Author name: moderat ereport

A cartoon by Clay Jones. Related | Trump gushes over ‘great jeans’ actress as controversy swirls

National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett appeared on Fox Business Wednesday to spin President Donald Trump’s uncertain economy and the concerning new jobs report. When host Maria Bartiromo asked the eager MAGA stooge to address Trump’s poppycock theory that the latest jobs report revisions were “rigged,” Hassett did his best to make excuses for his boss and misinform the public. Hassett delivered a meandering statement and ultimately suggested that under President Barack Obama, the Bureau of Economic Analysis released inflated Gross Domestic Product numbers ahead of Election Day. Related | Trump comforts himself with new bonkers theory to explain his economy “I had previously briefed Mitt Romney’s campaign that I thought that they’re probably going to have a number that looked like a recession. And then, in fact, they got a really big, beautiful number right before the election. Probably had a big effect on the election,” Hassett claimed with zero evidence. “And then that number ultimately was revised away, and it was revised away because it turned out that the number happened because of the biggest ever, all the way back to World War II, increase in defense spending.” YouTube Video In reality, the October 2012 GDP report Hassett referenced was neither big nor beautiful. It showed modest growth, which was a welcome sign for the then-Obama administration. The “revision” Hassett mentions not only didn’t lower the number, it was released in mid-December 2012—after the election. Following Friday’s dismal jobs report, Trump fired Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer and has since sprayed an unhinged firehose of lies and misinformation to any media outlet willing to regurgitate it. 

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s announcement of “The Speedway Slammer,” a new ICE facility opening in Indiana, was not as well received by the racing giant as she surely hoped. “COMING SOON to Indiana: The Speedway Slammer,” she wrote on X Tuesday. “If you are in America illegally, you could find yourself in Indiana’s Speedway Slammer. Avoid arrest and self deport now using the [Customs and Border Protection] Home App.” In a separate post, the official Department of Homeland Security proudly displayed an AI-generated image of a racecar emblazoned with “ICE” on the side. And while the Trump administration seems obsessed with ripping off pop culture—like South Park and Superman—to promote its deportation agenda, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway was less than amused.  “We were unaware of plans to incorporate our imagery as part of today’s announcement,” the company said in a statement. “Consistent with our approach to public policy and political issues, we are communicating our preference that our IP (intellectual property) not be utilized moving forward in relation to this matter.” Related | Trump and cronies are giddy to trample human rights at ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ The new ICE facility appears to complement Florida’s similar immigrant detention facility, the so-called “Alligator Alcatraz.” Earlier this week, a report was released detailing more than 500 accounts of alleged human rights abuses within U.S. immigration detention centers, including pregnant women being forced to sleep on floors.  The report also claimed that a child was denied medical care despite vomiting blood, while men in another facility were allegedly shot with rubber bullets after demanding access to food, water, and health care. ICE facilities have long been fraught with abuse, but with the uptick of deportations under Trump, aggression toward immigrants is skyrocketing.

There’s a new development in the Trump administration’s full-court press to bar foreigners from coming to the United States: Why not charge foreign tourists an exorbitant amount of money to visit here? The State Department announced this grand plan on Tuesday, calling it a “pilot” program that will be in effect for one year.  Ostensibly, this is targeted at countries with high visa overstay rates. The notion is that visitors will pay a bond of no less than $5,000 and as high as $15,000. Consular officers get to set the bond based on “any information provided by the visa applicant on the visa application or in the visa interview regarding the alien’s purpose of travel, current employment, income, skills, and education.”  This new extortion racket isn’t grounded in any law. The official publication of the rule in the Federal Register justifies this only by referencing President Donald Trump’s numerous executive orders as if they were law. So, when Trump popped off with his racist “Protecting the American People Against Invasion” executive order on Day 1 of his second term, the whole of the federal government tilted toward restricting immigration. Now, apparently, those efforts have turned to restricting visitors.  Related | Trump’s disastrous trade war is killing US tourism The first two countries that the administration has arbitrarily decided will be included in the pilot program are Malawi and Zambia. According to the administration, this is based on their overstay rate from DHS’s 2023 report. Except, as NBC pointed out, those two countries are not the top overstayers noted in that report—that would be Laos. Haiti, and Chad. However, people from those countries are already barred from coming here thanks to Trump’s travel ban 2.0, so apparently Secretary of State Marco Rubio had to go down the list to find other countries to target.  Of course, like all things immigration-related in the Trump administration, the countries that will be included in this pay-for-play arrangement can change at any time. Another fun fact: If someone here on a tourist visa decides to apply for asylum or any other nonimmigrant status, that’s a breach of the bond conditions and the government gets to keep the bond money.  All of this fits with Trump’s other isolationist, nativist actions. He’s tried to bar Harvard from enrolling international students. The courts have blocked those efforts, but never fear: the administration’s “settlement” with Columbia University requires the school to decrease international student enrollment.  This push to drive out international students is catastrophically bad for higher education and the economy. Over 1.1 million international students contributed $44 billion to the economy during the 2023-2024 school year. That’s on top of the hit the economy is taking from Trump’s haphazard and capricious trade war and tariffpalooza. There’s already a significant decline in international tourism, and we’re on track to lose $29 billion from that.  Rubio continues to be one of Trump’s most loyal foot soldiers, helping him isolate the United States and withdraw us from the global community. The secretary of state stepped up to keep America safe by refusing to issue visas to a Venezuelan Little League team and the Cuban national women’s volleyball team. But at least we’re letting in white South Africans, the only “refugees” Trump acknowledges.  As for the administration’s latest xenophobic ploy, which countries are subject to the bond requirement can change at any time—and everyone knows full well that countries will be added to and removed from this list based on how much they do or do not suck up to Trump. Meanwhile, foreign visitors of all stripes are going to keep passing us by, because who wants to deal with any of this?