mapping tool, like the wildfire risk predictions, is still available, but is now harder to find and access. But because the mapping tool was developed as an open-source project, we were able to recreate it.
Preserving websites for the future

In some cases, entire webpages are offline. For instance, the page for the 25-year-old Climate Change Center at the Department of Transportation doesn’t exist anymore. The link just sends visitors back to the department’s homepage.

Other pages have limited access. For instance, EPA hasn’t yet removed its climate change pages, but it has removed “climate change” from its navigation menu, making it harder to find those pages.



During Donald Trump’s first week back in office, the Department of Transportation removed its Climate Change Center webpage.
Internet Archive Wayback Machine


Fortunately, our partners at the End of Term Web Archive have captured snapshots of millions of government webpages and made them accessible through the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine. The group has done this after each administration since 2008.

If you’re looking at a webpage and you think it should include a discussion of climate change, use the “changes” tool“ in the Wayback Machine to check if the language has been altered over time, or navigate to the site’s snapshots of the page before Trump’s inauguration.

What you can do

You can also find archived climate and environmental justice datasets and tools on the Public Environmental Data Partners website. Other groups are archiving datasets linked in the Data.gov data portal and making them findable in other locations.

Individual researchers are also uploading datasets in searchable repositories like OSF, run by the Center for Open Science.

If you are worried that certain data currently still available might disappear, consult this checklist from MIT Libraries. It provides steps for how you can help safeguard federal data.

Narrowing the knowledge sphere

What’s unclear is how far the administration will push its attempts to remove, block or hide climate data and science, and how successful it will be.

Already, a federal district court judge has ruled that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s removal of access to public health resources that doctors rely on was harmful and arbitrary. These were put back online thanks to that ruling.

We worry that more data and information removals will narrow public understanding of climate change, leaving people, communities and economies unprepared and at greater risk. While data archiving efforts can stem the tide of removals to some extent, there is no replacement for the government research infrastructures that produce and share climate data.

Eric Nost, Associate Professor of Geography, University of Guelph and Alejandro Paz, Energy and Environment Librarian, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

'Truly Dystopian': Trump Administration Threatens Public Schools With Funding Cuts

A new Trump administration directive aims to "reduce our colleges and universities to the status of echo chambers, similar to those controlled by authoritarian states," warned PEN America.



WASHINGTON DC, UNITED STATES - FEBRUARY 12: National Education Association (NEA) and allies held a rally outside of the US Capitol in Washington, United States on February 12, 2025.
Photo by Celal Güne/Anadolu via Getty Images

Jake Johnson
Feb 16, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

Lawmakers and free expression groups voiced alarm Saturday after the Trump administration threatened to investigate and strip federal funding from public schools, including colleges and universities that don't comply with its broad interpretation of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down affirmative action programs in admissions.

In a letter to state education officials on Friday, Craig Trainor, the acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Education, wrote that the agency "intends to take appropriate measures to assess compliance with the applicable statutes and regulations based on the understanding embodied in this letter beginning no later than 14 days from today's date, including antidiscrimination requirements that are a condition of receiving federal funding."

"Institutions that fail to comply with federal civil rights law may, consistent with applicable law, face potential loss of federal funding," the letter states.

The letter takes aim at "DEI programs"—a right-wing boogeyman that the Trump administration has used as a pretext to rip apart federal agencies—and declares that the Education Department "will no longer tolerate the overt and covert racial discrimination that has become widespread in this nation's educational institutions," even as halts thousands of civil rights investigations.

PEN America warned that Trainor's sweeping directive "seeks to declare it a civil rights violation for educational institutions to engage in any diversity-related programming or to promote any diversity-related ideas—potentially including everything from a panel on the Civil Rights Movement to a Lunar New Year celebration."

"This declaration has no basis in law and is an affront to the freedom of speech and ideas in educational settings. It represents yet another twisting of civil rights law in an effort to demand ideological conformity by schools and universities," the group said in a statement Saturday. "To enact government interference in the intellectual life of such institutions is to end the United States' centuries-long history of intellectual freedom in educational settings, and to reduce our colleges and universities to the status of echo chambers, similar to those controlled by authoritarian states."

Brian Rosenberg, visiting professor of education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, toldInside Higher Ed that the letter was "truly dystopian."

"It goes well beyond the Supreme Court ruling on admissions and declares illegal a wide range of common practices," Rosenberg said. "In my career I've never seen language of this kind from any government agency in the United States."

"Republicans tell you they want to empower local communities and that states, schools, and parents know best, and again and again use top-down threats to achieve their culture war agenda."

The letter comes amid the Trump administration's broader assault on public education, including a push to abolish the Education Department altogether. That assault is expected to intensify if billionaire Linda McMahon, a proponent of school privatization, is confirmed as education secretary.

The Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency—which is currently rampaging through the Education Department and terminating contracts—posted Trainor's letter to X, the social media platform owned by Musk.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), a senior member of the Senate Education Committee, said Saturday that "this threat to rip away the federal funding our public K-12 schools and colleges receive flies in the face of the law."

"I hope no parent, student, or teacher is intimidated by these threats—this former preschool teacher certainly is not," said Murray. " While it's anyone's guess what falls under the Trump administration's definition of 'DEI,' there is simply no authority or basis for Trump to impose such a mandate. In fact, federal laws prohibit ANY president from telling schools and colleges what to teach, including the Every Student Succeeds Act, that I negotiated with Republicans."

"Rather than trying to make college more affordable or helping to improve our kids' outcomes, Trump is letting far-right extremists inject politics into the classroom at every turn," Murray added. "Republicans tell you they want to empower local communities and that states, schools, and parents know best, and again and again use top-down threats to achieve their culture war agenda."

Trump Executive Order Would Defund Schools That Require Covid Vaccines

Although the move was "largely symbolic" due to lack of such mandates, one expert still warned it is "legitimization of anti-science and anti-vax noise."


Five-year-old Madelyn Mirzaian is comforted by her mother, Dr. Christine Mirzaian, after receiving the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine at the Children's Hospital of Los Angeles on November 3, 2021.
(Photo: Al Seib: Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
Feb 14, 2025

COMMON DREAMS

Amid fears of what U.S. President Donald Trump's second term will mean for global health and public education, the Republican on Friday signed an executive order to defund schools that require Covid-19 vaccination for students.

Trump's order bars federal funding "from being used to support or subsidize an educational service agency, state education agency, local education agency, elementary school, secondary school, or institution of higher education that requires students to have received a Covid-19 vaccination to attend in-person education programs," according to a White House fact sheet.

The order, first reported by Breitbart News, also directs the secretaries of education and health and human services (HHS) to develop a plan "to end coercive Covid-19 vaccine mandates, including a report on noncompliant entities and a process for preventing federal funds from supporting educational entities that impose Covid-19 vaccine mandates."

While signing the order in the Oval Office, Trump—who was president during the onset of the pandemic and has received intense criticism for his handling of the public health crisis—said, "OK, that solves that problem."

The White House claimed that "parents are being forced into a difficult position: comply with a controversial mandate or risk their child's educational future." However, according toABC News, Trump's move was actually "largely symbolic" considering that no states currently require K-12 students to have the Covid shots.

The Associated Pressreported that "some colleges started requiring students to be immunized against Covid-19 during the pandemic, but most have dropped the requirements. A few continue to require vaccines at least for students living on campus, including Swarthmore and Oberlin colleges. Most of those colleges allow medical or religious exemptions."

As ABC noted:
One open question is whether the new administration could opt to go beyond Covid vaccines and put pressure on schools to drop requirements for other vaccines.

Currently, all 50 states mandate that students receive certain vaccinations, including to prevent the measles. Many states, however, offer religious exemptions.

"This is anti-vax pandering," Timothy Caulfield, a professor focused on public health and law at Canada's University of Alberta, said of Trump's order. "Still worrisome, however. It is yet more normalization and legitimization of anti-science and anti-vax noise."

The new measure came a day after Senate Republicans voted to confirm vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as HHS secretary and Trump signed another executive order establishing the Make America Healthy Again Commission.

Also on Thursday, the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions held a confirmation hearing for Linda McMahon, the billionaire GOP megadonor and former World Wrestling Entertainment CEO nominated to serve as education secretary, even though Trump has signaled that he ultimately intends to fully dismantle the department.

 McMahon Hearing Shows Trump 'Dead Set on Destroying Public Education'

"If confirmed, Linda McMahon will dismantle public education as we know it to fund tax cuts for billionaires," one union leader warned.


Linda McMahon, the nominee for secretary of education, testifies during her confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee in Washington, D.C. on February 13, 2025.
(Photo: Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc. via Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
Feb 13, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

Critics of U.S. President Donald Trump's plans for the Department of Education pointed to billionaire GOP megadonor Linda McMahon's Senate confirmation hearing on Thursday as the latest proof that the Republican administration intends to destroy public schools.

McMahon, accused of "enabling sexual abuse of children" as World Wrestling Entertainment CEO, appeared before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions as the education secretary nominee despite Trump making clear that he wants to shutter the department and billionaire Elon Musk—who is trying to obliterate the federal bureaucracy as chair of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)—claiming last week that "it doesn't exist" anymore.

"Education is meant to be the great equalizer for our children, not a great investment opportunity for the billionaires ransacking our federal government."

"Most of us believe every student deserves the opportunity, resources, and support to reach their full potential no matter where they live, the color of their skin, or how much their family earns," said Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, the largest U.S. teachers union. "But we didn't hear any of that today. As I travel around the country, parents and educators tell me their schools need more resources and more opportunities that will help students live into their brilliance. They do not want to gut public education or public schools."

She warned that "if confirmed, Linda McMahon will dismantle public education as we know it to fund tax cuts for billionaires. She will push vouchers that take funding from our public schools, where 90% of all children and 95% of those with disabilities learn and grow. Public funds should stay in our public schools. Our students need an education secretary committed to fully funding the programs that can help them reach their full potential, not siphoning money to send to private schools."

"The Senate must reject Linda McMahon as secretary of education. The agenda is clear and dangerous," Pringle argued. "Whether in Washington, with legal actions and lawsuits, or through grassroots actions in communities across the country, educators will continue to protect our students from this reckless agenda."


While the GOP-controlled Senate seems likely to confirm McMahon—so far, the chamber hasn't blocked any "fundamentally unfit" and "profoundly unqualified" Trump nominees—union and community leaders, educators, parents, and students have still pressured lawmakers to oppose McMahon and battle Trump's assault on public education.

They even braved winter weather at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday for a related rally. MomsRising executive director and CEO Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner called McMahon "wholly unqualified" and declared that "President Trump's education plan puts our children at risk and has grave implications for our workforce and our economy."

American Federation of Teachers (AFT) president Randi Weingarten, who was also at the rally, pointed out that "inside the Education Department, the world's richest man and his minions have been rifling through 45 million people's private student loan accounts and feeding the data into artificial intelligence in one of the biggest data hacks in U.S. history."

In response, AFT and unions sued multiple departments and the Office of Personnel Management "for violating the Privacy Act by improperly disclosing the sensitive records of millions of Americans to DOGE staff," Weingarten explained Wednesday. "And tomorrow, we hope Linda McMahon will discuss what she'll do to secure the personal data of veterans who receive benefit payments, current and former federal employees whose confidential employment files reside in OPM's system, and teachers whose pathway to the classroom was reliant on student loans to pay for college tuition. The American people deserve to know what she'll do to kick Elon Musk and DOGE out of the Education Department, out of our schools, and out of our data."



During the Senate hearing, "Democrats repeatedly grilled McMahon on her willingness to follow orders from Trump or Elon Musk even if they run afoul of congressional mandates," The Associated Pressreported, noting that the nominee "played down the work" of DOGE and "pledged to uphold the law and show deference to Congress."

McMahon also addressed the administration's push to shut down the department. According to the AP:
"We'd like to make sure that we are presenting a plan that I think our senators could get on board with, and our Congress could get on board with, that would have a better functioning Department of Education," McMahon said. But closing the department "certainly does require congressional action."

McMahon said the president's goal is not to defund key programs, but to have them "operate more efficiently." But she questioned whether some programs should be moved to other agencies. Enforcement of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, she suggested, "may very well rest better" in the Department of Health and Human Services, an agency that already has oversight of disability issues. The agency's Office for Civil Rights, she said, could fit better at the Justice Department.

Responding to the hearing in a statement, Aissa Canchola Bañez, policy director of the Student Borrower Protection Center, said that "Linda McMahon's testimony was nothing more than two hours worth of gaslighting. McMahon had the opportunity to state clearly and unequivocally that she will protect students, borrowers, and working families across the nation from the chaos that has already ensued as a result of President Trump and Elon Musk's work to make their Project 2025 agenda the law of the land. She did not."

"When asked whether she would abide by a directive by President Trump that breaks a law, her nonanswer spoke volumes. It is clear that Linda McMahon's blind loyalty to President Trump will guide her decision-making should she be confirmed to serve as the nation's highest education official—and our students and communities will pay the price," she cautioned.

Stacy Davis Gates, president of the Chicago Teachers Union, an AFT affiliate, was a similarly critical, saying that "today's hearing made clear that Donald Trump is not trying to roll the country back to 1950, he is trying to roll us back to 1850. McMahon's dog whistles, her promotion of segregationist school choice policies, and her boss' commitment to converting civil rights protections into tools to police students are all reversals of what formerly enslaved Africans fought for and created during Reconstruction after the Civil War."

"Donald Trump and whoever becomes his secretary should think twice before dismantling the Department of Education," she continued. "As a social studies teacher, it's incumbent on me to provide a brief civics lesson: We have a system of checks and balances that prevents them from doing so. But more importantly, this isn't an obscure federal office. This is a backbone of the government that millions of families with children in our public schools rely on."

"By continuing to come for our public schools, they are further angering the Black families who count on civil rights protections, the families of children with disabilities who rely on federal standards, the families in poverty who rely on federal support, and anyone who is sickened to see queer and transgender students targeted and bullied by the federal government," she added. "Education is meant to be the great equalizer for our children, not a great investment opportunity for the billionaires ransacking our federal government."


A protester disrups of the Senate confirmation hearing for Linda McMahon, President Donald Trump’s nominee to be secretary of education, in Washington, D.C. on February 13, 2025. (Photo: Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images)

Several protesters interrupted Thursday's hearing, including to express concerns related to the Individual With Disabilities Education Act and the Trump administration's attacks on LGBTQ+ youth.

One lawmaker who took aim at Trump and McMahon during the event—and was publicly thanked by the AFT for doing so—was Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), the committee's ranking member.

"In America, we must not allow our educational system to become a two-tier system," Sanders said, calling it "absurd" to provide vouchers for families to send their children to private schools rather than public ones—the focus of a recent Trump executive order.

Sanders also sounded the alarm about using taxpayer money for such vouchers in a four-minute video from his office stressing that "Donald Trump is dead set on destroying public education in this country."



Tony Carrk, executive director of the watchdog group Accountable.US, warned of the long-term consequences, saying after the hearing that "starving cash-strapped states of critical public education resources is a recipe for generational failure."

"The Trump-McMahon-Project 2025 agenda would leave millions of kids behind and further rig the system against low-income communities," he continued. "McMahon would be just the latest to join the Trump administration's billionaire club, which has made no allusions about its plans to let the wealthy cut to the head of the line while working people wait for the scraps."

Carrk also pointed to her time in the wrestling industry, declaring that "Linda McMahon puts on quite a show of confidence, but her alleged actions knowing about and mishandling the sexual abuse of children at her corporation should give no one confidence that she would enforce Title IX sex discrimination protections as education secretary."

'Going to go much higher': Doctor slams anti-vaxxers amid Texas measles crisis

Brad Reed
February 17, 2025 
RAW STORY

Doctor vaccinates child patient. (Arlette Lopez/Shutterstock.) 

Dr. Jonathan Reiner on Monday warned that the measles outbreak currently hammering communities in Texas is only going to get worse in the coming weeks.

Appearing on CNN, Reiner was asked by host Manu Raju how concerned he was about the measles outbreak which is largely hitting unvaccinated communities.

He replied that he was extremely worried about what's to come.

"It's going to go much higher, Manu," he said. "It's completely related to anti-vaccine sentiment... Texas as a whole has a very liberal opt-out policy for vaccinating kids before school. And in Texas, in that county in Texas, 18 percent of kindergartners, their parents opted them out of of vaccination. So there is a huge opportunity for a very opportunistic virus like measles to infect kids."

Reiner further emphasized that resistance to vaccinations was the primary reason that measles was ripping through communities.

"What's sad about this is that this is completely preventable," he said. "The vaccine is really spectacularly effective at preventing infection, it's about 98 percent effective at preventing infection. So every single person who's coming down now with measles in Texas is basically acquiring this disease because they have not been vaccinated."

Watch the video below or at this link.

Scathing analysis shows House GOP budget would add '$4.5 trillion' to deficit while gutting safety net

House Speaker Mike Johnson at the National Prayer Breakfast on February 6, 2025 (Wikimedia Commons)

Alex Henderson

February 12, 2025

ALTERNET

On Thursday morning, February 12, Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives released their budget resolution.

The resolution, according to the Center for American Progress' Bobby Kogan, "keys up their reconciliation bills, which can avoid a filibuster and be passed with a simple majority."

On X.com, formerly Twitter, Kogan posted, "This is VERY real. They are calling to cut Medicaid by AT LEAST $880 billion, and to cut SNAP by AT LEAST 20%."

The budget resolution comes at a time when the Department of Government Ethics (DOGE), headed by billionaire SpaceX/Testa/X.com CEO Elon Musk, is pushing draconian cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CPFB) and other agencies while President Donald Trump and other Republicans are calling for major tax cuts for the rich.

The GOP budget resolution is drawing a lot of responses on X.

NBC News' Sahil Kapur detailed the effect the budget House Republicans are proposing could have on the United States' federal deficit.

Kapur tweeted, "House Republicans release budget resolution ahead of a markup Thursday. • $4.5 trillion in new deficits for tax-writing Ways & Means Cmte • $4 trillion debt limit hike • $110 billion for Judiciary Cmte, $90 billion for Homeland Security Cmte (which oversee immigration) • A 'goal' of cutting mandatory spending by $2 trillion."

READ MORE: 'Trumpflation': Trump slammed for blaming Biden after he breaks 'day one' promise to 'bring prices down'

Jon Favreau of Pod Save America and Crooked Media posted, "Republicans want: $4.5 trillion in new deficits - including enormous tax cuts for Elon, Trump, and other billionaires $2 trillion in cuts to health care and retirement programs: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and veterans' benefits If DOGE terminated all other spending in the federal budget - on defense, education, transportation, medical research, foreign aid, etc., it would save around $1.7 trillion Not a math major, but..."

The Bulwark's Tim Miller — a Never Trump conservative, frequent guest on MSNBC, and former GOP strategist — tweeted, "So inflation is up and the House GOP has issued a budget resolution indicating they plan on popping another $3-4 [trillion] onto the debt."

The Center for American Progress' Brendan Duke wrote, "A walk through of some of the priorities outlined in the House Budget Resolution[:] They are cutting health care for people with low incomes and disabilities by $880B+ while likely extending tax cuts for business owners (HEAVILY tilted to highest income) and multinational corps."

In a separate tweet, Duke observed, "$230B+ in deficit reduction for the Agriculture Committee (that means nutrition cuts) $330B+ in deficit reduction for Education committee (that means education cuts) $880B(!!)+ in deficit reduction for Energy and Commerce (that means Medicaid cuts) And $4,500B for tax cuts."

Reporter Jamie Dupree noted, "The House GOP budget resolution would increase the debt ceiling by $4 trillion."

X user Mike Hamm, posting a chart showing food stamp use in red states, tweeted, "MAGAs voted for this, its only fair that they are the most affected."

'Hitting ranchers hard': Farmers union leader blames Trump for 'disastrous consequences'

David McAfee
February 16, 2025 
RAW STORY

A farm worker in a field. (Shutterstock)

Donald Trump's latest actions are hurting one of his biggest bases of support, the National Farmers Union president said Sunday.

Rob Larew, who leads the second-largest general farm organization in the country, noted over the weekend that the President of the U.S. is wrong to freeze funding that farmers need.

"The Trump administration’s decision to pause and review federal funding has sparked uncertainty for many Americans. Even if you have not personally felt the effects yet, you soon might, because these abrupt freezes are hitting family farmers and ranchers hard. And when farmers struggle, every consumer feels it at the grocery store," the farming policy advocate wrote.

According to Larew, Trump's freeze "has most immediately impacted federal conservation and voluntary climate-smart agriculture projects."

"Across the country, farmers have been left in limbo after making sustainability investments, trusting that the government would uphold its commitments," he wrote, adding, "For example, some farmers who purchased cover crop seed to improve soil health or installed solar panels to reduce energy costs are now learning that federal reimbursements have been cut off. These are not theoretical losses. These are real financial burdens that could push family farms into bankruptcy. Without intervention, these cuts will ripple through rural economies. Every farm that goes out of business means fewer families in rural communities, less money spent at the local businesses, fewer kids in the local schools, and fewer tax dollars for roads, hospitals and emergency services."

Further, according to Larew, "Beyond agriculture, the funding freeze threatens the infrastructure that keeps rural communities running."

"Federal grants and loans help small towns replace aging and costly infrastructure, such as broadband and water systems, and invest in local meat and food processing," he added. "Local entities have relied on federal loans and loan guarantees — existing commitments that the government is now freezing, leaving farmers, investors, lenders and rural communities on the hook for funds already spent."

He also encouraged lawmakers to "listen to the voices of those most impacted and recognize the real-world consequences of any cuts."

"Our rural economy and food system — and therefore all of America — depends on it," he said.

Read the full piece here.

'This isn’t just hippie-dippy stuff': Farmers 'reeling' from Trump spending freezes

Photo by Gregory Hayes on Unsplash

Roxanne Cooper

February 15, 2025

ALTERNET

According to a new report from the New York Times, a "core constituency" is "reeling" from "a rapid-fire array of directives by the Trump administration."

“This isn’t just hippie-dippy stuff,” said Aaron Pape, a Wisconsin farmer. “This is affecting mainstream farmers."

The Trump administration's recent directives have left farmers and rural communities across the United States grappling with financial uncertainty. A series of executive orders have frozen billions of dollars in federal funding for agricultural programs.

The impact is widespread and has created a ripple effect across rural America, according to the Times.

For example, Skylar Holden, a cattle rancher in Missouri, signed a $240,000 cost-sharing contract for property improvements but is now at risk of losing his farm. He laments, "Whenever my farm payment comes due, there's a good chance that I'm not going to be able to pay it."

In another example, Minnesota seed processor Tom Smude learned that his $530,000 grant for equipment was paused, leaving him unable to pay for ordered machinery. He expressed confusion about the president's priorities: "It's what he wants, growth in industry and keep America going. I feel like I'm doing my part and now you're going against what you said, a little bit."

The uncertainty has affected farmers' ability to plan for the year. Nick Levendofsky, executive director of the Kansas Farmers Union, stated, "Farmers don't need any more uncertainty than they already have."

While some farmers remain supportive of President Trump, many others expressed concern about the long-term consequences of these policy decisions.


Read the full report at the New York Times (subscription required).

Worry about 'job security' puts deep red state on edge as Trump slashes federal workforce

REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks while signing executive orders during a brief event in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, U.S., January 30, 2025.

Alex Henderson

February 15, 2025

ALTERNET

Former Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Michael Steele often warns, during his appearances on MSNBC, that the Trump Administration's dramatic cuts to the United States' federal workforce will have a major impact on the conservative red states that voted heavily for Donald Trump in 2024 — and not in a good way. Programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, Steele emphasizes, are not used exclusively in Democratic blue states.

One red state that is likely to feel the impact of the Trump/DOGE job cuts, according to New York Times reporters Eduardo Medina and Emily Cochrane, is Alabama — especially the city of Huntsville.

Although the national popular vote was close in the 2024 presidential election — Trump defeated Democratic nominee Kamala Harris by roughly 1.5 percent nationally — Alabama wasn't close at all: Trump carried Alabama by about 30.5 percent.

But Medina and Cochrane, in an article published on February 15, stress that Huntsville (which they describe as an "aerospace behemoth") is likely to be hit hard by Trump Administration cuts.

"More than half of the roughly 40,000 federal civilian employees in Alabama live in the congressional district that includes Huntsville, according to the Congressional Research Service as of March 2024," the Times reporters explain. "There are also thousands of workers there whose jobs are tied to government contracts and could be affected…. More than 6200 people work at the flight center alone, with about 2300 of them classified as federal civil employees of NASA."

Medina and Cochrane add, "There are lingering memories of past layoffs: more than 1000 jobs in Huntsville were lost when Constellation, a program to return astronauts to the moon, was shut down in 2010."

The journalists note that conservative Sen. Katie Britt (R-Alabama) "is among a number of Republicans who have raised concerns about the effect of a plan that would cut $4 billion in federal funding for research at the nation's universities, cancer centers and hospitals."

"Those cuts, which a federal judge put on hold this week, could affect research programs at the University of Alabama in Huntsville and elsewhere in the state," Medina and Cochrane report. "Such cuts could trickle to other facets of the Huntsville economy. Terrence Harris, a real estate agent in Huntsville, said that in the last couple of weeks, several of his clients who work for the government have backtracked from plans to purchase a home because they feel concerned about their job security."

Read the full New York Times article at this link (subscription required).

'Chaos': How Trump’s own policies would cause mass layoffs for states that voted for him

Former President Donald Trump in Phoenix, Arizona in July 2021 (Gage Skidmore)

Naomi LaChance

February 13, 2025
ALTERNET

The CEO of Ford has warned that Trump’s economic policies could mean layoffs are coming -- to four states that voted for him, points out NJ.com’s Matt Arco. Ford CEO Jim Farley said Tuesday that tariffs across North America could wreck the automotive industry.

“Let’s be real honest: Long term, a 25% tariff across the Mexico and Canada borders would blow a hole in the U.S. industry that we’ve never seen,” Farley said Tuesday at a conference in New York. “Frankly, it gives free rein to South Korean, Japanese and European companies that are bringing 1.5 million to 2 million vehicles into the U.S. that wouldn’t be subject to those Mexican and Canadian tariffs. It would be one of the biggest windfalls for those companies ever.”

He added that if Trump rolls back parts of the Inflation Reduction Act, Ford could need to lay off people working on electric vehicle production. The Trump administration has also undone Biden-era electric vehicle policy.

READ MORE: 'Grift': Elon Musk slammed after Tesla’s name disappears from State Dept. doc for $400 million contract

“We’ve already sunk capital — even though we’ve rationalized it — into battery production and assembly plants all through Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee. Many of those jobs would be at risk if big parts of the IRA are repealed,” he said.
These four states supported Trump in 2024. So far, Trump’s economic policies have shown little regard for those who voted to put him in office.

Trump, Farley said, “has talked a lot about making our U.S. auto industry stronger, bringing more production here or innovation in the U.S.”

But “so far what we’re seeing is a lot of costs and a lot of chaos,” he added.

“Mr. Farley’s remarks at the conference… offered a rare example of a corporate executive calling into question Mr. Trump’s policies or statements. In most cases executives have either offered praise or kept quiet, apparently out of fear they could prompt reprisals from the president,” writes Jack Ewing at the New York Times.

Earlier this week, Trump signed an order increasing taxes on steel and aluminum imports. This could hurt American auto manufacturers and make their products more costly.

“Steel producers have to find ways to increase capacity, and aluminum and steel might be in short supply in the short term,” Sam Fiorani, analyst at AutoForecast Solutions, told NJ.com. “Producing vehicles has a lot of moving parts, and raising the price of what is among the most important components of the vehicle is only going to raise the price of an already expensive product.”