Congress and President Trump have reopened the government at the same time the House has enough signatures to try and force Justice Department release of the Epstein Files. Never a dull moment in the Trump 47 administration. Here’s a comment:

Quelle Suprise – What could have been less surprising, as far as content goes? --Hugh Hansen, Contributing Pundit 

Read three emails released by House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Democrats between the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein; one with ex-girlfriend and “groomer” Ghislaine Maxwell and two with attorney Michael Wolff.

•••

Email your COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate whether you lean left or right (regardless of your opinion on the given issue) in the subject line. –Editors

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THURSDAY 11/13/25

It Evidently Doesn’t Matter -- On The Howard Stern Show — and let’s not lose sight of the fact that Stern had millions of listeners during the period in question — in 2004 Donald Trump said that it was OK to call his daughter Ivanka “a piece of ass.”

A couple years later he went on to say, “If Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her.”

Then in between those two comments timewise, there was the Access Hollywood tape of 2005 when he said, "I’m automatically attracted to beautiful women — I just start kissing them, it’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab 'em by the pussy. You can do anything.”

Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty in 2008 in Florida state court of procuring a child for prostitution and soliciting a minor for prostitution. He was convinced. Then, in 2019, while incarcerated before facing federal charges for sex trafficking of minors and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of minors, he died in his cell.

Epstein and Trump were in the same circles during the 1990s and early 2000s. Photos show it. Emails indicate it.

But it doesn’t matter.

Here’s the thing: Despite what Trump said about his daughter, despite what he said about molesting women, he was elected president, twice.

He had significant support from evangelical Protestant groups, people who one might think would not be accepting of such language and behavior.

The whole issue of the so-called Epstein Files from a political point of view is pointless. 

(This is not to excuse any of those who victimized the young, very young girls. It is outrageous. How any woman — especially mothers — can give this a pass is unimaginable.)

Whether or not there will be something that shows that Donald Trump participated in activities that are outside the boundaries of accepted behavior — morally and legally — simply won’t matter.

People know what he said about his daughter, what he said about molesting women, and that, apparently, is OK.

He, evidently, “can do anything.”

Which leads to a question: What ever happened to shame? — Stephen Macaulay, Pundit-at-Large.

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THURSDAY 11/13/25

Analysis by Todd Lassa

You probably have caught the business press news item about Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s potential to become the world’s first trillionaire thanks to a pay package approved by more than 75% of the electric car company’s shareholders last Thursday.

The Securities and Exchange Commission was to release the final tally within a few days after the annual shareholder’s meeting in Austin, Texas, but with that sort of preliminary count, Musk can count on receiving 423 million more shares to increase his stake in Tesla to 25%.

Before such a payout, according to Forbes, Tesla’s market capitalization must go from about $1.49 trillion as of Monday morning to $8.5 trillion in 10 years. It must sell 12 million more cars, 10 million automated driving system subscriptions (the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration – NHTSA -- has just opened new investigations into Tesla’s automated “full-self driving” or FSD, over potential “unsafe maneuvers,” Road & Track reported Sunday), operate 1 million Robotaxis (operated by FSD) and sell 1 million Tesla Optimus robots, among other requirements.

Those pro-Musk shareholders reportedly wanted to see this as much as Musk did because they believe it will focus his attention on Tesla and not on his other companies, including SpaceX and its wholly owned subsidiary Starlink, The Boring Company and, of course, X-Twitter. DOGE? Fuggetaboudit.

Two institutional shareholders in Tesla had opposed Musk’s pay plan; Institutional Shareholder Service (ISS) and Glass Lewis, according to Business Insider.

In Tesla’s third quarter earnings call with Wall Street analysts in late October, Musk criticized ISS and Glass Lewis, and said he wants control over the automaker – er, maker of four-wheeled robots, as CFO Vaibhav Taneja describes the company – to assure that the supreme level of artificial intelligence Musk says the company is developing for Optimus robots does not get into the wrong hands. 

(I covered this in a news report for Autoweek.)

“The point is, I’d like just enough voting control to give strong influence, but not so much that I can’t be fired if I go insane,” Musk said in the Q3 call.

I’ll let that comment sink in for just a moment.

A decade ago, Musk – who did not found Tesla any more than he is a founder of X-Twitter – convinced Wall Street that Tesla EVs would be by far the most dominant electric vehicles on the Earth’s roads (perhaps on Mars’ as well) and that when the world finally comes to realize that electric vehicles are the only road to sustainable automobility, will be pretty much the only relevant automaker on the face of the Earth.

It worked on analysts and investors. By the time Tesla made its first full-year profit in 2020, its market cap was greater than that of General Motors, Ford Motor Company, Toyota and Mercedes-Benz combined.

Now Musk has more than 75% of Tesla’s shareholders as well as Wall Street analysts riding the AI bubble convinced that, as he said in the Q2 earnings call, Tesla will become the world’s most valuable company in the world “by far” when Optimus is up and running at full speed.

While Musk’s claims that Tesla is the most American of US auto companies (it is, in that it produces everything it sells in the US in US factories, as a German assembly plant serves the European market and a Chinese plant serves China) might seem to appeal to his best old ex-friend Donald J. Trump, Tesla is more likely to cut its number of decent-paying assembly plant jobs here rather than increase it as the CEO tries to meet his 10-year goals. 

New jobs instead will go to Optimus robots. Factories all over the world will be Optimus’ first customers. Sure, humans still will have to make sure the robots know how to get to their workstations, but this is not the recipe for increasing the number of relatively good-paying jobs for those without college degrees.

Musk also has described a world in which every human on the face of the Earth will someday have an Optimus helper (will Tesla take food stamps?) and have access to the most perfect doctors. It’s not too early to rethink med school.

The Tesla CEO long has been known for hyperbole that only Wall Street will buy, though that has been enough for Musk so far. But this sort of thinking goes beyond what Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) would call the “tech-broligarchy.” 

Another socialist, Greece’s former finance minister Yanis Varofakis calls it “technofeudalism.” 

That’s not in the Oxford American Dictionary just yet, but “feudal system” is defined as “medieval social system whereby a vassal held land from a superior in exchange for allegiance and service.”

If Musk never makes up with Trump, will it matter once Musk’s a trillionaire who controls somewhere between 1 million and all the world’s robots?

Lassa is founding editor of The Hustings.

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WEDNESDAY 11/12/25

Commentary by Jerry Lanson

It’s official, at least for those who live in the realm of reality: In states and cities across the country, Democrats won a resounding off-year election victory on Tuesday.

Moderate women in Virginia and New Jersey won double-digit gubernatorial victories. In New York City, a young democratic socialist handily defeated Andrew Cuomo, the state’s former Democratic governor, despite Donald Trump’s endorsement of him. Californians backed redistricting to counter Republican gerrymandering by nearly two to one.

Democrats demonstrated that their party can still provide a big tent for voters with a wide spectrum of views. And the Democratic Party learned without a doubt that by emphasizing economic issues – the rising cost of food, housing, health care and utilities and the rising rate of inflation – it can run winning campaigns in 2026, wherever its candidates fall on the ideological spectrum.

Democratic jubilance, however, should be short-lived. This must be a time of heightened vigilance by those opposing Donald Trump’s efforts to expand his authoritarian rule. He’s already made clear that these election results taught him nothing.

“TRUMP WASN’T ON THE BALLOT, AND SHUTDOWN, WERE THE TWO REASONS THAT REPUBLICANS LOST TONIGHT,’ according to Pollsters,” Trump wrote Tuesday on a Truth Social Post.

What pollsters, he didn’t say.

Going forward, this we can anticipate. In the months ahead, Trump will ratchet up his efforts across red states to redistrict. In the year ahead, he will try harder to scrub Democrats from voter rolls, to intimidate them by sending armies of “poll watchers” to voting locations, to create voting deserts by working with red state governors to close polling sites and limit voting hours in blue neighborhoods.

All will be part of his strategy to undermine a fair election in 2026.

In the meantime, Trump likely will do all he can to further militarize American cities. Let us learn from Chicago. The day after the 2025 election, ICE agents hauled off a pre-school teacher after chasing her onto the school’s grounds and grabbing her in front of students, The Washington Post reports.

While most Americans, beyond burgeoning economic hardships, are living largely normal lives, Chicagoans regularly are being subjected to the sting of tear gas as ICE and Border Patrol officers chase down immigrants or face off against residents trying to record their actions.

Consider these words from The Washington Post.

“Federal immigration officers are using chemical irritants to disperse protesters in ways that violate American policing norms and are testing the boundaries of use-of-force laws, video footage from Chicago shows, in some cases hitting demonstrators directly with the munitions.”

Continued the article: “Federal officers have thrown chemical agents out of vehicles on city streets, creating a hazard for motorists. They have thrown tear-gas canisters near 

stores and schools, exposing children, pregnant women and older people to the noxious gas. And ... federal officers have fired pepper balls directly at protesters – in one case, striking a pastor in the head.”

On the Saturday before Halloween, as kids gathered for a holiday parade in Old Irving Park on the Chicago’s Northwest Side, federal agents began lobbing tear gas when neighbors protested the arrest of a man whose brother said had immigrated to the US at age 4.

“You had folks who were literally out on the street taking their kids to this Halloween parade when this happened,” Brian Kolp, a former Cook County prosecutor, told the local Fox News station. “I didn’t see anybody with a weapon. I didn’t see anybody make physical contact with these agents. I didn’t see anybody do anything that justified, for instance, taking my 70-year-old neighbor to the ground.”

Similar scenes, though not as common, continue to unfold in urban areas from Los Angeles to Boston, where masked ICE agents have smashed car windows to abduct their occupants and where this week, they raided a car wash at 9:30 a.m. and drove off with nine employees who were never given a chance to show their work papers, boston.com reported.

“This is a kidnapping, plain and simple,” Boston City Councilor Liz Breadon, who represents the neighborhood, told reporters.

Expect more of the same, with New York City a prime target once Zohran Mamdani is sworn in as mayor.

Democrats won this week’s election on economic issues, though polls do show a majority of Americans now believe ICE in its shadowy and harsh arrests has overstepped acceptable practices. But the key question now is who will provide a check on this administration’s actions, often carried out without regard to established law or practice? What will keep ICE and other Homeland Security agencies from continuing to indiscriminately and sometimes violently target immigrants and those who stand up for them? And are most Americans even paying attention?

These questions remain much more important than this week’s rash of post-election punditry about the 2026 election. Remember. As a democracy under siege, the United States first has to get that far.

So, let’s end the post-election celebrations. Let’s stop dissecting the results as if it’s just another post-election media fest.

It’s not. The government remains shut down. And what’s going on in this country is anything but normal.

Republished by permission from Lanson'sSUBSTACK From the Grassroots.

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MONDAY 11/10/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

In an interview with Bret Baier on Fox News November 5, Baier read a statement from a North Carolinian retiree who is a Trump supporter (voted for him three times) to President Trump. She was concerned about the price of goods being so high.

In his inimitable way, Trump responded, “Beef we have to get down. I think of groceries — it’s an old-fashion word, but it’s a beautiful word. Beef we have to get down, but we have prices way down.”

Adding, “And think of this: energy. She drives a car, probably, and her energy prices are way down. And energy is so all-encompassing, it’s so big, that when energy goes down, everything comes down.”

There’s a bit of problem with that.

Prices are not “way down” as the chart from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics at the top of the column indicates.

While that might be tough to read, here are a couple of highlights.

In September 2024, back in the Bad Old Days of Biden, chicken cost $1.98 per pound.

Now recall Trump campaigned heavily on the claim that he was going to bring down the price of “the groceries.”

Chicken in September 2025?

$2.06.

That’s a 4% increase. And while that may seem small, it is in a direction he claimed it wouldn’t be.

He is right about beef. A pound of ground chuck in September 2025 was $6.33. During the Biden administration, in September 2024 it was $5.58.

A gallon of milk? $4.02 under Biden. $4.13 under Trump.

And so it goes.

Again, keep in mind that while the amounts may be small, it is all additive.

Now the argument about energy being “so all-encompassing” is true.

Whether it is the woman driving to the grocery store to buy goods or the trucks that brought the goods to the store or the farm equipment involved in getting the food ready for market, fuel is necessary. And let’s not forget about natural gas to provide heating and the electricity to keep the lights on.

So if her energy prices, as well as those of the rest of the supply chain, “are way down,” then things should at the very least be better.

Again to the September 2024-to-September 2025 comparison with Bureau of Labor Statistics stats:

• Electricity per kWh: $0.18 to $0.19
• Gasoline per gallon: $3.34 to $3.34
• Piped gas per therm:        $1.40 to $1.61

It is probably a good thing for the job security of US Secretary of Labor Lori Chavez-DeRemer that the Bureau of Labor Statistics is closed because of the federal shutdown, because stats like these aren’t particularly helpful to the president’s argument.

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings.

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MONDAY 11/10/25

By K.E. Bell

You can see it in your social media feed every day. A teenage girl screams as ICE officers throw her mother to the ground, a knee on her back for the horrible crime of wanting a better life. A clergyman in Chicago gets shot in the head with pepper balls for exercising his constitutional right to protest. An ICE officer points his gun at a protester and says, “Bang bang,” and “You’re dead, liberal.” An ICE officer shoots a Chicago woman and lies about the reason why.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is out of control. It’s a largely fledgling police force that substitutes hatred for training. Of all the horrible aspects of the One Big Beautiful Betrayal, the skyrocketing funding for ICE was the most treasonous. It gave a would-be king and his worm-tongued advisor their Gestapo (gazpacho?).

Served with an agenda to detain and deport more and more migrants, most of whom have no criminal record, ICE storms the streets of US cities like an invasion force, and without the constraints faced by local police officers. Warrants? Don’t need ‘em. Racial profiling. Perfectly fine says this stacked Supreme Court. Brutality? That’s the point, isn’t it?

According to the Orange Menace it is. During an interview with CBS News 60 Minutes last Sunday, when asked if ICE raids have gone too far, President Trump said, “I think they haven’t gone far enough because we’ve been held back by the judges, by the liberal judges that were put in by Biden and by Obama.”

Some of these ICE officers — not the Proud Boys, January 6 rioters, Three Percenters, Trill Trumpers, KKK members, or militia members among them — will get PTSD from their actions. 

ICE must be bound by the same rules as any other police force. Warrants must be procured. Probable cause standards must be met. Police brutality rules must be followed. The federal government won’t do anything to restrain them, but the states can.

On October 16, US District Judge Sara Ellis in Illinois started the ball rolling down the right path by ordering ICE agents to wear body cameras during immigration enforcement activities. This came after incidents of lying to justify lawless actions and of excessive use of force without warning. 

That was only a start. 

The vast majority of ICE arrests are for the misdemeanor of being in the country illegally. That doesn’t require handcuffs and 3 a.m. raids with Blackhawk helicopters. It requires paperwork, sifting through the good and the bad, and prosecuting and/or deporting only those with criminal records. Not only that, but all those targeted, be they citizens or not, have the constitutional right to due process. 

Similarly, the protesters fighting for their neighbors’ rights don’t deserve to be tear gassed or shot with rubber bullets. They deserve respect of their constitutional right to protest an unjust government. 

The immigrants aren’t the felons here. All too often, ICE commits the felonies. 

New York is picking up the ball and moving it downfield. On October 22, Attorney General Letitia James, who is currently the subject of a malicious prosecution by the Trump Department of Justice, announced plans to create a portal for citizens to upload photos and videos of ICE activity in New York. Every attorney general who respects the rule of law should do the same. 

The evidence from those photos and videos should then be used to prosecute the illegal activities of power-mad ICE officers. We the people can help police the police.

A corrupt federal police force is unacceptable in America. It flies in the face of the ideals of this nation and violates our constitutional rights. 

It’s time to prosecute ICE for its wrongdoing. It’s necessary to curb the officers’ illegal behavior and to save the soul of this teetering nation.

Bell is a contributing pundit for The Hustings.

_____________________________________________

Can Democrats Handle a Win?

One of the eternal questions on politics. Democrats are justifiably feeling good after strong wins including those against President Trump’s endorsed New York City mayor and New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial candidates. 

Can they build momentum through the 2026 midterms?  Or at least, can they maintain the momentum they have?

For those of you on the left: How should Democratic Party leaders handle Zohran Mamdani’s victory? Should he be made a party leader himself?

For those of you on the right: Will President Trump be successful with his tactic of describing Mamdani as a “communist”? Would he be better off ignoring the mayor-elect?

These columns, left and right, are for your discussion on such burning political questions.

Please submit your COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and indicate your political leaning, left or right, in the subject line so we may post them in the proper column (left or right). ---The Editors

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WEDNESDAY 11/5/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA), Speaker of the US House of Representatives, makes $223,500 per year.

Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA), House Majority Leader, makes $193,400.

The median household income in Louisiana is approximately $60,000. 

To qualify for SNAP benefits in Louisiana, a four-person household can make no more than $64,296 annually. A single-person household’s limit is $31,296.

Approximately one in five Louisianians qualify for SNAP benefits.

Mike Johnson effectively put the House on vacation since September 19, 2025.

That is, he maintains that the House passed a “clean CR,” which he repeats over and over in front of microphones in Washington, DC, because he probably doesn’t want to go back to Louisiana and face his constituents in the 4^th congressional district.

His point is that this CR — or continuing resolution — would extend the spending of the previous year with no add-ons or amendments, so SNAP and other benefits would be funded if the Senate were to pass the House bill.

The “clean CR,” House Resolution 5371, passed with 221 votes in favor, 212 against.

Or 51.04% for.

Not exactly a resounding win.

Yet Mike Johnson has, in effect, said that the House has done its work, and won’t go back to work until that work is accepted by the Senate.

Meanwhile Johnson and Scalise, among other House members, continue to collect their salaries.

From September 19 to October 31 there are six weeks.

This means Johnson has made $25,788 during this time. It would take 5.16 months for someone earning $60,000 per year to make that much—and they would undoubtedly have to be working to earn that.

(Scalise, $22,315 during six weeks.)

(“Regular House members make $174,000 per year, so for those who are drawing a salary that’s $20,076 during the House not being in session for six weeks.)

The income aside, this is truly unacceptable behavior.

The members of the House have a job to do, which includes deliberating and negotiating. This whole notion of “Oh, we’ve already done that and so we’re done” is the sort of arrogance that would get an employee of a commercial enterprise summarily sacked.

If this “clean CR” isn’t helping out the people who live in Louisiana’s 4^th or 1^st (Scalise’s district), then do your jobs and get back to work so that there can be a resolution that will help out not just the needy Americans, but all Americans — there are some 1.4 million federal workers who are either furloughed or working without pay, and their jobs have ramifications that go beyond their immediate households (if someone isn’t working, then odds are she won’t be spending money at the local grocery store, which has an impact on the employees who may lose their jobs if there are many such people not shopping).

While the behavior of people like Johnson has been characterized as timidity in the face of Donald Trump, it is also an undeserved arrogance — and Trump is no less guilty of this.

While it seems that the Republicans are dominant, this dominance is pretty much a position rather than something of substance.

Let’s remember the make-up of the House is 219 Republicans and 215 Democrats, and if Johnson does his job and Adelita Grijalva (D-Az) is sworn in, that makes it 219 to 216. Not exactly a huge majority.

Also remember the popular vote in the 2024 presidential election was Trump 77,303,573 and Harris 75,019,257, which means that Trump had 49.9% of the popular vote and Harris 48.4%. Yes, Trump won, but this was not a mandate by any stretch of the imagination.

The recent Economist/YouGov poll showing that while 39% of Americans “Strongly or somewhat approve” of how Donald Trump is doing his job, 58% of Americans “Strongly or somewhat disapprove” of what he’s doing—and that 19-point spread is significant.

When it comes to economic issues, Trump is -22% on “Jobs and the economy” and 

-31% on “Inflation/prices” — the very fundamental things that Americans are directly impacted by on a daily basis and likely the things that a non-trivial number of those 77,303,573 voters thought he would excel at.

And while Trump and his acolytes were all giddy about DOGE, the Economist/YouGov poll found:

• 71% want spending for veterans to be increased a lot or slightly, and another 18% want it to remain the same
• 69% want increases in Social Security and 18% want it to remain the same
• 62% want increased in spending for education and 16% want it to remain the same
• 64% want increases in Medicare and 22% want it to remain the same
• 55% want increases in Medicaid and 22% want it to remain the same

And while the number for SNAP isn’t quite as good:

• 46% want increases

But when you add in the 26% that want SNAP spending to stay the same, that is a total of 72% of Americans who want SNAP spending to be spent where it is now or increased.

Nine percent are unsure, and 18% want it to be decreased slightly or a lot.

In fact, if you look at all those categories and sum the numbers (those who want increases or who want the spending to be the same), then it is clear that people do not want cuts in these programs.

Meanwhile, Trump is doing want can be considered seriously unpopular things:

• 24% approve of his cancelling trade talks with Canada — while 55% disapprove
• 25% approve of his tearing down the East Wing — while 61% disapprove
• 16% approve of his commuting the sentence of George Santos — while 60% disapprove

How does any of this — alienating our key trading partner, doing a profligate act of self-aggrandizement, showing contempt for law — help Americans?

And this brings us back to Mike Johnson and his colleagues. 

The Economist/YouGov poll found the American people have less confidence in Congress than any other institution. Fifty-eight percent have Very little confidence.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that many of those people aren’t doing their jobs.

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings.

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WEDNESDAY 11/5/25

Commentary by Jerry Lanson

Three days after the huge Oct. 18 protests, grass roots organizers of the No Kings rallies invited those who had participated to join a national Zoom call.

I don’t know how many people signed in. But I was struck that those who spoke were looking forward instead of merely dwelling on what one speaker described as “the largest peaceful protest in American history.”

An estimated at 7 million people protested in 2,700 different locations. While one person stood out alone in in a rural, red West Virginia town, an estimated 350,000 marched through New York City, a speaker said.

Organizers on the call urged everyone to share photos, videos, articles and stories (I’ve seen dozens and dozens). They noted that No Kings will be sending out weekly updates, including calls for action. They urged people to participate in nonviolence training and to know their rights. And they cautioned that the road ahead will demand the time, determination and sustained engagement of everyone.

“Some of the answer of what’s next depends on you,” activist Ash-Lee Woodward Henderson said.

The call offered promise that No Kings2 wasn’t going to be just another big, but isolated cry of resistance against a regime that is crushing the fundamental tenets of democracy, but instead an important step toward something bigger.

Just who is running the growing No Kings movement and what’s next remain fuzzy to me. Its website lists a mosaic of affiliated organizations that joined together for the first No Kings rallies on June 14. These range from the ACLU to Indivisible to Stand Up for Science to the Sierra Club to MoveOn to Manhattan Young Democrats. In all, the site lists more than 200 allied groups. The list for October 18 is not yet up, but there’s no doubt that there were more protests and a larger turn out than June 14.

I was among the skeptics of the initial “No Kings” label. It struck me that we aren’t fighting King George but modern-day authoritarianism, something akin not to an 18^th century British monarch but the contemporary Hungarian strongman Viktor Orbán.

No Kings felt euphemistic.

But I’ve come around. No Kings, I realize, is an effective American sentiment, harking back to our historic roots and the very reason we fought a Revolutionary War.

We, the American people, often disagree with one another. Yet I still believe a sizable majority of us agree that we have a right to our views, a right to participate in self-governance, a right to freedom of speech and a shared belief in our Constitution.

No Kings speaks to these common denominators.

The question now is how do we get beyond sharing these fundamental beliefs to standing up for them?

Time is of the essence. As Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy told MSNBC’s Chris Hayes October 22;

“We are not living in a functional democracy any longer. It’s not too late to save it, but it is just as important to acknowledge that we aren’t on the precipice of losing our democracy. We are losing it every day.”

His words are evident in the rubble of what was the White House East Wing, flattened without debate or discussion.

They are exemplified in the repeated sinking of boats and those aboard them in the Caribbean, without explanation, authorization by Congress or evidence that those killed are our enemies or even drug smugglers.

They are reflected in Donald Trump’s demand that his own Justice Department repay him $232 million, in the militarization of American cities, in his unilateral firing of whomever he pleases, and in his reliance on a secret donor to pay the military during the shutdown.

All are outrageous. Yet such actions are unleashed by the day as Trump bulldozes all in his path, increasingly unrestrained by courts, Congress, or anyone else.

If there is good news, it can be found in the continued growth of a popular movement to resist his regime, peacefully but forcefully.

There are signs, too, that this resistance is making converts. Though polls show Trump’s core Republican base is still solidly behind him on most issues, 30% believe he is using federal law enforcement to go after his enemies, a Reuters-Ipsos poll finds. Overall, the poll finds Americans by more than 2 to 1 think he is abusing his power in this way, politicalwire.com reports.

Other polls suggest independents in purple states and elsewhere strongly oppose Trump’s leadership and policies, leading political analysts like Charlie Cook to question whether Republicans, even after widespread gerrymandering, will succeed in holding the House in 2026. Another new poll shows Democrats moving ahead of Republicans when voters are asked which party can better lead the economy.

Meanwhile, the economic conditions continue to sour. Inflation in September climbed back to a 3.0% annual rate for the first time since January. Health insurance rates are about to spike for millions who rely on the Affordable Care Act. Millions more will lose food stamps in November. All this while the price tag for the new ballroom Trump intends to name after himself climbs to $350 million.

But the resistance still faces steep challenges. Even though 7 million people turned out October 18, that falls short of the roughly 12 million active resisters that research shows is needed to boost the odds of stopping the authoritarianism of this regime. 

Erica Chenoweth, a political scientist who among multiple roles directs the Nonviolent Action Lab at Harvard University’s Ash Center for Democratic Innovation and Governance, has studied hundreds of cases of non-violent popular resistance around the world over the last century. She has documented, the BBC notes, that “civil disobedience is not only the moral choice; it is also the most powerful way of shaping world politics.”

But there’s a rub. Chenoweth, the BBC reported, has found that “it takes around 3.5% of the population actively participating in the protests to ensure serious political change.”

In the United States, that would mean about 12 million people.

Based on these projected numbers, the US resistance, though growing from rally to rally, must continue to grow, person to person, town to town, state by state.

Chenoweth and three colleagues recorded promising signs in an article published at the Ash Center two days before the October 18 protest. They noted that the protest movement during this administration has been “far greater” than in 2017, and “overwhelmingly (and even historically) nonviolent, and far-reaching.”

Furthermore, the article noted, “the current protest movement has already reached deeper into Trump country than at almost any point during the first Trump Administration.”

This is encouraging. Whether it continues to grow rests with us.

Lanson’s column first appeared at his Substack, From the Grassroots.

_____
THURSDAY 10/30/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

On Friday October 17, Donald Trump put this on his social media platform:

“George Santos was somewhat of a 'rogue,' but there are many rogues throughout our Country that aren't forced to serve seven years in prison. I started to think about George when the subject of Democrat Senator Richard 'Da Nang Dick' Blumenthal came up again. His War Hero status, and even minimal service in our Military, was totally and completely MADE UP. This is far worse than what George Santos did, and at least Santos had the Courage, Conviction, and Intelligence to ALWAYS VOTE REPUBLICAN! George has been in solitary confinement for long stretches of time, and by all accounts, has been horribly mistreated. I just signed a Commutation, releasing George Santos from prison, IMMEDIATELY. Good luck George, have a great life!”.

George Santos, who was elected to Congress in 2020, was voted out of office in 2023 by a bi-partisan majority.

Santos was to plead guilty in 2024 to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft; he went to prison on July 25, which means this “rogue” spent just over 3% of his seven-year sentence in prison.

***

On October 23 Donald Trump granted a pardon to Changpeng Zhao, the founder of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. Zhao was convicted of violating US anti-money laundering laws; he pled guilty and was sentenced to four months in prison, which he served last year. He also paid a $50-million fine.

Binance the company pled guilty to the charge of bypassing sanctions and was ordered to pay $4.3 billion. The cryptocurrency company was reportedly involved in transactions that facilitated monetary activities of various terrorist organizations (e.g., 

Al Qaeda, ISIS) as well as child sexual exploitation networks.

As a press release from the Department of Justice from November 2023 put it:

“’Binance turned a blind eye to its legal obligations in the pursuit of profit. Its willful failures allowed money to flow to terrorists, cybercriminals, and child abusers through its platform,’ said Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen. ‘Today’s historic penalties and monitorship to ensure compliance with US law and regulations mark a milestone for the virtual currency industry. Any institution, wherever located, that wants to reap the benefits of the US financial system must also play by the rules that keep us all safe from terrorists, foreign adversaries, and crime or face the consequences.’”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt described Zhao’s conviction as part of the Biden administration’s “war on cryptocurrency.”

Sounds like a “war on terror,” medium of exchange notwithstanding.

Of course, there would have been no convictions had the Biden administration simply ignored the law.

But there’s the little issue of Article II, Section 3 of the US Constitution, which says the president is obligated to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”

Something that seems so pre-January 2025.

***

On July 31 Donald Trump said that the construction of the White House ballroom wouldn’t have an impact on the then-existing building, which he described himself as being “the biggest fan of.” He said there would be “total respect to the existing building.”

On October 20, the White House East Wing demolition commenced.

On October 21 the official White House website included an article that described the public reaction to the demolition as being “manufactured outrage” that is largely among “unhinged leftists and their Fake News allies.”

As of October 24, the East Wing of the White House is completely demolished.

“Total respect.”

***

Let’s go back to the George Santos case. He pled guilty. He was convicted.

But the whole rationalization related to Richard Blumenthal is, well, not particularly reasonable.

Blumenthal acknowledged in 2010 that he had mispresented his military service.

He was in the US Marine Corps Reserve during the war in Vietnam. He was not deployed to Vietnam during that time.

After The New York Times broke the story in 2010 Blumenthal held a press conference and said took “full responsibility” for being insufficiently clear about what he did or didn’t do (i.e., serve in Vietnam).

Blumenthal was in the Marine Reserve for six years.

So while he didn’t serve in Vietnam, he served in the military.

Which means what Donald Trump describes as “minimal service in our Military, was totally and completely MADE UP” wasn’t made up. Blumenthal did serve.

Donald Trump did not serve in the military in any capacity (stints as Commander in Chief notwithstanding).

He had four student deferments during the 1960s and a fifth medical deferment (bone spurs in his heels).

What does this have to do with George Santos, who pled guilty of wire fraud and aggressive identity theft?

Nothing.

But, as Donald Trump put it, “Santos had the Courage, Conviction, and Intelligence to ALWAYS VOTE REPUBLICAN!”

Odds are Blumenthal, US Senator representing Connecticut, a Democrat, doesn’t “ALWAYS VOTE REPUBLICAN!”

***

Then Zhao and Binance. 

Zhao did his time. And paid a fine. Binance paid big, too.

Again, the pleas were of guilt.

It could be argued that the reason there were guilty pleas was simply out of convenience: better to spend a few months in prison (more than Santos, however) and spend billions of dollars than go through some legal slog.

For Zhao the slate is clean.

He can now resume his position as CEO of Binance and the company can return to business in the US.

Asked about the pardon, Donald Trump said, “A lot of people say he wasn’t guilty of anything.”

And who might “a lot of people be”?

And didn’t Zhao plead guilty? Do people do that when they aren’t guilty?

While this gets a little tricky, DT Marks DeFi LLC owns 60% of WLF Holdco, which controls World Liberty Financial. DT Marks DeFi is a Trump-affiliated company.

World Liberty Financial is largely — but not exclusively — run by Donald Trump and his family.

World Liberty Financial is hosted by Binance.

Go figure.

***

Finally, the East Wing.

Donald Trump, throughout his career, has positioned himself as a Master Builder.

In his speech to the UN General Assembly in September, apropos of seemingly nothing, he said this:

“Many years ago, a very successful real estate developer in New York, known as Donald J. Trump, I bid on the renovation and rebuilding of this very United Nations complex.

“I remember it so well. I said at the time that I would do it for $500 million, rebuilding everything. It would be beautiful. I used to talk about, ‘I'm going to give you marble floors, they're going to give you terrazzo.’ The best of everything. ‘You're going to have mahogany walls, they're going to give you plastic.’ But they decided to go in another direction, which was much more expensive at the time, which actually produced a far inferior product. And I realized that they did not know what they were doing when it came to construction and that their building concepts were so wrong, and the product that they were proposing to build was so bad and so costly, it was going to cost them a fortune. And I said, ‘And wait until you see the overruns.’ Well, I turned out to be right.”

Perhaps the people at the UN had an inkling of what would happen were they to turn the project over to the Trump Organization.

It is also interesting that Donald Trump has been acutely critical of Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell for the construction cost overruns for the renovations of the Federal Reserve headquarters.

The initial estimate was $1.9 billion. It is now up to $2.5 billion. That’s an increase of 31.6%.

Powell’s job was rumored to be at risk because of the cost overruns at the Fed HQ.

The East Wing has been torn down. No construction work other than that has been undertaken.

Yet the cost for the ballroom has gone from $200 million to $300 million. That’s an increase of 50%.

“And I said, ‘And wait until you see the overruns.’ Well, I turned out to be right.”

Macaulay is pundit-at-large at The Hustings.

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WEDNESDAY 10/29/25