Democrat News

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The acting head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has submitted a notice of intent to resign.

In a resignation letter, David Richardson reportedly said he would step down in the next two weeks. Sources told CNN that Department of Homeland Security officials already had a plan to oust him.

Richardson, a close ally of DHS Secretary Krisi Noem, came under fire after he was publicly silent for a week following floods in Texas that killed more than 130 people. He also told staff in a June meeting that he was unaware that there was a hurricane season in the U.S. DHS official later claimed Richardson had been joking.

“He never should have been there to begin with,” former FEMA administrator Cameron Hamilton, a Trump appointee, told CNN. “The two words I’d use to describe him are unprofessional and overwhelmed.”

FEMA chief of staff Karen Evans was expected to replace Richardson.

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Now granted, I’m no tech genius, but I don’t see a cost/benefit payoff for AI. From what I read, the industry costs so much to maintain itself, it will never make an actual profit. Which means an inevitable bubble, right? Bubbles pop! But tech bros are so convinced of their on genius, they believe their pitches.

They’re not completely dazzled, though. Sarah Friar, OpenAI’s finance chief, says the company would support “federal measures” to make it easier to finance sizable investments in AI chips. We remember this same philosophy when Big Shitpile crashed in 2008. Capitalism means they keep all the profits and we pay for their losses!

They can’t afford the high costs of the AI data farms, AND NEITHER CAN WE. All that power. All that water! All that pollution!

I see potential uses for text-based AI, and medical applications, but on the whole, it’s got to be too expensive for something that’s so buggy. The only way to fix it? They’re hiring hundreds of writers and editors to… teach AI how to write, by inputting information that’s already available by hiring said writers and editors!

No, I don’t want AI mass surveillance, or AI making battlefield decisions. (Israel admits to a 10% error rate in their bombings, which certainly sucks for all those dead Gazans who got killed by these little tech oopsies).

AI is a classic example of the motto, “Ready, fire, aim!”

Via Yahoo Finance:

Billionaire Peter Thiel’s latest 13F didn’t show off a mere trim, but a full-blown exit from AI bellwether Nvidia (NVDA).

It comes at a surprising point when Wall Street’s been busy declaring the chipmaker as virtually untouchable.

Although Nvidia recently surpassed a $5 trillion valuation, Thiel walked away completely, shrinking his fund’s equity book by roughly two-thirds while building it around three megacap names.

That’s far from being a rebalance and more of an emphatic statement.

Thiel had previously warned about AI’s hype cycle running far ahead of its real economics, and his Q3 portfolio shakeup aligns with that view.

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New reporting suggests that Judge Emil Bove, a former member of President Donald Trump’s legal team, spoke in favor of murdering people aboard alleged drug boats without proving they had done anything wrong.

While serving as acting deputy attorney general after Trump took office, Bove told the federal government’s top drug prosecutors that the administration was no longer interested in intercepting boats carrying narcotics, multiple sources told NPR.

Since that time, the U.S. military has killed more than 75 people in boat strikes without providing any direct evidence to support the claim that they posed a threat to Americans.

During his February address to the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF), Bove reportedly shocked attendees when he said the new policy should be to “just sink the boats.”

“He said that we’re not going to worry so much about interdictions, we’re just going to sink the boats,” one person who attended the conference confirmed.

“I looked around at others in that room when he said that, and jaws literally dropped,” the person added. “The way people interpreted that was not, ‘We’re going to interdict and process the folks in the boats.’ People took that as, ‘We’re just going to blow up the boats with people in them.'”

One former DOJ official who was present for the speech did not take Bove’s remarks seriously.

“It seemed so outlandish,” the former official said. “It just didn’t seem reasonable until they started blowing boats up, and then holy s—-, does this all go together?”

“Now that you look back on it, I think you can infer he probably meant just sink the boats with the people on them.”

Although the administration has not provided any evidence that narcotics were on boats that were struck by the U.S. military, DOJ lawyers provided select members of Congress with a memo with a legal rationale for the use of force.

According to the DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel, officials had declined to seek additional war powers from Congress “because the administration has determined they don’t apply, since the American personnel conducting the strikes aren’t in danger,” NPR reported.

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Donald J. Trump thinks the brave women who survived abuse by notorious sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein are a “hoax.” Still, they’re telling the world that they are very real in a PSA video produced by World Without Exploitation. Ahead of Tuesday’s vote to release the Epstein Files, the video directs the public to a link to send automated letters of support to their congressional leaders.

The powerful video features the survivors of the horrific abuse holding photos of themselves at the ages they met Epstein, the wealthy late financier who is linked with influential individuals.

“There are about a thousand of us,” a woman says in the video. “It’s time to bring the secrets out of the shadows.”

AOL reports:

Epstein survivor Annie Farmer, whose sister Maria Farmer was the first woman to file a criminal complaint against Epstein in 1996, stressed the release of the files is not a political issue but one that has been buried too long.

“Please remember that these are crimes that were committed against real humans, real individuals. This is not a political issue. This, this has been going on for decades,” Annie Farmer said. “My sister Maria Farmer reported this under the Clinton’s administration, right? There have been mistakes that were made in this case under the Bush administration. So many things have happened over the decades that were law enforcement failures in this case.

“This is not partisan. We’re asking for you to stand with us now to release all of the files,” she continued.

Bensky has said she was 17 and a budding ballerina in 2004 when Epstein sexually abused her at his Manhattan mansion.

“When you look at how long this has spanned, we have to do something about it. And it really is not political. It’s never been political for us,” she said.

After a backlash, and with many Republicans expected to defy Trump to sign off on releasing the files, the president, a longtime friend of Epstein’s, finally called for releasing them. But that was after Trump called for his party to stay in line and vote against the petition. And of course, he’ll have his Attorney General Pam Bondi to “investigate” it, even though she claimed the list doesn’t exist, and that was just before she said the list was on her desk. I’m sure Team Trump is ready with their Sharpies to “investigate” the files.

The survivors deserve to be heard. And not only that, the system that allowed the abuse to continue needs to be put in the wood chipper, and die a painful death. All of this shit needs a do-over, but this administration is a huge part of the problem.

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Things are not going very well for Trump’s Revenge Tour: James Comey edition. The judge has been critical of all the probably, definitely, maybe illegal and incorrect things that the DOJ’s newest appointed lawyer, Lindsay Halligan has been doing in deference to King Mango Tits.

Not only was the indictment of James Comey rushed (literally, almost to the day when the 5-year statute of limitations was set to run out), but they clearly indicted first, looked for evidence second.

On Wednesday November 5th, just 2 weeks ago, the judge ordered prosecutors to “produce to defense lawyers a trove of materials from the investigation, saying he was concerned the Justice Department’s position had been to “indict first” and investigate second.”

Judge Fitzpatrick ordered prosecutors to “produce by the end of the day on Thursday grand jury materials and other evidence that investigators seized during the investigation.” This order came after Comey’s attorneys made a strong case that they were at a disadvantage to provide a solid defense, as they were not given an opportunity to review information that the FBI collected years before. Comey’s lawyers had previously requested a transcript of grand jury proceedings.

Well, things came to a head today when the same Judge found evidence of “government misconduct” related to how the Trump loving prosecutor actually secured the indictment against former James Comey. In fact, Judge Fitzpatrick found that Halligan may have made significant legal errors in presenting evidence and instructing grand jurors who were weighing whether to charge Comey.

In his ruling, the judge states: “The record points to a disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps, missteps that led an FBI agent and a prosecutor to potentially undermine the integrity of the grand jury proceeding.”

There were extensive mentions of violations of the Fourth Amendment (protects individuals from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government) as well as constitutional errors with the Grand Jury, privilege issues AND due process issues. It is rare for Grand Jury secrecy to be pierced so bluntly, but in this case, the violations are serious that the judge allowed it.

The conclusion paragraph is…incredible:

“The Court recognizes that the relief sought by the defense is rarely granted. However, the record points to a disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps, missteps that led an FBI agent and a prosecutor to potentially undermine the integrity of the grand jury proceeding. Therefore, in this case, “the Court has before it a rare example of a criminal defendant who can actually make a ‘particularized and factually based’ showing that grounds exist to support the proposition that irregularities may have occurred in the grand jury proceedings and may justify the dismissal of one or more counts of the indictment.”

Read the truly blistering ruling here.

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The rot, the absolute corruption of this administration that just doesn’t seem to care about appearances or how they spend taxpayer money, is nothing short of breathtaking.

This latest embarrassment comes just weeks after it was revealed that Patel was using a government jet to make frequent stops in Nashville. Patel had a senior FBI official sacked after that information was leaked.

Kash Patel’s relationship with the 27-year-old country singer and influencer continues to raise eyebrows. “This is a clear abuse of position and misuse of government resources,” said Christopher O’Leary, a former senior FBI agent.

Source: NBC News

FBI Director Kash Patel’s country music performer girlfriend currently enjoys the protection of an FBI security detail to shield her from potential threats, prompting concerns that the arrangement may delay law enforcement from responding to other incidents, two people with direct knowledge tell MS NOW.

Alexis Wilkins, Patel’s girlfriend, has a security detail made up of elite FBI agents usually assigned to a SWAT team in the FBI field office in Nashville, where Wilkins spends time for her work. She and Patel first met in Nashville and while they travel together at times, they do not share a residence. Patel often travels to Washington for work but keeps a legal residence in Las Vegas.

People familiar with FBI security protocols said they were unaware of any instance in which the girlfriends of top FBI officials received government-staffed security details. Former FBI Director Christopher Wray’s wife Helen received a security detail; she lived with Wray in their home in Atlanta.

SWAT team agents on a detail with Wilkins would presumably be unable to respond or delayed in responding to crises that might develop in their territory, such as mass shootings or terror attacks, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive security matters.

An FBI spokesman did not respond to MS NOW requests for comment.

Exclusive: Kash Patel’s girlfriend being protected by FBI SWAT agents as a security perk

“There is no legitimate justification for this. This is a clear abuse of position and misuse of government resources,” said Christopher O’Leary, a former senior FBI agent “She is not his…

— Ken Dilanian (@DilanianMSNBC) November 17, 2025

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Over the weekend, the panel on CNN’s Table For Five were discussing the Epstein files. The discussion started with a brief overview of the bizarre way that the Orange Felon’s syndicate has been handling it. Trump said he was going to release the file, then his DOJ claimed there was nothing in them and closed the case, and now, again on Trump’s orders, has reopened the case just to look at Democrats.

As the panel was debating what was in the files and why Trump was acting so strangely about the files, GOP strategist Angie Wong came out with a stunningly stupid take on the issue:

WONG: Why now? Well, because.Democrats just had a major loss with the government shutdown.and we.need to change the narrative. right? We need to flip.it back.onto the Epstein files.

Really, guys? We’re going to recycle something that’s been dead for so long. No one cares about this stuff. they care about, you know, real american voters, we care about affordability and. other real things, not about Epstein. Yes, it’s salacious. Yes, there’s sex and girls and powerful politicians, but quite honestly, I don’t care about it. But now we have to flip the narrative because Democrats had a loss.

NEBLETT: I don’t know, I think this has been a bizarre position. You don’t care that the president might be a pedophile. You don’t care that the pedophile…

The conversation turned into a bunch of babbling until the host regained control and did her best to cover the network’s ass by rerpeating that no one was calling President Pedo a pedophile.

Later in the segment, they had another GOP strategist show that the Republicans are only worrying about the political ramifications while the rest of the world is saying that it doesn’t matter who’s in the files. The files need to be released so that justice can finally be done for the survivors of that nightmare.

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Rep. Thomas Massie states the obvious when it comes to one of the motivations behind Trump calling for his lackey Pam Bondi at DOJ to go after Democrats who might be named in the Epstein files. Massie made an appearance on ABC’s This Week on Sunday, and was asked by host Jonathan Karl what’s next now that his discharge petition has the votes in the House and how many Republicans might end up voting to release the files.

Massie proceeded to hit Trump for potentially using the investigations as a last ditch effort to keep the files from being released.

MASSIE: I think we could have a deluge of Republicans. There could be 100 or more. I’m hoping to get a veto-proof majority on this legislation when it comes up for a vote. And, you know, the president’s been saying this is a hoax. He’s been saying that for months. Well, he’s just now decided to investigate a hoax, if it’s a hoax.

And I have another concern about these investigations that he’s announced. If they have ongoing investigations in certain areas, those documents can’t be released. So, this might be a big smokescreen, these investigations, to open a bunch of them to — as a last-ditch effort to prevent the release of the Epstein files.

Karl asked Massie why he believes Trump doesn’t want the files released and what he’s afraid of.

MASSIE: You know, I’ve never said that these files will implicate Donald Trump. And I — I really don’t think that they will. I think he’s trying to protect a bunch of rich and powerful friends, billionaires, donors to his campaign, friends in his social circles. And I — that’s my operating theory on why he’s trying so hard to keep these files closed.

KARL: What do you think is actually in these files? I mean, we’ve seen so much Epstein material, from the criminal cases, the stuff that just came out this week, you know, from the estate. What do you think is left?

MASSIE: Yes, I don’t have to guess at what’s in the files. I’ve talked to the survivors through their lawyer, and we know there are at least 20 people in those files. They’re politicians, billionaires, movie producers who are implicated criminally who haven’t been investigated. And it’s up to the FBI, not the survivors, and the DOJ to release those names, or at least to investigate them. And when I see Donald Trump announce a bunch of investigations, I don’t see him going after these rich elites that are implicated in these files according to the survivors.

After discussing the cheap shots Trump took at Massie and his new wife, Karl asked Massie whether he thought his bill would get a vote in the Senate.

MASSIE: Well, they don’t have the procedural maneuver that Ro Khanna and I used in the House. They don’t have that in the Senate. It’s called a discharge petition.

But the senators do have other ways to force votes as amendments, for instance, on larger bills in order to let bills move quicker through the chamber. So, they could force the vote in spite of the leadership’s efforts.

I just hope John Thune will do the right thing. Look, our own speaker tried to push this bill by unanimous consent last week, within 15 minutes of me getting the 218th vote, because he was trying to save people from a vote. If he’s ready to pass it by unanimous consent, then the Senate leader should be as well. Just bring it up.

But the pressure is going to be there if we get a big vote in the House.

We’ll see if the dam actually breaks in the House or not.

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WASHINGTON  — The Supreme Court agreed Monday to hear a Trump administration appeal that argues migrants have no right to seek asylum at the southern border.

Rather, the government says border agents may block asylum seekers from stepping onto U.S. soil and turn away their claims without a hearing.

The new case seeks to clarify the immigration laws and resolve an issue that has divided past administrations and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Under federal law, migrants who faces persecution in their home countries may apply for asylum and receive a screening hearing if they are “physically present in the United States” or if such a person “arrives in the United States.”

Since 2016, however, the Obama, Biden and Trump administrations responded to surges at the border by adopting temporary rules which required migrants to wait on the Mexican side before they could apply for asylum.

But in May, a divided 9th Circuit Court ruled those restrictions were illegal if they prevented migrants from applying for asylum.

“To ‘arrive’ means ‘to reach a destination,’” wrote Judge Michelle Friedland, citing a dictionary definition. “A person who presents herself to an official at the border has ‘arrived.’”

She said this interpretation “does not radically expand the right to asylum.” By contrast, the “government’s reading would reflect a radical reconstruction of the right to apply for asylum because it would give the executive branch vast discretion to prevent people from applying by blocking them at the border.”

“We therefore conclude that a non-citizen stopped by U.S. officials at the border is eligible to apply for asylum,” she wrote.

The 2-1 decision upheld a federal judge in San Diego who ruled for migrants who had filed a class-action suit and said they were wrongly denied an asylum hearing.

But Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer urged the Supreme Court to review and reverse the appellate ruling, noting 15 judges of the 9th Circuit joined dissents that called the decision “radical” and “clearly wrong.”

In football, a “running back does not ‘arrive in’ the end zone when he is stopped at the one-yard line,” Sauer wrote.

He said federal immigration law “does not grant aliens throughout the world a right to enter the United States so that they can seek asylum.” From abroad, they may “seek admission as refugees,” he said, but the government may enforce its laws by “blocking illegal immigrants from stepping on U.S. soil.”

Immigrants rights lawyers advised the court to turn away the appeal because the government is no longer using the “metering” system that required migrants to wait for a hearing.

Since June 2024, they said, the government has restricted inspections and processing of these noncitizens under a different provision of law that authorizes the president to “suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of alien” if he believes they would be “detrimental to the interests of the United States.”

The government also routinely sends back migrants who illegally cross the border.

But the solicitor general said the asylum provision should be clarified.

The justices voted to hear the case of Noem vs. Al Otro Lado early next year and decide “whether an alien who is stopped on the Mexican side of the U.S.-Mexico border ‘arrives in the United States’ within the meaning” of federal immigration law.

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SACRAMENTO — So far, gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra has escaped the bright spotlight focused on Gov. Gavin Newsom in the money pilfering scandal involving their former top aides. But that could change.

It seems only a matter of time before one of Becerra’s campaign rivals seizes the federal fraud case for attack fodder. I can hear it already: “If the man who wants to be governor can’t protect his own political funds, he shouldn’t be trusted to safeguard your tax money.”

That might not be fair, but this is big-time politics. And the word “fair” isn’t in the political dictionary.

Neither Becerra nor Newsom is implicated in any wrongdoing.

Newsom has drawn heavy media attention because his former chief of staff, Dana Williamson, is the central figure in the criminal case. Newsom also has made himself into a national political celebrity and the leader in early polling for the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination. That makes him prime news copy.

Becerra is low-profile by comparison, although he has achieved a very successful and respectable career: U.S. Health and Human Services secretary under President Biden, California attorney general and 12-term congressman.

It was Becerra’s dormant state political account that allegedly got pilfered of $225,000 while he was health secretary.

Federal prosecutors allege that Williamson, former Becerra chief of staff Sean McCluskie and Sacramento lobbyist Greg Campbell illegally diverted money to McCluskie’s wife, funneling the loot through shell companies for bogus consulting services.

McCluskie and Campbell both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud and have been cooperating with the federal government.

Williamson, who allegedly fleeced Becerra’s political kitty when she owned a government relations firm before joining Newsom’s staff, pleaded not guilty to bank and tax fraud charges. Besides raiding Becerra’s account, she’s accused of falsifying documents involving a COVID small-business loan and claiming $1 million in personal luxuries as business expenses on her income taxes.

After news of the case broke last week with Williamson’s arrest, Newsom’s office said the governor suspended her last November after she informed him of the federal investigation.

There also was a sophomoric attempt by a Newsom spokesperson to link the federal case to the combative relationship between President Trump and the California governor. It’s true Trump has been targeting his “enemies.” But this three-year FBI probe began under the Biden administration.

Becerra issued a statement saying that the “formal accusations of impropriety by a long-serving trusted advisor are a gut punch.” He also said he had been cooperating with the U.S. Justice Department‘s investigation.

The federal indictment alleges that McCluskie and Williamson misled Becerra about how monthly withdrawals from his political account were to be used.

The account stash of nearly $2 million was raised for a 2022 attorney general reelection campaign that never occurred because by then Becerra was health secretary. But the money could be used in some future state race, such as for governor.

Political operatives I talked with were stunned that $225,000 could be siphoned out of a politician’s campaign account without him noticing.

“Did the account have no one watching it except the consultants who were pilfering from it?” asked veteran Democratic consultant Garry South. “Those of us who have run campaigns are scratching our heads. I can’t imagine how this would happen.”

I asked the Becerra campaign.

A spokesperson replied that the health secretary had authorized payments for “campaign management” after being misled by trusted advisors.

Also, the spokesperson added, Becerra was counseled by a Health and Human Services attorney to distance himself from any “campaign or political activity” prohibited by the federal Hatch Act and ethics rules. So he delegated responsibility for managing the account to advisors.

And he got snookered and ripped off.

Will it tarnish Becerra’s image and hurt his campaign for governor? We don’t know yet. But probably not that much, if any. His only sin, after all, was trusting the wrong people and following an attorney’s advice.

Even big scandals don’t seem to damage politicians in this era — Trump being the unfathomable best example.

It could crimp Becerra’s fundraising if potential donors wonder where their money is actually going and whether anyone credible will be watching it.

The gubernatorial race is still wide open without a real front-runner. No candidate is captivating the voters.

A late October poll by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies showed paltry numbers for all candidates. Former Orange County Rep. Katie Porter led Democrats with 11% support among registered voters. Becerra was second with 8%. A whopping 44% of those surveyed were undecided.

Riverside County Sheriff Chad Blanco, a Republican, was first overall with 13%. But no Republican need apply for this job. California hasn’t elected a GOP candidate to a statewide office since 2006.

Becerra has as good a shot at winning as any current candidate. He was the leading Democrat among Latinos at 12%.

But he’ll need a better answer for why he may have allowed $225,000 in donated political contributions to be grabbed and illegally spent by people he trusted.