Plus: El Salvador wants to imprison American citizens, an uninspiring new DNC chair, conservatives are obsessed with Djibouti, and penguins take 10,000 naps per day.
February 4, 2025 ❧ Seattle's public housing referendum, Elon takes over the Treasury, and LA protests ICE
Plus: El Salvador wants to imprison American citizens, an uninspiring new DNC chair, conservatives are obsessed with Djibouti, and penguins take 10,000 naps per day.
It’s one of the newsiest we’ve ever seen from the standpoint of news.
❧ In Seattle, a referendum on February 11 will determine if people get massively expanded public housing. Since 2021, a group called House Our Neighbors has been working to prevent anti-homeless “sweeps” by the police and lobby the Seattle government to build social housing instead. Back in 2023, the group got a ballot measure approved to create a new publicly-owned housing authority, which would build affordable apartments for anyone who needs them. The plan is an ambitious one, modeled after similar programs in Vienna: in the proposed developments, both low- and medium-income tenants would be allotted units, and the rents paid by the medium-income dwellers would subsidize the lower-income ones, keeping the whole program’s costs down. (But for everyone, rent would be capped at no more than 30 percent of their income.) House Our Neighbors has even commissioned an architect, Neiman Taber, to draw up some sketches:
Now, there’s a second hurdle: getting all this funded. House Our Neighbors has placed a new initiative on Seattle’s ballots, this time to create a 5-percent “excessive compensation tax” on salaries of $1 million or higher. If passed, this would generate an estimated $53 million per year. But it’s being fiercely opposed by CEOs and other business elites, who have introduced a competing ballot measure that redistributes money from other affordable housing projects instead, pitting them against each other. With a vote scheduled for February 11, we’ll soon know which side wins out. (In These Times)
❧ The Costco workers’ strike was called off at the last minute. Late on Friday, just as roughly 18,000 retail workers were preparing to walk off the job and start picket lines the next day, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters announced that it had reached a tentative deal with the retail chain. However, the full terms of that deal haven’t yet been announced, and as the World Socialist Web Sitereports, some workers are concerned the gains won’t be enough to keep up with the rising cost of living. Additionally, Costco has started to apply pressure tactics, giving raises to everyone but the workers at its unionized locations. Whatever the deal contains, it’ll have to be ratified by the workers, so this struggle may not be over yet. (Business Insider)
❧ In Los Angeles, anti-deportation protestersshut down the streets. Thousands of demonstrators carrying Mexican, Salvadoran, and Native American tribal flags blocked the 101 Freeway for several hours on Sunday, along with others in cars who did “noisy burnouts” and filled the air with tire smoke, making the road even more impossible to use. It’s just one of many anti-Trump demonstrations planned for the next few weeks, and all of them are crucial as the MAGA agenda really kicks into gear. (Los Angeles Times)
❧ Minneapolis has agreed to pay out $600,000 to a woman who accused former police officer Derek Chauvin of kneeling on her back four months before his murder of George Floyd. The plaintiff, Patricia Day, said that Chauvin and another officer hauled her out of the car and pushed her to the ground during a traffic stop for alleged drunk driving. Day said, “I feared for my life. I didn’t know if I was going to survive this.” This is the third lawsuit the city has settled over Chauvin’s conduct since his murder conviction in 2021. But Chauvin’s behavior is just the tip of the iceberg—a Justice Department investigation has found that the Minneapolis PD has a persistent pattern of using unnecessary force and racial discrimination. (New York Times)
❧ The Humane Society of the United States has rescued over 250 animals from a fur farm near Cleveland. The farm itself has been permanently shut down, as the owner died at the age of 69 last December, after which Ashtabula County officials seized the property. At the site, the Humane Society found “foxes, raccoons, wolf-dog hybrids, skunks, opossums and coyotes” living in miserable conditions, and took more than 250 to be sheltered and cared for properly—although a few, sadly, were in such poor health they had to be euthanized. The Society’s director for Ohio, Mark Finneran says the case is a perfect example of why “Ohio must end the suffering of wild animals being farmed for fur or urine, or to be sold as pets” so something like this can’t happen again. (Animal Liberation Press Office)
CROOKS vs. SICKOS (Or, “What are our politicians and oligarchs up to?”)
❧ Elon Musk has seized control of the Treasury department’s payment system, which is responsible for dispersing money on behalf of the federal government. He now has access to the code that controls the distribution of funds for, among many other things, Social Security, Medicare, federal salaries, government payments, grants, and tax refunds. He also has access to confidential information, including the Social Security numbers of most taxpayers.
According to Wired, “Engineers between 19 and 24, most linked to Musk’s companies, are playing a key role as he seizes control of federal infrastructure.” None of these people work for an actual government agency, but for the “Department of Government Efficiency,” an executive advisory group that was unilaterally put in place by Trump, but which has not been approved by Congress.
Any one of these boys could shut off your Social Security checks if they decide that you are not “based.” (Image: The Daily Beast)
It’s not exactly clear at the moment what Musk is doing to the federal government because Congress is not conducting any oversight of his actions. But Musk has told us flat out, via his social media platform, that DOGE is using the power to unilaterally shut down congressionally authorized payments that he and his army of young lads dislikes. On Monday, Musk announced that he had “deleted” a government office called 18F, which oversees many tech projects—most notably it was in charge of handling the IRS’s recently introduced Direct File system, which allowed people to file their taxes for free, without paying for costly services like TurboTax. His apparent reason for doing this was that a random right-wing account on X called the 18F office “far-left.” Musk also said that DOGE was “rapidly shutting down” payments to a Lutheran charity organization that provides services to refugees after the Christian nationalist General Michael Flynn accused them of “money laundering” without any evidence.
Obviously, none of this is legal. Presidents are explicitly banned from “impounding”—or refusing to spend—funds appropriated by Congress, which has the sole power of the purse. If presidents can’t do it, then an unelected, unconfirmed, unaccountable federal bureaucrat certainly can’t. But Musk is doing it anyway because nobody is stopping him.
❧ The Trump administration has also shut down USAID, the agency that distributes billions of dollars in foreign aid, suspending $68 billion in payments. USAID provides lots of critical humanitarian assistance worldwide in impoverished parts of the world—the New York Times lists a few examples:
War relief in Ukraine, peace-building in Somalia, disease surveillance in Cambodia, vaccination efforts in Nigeria, H.I.V. prevention in Uganda and maternal health assistance in Zambia, among a wide range of other programs. The agency has helped to contain major outbreaks of Ebola and other hemorrhagic fevers in recent years. In some regions, it supplies food, shelter and access to clean water that can be the difference between life and death. In others, it supports global networks of disease surveillance and biomedical research that help local populations and also protect Americans.
Despite doing a lot of good things, USAID has never exactly been a benevolent organization (See Saheli Khastagir's 2021 article in Current Affairs for more on that.) Rather, it’s a Cold War-era tool that the U.S. has used to expand its soft power abroad and legitimize more overt forms of imperialism. Help from USAID in developing countries has often coincided with and helped to legitimize more aggressive projections of power through military coups and extortionate IMF loans. USAID's “development” of foreign countries is usually a euphemism for making them friendlier for U.S. corporations to operate in for their own benefit.
That said, getting rid of USAID is hardly an effort by Trump to make U.S. foreign policy less interventionist or exploitative—this is a guy who has talked about invading or annexing close to a half dozen different countries. Rather, he just wants to remove any of the carrots in favor of only sticks.
❧ In another example of that “pro-worker conservatism” we hear so much about, a GOP legislator wants to abolish the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Representative Andy Biggs (R-AZ) has introduced an extremely short bill— just 67 words—called the “NOSHA Act,” which would dismantle the safety agency altogether and hand its responsibilities to “state governments and private employers,” instead. Since private bosses have a vested interest in cutting corners on safety, and the U.S. already has a serious problem with factory workers dying on the job when machines aren’t shut down properly, this is obviously a terrible idea. If you’re inclined to yell at Rep. Biggs, his contact information is here. (For Construction Pros)
The face of a man who doesn’t expect to be working with power tools HIMSELF any time soon. (Image: U.S. House of Representatives)
❧ The Senate Finance Committee has voted to advance RFK Jr.’s nomination as Health and Human Services secretary. After a week of intense pressure from both pro and anti-Kennedy sides, Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA), who was considered the most likely Republican to defect and vote against RFK Jr., ultimately decided to support him after all, saying he’d received “serious commitments… from the administration” about public health. This makes it significantly more likely Kennedy will be confirmed by a full Senate floor vote, but it’ll still be tight; he can only afford to lose three GOP votes, and Senators Murkowski, McConnell, and Collinsare already being speculated to be potential “nos.”
❧ The Trump administration is removing references to LGBTQ people on government websites in an effort to comply with recent executive orders on “gender ideology” and “DEI.” Many pages that reference the community have been taken down—including a Labor Department page about discrimination in the workplace, a CDC survey on youth risk behaviors that included some of the only available data on LGBTQ youth, and info about the Justice Department’s LGBTQ+ working group.
Even more chilling are pages that have been altered to remove certain groups from recognition. The State Department’s advisories for LGBTQI travelers—who face added risk in certain countries with homophobic and transphobic laws—now only references “LGB” travelers, as if to suggest that the government is no longer concerned with the safety of trans, queer, or intersex people.
Lots of other pages have been altered specifically to remove certain groups from recognition: The page of “Resources for LGBTQI+ Prospective Adoptive Parents” now just says “LGB Prospective Adoptive Parents.” Same with “Social Security for LGBTQI+ People,” which now only refers to “LGBQ People.”
And perhaps most concerning, the CDC has been forced to remove pages related to HIV prevention—including info on rates of diagnosis and the most common means of transmission. Researchers were left scrambling to archive as much information as possible, as it’s not clear at this moment whether any of it will be put back online. While the attacks are most directly being lodged at trans people currently, these are foreboding signs for everyone who isn’t straight and cis. (NBC News)
❧ As the Trump administration has begun ripping apart civil rights and the administrative state by executive fiat, you’re probably wondering whether congressional Democrats are mounting any sort of resistance.
❧ The Democratic National Committee also has a new chair, and he doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. Since the Democrats just suffered a humiliating defeat, it would seem obvious that new leadership and a whole new approach to politics are needed. But in the February 1 leadership elections, the Democrats did not elect Faiz Shakir, the former Bernie Sanders advisor who promised a thorough overhaul of the party; in fact, he got only two votes. They didn’t even elect Ben Wikler, the Wisconsin party chair who wanted a “full audit of DNC consulting contracts” to ensure people’s donations are being spent wisely. Instead, they picked Ken Martin, who’s most famous for suggesting that the Democratic Party needs to take donations from “good billionaires” while avoiding “bad billionaires.” So, you know, don’t expect much of anything to change. (MSNBC)
❧ Trump is once again attacking South Africa’s post-apartheid government. In a post to Truth Social, the president accused the country of “confiscating land” from “certain classes of people”—a reference to right-wing conspiracy theories about the supposed persecution of white farmers, which have been promoted by pundits like Tucker Carlson and Lauren Southern. Trump also spread groundless claims about the “large scale killing” of South Africa’s white population in his first term, and now he’s threatening to cut off “all future funding to South Africa” unless there’s an “investigation.” (In response, President Cyril Ramaphosa said the U.S. doesn’t provide much funding to South Africa anyway, other than for AIDS relief.)
As writer Joe Walsh has explained in great detail forCurrent Affairs, there’s never been any evidence behind these lurid stories. Rather, they’re a way for far-right figures like Trump and Elon Musk—who grew up under apartheid—to cast doubt on South African democracy itself, and attempt to make the apartheid era look redeemable by comparison. It’s a dangerous lie that needs to be debunked every time it shows up. (BBC)
When he “ReTruths” his own “Truth,” you know he’s serious.
❧ The official death toll in Gaza has been updated to nearly 62,000, as those who are missing have been declared dead. The ceasefire that went into effect on January 19 has allowed for rescuers to recover the dead in parts of Gaza they could not reach before. It is estimated that more than 14,000 people have been trapped beneath the rubble of destroyed buildings. Before the ceasefire, they weren’t included in official figures from Gaza officials. But now, as Palestinians returned to their destroyed homes and villages, they are finding “mass graves and people buried under the rubble or killed and their bodies left at the scene.” Even this is probably a significant undercount because it only includes those directly killed due to the conflict, but not those killed due to its knock-on effects, like disease and hunger. (Al Jazeera)
❧ LONG READ: Throughout the 922 pages of the “Project 2025” policy agenda, only one African country is targeted by name: Djibouti. But why are U.S. conservatives so concerned about securing their “position” in this tiny East African nation? For Responsible Statecraft,Aidan Simardone breaks the situation down:
Djibouti is critical because of its location. Situated near the Gulf of Aden, around one third of ship traffic passes by on its way to the Suez Canal. To protect these ships, Djibouti hosts military bases from China, France, Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia and the United States. Until recently, Djibouti-American relations were good. But when Djibouti refused to let the United States attack the Houthis from their territory, the foreign policy establishment lost its temper and blamed Chinese influence.
❧ Trump’s trade war with Mexico and Canada, America’s two largest trading partners, appears to be on hold for now. Over the weekend, Trump announced that he’d enact 25-percent tariffs on imports from both countries—a move that was followed by chaos in the global financial markets and fears of rising prices for all sorts of consumer goods. He also placed a 10-percent tariff on Chinese imports. He’s since backed off the threats to Mexico and Canada after phone calls with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who agreed to help him enforce his border policy.
Trump is, of course, trumpeting this as a diplomatic master stroke. But most of what these leaders agreed to are things they’d already done in the past without the threat of tariffs. Sheinbaum’s “agreement” was to send 10,000 troops to the border—something Mexico already did in 2021.Meanwhile, Trudeau affirmed that he would enact a “$1.3 billion border plan,” which had already begun last year. Trudeau also agreed to appoint a “fentanyl czar” and launch a new directive to stop the flow of the drug. But only about 0.2 percent of all fentanyl comes through Canada.
Though they’ve so far mostly been bluster and bullshit, we probably have not seen the last of Trump’s tariff threats. Replacing progressive income taxes with tariffs (effectively shifting the greatest tax burden onto the poorest Americans) is a policy he has made central to his second term and there’s a good chance he’ll begin making more demands.
❧ El Salvador’s dictator Nayib Bukele has offered up his country as a place for the Trump administration to send deportees and other criminals, “including those of US citizenship and legal residents.” Bukele is infamous for carrying out indiscriminate arrests—mostly in poor neighborhoods—and throwing those he rounds up into squalid prisons where many have faced torture and death. He is celebrated in some corners for waging war on El Salvador’s gangs. But in the process, thousands of innocent people have also been rounded up. In his own post proposing that America “outsource” its prison population, Bukele included an image of police in full military gear looming over dozens of helpless detainees, which is apparently his vision for how to treat those rounded up by Trump.
There are reportedly no plans for the U.S. to begin exporting its detainees to El Salvador at the moment. But Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who visited the country and met with Bukele this week, has expressed gratitude for the proposal, saying “No country’s ever made an offer of friendship such as this.” Deporting American citizens is obviously illegal. But legality is clearly not something the Trump administration is concerned about, so this is something to keep an eye on. (The Guardian)
❧ For the first time, Nigel Farage’s “Reform UK” party is leading in the British polls. Conducted jointly by the Times of London and YouGov, a new poll shows a virtual dead heat between three parties: the Conservatives at 21 percent, Labour at 24 percent, and Reform UK in the lead at 25 percent. It should be pointed out that this 1-point lead is within the poll’s margin of error—but still, the result shows a worrying gain for the far right, and an embarrassing collapse for a Labour Party that won commanding majorities in parliament less than a year ago. Turns out governing as technocratic centrists doesn’t work very well! (Financial Times)
During breeding season, they must keep a vigilant watch over their eggs to ensure they are not snatched up by hungry skuas or kidnapped by other jealous penguins. This is especially important while their partners are away foraging for food.
A study published in 2023 observed that nesting chinstrap penguins engage in as many as 600 “microsleeps” per hour. These power naps often happened for just four seconds, but when the scientists examined these penguins’ brain activity, they found that they were producing the sort of slow brain waves that occur during sleep. Using these microsleeps, penguins accumulate more than 11 total hours of sleep per day, which is a lot more than most humans get!
Video: Associated Press
Writing and research by Stephen Prager and Alex Skopic. Editing and additional material by Nathan J. Robinson and Lily Sánchez. Header graphic by Cali Traina Blume. This news briefing is a product of Current Affairs Magazine. Subscribe to our gorgeous and informative print edition here, and our delightful podcast here.
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