Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[Fugus]

Only real hope I have at this point is that massive, world record shattering weather events happen and decimate huge swaths of the nation in the areas where the people voted for this.

As that is exactly what they knowingly voted for as this was spelled out in project 2025 because they think reporting and tracking them brings attention to climate change. Hopefully they get it.

Then after enough of them are out and the pushback is extreme, we can get people in who actually push to fix the stuff properly this time. Would be nice to have them push for proper healthcare, wages, worker protections, consumer protections, access to education and education standards and so on.

But not holding my breath on it. But if I were a religious man, which I’m not, all I can do is look up, tell the big man the next move is his, time to get to work and don’t fuck this time for a change. Too many innocent people suffered due to his pride and sloth already.

[gondrin]

So, explain to me this MAGA supporters. Garcia, which there is absolutely no proof of ever being in a gang, of ever committing a violent crime(or a crime in any sense of the term) is literal enemy number one for this administration but a person who has been charged with and found guilty of smuggling migrants, using a firearm while drunk on a Texas community and has been found guilty multiple times that led to felony charges is being released and now not being deported.

The government wants to deport someone that was working and wants to free and keep someone in the country that is a literal criminal.

Where is the outrage here?

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/st...3e37f964&ei=38

The Trump administration has agreed to release from prison a three-time felon who drunkenly fired shots in a Texas community and spare him from deportation in exchange for his cooperation in the federal prosecution of Kilmar Abrego García, according to a review of court records and official testimony.

Jose Ramon Hernandez Reyes, 38, has been convicted of smuggling migrants and illegally reentering the United States after having been deported. He also pleaded guilty to “deadly conduct” in the Texas incident, and is now the government’s star witness in its case against Abrego.

The government illegally deported Abrego to a notorious megaprison in El Salvador in March, and stonewalled for weeks after the Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return to the United States. Officials flew the Maryland resident back into the country this month, but only after a grand jury had indicted him on charges of migrant smuggling, in part because of Hernandez’s testimony.

In court, prosecutors have identified their main witness as the “first cooperator.” But a federal agent also testified this month that the main cooperator owned the vehicle that Abrego was allegedly using to smuggle migrants when the Tennessee Highway Patrol stopped him in 2022. The Department of Homeland Security has identified Hernandez as the registered owner of the SUV Abrego was driving in that incident. That traffic stop is the centerpiece of the criminal investigation.

Hernandez is among a handful of cooperating witnesses who could help the Trump administration achieve its goal of never letting Abrego walk free in the United States again. In exchange, he has already been released early from federal prison to a halfway house and has been given permission to stay in the U.S. for at least a year.

“Otherwise he would be deported,” Peter Joseph, a Homeland Security Investigations special agent, testified at Abrego’s criminal hearing June 13. The government is also likely to give him a work permit, the agent told the court.

Abrego’s mistaken deportation in March to El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center with more than 200 other deportees revealed the risks associated with the Trump administration’s efforts to quickly fulfill the president’s campaign promise to carry out mass deportations. But the Justice Department’s decision to spare Hernandez shows that officials are also willing to keep serious offenders in the United States to meet their particular goals. Abrego has no prior criminal arrests or convictions.

Hernandez was going to be deported a sixth time in the coming months. Then federal agents showed up a few weeks ago, asking about Abrego.

“It’s wild to me,” said Lisa Sherman Luna, executive director of the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition. “It’s just further evidence of how the government is using Kilmar’s case to further their propaganda and prove their political point.”

Hernandez’s criminal history and recent transfer to a halfway house in return for his testimony match the agent’s description of the main cooperating witness. The U.S. Department of Justice declined to comment about the agreement to release Hernandez or on his criminal record. Hernandez’s court-appointed lawyer, Javier Martinez, did not respond to requests for comment.

Hernandez testified during the grand jury proceedings that led to the recent indictment against Abrego, who has pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors allege that Abrego, 29, was a driver for a business that transported thousands of undocumented immigrants from Texas to states such as Maryland for money.

Joseph testified that Hernandez told investigators he met Abrego around 2016 when he was living in the D.C. suburbs of Maryland. He alleged that they’d both worked as drivers for undocumented immigrants. Federal records show that more than 60 percent of convicted smugglers are U.S. citizens with little to no criminal history, and drivers are often low-level operatives in need of quick cash.

After Hernandez moved to the Houston area, the two kept in touch. Both are from El Salvador. Hernandez is nearly a decade older than Abrego.

Abrego crossed the southern border illegally in 2011 as a teenager, court records show, after he said he’d received multiple death threats from a gang. Immigration officers detained him for several months in 2019 after a Maryland police detective alleged he was an MS-13 gang member. The detective, who made the claim after an encounter with Abrego at a Home Depot parking lot, was later fired and indicted over alleged misconduct in an unrelated case. Abrego’s lawyers have said he was never a member of any gang.

Abrego was released after an immigration judge ruled he should not be deported to El Salvador because his life could be threatened by the gangs that had sparked his decision to flee to the United States in the first place.

Hernandez’s criminal record dates at least to 2015, when police in Chesterfield County, Virginia, arrested him for public drunkenness and he paid a small fine. He has been arrested or in prison every year since, according to federal, state and county records reviewed by The Post.

Houston police arrested him in 2016 for alleged cocaine possession, but court records show prosecutors dismissed the case because of an issue with the search. Police in College Station, Texas, arrested him in 2017 for allegedly driving while intoxicated with a handgun in the car. He pleaded guilty to misdemeanor drunken driving and was punished with 60 days in jail and a $1,500 fine. He also forfeited the gun to the state.

An immigration judge in Texas ordered him deported in February 2018, and he was sent to El Salvador that month.

Two months later, U.S. Border Patrol agents arrested Hernandez after he waded across the Rio Grande into Texas. He pleaded guilty to entering the country illegally, a misdemeanor, and was sentenced to 30 days in prison. Federal court records show he was deported in May 2018.

But Hernandez repeatedly seemed to find a way to get back in. By December of the next year, he had surfaced again, this time, in Mississippi. An officer had pulled over the vehicle he was riding in, and suspected Hernandez was helping smuggle migrants.

The van held more passengers than seat belts, and a large piece of cardboard was blocking the back window. Seven passengers were undocumented immigrants from Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico and El Salvador, and some admitted they had paid hundreds of dollars for rides north.

Federal investigators said Hernandez admitted that he was in the United States illegally. He said he was running a business called “Transs Express” that offered rides from Texas to South Carolina, Virginia, Maryland and Atlanta for $350 per person. He said he had started out as a ride-app driver in Maryland but there was too much competition, so he moved to Texas and started his own company. Hernandez sat in the front passenger seat, while his partner’s unlicensed 18-year-old brother drove. The man told investigators Hernandez paid him $400 to help transport the migrants.

Hernandez later pleaded guilty to illegally transporting migrants and was sentenced to 18 months in federal prison in 2020. It is unclear what happened after Hernandez finished that sentence, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not immediately respond to questions about his immigration history.

On a December afternoon in 2022, Hernandez was “highly intoxicated” and had just argued with his wife, according to Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office records released in response to a public records request from The Post.

Hernandez was riding around a Texas community known as the Woodlands with a friend at the wheel of a pickup truck. The friend told authorities Hernandez pulled out a silver handgun and, from the passenger seat, began to shoot out the window. It was before 4 p.m. and with neighbors nearby.

Then, he fell asleep.

Sheriff’s deputies pulled over the truck. One deputy wrote that Hernandez was “too intoxicated to give his side of the story.” Authorities said they recovered 11 spent shells and several rounds of live ammunition.

“Jose kept on saying he did nothing wrong,” the report said.

Authorities charged him with deadly conduct with a firearm, a third-degree felony, in part because he was shooting in a residential neighborhood with a person only 50 feet away, and he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to two years in state prison.

After his sentence was up, federal prosecutors charged Hernandez with reentering the United States illegally after having been convicted of a serious crime. That crime carries a potential sentence of up to 20 years and hefty fines. Hernandez asked the federal judge for leniency, noting he had already been in state prison for two years.

“All I want is to go back to my country and to go back to my family,” Hernandez said.

U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen asked why Hernandez had been in state prison. His lawyer recounted the shooting but noted that nobody had been injured.

“Oh,” the judge said.

Hanen granted the prosecutor’s request that Hernandez serve 30 months in federal prison. He was nearing the end of that sentence, and facing imminent deportation, when ICE officers wrongly deported Abrego in March.

The Supreme Court in April ordered the administration to facilitate Abrego’s return to the United States, around the time that federal investigators heard about Hernandez and began interviewing him in prison. An indictment was filed under seal on May 21, and Abrego was brought back in early June.

Abrego’s defense lawyers have disparaged Hernandez as a “snitch” and a “two-time felon,” though records show he has been convicted of at least three felonies. Others caution that Hernandez may fear deportation to the same Salvadoran prison where Abrego ended up.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara D. Holmes ruled on June 22 that Abrego was eligible for release from criminal custody, saying the government had failed to prove that he posed a flight risk or a danger to the community. She wrote that she put “little weight” on the claims of Hernandez and other cooperators based on their records and interest in avoiding deportation.

But the government has given conflicting signals about what could happen to Abrego next.

Federal officials have said Abrego will not be freed pending trial, and that he would be transferred into immigration custody. A government lawyer told the federal judge in Maryland, who first ordered Abrego’s return, on Thursday that immigration authorities would initiate civil proceedings to remove him to a third country.

Top Justice Department and White House officials, meanwhile, have insisted there is no chance they would remove him from the country before his criminal trial.

Pointing out what they described as those “directly contradictory statements,” Abrego’s lawyers made an unusual request Friday: to keep him in criminal custody until July 16, when a judge has scheduled a hearing to more fully explore the issue. They noted that prosecutors and immigration officials had worked together to secure an indictment against Abrego.

The officials had also worked together to free Hernandez.

[Fugus]

And evidently the budget bill just got enough votes to proceed in the Senate. Wonder what was stripped out and what was reworded.

Also, won’t it have to go back to congress for another vote? The so called fiscal hawks might get mad but betting they will fall in line.

[gondrin]

And evidently the budget bill just got enough votes to proceed in the Senate. Wonder what was stripped out and what was reworded.

Also, won’t it have to go back to congress for another vote? The so called fiscal hawks might get mad but betting they will fall in line.

One of the biggest things that got stripped out was the sale of federal lands in the western US. Along with things like courts not being able to hold people in contempt without a security first and other nonsense that shouldn't have been in it.

And yes, it will still have to go back to the House seeing as things were changed. Both sides of Congress has to match up exactly in order to go to the President for him to sign or veto.

[Fugus]

One of the biggest things that got stripped out was the sale of federal lands in the western US. Along with things like courts not being able to hold people in contempt without a security first and other nonsense that shouldn't have been in it.

And yes, it will still have to go back to the House seeing as things were changed. Both sides of Congress has to match up exactly in order to go to the President for him to sign or veto.

Really have to wonder what they hope to do in the midterms and the next election to stop from getting demolished….

Will they run a fuck ton of people as Democrats to only turn after they won?

Will they try and deport several hundred thousand citizens claiming they are illegal and denying them access to the courts to prove otherwise?

Will they purge voter rolls of several hundred thousand within days of the elections?

Or are they expecting to lose massively and the courts just hold the lines for them till they can blame Democrats for the damage again?

[Edge-]

So, explain to me this MAGA supporters. Garcia, which there is absolutely no proof of ever being in a gang, of ever committing a violent crime(or a crime in any sense of the term) is literal enemy number one for this administration but a person who has been charged with and found guilty of smuggling migrants, using a firearm while drunk on a Texas community and has been found guilty multiple times that led to felony charges is being released and now not being deported.

The government wants to deport someone that was working and wants to free and keep someone in the country that is a literal criminal.

Where is the outrage here?

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/st...3e37f964&ei=38

holy shit they will fucking do anything to cover up the fact that they made big mistakes, won't they lmao

"hey, we found a hardened actual criminal to lie for us" is sure a thing

[Malkiah]

Really have to wonder what they hope to do in the midterms and the next election to stop from getting demolished….

my prediction is: nothing, because they don't have to.

i'm calling it now: 2026 mid terms will be small flip of either the house or senate but probably not both, and it will be a thin flip that basically just gives dems procedural control - basically a majority that's as narrow as the republican majority is now.
then we'll have two years of negotiating downwards where dems won't greenlight the most egregious shit, but will contort themselves into knots at every opportunity to procedurally approve most of the republican agenda.

then 2028 will most likely be an old ass boring as shit neoliberal dem who wins by like 20-40 EC points and a 5% popular vote lead on a platform of "getting back to normal" and is the staid dickwad that biden was supposed to be before he went off script and tried to actually do some shit in his term.

[Azadina]

Well, Trump is now demanding a "Thank You" from the Supreme Leader of Iran.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world...56035e77&ei=13

By Drumpfs logic, I SAVED HIS LIFE FROM UGLY DEATH! I've known plenty of times where he's been, and I've not let myself terminate his life! WHERE IS MY THANK YOU DON?

I think I also might have saved the life of every person I've ever met....by not killing them. That's a lot of lives saved. Fuck the MAGAts are stupid. So stupid it should be illegal.

[Fugus]

my prediction is: nothing, because they don't have to.

i'm calling it now: 2026 mid terms will be small flip of either the house or senate but probably not both, and it will be a thin flip that basically just gives dems procedural control - basically a majority that's as narrow as the republican majority is now.
then we'll have two years of negotiating downwards where dems won't greenlight the most egregious shit, but will contort themselves into knots at every opportunity to procedurally approve most of the republican agenda.

then 2028 will most likely be an old ass boring as shit neoliberal dem who wins by like 20-40 EC points and a 5% popular vote lead on a platform of "getting back to normal" and is the staid dickwad that biden was supposed to be before he went off script and tried to actually do some shit in his term.

If it really goes that route, we really are a failed experiment on our way out. Especially as a lot of the damage done is permanent or damn near so.

For it to legitimately go down that route, our fate is decided as a nation already and the majority of voters have decided they would rather watch the US die pretending they are right or just so they can make a little more cash now knowing they can flee the carcass later than actually watch it succeed proving them wrong or costing them a little more cash now even knowing the future payoff will be greater.

[Breccia]

Self-proclaimed best dealmaker gives up on deals.

The pause on Trump's sweeping global tariffs expires in about 10 days, with one deal and one temporary truce in hand, and the rest of the world in varying states of limbo.

"We made deals, but I'd rather just send them a letter, a very fair letter, saying 'congratulations, we're going to allow you to trade in the United States of America, you're going to pay a 25% tariff, or 20%, or 40 or 50%.' I would rather do that," Trump said on Fox News' "Sunday Morning Futures."

Asked about extending the pause, Trump said "I don't think I'll need to. I could, there's no big deal."

"What I wanted to do is, and what I will do just — sometime prior to the 9th — is we'll send a letter to all these countries," he added.

"I'm going to send letters. That's the end of the trade deal," Trump said, giving U.S. ally Japan as an example.

Yep. Low-energy Trump has given up on his biggest campaign promise. No deals, just him and him alone assigning a number.

I guess deals are bad now.

[gondrin]

Self-proclaimed best dealmaker gives up on deals.



Yep. Low-energy Trump has given up on his biggest campaign promise. No deals, just him and him alone assigning a number.

I guess deals are bad now.

So, what happened with the 90 deals in 90 days? All we have to show for it is 1 possible deal with the UK and a couple of non-deals with Canada and Mexico of stuff they were already going to do to begin with or were in the process of implementing.

Trump's Art of the Deal. Overpromise, under deliver, never actually commit to anything.

[Xath]

Really have to wonder what they hope to do in the midterms and the next election to stop from getting demolished….

Will they run a fuck ton of people as Democrats to only turn after they won?

Will they try and deport several hundred thousand citizens claiming they are illegal and denying them access to the courts to prove otherwise?

Will they purge voter rolls of several hundred thousand within days of the elections?

Or are they expecting to lose massively and the courts just hold the lines for them till they can blame Democrats for the damage again?

There was an early EO giving the executive basically control over election security it was stopped in the courts guess what is no longer stopped.

- - - Updated - - -

Self-proclaimed best dealmaker gives up on deals.



Yep. Low-energy Trump has given up on his biggest campaign promise. No deals, just him and him alone assigning a number.

I guess deals are bad now.

Welp down go the markets

[Bwgmon]

Welp down go the markets

Don't be so sure, we've seen that the stock market has mostly untethered itself from reality at this point.

[gondrin]

There was an early EO giving the executive basically control over election security it was stopped in the courts guess what is no longer stopped.

- - - Updated - - -



Welp down go the markets

As far as the election security thing goes, it still doesn't give the executive anything. It never actually gave the executive any control over any state level election security unless the state itself wants to allow the federal government access to it.

This is that EO:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/president...can-elections/

First off, if a state counts votes after election day, there is nothing the federal government can do to prevent it as there is no actual law stating they are required to count all votes received by election day. Just that the day of the election is set on a certain day and the electoral votes are cast and counted on a certain date. Trump's big complaint was the receiving and counting of votes after election day which, with the size of the country, is pretty much a required thing to do seeing as there are people who are abroad that are still allowed to vote like military members, citizens that work in embassies and the like.

Let me highlight one of the problems with the EO that shows this:

Federal law establishes a uniform Election Day across the Nation for Federal elections, 2 U.S.C. 7 and 3 U.S.C. 1. It is the policy of my Administration to enforce those statutes and require that votes be cast and received by the election date established in law. As the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit recently held in Republican National Committee v. Wetzel (2024), those statutes set “the day by which ballots must be both cast by voters and received by state officials.” Yet numerous States fail to comply with those laws by counting ballots received after Election Day. This is like allowing persons who arrive 3 days after Election Day, perhaps after a winner has been declared, to vote in person at a former voting precinct, which would be absurd.

Both of those statutes actually state nothing about states receiving and counting votes after election day. Just that the day the election is held is on a certain day. Also, it also states that the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in some which way, which now won't apply to anything outside of said district. Seeing as now nationwide injunctions are no longer valid.

And their argument within the EO that states are required to keep and maintain current voter rolls is correct. However, the States are the ones that are to do it, not the federal government seeing as the federal government doesn't actually hold elections. The only thing the EO does is direct DHS to provide states, upon request from the state itself, any voter registration the state requires. Not the other way around.

However, this part of the EO is laughable since Trump actively benefited from it:

Federal law, 52 U.S.C. 30121, prohibits foreign nationals from participating in Federal, State, or local elections by making any contributions or expenditures. But foreign nationals and non-governmental organizations have taken advantage of loopholes in the law’s interpretation, spending millions of dollars through conduit contributions and ballot-initiative-related expenditures. This type of foreign interference in our election process undermines the franchise and the right of American citizens to govern their Republic.

So no, the EO did nothing to give Trump any control over any election security seeing as election security is on the state level seeing as the States themselves are the ones that hold elections, not the federal government.

[Edge-]

Self-proclaimed best dealmaker gives up on deals.



Yep. Low-energy Trump has given up on his biggest campaign promise. No deals, just him and him alone assigning a number.

I guess deals are bad now.

apparently all this time the art of the deal was just not making deals

illuminating

[Bwgmon]

apparently all this time the art of the deal was just not making deals

illuminating

Nobody told him deals would be difficult!

[btlcryct]

The senator from Alaska was going to vote no because she was concerned about what the Medicaid and SNAP cuts do to her state. To get her to vote yes, Republicans made a deal Alaska would be exempt from the cuts, claiming they already have hardships living in Alaska, so she ended up voting yes. Nothing like screwing the other 49 states (though rumor is HI got the same deal) as long as you get yours. Well, the Senate ruleskeeper said that violates the Byrd rule.

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/0...arian-00431730

Guess maybe you shouldn't vote on a bill based on 'rules for thee, not for me.'

[Draco-Onis]

The senator from Alaska was going to vote no because she was concerned about what the Medicaid and SNAP cuts do to her state. To get her to vote yes, Republicans made a deal Alaska would be exempt from the cuts, claiming they already have hardships living in Alaska, so she ended up voting yes. Nothing like screwing the other 49 states (though rumor is HI got the same deal) as long as you get yours. Well, the Senate ruleskeeper said that violates the Byrd rule.

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/0...arian-00431730

Guess maybe you shouldn't vote on a bill based on 'rules for thee, not for me.'

My god we are doing this bullshit again, she says that they pinky swear to spare her state then she is "shocked" when Trump breaks his promise like he always does.

[btlcryct]

At this point, I'd welcome an asteroid or alien invasion or something to just reset it all. More and more Agent Smith's line in the first Matrix that humans are a virus is proving accurate.

[gondrin]

The senator from Alaska was going to vote no because she was concerned about what the Medicaid and SNAP cuts do to her state. To get her to vote yes, Republicans made a deal Alaska would be exempt from the cuts, claiming they already have hardships living in Alaska, so she ended up voting yes. Nothing like screwing the other 49 states (though rumor is HI got the same deal) as long as you get yours. Well, the Senate ruleskeeper said that violates the Byrd rule.

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/0...arian-00431730

Guess maybe you shouldn't vote on a bill based on 'rules for thee, not for me.'

Well, they actively haven't voted on the bill yet. All they did was vote to move forward with the debate portion of said bill. This means that now after debate, sometime Monday, they'll actively vote for said bill. Rand Paul and Tillis are definite hard "No" as they also voted to not move forward with the bill and, at least with Tillis, he is retiring. All it will take is 2 more "No" votes to tank it. Not saying it will be tanked, just that those are the amounts needed to tank it.

- - - Updated - - -

At this point, I'd welcome an asteroid or alien invasion or something to just reset it all. More and more Agent Smith's line in the first Matrix that humans are a virus is proving accurate.

Honestly, an alien invasion. Because of the simple reason is that if an alien species has the ability to traverse the stars, especially in any capable manner that goes near the speed of light(or somehow knows physics that can allow them to go FTL), the insane crowd for all intents and purposes would be completely unable to handle the notion that all their guns and weapons would do jack squat against something that, more than likely, would have technology to make those weapons useless. And praying to any God they believe in would do nothing also.

As much of a terrible movie and story it is, Battlefield Earth points that out quite keenly. The human race stood against the invading alien force for about a good 9 minutes before being eradicated.

While the movies that deal with alien invasions tend to have some MacGuffin to allow the humans to win, reality would probably be far different against a far technologically superior force. Especially one that is on many orders of magnitude greater. History has shown that an invading force that has far superior technology typically wins the day. And rarely spares the survivors.