Month: June 2025

Bertrand: And what we are told is that as of now, this defense intelligence agency assessment, it does conclude at this point… that those underground facilities, including the centrifuges, including the highly enriched uranium that everyone has been talking so much about, those… pic.twitter.com/oNO2unQKUd

— Acyn (@Acyn) June 24, 2025

Bertrand: And what we are told is that as of now, this defense intelligence agency assessment, it does conclude at this point… that those underground facilities, including the centrifuges, including the highly enriched uranium that everyone has been talking so much about, those are largely intact.

Yeah.

The Iranians have learned one thing from all this. Build that bomb as quickly as humanly possible now. Then Trump will go to Tehran and salute the Ayatollah and call him his best friend.

That’s how this works now, right?

Wired traced the trajectory of a propaganda campaign that ended up being taken up by the president and his cult TV network:

President Donald Trump and his most vocal supporters have been using disinformation, fake videos, and mental gymnastics to try to spin the US military’s bombing of three Iranian nuclear sites as a complete and total victory that signals the end of a war instead of the beginning.

On Saturday night, with the B-2 stealth bombers that dropped a dozen GBU-57 “bunker buster” bombs on the Fordow underground nuclear facility just beginning their flights back to the US, Trump declared the mission a complete success.

But rather than relying on information from his own intelligence agencies, satellite imagery, or on-the-ground reporting, Trump instead posted on Truth Social a screenshot of an X post from an anonymous account that claims to conduct open source intelligence investigations.

“Fordow is gone,” the account, which lists the website of a Zionist clothing company in its biography, wrote, providing no further information. Trump followed this up by claiming in a press conference that Fordow had been “completely and totally obliterated.”

It immediately became clear that the triumphant declarations were likely premature, with Trump’s own military officials pushing back against his assessment. “It would be way too early for me to comment on what may or may not still be there,” said General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Israeli military officials told The New York Times that while the facility had sustained significant damage, it had not been destroyed. Additionally, a senior Iranian official told Reuters that most of the highly enriched uranium at the Fordow facility had been moved before the bombing, while the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency told The New York Times that the highly enriched uranium previously stored at the Isfahan facility had been moved before it was targeted by US strikes.

Trump’s early declarations of success on Truth Social set the tone, though—and appear to have inspired others. Fox News host Sean Hannity, among the loudest proponents for bombing Iran in recent weeks, posted the same phrase the account Trump screenshotted did—”Fordow is gone”—on his Instagram account, alongside a video of a massive explosion. (After WIRED published this story, Hannity appeared to have deleted the post.)

The video, however, does not show Fordow and is instead of a December 2024 Israeli strike on a missile base in Tartous, Syria. Hannity’s post, which remains on the platform, had been viewed more than 5 million times as of Monday morning.

That same video and other obviously fake videos have been shared widely on platforms like X, Facebook, and TikTok, with accounts also claiming they show explosions at Fordow. In some cases, users on X asking Grok to verify the footage have been told by X’s AI-powered chatbot that the footage is real—even though it is not.

Despite the pushback from his own military, Trump has continued to claim that the Fordow facility had been destroyed. “Obliteration is the accurate term,” Trump wrote on Sunday evening in a Truth Social post.

Trump has said that he doesn’t believe his own intelligence and we know that he believes whatever Fox News tell him. Now it’s clear that this is actually a feedback loop between internet tolls and bots, foreign intelligence operations, Fox News and Trump’s addled brain.

Great.

Trump: "We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don't know what the fuck they're doing. Do you understand that?" pic.twitter.com/Zoyq37wZgr

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 24, 2025

Trump on Israel: "These guys gotta calm down. Ridiculous … I didn't like the fact that Israel unloaded right after we made the deal. They didn't have to unload … I'm not happy about that, Israel." pic.twitter.com/NxhtjuxsUY

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 24, 2025

Trump on reports that Iran's nuclear capacity isn't demolished: "CNN is scum. And so is MSDNC." pic.twitter.com/5I5MJy2IAw

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 24, 2025

He’s on his way to the NATO Summit where he says he’s going to solve more problems.

The wingnuts are eating this up. The more aggressively stupid and hostile he is, the more they want to rush right out and roust an immigrant or a woke hippie liberal.

Maria Bartiromo and Ted Cruz praise Trump for his "busy morning on Truth Social" and "extraordinary" leadership pic.twitter.com/nypsk92m9Q

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 24, 2025

Welcome to Alligator Alcatraz

Andrew Egger of the Bulwark provides a summary of just some of the depraved actions alleged immigration agents have taken against both alleged undocumented immigrants and bona fide U.S. citizens during ICE’s ongoing immigrant safari in Los Angeles County.

The masked, nonuniformed ravers throwing people into unmarked vans are alleged ICE agents because they refuse to identify themselves or display badges. Seriously, non-felon civilians can buy body armor in most states in the country.

One can spot tricked-out AR-platform rifles at firing ranges from coast to coast.

You can buy Velcro patches that say POLICE on Amazon, for godsakes.

Get an ICE agent patch for your dog!

To all appearances, these unidentified brutalists are brownshirts cosplaying as police.

With Monday’s Supreme Court ruling in favor of the Trump administration, this behavior will get worse. SCOTUS conservatives greenlit the kind of extraordinary rendition that left two dozen CIA agents convicted in absentia in Italy over a dozen years ago. The Milan kidnapping of Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, also known as Abu Omar, took place in February 2003 under the Bush-Cheney regime.

Steve Vladeck lays out the frightening details of the SCOTUS decision at his Substack.

Kristi Noem looks to up the ante by building the kind of “FEMA camps the far right has warned about for decades.”

Wow!!@KristiNoem did what everyone has warned about for a decade!!

She's building the FEMA camps the far right has warned about for decades.https://t.co/dBsoSRyS6m

— emptywheel (check) (@emptywheel) June 24, 2025

CNN:

“Alligator Alcatraz,” as Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier calls it, is being erected on a little-used airstrip in the Everglades, the vast expanse of marshes and swamps that covers much of southern Florida and hosts a dizzying array of wildlife, from hundreds of bird species to bobcats, panthers, crocodiles and alligators.

“You don’t need to invest that much in the perimeter. If people get out, there’s not much waiting for them other than alligators and pythons,” Uthmeier said in an announcement video that casts the facility as “the one-stop shop to carry out President Trump’s mass deportation agenda” and features slow-motion footage of snapping alligators.

Construction of the new Florida facility comes just weeks after Trump said he had directed federal agencies to reopen the original Alcatraz – a prison famously known for being virtually inescapable because of its location on a small island in the Pacific Ocean off San Francisco. And in his first term, Trump floated the idea of fortifying the US southern border with a water-filled trench infested with alligators, the New York Times reported (Trump denied it).

Next Trump will want to annex Devil’s Island.

What a proud moment for misty-eyed, freedom-loving red-hats.

Update: Added “No Cop” meme.

* * * * *

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A Public Service Announcement

I hadn’t heard of this gentleman below, but he’s decided enough is enough. It’s not much, but he decided that, basically, that “this aggresssion will not stand, man.” A woman over the weekend said something similar. Both are desperate to do something, anything, to send a message to the clown car of lunatics and cult enablers inside the Beltway. Someone has to.

 

View on Threads

From Threads:

Monday 6/23 on the capitol lawn with my sign, a synopsis of my day…To say that today was hot, would be a profound understatement. As I anticipated a very warm week, I brought my trusty digital thermometer with me. Believe it or not, it was reasonably comfortable under my umbrella, even though the temperature hovered around 97° all day.My biggest problem where the biting flies who didn’t seem to be deterred in the least by my deep woods off bug repellent. Now what’s up with that? 🧵1/5

Got a ride from Alyssa up to the top of Capitol Hill on the electric cart. When she saw my wagon with all my stuff in it, she asked if I was “the guy with the sign?” When I said yes, she said she was happy to be taking me up to the top of the hill. Alyssa was very accommodating and helpful with my wagon. Apparently, I’ve become well known amongst the locals. 🧵2/5

He adds

That’s the temperature in the shade under my umbrella.

Although both houses are in session today, the parking area in front of the capitol was nearly empty (see photo). There were very few tourists, and fewer than a dozen capitol tour groups. No one came by to chat, except for people I’ve known for the past few months.Mark with his guitar stopped by to say hi. Amber with her sign stopped by a few times to chat as she did multiple loops around the capitol. Jamie Dupree was on his daily circuit around the Capitol to see what’s happening.🧵3/5

The Capitol police walked, what I must assume are their explosive detection dogs, twice around my protest area today. This is not the first time they have walked their dogs very close to my wagon. Intimidation tactics can be very subtle.Did I mention it was a really hot day? I’m not sure I’ve ever appreciated air conditioning as much as I did today. 🧵4/5

Today was an astonishingly quiet day out on the lawn. So ends my 21st day of attempting to shame the shameless.I have consumed my dinner and I’m done writing. It was a long day in the hot sun and now it’s time to relax. I wish everyone a pleasant evening. And I’ll see you tomorrow.🧵5/fin

And that’s it, isn’t it? “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

That’s what we do here every day. Push back, doing what we can in our own little ways. Not because we want to but because we have to.

This is old ground:

Sometimes in politics you get run over. But being in the fight means I stopped feeling like road kill decades ago. The antidote to cynicism and despair is stepping back into the fight the way Rick Blaine does at the end of Casablanca. 

Even older:

“Why doesn’t somebody do something?” has become something of a joke question in my house. It’s one of those questions we ask when exasperated over whatever daily outrage comes over the radio, TV, or Web. After hearing the question one too many times, it finally dawned on me that I was somebody. Look at the trouble that’s gotten me into.

Thank you for being in this with us. None of us asked to live in a police state.

Well, some of us did. That’s the problem.

* * * * *

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And it’s not the immigrants

ICE is completely out of control:

Video of a landscaper being taken down, pinned and repeatedly punched by masked federal agents in Orange County has gone viral online, and Alejandro Barranco finds it painful to watch.

The Marine veteran says his father, Narciso Barranco, was working outside of a Santa Ana IHOP on Saturday when several masked men approached him. Frightened, he began to run away, his son said. Moments later, he was on the ground, held down by the men, who struck him.

The younger Barranco said Sunday that his father was pepper sprayed and beaten, and that his shoulder was dislocated. After speaking with him Sunday at about 6 p.m., Barranco said his father had not received medical treatment, food or water after more than 24 hours in a detention facility in Los Angeles.

“I don’t think it was just, I don’t think it was fair,” Barranco said of the use of force against his father. “I don’t think they need four 200[-pound] plus guys to hold down a 5-6 or 5-7, 150-pound guy.”

[…]

Alejandro Barranco, 25, is a veteran of the U.S. Marines and his two younger brothers, Emanuel and José Luis Barranco, are active-duty members.

Look for Pete Hegseth to have them drummed out of the corp for being DEI hires.

These actions are happening all over L.A County right now. The mainstream media has moved on. Nobody’s lit a Waymo on fire lately so who cares, right? It’s just the nation’s second largest city and largest county under siege at the hands of armed thugs in masks who are operating with impunity.

I wish I thought something would be done about this but I can’t see the mechanism. If we all take to the streets, it makes a small blip and then we’re on to the next story. The Supreme Court is basically backing Trump’s inhumane policies (see below) and this whole thing has just faded into the background as we churn through one atrocity after another. But it’s an ongoing nightmare for law abiding, tax-paying workers who are doing nothing but contributing to our society. It’s a horror show.

I will never be able to forgive the people who made this happen. I’m sorry. It’s too much.

The conservative Supremes come through for him again

It will be a miracle if they end up doing the right thing on any of these cases. We now have a dictatorship:

The Supreme Court made it easier Monday for the Trump administration to deport convicted criminals to “third countries” to which they have no previous connection.

In a brief unsigned order that did not explain its reasoning, the court put on hold a federal judge’s ruling that said those affected nationwide should have a “meaningful opportunity” to bring claims that they would be at risk of torture, persecution or death if they were sent to countries the administration has made deals with to receive deported immigrants.

As a result, the administration will be able to try to quickly remove immigrants to such third countries, including South Sudan. Affected immigrants can still attempt to bring individual claims.

“The ramifications of the Supreme Court’s order will be horrifying; it strips away critical due process protections that have been protecting our class members from torture and death,” said Trina Realmuto, executive director of the National Immigration Litigation Alliance, one of the groups that brought the legal challenge.

The three liberal justices on the conservative-majority court all dissented.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a dissenting opinion that the court had stepped in “to grant the government emergency relief from an order it has repeatedly defied.”

She said the court was “rewarding lawlessness” by allowing the Trump administration to violate immigrants’ due process rights.

The fact that “thousands will suffer violence in far-flung locales” is less important to the conservative majority than the “remote possibility” that the judge had exceeded his authority, Sotomayor said.

Even aside from the horror of putting some Vietnamese immigrant in the desert in Sudan with nothing, that last but by Sotomayor indicates they are also on the verge of ruling that the president doesn’t have to answer to the district courts and possibly the court of appeals. I guess they want to preserve a little piece of this dictatorship only for themselves. I’m going to guess they’ll be in for a rude surprise on that one if they do something that Trump and his junta don’t like. They’ll tell them they can go fuck themselves too.

Here’s one of the details that just makes your hair stand on end:

Under immigration law, the government can deport people to third countries only if it is “impracticable, inadvisable, or impossible” to send them either to their home countries or previously designated alternative countries, the plaintiffs’ lawyers added.

The Guatemalan plaintiff, identified as O.C.G., is a gay man who the plaintiffs say was quickly deported to Mexico this year even though it was not previously designated as a country he could be sent to. O.C.G. had said that was kidnapped and raped in Mexico last year.

The Mexican government sent him to Guatemala, where he was, until recently, in hiding.

On June 4, the Trump administration returned him to the United States.

They deported him and then brought him back so they could deport him to someplace like South Sudan. This is pure sadism.

Native Americans are routinely being harassed by ICE and border patrol which, as that women in the video above is quite rich considering they were literally in the country first.

And that’s not all. Bolts reports that their voting rights are being attacked by the federal government as well.

The water system that provides for the entire Spirit Lake Reservation in North Dakota has been contaminated with dangerous levels of manganese that have made the water undrinkable since May. 

For Lonna Jackson-Street, chair of the Spirit Lake Tribal Council, which is now scrambling to provide bottled water to residents and install a filtration system, the crisis underscores the need for Native voices in government. The federal government fails to properly maintain infrastructure it’s supposed to be managing, and state leaders don’t dedicate enough resources to reservations they see as outside their jurisdiction. “Native representation is so important,” she said, “because they understand the gaps in these services and how they are administered to our tribal nations.”

A member of Spirit Lake Nation was elected to North Dakota’s legislature for the first time last fall thanks to a redistricting lawsuit filed by Jackson-Street’s tribe, alongside the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa. The suit claimed that the districts drawn by North Dakota in 2021 violated the Voting Rights Act, and the tribes’ initial success in court triggered a new map and increased representation in 2024.

But last month, a federal appeals court tossed out their victory and declared that only the federal government can sue over violations of the Voting Rights Act, a devastating blow to the ability of these tribes—and others in the region—to seek legal recourse. 

The decision was a major win for the conservative lawyers who’ve been trying to gut the VRA, and it came just as the Trump administration is signaling that it has little interest in enforcing voter discrimination laws. 

With little federal support and little ability to pursue fair representation in court, it’s fallen to civic and voting organizations to battle to fill in the gaps, with grassroots actions like registration drives, and to help ensure that Native voters have a fair shot at political power. But these groups, too, are facing difficulties this spring, with many reporting that they have felt the financial pressure of the GOP’s war on all things “DEI.” 

These folks are among the most vulnerable in our society (which has been a national shame since the very beginning) and the Trump administration is doing everything they can to make them even more miserable. I don’t think they plan to deport them (although that wouldn’t surprise me) but they are certainly trying to disenfranchise them, starve them and make them sick. There’s not a lot of political upside so I think it’s just because they enjoy it.

Read the whole thing. This stuff doesn’t get enough circulation and it should.

Dr. Jeffrey Lewis, aka ArmsControlWonk, and expert on non-proliferation and arms control,wrote this thread on BlueSky and twitter that’s gone viral. For those of you who don’t waste your time in those places I thought I’d share:

Why am I so unimpressed by these strikes? Israel and the US have failed to target significant elements of Iran’s nuclear materials and production infrastructure. RISING LION and MIDNIGHT HAMMER are tactically brilliant, but may turn out to be strategic failures. 🧵 1/17 

Netanyahu’s justification for conducting this strike was that “Iran has produced enough highly enriched uranium for nine atom bombs — nine.” He refers to Iran’s stockpile of ~400 kg of 60% U-235 which, if further enriched, would be enough for 9-10 weapons. Let’s consider. 2/17 

The 400 kg of HEU was largely stored in underground tunnels near the Isfahan Uranium Conversion Facility. Despite extensive Israeli and US attacks the facility, there does not seem to have been any effort to destroy these tunnels or the material that was in them. 3/17

No one even knows where the HEU is now! @rafaelmgrossi says Iran moved it. Lil’ @marcorubio says nothing can move in Iran. But trucks are moving in Iran. Trucks and heavy equipment showed up at least two days ago to seal the tunnels to protect them. @planet took a picture. 4/17

Trucks also showed up at the Fordow FEP the day before the strike, possibly to relocate sensitive equipment, and certainly to cover those entrances with dirt. Iran just isn’t a no-drive zone at the moment. 5/17

To be fair, some Trumpkins acknowledge Iran still has the material. @JDVance says they’re going to “have conversations with the Iranians about” it. 🙃 The talking point is that the US has knocked out Iran’s ability to further enrich it and convert it to metal, so its fine. 6/17

IT’S NOT FINE. Yes, the strikes on the enrichment plants at Qom (Fordow FEP) and Natanz (PFEP and FEP) appear successful. But there has been no effort to strike the enormous underground facility next to Natanz where Iran can make more centrifuges and maybe do other things. 7/17

In 2022, Iran moved a centrifuge production line to “the heart of the mountain” there. This facility is huge — we estimated 10,000 m2 or more — and we don’t really know what else it might house (like enrichment or conversion). 8/17

Also, Iran recently announced a “new enrichment facility in a secure location” and told the @iaea it was ready to start installing centrifuges. The @iaea was set to inspect the facility, near Isfahan, before the bombing. It hasn’t been bombed AFAIK. 9/17

Let me say again: Iran said it had a new enrichment facility. The @iaeaorg was about to go see it. But before that could happen, Israel struck other facilities in Iran — but not the new one. See the problem? 10/17 

This means Iran has retained 400 kg of 60% HEU, the ability to manufacture centrifuges, and one, possibly two underground enrichment sites. That is also to say nothing of possible secret sites, which opponents of the JCPOA used to invoke all the freaking time. 11/17 

Let’s say Iran decides to rush a bomb. Iran can install ~1.5 cascades a week. In six weeks, it could have 9 cascades of IR-6 machines. It would take those machines about 60 days to enrich all 400 kg to WGU. Altogether that’s about five months although IMMV. 12/17 

Look, I get it. Watching bombers conduct an >11,000 km precision bombing raid is awesome. I am the sort of wierdo who happily read a 528 page book about the first Black Buck raid of the Falklands War in 1982. I really do get it. 13/17

But what does it say of two of the most amazing military operations in modern memory are still unable to fully eliminate Iran’s nuclear program? I think that’s proof that this is tactical brilliance may be in service of a foolhardy strategy. 14/17 

RISING LION and MIDNIGHT HAMMER have not slowed the Iranian program nearly as much as the JCPOA. We hold diplomacy to much higher standards than bombing. The same people who endlessly complained about the JCPOA “sunsetting” are now happy to delay Iran’s bomb by much less. 15/17 

This is why I said the strike is about regime change. As late as May, @DefenseIntel said Iran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program. When asked about that, @marcorubio said intel was “irrelevant.” It’s only irrelevant if the problem is the regime, not the program. 16/17 

We ought to judge this strike by its real purpose, not the legal camouflage of preemptive self-defense. If the strike leaves the current regime, or something very much like it, in power with a nuclear option then it will have been a strategic failure. 17/17 

This would not be surprising in the least.

One thing that has become crystal clear in the last few years is that anyone who has the capability of developing their own nuclear capability is likely preparing to do so ASAP. If there’s one thing that Trump, with his behavior toward North Korea and Iran and Putin with his invasion of Ukraine which voluntarily gave up its nuclear arsenal, have proved to the world — get your own nuke . It’s the only thing that will protect you from malevolent people like them.

By the way:

The homophobic slur was a nice touch I thought. I’m sure Trump’s pal Vlad got a kick out of it.

Him admonishing another person for “casually using the ‘n’ word” is really rich. He threatens nuclear annihilation on a weekly basis.

Bragging about the nuclear submarines has gotten him into trouble before:

Months after leaving the White House, former President Donald Trump allegedly discussed potentially sensitive information about U.S. nuclear submarines with a member of his Mar-a-Lago Club — an Australian billionaire who then allegedly shared the information with scores of others, including more than a dozen foreign officials, several of his own employees, and a handful of journalists, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The potential disclosure was reported to special counsel Jack Smith’s team as they investigated Trump’s alleged hoarding of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, the sources told ABC News. The information could shed further light on Trump’s handling of sensitive government secrets.

He’s immune from prosecution and impeachment for such behavior now so he could give the coordinates directly to Vladimir Putin and nothing would happen to him. But it take a lot of chutzpah for him to lecture others about loose lips. He’s a walking security threat.