curated news excerpts & citations
Borowitz: Envoy From Greenland Offers to Meet Stephen Miller
NUUK, GREENLAND (The Borowitz Report)—In a friendly gesture by Greenland, on Monday a special envoy from the territory offered to meet White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller.
“Our envoy has expressed a strong desire for face-time with Mr. Miller,” said Greenlandic government spokesman Hartvig Dorkelson. “He’d like to meet Mrs. Miller as well.”
The spokesman did not elaborate on logistics for the meeting, saying only that it would “most likely involve lunch.”
“If the meeting goes well, we hope it will whet our envoy’s appetite for other members of the Trump administration,” Dorkelson said. “We would enthusiastically welcome JD Vance.”
Hans Christensen: Russia’s War Now Lasted Longer Than WWII
Russia’s full scale war on Ukraine started with the attack on 24 February 2022 which is now 3 years, 10 months, 2 weeks and 4 days ago. It is now surpassing the duration of WWII as far as Russia is concerned; the USSR fought Germany for 3 years, 10 months and 3 weeks. Russia’s role is inverted, though, because Russia is the aggressor, not the defender this time.
(Hans Christensen more…)
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NY Times: U.S. Attacked Boat With Aircraft That Looked Like a Civilian Plane
The Pentagon used a secret aircraft painted to look like a civilian plane in its first attack on a boat that the Trump administration said was smuggling drugs, killing 11 people last September, according to officials briefed on the matter. The aircraft also carried its munitions inside the fuselage, rather than visibly under its wings, they said.
The nonmilitary appearance is significant, according to legal specialists, because the administration has argued its lethal boat attacks are lawful — not murders — because President Trump “determined” the United States is in an armed conflict with drug cartels.
(NY Times more…)But the laws of armed conflict prohibit combatants from feigning civilian status to fool adversaries into dropping their guard, then attacking and killing them. That is a war crime called “perfidy.”
LAWdork: Kelly sues Hegseth over censure for lawmakers’ video about troops’ duty to refuse illegal orders
The Arizona senator is seeking an order by Friday blocking the Defense Department’s efforts.
(LAWdork more…)Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – January 12, 2026
Today, Democratic senator Mark Kelly of Arizona sued Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, the Defense Department, Navy Secretary John Phelan, and the Navy Department for violating his First Amendment rights, the Speech and Debate Clause of the U.S. Constitution, the separation of powers, due process, the law that establishes ranks for retired commissioned officers (10 USC 1370), and the Administrative Procedure Act that establishes the ways in which agencies can make regulations.
While this sounds complicated, at its heart it’s about the attempt of the Donald J. Trump administration to trample Congress and create a military loyal to Trump alone.
…The warning Kelly and the other five Democratic lawmakers offered to military personnel that they must refuse illegal orders took on renewed meaning this evening. … The journalists report that disguising a military aircraft to look like a civilian plane is a war crime called “perfidy.”
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)Daily Beast: Trump, 79, Confuses His Truth Social Rant With the Law
President Donald Trump has suggested his late-night demands on social media are as good as law.
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Paul Krugman: The Ignominious Death of Drill, Baby, Drill
On Friday Donald Trump met with top energy executives to discuss his plans for Venezuela. According to Politico,
The White House at the last minute shifted the meeting from a closed-door session in the Cabinet Room to a live-televised spectacle in the East Room.
The idea, presumably, was to show a chorus of business leaders praising Trump and begging for a chance to participate in his excellent adventure. But that’s not what happened. In fact, the meeting was basically a debacle. None of the oil executives were willing to make specific commitments to invest in Venezuela, although some of them talked about possible increases in Venezuelan production. Trump spent a substantial part of the meeting talking about his ballroom project, standing at the window and staring at it. He continued to talk about his glorious ballroom even after returning to his seat.
That said, most of the executives were careful to sound positive. Who wants to incur Trump’s wrath? But Darren Woods, the CEO of ExxonMobil, blurted out the awkward truth — namely that Venezuela is “uninvestable” under current conditions.
On Sunday evening Trump responded by saying that he was “inclined” to block ExxonMobil from investing in Venezuela. “I didn’t like their response.” What’s next? Will the Justice Department find some excuse to open a criminal investigation into Wood, the way it has against Jerome Powell?
(Paul Krugman more…)Politico: ‘Freaked out’ about the bond market: White House reels from Powell probe
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NY Times: Trump Has Another Justification for the Shooting of Renee Good: Disrespect
John Pavlovitz: Actual Jesus Christians Should Be Leading the Opposition to ICE.
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ICE is the vile, violent, snarling embodiment of the very evil Jesus spent his life opposing, and Christians who have any interest in his mission should be forcefully turning it over like the sinful table that it is. Instead, too many of them are being rendered silent and invisible.This is not true of every church or every believer, of course. Thankfully, there are thousands of courageous faith communities doing beautifully subversive justice work beneath the radar of recognition; quietly caring for their neighbors, obstructing the aggressors, and being the places of refuge that buildings called sanctuaries are supposed to.
And there are also churches loudly leveraging their pulpits and platforms, speaking with unmistakable moral clarity, prioritizing preaching the Gospel over filling the pews, calling out the malevolence in their midst, and standing between the masked monsters and those they gleefully prey upon.
But it’s not nearly enough.
(John Pavlovitz more…)Raw Story: ‘Did you not just learn?’ ICE agents threaten MN churchgoer with Renee Good lesson
People’s World: Uprising against ICE raids grows across the country
Sarah Jones & Jason Easley: ICE Is Infringing On Your Rights
By going door to door, ICE has abandoned the pretense of immigration enforcement, and is now infringing on the rights of the American people.
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ReligiousLiberty.TV: Torah Scrolls Destroyed in Attack on Civil Rights Era Synagogue
A deliberate fire at Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson recalls 1967 KKK violence amid rising national antisemitic trends.
(ReligiousLiberty.TV more…)NY Times: Trump Says Civil Rights Led to White People Being ‘Very Badly Treated’
President Trump’s comments were a blunt distillation of his administration’s racial politics, which rest on the belief that white people have become the real victims of discrimination in America.
Margaret Chase Smith: Declaration of Conscience
NPR: January 6, 2021: A visual archive
Accountability Initiative ICE List
GriftMatrix
Trump Action Tracker
Timeline: Tracking the Trump Justice Department’s Anti-Voting Shift
Tracking the Lawsuits Against Trump’s Agenda
Trump Pardons Database
Project 2025 Tracker
DOGE Tracker
ProPublica: Elon Musk’s Demolition Crew
Wired: 6 Tools for Tracking the Trump Administration’s Attacks on Civil Liberties