AMERICA IS A FASCIST STATE
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement, characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived good of the nation or race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy.
Opposed to anarchism, democracy, pluralism, egalitarianism, liberalism, socialism, and Marxism fascism is at the far right wing of the traditional left–right spectrum.
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement, characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived good of the nation or race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy.
Opposed to anarchism, democracy, pluralism, egalitarianism, liberalism, socialism, and Marxism fascism is at the far right wing of the traditional left–right spectrum.
AMERICA IS A ROGUE STATE
A nation or state regarded as breaking international law and posing a threat to the security of other nations.
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/07/14/us/trump-news
Live Updated
July 14, 2025
New York Times
Trump Administration Live Updates: Supreme Court Clears Way for Dismantling of Education Department
Demonstrators in Washington protested in March against the dismantling of the Education Department. Credit: Eric Lee/The New York Times
Live Updated
July 14, 2025
New York Times
Trump Administration Live Updates: Supreme Court Clears Way for Dismantling of Education Department
Demonstrators in Washington protested in March against the dismantling of the Education Department. Credit: Eric Lee/The New York Times
Where Things Stand:
Education Department: In a major victory for the Trump administration, the Supreme Court on Monday let it fire more than a thousand Education Department employees and functionally eliminate the agency. The court’s decision, while technically temporary, lets workers who had been reinstated during the legal battle be fired again. The department manages federal loans for college, tracks student achievement and enforces civil rights laws in schools. Read more ›
New lawsuit: Two dozen states and the District of Columbia are suing the Trump administration over $6.8 billion in education funding it withheld a few weeks before the start of the next school year. The money pays for free or low-cost after-school programs, as well as teacher training and help for children learning English.
July 14, 2025,
by Carl Hulse
Reporting from the Capitol
New York Times
The Senate approves the first judge of Trump’s second term.
Whitney D. Hermandorfer during her confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee in June. Credit: Nathan Howard/Reuters
The Senate on Monday confirmed the first federal judge of President Trump’s second term, putting the administration on a much slower pace for filling federal court vacancies than in his first term, when a rush to install conservatives on the courts was an overarching priority.
Senators voted 46 to 42 along party lines to confirm Whitney D. Hermandorfer of Tennessee to a seat on the Cincinnati-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Her approval came more than six weeks later than the first appellate judge confirmed after Mr. Trump took office in 2017. The Senate had also confirmed a new Supreme Court justice by this point in his last term, placing Neil M. Gorsuch on the court.
This time around, Mr. Trump has put more emphasis on other aspects of his administration, aggressively pushing ambassadorial nominations and devoting much of the energy of the Senate to pushing through the sweeping tax and policy legislation enacted this month.
In addition, significantly fewer judicial vacancies exist today compared with 2017, when Mr. Trump inherited more than 100 court openings after Senate Republicans stalled President Barack Obama’s judicial selections when they took Senate control in 2014.
“We’re not facing the number of judicial vacancies this Congress we did during Trump’s first term,” said Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota and the majority leader. “There are around 50 vacancies on the federal bench. Our job is to fill those vacancies with more judges who understand the proper role of a judge, and that starts with confirming Ms. Hermandorfer.”
Ms. Hermandorfer served as director of the strategic litigation unit in the Tennessee attorney general’s office, where she has argued high-profile cases, including defending the state’s abortion ban and challenging a Biden administration prohibition on discrimination against transgender students.
She clerked for Justices Samuel A. Alito and Amy Coney Barrett on the Supreme Court and for Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh when he sat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. At age 38, she is part of an effort by both parties to place younger judges on the bench, where they can serve for decades given their lifetime tenure, as opposed to the previous tradition of choosing lawyers with more extensive careers.
Her legal background drew criticism from Democrats.
“She has less than 10 years of legal experience,” Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, said on Monday. “She has never served as a chief counsel on any single case. She made a career of going after people’s reproductive rights, transgender rights and anti-discrimination policies.”
Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, also suggested that Ms. Hermandorfer had a “shocking” lack of experience for such a powerful appeals court post and noted that she ducked questions on whether Mr. Trump had lost the 2020 election.
“The fact that she’s willing to condone President Trump’s false claims further demonstrates a level of partisanship and deference to this president that is unacceptable for someone seeking a lifetime appointment,” Mr. Durbin said.
Republicans were strongly in support. Senator Charles E. Grassley, the Iowa Republican who is chairman of the Judiciary Committee, called her approval “nothing but net,” in a nod to Ms. Hermandorfer’s stint as a co-captain of the women’s varsity basketball team at Princeton.
“Ms. Hermandorfer understands the powerful role that judges have in our system of government, but even more importantly, she respects the limitations of that power,” Mr. Grassley said.
During his 2016 presidential run, Mr. Trump made his commitment to appointing conservative judges a central theme of his campaign, seeking to allay concerns on the right about his character and political leanings. In a first, he made public lists of those he said he would nominate to the Supreme Court if elected, a promise that was seen as important to his win.
With the eager cooperation of Senator Mitch McConnell, the Kentucky Republican who was then majority leader, Mr. Trump moved quickly to follow through on his judicial pledge. He ultimately placed 234 federal judges on the bench, including three Supreme Court justices after Mr. McConnell held open a vacancy that occurred with almost a year left in Mr. Obama’s tenure while another was pushed through just days before the 2020 election.
During the administration of President Joseph R. Biden Jr., Democrats worked aggressively to counter Trump’s judicial record and ultimately saw the confirmation of 235 federal judges. At this point in the Biden administration, seven judges had been confirmed.
Other judicial nominees are in the pipeline. Mr. Trump has nominated 10 people for U.S. district court seats in Missouri, Florida and Kentucky. He also put forward Emil Bove III, a former Trump defense lawyer and Justice Department official, for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, which handles cases from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and the Virgin Islands.
Mr. Bove, who could face a committee vote on his confirmation as early as Thursday, has faced accusations from a fired Justice Department colleague that he was willing to ignore court orders in immigration cases, an accusation Mr. Bove has denied.
July 14, 2025
Abbie VanSickle
Reporting from Washington
The Supreme Court agrees that the firing of more than 1,000 Education Dept. workers can proceed.
The emergency application to the justices stemmed from efforts by the Trump administration to sharply curtail the federal government’s role in the nation’s schools. Credit: Eric Lee/The New York Times
The Supreme Court agreed on Monday that the Trump administration can proceed with dismantling the Education Department by firing more than a thousand workers.
The order is a significant victory for the administration and could ease President Trump’s efforts to sharply curtail the federal government’s role in the nation’s schools.
The Trump administration has announced plans to fire more than 1,300 workers, a move that would effectively gut the department, which manages federal loans for college, tracks student achievement and enforces civil rights laws in schools.
The Education Department began the year with more than 4,000 employees. The administration also fired some probationary workers and offered employees the ability to resign. Altogether, after the terminations, the Education Department will have a work force of about half the size it did before Mr. Trump returned to office.
The move by the justices represents an expansion of presidential power, allowing Mr. Trump to dismantle the inner workings of a government department created by Congress without legislators’ input. The firings will hobble much of the department’s work, supporters argued in court filings. Particularly hard hit was the department’s Office for Civil Rights, which had seven of its 12 offices shuttered.
It comes after a decision by the justices last week that cleared the way for the Trump administration to move forward with cutting thousands of jobs across a number of federal agencies, including the Departments of Housing and Urban Development, State and Treasury.
The order by the court was unsigned and gave no reasoning, as is typical in such emergency applications. No vote count was given, which is usual for emergency orders, but Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissent, joined by the court’s other two liberals, Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.
The three argued that Mr. Trump had overstepped his authority with his “unilateral efforts to eliminate a cabinet-level agency established by Congress nearly half a century ago.”
“Only Congress has the power to abolish the department,” Justice Sotomayor wrote in her 19-page dissent.
The court’s decision, she wrote, would have severe consequences for the country’s students by unleashing “untold harm, delaying or denying educational opportunities and leaving students to suffer from discrimination, sexual assault and other civil rights violations without the federal resources Congress intended.”
The order is technically temporary, in effect only while courts continue to consider the legality of Mr. Trump’s move. In practice, fired workers whom a Boston judge had ordered be reinstated are now again subject to removal from their jobs.
Trump administration officials celebrated the court’s decision. Shortly after it was announced, the education secretary, Linda McMahon, said in a statement that the department would press forward with terminating workers.
“We will carry out the reduction in force to promote efficiency and accountability and to ensure resources are directed where they matter most — to students, parents, and teachers,” Ms. McMahon said. She added that the administration would “return education to the states,” but would “continue to perform all statutory duties” while “reducing education bureaucracy.”
The White House also praised the decision. “The Supreme Court once again recognized what radical district court judges refuse to accept — President Trump, as head of the executive branch, has absolute constitutional authority to direct and manage its agencies and officers,” a spokeswoman, Liz Huston, said in a statement.
In a statement, a union representing Education Department workers called the court’s decision “deeply disappointing.”
“This effort from the Trump administration to dismantle the Department of Education is playing with the futures of millions of Americans, and after just four months, the consequences are already evident across our education system,” Sheria Smith, the president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 252, said in a statement.
Mr. Trump had signed an executive order on March 20 instructing Ms. McMahon to start shutting down the federal agency, which manages federal loans for college, monitors student achievement and supports programs for students with disabilities. Trump administration officials cited low test scores by students as the reason to dismantle the department.
“We’re going to shut it down, and shut it down as quickly as possible,” Mr. Trump said during the ceremony where he signed the executive order.
The move immediately set up a legal fight over the future of the department because it was created by an act of Congress, and legislators had not given approval to eliminate it.
Shortly after, two school districts, the American Federation of Teachers and 21 Democratic state attorneys general filed a legal challenge in federal court in Massachusetts. The challengers asked a judge to block the executive order and to unwind a round of layoffs that gutted the department’s work force by about half.
Lawyers for the challengers argued that the administration’s plans would interfere with the department’s ability to carry out functions required by law.
On May 22, Judge Myong J. Joun of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts ordered the Trump administration to reinstate the fired employees while the lawsuit was pending. Judge Joun, who was nominated to the bench by President Joseph R. Biden Jr., said he agreed that only Congress could eliminate the department and that the administration’s actions amounted to an illegal shutdown of the agency.
On June 4, a panel of judges in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit upheld Judge Joun’s ruling. Two days later, the Trump administration filed an emergency application with the Supreme Court, asking it to intervene and lift the trial judge’s order. In the filing, Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that Judge Joun had “thwarted the executive branch’s authority to manage the Department of Education.”
In response, lawyers for the challengers argued that the agency’s leaders had “set out to destroy the agency by executive fiat” and without the support of Congress.
In court filings, the challengers asserted that the trial judge had properly determined that the government was likely to lose its argument that it had not eliminated the department. Judge Joun properly recognized that just because “a skeleton crew remains” at the Education Department, that did not mean the Trump administration was “faithfully carrying out Congress’s mission” in what was effectively “tearing the department down to the plywood,” they argued.
The Trump administration replied in court filings that the department had “determined that it can carry out its statutorily mandated functions with a pared-down staff and that many discretionary functions are better left to the states.”
Michael C. Bender contributed reporting.
July 14, 2025
Sarah Mervosh
Education reporter
24 states sue Trump over $6.8 billion withheld from education.
About 1.4 million children nationwide attend after-school programs that rely on federal support. Credit...Philip Cheung for The New York Times
A coalition of 24 states and the District of Columbia sued the Trump administration on Monday over $6.8 billion in education funding that the administration has withheld a few weeks before the start of the school year.
The withheld money includes about 14 percent of all federal funding for elementary and secondary education across the country. It helps pay for free or low-cost after-school programs that give students a place to go while their parents work. It also covers training to improve the effectiveness of teachers and help for children learning English.
Attorneys general from 22 states signed onto the lawsuit, along with the governors of Pennsylvania and Kentucky. All are Democrats.
The lawsuit accuses the Trump administration of holding back the money illegally. The U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power of the purse, and the Impoundment Control Act of 1974 says that a president cannot unilaterally refuse to spend money that Congress has appropriated.
The lawsuit asks a federal judge in Rhode Island to order the release of the money, which was supposed to be sent to states on July 1.
The Department of Education notified state education agencies on June 30 that it was holding the money back while it conducted a review. The Trump administration has sought to slash federal spending and align the budget with the president’s political priorities.
A spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget said that an initial review found instances of federal education money being “grossly misused to subsidize a radical left-wing agenda.” Among the examples he cited was a seminar on “queer resistance in the arts.”
The White House did not respond immediately to a request for comment about the lawsuit.
The White House has not said when the money might be released. It has proposed eliminating dedicated funding for the programs in its 2026 budget, ending some of the programs outright and collapsing others into a smaller pot of education funding for states.
President Trump and his team have said they believe the Impoundment Control Act is unconstitutional, and have argued that the president should have a greater say over spending in many areas of government.
Mr. Trump has said he also wants to eliminate the Department of Education, arguing that education should be more fully controlled by the states, though only Congress can abolish a cabinet-level agency.
The withholding of $6.8 billion for education has been sharply criticized by a growing chorus of Democrats, as well as by some Republicans.
Rep. Mike Lawler, a Republican who represents suburban areas north of New York City, urged President Trump to release $1.3 billion of the money to be used for after-school and other programs that keep children occupied outside of school hours, including in the summer.
He argued in a statement that the programs fulfill the Trump administration’s goal of giving power over education to the states, because state education agencies manage the money and choose which organizations receive it.
Nationwide, the withheld federal money funds after-school and other services for an estimated 1.4 million children, or nearly 20 percent of all students who participate in after-school programs, according to the Afterschool Alliance, an advocacy group. Most of the students in the programs come from lower-income households, and through after-school, they typically receive academic help, enrichment and a free snack or meal.
“Work doesn’t end at 3 o’clock,” said Christy Gleason, executive director of the Save the Children Action Network, which runs after-school programs at 41 schools, mainly in rural areas.
In many rural areas, the federally funded after-school programs are the only option. Cutting them would leave working parents there with few alternatives for child care, she said.
The withheld money includes $2.1 billion to help train, mentor and retain effective teachers, with a focus on low-income school districts. It also includes $1.4 billion in flexible funding for schools to spend on art, music, mental health services, physical education and technology. Smaller amounts go toward helping children learning English; adult literacy and education; and support for children of migrant farmworkers.
In Monterey County, Calif., about one in eight students qualify for the federal program for children of migrant farmworkers, said Deneen Guss, the county superintendent, who works with 24 local school districts.
The students’ parents move seasonally to harvest crops like strawberries and vegetables, education officials said. Many of them arrive in the county in March and move on again in October, creating academic and emotional challenges for students.
The federal money helps pay for academic support and other needs, like helping children sign up to see a doctor or dentist. The Trump administration has proposed eliminating the program, claiming that it is ineffective and strips taxpayer money from American students.
Most students in the Monterey County program are U.S. citizens or are in the country legally, Dr. Guss said.
Because the money to pay them has been withheld, the county has issued a layoff notice for about 30 employees who work as family specialists, teachers’ aides and in other positions, said Ernesto Vela, an assistant superintendent in the Monterey County Office of Education.
“All of the staff, if the funds do not come in, then essentially their last day of work is Sept. 7,” he said.
About 1.4 million children nationwide attend after-school programs that rely on federal support. Credit...Philip Cheung for The New York Times
A coalition of 24 states and the District of Columbia sued the Trump administration on Monday over $6.8 billion in education funding that the administration has withheld a few weeks before the start of the school year.
The withheld money includes about 14 percent of all federal funding for elementary and secondary education across the country. It helps pay for free or low-cost after-school programs that give students a place to go while their parents work. It also covers training to improve the effectiveness of teachers and help for children learning English.
Attorneys general from 22 states signed onto the lawsuit, along with the governors of Pennsylvania and Kentucky. All are Democrats.
The lawsuit accuses the Trump administration of holding back the money illegally. The U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power of the purse, and the Impoundment Control Act of 1974 says that a president cannot unilaterally refuse to spend money that Congress has appropriated.
The lawsuit asks a federal judge in Rhode Island to order the release of the money, which was supposed to be sent to states on July 1.
The Department of Education notified state education agencies on June 30 that it was holding the money back while it conducted a review. The Trump administration has sought to slash federal spending and align the budget with the president’s political priorities.
A spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget said that an initial review found instances of federal education money being “grossly misused to subsidize a radical left-wing agenda.” Among the examples he cited was a seminar on “queer resistance in the arts.”
The White House did not respond immediately to a request for comment about the lawsuit.
The White House has not said when the money might be released. It has proposed eliminating dedicated funding for the programs in its 2026 budget, ending some of the programs outright and collapsing others into a smaller pot of education funding for states.
President Trump and his team have said they believe the Impoundment Control Act is unconstitutional, and have argued that the president should have a greater say over spending in many areas of government.
Mr. Trump has said he also wants to eliminate the Department of Education, arguing that education should be more fully controlled by the states, though only Congress can abolish a cabinet-level agency.
The withholding of $6.8 billion for education has been sharply criticized by a growing chorus of Democrats, as well as by some Republicans.
Rep. Mike Lawler, a Republican who represents suburban areas north of New York City, urged President Trump to release $1.3 billion of the money to be used for after-school and other programs that keep children occupied outside of school hours, including in the summer.
He argued in a statement that the programs fulfill the Trump administration’s goal of giving power over education to the states, because state education agencies manage the money and choose which organizations receive it.
Nationwide, the withheld federal money funds after-school and other services for an estimated 1.4 million children, or nearly 20 percent of all students who participate in after-school programs, according to the Afterschool Alliance, an advocacy group. Most of the students in the programs come from lower-income households, and through after-school, they typically receive academic help, enrichment and a free snack or meal.
“Work doesn’t end at 3 o’clock,” said Christy Gleason, executive director of the Save the Children Action Network, which runs after-school programs at 41 schools, mainly in rural areas.
In many rural areas, the federally funded after-school programs are the only option. Cutting them would leave working parents there with few alternatives for child care, she said.
The withheld money includes $2.1 billion to help train, mentor and retain effective teachers, with a focus on low-income school districts. It also includes $1.4 billion in flexible funding for schools to spend on art, music, mental health services, physical education and technology. Smaller amounts go toward helping children learning English; adult literacy and education; and support for children of migrant farmworkers.
In Monterey County, Calif., about one in eight students qualify for the federal program for children of migrant farmworkers, said Deneen Guss, the county superintendent, who works with 24 local school districts.
The students’ parents move seasonally to harvest crops like strawberries and vegetables, education officials said. Many of them arrive in the county in March and move on again in October, creating academic and emotional challenges for students.
The federal money helps pay for academic support and other needs, like helping children sign up to see a doctor or dentist. The Trump administration has proposed eliminating the program, claiming that it is ineffective and strips taxpayer money from American students.
Most students in the Monterey County program are U.S. citizens or are in the country legally, Dr. Guss said.
Because the money to pay them has been withheld, the county has issued a layoff notice for about 30 employees who work as family specialists, teachers’ aides and in other positions, said Ernesto Vela, an assistant superintendent in the Monterey County Office of Education.
“All of the staff, if the funds do not come in, then essentially their last day of work is Sept. 7,” he said.
