Wednesday, April 16, 2025. Annette’s Roundup for Democracy.
In case you know anyone who wants to know why schools with large endowments deserve federal money.
An endowment is how the school makes sure it will exist in perpetuity, while supporting its students, faculty, staff, and administration, and maintaining its physical plant, etc.
The endowment also allows schools to offer needs based tuition. In Harvard’s case, it gives free tuition to all students whose families make less than $200,000.
Schools with large endowments are able to attract top talent by providing not just larger salaries but intellectual and other community - communities of people, and more comfortable and usable physical plants. The endowment makes that happen.
The endowment also allows the school to supply the funds to match government grants that enable the school’s talent - top scientists and thinkers - to make the important and innovative breakthroughs that make us all healthier and wiser.
The school also uses its own funds to partner with the government or private companies to do the kind of good work noted in the post below.
Helping the U.S. fight addiction, cancer, other afflictions.
Helping the U.S. fight addiction, cancer, other afflictions.
A snapshot of research backed by partnership between government agencies and higher ed
Examples of how Harvard scholars are tackling real-world problems — through critical research supported by federal funding — appear daily in the Gazette.
The following is a snapshot of recent coverage.
Preventing opioid deaths
The fentanyl crisis hits close to home for Harvard-trained researcher Travis Donahoe, whose research probes the forces driving opioid deaths and the best ways to intervene. “Ending this epidemic is one of the most important changes we can make to improve the health — and dignity — of all Americans.”
Repairing eye damage once thought untreatable
A stem cell therapy developed at Mass Eye and Ear safely restored the cornea’s surface for 14 patients in a clinical trial. When a person suffers a cornea injury, it can deplete the limbal epithelial cells, which can never regenerate. People with these injuries often experience persistent pain and visual difficulties.
Creating at-home test to catch Alzheimer’s early
Researchers from Harvard-affiliated Mass General Brigham developed olfactory tests — in which participants sniff odor labels that have been placed on a card — to assess people’s ability to discriminate, identify, and remember odors.
Identifying 296 genetic disorders that can be treated before birth
“We saw a critical gap in prenatal care and an opportunity to define the genetic disorders that are treatable during this time,” said the study’s senior author. “These conditions are actionable — meaning that, empowered with diagnostic information, we can intervene early and improve outcomes.”
Exploring a cheaper way to make RX drugs
Chemist and Ph.D. candidate Brandon Campbell sees in silver an opportunity to lower the cost of medicine in the U.S., where consumers pay nearly three times more than 33 other nations in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Anticipating surge in demand for AC
A Harvard startup has developed a “third way” of pulling moisture from the air that works like a coffee filter. It uses much less energy than traditional air conditioners and dehumidifiers and is more stable than desiccant systems.
Tracking dark energy, future of universe
The fate of the universe hinges on the balance between matter and dark energy, which is the force thought to be driving the universe’s accelerating expansion. New research suggesting that dark energy, widely thought to be a “cosmological constant,” might be weakening suggests the standard model of how the universe works may need an update.
Uncovering potential new therapies for autism, anxiety
New insights on how inflammation sparked by the body’s immune response alters mood and behavior could lead to alternatives to traditional psychiatric drugs that act directly on the brain. These treatments would work indirectly by altering immune chemicals outside the brain.
Examining links between diet and healthy aging
“Studies have previously investigated dietary patterns in the context of specific diseases or how long people live,” said one of the researchers. “Ours takes a multifaceted view, asking, how does diet impact people’s ability to live independently and enjoy a good quality of life as they age?”
Building a lens now found in millions of electronic devices
Over the course of his Harvard doctoral studies, Rob Devlin must have made 100 of a new kind of mini-lens, experimenting with materials and prototyping new designs to bend light like a traditional camera only using a series of tiny pillars on a millimeter-thin wafer.
Advancing progress toward treating rare, fatal condition.
“Milestone” in nine-year quest to find a treatment for prion disease is personal for patient-scientist and her husband.
Calculating longevity benefits of simple dietary swap
A study finds that replacing butter with plant-based oils cuts the risk of premature death by up to 17 percent.
Solving confounding medical mysteries
With key contributions from Harvard researchers, the Undiagnosed Diseases Network identifies the rarest of illnesses and discovers new ones.
Opening new fronts against A-fib
Researchers double the number of genetic factors associated with a condition that affects more than 5 million Americans.
Making leap in quantum computing
For the first time, scientists succeeded in trapping molecules to perform quantum operations. The technology promises speeds exponentially faster than classical computers, which could enable game-changing advances in fields including medicine, science, and finance.
Finding powerful tool for colon cancer survival
Patients who exercise regularly after treatment live longer, according to research from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute research.
Taking big step toward targeted molecular therapies for cancer
Researchers developed innovative approaches to understand, target, and disrupt uncontrollable growth of disease.
Discovering citrus might be a mood protector
A physician-researcher outlined gut-brain clues behind an “orange a day” depression finding.
Unlocking possible key to diseases linked to X chromosome
A Jell-O-like substance could be key to treating Fragile X and Rett syndromes, researchers found. (Harvard Gazette)
Courage is contagious.
Harvard is not only fighting back. It is inspiring others.
On Monday, Trump removed more than $2 billion of Harvard’s federal funding.
Yesterday, Trump again escalated his fight with Harvard, threatening to remove the university’s nonprofit tax status.
Federal law prohibits the president from “directly or indirectly” telling the I.R.S. to conduct specific tax investigations, and it is unclear whether the agency would actually move forward with an investigation. (Source. New York Times)
But this happened too.👇
Columbia Vows to Reject Any Trump Deal That Erodes Its Independence.
Claire Shipman, Columbia’s acting president, issued a statement late Monday, hours after the president of Harvard offered a defiant response to demands from the Trump administration.
A message from the university’s acting president said that talks with the Trump administration were continuing as the White House is seeking to place the school under judicial oversight.
Columbia University, which has faced criticism for not striking a more defiant stand against efforts by the Trump administration to set its agenda, showed signs late Monday of adopting a tougher tone. In a note sent to the campus, the acting president pledged that the school would not allow the federal government to “require us to relinquish our independence and autonomy.”
The message came less than 12 hours after Harvard became the first university to refuse to comply with the administration’s demands, prompting federal officials to freeze $2.2 billion in multiyear grants to the school. The letter was sent to students and faculty members as Columbia has endured intense fire for what critics regard as White House appeasement.
Until now, Columbia had largely avoided public criticism of the administration and its campaign against universities. In her first public statement, in March, Claire Shipman, Columbia’s new acting president, acknowledged that the university faced “a precarious moment,” but she did not directly mention federal officials or their cancellation of about $400 million in grants and contracts to the school.
And when Ms. Shipman’s predecessor, Katrina Armstrong, revealed an agreement regarding major demands from the government — including placing the university’s Middle Eastern studies department under new oversight and creating a security force empowered to make arrests — she did not critique the administration’s interference in higher education.
But on Monday, Ms. Shipman — who said that she had read a strongly worded note from Harvard president’s “with great interest” — appeared to adopt a new tone, the most robust sign of potential pushback from Columbia’s leadership since the government’s cancellation of federal funding to the university.
Ms. Shipman wrote that Columbia would “reject heavy-handed orchestration from the government that could potentially damage our institution and undermine useful reforms.” She said that any agreement in which federal officials dictated “what we teach, research, or who we hire” would be unacceptable.
Still, Ms. Shipman did not go as far as Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, who categorically refused to stand down, writing on Monday that the federal government had sought to “invade university freedoms long recognized by the Supreme Court” and that the institution would not concede to “demands that go beyond the lawful authority of this or any administration.”
“Neither Harvard nor any other private university can allow itself to be taken over by the federal government,” Mr. Garber wrote.
A few hours later, Ms. Shipman’s 763-word statement hailed what she characterized as “good faith discussions” with a federal antisemitism task force that has been behind much of the effort against universities.
Addressing the prevalent anxiety among international students — hundreds of whom across the United States have been abruptly stripped of their ability to stay in the country — Ms. Shipman wrote that she was following the government’s actions “with great concern” and directed foreign students to a new need-based hardship fund.
Columbia’s response came as the Trump administration has discussed seeking a consent decree in which a federal judge would enforce any deal reached with the university. Ms. Shipman did not explicitly address the possibility of such a measure but said that no agreement had been reached with the federal government and that discussions were ongoing, including over how to address concerns about discrimination and harassment on campus and how to restore a federal partnership that “supports our vital research mission.”
“Some of the government’s requests have aligned with policies and practices that we believe are important to advancing our mission,” said Ms. Shipman, who was a co-chair of the university’s board of trustees before being appointed acting president last month.
Still, she added: “Other ideas, including overly prescriptive requests about our governance, how we conduct our presidential search process and how specifically to address viewpoint diversity issues are not subject to negotiation.”
A spokeswoman for the federal Education Department, whose officials have been involved in negotiations with Columbia, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In the last three months, the Trump administration has taken aim at some of the nation’s most prominent schools as it moves to eradicate what it says is rampant antisemitism on campuses, including Columbia’s, along with what it calls unfair diversity, equity and inclusion efforts across higher education.
Federal agencies have suspended hundreds of millions of dollars in funds for research at several universities, including Columbia, Brown, Cornell and Northwestern. Some Columbia faculty members have argued that the school’s response to the government’s demands has undermined its central principles and academic freedom.
The federal government demanded an extraordinary set of changes at Harvard in a letter last week, including that the university share all its hiring data with the Trump administration, place certain departments under an external audit and immediately shut down any programming related to D.E.I.
As Harvard’s president rejected the administration’s ultimatum, Ms. Shipman told her campus that “our institution may decide at any point, on its own, to make difficult decisions that are in Columbia’s best interests.”
Joseph Howley, a classics professor at Columbia, said that he appreciated that Ms. Shipman’s letter seemed to include a “commitment to some principles that I think we are all glad to hear are in fact principles.”
But to him, “the main thing that stood out” was that school leaders were “clearly affirming how much time they’re talking to Donald Trump’s federal government when they don’t seem to be spending very much time talking to their own faculty.”
“That was a problem all of last year,” he said. “And it doesn’t get us anywhere good.”
Christopher L. Eisgruber, the president of Princeton University, where at least $210 million in federal grants and contracts are at risk, acknowledged in a recent interview with The New York Times that some universities might have to concede “in order to protect people.”
But he added that they also needed “to speak up under those circumstances,” even if to express regret over a compromise.
“I do wish I had heard that from Columbia,” Mr. Eisgruber said. “You may say, ‘Look, I wish I could take a stand on principle, but given what’s at stake, I can’t.’ But then you need to say that. You need to admit and you need to say to your community and to Americans, ‘Hey, there’s something really fundamental that has been lost here.’” (New York Times)
One more thing.
Cuts to Cornell and Northwestern: The Trump administration froze more than $1 billion for Cornell and $790 million for Northwestern amid investigations into accusations of discrimination stemming from efforts to promote diversity.
Then this.👇
Cornell further details federal stop-work orders on defense, cancer research
ITHACA, N.Y. — As a result of 80-plus stop-work orders federal officials sent to Cornell University April 8, a wide range of research efforts centered on cancer detection and treatment and military technology have ceased, according to a university spokesperson.
Over the weekend, Cornell released further details regarding the flood of stop-work orders the federal government sent the Ivy League institution last week. As of April 11, university officials said they had received “stop-work orders on more than 80 research grants from the Departments of Defense and Agriculture.”
Cornell’s initial statement said other cuts could be made to grants through the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Education. A stop-work order is issued to contractors requiring them to “stop all, or any part, of the work called for” in the contract agreed to by both parties — in this instance, Cornell and the federal government. Typically, stop-work orders are set to last for 90 days, though they can be shorter.
It is unclear how many workers have been impacted by the stop-work orders, or if the orders are only in effect for a certain amount of time. When asked for further details, a Cornell spokesperson referred to the university’s April 8 statement.
Despite reports last week that the federal government would freeze more than $1 billion in federal grants and contracts to Cornell, university officials said they have not received a formal letter from the Trump administration informing them of a full list of cuts. To this point, the only communication with the federal government the university has confirmed is the series of stop-work orders on a growing list of individual grants.
The bulk of the interrupted research deals with national defense and cancer research, though the school only released details about a quarter of the stop-work orders that Cornell has received from the federal government.
The research funded by these competitively granted awards fall into three general categories: research designed to strengthen our military, improve the treatment of cancer, and detect and prevent the spread of avian influenza and other infectious diseases,” according to a university spokesperson.
Cornell officials have declined repeated requests to review any of the stop-work orders sent by the federal government to the school, redacted or otherwise. The information below, a snapshot of some of the programs that have been paused, was provided by the university’s media relations department.
In the defense realm, the government sent orders to stop work on the following federally funded research initiatives:
Real-time sensor data to prevent mid-air collisions of airplanes and spacecraft
Robot actuators that can enable rapid, reliable airway management for combat soldiers or disaster victims
Jet engine and airplane materials
Synchrotron work involving military vehicle safety and performance
Vulnerabilities in America’s semiconductor supply chain
Novel propellants for the U.S. Air Force in areas vital to space exploration and national security
Automation of tedious and error-prone parts of U.S. military decision-making
The operation of the nation’s only high-intensity X-ray housed at a research university, used in imaging for physics, chemistry, biology and environmental and materials sciences research
The orders have also stopped work on the following cancer research initiatives:
Dietary folate’s impact on genetic mutations that can lead to lung cancer
A combined approach of radiation and immunotherapy that could help the body’s immune system detect and eliminate cancerous prostate tumors, as well as development of a tumor-targeting radiotherapy for prostate cancer patients
Investigating methods to address brain swelling and immunosuppression in patients whose cancer has metastasized to their brain
Genetic testing to determine why certain bladder cancer cells become resistant to chemotherapy
New approaches to detect breast cancer earlier through blood-based testing and fight specific forms of breast cancer through a combination of radiation, hormone therapy and immunotherapy
Research on heart-assist pumps for infants, toddlers and young adults with congenital and acquired heart disease has paused as well, including bulk milk testing for avian flu and farm surveillance to detect the virus.
The White House has not responded to a request from The Ithaca Voice for confirmation and further details about the federal cuts, though CNN reported that the White House has confirmed the cuts and that they are connected to the U.S. Department of Education’s ongoing Title VI investigation into the school.
As of Monday, the White House has not officially announced any of the cuts initially reported by the New York Times citing two unnamed Trump administration officials. Other organizations have confirmed the Times’ reporting, though there has been no formal announcement of the cuts.
Harvard University announced Monday that it would not comply with a list of requested changes to the school’s operations sent by the Trump administration, which included reducing student and faculty power in the university’s decision-making, reporting foreign students who violate Harvard’s code of conduct to federal authorities and hire an outside consultant to ensure the university’s curriculum is “viewpoint-diverse,” according to reporting by the New York Times.
Harvard’s decision could risk hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding. The administration has not responded to Harvard’s decision as of Monday afternoon. Columbia University capitulated after receiving a similar letter from the administration last month, accusing Columbia’s leadership of not addressing on-campus antisemitism in connection with protests last year over the war in Gaza.
Since reports first came out last week, officials at Cornell have maintained that the administration has not yet communicated a similar list of demands, though the school is included in a list of 60 universities being investigated by the U.S. Department of Education into their approaches to on-campus demonstrations last year.
Cornell also announced Monday that the university joined a lawsuit with eight other universities and the Association of American Universities, the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and the American Council on Education against the Department of Energy over “cuts to indirect costs for existing sponsored research grants.”
The lawsuit is similar to one Cornell joined earlier this year seeking to stop reductions to research reimbursements for grants through the National Institutes of Health.
“This is the second time this semester that Cornell has taken the unprecedented step of seeking emergency judicial intervention after a federal agency abruptly breached the negotiated rate for indirect costs,” according to a letter released Monday afternoon from Cornell president Michael Kotlikoff and provost Kavita Bala. (Ithaca Voice).
Two Dictators Walk Into a Bar...
On yesterday’s sickening Oval Office summit.
No time to give it its due, what with the constitutional crisis, but we can’t fully pass over Trump’s wild assertion yesterday that Ukraine started the war with Russia: “You don’t start a war against someone twenty times your size and then hope that people give you some missiles.”
Okay, now on to the worse stuff. Happy Tuesday.
Soul brothers Donald Trump and Nayib Bukele meet at the White House.
A Degrading Spectacle
by William Kristol
For some godforsaken reason, I made myself watch some clips yesterday of President Donald Trump and President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador (“the world’s coolest dictator,” as he calls himself) yukking it up in the Oval Office.
After all these years in and around politics, I’d like to think I have a pretty strong stomach, but yesterday was sickening. Trump and Bukele were having a great time. They were relishing the fact that innocent men had been snatched from their homes in the United States and sent by our government, lawlessly and with neither evidence nor due process, to an open-ended sentence in a ghastly prison in El Salvador. They were enjoying the prospect that even more people would be sent there, including some “homegrowns” who, Trump assured Bukele, will be the next to go.
This was not newsreel footage of two dictators meeting somewhere far away and long ago. This was yesterday. Here in Washington, D.C. In the Oval Office.
Almost a decade after Trump’s entry onto the political center stage, almost three months into his second term, the spectacle wasn’t surprising. Still, it was a new low.
And it reminded me of the young Abraham Lincoln’s 1838 address to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, where he spoke on “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions”:
At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.
I’d studied Lincoln’s speech a bit. But I must acknowledge that I didn’t really take this seriously as a concrete possibility. I was well aware that democracies can fail, and that others have. But I hadn’t really envisioned the prospect of the suicide of freemen here.
Now one has to.
How does that suicide happen? Trump would certainly be its primary author. But looking at the video from the Oval Office, one is reminded of how many enablers he has, starting with the senior officials sitting on the couch in the Oval Office and standing behind it. There are other associates who weren’t there, such as Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, who recently met with President Putin and said of the murderer and war criminal, “I don’t regard Putin as a bad guy.”
But of course there are also so many others working for Trump, arranging all the events and drafting all the documents, to say nothing of those who are in fact seizing innocent people and sending them into captivity.
There are many, many enablers.
And of course one should not neglect Trump’s supporters among the people. They too make all this possible.
I’d add that one of the things we tell ourselves to make ourselves feel better is that Trump’s supporters fall into only two camps: There are the Trumpist elites, dedicated authoritarians out for money and power. And there are ignorant followers, true believers, brainwashed by social media.
Both camps exist. But there is a third class that for some reason I couldn’t stop thinking about yesterday: His sophisticated apologists. Those who, we are told, really know better. Those who often express some qualms in private, but in public accelerate the degradation of American democracy.
These apologists presumably were among the college graduates who voted for Trump in 2024. Some Trump opponents like to tell themselves that Trump does better among the less educated. That’s true: 56 percent of non-college graduates voted for Trump. But 42 percent of college graduates did as well. And 42 percent isn’t that much smaller a figure than 56 percent.
And one should add that those tens of millions of educated Trump supporters are disproportionately important. Trump and Trumpism couldn’t be sustained by only authoritarian elites and brainwashed masses. Trumpism depends on these educated apologists.
And I will say that I have no confidence that these educated Trump enablers will break from Trump any more quickly than his less educated supporters. Indeed, these sophisticated rationalizers have spent a good deal of time rationalizing and are proud of their ability to rationalize. They could be harder to dislodge than some true believers who might simply lose their faith, or some low-information voters who may simply wake up to what’s happening around them.
Lincoln was familiar with this phenomenon too. As he said in his first debate with Stephen Douglas, there is “a class of men,” many of them of “vast influence,” who should be held particularly responsible for being willing to “blow out the moral lights around us” and “eradicate the love of liberty” in the broader political community.
The modern counterparts of these men have played their part in laying the groundwork for the degrading spectacle we saw yesterday in the Oval Office. But let’s not end on a hopeless note. Today is the 160th anniversary of Lincoln’s death. Perhaps the inspiration one can find in his example can outweigh the demoralization one feels from yesterday’s spectacle of Trump and his sidekick Bukele in the Oval Office. (Bill Kristol, The Bulwark).
Letter from an American, by Heather Cox Richardson
Today, U.S. president Donald J. Trump met in the Oval Office with the president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, along with a number of Cabinet members and White House staff, who answered questions for the press. The meeting appeared to be as staged as Trump’s February meeting with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky, designed to send a message. At the meeting, Trump and Bukele, who is clearly doing Trump’s bidding, announced they would not bring Kilmar Abrego Garcia home, defying the U.S. Supreme Court.
Bukele was livestreaming the event on his official X account and wearing a lapel microphone as he and Trump walked into the Oval Office, so Trump’s pre-meeting private comments were audible in the video Bukele posted. “We want to do homegrown criminals next…. The homegrowns.” Trump told Bukele. “You gotta build about five more places.” Bukele appeared to answer, “Yeah, we’ve got space.” “All right,” Trump replied.
Rather than being appalled, the people in the room—including Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Attorney General Pam Bondi—erupted in laughter.
At the meeting, it was clear that Trump’s team has cooked up a plan to leave Abrego Garcia without legal recourse to his freedom, a plan that looks much like Trump’s past abuses of the legal system. The White House says the U.S. has no jurisdiction over El Salvador, while Bukele says he has no authority to release a “terrorist” into the U.S. (Abrego Garcia maintains a full-time job, is married to a U.S. citizen, has three children, and has never been charged or convicted of anything.) No one can make Trump arrange for Abrego Garcia’s release, the administration says, because the Constitution gives the president control over foreign affairs.
Marcy Wheeler of Empty Wheel noted that “all the people who should be submitting sworn declarations before [U.S. District Court] Judge Paula Xinis made comments not burdened by oaths or the risk of contempt, rehearsed comments for the cameras.” They falsely claimed that a court had ruled Abrego Garcia was a terrorist, and insisted the whole case was about the president’s power to control foreign affairs.
As NPR’s Steven Inskeep put it: “If I understand this correctly, the US president has launched a trade war against the world, believes he can force the EU and China to meet his terms, is determined to annex Canada and Greenland, but is powerless before the sovereign might of El Salvador. Is that it?”
On April 6, Judge Xinis wrote that “there were no legal grounds whatsoever for [Abrego Garcia’s] arrest, detention, or removal.… Rather, his detention appears wholly lawless.” It is “a clear constitutional violation.” The Supreme Court agreed with Xinis that Abrego Garcia had been illegally removed from the U.S. and must be returned, but warned the judge to be careful of the president’s power over foreign affairs.
At the Oval Office meeting, when Trump asked what the Supreme Court ruled, deputy White House chief of staff Stephen Miller said it had ruled “9–0…in our favor,” claiming “the Supreme Court said that the district court order was unlawful and its main components were reversed 9–0 unanimously.” Legal analyst Chris Geidner of Law Dork called Miller’s statement “disgusting, lying propaganda.”
He also noted that when the administration filed its required declaration about Abrego Garcia’s case today, it included a link to the Oval Office meeting, thus submitting Miller’s lies about its decision directly to the Supreme Court. Geidner wished the administration's lawyers: “Good luck there…!”
Legal analyst Harry Litman of Talking Feds wrote: “What we all just witnessed had all the earmarks of a criminal conspiracy to deprive Abrego-Garcia of his constitutional rights, as well as an impeachable offense. The fraud scheme was a phony agreement engineered by the US to have Bukele say he lacks power to return Abrego Garcia and he won't do it.”
As Adam Serwer wrote today in The Atlantic, The “rhetorical game the administration is playing, where it pretends it lacks the power to ask for Abrego Garcia to be returned while Bukele pretends he doesn’t have the power to return him, is an expression of obvious contempt for the Supreme Court—and for the rule of law.”
Serwer notes that if the administration actually thought there was enough evidence to convict these men, it could have let the U.S. legal process play out. But Geidner of Law Dork noted that Trump’s declaration this morning that he wanted to deport “homegrown criminals” suggests that the plan all along has been to be able to get rid of U.S. citizens by creating a “Schroedinger’s box” where anyone can be sent but where once they are there the U.S. cannot get them back because they are “in the custody of a foreign sovereign.”
“If they can get Abrego Garcia out of the box,” Geidner writes, “the plan does not work.”
On August 12, 2024, in a discussion on billionaire Elon Musk’s X of what Trump insisted were caravans coming across the southern border of the U.S., Trump told Musk that other countries were doing something “brilliant” by sending streams of people out of their country. “You know the caravans are coming in and…who’s doing this are the heads of the countries. And you would be doing it and so would I, and everyone would say ‘oh what a terrible thing to say.’”
He continued: “The fact is, it’s brilliant for them because they're taking all of their bad people, really bad people and—I hate to say this—the reason the numbers are much bigger than you would think is they’re also taking their nonproductive people. Now these aren’t people that will kill you…but these are people that are nonproductive. They are just not productive, I mean, for whatever reason. They’re not workers or they don’t want to work, or whatever, and these countries are getting rid of nonproductive people in the caravans…and they’re also getting rid of their murderers and their drug dealers and the people that are really brutal people….”
Scholar of authoritarianism Timothy Snyder explained the larger picture: “On the White House’s theory, if they abduct you, get you on a helicopter, get to international waters, shoot you in the head, and drop your corpse into the ocean, that is legal, because it is the conduct of foreign affairs.” He compared it to the Nazis’ practice of pushing Jews into statelessness because “[i]t is easier to move people away from law than it is to move law away from people. Almost all of the killing took place in artificially created stateless zones.”
Yesterday, Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) requested a meeting with Bukele today “to discuss the illegal detention of my constituent, Kilmar Abrego Garcia.” He said that he would travel to El Salvador this week if Abrego Garcia “is not home by midweek.”
Judge Xinis has set the next hearing in Abrego Garcia’s case for …[Tuesday], April 15, at 4:00 p.m.
The courts fight back.
Judge Xinis’ Hearing yesterday.
Jennifer Vasquez Sura, the wife of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, before a hearing in Greenbelt, Md., on Tuesday.
Deportation hearing: A federal judge rebuked the Trump administration for doing “nothing” to arrange the return a Maryland man who was wrongly flown to a prison in El Salvador last month, and in a hearing on Tuesday set in motion a process to determine if the Trump administration officials had defied court orders requiring the government to bring the man, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, back to the United States. (New York)
One more thing.
Don’t count on Republicans to try to rein in Trump.
The shocking and disturbing posts below 👇 make clear how widespread support is in Republican ranks for Administration immorality.
In an interview on Fox News, Tom Homan, President Trump’s border czar, threatened to simply deport Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia a second time if he were ever returned to the United States, essentially boasting that the Trump administration would knowingly violate a court order preventing Abrego Garcia’s deportation.
“If somehow he comes back,” Homan said. “He will be detained and removed again.” (New York Times)
Senator Chuck Grassley, the Iowa Republican who chairs the Judiciary Committee, defended the Trump administration’s apparent inaction in the case of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, the wrongfully deported Salvadoran immigrant. Asked at a town hall if the United States should help facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return, Grassley said: “El Salvador is an independent country. The president of that country is not subject to the U.S. Supreme Court.” (New York Times)
Democrats hatch a plan.
Democrats’ plan of action: Democratic lawmakers say they are willing to go to El Salvador to seek Abrego Garcia’s release, a plan that has gained steam after the country's president said during a visit to the White House on Monday that he would not send the man back to the U.S., Megan Lebowitz and Frank Thorp V report.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., sent a letter Monday to El Salvador's ambassador in the U.S. requesting a meeting with the country's president, Nayib Bukele, who said in meeting with Trump later in the day that he "of course" would not send Abrego Garcia back to the U.S.
Van Hollen said if Abrego Garcia was not in the U.S. by "midweek," he would "travel to El Salvador this week to check on his condition and discuss his release."
The idea gained support from several Democratic lawmakers, including Reps. Maxwell Frost of Florida and Yassamin Ansari of Arizona, who said they would be willing to join Van Hollen on the trip.
Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, also sought to dial up the pressure on Republicans.
"Now is the time for my Republican colleagues to step up,” he said in a statement. “You can no longer stay silent in the face of a constitutional crisis. You must join Democrats in responding to this madness and demanding that Mr. Abrego Garcia is returned to the United States immediately." (NBC News)