Last week’s shocking report that Mr. Hegseth shared sensitive information about a yet-to-be-launched air attack in Yemen on an unclassified messaging app is now straining the limits of his credibility as an everyman — and his fitness to lead the American military’s 2.1 million service members.

Americans stationed across the globe know if they violate similar security protocols, they can expect swift reprimand, the loss of security clearance and perhaps a court-martial. In his first departmentwide message on Jan. 25, Mr. Hegseth told troops he was a firm believer in holding everyone to account. “Our standards will be high, uncompromising, and clear,” he wrote. Now those same operational security standards don’t appear to apply to him. What message is sent to American troops if that imbalance continues?

…

For now, the affair raises profound questions about whether Mr. Hegseth can handle an actual national security crisis, after he’s managed to blunder into such a major unforced error.

…

It’s difficult to imagine that two of his recent predecessors, Jim Mattis and Lloyd J. Austin III, who retired six ranks above Mr. Hegseth as four-star generals, would have copy and pasted such details onto a publicly available app. It’s not that either man flawlessly executed the role of defense secretary, but at least they were accountable…. Mr. Hegseth, so far, hasn’t shown that he is willing to admit any fault. Instead, he has taken a defiant tone, attacking Mr. Goldberg’s credibility and arguing that “nobody was texting war plans.”

Opinion | The Message Pete Hegseth Sends the Troops – The New York Times

The so-called Save Act would strip millions of their access to the vote and make the process harder for everyone else

One such piece of legislation is the so-called Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or Save Act, which would require Americans seeking to register or re-register to vote to prove US citizenship. This dangerous bill would in effect strip millions of Americans of their access to the vote, while making the voting process more difficult and burdensome for everyone else. Rather than make our elections more secure, the Save Act would disenfranchise millions based on nothing but a series of debunked conspiracy theories.

Republicans are quietly trying to disenfranchise millions of voters | Alexis Anderson-Reed

The so-called Save Act would strip millions of their access to the vote and make the process harder for everyone else

Republicans are quietly trying to disenfranchise millions of voters | Alexis Anderson-Reed | The Guardian

In January, just days after Donald Trump was sworn in as president, immigration agents came to Dana Beauty Salon in Mount Rainer, Maryland, located just two minutes from the Washington D.C. border. They were looking for one of the employees, an undocumented migrant, who was taken into custody and is being held at a detention center in New Hampshire pending a court hearing. That day changed the life of the salon’s owner, Daysi García. “They showed up one day, I think it was a Thursday. By the time the weekend came around, no one was coming in, our workers weren’t coming in for their shifts, not even the clients were coming in,” she recalls sadly.

…

“What is happening now is worse than what we experienced during Covid. Back then, people could put on a mask and come in. Now, they don’t even want to leave their homes,” says García.

Latino businesses collapse under deportation terror: ‘What is happening now is worse than what we experienced during Covid’

Meanwhile, Nero fiddles, Trump plays golf.

King Donald’s diplomatic toolbox seems to be limited to (1) bombs and (2) tariffs.

Trump told NBC on Saturday that “If they don’t make a deal, there will be bombing,” he said. “But there’s a chance that if they don’t make a deal, that I will do secondary tariffs on them like I did four years ago.”

Trump threatens to bomb Iran unless they end nuclear weapons program and begin talks on new deal

Officials say they have asked several countries in Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe

These people came to the United States in search of a better life, as many millions have done over the past 250 years.

And their reward? Trump is forcibly exporting them to whatever third-world country will take them.

The Trump administration is pursuing agreements with several more countries to take migrants deported from the U.S., according to officials familiar with the matter.

Immigration officials are seeking more destinations where they can send immigrants the U.S. wants to deport, but whose countries are slow to take them back or refuse to. Their desired model builds on a one-time deal the administration struck with Panama in February, under which they sent a planeload of over 100 migrants, mostly from the Middle East, to the Central American nation. Panama then detained the migrants and worked to send them to their home countries.

The officials are in conversations with countries in Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe, but aren’t necessarily looking to sign formal agreements, the people said.

…

Among the countries the U.S. has asked to take the deportees are Libya, Rwanda, Benin, Eswatini, Moldova, Mongolia and Kosovo.

Exclusive | U.S. Looks for More Countries to Take Migrants – WSJ

Libya, Rwanda, Benin, Eswatini, Moldova, Mongolia and Kosovo? How inhumane can they get?

Thanks to Trump’s administration, the US could soon have to fight wars to get things that, just a few weeks ago, were there for the asking

The American vice-president, JD Vance, visited a US base in Greenland for three hours on Friday, along with his wife. National security adviser Mike Waltz and his wife also went along. Fresh from using an unsafe social media platform to carry out an entirely unnecessary group chat in which they leaked sensitive data about an ongoing military attack to a reporter, and thereby allegedly breaking the law, Waltz and Vance perhaps hoped to change the subject by tagging along on a trip that was initially billed as Vance’s wife watching a dogsled race.

The overall context was Trump’s persistent claim that America must take Greenland, which is an autonomous region of Denmark. The original plan had been that Usha Vance would visit Greenlanders, apparently on the logic that the second lady would be an effective animatrice of colonial subjection; but none of them wanted to see her, and Greenland’s businesses refused to serve as a backdrop to photo ops or even to serve the uninvited Americans. So, instead, the US couples made a very quick visit to Pituffik space base.

At the base, in the far north of the island, the US visitors had pictures taken of themselves and ate lunch with servicemen and women. They treated the base as the backdrop to a press conference where they could say things they already thought; nothing was experienced, nothing was learned, nothing sensible was said. Vance, who never left the base, and has never before visited Greenland, was quite sure how Greenlanders should live. He made a political appeal to Greenlanders, none of whom was present, or anywhere near him. He claimed that Denmark was not protecting the security of Greenlanders in the Arctic, and that the US would. Greenland should therefore join the US.

It takes some patience to unwind all of the nonsense here.

Vance’s posturing in Greenland was not just morally wrong. It was strategically disastrous | Timothy Snyder

Thanks to Trump’s administration, the US could soon have to fight wars to get things that, just a few weeks ago, were there for the asking, says professor Timothy Snyder of Yale University

Vance’s posturing in Greenland was not just morally wrong. It was strategically disastrous | Timothy Snyder | The Guardian

They admit they screwed up, and they refuse to do anything about it. Unbelievable!

The Trump administration conceded in a court filing Monday that it mistakenly deported a Maryland father to El Salvador “because of an administrative error” and argued it could not return him because he’s now in Salvadoran custody.

Trump administration concedes Maryland father from El Salvador was mistakenly deported and sent to mega prison | CNN Politics

The Trump administration conceded in a court filing Monday that it mistakenly deported a Maryland father to El Salvador “because of an administrative error” and argued it could not return him because he’s now in Salvadoran custody.

Trump administration concedes Maryland father from El Salvador was mistakenly deported and sent to mega prison | CNN Politics

President Donald Trump is attempting to dictate the rules for national elections in violation of both federal law and the U.S. Constitution, a lawsuit filed Monday in Washington, D.C., federal court alleges.

On March 25, the 45th and 47th president issued Executive Order 14248, titled: “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections.” The order broadly seeks to reshape how elections are administered in the country by, among other things, purporting to enforce a requirement that all voters prove their citizenship by way of formal documentation and by putting a stop to vote-by-mail systems that count ballots postmarked by, but received after, Election Day.

The plaintiffs, led by the Democratic National Committee, claim in their 74-page lawsuit that the executive order “asserts unprecedented authority” for the presidency over election administration “on a host of topics.” And this effort, the lawsuit claims, contravenes a number of federal laws and the explicit constitutional carveouts for election authority granted to the states and U.S. Congress.

“In the United States of America, the President does not get to dictate the rules of our elections,” the complaint begins. “The Framers of our federal Constitution foresaw that self-interested and self-aggrandizing leaders might seek to corrupt our democratic system of government to expand and preserve their own power. They therefore created a decentralized system of elections based upon separated powers divided among the leaders elected by — and closest to — the people.”

‘The president possesses no such authority’: Lawsuit pits Kavanaugh against 5th Circuit in challenge to Trump’s order that aims to ‘dictate’ new rules for national elections

A Venezuelan man came to the United States to donate a kidney to his brother in kidney failure, but ICE authorities detained him, putting the fate of both brothers in question.

José Alfredo Pacheco, 37, was diagnosed with end-stage kidney failure in December 2023, shortly after arriving in the Chicago area from Venezuela, seeking asylum. His older brother, José Gregorio González, 43, hoped to donate his kidney to save Pacheco’s life — but immigration authorities detained him, throwing their plans into disarray.

The pair had an appointment at a hospital ahead of the organ transplant surgery, the Chicago Tribune reported. But those plans are now up in the air after Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested González on March 3 as he was making breakfast at his home for his sick brother.

A man came to the US to donate a kidney to his brother. ICE showing up as his doorstep interrupted that plan

A man came to the US to donate a kidney to his brother. ICE showing up as his doorstep interrupted that plan – ‘We both cried when they arrested him because we both know he is my lifeline,’ said José Alfredo Pacheco, who is suffering from end-stage kidney failure

A man came to the US to donate a kidney to his brother. ICE showing up as his doorstep interrupted that plan

Dogukan Gunaydin, the STEM MBA student at the University of Minnesota who was arrested and detained by immigration officials last week, filed a lawsuit in federal court Sunday alleging the arrest and detention is a violation of his statutory and constitutional rights.

A Department of Homeland Security official said in a statement Monday that Gunaydin’s detention stems from a drunk driving conviction, clarifying that it had nothing to do with political activism on campus that has drawn scrutiny from the Trump administration. Gunaydin’s attorney also says he attended no protests.

Gunaydin is a citizen of Turkey.

Hennepin County Court records show Dunaydin was charged with gross misdemeanor DWI in July 2023. In March 2024, Dunaydin pleaded guilty to 3rd-degree DWI. The petition he signed said, “I understand that if I am not a citizen of the United States, my plea of guilty may result in deportation.

Gunaydin’s attorney Hannah Brown disputes in a petition for writ of habeas corpus that the DWI was a crime that is cause for termination of his student status or renders him deportable under immigration law. 

U of M student detained by ICE for DWI conviction files lawsuit, claiming detention is unlawful