DHS Just Said They're Liberating L.A. from Its Elected Officials
Federal goons roughed up a U.S. senator who challenged a cabinet secretary's vow to usurp "socialist" and "burdensome" government
June 13: Noem warns that even citizens aren’t safe … Assault on Padilla inspires much GOP lying about what we can see for ourselves on video … Court hearing Tuesday for lawsuit challenging National Guard deployment … No Kings rallies set to overshadow sad presidential birthday Saturday …
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It wasn’t just that Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) was physically assaulted yesterday by federal employees and handcuffed, he was silenced before he could challenge Homeland (sic) Security Secretary Kristi Noem for saying in Los Angeles, CA, what should have been the biggest story of the month yesterday:
“The Department of Homeland Security and the officers and the agencies and the departments and the military people that are working on this operation will continue to sustain and increase our operations in this city. We are not going away. We are staying here to liberate this city from the socialist and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country.”
To liberate this city. From its elected leadership.
And as Noem said earlier in her remarks, no one is safe:
“Just because you think you're here as a citizen or because you're a member of a certain group or you're not a citizen it doesn't mean that you're going to be protected and not face consequences from the laws that this country stands for.”
Think you’re here as a citizen. As for the laws this country stands for, remember that Noem testified falsely and buffoonishly that habeas corpus is a presidential power to remove people from the country and suspend their rights.
Yesterday’s assault on Padilla by unidentified Noemgoblins occurred, Noem said later, after Padilla “burst into the room” and started “lunging toward the podium.”
As Noem knows, she’s fucking lying. Video of her full remarks shows that she wasn’t even fazed by Padilla beginning to speak. The camera pans from her to the back of the room, giving a crystal clear idea of just how far Padilla was from the podium.
And because you can hear Padilla speaking, it’s also clear that he was attempting to ask her a question. He can’t be seen behind the row of cameras, but that’s the point: He stepped forward so he could be seen as he asked his question.
That’s when he’s assaulted. When he steps forward and speaks. And as they put their hands on him, he tells them he’s Senator Alex Padilla and they continue to push him into the hallway, where they practically hog-tied the man.
They claimed later that they didn’t know who he was.
Even though Noem has literally testified in front of Padilla. Even though he had obviously somehow gotten into a federal building and was standing within lunging distance — for Plastic Man — from the Homeland (sic) Security secretary, where they let him hang out until he dared open his fucking mouth.
And as Padilla said in a video last night, he was escorted to Noem’s news conference by a National Guardsman and an FBI agent. In fact, when the camera swings to Padilla, you can see that the door to the room is closed. So he was allowed in and then someone decided it was cool to close the doors with this unknown intruder inside.
Noem said afterward that goshgolly if only Padilla had asked for an appointment. First of all, it wasn’t a DHS building, it was a federal building. That makes it Padilla’s more than Noem’s. She was in his fucking house in his fucking socialist, burdensome state.
Secondly, as Padilla explained in his video, he’s gotten “little to no response” just requesting information — which DHS is legally bound to provide him! — from Noem.
But the lies are 1/1000th of the story here. The Homeland (sic) Security secretary said federal forces are usurping the elected officials of Los Angeles and the state of California.
Not on any legal grounds, but for “socialism” (sic) and “burdensome government.” And most media are barely mentioning that little tidbit of terror.
Plus, if Pres. Donald Trump can do this to Padilla — actually, fuck that noise. We're past hypotheticals.
They’re already doing all the ifs. They just did it to Padilla and they’re already doing it to everyone else.
Padilla closed his video last night vowing that, “We’re going to continue our job of oversight and to hold Donald Trump accountable, because what we’ve seen here cannot be normalized. It is not normal and we shouldn’t act normal.”
HOW NOT TO ACT NORMAL Acting normal is presumably what led seven Democratic senators back in January to help confirm Noem as DHS secretary. These seven:
John Fetterman (PA)
Maggie Hassan (NH)
Tim Kaine (VA)
Andy Kim (NJ)
Gary Peters (MI)
Jeanne Shaheen (NH)
Elissa Slotkin (MI)
No Democrat’s hands are totally clean. They all voted for at least one Trump nominee. Padilla voted for three: Unqualified Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, unenvironmental Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, and unconstitutional Secretary of State Marco Rubio, deporter of op-ed writers.
The idea behind these collaborationist confirmation votes is that Senate comity will protect them/us. It’s a comity of errors.
In protest, yesterday, House Democrats went en masse to the GOP leadership offices: Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD). They got nowhere.
And we, all of us, got here because Democrats for decades have failed to do enough to stand up for the rule of law and the Constitution. They’ve let one Republican administration after another skate on criminality and abuse of power. They’re continuing to do it right now, surprised at every step that things keep getting worse:
Rep. Al Green (D-TX) removed from the Capitol for live-fact-checking Trump’s lies. Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-NJ) arrested for trying to access a federal facility that the law demands that she have access to. And now Padilla.
If Republicans are willing to use powers they don’t have, Democrats must use all the powers they do have.
Even since the invasion of Los Angeles, Democrats have failed to put military and federal employees on notice of future accountability. As TFN newsfucked on Tuesday, no media or politician even named the U.S. Northern Command general at the top of the invasion food chain.
It was Gen. Gregory Guillot. Well, guess who Padilla was waiting to meet with when he popped in to Noem’s ShamPow infomercial? Guillot.
Any guesses whether Padilla was planning to advise Guillot that he’s carrying out unlawful orders? Or to preserve all communications and records for the subpoena he’s getting in January 2027?
Because I have a guess!
So, Democrats can right now, today, advise the Trump administration and everyone all the way down the chain of command that they will be held accountable if they obey unlawful orders. That definitely wouldn’t be normal. And there’s more they can do.
In February, less than a month into Trump2.0, the New Republic’s Aaron Regunberg explained how Senate Democrats, even in the minority, could “grind Senate business to a crawl.”
The Senate can only get a lot done if there’s unanimous consent to skip all the procedural bullshit. Y’know, the democracy! Roll-call votes. Debate.
Democrats could put holds on all nominees. They could demand quorum calls — forcing Republicans to ensure they’ve got 51 senators on the floor before they can resume processing America’s poor into protein paste and corporate tax credits. (The Revolving Door Project also has ways Democrats can gum up the executive machinery via their oversight role.)
Democrats aren’t doing any of this, even as the Trump administration rolls on and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act of death emerges from the Stygian depths. Hopefully, the violent, fascist, unrepentant humiliation and subjugation of a U.S. senator will suffice to change that as of today.
Because if Americans around the country can put their bodies on the line in tomorrow’s No Kings rallies, Democratic officials had better fucking show they’re in this, too. Before any more of us are in chains.
NOW WHAT? A federal appeals court will hear arguments on Tuesday over Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D-CA) lawsuit challenging Trump’s deployment of the California National Guard. Tuesday, it’s worth noting, is one thousand years from now.
And already, even before Saturday’s No Kings rallies, the anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) protests are spreading. That’s what Noem and Trump are vowing to squelch.
Trump’s approval ratings are currently at 38%. So let’s see what happens when he sends in Marines to rough up protesters in … :::checks map::: … Salt Lake City…
Israel and Iran Now at War That Never Would’ve Happened if Trump Were President
Remember we got confirmation just last month that Hamas made the Oct. 7, 2023, attack so awful and horrific precisely so that it would inspire an Israeli response obscene and monstrous enough to destroy Israel’s normalization talks with Saudi Arabia?
Well, on Sunday, Pres. Donald Trump was planning to send veteran diplomat real-estate developer Steve Witkoff to try to salvage U.S. nuclear talks with Iran. Trump even told Israel not to fuck things up.
Perhaps you see where this is going?
Overnight, Israeli rockets and missiles struck targets in Iran related not just to its nuclear program, but to its keeping its leaders alive program. Iran's military chief of staff, the Revolutionary Guard commander, and top nuclear scientists were killed in just the first few hours of an operation that could last days.
Iran responded with about 100 drones said to be targeting Israeli sites. (And Trump thought Harvard’s antisemitism was bad!)
After pulling non-essential U.S. personnel out of the region yesterday, Trump tried to keep U.S. targets out of the crosshairs, too, denying any U.S. involvement whatsoever in the military strikes by a U.S. ally the U.S. has been supplying with military weaponry and intelligence for decades.
MEDIA WATCH First of all, give ‘em hell any time you see any media outlet talking about the U.S. getting “drawn” into a conflict. Oh noes, here I am getting drawn 5,700 miles into a war.
But also, feast your eyes on the moral void created when a Beltway outlet contemplates the prospect of Earth’s tinderbox igniting:
“The Jewish nation’s decision to conduct a pre-emptive strike on Tehran’s nuclear facilities on Thursday night threatens to draw the United States into a Middle East conflict — and…”
And what, oh, savvy insider? “…and kill a million or so people like when Pres. George W. Bush drew us into a Middle East conflict?” Or “…and inspire decades of global terrorism and national-security autocracy complete with torture and black sites?”
Oh, no, tender Newsfucker. Politico contemplateth something of far more interest to its Beltway readership…
“…and split the MAGA coalition that catapulted Trump back into the Oval Office.”
That’s right, Politico’s discovered that the MAGA are mad about Israel, but not in the “I’m just wild about Harry” sense. Charlie Kirk said of his audience, “you guys ... are not thrilled with this.” Breaking Points host Saagar Enjeti called Israel’s attack “deliberate sabotage and a blatant attempt to force us into war,” which sounds an awful lot like criticizing Israel, the worst hate crime ever.
Three Quickies
The Senate yesterday confirmed former Rep. Billy Long (R-MO) to run the Internal Revenue Service into the ground. Long hates the IRS not just for the usual Republican reasons. But at least this nominee of Pres. Donald Trump has some relevant experience for the job. Long’s background includes work with tax credits, specifically tax credits that the IRS called a fraud. It’s sort of as if one were to nominate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., to be in charge of vaccines. No Democrats voted for Long, so maybe they’re getting the hang of this.
Critics of Pres. Donald Trump’s fascist, xenophobic campaign against immigrants got a powerful new ally yesterday. Trump’s “aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away,” said, um, Trump. He also said that undocumented workers who got here before Pres. Joe Biden are fine, upstanding, non-citizens, but said in another post yesterday apparently from the same brain that “Biden let 21 Million Unvetted, Illegal Aliens flood into the Country from some of the most dangerous and dysfunctional Nations on Earth — Many of them Rapists, Murderers, and Terrorists.” But Biden’s brain!
A political action committee backing disgraced former Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) for mayor of New York City put together a flyer aimed at Jewish voters and criticizing Cuomo’s Muslim rival, state Assembly member Zohran Mamdani. The PAC said the flyer was never released, and blamed a vendor for the flyer, which apparently used AI Qaeda to make Mamdani look like this1:
TCB
THANKS! I spent some time this week speaking with a congressional aide about an issue of mutual interest. And I spent a big chunk of time researching a story that’s entirely not at all clickbait and will get beaten up after school by SEO but is also really important.
In other words, I was able not to spend every waking hour posting hot takes. I was even able to report on and get White House comment on a second, exclusive story I’m hoping to post next week on my other Substack.
All of this is only possible because of the Newsfuckers supporting my work financially. Thank you. The latest fruits of our collective labor are coming!
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Go get ‘em, kids! If you can’t be in the streets peacefully Saturday, try to make some fuckin’ noise online! We got this…
TFN creator and writer Jonathan Larsen co-created Up w/ Chris Hayes and wrote for Countdown with Keith Olbermann at MSNBC, helped launch CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° and Air America Radio, and has also worked at The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Young Turks.
If Padilla looked like say, Scott Bessent, or had White Nationalist tattoos like Hegseth, the wouldn’t have been tackled. This is pure, unadulterated racism. I’ve been sickened by everything that has happened since November 6th, but this is the absolute worst, and it’s not going to get better.
“We are staying here to liberate this city from the socialist and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country.”
The country’s leadership has come so far from the bad old days of the Vietnam war, when leaders naively thought sometimes you have to destroy a city in order to save it.