Mark Rickling

Is Trump’s tariff pivot legal? President Donald Trump moved to revive a part of his tariff agenda under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, raising questions over the statute’s “balance of payments” standard.

Last week, SCOTUS dealt a major blow to Donald Trump’s illegal attempt to claim dictatorial powers, striking down his phony “national emergency” used to justify sweeping tariff taxes that have driven up prices for all of us. Unfortunately, that ruling has not stopped Trump’s destructive trade war.

What a mission-driven press must do in this time of crisis We need the opposite of media capitulation. Here are some concrete ideas.

“‘…the United States has moved swiftly from democracy to a form of authoritarianism.’ I believe that millions of Americans don’t fully understand what’s happening, and yes, I blame the press whose job it is to clearly inform the public.” - @sulliview.bsky.social

open.substack.com/pub/margaret...

Prior to 2015, if any candidate for elected office had begun a public statement or tweet with this sentence, he or she would have been laughed out of public life.

Now, Americans re-elect them as commander-in-chief. I will never allow myself to become numb to his insanity.

Instead of relief, working families get more higher prices on everything. To stop this chaos and rein in unchecked tariff power, I’ve sponsored the Stopping a Rogue President on Trade Act — legislation to permanently bar presidents from unilaterally imposing tariff taxes that hike costs on Americans

Our would-be king just announced a new 10% global tariff after the SCOTUS struck down his national emergency tariffs as unlawful — and he refuses to refund the billions paid by small businesses and consumers. That tariff regime raised prices by an estimated $1,700 a year for the average family.

Money quote: "There was no cash paid for United States federal income taxes as we generated a taxable loss for...2025 due to the provisions allowed within the One Big Beautiful Bill Act."
They're telling *shareholders" they made $145 million in the US, even as they tell the IRS they lost money.

Most companies are pretty squirrelly about disclosing the impact of the 2025 Trump tax cuts on their tax bills. But ticket-broker giant Live Nation isn't shy: they say the OBBBA is the reason they paid zero federal income tax in 2025, despite $145 million of U.S. profits.
www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Arch...

Said the guy who’s moving to bomb Iran. 😞

Absolutely amazing what hill some people choose to die on. Online has fried their brains.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York just confirmed what we have long known: it’s not foreign countries paying for Trump’s tariff taxes.

Nearly 90% of the cost has been borne by American consumers and businesses — driving up prices and squeezing families at the checkout.

So SCOTUS, with its fabricated-out-of-thin-air immunity doctrine, has actually made American presidents less accountable than LITERAL royalty.

BUT AOC WHO ISN'T PRESIDENT MADE A MISTAKE IN SAYING VENEZUELA IS BELOW THE EQUATOR!!!

SHE CAN NEVER BE PRESIDENT!!!! NEVER!!!!!!

Every Trump official is fundamentally a thug

Futurama character Fry with a fistfull of dollars to give to someone.

Where my link to click?

US Soccer set that memo on fire.

Trump claimed the power to unleash a tariff war by declaring a “national emergency.” This is clearly a false predicate.

The tariff power lies with Congress per the Constitution. Trump’s invocation of an “emergency” in order to punish countries whose leaders don’t grovel is utterly ridiculous.

This is the 38th time that the U.S. military has unlawfully killed civilians on the orders of Pete Hegseth and Donald Trump. At least 130 people — never charged with crimes, their identities unknown to their executioners — are now dead.

Celebration of PR independentistas who blew up power towers in the 70s (e.g. Cerro Maravilla)? But nobody is getting this reference.

it never even occurred to me that this was happening as it happened because it seemed impossible but gotdamn that's the best thing to ever happen during a super bowl halftime.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerro_M...

The Death of Direct File Tech for good not welcome in the Trump administration

Reminder when you watch the Intuit Super Bowl ads, they have Super Bowl ad money because they are a successful rent seekers who have worked for decades to kill free, quality, public tax preparation services donmoynihan.substack.com/p/the-death-...

💯💯💯

Not to mention Dave Kasper.

this particular line is maybe the best statement of purpose i have seen for those of us who want a more militant opposition to this administration

Liam is home now and we are grateful to @joaquincastrotx.bsky.social for traveling to Minneapolis with him and his dad.

Welcome home Liam ❤️❤️

Johnson listed four other CEOs who are executive board members of trade organizations that lobbied for OBBBA: Land O’Lakes CEO Beth Ford (Business Roundtable), Hormel CEO Jeff Ettinger (the Meat Institute), Allianz CEO Jasmine Jirele (U.S. Chamber of Commerce), and Target CEO Michael Fiddelke (the National Retail Federation). Target also makes its property available for ICE to use, even after agents targeted its own employees. A comparison of the open-letter signatures and the executives listed among Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill endorsements shows several more Minnesota-based executives who want to have it both ways: Best Buy CEO Corie Barry, C.H. Robinson CEO Dave Bozeman, and US Bancorp CEO Gunjan Kedia, all of whom are members of the Business Roundtable, which lobbied for OBBBA. In addition, Minnesota-based Medtronic and Boston Scientific, whose executives signed, are on the board of directors of the trade group AdvaMed, which supported OBBBA. And the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce also supported OBBBA; they coordinated and released the open letter. Seventeen companies whose CEOs signed the letter—Allianz, Ameriprise Financial, Boston Scientific, Cargill, CHS, Inc., ECMC Group, Ecolab, General Mills, Hormel, Land O’Lakes, Mayo Clinic, Medtronic, Securian Financial Group, Solventum, Target, UnitedHealth, and Xcel Energy—also reported lobbying directly on OBBBA in federal lobbying disclosures. Blue Cross and Blue Shield reported 52 separate lobbying reports about OBBBA; Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota president and CEO Dana Erickson signed the letter.

A spokesman for Allianz said the company declined to comment. Other companies did not respond, including UnitedHealth Group, which brings its own brand of hypocrisy to the discussion. Stephen Hemsley, CEO of the Minnesota-based company, signed the open letter. UnitedHealth is the largest Medicare Advantage insurer, serving about eight million people, and is responsible for perpetrating what can reasonably be described as a fraud against U.S. taxpayers by overcharging for services. According to a new analysis by the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, the fraud will require taxpayers to cover an estimated $76 billion in unnecessarily expensive charges this year, significantly more expensive than the $1 billion alleged Medicare fraud that supposedly prompted the immigration operation in Minnesota.

Eighteen companies represented by CEOs on the letter lobbied for the Big Beautiful Bill. Nine of them are top executives on trade groups that lobbied for the bill.
UnitedHealth is on the letter despite defrauding the government by orders of magnitude above any Somali day care operation.

Minnesota CEOs Cry Crocodile Tears Over ICE - The American Prospect Executives who lobbied for Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which enabled the immigration terror in their state, now want everyone to believe they are on the people’s side.

The weak "deesclation of tensions" letter from large Minnesota businesses elides how instrumental they were in the creation of Operation Metro Surge, through public support & active lobbying for the Big Beautiful Bill that allocated $170 billion for mass deportation.

Ms. Omar, visibly shaken after the assault, insisted to her staff and security that she would continue. She asked for a napkin and told them: "Just give me 10 minutes. I beg you. Please don't let them have the show." Ms. Omar then turned the crowd. "Here's the reality that people like this ugly man don't understand," she said. "We are Minnesota strong, and we will stay resilient in the face of whatever they might throw at us." Someone in the crowd later thanked Ms. Omar for staying and continuing after the assault, which had shaken not only her but the entire room. "I learned at a young age you don't give in to threats," Ms. Omar said.

Ilhan Omar is an American hero. www.nytimes.com/live/2026/01...

The $40 million that Bezos paid for the Melanie propaganda film would cover the cost of about 200 journalists for a year.

The Trump administration admits even more ways DOGE accessed sensitive personal data New court documents reveal even more ways DOGE improperly accessed and shared sensitive personal data last year — and how that data appears to have been used to advance dubious fraud claims.

This is not an abstract fear. Last week DOJ admitted that DOGE operatives at the Social Security Administration entered a secret data-sharing agreement with a group seeking to overturn state election results.

www.npr.org/2026/01/23/n...