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Over the weekend, U.S. intelligence analysts warned that Russia was massing forces for a large offensive out of now-captured Izyum all the way to Dnipro, a distance of over 200 kilometers. U.S. intelligence has been on point throughout the war, but to outside observers the move seems utterly implausible. It would be an operation equal in scope to the Russian attack on (and retreat from) Kyiv, but facing even longer supply lines, routed through even less defensible territory, in the face of stiffer potential Ukrainian resistance and utilizing battalions that have suffered heavy losses since the first days of the war. There’s no part of that calculation that works out well for Russia, even taking Ukraine’s own heavy casualties into account.

That doesn’t mean Russia won’t try, and what we’ve seen from U.S. intelligence so far seems to hint that they have a much easier window into what Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s inner circle believes than what Russian military realities actually are. It’s very possible that Russia will attempt the unfathomably risky move because Putin and whatever generals still have Putin’s favor are demanding that their underlings do it. And it’s very possible that it could end in a shredding of those Russian forces that makes the Russian losses elsewhere pedestrian in comparison. The latter possibility is even more likely as NATO countries abandon their previous reticence at providing so-called “offensive” weaponry to Ukraine and are now opening the equipment floodgates.

That newest NATO equipment mostly hasn’t arrived yet, but Ukraine has been receiving a steady stream of the sort of anti-armor weapons that were used to such devastating effect elsewhere in the country. New armored vehicles to replace lost ones are now on the way as well. And hanging above it all, literally, are the region’s infamous spring rains. Our most recent news updates:

• Russia faces myriad challenges in Donbas front, and here’s the primer
• Russia will break new records of stupidity if it really thinks it can move on Dnipro
• NATO dramatically expands Ukraine weapons shipments after Russia’s war crimes
• Reports say Russia is massing for massive Donbas attack, but can they really?

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Richard Grenell was a terrible choice for acting director of national intelligence—which is precisely why Donald Trump chose him. It’s like when Trump is rudely confronted with a salad bar and has to choose between piling fresh greens on his plate or bobbing for stray croutons in the ranch dressing trough. His squishy id will wail like a toddler until he picks the most immediately gratifying option.

In the case of Grenell, Trump liked the way he looked on the teevee. Normally, that would be reason enough for Trump to pull the trigger, but Grenell was also a reliable flunky-in-waiting—which was something the ocher abomination simply couldn’t resist.

As The Washington Post put it in February 2020—shortly after the hire was made—Trump was dazzled by Grenell’s “sycophantic pandering.”

PRESIDENT TRUMP’S campaign to purge the government of anyone not blindly loyal to him continued Wednesday with the appointment of Richard Grenell as acting director of national intelligence. Mr. Grenell, who currently serves as ambassador to Germany, is manifestly unqualified for the job, even in an acting capacity. He has no experience in intelligence or in managing large organizations — like the 17 agencies that will now report to him.

Mr. Grenell has nevertheless won the president’s favor in a familiar way: by loudly praising him and his agenda on Fox News programs and social media. Probably, he has convinced Mr. Trump he can be counted on to put the president’s personal and political interests above those of national security — something the two previous DNIs would not reliably do.

Well, yeah, that tracks. Another reason Trump liked him? Grenell is likely a white supremacist.

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Amidst a Twitter squabble with Democratic Reps. Ted Lieu and Eric Swalwell on Friday, former Mike Pence aide and born again anti-Trumper Olivia Troye spilled the tea on Grenell’s extremist leanings. 

The exchange started with a racist jab at Lieu and ended with me wondering why Vladimir Putin has yet to act to de-Nazify the United States.

For the nontweeters:

GRENELL: “Ted LIEu spent years delivering the Beijing line that Hunter Biden’s laptop was Russian disinformation.

“China celebrated his lies. @tedlieu”

LIEU: “Dear @RichardGrenell: I served on active duty to defend your right to say stupid stuff.

“To the extent you now randomly mention China because of my race, then you’re saying stupid, racist shit.

“Also, did you come up with LIEu all by yourself? Impressive.”

Grenell’s take is a little ironic, of course, given that Donald Trump spent years delivering the Moscow line that … well, pick one. He delivered every conceivable Moscow line at one time or another. But, hey, maybe Putin was actually a good guy all along until President Biden pushed him too far by refusing to pull the U.S. out of NATO as Trump had promised. 

Before long, Rep. Swalwell entered the fray with some genuinely astonishing info about Grenell, a former U.S. ambassador to Germany.

For the nontweeters:

SWALWELL: “Hey @tedlieu, did you know @RichardGrenell used to hang out with Nazis when he was supposed to be representing us in Germany?”

Okay, well, that’s alarming. A U.S. ambassador to Germany was allegedly rubbing greasy elbows with bona fide Nazis? That’s not a good look.

Oh, but it gets better. Enter Troye, who broke with the Trump administration before the 2020 election over its shambolic and unserious response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

For the nontweeters:

LIEU: “To be honest, I don’t really know much about Grennell [sic]. (I just view him as a boring internet troll). Do you have proof of this?”

TROYE: “I do. While in his role as Ambassador, Grennell tried to get Mike Pence to attend a white supremacist gathering during one of his overseas trips.”

Wait, is Pence white enough for a white supremacist gathering? (I’m only kidding, of course. If he were any whiter, Elmer’s Glue might sue him for trademark infringement.)

I assume Mother put the kibosh on any Nazi picnics Pence might have wanted to attend, so the only story here is that one of the Trump administration’s top intelligence advisers may very well have been a Nazi sympathizer. You know, regular stuff.

But hey, this country has some totally made-up Republican crises to attend to—like critical race theory and Mr. Potato Head’s unceremoniously french-fried schwanzstucker—so we’ll get to purging Nazis from our government a bit later.

Makes total sense, right?

It made comedian Sarah Silverman say, “THIS IS FUCKING BRILLIANT,” and prompted author Stephen King to shout “Pulitzer Prize!!!” (on Twitter, that is). What is it? The viral letter that launched four hilarious Trump-trolling books. Get them all, including the finale, Goodbye, Asshat: 101 Farewell Letters to Donald Trump, at this link. Or, if you prefer a test drive, you can download the epilogue to Goodbye, Asshat for the low, low price of FREE. 

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After more than a year of avoiding jail time related to the murder of a pedestrian, South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg may finally be held accountable for his actions. Calls for his resignation are increasing nationwide as he faces an impeachment inquiry.

Investigations into his actions were opened up to the public by Ravnsborg’s Republican colleague, Gov. Kristi Noem. According to Daily Kos, new evidence in the case was shared in March by a Noem appointee.

The GOP attorney general was driving home from a political fundraiser on Sept. 12 when he struck a man, who was walking on the side of a highway. In a 911 call after the crash, Ravnsborg claimed he hit a deer. He said he didn’t realize he struck a man until he returned to the crash scene the next day and discovered the body of Joseph Boever. He failed to mention that the victim’s glasses were in his car. Claiming he did nothing wrong, Ravnsborg insisted he remains the state’s top law enforcement officer.

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At the time, many Republicans supported this decision, but his popular predecessor Marty Jackley has gathered even more support, causing GOP officials to slowly “turn” on Ravnsborg and rethink his driving accident.

According to the Sioux Falls Argus Leader, the South Dakota House of Representatives will decide whether or not Ravnsborg can stay in office on Tuesday. The vote could end as the state Capitol’s first-ever impeachment of a constitutional officer.

The move follows an investigation recommended to the House Select Committee last month. Despite investigations and new evidence being introduced, the chamber decided not to vote to impeach following a secret closed meeting on March 28. Since then, resolutions have pushed representatives to rethink their decision.

“This is long overdue, and hopefully, we can get the situation resolved for the betterment of the people of South Dakota,” Rep. Sydney Davis told the Argus Leader.

Others “on the fence” expressed similar concerns, including Republican State Rep. Charlie Hoffman, who was swayed after a presentation by South Dakota Highway Patrol troopers last Wednesday, in which Ravnsborg was proven to be a reckless driver.

“After seeing the length of time Mr. Boever’s body was on the AG’s car with his head inside of the AG’s car’s window, and then flying off hitting the middle of the lane behind the AG’s car, leaving bone fragments on the road and skidding into the ditch at 65 mph, my mind has changed,” he told The Daily Beast on Friday. “I now have irrefutable evidence the AG knew exactly what he hit and lied to investigators and the Hyde County sheriff.”

The presentation confirmed multiple speeding tickets and other driving violations Ravnsborg had received.

According to the Dakota Free Press, investigations have found various discrepancies and issues in how the case was handled. The sheriff who allegedly gave Ravnsborg a ride after the incident not only failed to investigate the accident but ignored scenes of the crime, including Boever’s flashlight, which he assumed was from Ravnsborg’s car.

The decision to impeach now lies in the hands of the full House. Given the new details the Department of Public Safety provided this week to prove Ravnsborg was distracted the night he killed Boever, one can hope the House will make the right decision.

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Florida Republican Marco Rubio’s response to valid criticism that he’s done nothing to permanently protect Venezuelan immigrants in the state is to say that Venezuelans calling him out on his inaction aren’t really Venezuelan.

“I would like to ask Mr. Rubio why he did not support HR 6,” the House-passed legislation that would put Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holders on a path to legalization, Casa de Venezuela founder William Diaz told Miami Herald. It’s a good question, and it deserves an answer—but not according to Rubio.

“These are Democrat groups that are more Democrats than they are Venezuelan, that have been Democrats before and they will continue being Democrats after,” he told Miami Herald. But the outlet reports Diaz is a former supporter of Republican Rick Scott.

RELATED STORY: Marco Rubio’s anti-LGBT record continues on, following defense of Florida GOP’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill

Both Rubio and Scott have steadily failed to advocate for immigrants in their states, by refusing to support numerous pieces of legislation that would put temporary holders onto a pathway to permanent status.

Both did support the Biden administration’s popular decision last year to grant temporary relief to thousands of Venezuelan immigrants already here, but really only because the administration was going to go through with this well-received policy, whether or not Rubio and Scott approved. So they figured they might as well say they agreed with it.

But when it comes to something he can lead on himself, Marco continues to be a failure, slamming advocates for wanting “to turn the topic of Venezuela into an immigration issue,” Miami Herald continued. Rubio then dusted off an old talking point Republicans have used as an excuse to not act on humane immigration proposals (like the 2013 Senate immigration bill that Marco co-wrote but then disowned as part of his epically pathetic bid for the presidency).

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“It is impossible—and I say it with all sincerity—it is impossible to do absolutely anything about immigration while this emergency we have right now continues to exist,” he said, according to the report. Imagine this guy being sincere about anything.

The fact is that the GOP will never acknowledge a secure anything at the border if the president is a Democrat. Republicans were mimicking the language of an anti-immigrant hate group from the start of the president’s term.

Marco Rubio is creative only in the sense that he’s found ways to be a massive disappointment to humanity on multiple fronts, last month defending the harassment of LGBTQ children by supporting the state GOP’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill. 

Rubio won’t even defend his own policy stances and decisions. We know he betrayed immigrant communities by turning his back on his immigration bill, but we also don’t discuss nearly enough how Rubio broke his promise not to run for reelection. He used the Pulse mass shooting as his excuse. He’s not only failed to combat gun violence since then, but he’s also given the thumbs-up to targeting LGBTQ kids. Shameful and pathetic.

Now again up for reelection in 2022, Miami Herald reports that Rubio joined New Jersey’s Bob Menendez in urging an extension of protections for Venezuelans—but still no pathway to legalization. “We are not buying it, we are not going to be props again in his political game,” Venezuelan American Caucus executive director Ade Ferro said in the report.

RELATED STORIES: Evergreen: Marco Rubio is awful

Two dozen groups call on Marco Rubio and Rick Scott to support legalization for TPS holders

Biden admin to offer temporary protections to hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans currently in U.S.

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Journalists and activists have been reporting on the dismal conditions children are subjected to at Louisiana’s Acadiana Center for Youth at St. Martinville for weeks. Now they’re calling on Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards to shut down the youth detention facility, located about two hours west of New Orleans. 

Activist Tamika Mallory shared a video on Monday posted by the charity Us or Else, which was founded by rapper Tip “T.I.” Harris. In the caption of the post, the charity paints a grim picture of the daily lives of those children who end up at the facility.

RELATED STORY: Incarcerated voices: Why do they matter?

That grim picture:

“Your child makes a mistake. He’s sent to Juvenile Detention to be reformed. You have no choice but trust the system to protect him.

He’s locked away in a small cell for 23 hours at a time

No lights

No exercise

Abusive guards

No court ordered classes

No reform

No help

Some kids were so desperate they dug through concrete walls to escape!

That’s exactly what is happening to KIDS at Acadiana Youth Detention Center in Louisiana! The mental torture that they are experiencing is disgusting! Their only interaction with people was through their meal slot! How is any of this rehabilitation for these kids? We are not going to step aside while this facility creates a pipeline to prison for our kids!”

In partnership with ProPublica and NBC News, the journalism nonprofit the Marshall Project reported on how judicial officials in one courtroom found out about the facility, described as a “high-security lockup,” opened in secrecy last summer. A 15-year-old being held in solitary confinement around the clock at the facility was shown from a courtroom screen having been detained for “joyriding in a stolen car,” the Marshall Project reported.

“He was getting no education, in violation of state and federal law, nor was he getting court-ordered substance abuse counseling, according to two defense attorneys present,” journalists Beth Schwartzapfel, Erin Einhorn, and Annie Waldman wrote. “And no one in the room that day—not the judge, not the prosecutor, not the defense lawyers—appeared to have heard of the facility where Louisiana’s Office of Juvenile Justice was holding him: the Acadiana Center for Youth at St. Martinville.”

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The journalists’ project relied on hundreds of pages of incident reports, emails, videos, education records, and emergency response logs, as well as dozens of interviews.

They wrote that, while the state of Louisiana treats solitary confinement as a “last resort,” teens at the Acadiana Center, including those diagnosed with mental illness, were held in their cells for at least 23 hours a day for weeks. “They were shackled with handcuffs and leg irons when let out to shower, and given little more than meals slid through slots in their doors,” Schwartzapfel, Einhorn, and Waldman wrote. “Some teens took those brief moments of human contact to fling their feces and urine at the guards.”

“At least two of the teens in the facility harmed themselves so badly that they required medical attention. Some destroyed beds and shattered light fixtures, using the metal shards to hack holes in the cinder block walls large enough for them to escape.”

Two teens actually did escape the detention center in January and were later apprehended. Two more teens escaped in February, ABC-affiliated WBRZ reported. “My tolerance level has pretty much met or is pretty close to the threshold,” Sheriff Becket Breaux told the news station at the time. “We have a meeting with juvenile justice to discuss this and come up with ways of stopping this.”

The sheriff’s conversation with WBRZ didn’t cover the conditions the teens were fleeing at Acadiana Center.

Rashad, a 15-year-old held at the detention center, told the Marshall Project “you have to have a strong mind” to survive at the facility. Rashad was identified by his middle name for his protection. “You can’t think about it,” he said. “If you think about it, it will make you sad.” He said he was in his cell all day and had clothes, but no socks, books, paper, or pencils.

Peter Dudley, Rashad’s attorney, told the Marshall Project his “jaw dropped” when he learned of the conditions his client was being kept in. “You’ve got a child that we’re supposed to be trying to rehabilitate. He’s basically being housed like a death row inmate,” Dudley said.

The nonprofit Louisiana Center for Children’s Rights filed a complaint with the Louisiana Department of Education last November claiming that the Acadiana Center “systemically deprived the children at St. Martinville of their legal right to a free appropriate public education.”

The Marshall Project reported that following that complaint, the detention center added educational classes though they still didn’t meet the bar set by state law that students receive six hours of daily instruction.

“Clearly these facilities are underresourced. They’re undermanned,” state Rep. Royce Duplessis told the Marshall Project. “We need to make sure the guards are paid, and these are not facilities that kids want to tear up and jump on the guards and just be destructive.”

Duplessis filed proposed legislation to limit solitary confinement in juvenile facilities to four hours, and requires that the child’s guardians and attorney be notified when a juvenile is held in solitary confinement under any circumstances. The bill states:

“Juveniles in solitary confinement shall be continuously monitored. Facility staff shall engage in continued crisis intervention and de-escalation techniques and make visual and verbal contact with each youth in solitary confinement at least every ten minutes. The intent and purpose of this intervention is to help de-escalate the juvenile’s behavior so the juvenile can rejoin the general population as soon as possible.”

The bill was last referred to the Committee on Administration of Criminal Justice in March.

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It’s difficult to even remember all of the horrific violence that took place during the Black Lives Matter protests following the murder of George Floyd, much of it at the hands of police.

One episode, in particular, took place during a protest in Buffalo, New York, when video captured a 75-year-old protester shoved to the ground by two police officers in riot gear. Martin Gugino fell and hit his head. Blood was seen pouring from his ear. The video, shot by Buffalo radio reporter Michael Desmond, sent shockwaves around the world.

In the days that followed, officers Aaron Torgalski and Robert McCabe were suspended without pay and then arrested and charged with second-degree felony assault. Last year, a grand jury dismissed the case. On Friday, arbitrator Jeffery M. Selchick officially cleared the officers of any wrongdoing, The Buffalo News reports.

RELATED STORY: Black teen was top student until she was dragged out of class and strip-searched by police at school

“Upon review, there is no evidence to sustain any claim that Respondents (police officers) had any other viable options other than to move Gugino out of the way of their forward movement,” Selchick wrote of the June 4, 2020 incident in his 41-page arbitration.  

The officers testified that Gugino refused to move, and Torgalski said he was both afraid of getting COVID-19 from Gugino and that the elderly man had gotten too close to his firearm. Torgalski claimed he wasn’t sure why Gugino fell.

Selchick surmised in his decision that Gugino fell because he was holding something in his hands, and due to his age and because the force of the officers took him by surprise, he simply “lost his balance.”

Gugino has sued the Buffalo Police Department over his injuries, which include a fractured skull and required a month-long hospital stay. The suit is pending.

Gugino’s attorney Melissa D. Wischerath told The Buffalo News they were “not aware of any case where this arbitrator has ruled against on-duty police officers, so his ruling here on behalf of the police was not only expected by us, but was certainly expected by the union and city who selected and paid him. His decision has absolutely no bearing on the pending lawsuit.” 

Thomas H. Burton, an attorney representing the Buffalo Police union, claimed the arbitrator’s ruling was “the right victory and an across-the-board victory for Buffalo Police officers.” Burton added: “Evidence from the hearing showed that they simply were trying to back him off … if Mr. Gugino had simply moved away and left, none of this would have happened.”

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A few months after the incident, Gugino told WGRZ-TV that when it comes to Buffalo police, “it’s not a situation of a few bad apples, this is a bad barrel. A couple of bad barrels.”  

He added:

“These are not two especially bad officers, the whole system is wrong. They’re all taught to do the wrong thing. That’s the problem that has to be fixed… And the chief of police, whatever training he gave these guys is not right. You’re allowed to protest on the sidewalk. Protest is the American way. That’s the feedback that the government needs.”  

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Republicans are no stranger to queerphobia and anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric and legislation. But in the last year alone, conservatives at the local and state levels have pushed a stunning number of anti-queer bills, some of which have already been signed into law. Much of this legislation has targeted transgender folks, including trans youth, especially when it comes to access to safe, gender-affirming health care and sports. 

Conservatives have consistently presented trans people—especially trans women—as predators, which becomes immediately familiar if you revisit anti-trans arguments about bathroom access that were popular several years ago. LGBTQ+ people have been branded as creeps and predators going decades back, actually, and thanks to conservatives like Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, that rhetoric is getting a revival. According to conservatives, young people shouldn’t be exposed to LGBTQ+ topics or identities in the classroom, and as DeSantis Press Secretary Christina Pushaw spewed, anyone who opposes such guidelines is basically a predator. Yikes!

And it’s not only Florida. A handful of comparable Don’t Say Gay bills are popping up around the country. And no matter where you live, if you watch Fox News, you’ve probably seen grown adults go on air to … argue that male teachers are predators and pontificate about why men aren’t beating up teachers who discuss LGBTQ+ issues. Yes, really. Let’s see some of these horrifying moments below.

RELATED: Chris Murphy just showed every progressive how to call out transphobes like Marjorie Taylor Greene

A recent example on Fox News comes from a conversation between host Mark Levin and writer David Mamet, where Mamet boldly suggested that male teachers are “inclined” to pedophilia, as highlighted by the New Civil Rights Movement. 

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“We have to take back control,” he stated. “There’s no community control of schools. What we have is um, kids being not only indoctrinated but groomed in a very real sense by people who are … Whether they know it or not, sexual predators. Are they abusing the kids physically? No, I don’t think so. But they’re abusing them mentally and using sex to do so.

“This has always been a problem with education. Teachers are inclined, particularly men, because men are predators, to pedophilia. And that’s why there were strict community strictures about it, thank god. So this started to break down when the school said, ‘You know what? We need to teach kids about sex because what if they don’t do it at home?’”

Surprising no one, he offered no studies or research to back up his outrageous claims. The use of the word “grooming,” of course, is a signal that we’re really talking about here is gay people (and particularly gay men) manipulating and abusing youth. It suggests that an event talking about sexual identity or having sex ed is an opportunity to have some kind of sexual activity or engagement, when it’s actually just about educating on sexual health, identities, and (hopefully) important topics like consent, how to report abuse, and so on. 

Painting cisgender men as predatory also feeds into the narrative that trans women are actually cis men pretending to be women in order to access women and girls in places like the bathroom and locker room. It’s all connected.

As highlighted over at Media Matters, Tucker Carlson recently wondered aloud why fathers aren’t storming classrooms and beating up teachers who talk about identity. 

“Teachers pushing sex values on your third grader, why don’t you go in and thrash the teacher?” Carlson said in part while blabbering on Fox News. “Like this is an agent of the government pushing someone else’s values on your kid about sex, like where’s the pushback?”

So now it’s cool to incite violence against educators? Though folks were already physically attacking teachers over mask mandates, so it’s really nothing new in this day and age. And it’s especially not new from Fox—but it’s still disgusting and shameful. 

At the end of the day, grooming is a serious form of abuse and sexual violence. It is never okay for an adult to coerce or manipulate a young person, whether or not that involves emotional, physical, or sexual contact. It’s not okay, period. The characterization of LGBTQ+ people as being more likely to be predators or the idea that queer people only want to talk to youth about sexual orientation or gender identity is to “turn” them queer is inaccurate, offensive, and hateful. Nothing backs these claims except for the hate of the person spewing them. 

And all the while, conservatives are eager to change laws so they can marry minors. But again, they want to call us the predators … 

Sign the petition: Demand the Senate pass the Equality Act and protect the LGBTQ community from discrimination.

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Texas Rep. Veronica Escobar is slamming right-wing Gov. Greg Abbott’s recent announcement seeking to bus asylum-seekers to Washington, D.C., as his usual, but no less disgusting, political theatrics. She ties this latest plan to another border scheme that has treated both migrants and deployed soldiers with disregard.

“If a person is a soldier or a migrant, he doesn’t care,” Escobar tells Border Report. She represents the El Paso region. “For him, they represent an opportunity to advance his politics of hate and cruelty. He’s not focused on solutions or on working with Congress to really help Texans; he’s focused on winning (re-election) at any cost.”

RELATED STORY: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott peddles horrific plan to kidnap immigrants, then backtracks

As noted last week, while Abbott puffed up his chest for cameras and threatened that he would kidnap forcibly move asylum-seekers across state lines as retribution for the Biden administration’s just decision to stop enforcing Stephen Miller’s anti-asylum policy at the southern border, Abbott was notably sedate in the official statement, which said the busing would actually be voluntary.

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“I don’t know if he’s really going to do what he says—I don’t think so,” Escobar commented to Border Report. “But if he wants to go through with this treatment of vulnerable people, I think someone will take him to court.” 

But what she knows for sure is that Miller’s Title 42 order has been an abject failure, quadrupling crossings, experts have said. “We have 1,900 miles of wall. That has not stopped, curbed, or deterred migration,” Escobar continued to Border Report. “We’ve now had almost three years of Title 42. That has not stopped curbed or deterred migration.”

Escobar had vocally urged an end to the policy, and called for the administration to “re-envision our immigration policies to be more strategic and humane,” including creating a pilot program “for processing vulnerable populations using civilian personnel instead of law enforcement.” Border state advocates have also said they’re ready to welcome asylum-seekers. 

“Our community in Arizona is welcoming to refugees and asylum seekers; it has been for many years,” said Their Story is Our Story Assistant Director of Advocacy Christy Bishop.

“Finally, Congress has an obligation to act on reforming outdated immigration laws,” Escobar said last month. “Calls for vulnerable populations to ‘get in line’ or ‘do it the right way’ reflect an ignorance about the limited legal opportunities that exist. It falls on those of us in Congress to create those legal opportunities that would go a long way in addressing the challenges and opportunities we face at our nation’s front door and beyond.”

In the aftermath of the horrific mass shooting by a white supremacist terrorist in El Paso in 2019, Escobar has relentlessly used her platform to call attention to the dangers of racist rhetoric commonly used by Abbott and other right-wing politicians.

Escobar late that year chaired a field hearing on anti-immigrant rhetoric and domestic violence that was skipped by Republicans. “Unnamed Republican representatives had planned to attend, Escobar said, but ‘backed out at the last minute’ for unknown reasons,” the El Paso Times reported. Probably because the anti-immigrant rhetoric of so many in their party is no different than racist mass murderers. Several years later, they’re just getting worse, just openly threatening to kidnap people.

RELATED STORIES: ’Matter of life and death’: Escobar chairs hearing on anti-immigrant rhetoric and domestic terrorism

In absence of presidential leadership, Rep. Escobar becomes a comforter in chief for El Paso

GOP states waste no time suing over Biden admin’s termination of anti-asylum Title 42 policy