April 18, 2025 at 4:14 PM EDT
DOGE staffer screamed at employees while making them work 'for 36 hours straight': report

Employees at one federal agency were reportedly kept up for more than a day and a half straight due to the demands of a staffer from South African centibillionaire's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). That's according to a Friday article from CNN, which reported on DOGE staffer Gavin Kliger's alleged treatment of workers at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The allegations stem from a sworn declaration a CFPB employee made in U.S. District judge Amy Berman Jackson's court anonymously out of fear of retaliation.

April 18, 2025 at 3:38 PM EDT
'Rapid erosion': Trump's FEMA cuts put hurricane-prone states in a 'really bad situation'

WIRED reports that with hurricane season approaching, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is not up to the fight after being taken apart by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Under Trump and DOGE, the nation's primary disaster response agency is suffering under a "rapid erosion" of tools, practices and vital partnerships. It's also haunted by the threat of more staff cuts and an exodus of seasoned senior staff, leaving the Federal Emergency Management Agency a broken shadow of what it was, say sources.

April 18, 2025 at 12:01 PM EDT
Trump's latest target: The watchdog that keeps suing him

From the outset of his 2024 presidential campaign, Donald Trump signaled that a central focus of his presidency would be targeting and exacting retribution against his critics. "In 2016, I declared, 'I am your voice,'" Trump told attendees at CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference in March 2023. "Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution."

April 18, 2025 at 11:24 AM EDT
'Thrown to the wolves': Why 'loyal soldier' JD Vance is as 'disposable' to Trump as Pence

"You're fired" were not only words that Donald Trump famously used when he was hosting the hit reality show "The Apprentice" during the 2000s -- they are also words he used a lot during his first administration. Trump clashed with a long list of appointees the first time he was president, including two national security directors (HR McMaster and John Bolton), a U.S. attorney general (Jeff Sessions), a secretary of state (Rex Tillerson), an FBI director (James Comey) and a White House chief of staff (Gen. John F. Kelly) -- all of whom were either fired or resigned in frustration. Near the end of his first administration, Trump even clashed with two officials who had often described as loyalists: then-Vice President Mike Pence and then-U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr.

April 18, 2025 at 10:47 AM EDT
Defense Secretary mistakenly shares screenshot of article contradicting his self-praise

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth posted a screenshot on Friday on the social platform X of an article about the elimination of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) roles at the Department of Defense (DOD), with the caption, "As we said from day one: DEI is DEAD at DOD." The headline of the article published in Defense One on Thursday, included in Hegseth's screenshot, reads, "There's no more DEI at DOD, watchdog finds."

April 18, 2025 at 10:27 AM EDT
Trump's 'showdown' with the Fed is bad news for anyone with a 401k -- here's why: economist

President Donald Trump is calling for Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to be fired. In a Thursday, April 17 post on his Truth Social platform, Trump wrote, "Powell's termination cannot come fast enough!" Many economists, in response, are saying that it is crucial for the U.S. Federal Reserve to maintain its independence from the White House -- and not be subject to the whims of Trump or any other president.

April 18, 2025 at 10:17 AM EDT
Easter Sunday -- and the potential to alter the course of American democracy

For the first time since 2014, and the last time until 2087, Easter Sunday will fall on April 20. The 20th will also mark the last day of Passover, Chinese Language Day, International Cannabis Day and the 136^th anniversary of the birth of Adolf Hitler. There's a lot going on. This article originally appeared on TruthDig.

April 18, 2025 at 4:46 AM EDT
Trump steals a line from the 'world's coolest dictator'

What a difference a dictator makes. Some world leaders get a rough ride in their Oval Office meetings with Donald Trump - most famously, the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, who the US president and his entourage publicly disparaged in their now-notorious meeting at the end of February. But not El Salvador's Nayib Bukele, the self-styled "world's coolest dictator" - an autocrat whose country's incarceration rate is the highest in the world - with whom Trump swapped a few friendly quips this week about authoritarian leadership.

April 18, 2025 at 4:38 AM EDT
'Reclaim America': Expert explains how right-wing extremists hijacked US history

Patriots' Day, a commemoration of the battles of Lexington and Concord - the first confrontations of the American Revolution - holds historical value as a symbol of American resistance to British colonial rule. Over time, however, the holiday has been co-opted by extremist groups. Capitalizing on ambiguities in the understanding of patriotic symbols, extremist groups have attempted to change the meaning of freedom and liberty embedded in the symbol of the American flag.

April 18, 2025 at 4:18 AM EDT
Conspiracy theorist wrongly identified as federal agent in viral window-smashing video

Social media posts have been falsely claiming that a man with connections to Arizona and far-right militias was the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who smashed a car's window with an axe to apprehend a Guatemalan immigrant. But that man has not been hired by ICE and is currently in Oklahoma spreading conspiracy theories there. Michael "Lewis Arthur" Meyer is the founder of a group known as Veterans on Patrol which has been involved with a number of militia activities along the southern border often with a QAnon theme.

April 18, 2025 at 4:10 AM EDT
Trucking industry giant blames Trump tariffs in layoff of hundreds of workers

Mack Trucks will lay off between 250 and 350 workers at its Lehigh Valley Operations center outside Allentown over the next three months, due to economic uncertainty caused by U.S. tariffs, a company spokesperson said Thursday. "Heavy-duty truck orders continue to be negatively affected by market uncertainty about freight rates and demand, possible regulatory changes, and the impact of tariffs," spokesperson Kimberly Pupillo said.

April 18, 2025 at 4:03 AM EDT
US citizen vows to sue after being released from Florida detention jail

Juan Carlos Lopez-Gomez held his mother in a tight embrace and wept following his release from the Leon County Jail Thursday evening, where the U.S. citizen was held after his arrest for illegally entering Florida as an "unauthorized alien." An official with Homeland Security Investigations in Tallahassee took Lopez-Gomez, a 20-year-old born in Georgia, to a Wendy's near the jail, where he reunited with his mother after spending more than 24 hours under arrest following a traffic stop in which he was a passenger.