The NFL Is “Socialist” on Purpose, and It Exposes Republican Economic Stupidity

 

NFL Super Bowl game was great. The guys wearing blue beat the guys wearing red, and Bad Bunny and Lady Gaga made MAGA snowflakes cry.

But the NFL can also teach Americans a huge lesson about economics, “socialism,” and the differences between Republican “free market” nuts and FDR’s re-regulation of the American economy that created the largest middle class in history and the first in the world to include more than half of a nation’s citizens.

Most Americans would be highly offended, for example, if the NFL took big bucks from Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg or somebody like these monopolists to change the rules so whichever team gave the League the most money could have an extra three players on the field at all times. 

But that’s pretty much exactly what Reaganomics and deregulation have brought us in our marketplaces; it’s the staggering difficulty that every small business in America faces today in the form of massive corporations like Walmart, Facebook, X, Google, and Amazon.

For capitalism to work in a way that doesn’t produce oligarchs and monopolies, it must be regulated. Capitalism, after all, is just a game that people play using money and mutually agreed-upon rules. Just like football.

The NFL heavily regulates football in the United States, at least the football played by its teams. Those regulations include how many players are on the field at any time, exactly what constitutes a down or a touchdown, and rules about how players may physically contact each other, and under what circumstances.

The NFL’s super-socialist regulations also decide which team gets first pick of new players: they decided that the worst-performing teams should have first choice of newly available players, giving every team an opportunity to rise through the ranks in the following season.

It’s much like progressive income taxation and the estate tax, giving the little guy a chance while slightly restraining those already at the top. These regulations guarantee the safety and stability of the game itself, and guarantee that fans of football have a consistent experience, because everybody understands and follows the rules.

That’s not meritocracy; it’s planned redistribution of future resources to maintain league balance. If American public policy worked this way, the millionaire opinion bots at billionaire-owned Fox “News” would spontaneously combust.

The league also pools its television and licensing revenue and divides it equally among all teams: No owner gets richer just because they’re in a bigger market. In a pure “free market,” the Cowboys and Giants would drown everyone else in cash. The NFL says, “Nope, everybody eats.” That’s redistribution by design.

And they impose a hard salary cap so rich owners can’t simply buy championships, and they require owners to spend what is effectively a minimum wage on players rather than hoarding profits. Teams that overspend are punished: that’s collective control of capital to prevent oligarchy, the exact thing conservatives scream about.

NFL teams are also required to spend a minimum percentage of shared revenue on their players. Owners can’t just hoard money; they must reinvest in labor. That’s closer to social democracy than laissez-faire capitalism.

The NFL figured out something America forgot after Reagan: markets only work when rules prevent the powerful from rigging the game.

In other words, the NFL is a regulated market with enforced rules that prevent monopolies, protect labor, and preserve competition. And because of that, small-market teams can win, dynasties don’t last forever, and fans get a fair game. If the American economy were run more like the NFL, we’d have fewer oligarchs, more competition, and a much healthier middle class.

But imagine if Milton Friedman, Robert Bork, or the other idiots like them who first advised the Reagan administration and now have guided Republicans ever since were to have taken over the NFL.

The teams with the wealthiest owners would always get the best players and thus would win every game. They might even decide that the team that gave the NFL the most money could have an extra player or three on the field at various times.

They’d assure us that the teams that didn’t perform as well just have to “pull themselves up by their bootstraps.” Perhaps their problem is just that their players are “lazy,” these people would tell us, and the solution is to cut their salaries and reduce the amount of protective equipment they can wear so that they will have a “incentive” to play harder and increase their performance.

Then the richest teams would begin buying the poorer teams, until all the teams are owned by three or four billionaires. Sounds like every industry in today’s America. But conservatives would try to convince you it would create a football paradise, right?

Of course it wouldn’t be a paradise: Fans would stop watching, kids would stop dreaming of playing, and the game itself would collapse under the weight of rigging and unfairness. Not to mention that if the socialist NFL ever actually tried some crazy “free market” stupidity like that, Congress would be holding hearings within a week, and the public outrage would be deafening.

But when the same thing happens in our economy, we’re told by Republicans that it’s just “the free market.” We’re told that “monopolies are natural,” that “billionaires are geniuses,” and that working people who can’t get ahead in a rigged system somehow “deserve their fate.”

We’re told by these fools that any attempt to re-write the rules so the American economy is fair again and our middle class can recover from the massive $50+ trillion hit it’s taken from 45 years of Reaganomics is “socialism,” even though FDR’s system is exactly how every successful capitalist system in history has worked.

Franklin Roosevelt understood this. He knew markets don’t self-police any more than football does. Without referees, rules, and consequences, the biggest and most ruthless players take over, the game stops being a game, and democracy itself is put at risk. And when the morbidly rich write the rules, they inevitably only benefit themselves; everybody else gets screwed.

The NFL doesn’t regulate football because it hates competition: it regulates football and “redistributes” wealth and opportunity so competition can exist at all. America once did the same thing with capitalism, and the result was the greatest middle class the world had ever seen.

Two-thirds of us were in the middle class when Reagan came into office and could get there with a single paycheck thanks to FDR‘s and LBJ‘s “socialist” New Deal and Great Society policies. Today it’s only roughly 45% of us and requires two paychecks. All because of 45 years of Reaganomics.

The choice in front of us is simple. We can keep pretending that letting billionaires write the political and economic rules and own the media is “freedom,” or we can remember that a fair game is what freedom looks like. Because when the rules only work for the owners, the rest of us aren’t players anymore. We’re just there to watch, pay, and lose what little we have so the billionaires can buy another super-yacht.

-Thom Hartmann

"Let’s say it: Trump is a racist"

 

Why did it take Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) until Friday, after Trump had posted a video portraying former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama as apes, to acknowledge that Donald Trump is a hard-bitten racist? And why has legacy media for so long avoided calling Trump racist?

Perhaps if Scott, or any number of lawmakers, had spoken up as strongly when Trump questioned Obama’s birth certificate or rode down the golden escalator in 2015 and launched his campaign while calling Mexican immigrants drug dealers, criminals, and rapists, Trump would not have won the presidency the first time.

Perhaps if the legacy media had identified Trump as a shameless racist years ago, the political, media, and business elite might have found it harder to normalize him and his neo-Confederate MAGA cohort.

The evidence of Trump’s abject bigotry has been out in the open for decades, from his determination to assign the death penalty to the exonerated Central Park 5 to his nonstop racist commentary about immigrants. His attack on DEI is rooted in this same racism, although the legacy media and timid politicians dare not call it that for fear of being labeled “woke.”

Blaming the 2025 D.C. plane crash on DEI; taking down a tribute to Jackie Robinson; replacing MLK, Jr.’s birthday as a federal holiday with his own at our National Parks; trying to write slavery out of the Smithsonian; and arresting Black journalists…are plainly efforts to demean and erase African Americans from our history.

Even before Trump took office in 2025, the ACLU aptly described precisely what he was doing: This attack on DEI is part of a larger backlash against racial justice efforts ignited by the 2020 killings of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor, and the nationwide protests — unprecedented in size and diversity — that followed.

The ACLU explained that anti-DEI ideologues frame “their attacks as a strike against ‘identity politics’ and weaponizing the term ‘DEI’ to mean any ideas and policies they disagree with — especially those that address systemic racism and sexism.” This is nothing more than a tactic in “a larger effort by right-wing foundations, think tanks, and political operatives to dismantle civil rights gains made in recent decades.”

Trump has turned the top ranks of civilian and military personnel into a virtually all-white boys club. He has restored the names of Southern slaveholders to military bases; while refusing to appoint a single Black woman to the federal bench in his second term. He has repeatedly hired neo-Nazis and elevated White Nationalist sympathizers. He selected primarily Black and Muslim countries to enforce restrictions and provoke adverse treatment on visas.

Furthermore, his constant insults directed at women — evidenced by the E.J. Carroll sexual assault verdict, or his ongoing mistreatment of female reporters — leave no doubt about his misogynistic venom. His compulsive dehumanization of immigrants and resorting to enabling White supremacists have been at the heart of his presidency. It is hard to conjure what more proof of deep-seated racism and misogyny would be sufficient to persuade those who feign inability to know Trump’s real motives.

It should be noted that, on Friday, in a candid and refreshing move, the New York Times did report: “President Trump posted a blatantly racist video clip…then deleted it after an outcry, including from members of his own party.” The paper also acknowledged the endemic nature of Trump’s racism: 

“Mr. Trump has a history of making degrading remarks about people of color, women and immigrants…. Across Mr. Trump’s administration, racist images and slogans have become common on official sites.” 

However, the Times and other legacy media reporters do not persistently grill him on this topic. In failing to put serial examples of his racism in context, they allow Trump and MAGA politicians to skate along with formulaic denials.

Even now, the regime slides by without serious confrontation. The press should continue interrogating the White House press secretary as to why she originally stated that the Obama video clip elicited “fake outrage.” She needs to be pressed to identify the mystery aide who allegedly posted it erroneously (has that “aide” been fired?) This should be the focus when she returns to the briefing room.

Beyond this incident, corporate/legacy media could confront MAGA politicians, examine the racist views of Trump’s voters, or explain that his policies, however rationalized, are racist. The crusade to destroy the Voting Rights Act could be identified as part and parcel of Trump’s aim to return America to Jim Crow politics, and his plan to make the country whiter through mass deportation could be labeled as the full expression of White nationalism. They could reject his excuses (e.g., DEI is all about “merit”) and refuse to let Republicans scamper away or appear on TV without answering about the most recent racist comment.

Cowed for fear of being labeled as “woke,” elected leaders, sports champions, business leaders, and other prominent figures must stop ignoring the regime’s racist underpinnings, the MAGA party’s White nationalism, and the wholesale assault on pluralistic democracy — which the Supreme Court has aided and abetted (e.g., eviscerating the Voting Rights Act, ending affirmative action).

They should follow Judge Ana C. Reyes’ example: look to Trump’s own words to discern his motives. We need to stop pretending there are benign reasons for policies and personnel decisions that (wow!) just so happen to bolster white men at the expense of all those easily classified as “others.” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries had it right in demanding his enablers and sycophants aggressively denounce Trump.

Trump might be president, but the time for mincing words and normalizing his ethnic cleansing campaign (disguised as “immigration policy”) has long passed. All decent citizens should ostracize him when he prioritizes frivolous social functions at Mar-A-Lago rather than attending to the needs of the nation (see: snoozing through the Melania premiere while the country grappled with Alex Pretti’s devastating, baseless murder).

Let’s say it: Trump is a racist. The Republican Party tolerates — if it does not actively endorse — his racism. Those who normalize him enable racism. His agenda is grounded in racism.

-Jennifer Rubin, The Contrarian is community-supported. Get engaged and join the fight by becoming a free or paid subscriber.

 

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• Oleksandr Dovzhenko — a pioneering filmmaker, writer, and artist, widely considered one of the founders of poetic cinema. His films reshaped global cinema and brought Ukrainian culture, landscape, and spirit to international audiences. These individuals are just a few examples of how Ukraine’s intelligence, creativity, and determination continue to influence the world. At Ukrainian Apparel, we honor this legacy through designs inspired by resilience, pride, and heritage. Wear more than clothing. Wear legacy and support Ukraine. Slava Ukraini! 🇺🇦 With Love, -Ukrainian Apparel Team Ukrainian Clothing Online Shop | Ukrainian Apparel

Why we keep doing this work in Ukraine

Hello Dear Reader, This is Yana Zhuryk, membership growth manager, here at the Kyiv Independent. You haven’t heard from me yet — I usually stay behind the scenes — but you may have seen some of the work I’ve been a part of, like our anniversary campaign in November. Today, I’m writing this email from my dark apartment in Kyiv, curled up under a few blankets with my cat. I feel extremely lucky that she decided to cuddle — it doesn’t happen often, she has that kind of personality. Outside, it’s −15 degrees Celsius (5 degrees Fahrenheit). The electricity has been out for around five hours already. My laptop is running on a charging station, and the Wi-Fi is on a power bank. In Ukrainian, February is called лютий (lutyi) — literally “fierce” or “severe.” It’s hard to think of a better word for days like this. I recently had a conversation with my best friends about what keeps us in Ukraine. We’re women — so technically, we can leave (under martial law, men of conscription age are not allowed to leave). We can move abroad, start over somewhere quieter, more predictable. But all of us made a conscious choice to stay. Some because of partners or families. Some because of work. Some because it simply feels right to be here. I’m in that last category. Living in Ukraine during Russia’s full-scale invasion changed my sense of “normal,” especially this winter. I plan my days around the electricity supply schedule — when we even have a schedule. I keep power banks charged at all times. I’ve learned which cafés near my apartment have generators, which streets are too icy to walk on, how to get back online quickly when my Wi-Fi disappears mid-meeting, and where the closest shelters are, for when Russian drones or missiles head toward Kyiv. I started celebrating small things: a hot shower, a working elevator, a quiet night without an air attack. There’s a superstition in Ukraine that you should never throw away bread, no matter how stale it is. It’s rooted, in part, in the memory of the Holodomor, the deadly, man-made famine orchestrated by the Soviet authorities in the 1930s. I remember my great-grandmother, who lived through it, becoming genuinely upset when my mother tried to throw away leftover bread. I think my generation will similarly forever carry its own habits shaped by this time — always having a power bank nearby, thinking about alternative energy sources, and shelters when building homes. This is how Russia is changing our “normal.” And still — life goes on. What keeps me here isn’t heroic resilience. It’s the feeling of being exactly where I’m supposed to be; of doing work that matters, alongside people who care deeply about what they do; of knowing that the journalism we produce, and the community we build, make a real impact on people’s lives. Working at the Kyiv Independent doesn’t feel like “just a job.” It feels like a responsibility — and, in many ways, a privilege. But we wouldn’t be able to do this job alone. The reason we can keep reporting, planning, and thinking beyond the next day is because of the people who support us. Our members are the backbone of what we do. They give us something incredibly powerful: stability in an unstable world. If you’ve ever wondered whether your support makes a difference — it does. On days like this, especially. To everyone who already supports us — thank you, it truly means a lot. If you value our work or feel connected to what we do, or if you simply want to stand a little closer to the people behind the reporting, I invite you to join our community. Becoming a member isn’t just about exclusive content or discounts — it’s about choosing to be part of a community that cares and helps protect independent journalism. Membership Growth Manager Yana Zhuryk

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On Donald Trump's Corruption

“I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore!” That famous line was at the center of the classic 1970s film Network – but it is also an apt motto for how my democracy litigation colleagues, and I are responding to Donald Trump’s corruption in all its forms.  According to the New York Times, there are over 600 cases defending the guardrails of democracy against his assault. We have 252 cases and matters at Democracy Defenders Fund and Democracy Defenders Action alone, with hundreds more by other organizations. Building on those successes, the time has come to go on offense against corruption by Trump and his cronies. That’s why this week we at DDF, along with wonderful partners, filed a lawsuit challenging Trump’s so-called “Gold Card” visa program.  It is a blatantly illegal attempt to strip qualified immigrants of a path to citizenship while selling legal status to wealthy foreigners. Forget “give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.” Trump’s maxim is “give us your money, your oligarchs, your privileged few.” 1. The Epstein Files Cover-Up The signature corruption scandal of the Trump administration remains Trump’s association with one of the most notorious child sex traffickers in history – and his administration’s refusal to turn over all of the files about the case so we can be certain we have all Trump-Epstein documents. The administration admitted it’s refusing to disclose about 3 million files, despite a law requiring their disclosure. The Department of Justice wants us to trust that it has good reasons for all that, but the place is run by two of his former defense lawyers, the FBI is helmed by an even bigger Trump loyalist, and they have acted like it too often for us to give them any credence. This scandal is not going away. Current Status: Democracy Defenders Fund filed a complaint this week with the Office of the Inspector General about the missing documents, and we are litigating and investigating on multiple fronts. We will continue to pursue all legal avenues to ensure the complete release of all eligible files relating to the Epstein investigation, as required by the Epstein Files Transparency Act. 2. Selling American Residency to the Super-Rich In September, Trump debuted the so-called “Gold Card,” a program that lets wealthy foreigners effectively buy permanent U.S. residency for a $1 million payment to the federal government. That’s bad enough, but consider this: Rather than asking Congress to create a new visa category, Trump simply ordered federal agencies to treat these massive cash “gifts” to the Department of Commerce as proof of eligibility for elite EB-1 and EB-2 visas.  Those are categories Congress reserved for Nobel laureates, pioneering scientists, and individuals whose work serves the national interest. But these employment-based visas are strictly capped – so every Gold Card handed to a millionaire donor necessarily displaces a qualified scientist, engineer, physician, or researcher already waiting in line. (It is worth noting that all available EB-1 visas were granted September 8, 2025, with the cap resetting every year on October 1.) That means that Trump has effectively transformed lawful permanent residency into a luxury commodity, letting oligarchs buy into our country like they buy Ferraris and Picassos. We’re not letting Trump auction off our immigration system without a fight. This week, we brought suit on behalf of a group of highly accomplished professionals – people who followed the rules, only to find themselves subject to being pushed aside by wealthy applicants who could jump the line with a seven-figure check. And remember: Congress — not the president — has the exclusive authority to set immigration eligibility and raise federal funds. The Gold Card program overrides Congress’s choices — both as to who qualifies for employment-based immigration and how and under what conditions agencies may collect revenue. Current Status: We will see Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in court (and in the Epstein files). 3. World Liberty Financial Trump’s crypto company, World Liberty Financial (WLFI), was near the top of our list when we debuted it in December – and things have only gotten worse. New reporting last week revealed that the “Spy Sheikh,” Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al Nahyan — the United Arab Emirates’ national security adviser and one of the most powerful men in the Gulf – had quietly amassed a secret stake in Trump’s crypto venture through a web of investment vehicles designed to obscure his involvement.  His hidden investment in Trump’s crypto business created an extraordinary conflict of interest: a foreign national security advisor with direct financial ties to the sitting U.S. president’s private enterprise. And it may already be paying off, as, months later, the UAE secured a deal for millions of the most advanced computer chips from American company NVidia, a “coup” for the tiny nation. The White House has denied any impropriety here. Current Status: WLFI is flush with Gulf cash – but these revelations may make Trump’s crypto conflicts so unpalatable that there are consequences. Perhaps even the crypto industry PAC’s $193 million midterms war chest won’t be enough to get uneasy Democrats to vote for legislation creating a market structure for cryptocurrency without any checks on Trump’s ability to influence the market to his benefit. 4. The Meme Coin Grift Trump’s meme coin represents perhaps his most brash self-enrichment scheme, one unlike anything we have ever seen from an American president. According to the website, the token is “intended to function as an expression of support for, and engagement with, the ideals and beliefs embodied by the symbol “$TRUMP“ — and not as an investment or security. But of course this slice of code was listed on various crypto exchanges and immediately surged in price.  Since its launch, the coin’s value closely followed Trump’s announcements, with wild fluctuations. The president even hosted an exclusive dinner for meme coin “investors” who spent tens of thousands to buy the digital token. This access auction was a scheme so brazen — even for Trump — that it left ethics experts like us stunned. The White House denies any conflicts of interest. Current Status: The Trump-dominated Securities and Exchange Commission has shown zero interest in examining Trump’s meme coin activities. This makes defeating the new crypto market bill even more important. We have been sounding the alarm, and our fight continues. 5. Tom Homan’s $50,000 With Trump’s Border Czar Tom Homan back in the news as he took center stage in Minnesota’s ICE invasion, Democracy Defenders Fund this week expanded our investigation of his conduct. We launched additional FOIA requests about his alleged acceptance of a $50,000 payment from undercover federal agents posing as business executives. Homan has denied wrongdoing. But if Trump is going to thrust him into the country’s civil rights flashpoint, then we have to have transparency.  A tape of the alleged payoff reportedly exists. Let’s see it. The secrecy surrounding these meetings raises the same fundamental question that follows so many Trump officials: Is government power being secretly shaped by those with money and access? The American people deserve to know what kind of person has taken control of immigration actions in Minnesota and whether he can be trusted to wield that power. Current Status: If we don’t promptly get the materials we are asking for, we are prepared to pursue all legal remedies. If Trump and Co. don’t believe us, they should take a look at our 252 cases and matters. 6. The USD1 Binance-UAE Deal Less than two months after Trump’s WLFI launched USD1, its stablecoin, a UAE state-backed investment firm announced that it would use USD1 to finance a $2 billion investment in crypto exchange Binance, which was then under SEC investigation. In May, Binance decided to list USD1 – and, days after the announcement, Trump’s SEC dropped its securities case against the exchange. And then there’s Trump’s treatment of Binance’s head Changpeng “CZ” Zhao. He pleaded guilty to money laundering in 2023 and got a Trump pardon this past October. The White House defended Zhao, criticized his prosecution, and blamed the Biden administration for creating a “war on cryptocurrency.“ Current Status: With last week’s latest revelations of the UAE’s crypto influence campaign with the “Spy Sheikh’s” role in WLFI (#3 above), it’s worth keeping an eye on this while we wait for the next shoe to fall. 7. Trump’s Qatari Boeing In May, Qatar presented Trump and his administration with a $400 million Boeing 747, ostensibly to use as Air Force One — a present reportedly worth more than all foreign gifts bestowed on all former American presidents combined. As my colleagues and I noted in a legal complaint, the Trump administration is apparently illegally transferring nearly $1 billion from a nuclear weapons program at the Defense Department to retrofit the jet, a gross mismanagement of key federal funds. And it will barely have time in the air before Trump’s term ends and it gets “donated” to Trump’s presidential library for his continued use.  Meanwhile, after the transfer, Qatar got a guarantee that the United States will defend Qatar through “diplomatic, economic, and, if necessary, military” measures and a new “military facility” for Qatar’s Air Force at the Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho. Trump has defended the transfer of the plane as a legitimate “gift,” and the White House said that “any gift given by a foreign government is always accepted in full compliance with all applicable laws. President Trump’s administration is committed to full transparency.” Current Status: We’re waiting for the Government Accountability Office to act on our complaint — but it’s hard to imagine a clearer conflict of interest. 8. Melania’s Amazin’ Flop Amazon’s Melania film had its lavish Washington, D.C., premiere last week, and it went about as expected: a high-profile commercial event designed to elevate — and monetize — the Trump brand. Black carpets, media spectacle, and exclusive distribution through Amazon’s Prime Video platform were deployed to attempt to transform Melania Trump’s story into something in line with the $40 million Amazon paid for the rights.  That was about $26 million above the nearest bidder, which raises questions about what Amazon was really paying for here. Unfortunately for Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Melania Trump, and director Brett Ratner (who was already having a bad day after surfacing in the Epstein files), the movie scored a putrid 6% on Rotten Tomatoes, with reviewers describing it as, “primarily a film about a woman walking into and out of rooms,” and an “unbelievable abomination of filmmaking.” Current Status: Melania’s 6% rating leaves it in the rarified air of films like 1997’s Mortal Kombat Annihilation (4%), and 2010’s The Last Airbender (5%). 9. Trump’s Foreign Real Estate Boom Trump is set to more than triple his foreign properties during this term, as real estate developers are working on at least 23 Trump-branded projects. These projects are a global feeding frenzy for foreign governments looking to curry favor with the president. To take only a few examples, Trump is building a hotel, golf course, and residences in Oman on property owned by the government. A Saudi real estate firm (with close ties to the Saudi government) is the Trump Organization’s partner in various real estate deals, including a new Trump Hotel in Dubai and a residential tower in Jeddah.  In November, the Trump Organization announced a project in the Maldives with the same Saudi firm. The very next day, Trump met with Saudi Crown Prince and Jared Kushner buddy Mohammed bin Salman and announced an “Economic and Defense Partnership” with the kingdom. Hard to come up with better reasons why the Constitution prohibits the president from accepting foreign emoluments. When asked about possible conflicts of interest in the context of Trump’s then-upcoming trip to the Middle East, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed that it was “ridiculous that anyone in this room would even suggest that President Trump is doing anything for his own benefit.” Current Status: Each individual property may constitute an emoluments clause violation. We at Democracy Defenders Fund include leaders of the team that won multiple emoluments cases against Trump in his first term, and we ain’t playing. Watch this space! 10. Trump’s D.C. Renovation Racket In the middle of the longest government shutdown ever, as federal workers were going without pay and standing in bread lines, Trump ordered the destruction of the historic East Wing to build a massive, $300 million-plus ballroom. And that’s only one of his Washington, D.C., personal vanity projects, which also include renaming the Kennedy Center after himself.  When that caused artists and audiences to hemorrhage, Trump suddenly announced he planned to close the center for supposed renovations. We can’t help but wonder if it’s to avoid the additional embarrassment of no one showing up. Trump says he’s raised private money for both these renovations, but the ballroom donors include corporations that have received billions in federal contracts – and about a dozen facing federal enforcement actions. Current Status: We and partners are litigating the Kennedy Center renaming on behalf of Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH), with the government’s filing due on March 1. nd we are considering all legal steps to address the closing if it moves forward. Others are litigating the ballroom case, and initial signs point to a tough ruling for the White House. -Norman Eisen and Gabriel Lezra, The Contrarian

Guess who made that lawsuit possible? You did, Contrarians! All profits from your paid subscriptions go to help support that and our other 251 cases and matters–like our huge win at the Supreme Court this week defending California’s Prop. 50 and counteracting Trump’s attempt to steal congressional seats. If you’re not a paid subscriber, please consider becoming one and joining the fight. I cover the Gold Card case and nine other outrages in my updated top 10 list of Trump and his cronies’ worst corruption scandals – and of the pushback in the courts of law and of public opinion. There is nothing the American people hate more than corruption, and it has contributed to Trump’s historic unpopularity. Since we published our first list in December, new schemes have emerged, and old ones have metastasized or featured shocking additional revelations of abusing power for personal or financial gain, corrupting the rule of law, and more. What follows is an updated list, reflecting both brand-new scandals and new developments in cases we flagged before. After you give the list a look, please keep on reading for our usual roundup of all our great Contrarian coverage this week. Upgrade to paid

"Trump’s Racist Attack on the Obamas Shows the Moral Collapse of His Presidency. This wasn’t a joke or a mistake but a warning about how racism, silence, and abuse of power are eating away at democracy…"

Normally I wouldn’t post such a disgusting, racist image that originated on Elon’s social media sewer, but it’s important for the historical record for Americans to see what the President of the United States reposted last night on his own site — as your and my representative — for the entire world to see. (Screengrab / Truth Social, per Raw Story)

I’ve been talking into microphones since I did the morning news on WITL in Lansing Michigan in the late 1960s, and I’ve seen a lot of ugly moments in American politics. But every so often something happens that still takes your breath away, not because it’s surprising, but because it’s so painfully revealing.

This latest racist stunt by Donald Trump — reposting a meme on his Nazi-infested social media site in which the Obamas’ faces are superimposed onto the bodies of primates in the jungle set to the 1961 song “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” by The Tokens — is one of those moments.

That a popular pro-Trump account on X created this video and it has lived on that platform without consequence is disgusting in and of itself. But Trump — as our president, speaking in our voice — made it infinitely worse last night by promoting it to millions around the world.

Promoting a video that depicts Barack and Michelle Obama as non-human primates isn’t a joke. It isn’t satire or an accident. It’s the oldest racist smear in the book, dressed up in a cheap meme and now blasted out by a man who once swore an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

When the president of the United States does something like this, it doesn’t just insult two people. It tells a story about who, according to the most powerful man in the world, belongs in America and who doesn’t.

For centuries, racism in this country has relied on the lie that some people are less than human. That lie has been used to justify slavery, Jim Crow, lynchings, and mass incarceration.

It’s the lie that made it easier for people to look away while their neighbors were brutalized. It’s the lie that justifies ICE’s brutal, racist behavior. When Trump shares imagery that taps directly into that history, he’s not being edgy: he’s reopening wounds that never fully healed.

When the President of the United States signals that this kind of racism is acceptable, it gives permission to others. It tells the kid being harassed at school, the family being targeted by a hate group, and the voter being pushed out of the polling line that the cruelty they’re experiencing is justified. That it’s their own fault.

It tells the bullies and thugs of ICE as they do their “Kavanaugh Stops” — targeting people based on their race — that they’re on the right side of power. This isn’t just about harm to minorities, although that harm is real and immediate.

It’s about what happens to democracy itself when the presidency becomes a megaphone for dehumanization. Democracy depends on the idea that we’re all political equals. Once you start suggesting that some Americans are animals, that idea collapses. It becomes easier to justify taking away voting rights, ignore court rulings, or shrug when violence follows hateful rhetoric.

I remember a time, during the era of Eisenhower and Kennedy, when the presidency stood as a kind of moral North Star. Even when presidents like Nixon and Clinton failed to live up to it, there was at least a shared understanding that the office itself mattered. That it should pull us together, not rip us apart.

Trump has spent years doing the opposite, from the 1970s when he was busted along with his father for refusing to rent to Black people to his recent use of words like “vermin” and “shitholes” to describe Hispanic and Black people and majority-Black countries. Last night’s post is another brutally clear example of Trump’s deep, lifelong racism.

What’s even more chilling is the silence from Republican leaders and elected officials. If you can’t bring yourself to condemn something this overtly racist, where exactly is your line? Silence in moments like this isn’t neutrality: it’s complicity. It tells people of color in America, already dealing with the burden of centuries of institutional racism, that their pain is irrelevant and their dignity a plaything in the hands of white people.

I know some people will say we should ignore it, that reacting “just feeds the outrage machine.” Trump’s propaganda princess, Karoline Leavitt, tried to downplay it by telling reporters this morning: “This is from an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle and Democrats as characters from the Lion King. Please stop the fake outrage and report on something today that actually matters to the American public.”

But pretending this doesn’t matter is how we normalize it and weaken our shared sense of humanity. And the end point of that is always disaster.

As California Governor Gavin Newsome just posted: “Disgusting behavior by the President. Every single Republican must denounce this. Now.” “Denounce” is a bare minimum. This country can do better. We’ve done better before, often after terrible struggle and sacrifice.

But we won’t get there by minimizing moments like this or waving them off as “just another Trump post.” We get there by calling it what it is, by standing up for one another as equals in our humanity, and by insisting that the presidency must reflect our highest ideals, not our ugliest instincts.

If this doesn’t provoke the 13 white billionaires in Trump’s cabinet — who would all instantly fire anybody in any of their companies who posted such an image on their company’s servers — to start 25th Amendment proceedings or endorse impeachment, it’ll tell us everything about who they are, too. America is stronger when we recognize each other as fully human. The moment we let that slip; we all lose something precious.

-Thom Hartmann

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Dear Trump Administration Official

I’m writing to you not as a political opponent, but as a historian who’s spent a lifetime studying what happens when democracies flirt with strongmen and otherwise decent people convince themselves that loyalty to Dear Leader today will be rewarded by safety and protection tomorrow. It almost never is.

You’re out there defending Donald Trump’s lawbreaking, cheering his attacks on judges, prosecutors, immigrants, journalists, and even the Constitution itself. You defend his bribe-taking, the jet from Qatar, the violence of ICE, and his hotel and crypto grifts. You say it’s necessary for him to abuse power to “get things done,” that the other side is worse, that he’s strong and that’s what the American people need.

History is littered with people who believed the same things. Let’s start close to home. Richard Nixon didn’t go to prison: his loyalists did. His attorney general John Mitchell did hard time in a federal prison. His chief of staff H.R. Haldeman did hard time, as did John Ehrlichman, Charles Colson, and his White House attorney John Dean. The burglars did time, as did the fixers. The forty Nixon officials who went to prison even included two members of Nixon’s cabinet: AG Mitchell and Commerce Secretary Maurice Stans.

The people who “just followed orders” or egged Nixon on — like you’re doing now with Trump — were the ones who went to jail, while Nixon walked away to a quiet retirement. That’s the pattern history shows us over and over, all the way back to the Roman Republic: the boss either dies or escapes while his helpers become the long-term fall guys.

Every authoritarian system runs on the same fuel you’re today giving Trump: people who believe that by protecting the leader they’re protecting themselves and their families. Tragically, at least for them, it never works out that way.

When Hitler’s regime collapsed, he was dead, but his inner circle faced tribunals, prison cells, and even the gallows. The men who signed orders, ran ministries, moved trains, seized property, and “made it all legal” discovered that when corrupt administrations fall, their paperwork trail lasts longer than their leader’s loyalty. Their defense of “I was serving my country” or “just taking orders” didn’t save them: it convicted them.

Mussolini’s story is even darker. As his own crimes caught up with him, his own allies turned and ran. He was executed by people horrified by his excesses. His son-in-law, once his foreign minister and a loyal insider, was put up against a wall and shot after a show trial. Dictators never go down alone: they take their flunkies with them and it’s typically the flunkies who bear the harshest punishments.

Chile’s Pinochet managed to dodge some justice himself, but the men who ran his torture chambers and death squads didn’t. Years later they were dragged into court, convicted, and sent to prison. Time didn’t save them, and neither did politics or the loyalty they expected from the good general. And it won’t save you.

The same happened after Saddam Hussein fell; his henchmen were tried and executed or died in prison. In Romania, the Ceausescu were hunted down and shot but their senior officials faced courts, disgrace, and decades in prison. Across history, when the music stops, the people closest to the guy at the top inevitably find there aren’t enough chairs.

Here’s the uncomfortable (for you) truth: authoritarian leaders like Trump and Putin treat loyalty like a disposable resource. Just look at all the Republicans who served in Trump’s first term and he’s now trying to throw into prison. Loyalty, for narcissists and authoritarians like Trump, is always a one-way street.

So long as you’re useful, you’re protected, but the moment Dear Leader no longer commands power you’ll become a liability, an offering to be thrown out to appease the angry mob. And when the prosecutors come calling for you after Trump’s gone, they won’t start with your elegant speeches or proclamations that Renee Good and Alex Pretti were “domestic terrorists.” They start with your memos, phone calls, pressure campaigns, documents, and quiet threats; they’ll go after your “find the votes” activities, the cooked reports, the arrests without cause, the orders that violated others’ civil rights.

They’ll start, in other words, with the people who made Trump’s crimes happen to people like you. That’s how conspiracies are proven in a court of law: not by vibes, but by nailing the insiders.

Right now, you may feel powerful. You’re on TV, retweeted, and praised by Trump. The base cheers, the fundraising money pours in, the billionaires are chummy, and it feels like history is being written by your side. But history has a funny way of circling back:

— Nixon’s aides told themselves they were protecting the presidency, but they destroyed their own lives instead.

— The seniormost Nazis told themselves they were saving Germany, but they were prosecuted as war criminals.

— Mussolini’s ministers told themselves they were stabilizing Italy, but they ended up dead or disgraced.

— Pinochet’s enforcers told themselves they were fighting communism, but they ended up in prison.

There’s a simple and perennial reason why prosecutors always say, “Follow the money” and “follow the paper trail”: abusive power always leaves fingerprints. And there’s no statute of limitations on some of the crimes you’re now waving away.

Obstruction of justice. Conspiracy. Civil rights violations. Election interference. Murder under color of authority. Bribery. Abuse of power. False statements. Unlawful detention. Retaliation against whistleblowers. Collusion with foreign enemies. These aren’t political talking points that I’m trying to wave around to score with public opinion or scare you, they’re criminal statutes.

You may tell yourself — like all those people before you told themselves — that Trump will protect you. But Nixon didn’t protect his people; he left the White House and never looked back to watch his underlings fall. History’s strongmen never look back. When the heat gets intense enough, they point at others, not themselves.

Already we’re seeing this pattern with dozens of people who’ve left Trump’s first term employ, from his Attorney General, CIA director, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Defense Secretary, and FBI Director all the way down to functionaries in the Oval Office: “I didn’t know he was that crazy.” “They acted on their own.” “I was advised incorrectly.” “They went too far.”

Every authoritarian uses the same script, and Trump has already proven that he’s no different. Do you think he’s suddenly going to decide to protect you rather than run off with the goodies? If so, I have a bridge to sell you.

Seriously, here’s the part nobody in the cheering crowd has bothered to tell you: when regimes fall — or even just lose power, like Nixon did — the leader’s efforts become solely about his own personal survival. Your life, as a disposable underling, becomes a tool he can use to redirect blame and avoid accountability.

The courts won’t ask whether you believed in the cause: they’ll ask what you did. Did you pressure an official? Did you sign that order? Did you participate in killing those fishermen with a missile? Did you move the funds? Did you authorize those deportations to foreign torture centers? Did you look the other way? Did you help cover up the child rapes? That’s when you’ll discover the very real difference between a political appointee and the defendant you’ll become.

I’m not asking you to become a Democrat, to abandon your “conservative” principles, or even to leave your party. Instead, I want you to realize that the Constitution is older than Donald Trump and far more durable than any cult of personality.

There’s a reason the Founders feared concentrated power and split it among three branches of government: like their advisor Montesquieu, they’d also studied history. Strongmen always promise protection to the people they con into doing their dirty work. What they deliver to those folks, though, is always collateral damage.

Right now, you’re standing close to a light that feels bright and powerful. History suggests, however, that it’ll end by burning the people nearest to it. Including you. Presidents can walk away, but staffers, lawyers, deputies, agency heads, cabinet officials, and enablers can’t.

You still have time to choose which side of history you’re on, and which side of a courtroom you never want to sit in. Because the lesson of every fallen strongman is the same: abusive power-by-association today becomes criminal liability tomorrow.

 -Thom Hartmann