July 2026 EVENTS

Elon Musk, in a post on X on Sunday, claimed those who say DOGE’s USAID cuts resulted in deaths “cannot cite a single name of someone who died out of the ‘millions’ they falsely claim have died. Not a single name!”

New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof quickly responded with the names of four he said died because of the cuts, including an 8-year-old girl, and suggested the world’s richest person travel to Africa with him to “talk to these moms and dads, and you’ll see the dying children themselves.”

In a post late on Monday, responding to a separate response from Kristof, Musk called Kristof “an utter piece of s— and a liar.”

In another post on X on Monday, Musk wrote: “Deaths in Africa DECREASED after USAID funding was cut, because they’re no longer able to push for violent revolution to install leftist regimes!” There is no available evidence supporting Musk’s claim. 

On Tuesday, Musk posted an image of what appears to be three militants in USAID-branded shelter materials, claiming without evidence in a follow-up post, “This is how USAID spent your tax dollars.”

In March 2025, Musk argued “no one has died as a result of a brief pause to do a sanity check on foreign aid funding,” and earlier this month he responded to a story from The Verge titled “The World’s First Trillionaire Is a Killer,” by writing, “If I were, the douchebags at Verge would have been dead long ago."

Humanitarian funding from the U.S. was slashed to $3.7 billion from $14 billion from 2024 to 2025, including USAID spending being reduced by roughly 58% from 2024 to 2025.

A study published in the Lancet in July 2025 found the funding cuts could cause the deaths of more than 4.5 million children and more than 14 million total deaths by 2030. 

NPR reports that on January 26, David Streever, a former journalist who now works in the tech industry, sent an email to Todd Lyons, then-acting director of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In it, he warned Lyons that his own conscience would torment him in the future for his actions and compared him to a Nazi official. 

On June 23, his wife, Rev. Hilary Streever, an Episcopal priest, was approached by two agents from Homeland Security Investigations, part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. They told her they were looking for her husband. Hilary told NPR the agents had said it was about "an email he may or may not have sent threatening Todd Lyons.”

She told them her husband was out of the country with their daughter and would be home Friday.

The agents asked her to tell her husband to call them back and left a form for him to sign. It said "WARNING NOTICE" and "YOU MAY BE IN VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW" and described federal laws that make it a crime to threaten federal officials. 

When Hilary relayed the message to David, he was puzzled. "I've never made a threat against anyone. I'm not a violent person," he told NPR. He did remember a strongly worded note he had sent to Lyons' government email address in January right after federal immigration officers fatally shot two people in Minneapolis.

When he returned from his trip on Thursday evening, just hours after he landed in New York a third Homeland Security Investigations special agent showed up at the airport hotel where he was staying. 

He was woken up sometime after 9 p.m. by the front desk calling his room to tell him that someone from Homeland Security had come looking for him.

"They said the investigator seemed to know I was there, left a card and said they should have me call him," Streever recalled. "I was really freaked out. How could this agent have found me?"

He also received two voicemail messages a few minutes before 9 p.m. from a New York number, claiming to be Homeland Security Investigations.

"This is clearly out of line," said Adam Steinbaugh, an attorney at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), which advocates for free speech, about the investigation into Streever.

“The First Amendment protects the rights of Americans to voice their concerns to their government,” Steinbaugh said. "The government doesn't have to listen to those, but it doesn't get to dispatch federal agents to your door and stalk you across the state of New York," he added.

DHS did not respond to questions about the case. The department gave NPR a statement that said: "ICE investigates all credible threats towards its employees and officers, including threats to the ICE Director. As a matter of policy, we do not comment on any ongoing investigations."

The email Streever sent called Lyons a "monstrous human being" and predicted the ICE leader would "go down in history as America's Reinhard Heydrich, the butcher" — a reference to the Nazi official considered to be one of the architects of the Holocaust.

"The way you are protecting the obvious execution in Minnesota, even as we see the videos, will lead to your downfall. Even Trump will turn on you before the end, and you will be a sad, despised man who eats himself alive with shame at your own pathetic weakness.

"You will never know peace. You will seek to lose yourself, to escape the burden of knowing the truth about yourself. But wherever you go, you will find yourself. You will torment yourself until your last day on Earth," the email read.

While harshly critical, nothing in this email constitutes a threat.

Streever recalled reading a news story on social media earlier that day about a poll worker in Syracuse, Paigelynne Gonyea, who had been contacted by two HSI agents while she was working New York's primary election on June 23. The agents presented her with a form to sign that said her Instagram account may have violated the law.

Streever reached out to Gonyea on Facebook a little after 10 p.m. on Thursday and soon they were comparing notes. They determined the agents who had visited Streever's home in Rochester were the same pair who earlier that day had visited Gonyea at a Syracuse polling place.

In the morning Streever stopped by the hotel's front desk and received an envelope with the business card of Trevor Pitts, the HSI agent who had visited the night before. The phone number on the card matched the number left on the two voicemails. When NPR contacted him at that number, Pitts referred NPR to a New York ICE office for comment, though NPR did not receive a response.

It remains unclear how the agent tracked Streever to his airport hotel. He had not told customs officers or even his wife which hotel he was going to. 

On his train ride home, he connected with civil liberties advocates and the office of his representative in Congress, Rep. Joe Morelle, D-N.Y. He and his wife decided to go public with their ordeal.

"If they hadn't come after me, I would have just been a guy whose sole act of defiance was writing a stern email to a faceless bureaucrat who was never going to read it," Streever said.

"But for them to come after me six months later for that one email, it makes me feel like we do have a lot of power. It makes me feel like they do care that we're speaking up."

In July last year, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz unveiled plans to corral the entire population of Gaza into a “humanitarian city” near Rafah, where they would be subjected to security screening and barred from leaving.

Trump’s “Board of Peace” appears to be following up on these plans, launching “Hamas-free humanitarian zones” in Gaza where Palestinians will be herded while the Israeli military expands its control on the rest of the territory, Israeli media is reporting.

Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom reported that the first site will open in Tel Sultan, near Rafah, “within weeks”, and house civilians “with no weapons or affiliation with Hamas”.

It added that the zone will be policed by a “multinational force”, known as the International Stabilization Force (ISF), which will be equipped with “non-lethal weapons” and operate from the Israeli Amitai Camp near Gaza under the command of the board.

According to the report, while aid and temporary housing will be supplied to the areas, Board of Peace officials have pledged not to import concrete into Gaza.

The newspaper further reported that the board is seeking to establish “large logistics warehouses that will serve its efforts to regulate the humanitarian shelters, including in communities near the border fence”, and has begun identifying sites for this purpose.

On Tuesday, the board announced that the first “tactical vehicles” had arrived at the ISF base.

Israel and the US signed an agreement on Wednesday under which Washington will lease a plot of land once owned by Palestinians in Jerusalem for 99 years for the sum of $1 to build the permanent site of the US Embassy in the city.

Foreign Minister Gideon Saar and US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee signed the agreement, in the presence of Jerusalem Mayor Moshe Lion.

Adalah, a rights group in Israel, claims this land was been confiscated from Palestinians under Israel’s 1950 Absentees’ Property Law and that archival documents prove the land belonged to Palestinian families before 1948 and had been leased to British Mandate authorities.

The confiscation of the land violates international law, particularly Article 46 of the Hague Regulations, which prohibits the confiscation of private property, Adalah said.

Republican Texas Representative Troy Nehls ignited a storm of controversy on X after a video was posted showing comments he made about affordability.

As he was departing Capitol Hill, a reporter asked Nehls, "How do House Republicans make the case that you're fighting for affordability when you go back to your districts?"

"Affordability, what are you talking about? Over the Fourth, I'm going to get me a couple of big lobster tails; I'm going to get me some nice rib-eyes. I'm going to sit in my backyard with my family, my neighbors, and we're going to be enjoying the Fourth, celebrating 250 years, the birthday."

The reporter asked a follow-up question "Do you think the 60% of Americans living paycheck to paycheck can afford lobster tails and rib eyes and all of that?"

Nehls responded "Maybe not. Maybe the 60% of Americans don't work as hard as I do. I don't know."

X user @TheMaineWonk posted the video with the caption, "House GOP out here cutting ads for Dems."

Nehls is currently the subject of an ongoing House Ethics Committee investigation regarding the misuse of campaign funds for personal purposes. 

The House Ethics Committee and the independent Office of Congressional Ethics found probable cause that Nehls' campaign improperly paid more than $25,000 in rent to Liberty 1776, LLC, a company owned and operated by Nehls. The committee is also reviewing his failure to disclose book publishing royalties on his mandatory financial disclosures. Nehls has denied any wrongdoing.

Andrea Shaw has been charged with the murder of her 18-month-old twins more than a year after their deaths.

The 18-month-old twins were found dead in a shared bed on May 1, 2025. Authorities did not reveal a cause of death.

Days after the two children were found dead, Shaw and her husband appeared on a podcast produced by Children's Health Defense, an anti-vaccine organization formerly led by current U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

On the podcast, Shaw suggested that they died because of recent vaccinations.

But following an investigation that lasted more than a year, Shaw was arrested for their murder in Boise, Idaho. 

 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has detained over 10,000 people across the U.S. over the past five days.

According to The New York Times, top ICE officials have pushed to double daily arrest numbers after the White House called for an increase to 2,000 ICE arrests per day.

The number of people detained in ICE immigration jails has also jumped by nearly 4,000 in recent days, with more than 63,000 people in ICE detention nationwide.

A former Olympic canoeist has been indicted by a grand jury in Washington, DC, Superior Court, for allegedly damaging the Reflecting Pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial on June 19th.

David Hearn was charged Thursday with one count of destruction of property with a value of more than $1,000, according to the indictment. The felony charge carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, if convicted.

The indictment said that Hearn “maliciously did injure, break and destroy certain property, that is, the lining material of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.”

Hearn previously told ABC News that police arrested him after he touched a piece of blue coating that was partially detached from the bottom of the Reflecting Pool.

Hearn said he went for a bike ride and stopped by the pool as a "curious, concerned citizen" and that he "was able to reach out and touch the edge of that that was still attached at the bottom and handled it a little bit.”

"I did not remove, I did not damage, I did not rip, tear, break, destroy or harm any part of the Reflecting Pool," Hearn said.

During a news conference, US Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro described Hearn as “violently” ripping up about two square feet of the massive pool, and being belligerent and rude toward federal officers guarding it.

She declined to describe any additional evidence beyond witnesses on the scene, “who have no agenda … just working there,” and who saw “damage to a national monument.”

Video has been posted online which appears to show Hearn touching the pool briefly before being pounced upon by federal officers.

Hearn’s attorney Norm Eisen blasted the indictment.

“Davey Hearn is innocent. These charges are outrageous and should be alarming to every American. This indictment reflects the Administration’s effort to shift blame for their own failures,” Eisen said in a statement. “On the eve of our nation’s Independence Day, Americans should be deeply concerned by the misuse of government power against an ordinary citizen based on a concocted narrative.”

US Air Force Major Jason Watson was arrested on the steps of the US Capitol on Wednesday after delivering a speech calling for the impeachment and removal of President Trump and Vice President JD Vance.

During his speech, Watson criticized the Trump administration’s recent military actions in Venezuela and Iran and Trump’s immigration enforcement crackdown, arguing it violated multiple constitutional provisions, according to a video posted online by the group Removal Coalition.

“For this, the president and vice president must be impeached, convicted, and removed,” Watson said. 

Watson was speaking at a news conference organized by Removal Coalition. During the news conference, Watson identified himself as an active-duty service member and wore his military uniform. Democratic Rep. Al Green of Texas also attended the event. Green has repeatedly introduced articles of impeachment against Trump.

“I’m here with him because Rep. Green is the only member of Congress that has demonstrated the courage and conviction to ... force a vote on articles of impeachment,” Watson said at the event. “If Congress followed his example, we could remove the entire Trump administration, but Congress remains unconvinced of the urgency and necessity for them to honor their oaths, so we must persuade them with our unrelenting, uncompromising civil resistance.”

Watson was “escorted” to the steps by a member of Congress, who “left the area,” before US Capital Police gave Watson “lawful orders to stop the illegal demonstration or he would be arrested,” the police said in a statement.

Watson is currently being held in custody at an air force base, according to Jessica Denson, the founder of the Removal Coalition. Denson said she expects significant charges to be filed against Watson; she added that was also Watson’s own expectation going into Wednesday’s protest.

Service members are subject to stricter laws than the average citizen when it comes to protesting. The Uniform Code of Military Justice prohibits officers from “using contemptuous language towards the President, Vice president, the Secretaries of War and of a military department, Congress, and certain other officials,” according to an Air Force memo last year.

Air Force Secretary Troy Meink addressed the incident on social media later on Thursday, saying, “I expect every Airman and Guardian to comply with all laws and policies governing personal conduct, political participation, and the wear of the uniform.”

Meink added: “Pursuant to a thorough investigation - which will proceed unimpeded - commanders will ensure appropriate disposition when holding service members accountable in accordance with military law and due process.”

Military Times reports that Col. Tracy Allen, commander of the 633rd Medical Group at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, one of the largest Air Force bases, was relieved of command on Tuesday because of a “loss of confidence,” a Langley spokesperson told Military Times on Thursday.

Allen was removed by Col. Stephen Anderson, 633rd Air Base Wing commander, “after careful consideration.”

The base did not provide a specific reason for Allen’s removal beyond citing a loss of confidence in her ability to lead.

Until a new commander of the medical unit is chosen, Col. Michael Blowers, the deputy command surgeon at Air Combat Command, has assumed responsibility of the group.

Before taking command, Allen previously led the 436th Medical Group at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware. She also served as the chief of the Medical Readiness Division and chief of the Air Force Medical Operations Center, according to her LinkedIn.

The base houses Air Combat Command, one of the force’s 10 major commands. It has 1,150 assigned aircraft with 35 wings and 1,470 units across 248 locations.

The 633rd Medical Group has five squadrons and 1,400 personnel that deliver outpatient, specialty and emergent care and operate an outpatient surgical center.

The unit also supports a local patient population of up to 29,000 active-duty members and their families alongside 426,000 TRICARE beneficiaries in Hampton Roads, the area in which the base is located.

City firefighters battled a blaze for hours Thursday afternoon at the historic campus of the former St. Catherine Indian School near downtown Santa Fe.

The fire was reported at about 3:45 p.m., and more than two dozen firefighters were still on scene several hours later, working to knock down the flames, according to a statement from city officials.

Around 4 p.m., city police officers handcuffed a man on the property, although it wasn’t clear whether he played any role in the fire.

City spokesperson Peter Olson confirmed the man was being questioned by police Thursday afternoon, but he said he did not have further details, including the man’s name. Olson said police were considering filing a charge of criminal trespass against the man.

The cause of the fire was still undetermined Thursday evening.

St. Catherine’s Industrial Indian School for Boys, later the coeducational St. Catherine’s Indian School, formed a campus of 19 buildings on the northwest side of Santa Fe adjacent to the Rosario Chapel and Cemetery. 

The school is a remnant of a system of Indian boarding schools, run by missionaries of various Christian religious orders, first developed in nineteenth century New Mexico to educate, assimilate, and “civilize” indigenous children into Euro-American culture.

In 1886, Katherine Drexel, a wealthy Pennsylvania heiress, donated funds to the Catholic Indian Bureau to construct the primary school building. Drexel, who later took religious vows and was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 2000, provided the capital for a string of nearly sixty schools across the country established to educate Native American and African American students. 

From the late 1800s through the twentieth century, Indian Boarding Schools throughout the western United States and Canada enrolled Indian students, generally against their will. The schools were designed to convince Native Americans to be submissive and loyal to the white culture. 

Indian boarding schools implemented programs of socialization, indoctrination, physical abuse, brainwashing and death. 

An investigation by the U.S. Interior Department in 2024 documented at least 973 Native American children's deaths at federally supported boarding schools. A deeper investigation by the Washington Post revealed a higher toll of more than 3,100 deaths between 1828 and 1970. Primary causes of death included infectious diseases (such as tuberculosis and measles), malnutrition, and accidents, compounded by horrific living conditions and physical abuse. The government investigations also identified dozens of marked and unmarked burial sites at the schools, as many children's bodies were never returned to their families or tribes.

ABC News reports that across Trump's first year back in the White House, his investment advisers made more than 21,000 securities trades, amassing sizable holdings in companies that are directly involved in deals tied to his administration, according to a review of his annual financial report.

According to the report, Trump's investment accounts grew to at least $858 million and included stakes in approximately 1,600 companies. 

The trades across eight separate accounts marks a significant departure from previous presidents, who have either divested their holdings or traded exclusively in diversified mutual funds. By contrast, Joe Biden made a total of 13 stock trades during his entire tenure as president. 

Trump holds stakes in dozens of companies that have government contracts, such as Palantir, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, Intel, Nvidia, as well as private prison operators GEO Group and CoreCivic. 

Many of the companies Trump has invested in also benefit from his policies, prompting criticism from Democrats about alleged conflicts of interest. 

On the same day that the White House unveiled its "AI Action Plan" on July 23, 2025, Trump purchased between $1-5 million each in six companies -- Amazon, Apple, Broadcom, Meta, Microsoft, and Nvidia -- whose work with AI was directly impacted by the policy.

The White House has defended the president's stock trades and highlighted that his investment accounts are managed by professional advisers who do not regularly communicate with Trump.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Trump argued that "everyone" including himself is profiting from overall growth of the stock market. 

"You know ⁠why ​I'm profiting? Because the ​stock market's going up, everybody's profiting," Trump said. 

Trump has also actively traded in multiple companies whose stock prices have been impacted by his posts on social media.

In the months before Trump publicly praised software maker Palantir on social media earlier this year, his investment advisers purchased between $200,000 and $680,000 worth of the company's stock, according to a different disclosure report covering the first quarter of 2026.

Trump also sold between $1-5 million of the stock during the same time frame, undercutting claims that he was trying to buy the stock when it dipped. 

"Palantir Technologies (PLTR) has proven to have great war fighting capabilities and equipment. Just ask our enemies!!! President DJT," Trump wrote on April 10 in a post that included the stock ticker of the company. 

After Palantir's stock suffered one of the worst weeks in a year, Trump's subsequent public endorsement of the company preceded a significant uptick in the company's stock price. 

Another high-profile post by Trump that moved the market -- his April 9, 2025, declaration that "THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT" -- came four hours ahead of his announcement that he would pause tariffs for 90 days. 

One day before the post, one of Trump's investment accounts made 327 purchases of a broad array of securities.

The group “Israel Exposed” has launched a new website to archive Gaza footage in one place.

ArchiveGenocide.com, includes more than 64,000 videos and nearly 18,000 photos. It also says the archive has a searchable index, geolocation data, a live map with minute by minute updates, a victim list and a source list of more than 300 journalists.oblems.” 

Tibetan independence activist Lobga Rangzen self-immolated in front of UN building in New York, on July 2,2026 at about 6:30 pm. He protested against the Chinese government’s repressive policies in Tibet including China’s new “Ethnic Unity Law” and called for Independence for Tibet, as we as preservation of Tibetan culture and language, unity among Tibetans.

He later passed away at 7:04 pm at Bellevue Hospital.

Lobga Rangzen was born in DzaKhong, in the Karze region of eastern Tibet. His three brothers and sisters died in a Chinese prison after protesting against Chinese brutal rule and repressive policies in Tibet. He was a monk while living in Tibet, and fled the country to seek refuge in India in 1992. 

He moved to the United States in 2006. An active advocate for Tibetan independence, he organized and participated in the Tibetan freedom movement and has staged hunger strikes in New York to demand freedom for Tibetans. 

He was 52 years old when he set himself on fire in front of UN headquarters, wearing a chupa—a traditional Tibetan dress and standing next to the Tibetan national flag, which was flying high in the air as he set himself on fire.

Before setting himself on fire, Lobga posted a live message on Facebook in which he stated that his actions were motivated by his commitment to Tibetan independence and not by personal reasons. He spoke of the lack of freedom under Chinese occupation in Tibet, condemned policies aimed at eradicating the Tibetan identity, and called for Tibetan independence.

His final words were: “I don’t want you to mourn for me, I want you to continue the struggle for Tibetan independence, because the lack of independence is the root of all our problems.” 

According to a survey from the libertarian Cato Institute think tank of more than 2,000 U.S. adults conducted in late June, nearly half of Americans (46%) don't know that America's 250th anniversary commemorates the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, and nearly 60% do not know the main purpose of the U.S. Constitution is to limit government power or why the colonies declared independence from Great Britain.

The majority of those surveyed believe the country has strayed from its founding principles, and more than half fear the U.S. could cease to be a free country within the next 50 years, citing corruption and the abuse of power as primary threats. Republicans and Democrats share these fears.

Gen Z respondents exhibited the lowest levels of civic knowledge and the least favorable views of the nation's founders. 

The Epstein survivors have launched their own website, survivorsisters.org.

The site tells the documented, fact-based story of Jeffrey Epstein's network of abuse — from the first FBI report in 1996 to the fight for accountability that continues today. It is a resource for survivors, advocates, and anyone seeking the truth. 

On social media, Senator Warren posted a list of numbers of children in each state who have lost Medicaid and CHIP because of Trump so far.

Alabama: 5,663 kids, Alaska: 12,388 kids, Arizona: 74,680 kids, Arkansas: 10,523 kids, California: 382,776 kids, Connecticut: 5,516 kids, DC: 4,635 kids, Delaware: 4,360 kids, Florida: 121,219 kids, Georgia: 93,697 kids, Hawaii: 1,366 kids, Idaho: 7,541 kids, Illinois: 92,727 kids, Indiana: 174,016 kids, Iowa: 8,340 kids,, Kansas: 12,535 kids, Kentucky: 60,522 kids, Louisiana: 32,496 kids, Maine: 1,910 kids, Maryland: 23,906 kids, Massachusetts: 25,169 kids, Michigan: 50,421 kids, Mississippi: 11,259 kids, Missouri: 28,129 kids, Montana: 2,178 kids, Nebraska: 6,793 kids, Nevada: 16,300 kids, New Hampshire: 5,629 kids, New Jersey: 9,691 kids, New Mexico: 19,054 kids, New York: 31,849 kids, North Carolina: 58,250 kids, North Dakota: 2,474 kids, Ohio: 80,467 kids, Oklahoma: 17,618 kids, Oregon: 13,797 kids, Pennsylvania: 55,519 kids,, Rhode Island: 11,163 kids, South Carolina: 49,298 kids, South Dakota: 5,555 kids, Tennessee: 17,633 kids, Texas: 190,956 kids, Utah: 11,325 kids, Vermont: 2,034 kids, Virginia: 67,520 kids, Washington: 30,047 kids, West Virginia: 11,883 kids, Wisconsin: 28,820 kids, Wyoming: 3,829 kids.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright today released the following statement.

"I'm thrilled to report that after about 35 years, on July 4th, we will end the subsidies for wind and solar, thanks to the Working Families Tax Cut.

"Wind and solar take a lot of land, 100 times more land for a similar amount of energy. They take an enormous amount of materials, energy intensive materials like steel and cement and polysilicon.

"They take an enormous amount of additional transmission lines to connect their large land, far flung production back to where there's demand centers.

"And what do we get for all that is a relatively small amount of low value energy. It's low value because the wind doesn't always blow and the sun doesn't always shine.

"So they drive up the system costs and increase Americans' electricity prices.

"Enough of raising electricity prices. We're going to drive them down. Thank you."

For more than three decades, the federal government has subsidized wind and solar energy generation. In 2025, wind and solar accounted for approximately three percent of total U.S. primary energy consumption.

Fossil fuels have received an estimated $549 billion from the federal government, while renewables have received an estimated $195 billion.

The annual U.S. fossil fuel subsidies are estimated at $29.4 billion, enough to pay for the annual utility bills of 17.2 million Americans.

Since 2009 the costs of wind and solar have fallen by 55 percent and 84 percent, respectively, making renewables the cheapest source of energy even without subsidies.

Fossil fuel executives donated millions to Trump’s 2024 campaign after hearing assurances that he would repeal environmental regulations and expand access for drilling on public lands and their companies continue to enjoy direct financial subsidies, land acquisition, streamlined and fast track permitting, government services, and ignored pollution costs.

When Trump met with the president of the European Commission in July of last year Trump called windmills a "con job" and blamed them for killing both humans and whales.

A coalition of organizers and activists carried a 700 ft Constitution preamble banner through the streets of Washington DC today.

The Constitution preamble states:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Created by the Backbone Campaign, the banner was delivered to the national archive as part of the We the People 250 March. About 300 people were carried the banner.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was established on March 1, 2003. It was created as part of the Homeland Security Act of 2002, which formed the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in response to the September 11 attacks.

Since 2003 the reported deaths have been:

2003 – 3 - President George W Bush

2004 – 32 - President George W Bush

2005 – 18 - President George W Bush

2006 – 17 - President George W Bush

2007 – 7 - President George W Bush 

2008 – 16 - President George W Bush

Total under George W Bush: 93, average of about 16 a year

2009 – 8 – President Obama

2010 – 8 – President Obama

2011 – 10 – President Obama

2012 – 4 – President Obama

2013 – 9 – President Obama

2014 – 6 – President Obama

2015 - 10 – President Obama

2016 – 10 – President Obama

Total under President Obama: 65, average of about 8 a year

2017 - 12 - Trump

2018 - 9 - Trump

2019 - 9 - Trump

2020 – 18 – Trump

Total under Trump’s first term: 48, average of 12 a year

2021 – 5 – President Biden

2022 - 3 – President Biden

2023 - 7 – President Biden

2024 - 11 – President Biden

Total under President Biden: 26, average of about 7 a year

2025 – 33 - Trump

2026 – 19 - Trump

Total so far under Trump’s second term: 52, average of about 35 a year

2025 had the highest number of deaths since 2004, and December 2025 was the deadliest month on record.

ICE also regularly "releases" individuals from ICE custody shortly before death, which allows them to avoid counting those individuals in official reports. 

For example, in New Mexico, a transgender asylum-seeker was given parole documents to sign while in a hospital bed after being denied medical care at the Otero Processing Center for several weeks. She died four days later in the hospital. Men have also been "released" from ICE detention while hospitalized and in a coma. 

Trump’s “Board of Peace” (BoP), is the international organization with the stated purpose of “promoting peacebuilding around the world.”

The Board of Peace was proposed in September 2025 and formally established in January 2026.

Trump is explicitly named in the BoP's charter as its chairman. He is not subject to term limits and holds the sole authority to nominate his designated successor. According to the charter, as the chairman, he is exclusively authorized to invite countries to join the BoP. In that capacity, he also has the exclusive authority to create, modify, or dissolve subsidiary entities of the board. All revisions to the charter, as well as administrative directives issued by the BoP, are subject to his approval.Trump's chairmanship is independent of his presidency of the United States, and he has indicated that he wants to remain chairman for life.

Participating countries are required to contribute US$1 billion to the organization to renew membership after the first three years.

By May 2026, the BoP had no funds in its official World Bank account, despite $17 billion in pledges by member states. Donations have gone into a J. P. Morgan account with no oversight.

As of 2026, 25 of the 62 invited countries have signed the board's charter.

The members of the Board of Peace Executive Board were announced on 17 January 2026. They are:

• Nikolay Mladenov – High Representative for Gaza, former United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process
• Marco Rubio – United States Secretary of State
• Steve Witkoff – United States Special Envoy to the Middle East
• Jared Kushner – Donald Trump's son-in-law
• Tony Blair – Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
• Marc Rowan – CEO of Apollo Global Management
• Ajay Banga – President of the World Bank Group
• Robert Gabriel Jr. – American political advisor

A "Gaza Executive Board" also exists. Its members, also announced on 17 January 2026, are:

• Steve Witkoff – United States Special Envoy to the Middle East
• Jared Kushner – Donald Trump's son-in-law
• Hakan Fidan – Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkey
• Ali al-Thawadi – Minister for Strategic Affairs of Qatar
• Hassan Rashad – Director of the General Intelligence Service of Egypt
• Tony Blair – Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
• Marc Rowan – CEO of Apollo Global Management
• Reem Al Hashimy – Minister of State for International Cooperation of the United Arab Emirates
• Nikolay Mladenov – High Representative for Gaza
• Yakir Gabay – Israeli businessman
• Sigrid Kaag – United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process

The following states have signed the charter of the BoP. 

• Albania
• Argentina
• Armenia
• Azerbaijan
• Bahrain
• Bulgaria
• Cambodia
• Egypt
• El Salvador
• Hungary
• Indonesia
• Israel
• Jordan
• Kazakhstan
• Kosovo
• Kuwait
• Mongolia
• Morocco
• Pakistan
• Paraguay
• Qatar
• Saudi Arabia
• Turkey
• United Arab Emirates
• United States
• Uzbekistan
• Vietnam

Folarin Balogun, the star striker of the U.S. men's national soccer received a red card last Wednesday during the 2-0 U.S. victory over Bosnia-Herzegovina in the Round of 32 match for stepping on the ankle of Bosnian defender Tarik Muharemović as the two tangled while going after the ball.

The Associated Press reported that Trump called FIFA president Gianni Infantino after the match, asking FIFA to review the red card. 

Now Balogun is eligible to play in the FIFA World Cup Round of 16 game against Belgium on Monday.

FIFA's Disciplinary Committee announced Sunday that it would suspend Balogun's one-game red card ban for a probationary period of one year, allowing him to play in any remaining World Cup games.

The decision to delay a one-game red card suspension is highly unusual. 

The committee did not give a reason for their decision and said that .Balogun's probationary period will be revoked and the one-game suspension enforced if he commits "another infringement of a similar nature and gravity."

U.S. Soccer released a statement that said . "Our full attention is focused on the Round of 16 match against Belgium in Seattle, and we look forward to the continued support of our amazing fans."

"Thank you to FIFA for doing what was right, and reversing a great injustice!" Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.

Alexandra Bravo, the Ecuadorian prosecutor investigating allegations that three boats from Ecuador were struck by the US and that dozens of survivors were abducted and tortured by American forces, was killed in the city of Manta on June 14.

Police say a hitman on a black motorcycle opened fire on Bravo and her sister as they were leaving a cafe. Both women were killed and their driver was injured. There was “no sign of the police detail that had been assigned” to protect Bravo.

“For almost a year, the US government has been illegally bombing fishing boats and killing people without evidence of wrongdoing,” said Rep. Jesús “Chuy” García (D-Ill.). “And last month, Alexandra Bravo, the Ecuadorian prosecutor investigating boats that were attacked or disappeared, was murdered... There must be an independent investigation.”

Bravo had been investigating the cases of three fishing boats—the Fiorella, the Negra Francisca, and the Don Maca—which were reportedly struck by drones in January and March.

The 36 surviving crew members of the latter two vessels reported that they were captured by US forces and subjected to torture before eventually being returned to Ecuador.

Eight fishermen went missing from the Fiorella, and their family members have reported that Ecuadorian authorities have provided little help to them as they look for answers, with the daughter of one missing fisherman saying an official had suggested the crew was involved in drug trafficking.

The White House has insisted that the 66 strikes that have been carried out by US forces since last September were on boats running drugs, and the 221 people on board were involved in drug trafficking. Trump has claimed the US is in an armed conflict with Latin American drug cartels, but Congress has not authorized military force in the region.

Even if the bombed vessels were ferrying illicit substances to the US, military attacks against civilians for alleged involvement in drug trafficking is against international law.

Bravo had reported facing pressure from the attorney general’s office regarding her investigation, with her superiors telling her to treat the alleged attacks on the boats only as “cases of disappearance” and to “close all lines of inquiry” after the 36 survivors of the Negra Francisca and the Don Maca returned, even though they showed signs of torture.

On July 13, 2026, Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 25-year-old Colombian immigrant to the United States, was shot and killed by David Brouillette, a United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer during a traffic stop in Biddeford, Maine, United States. 

ICE agents attempted to pull over the car Durán Guerrero was driving, yelling "move it, let's go" and "back, back!" immediately before ICE officer David Brouillette fired five gunshots at his car, striking him in the head

ICE agents were executing a search warrant, though Durán Guerrero was not the target of the warrant.

David Brouillette has a history of abuse and violence.

His ex-wife Ashley Brouillette says one of their last interactions was a three-minute voicemail in which David told her that someone should slit her and her daughters’ throats.

After the killing, Ashley says, David told her that she needed to talk about his character in a positive way. “I’m not going to lie for you,” she replied. She says he also asked her not to talk about abuse that had happened in their marriage, which ended in 2009. 

Another ex-wife, Lucinda Brouillette, said in a statement to reporters that she “unequivocally” believes David is capable of extreme acts of violence. In hundreds of pages of court records, she has accused him of physical and verbal abuse, including allegedly dumping a plate of spaghetti on his 13-year-old daughter’s head and then tackling her while she cried. “I have feared for a long time that his anger, aggression, and escalating behavior would eventually result in severe, life-threatening violence, and I often believed I would be the one on the receiving end of it,” Lucinda wrote.

Ashley believes her ex-husband should have never had access to a weapon in a personal capacity, much less in an official one: “He does not belong in careers that involve guns.”

The Charlotte Observer reports that Charlotte Mayor Rob Harrington says he is confident in the police department’s handling of the death of Juliana Nzita, while at least two City Council members say they want answers after a Charlotte Observer investigation published Wednesday

Juliana, who was 16 years old and Black, was found Friday, May 8 hanged from a tree near a predominately Black church in north Charlotte after going missing for several days. 

Her body was suspended by the neck from a ratchet strap wrapped around a leaning tree trunk at least twice her height. Her feet rested on the ground near a child’s chair. 

By Monday, the medical examiner ruled her death a suicide, and Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police closed the case four days later. 

Her family, who emigrated from the Congo, described her smile as warm, her demeanor as gentle. She also struggled with her mental health and severe bullying at school, an uncle said. 

The Charlotte Observer investigated the circumstances around Juliana’s death and how CMPD handled her case. Police apparently never found her cell phone. No one from CMPD contacted the man who found Juliana’s body. Authorities did not do an autopsy, although police said a thorough inspection of the body was performed. 

CMPD refused the Charlotte Observer’s request to interview the detectives on the case and has not made any public statements to address concerns circulating on social media. 

On Wednesday, after The Observer presented to police what reporters had discovered, CMPD provided some answers. However, they refused to provide any documents associated with Juliana’s case beyond basic incident reports. 

Kenneth Tolbert found Juliana’s body. He does not believe the police’s determination that she died by suicide. 

He doubted the small chair could have held her weight or that it was tall enough to lift her to that tree limb. “I couldn’t even reach it myself,” Tolbert said, referring to the limb. He stands 5 foot 9 inches. Tolbert now searches the internet for any updates on Juliana, frustrated that he finds only rumors. “If this were a white girl who was found hanging at a Myers Park church, the police would have been all over this. It would have been national (news) in 72 hours,” he said. “We cannot let Juliana’s death be in vain. There has to be transparency and an investigation.” 

CMPD offered nothing in the way of public explanation about why they concluded Juliana hanged herself until The Observer started asking questions. 

CMPD also said in the email that a thorough physical examination revealed no defensive wounds and no signs of physical or sexual assault, that there was no evidence indicating foul play, and that a tree limb had broken during the incident. The church does appear to have cameras, but police said that no relevant footage was captured. 

Police declared her death a suicide in three days, without an autopsy, her phone or interviewing the man who found her body.

The Mecklenburg County Medical Examiner’s Office told the Observer that the decision to do autopsies depends on whether police or the medical examiner suspect foul play. At the Observer’s request, Asha Layne, an associate professor at Morgan State University and former Baltimore Police crime scene investigator, reviewed the nearly two-minute-long footage that Tolbert took. She said pertinent information that’s unknown includes the height of the victim, the height of the chair and the distance from the ground to the branch. Layne asked if police checked Juliana’s blood for alcohol or drugs, if they analyzed the rope and if they looked for anybody else’s DNA on the rope or her body. 

Juliana’s family is awaiting the results of their own, independent autopsy, which will include DNA analysis, according to Jill Collen Jefferson. She’s a civil rights attorney working with the family.

Jefferson has studied dozens of “modern-day lynchings” and suspicious deaths where racial or other identity-based motives may be at play. She found a pattern among nearly all of them: Police made premature conclusions that the deceased died by suicide; crime scenes were often compromised; and investigations appeared “shoddy.” 

Four criminal justice and mental health experts interviewed by the Observer said based on what they can tell, Juliana’s manner of death appeared unusual. First, hanging is the least common method that girls her age use to hurt themselves — especially in public, said Raymond Winbush, director of the Institute for Urban Research at Morgan State. 

Second, Black people also rarely hang themselves in public, Winbush said, given the historical context. And third, he noted that Juliana’s feet were touching the ground when Tolbert found her. Survival instinct would have kicked in, Winbush said, and likely would have stopped her from hanging herself. CMPD disputed that, saying that this is not ”supported by forensic science or investigative facts.” 

Juliana attended North Academy of World Languages in north Charlotte before switching to virtual school, her obituary said. “Juliana’s story is not just about loss — it is about the silent pain so many people carry after bullying, trauma, and emotional suffering,” Umba wrote. “No one should feel alone, forgotten, or overwhelmed by their struggles. Juliana mattered, and her life mattered.” 

In Oregon last Friday afternoon, three men claiming to be ICE officers pulled over and assaulted a driver.

Two men, one of whom was armed with a rifle, got out of the vehicle and told the driver they were with ICE and that they were being detained.

They forced the driver out of the car and placed them in the back of their vehicle, where a third man guarded the driver and assaulted them.

After about 15 or 20 minutes, the men let the driver go.

But according to Oregon State Police, the men were not real law enforcement officers. OSP said it confirmed with federal law enforcement agencies that no federal agents were involved in the incident.

The victim later went to a hospital to be treated for injuries received during the incident. While there, OSP said the victim began receiving text messages claiming to represent a law firm offering to help in the matter.

OSP said it and the FBI are investigating the reported incident.

At the rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Association dinner Friday night, Trump delivered a rambling speech which lasted just over an hour. The speech took shots at various individuals, such as Bruce Springsteen, “Barack Hussein Obama”, and journalist Kaitlan Collins of CNN, one of the evening’s key award winners, whom he again accused of not smiling enough. 

"This place [the dinner] is really the largest group of 'Trump derangement syndrome' people ever put together at one time," he said. "I suspect some of you are lucky that our last dinner was cut short...I was going to go after you."

The Katharine Graham Award for Courage and Accountability was awarded to The Wall Street Journal reporters (Khadeeja Safdar, Sadie Gurman, Annie Linskey, Josh Dawsey, Alex Leary, Rebecca Ballhaus, Ryan Barber, and Joe Palazzolo) for investigative coverage on Trump's ties to Jeffrey Epstein.

Trump commented “Do I have a say in those awards?”.

He also “joked” about running for an unconstitutional third term, including donning a hat that said “Trump 2028” and delivering the “scoop” that he was running again.

Corey Ruiz, a 38 year-old Black man, was shot and killed by a police officer in Madison Wisconsin on Wednesday.  

The killing occurred on a busy street near the State Capitol, where officers were responding to reports of a man stealing bicycles and looking into parked vehicles, officials said. 

Multiple people captured cellphone footage, and videos of the shooting have circulated widely on social media.

Bystander footage shows three officers holding down Mr. Ruiz while he is on his knees. The officers yell that Mr. Ruiz has a knife. Mr. Ruiz then stands up and another officer approaches the scene and yells, “Taser, Taser!” Mr. Ruiz is pushed or falls to the ground, where he is lying on his side while one officer appears to be restraining him, and another appears to have his foot on Mr. Ruiz’s body. A third officer shoots Mr. Ruiz three times at close range while he is lying down.

Chief John Patterson of the Madison Police Department said the footage on social media was only “one perspective” and added that “not all perspectives are online right now.”

At a news conference on Friday, family members spoke about Mr. Ruiz, including his mother, his sister, and his 13-year-daughter. 

They addressed his criminal record, which included convictions for drug possession, theft and resisting or obstructing an officer, stating that it did not define him.

The Wisconsin Justice Department is leading a homicide investigation into the shooting.

At a news conference on Thursday that was disrupted by protesters, Chief Patterson pledged he would cooperate fully with state investigators.

After state officials finish investigating, they will share their findings with the district attorney’s office, which will decide whether to bring charges against the officer, Chief Patterson said.

The name of the officer who shot Ruiz as not been released. All four officers involved have been placed on administrative leave.

The suspect in the deadly Berlin Pride attack that left one person dead and 29 injured was shot and killed by police during a confrontation on Sunday in a suburb of the city.

Abdul Ballout, a German citizen with Lebanese roots, was killed following a search that lasted nearly 24 hours. 

Ballout was suspected of driving a van into a crowd near Berlin’s Pride festival Saturday night before stabbing others with a machete in what authorities believe was an Islamic extremist terror attack.

The attack occurred a few hundred meters from a party near the Brandenburg Gate that was supposed to close out the city’s Pride festival.

Ballout was tracked down around 6 p.m. Sunday at a garden in Spandau, a Berlin suburb. Police said he ran toward officers with a sharp instrument, and police fired at least one shot. He died at the scene.

Ballout traveled to Lebanon in 2025 with the goal of joining the Islamic State group. He was arrested there and sentenced by a military court to three months’ imprisonment for offenses including incitement to religious and sectarian conflict.

He returned to Germany after completing his sentence, where he was arrested at the Berlin airport.

In May, a juvenile court in Berlin convicted Ballout of preparing a serious act of violence endangering the state, as well as publishing Islamic State propaganda and other charges, prosecutors said.

The court handed down a suspended sentence of 1 year and 10 months in youth custody, which Berlin prosecutors had appealed.

He was released from detention pending the appeal.

Chancellor Friedrich Merz urged the nation to remain united in the aftermath of the attack.

“I would like to say this to Christopher Street Day participants here in Berlin but also across Germany: Don’t let yourselves, let us not let ourselves, be intimidated,” he said. “These acts have only one purpose: They aim to divide our society. They want to take away from us the most important thing we have: Namely our openness and our freedom.”