❧ There’s another dynamic young socialist running for mayor in a major U.S. city. Last month, Zohran Mamdani shocked the world when he won a decisive victory in New York City's democratic primaries. This month, it’s Omar Fateh, a 35-year-old state Senator and democratic socialist, who’s making great strides toward becoming the next mayor of Minneapolis.
Fateh’s platform is solidly left-wing, including higher taxes on the rich, a “Just Cause” eviction policy that would help reduce homelessness, and a crackdown on police misconduct and brutality. The last is especially important, since Minneapolis has the fourth most violent police force in the nation. And this Saturday, Fateh won the endorsement of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party at their caucus, handing incumbent mayor Jacob Frey a shocking defeat. It seems there were some procedural irregularities with the caucus vote itself, and Frey's supporters are now challenging the result. Fateh, whose parents are Somalian immigrants, has also been the target of deeply racist attacks online. But America might be getting a wave of progressive mayors this year, and that’s a development worth watching. (Newsweek)
❧ ICE says “privacy for me, not for thee.” On Thursday, the Trump administration gave ICE the data of every Medicaid enrollee. That’s not an exaggeration: in order to facilitate Trump’s deportation agenda, ICE will receive a dataset containing “the names, addresses, birth dates, ethnic and racial information, as well as Social Security numbers for all people enrolled in Medicaid.” This is according to an agreement between the Department of Homeland Security and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which was not made public until an investigative report by the Associated Press. Immigrants who are not in the U.S. legally are not allowed to enroll in Medicaid, but people who go to an emergency room and are unable to pay are entered into what’s called “Emergency Medicaid” regardless of immigration status. Even putting aside the horrific consequences of discouraging people from going to the ER, covertly giving ICE a dataset of 70 million people’s identifying information is a nightmare for medical privacy rights.
Fortunately, though, the privacy of one group of people is being protected: ICE employees! The Intercept has found that immigration judges are repeatedly allowing ICE lawyers to keep their names out of court transcripts. Justifying the practice, one immigration judge said in a hearing that “we're not really doing names publicly” after having read the names of the immigrant and their lawyers into the record. One judge is quoted in the report as saying that “some ICE attorneys have said they found it ‘dangerous to state their names publicly.’” Dangerous as in, they may feel shame. Not dangerous as in being shipped to a Salvadoran supermax prison with no knowledge of who’s doing it to you. (Common Dreams & The Intercept)
Art by Helen Geiger from Current Affairs Magazine, Issue 29
❧ Puerto Rico has enacted a sweeping ban on gender-affirming care. On Wednesday, Puerto Rico’s governor signed into law the most extreme trans care ban in the United States (and its overseas colonies). The law criminalizes gender-affirming hormone treatment or surgery for anyone under the age of 21. Penalties for doctors and patients who violate the law include up to 15 years in prison and a $50,000 fine.
Fortunately, activist groups are already fighting back. Legal organizations including the ACLU of Puerto Rico will shortly challenge the law in court on the basis that it violated Puerto Rico’s constitutional guarantees to privacy. While the Supreme Court signed off on gender-affirming care bans earlier this year, their ruling does not affect state and territorial constitutions which have broader privacy-related protections. (Erin in the Morning)
❧ The deadliest train in America kills one person every 13 days—and, of course, it’s privately owned. An investigative report by the Miami Herald uncovered that Brightline, the only private intercity passenger rail company in the U.S., “blamed victims for the high death rate, and, as fatalities climbed, turned to the public to pay for safety upgrades.” Since the trains started running in 2017, their death toll has climbed to 182, with a further 99 people seriously injured and 101 cases where the train “crashed into vehicles, but no one was hurt.” Brightline, which runs rail service connecting Miami and Orlando, has not been found liable for any of the deaths (although it has settled more than a dozen wrongful death suits out of court.) But Brightline’s owners have long opposed common-sense safety upgrades, including adding fencing in dense pedestrian areas to keep people from inadvertently walking onto tracks. (Brightline changed its tune on fencing after the federal government offered the company $35 million to install new safety measures.) When private profit is involved, apparently, crushing people to death is just the cost of doing business. (Miami Herald)
If you think about it, shareholder value is worth about five human lives.
AROUND THE WORLD
❧ Georgia is lurching towards autocracy. Georgia, the nation in the Caucasus mountains that borders Russia, is nearing the dictatorial point of no return. While it was once a bright spot for democratic reforms, the country has backslid into authoritarian rule since the Georgian Dream party took power in 2012. The party, which is puppeted by Russian billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, has for years tried to distance Georgia from the West and ally it with Russian interests. This culminated in the country officially pausing its process of entering the EU.
In support of its push towards Russia, Georgian Dream has unleashed a vast crackdown against its political opponents. Most leaders of the major opposition party are in jail. Protestors are subject to torture and arrests. The state recently passed a law making it a crime to step off of sidewalks while protesting. In a country where the average person makes only $800 USD a month, the $1,800 fine is crushing. These laws limiting protests are enforced using facial recognition technology imported from China—the same technology used to surveil Uyghur Muslims.
The most recent nationwide elections were "illegitimate," according to the European Parliament, the EU’s governing body. Other independent observers identified a “large-scale, multi-faceted election-rigging scheme” to benefit Georgian Dream. Voters were intimidated and bribed to support Georgian Dream, and some computer models have indicated that up to 245,000 ballots were fraudulently added to increase Georgian Dream’s vote total.
This leaves opposition parties in a bind. If they choose to participate in upcoming local elections, they will be harassed and jailed. Worse still, Georgian Dream could falsify the results and use the presence of opposition candidates to legitimize their rule. If opposition parties choose not to participate, then it gives the current administration even more leeway to enforce its rule. There appears to be no good option as long as Georgian Dream is in power. (Civil Georgia)
This story was suggested by a News Briefing reader. If you have suggestions on things you want to see Current Affairs cover, please email briefing@currentaffairs.com!
❧ Sir Keir Starmer has suspended four Labour MPs over their unwillingness to cut welfare benefits. Last week, British Prime Minister Kier Starmer suspended four members of parliament from his Labour Party in retaliation for their refusal to support significant welfare cuts. Earlier this month, 47 Labour party members forced Starmer to water down his proposed cuts; the same four MPs played a significant role in rallying support against the plan. This means that the MPs, Neil Duncan-Jordan, Brian Leishman, Chris Hinchliff and Rachael Maskell, will now sit in Parliament as independents.
This comes weeks after two prominent MPs formed a new left-wing alternative to the Labour party. Jeremy Corbyn (who was booted from Labour in 2023) and Zarah Sultana (who left Labour earlier this month) have joined forces to create a party that may appeal to voters and MPs deemed too left-wing for Starmer’s liking. Already some polls indicate the new party would rival Labour’s popularity, even though the party has yet to be named. (BBC)
CROOKS vs. SICKOS (or, “What’s going on with our politicians and oligarchs?”)
❧ Neuralink falsely claimed to be a minority-owned small business. Elon Musk’s $9 billion company aims to implant computer chips in people’s brains, giving them the power to telepathically control compatible devices. It also aims to implant itself into the federal government’s registry of disadvantaged businesses, which would give it access to preferential consideration in government contracting. A report by Popular Information found that Neuralink has self-certified as a “small disadvantaged business” since 2017. To qualify as a disadvantaged business, a company must be majority-owned by someone who, among other requirements, has a net worth of less than $850,000. Elon Musk (net worth $400 billion) has previously said of similar initiatives to aid historically discriminated Americans, “DEI is just another word for racism. Shame on anyone who uses it.” (Popular Information)
Musk once told Neuralink to house animal test subjects in a “monkey Taj Mahal.” Y’know, the kind of thing a struggling business can afford. Neuralink is currently under investigation for killing more than 1,500 animals. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)
❧ SCOTUS Operates in the Shadows. And I’m Jealous. Last Monday, the Court signed off on Trump’s destruction of the Department of Education in an unsigned, unexplained order. This has become normal on the shadow docket. “Normal” cases take place on the merits docket, where the Court hears months of briefing and argument before making a decision. But on the shadow docket (also referred to as the emergency docket) the Court makes expedited decisions, often with no briefing, and the Court is not required to write a decision or let the public know how it voted on a case. Many outlets have criticized the Court’s use of the shadow docket during this Trump administration. The shadow docket has been wildly deferential to Trump, and Trump is using it far more than any predecessor. Using the shadow docket leaves lower court judges in the dark on how to apply SCOTUS’ rulings, it leaves the public in the dark as to why they rule, it makes the Court look political (which, of course, it is), and it gives Justices a way to weasel out of justifying unjustifiable rulings. All good points, but I want to make another, more enlightened criticism: I’m jealous.
Current Affairs prides itself on delivering timely, factual analysis to our readers. As the writer of this News Briefing (Subscribe Here!), I have to scour the web for stories, prepare original commentary, and work with our team of brilliant editors to inform you of, well, current affairs. But if John Roberts, the so-called best lawyer in America, doesn’t have to write anything before making a ruling, why can’t I just send a weekly email saying “the news sucks” and move on? My job isn’t that much more important than his. If I had more free time, I would use it to improve the socialist world by loitering in coffeeshops and also maybe taking a nap. Supreme Court justices, on the other hand, use their free time to go on fishing trips with billionaires. They have shown that they cannot be trusted with recess privileges.
Doubly insulting is the fact that as a law student, I have to actually write essays. What the hell! If law school was supposed to teach you how to be a lawyer, I would be learning how to run gambling rings and practicing my cat impressions. Instead I am learning about logical argumentation, which is so 20th century. Steve Vladek, a professor at Georgetown’s Law School, literally wrote the book on the shadow docket. But an inside source told me that he requires students to complete assignments and possibly even go to class. How sickening. (One First)
Raw footage of the Current Affairs team finding stories for the News Briefing. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)
❧ The president of the NFL players’ union has resigned in disgrace. Lloyd Howell Jr., the former president of the NFL player’s Association (NFLPA), s, resigned this week after scandals upended his administration. ESPN revealed on Friday that Howell had the union reimburse him for thousands of dollars of expenses at strip clubs, including for cash withdrawals from a club ATM. Howell resigned unexpectedly just hours after ESPN asked his office questions about the expenses.
But Howell’s worse transgressions are his pro-management ties. ESPN reported last week that in addition to his duties as the President of the NFLPA, Carlyle was working as a paid, part-time consultant for the Carlyle Group, a private equity conglomerate that is currently trying to purchase a stake in an NFL team. Worse still, ESPN also uncovered that Howell had made a deal with NFL team owners to keep under wraps an arbitrator’s finding that team owners colluded to reduce the amount of guaranteed money paid to players. Collusion to keep salaries down violates the NFL-NFLPA collective bargaining agreement, but Howell prevented union members from learning about the collusion until the arbitrator’s finding was leaked on an ESPN podcast. (ESPN, ESPN, & ESPN)
VULPINE FACT OF THE WEEK
A fox is causing havoc by stealing shoes.
Last year, we informed you of a criminal ring of foxes stealing newspapers. They’re back. Foxes in Grand Teton National Park have stolen 32 shoes. It is unknown if the fox is working with accomplices. After 19 thefts, the park service issued a warning to campers to lock shoes in secure lockers. Campers responded by donating shoes to a taxidermied effigy. Please treat the fox with caution; given Wyoming’s gun laws, you should assume it is armed and dangerous. (Backpacker)
To all the readers who have asked, no. Current Affairs does not accept used shoes as donations. Please take footwear to your local zoo. (Image: National Park Service)
Writing and research by Grady Martin. Editing and additional material by Nathan J. Robinson and Alex Skopic. Header graphic by Cali Traina Blume. This news briefing is a product of Current Affairs Magazine. Subscribe to our gorgeous and informative print edition here, and our delightful podcast here.
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