AOC Urged to Primary Spineless Schumer - The Friday AM Quickie 3/14/25
Americans are not sending their best to Australia. A visiting outdoors and hunting influencer fled the country after posting a "cruel" and "dreadful" video of herself by the side of a road taking a struggling baby wombat away from its panicked mother. There were widespread calls for her deportation, and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese "suggested that she try the same with a crocodile and see how that goes." Soz! - Corey
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THE BIG NEWS
Betrayal: After Schumer Folds on GOP Medicaid Cuts, Dems Beg AOC to Unseat Him
Yesterday I told paying subscribers that "growing pressure from the left had an effect" on Senate Democrats after Minority Leader Chuck Schumer indicated he would oppose a disastrous House Republican funding bill that would gut Medicaid. I noted that some journalists urged skepticism about Schumer's sincerity – and the skeptics turned out to be correct. Schumer yesterday enraged the House Democratic caucus, progressive activists, federal workers' unions, and ordinary constituents "by announcing that he planned to vote to allow the GOP bill to move forward, and indicat[ing] that he had enough votes to help Republicans break any filibuster by his own party against the measure."
Schumer argued in a floor speech yesterday that a government shutdown this weekend resulting from a failure to pass the GOP bill today "would give Donald Trump [and allied oligarch Elon Musk] the keys to the city, the state and the country." But his Democratic critics – and their are many – say the damage has already been done, that advancing the GOP bill would in fact codify Musk's rampage through federal agencies, and that Schumer's wobbly centrist faction is making excuses for their abject surrender. "The shutdown is already happening. It is called Trump and Musk's demolition of our government," Stefanie Feldman, a longtime aide to former President Joe Biden, wrote yesterday. "The question is whether Congress will cede its remaining checks on the powers of the president."
California Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff went further, saying that if Democrats advance the GOP funding bill, "we will own what the president does. I am not willing to take ownership of that."
Vermont socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders says Democrats have more to gain from standing up to the oligarchy than they risk losing by being falsely blamed for a government shutdown. "I think the American people are sick and tired of Elon Musk, the richest guy in the world, running around, slashing Social Security, veterans programs," and Medicaid, Sanders told MSNBC's Chris Hayes last night. "You gotta draw a line."
"I think there is a deep sense of outrage and betrayal" toward Senate Democratic leaders, New York Squad Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told reporters last night, calling Schumer's reversal "a huge slap in the face."
Schumer's surrender may be his undoing. Per CNN, his decision prompted multiple House Democrats to encourage AOC to run against him in the next Democratic primary. One member says the House caucus is "'so mad' that even centrist Democrats were 'ready to write checks for AOC for Senate,' adding that they have 'never seen people so mad.'" Schumer is up for reelection in 2028. But as AOC says, the Senate votes today, and "we have time to correct course on this decision."
MORE STORIES TO WATCH
US Military Prepares Panama Invasion Plan on Trump's Orders
Since taking office in January, Donald Trump has threatened the sovereignty of Canada, Mexico, Greenland, and Panama, which owns and controls the Panama Canal, a valuable shipping route ceded by the US in a 1977 treaty, 13 years after the US Army gunned down Panamanian students protesting American colonialism in an incident commemorated in Panama as Martyr's Day. Trump doesn't respect that treaty and has vowed, most recently in his address to Congress, to "reclaim" the canal. Now NBC News reports, and CNN confirms, that Trump has ordered the Pentagon to draw up plans for a military invasion of Panama to seize the canal. Unfortunately, neither news outlet had the cojones to call the plan what it is. NBC quotes anonymous military officials who "cautioned that a US invasion of Panama is unlikely and would come under serious consideration only if a larger American military presence in Panama does not achieve Trump's goal of reclaiming the waterway" – in other words, if Panama doesn't surrender the canal, the US will take it by force. The Pentagon doublespeak is about as credible as Russia's "Special Military Operation" in Ukraine. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth "is expected to visit Panama next month"; the US already has 200 troops stationed there. The US last invaded in 1989 to oust Manuel Noriega.
Trumpocalypse: Two Judges Order Trump to Rehire Thousands of Fired Federal Workers
- Hundreds of Jewish Voice for Peace Protesters Flood New York Trump Tower Demanding Release of Mahmoud Khalil; 98 Arrested "'The American government executed my grandparents during a similar time of fearmongering and political repression. I honor their memory by refusing to be silent in the face of the abduction of Mahmoud Khalil,' said protester Rachel Meeropol, the Jewish granddaughter of two Americans, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were put to death in 1953 after being convicted of passing state secrets to the Soviet Union." via the City, the Washington Post, NBC News, and the New York Times.
- Trump Lawyers Ask Supreme Court to Rule that Lower Courts Can't Block His Unconstitutional Orders The argument came in an emergency appeal to three nationwide injuctions filed by federal judges against Trump's effort to end birthright citizenship. via Politico, the Washington Post, and Axios.
- Uh Oh: Elon Musk Visits the National Security Agency for Some Reason Kash Patel's FBI, meanwhile, ordered Citibank to freeze the accounts of NGOs including Habitat for Humanity over supposed "'possible criminal violations,' including 'conspiracy to defraud the United States.'" via the Wall Street Journal, NBC News, and the New Republic.
- 'You Ruined This Place!': Kennedy Center Crowd Boos JD and Usha Vance for More Than 30 Seconds Before Orchestral Performance "Audience members nervously joked during the intermission about the apposite all-Russian programme," featuring Shostakovich's second violin concerto and Stravinsky's "Petrushka." via the Guardian and the Washington Post.
QUICKEST QUICKIES
- UN Report: Israel's 'Systematic' Sexual Violence Against Women in Gaza Constitutes 'Genocidal Acts' Meanwhile, the US and Israel have contacted "Sudan, Somalia and the breakaway region of Somalia known as Somaliland" about resettling Palestinians from Gaza there, a plan "once considered a fantasy of Israel's ultranationalist fringe." via the Washington Post and the Associated Press.
- Keir Starmer Abolishes NHS England to Bring Health Agency Under Politicial Control In the same speech announcing the change to the country's sacred national health system yesterday, Britain's Labour Party Prime Minister said artificial intelligence creates a "golden opportunity" to replace public sector jobs. via BBC News, the Guardian, and the Independent.
- 'I Want Justice': Indonesian Fishermen Sue US-Based Bumble Bee Foods Over Forced Labor "On a ship that caught tuna for American consumers, fishermen said they were fed so little that they resorted to eating the bait," and had half of their $320 monthly salaries confiscated by a captain who beat them with a metal hook. via the New York Times.
- FBI Joins Investigation of Suspected Arson at Big Pharma Exec's New Jersey Home At least seven other agencies, "including the Morris County Prosecutor's Office Arson/Environmental Crimes Unit, Morris County Sheriff's Office CSI Unit, New Jersey State Fire Marshals Office K-9 Unit, New Jersey Transit Police, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority Police Department, and the New York City Police Department," are investigating the March 4 fire at the Madison residence of a Bayer executive, in which no one was injured and no property was significantly damaged. via USA Today and Yahoo Finance.
SOME NUMBER
$65 million
That's how much Bay Area real estate developer Brad Ehikian, the brother and business partner of acting General Services Administration chief Stephen Ehikian, stood to gain from a sweetheart deal he pitched his brother's agency last month to buy a large federal property in Silicon Valley for approximately half the value the GSA had attempted to sell it for at auction. Working with Elon Musk's DOGE, the GSA plans to sell off half of the real estate it owns across the country. Trump family members, meanwhile, are preparing to take a stake in the cryptocurrency firm Binance, which pleaded guilty to money laundering two years ago, the Wall Street Journal reports.
ON THE SHOW TODAY
3/14: Happy Friday! Sam and Emma speak with Jeet Heer, national affairs correspondent for The Nation, to round up the week in news.
DON'T MISS MR CLIPS
Zohran Stands Up to Trump's Attack on Free Speech While Cuomo Hides
"The cowardice that is on display across our city and state is unacceptable."
Dem RIPS Republican's Disgusting Transphobia
There is no compromise on human rights.
PARTING WORDS
"Kellogg is a former American general, too close to Ukraine. Not our kind of person, not of the caliber we are looking for."
-- An anonymous senior Russian official, speaking to NBC News about how Aspiring Tsar Vladimir Putin ensured that Donald Trump's special envoy, retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, did not attend last month's summit in Saudi Arabia on the future of Ukraine. Putin said yesterday that he agreed to "the idea" of a 30-day ceasefire with Ukraine, but that Russia still has significant demands that he needs to talk about privately with Trump. The Washington Post reports that classified US intelligence says Putin "has not veered from his maximalist goal of dominating" Kyiv and that the new reality entails a "permanent standoff between Russia and the rest of Europe."
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