Friday Talking Points -- No Prize For Trump

[ChrisWeigant]

Donald Trump actually achieved something worthwhile this week. A ceasefire deal that will result in all the hostages being released was hammered out between Israel and Hamas, and the guns have gone silent in Gaza. Whether this results in a long-lasting peace deal remain to be seen (there are a lot of details that are still "to be determined" in the deal), but progress has definitely been made. However, Trump did not achieve what he really wanted in all this, as the Nobel Peace Prize was announced today -- for someone else. Maybe he'll be considered next year, but so far the petulance and anger from the MAGA crowd has already begun.

It was impossible not to read between the lines of the Nobel citation, which stated in part:

Democracy is a precondition for lasting peace. However, we live in a world where democracy is in retreat, where more and more authoritarian regimes are challenging norms and resorting to violence. The Venezuelan regime's rigid hold on power and its repression of the population are not unique in the world. We see the same trends globally: rule of law abused by those in control, free media silenced, critics imprisoned, and societies pushed towards authoritarian rule and militarization. In 2024, more elections were held than ever before, but fewer and fewer are free and fair.

So at least the Nobel Committee did mention Trump, in a way, since that list seems awfully familiar, these days.

In other news, the government shutdown plowed through its second week, with no end in sight. The Senate won't be back in session until next Tuesday, and the House speaker has said he won't call his chamber back from vacation until the shutdown is over. So far, Democrats seem to still largely be united, but cracks are appearing on the Republican side. None other than Marjorie Taylor Greene broke ranks this week and started making the Democrats' case, since it seems her own family will be affected if the Republicans refuse to extend the Obamacare subsidies that will expire at the end of this year. Here's just some of what she had to say:

"I'm carving my own lane," [Marjorie Taylor Greene] wrote on X. "And I'm absolutely disgusted that health insurance premiums will DOUBLE if the tax credits expire this year."

. . .

"I'm going to go against everyone on this issue because when the tax credits expire this year my own adult children's insurance premiums for 2026 are going to DOUBLE, along with all the wonderful families and hard-working people in my district," she wrote.

. . .

"It is absolutely shameful, disgusting, and traitorous, that our laws and policies screw the American people so much that the government is shut down right now fighting over basic issues like this."

Another fractious issue for Republicans is the fact that if they don't act on a standalone funding bill, America's troops are all going to miss a paycheck next week. Democrats tried to move legislation to pay them, but the Republicans blocked it. This has led to a few other Republicans breaking ranks:

"I'm urging the Speaker and our House leadership to immediately pass my bill to ensure our servicemembers, many of whom live paycheck to paycheck while supporting their families, receive the pay they've earned," Rep. Jen Kiggans (R-Va.) said Wednesday on X. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), a former member of House leadership, backed the vote demand on Thursday.

Some Republicans are even calling on Mike Johnson to relent and call the House back into session as well.

Johnson isn't just refusing to allow a vote on pay for the troops, he's also refusing to seat a duly-elected Democrat, after she won a special election in Arizona. This is quite likely because she will become the final signature necessary to force a House vote on a bill to release all the Epstein files, which Johnson is strongly against. This led to a shouting match outside his office this week, as the two Democratic senators from Arizona confronted him over the issue (we wrote about this situation earlier this week in more detail).

Today, the Trump administration followed through on its threat to fire as many government workers as possible, which is not required during a shutdown (but Trump doesn't care). All other federal workers were warned that they may not actually get their back pay whenever the shutdown ends as well. As time goes on, the fallout from the shutdown is going to start affecting more and more people in more and more areas, of course. This week we've already seen air traffic controllers deciding it is a fine time to call in sick, which has led to airport towers being completely unstaffed.

Trump's obsession with unleashing retribution on his political enemies continued this week, as James Comey appeared in court (to plead "not guilty" ) while Letitia James was charged with a very dubious mortgage fraud indictment. Stephen Miller summed up exactly what Trump's authoritarian regime is aiming for, saying of Trump's political enemies: "We will not live in fear, but you will live in exile, because the power of law enforcement under President Trump's leadership will be used to find you, will be used to take away your money, take away your power, and if you have broken the law, to take away your freedom." This is banana republic stuff, folks, and it's right out in the open now.

Meanwhile, Trump got dealt a few setbacks in his plans to wage war on Chicago and Portland, Oregon, as two federal judges (one appointed by him!) ruled that Trump had no right to send in National Guard troops to the two cities. Trump initially tried to send the states' own National Guard, but when that didn't work tried an end-run around the judges by sending other states' troops in instead (California National Guard troops in Oregon, and Texas National Guard troops in Illinois). These moves were also blocked by the judges -- but who knows what will happen when the appeals get all the way to the Supreme Court?

The Trump-appointed judge used some pretty scathing language in her ruling:

U.S. District Judge Karin J. Immergut noted that the Constitution leaves policing powers to state and local governments while granting Congress the power to provide for calling up state militias to execute federal laws, suppress insurrections and repel invasions. She said Trump's determination that troops were needed was "simply untethered" to "the facts on the ground," including that "it had been months since there was any sustained level of violent or disruptive protest activity in Portland."

"This country has a longstanding and foundational tradition of resistance to government overreach, especially in the form of military intrusion into civil affairs," Immergut wrote in her 31-page opinion. "This historical tradition boils down to a simple proposition: this is a nation of constitutional law, not martial law."

Trump, frustrated by the federal judges, is now openly musing about perhaps using the Insurrection Act to send in the troops. To American cities. Where no rebellion or insurrection exists.

In Chicago, ICE troops staged a siege on an apartment building that was downright shocking in the tactics that were used:

[A]s many as 300 federal agents conducted an overnight raid on an apartment building on Chicago's South Side, some rappelling from a Black Hawk helicopter as they detained residents and even children in a search for suspected gang members and undocumented immigrants.

Got that? Rappelling from a Black Hawk helicopter. To an apartment building. This used to be a country where we condemned such tactics in other countries run by strongmen, but this is Trump's America now.

If Trump truly does want to be in the running for next year's Nobel Peace Prize, the best way to do so would be to stop waging war here at home, just to state the obvious.





As Donald Trump makes moves to occupy Chicago with federal troops, the state's governor has not been shy about fighting back. Which is why Governor JB Pritzker is our Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week this week.

Here's just a sampling of what Pritzker has been saying this week about Donald Trump:

This is a man who's suffering from dementia. This is a man who has something stuck in his head. He can't get it out of his head. He doesn't read. He doesn't know anything that's up to date. It's just something in the recesses of his brain that is effectuating to have him call out these cities. And then, unfortunately, he has the power of the military, the power of the federal government to do his bidding, and that's what he's doing.

In a separate comment, Pritzker was asked why Trump was sending the National Guard into blue cities. He replied in a similar vein: "Aside from the fact that he's out of his mind and has dementia?" Pritzker also said of Trump this week: "This guy's unhinged, he's insecure. He's a wannabe dictator."

When Trump threatened that both Pritzker and the mayor of Chicago "should be in jail for failing to protect Ice Officers," Pritzker responded: "If you come for my people, you come through me. So come and get me."

Pritzker is pretty obviously considering a run for president in 2028, and from where we sit it seems like he's doing a good job so far. And he issued a call for other Democrats to join him in fighting back:

This is exactly the moment for people to stand up. And do I see enough people doing it? No, I don't. It shouldn't be that there are Democrats that are afraid, because you know what? We're the targets. We need to be strong, we need to fight back.

. . .

He wants us all in big cities to get used to the idea that it's OK to have military on the streets. You're going to see soldiers outside your polling place. That's going to intimidate a lot of people, and especially it's going to intimidate people who are not Republicans. We know what they're looking for is an excuse to say that there's fraud in the election in 2026. That is the real purpose.

That's a frightening thing to even contemplate, but Pritzker is right to raise such an alarm. With Trump pitting the military against blue cities, even to the point of using National Guard troops from red states to do so, it certainly isn't that farfetched to think this is all a prelude to seeing this sort of thing all over the place, roughly one year from now.

For sounding the alarm, for calling out Trump in language even he can understand, and for refusing to back down, JB Pritzker is the winner of this week's Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week award.

[Congratulate Illinois Governor JB Pritzker on his official contact page, to let him know you appreciate his efforts.]





Some media outlets tried to make a very big deal out of some video clips featuring Katie Porter this week, but both instances (getting testy with a reporter and getting testy with a staffer) seemed more molehill than mountain, at least to us. Porter has pulled out to an early lead in the governor's race in California, but seeing as how the election won't be for over a year, we seriously doubt anyone's going to have this at the top of their minds when voting.

In fact, this week the choice for Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week was pretty easy, sadly enough. The candidate running for attorney general of Virginia, Jay Jones, is the clear winner of the MDDOTW, for a series of texts he sent awhile ago to a Republican colleague. This included calling for the then-leader of the Virginia legislature's lower chamber to be shot in the head, with two bullets.

We wrote about this in detail yesterday, in an article where we called on Jones to withdraw from the race -- even though early voting has begun and it would likely mean the Republican candidate would win. But there are some things that just cannot be forgotten or forgiven, and this seems to be one of them. Not only did Jones state that he would "go to their funerals to piss on their graves" to "send them out awash in something" about his political opponents, he singled one out (Todd Gilbert) in absolutely unacceptable language, saying: "Three people, two bullets: Gilbert, hitler, and pol pot. Gilbert gets two bullets to the head. Spoiler: put Gilbert in the crew with the two worst people you know and he receives both bullets every time."

He also, for good measure, said he wished Gilbert's wife had to watch her own child die in her arms, in order to make Gilbert change his political views.

As we said, this is absolutely unacceptable for any politician, much less one running for the top law enforcement office in the state. Such language should be universally condemned, but a few Democrats are trying to ignore it and move on, since they really want Jones to win his election.

This is reprehensible. Jones should drop out of the race, period. For now, we are doing what we can to urge him to do so by handing him the Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week award.

[We do not, as a rule, link to candidates' websites, so you'll have to search for contact information for Jay Jones on your own, if you'd like to let him know what you think, sorry.]




Volume 816 (10/10/25)

We have a very mixed bag of talking points this week. As always, use responsibly!




Social Security disability payments to be cut?

This one flew under the radar this week, but it deserves to be talked about.

"Donald Trump apparently wants to cut Social Security funds for disabled Americans. Hundreds of thousands of disabled Americans would lose their access to benefits under this plan, which makes me wonder why nobody seems to be talking about it. People should be outraged that Trump is trying to save money by cutting funding to the most vulnerable people in the country! This is beyond heartless, it is just cruel. Democrats need to fight this move with everything they've got, and make sure people know what Trump is planning on doing. Most Americans would be outraged if they knew about this plan, and we will fight Trump to make sure elderly disabled people don't see their incomes drastically reduced."



Comedy special?

This needs a correction, obviously.

"Speaker Mike Johnson apparently wanted to try his hand at stand-up comedy this week, when he said during an interview: 'Let me look right into the camera and tell you clearly: Republicans are the ones concerned about healthcare. Republicans are the party working around the clock to fix healthcare.' This is pretty laughable, you've got to admit. Here, Mike, let me fix that for you: 'Republicans are the party working around the clock to make healthcare more expensive for all and much harder to obtain.' Because to suggest otherwise is nothing more than a bad joke."



Speaking of healthcare...

Questions should be asked.

"Remember when Republicans were in a tizzy over Joe Biden's medical problems? And how they declared that anyone in his administration who saw any signs of decline in Biden should have told the public about it? Well, I'd like to hear what those around Donald Trump have to say now about his mental and physical fitness, personally. Why is Trump going in for a second 'annual' checkup in one year's time? What's the problem? Of course, if Trump were suffering from dementia it'd be hard to tell the difference, since he has always had problems with the English language and completing a coherent thought, but if he's getting worse then the American people deserve to know about it."



Yeah, that'll solve the problem!

Fire them all! That's the ticket!

"America has a serious shortage of air traffic controllers, which stretches back decades. The people who do this critical work are understaffed and overworked already. During the government shutdown, many have been calling in sick. Already some air traffic control towers have had to shut down because there's no one to do the job. So the secretary of Transportation had a brilliant idea -- he's just going to fire all the 'problem children' (his words) because 'I can't have people not showing up to work.' Because that'll fix the staffing shortage problems! Sure! Just fire a bunch of them, and everything will be fine, as far as Sean Duffy is concerned. He seems blissfully unaware of the fact that doing so would make the problem a lot worse, not better."



Farm bailout delayed

This is becoming a bigger and bigger problem by the day, even if the media aren't covering it all that much.

"America's farmers are hurting because of Trump's trade war. With all the tariffs Trump has imposed, countries are no longer interested in buying what America's farmers grow. A massive wave of farm bankruptcies is just around the corner, in fact. So Trump is going to take taxpayer money and use it to bail the farmers out, to fix a problem that he created. He was all set to make a big announcement about it this week, but couldn't because the government is still shut down. Whenever it happens, though, please remember two things -- this wouldn't have been necessary if Trump hadn't started his trade war, and bailouts aren't going to be enough to save every farmer in the country. Some will have to sell their family farm, because Trump plays politics with their livelihoods."



Make Argentina great again!

This one grates, for soybean farmers.

"I'm sorry, but I seem to have missed Donald Trump running on the slogan 'Make Argentina great again!' -- does anyone else remember when he would yell this at his rallies? Well, whether he said it or not, that's what he is attempting to do, to the tune of $20 billion in American taxpayers' money. He's just forking out that enormous amount of cash to Argentina, even though their farmers are doing great because now China is buying all their soybeans from them, not America. So it's really a double-whammy for American farmers. Not only has their main customer disappeared, but Trump is helping Argentinian farmers sell their soybean crop to China. Which is why I must have missed it when Trump used 'Make Argentina great again' as a rallying cry."



Make China great again!

Don't recall this slogan being used, either.

"Everything Trump has done that makes America smaller and less respected on the world stage seems to wind up helping China. Trump wages war on solar panels and wind energy and electric cars, which cripples those industries here while China benefits by growing their world market share in these industries of the future. Trump's trade war with China means more and more countries want to trade with them -- tariff-free -- and increasingly see the United States as an unreliable partner. Crippling solar and wind is also driving up energy prices here, which helps China as they try to take the lead in the emerging technology of artificial intelligence. China leads the world in robotic tech, while Trump wages an ideological war on America's top universities and makes it harder and harder for foreign students to study here and then work for American companies. China is more than willing to take up this slack, too. While Trump is destroying American competitiveness, China just laughs and laughs. Because in the end, what Trump is doing is nothing short of making China great again."




Chris Weigant blogs at: ChrisWeigant.com
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