WATCH:

The gang of violent Venezuelans known as Tren de Aragua actually is worse than that sounds, according to a new report.

Because the gang now has been linked to the Venezuelan government.

It is the Washington Stand that reported according to a Federal Bureau of Investigation study, “Venezuela’s socialist president Nicolás Maduro and his deputies are using criminals from the Tren de Aragua (TdA) transnational gang as ‘proxies’ to ‘destabilize’ foreign nations, including Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and the U.S.”

The report said, “The FBI anticipates that TdA members the Venezuelan government has sent to the U.S. will, within the next six to 18 months, begin targeting and killing other Venezuelan nationals who have been opponents or critics of Maduro’s administration.”

President Donald Trump several times has charged that the Venezuelan government is weaponizing criminals in dangerous gangs and sending foreign terrorists into the U.S.

“These findings should shock Americans but not the law enforcement community,” a Trump administration official who was not identified, told Fox News.

“They reflect the sentiments of numerous other intelligence assessments across multiple agencies.”

That official explained Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro “is a Marxist dictator who hijacked a once-prosperous Venezuela and brought in nothing but total economic collapse and gang takeover. He crumbled Caracas, now overrun with drugs and violence, and wants to do the same across the United States by sending his most violent and dangerous criminals into our communities.”

The Trump administration has worked to utilize several laws to crack down on the illegal access to the United States by the gang members, and to deport those who have arrived.

The fact that the Venezuelan government is “aiding and abetting” the terror gang was confirmed, in the report, by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

An official in the ODNI assessed that the links between the terrorists and the government there mirror “the behavior of the Taliban in Afghanistan and other Middle Eastern failed states like Syria and Libya that have welcomed terrorists with open arms.”

While a National Intelligence Council report accessed by the AP claimed there’s no link, one expert suggested that was incorrect, based on “leakers.”

The “propaganda media conveniently did not include [more accurate intelligence] because it gets in the way of their biased narrative and attempt to deceive the American people,” the expert said.

DNI Tulsi Gabbard explained, “The Office of the Director of National Intelligence fully supports the assessment that the foreign terrorist organization, Tren De Aragua, is acting with the support of the Maduro Regime, and thus subject to arrest, detention and removal as alien enemies of the United States.”

The State Department earlier this year designated TdA as a foreign terror organization.

Trump has said, “TdA is closely aligned with, and indeed has infiltrated, the Maduro regime, including its military and law enforcement apparatus. Venezuelan national and local authorities have ceded ever-greater control over their territories to transnational criminal organizations, including TdA. The result is a hybrid criminal state that is perpetrating an invasion of and predatory incursion into the United States, and which poses a substantial danger to the United States.”

In just the past few days, several dozen TdA members and leaders have been charged under the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Most of those defendants are in custody.

 

U.S. Customs duty collections soared more than 60% in April, marking the highest monthly revenue haul in terms of dollars in American history.

According to newly released Treasury Department data reviewed by Bloomberg, at least $15.4 billion in customs duties and related excise taxes flowed into federal coffers last month, $6 billion more than the month before. This spike in revenue coincides with the first wave of President Donald Trump’s newly implemented tariffs taking effect. Those include a renewed 25% tariff on steel and the “universal” 10% tariff Trump announced on April 2.

Daily collections — payments made at the time goods enter the country — rose nearly 40% in April compared to March.

While the April numbers reflect the 25% increase, it does not account for most of the 10% universal tariffs. May’s total could climb even higher as the full scope of the tariffs kicks in, Bloomberg reports.

Trump has long championed tariffs as a key component of his “America First” economic strategy not only as a way to protect American manufacturers from cheap foreign imports, but to generate revenue.

Critics in D.C. flatly rejected the idea of tariffs as a legitimate trade strategy, but before the income tax was introduced in 1913, tariffs were the primary way America funded its government.

Trump has said repeatedly that one of his goals is to reduce reliance on income taxes — and tariff revenue is part of how he plans to do it.

”There is a chance that the money from tariffs could be so great that it would replace (the income tax). You know, in the old days, about 1870 to 1913, the tariffs were the only form of money. And that’s when our nation was relatively the richest. We were the richest,” President Trump told Fox News.

However, $15 billion is a relatively small sum compared with the entirety of the bill the country owes. The national debt is currently more than $36 trillion. During the first half of the fiscal year, Washington racked up a $1.31 trillion deficit.

Economists who have doubted Trump’s trade strategy from the beginning are still not convinced. “If you get to $100 billion to $200 billion, you’ll be pretty lucky,” Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s, told CNBC earlier this month.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Florida State Senate Minority Leader Jason Pizzo announced Thursday he is leaving the Democratic Party, promptly stepping down from his position.

Pizzo, who had served as a member of the Florida Senate since 2018, said during a speech on the Senate floor that “the Democratic Party in Florida is dead.” He added that he had mailed in a voter registration form to switch his party affiliation to “no party affiliation.”

The Miami-area lawmaker claimed that Florida’s political system was similar to “the infighting, power struggles, corruption and decline of civic virtue that pervaded and eventually ushered in the fall of Rome.”

“So, too, are we players, or perhaps props, in the mess that is bottom partisanship,” Pizzo added during his speech. “Our constituents are craving practical leaders, not political hacks.”

“The party my dad volunteered for with JFK when he was 18 years old in 1960 is not the party today,” the senator went on to say, referring to the Democratic Party. “It craves and screams anarchy and then demands amnesty. That is not okay.”

Florida State Sen. Lori Berman was elected as the Florida Senate’s new minority leader shortly after Pizzo’s announcement, Florida Politics reported.

Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried said in a statement Thursday in response to Pizzo’s announcement that the state party was “more united without him.”

“Jason Pizzo is one of the most ineffective and unpopular Democratic leaders in recent memory, and his resignation is one of the best things to happen to the party in years,” Fried wrote in the statement. “His legacy as leader includes continually disparaging the party base, starting fights with other members, and chasing his own personal ambitions at the expense of Democratic values.”

Pizzo’s decision to leave the Democratic Party follows months of speculation that he may launch a gubernatorial bid in 2026 to succeed incumbent Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is term-limited from seeking reelection.

“Senator Pizzo didn’t leave the Democratic Party; the party left him,” Evan Power, chairman of the Republican Party of Florida, said in a statement Thursday. “Senator Pizzo is the third Florida Democrat to leave the party in the last few months.”

In December, two Florida state representatives, Hillary Cassel and Susan Valdés, announced they were switching their party affiliations to the GOP, increasing Republicans’ majority in the state House.

While Florida was a hotly-contested swing state within the last decade, President Donald Trump won the state in the past three presidential elections. In the 2016 presidential election, Trump won the Sunshine State by less than two points securing 48.6% of the vote in Florida, compared to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 47.4%.

In 2020, Trump notched 51.2% of the vote in Florida, while former President Joe Biden secured 47.9%.

Trump notably widened his margins in Florida in the 2024 presidential election, receiving 56.1% of the vote to former Vice President Kamala Harris’ 43%. The president carried Pizzo’s home county of Miami-Dade by 11 percentage points in 2024 after losing it by seven in 2020 — marking a swing of 18 points and making him the first Republican to win the majority-Hispanic county since 1988.

Pizzo did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Already, a former judge in New Mexico and his wife have been arrested for housing an alleged member of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua terror organization, and a Wisconsin judge has been charged for helping an illegal alien escape from federal agents who arrived at the courthouse during his hearing to take him into custody.

That’s probably not the end of actions against activist judges who use their judicial powers to thwart the president’s border security agenda, according to Attorney General Pam Bondi

“No one’s above the laws in this country,” she said. “And if you are destroying evidence, if you’re obstructing justice, when you have victims sitting in a courtroom of domestic violence and you’re escorting a criminal defendant out a back door, it will not be tolerated, and it is a crime in the United States of America. Doesn’t matter who you are, you’re going to be prosecuted.”

Pam Bondi on judges arrested for alleged interference with immigration enforcement: “No one is above the law.” pic.twitter.com/6YABhh0u5Y

— Fox News (@FoxNews) April 25, 2025

The latest arrest was of Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Hannah Dugan, who was taken into custody by the FBI for allegedly hiding a previously deported illegal immigrant in her jury room in order to stop him from being arrested by ICE.

This judge broke her oath to uphold the law https://t.co/tjlPThrfyW

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 25, 2025

Fox News reported Dugan was charged with obstruction.

In an interview on “American Reports,” Bondi explained how the Trump administration will handle judges who obstruct and block federal efforts to secure the border and remove illegal aliens.

“We are going to prosecute you, and we are prosecuting you. I found out about this the day it happened,” she said.

“We could not believe, actually, that a judge really did that. We looked into the facts in great depth… You cannot obstruct a criminal case. And really, shame on her. It was a domestic violence case of all cases, and she’s protecting a criminal defendant over victims of crime.”

Dugan is accused of protecting illegal alien Eduardo Flores-Ruiz after his criminal court hearing before Dugan just days ago.

“Dugan demanded that the (federal) officers proceed to the chief judge’s office and – after his hearing ended – escorted Flores-Ruiz and his attorney out a restricted jury door, bypassing the public area where agents were waiting in order to help him avoid arrest, per the complaint,” the report said.

Bondi pointed out then Flores-Ruiz fled on foot, creating a threat to the public.

“We’re sending a very strong message today,” she said. “If you are harboring a fugitive, we don’t care who you are. If you’re helping hide one, if you are giving a TDA member guns, anyone who is illegally in this country, we will come after you and we will prosecute you. We will find you.”

The earlier arrests were of ex-New Mexico Magistrate Judge Joel Cano, and his wife, Nancy Cano.

They allegedly harbored suspected Tren de Aragua terror group member Cristhian Ortega-Lopez.

 

President Donald Trump has been waging a war of tariffs for weeks now.

He’s trying to balance the international trade scene, where for years American companies have been subjected to high tariffs to get their products into foreign countries, while manufacturers in those countries essentially have an open door to American consumers.

Trump announced a long list of high tariffs for other countries, and as was his plan, they are now coming by the dozens to seek trade deals with America that would reduce those, possibly even reaching equality those for U.S. producers.

One of the most belligerent respondents to Trump’s campaign was China, which announced tariffs of more than 100% for American products when Trump did the same for Chinese goods.

But that standoff may be crumbling.

A report from Fox Business explains that China expert, and Gatestone Institute senior fellow, Gordon Chang, has delivered his assessment of the fight.

He believes there’s now a “win” for Trump and China is now “caving” on the issue, as China apparently has been creating exemptions for its tariffs for some U.S. goods.

Trump has confirmed he’s talked with China several times, but he wasn’t ready to deliver details.

There is no country who has abused and ripped off America more than China.

President Trump is stopping it and putting America First.

The era of economic surrender is over. pic.twitter.com/wwwKC9Dsqp

— Karoline Leavitt (@PressSec) April 10, 2025

Chang concluded, “China is doing this, but it’s not announcing it. It’s just not imposing the tariffs on aviation products, industrial chemicals, and semiconductors. It’s sort of like the Chinese way of doing it,” Chang explained during an interview on Varney & Co.

Trump, responding to questions on the issue, said, “I don’t want to comment on that, but I’ve spoken to him many times. I’ll let you know at the appropriate time. Let’s see if we can make a deal.”

Watch the latest video at foxbusiness.com

Fox noted that China said it was not negotiating with the U.S. on trade, but a later published report confirmed China’s Ministry of Commerce taskforce was working on a list of items to be exempted from tariffs.

Reporter: “China is saying it is fake news that you had a meeting.”

Trump: “They had a meeting this morning.”

Reporter: “Who’s they?”

Trump: “Doesn’t matter who ‘they’ is.”

pic.twitter.com/TWvrwUmPSp

— Spencer Hakimian (@SpencerHakimian) April 24, 2025

Fox News host Jesse Watters on tariffs:
“What these tariffs are doing to China is collapsing their economy, increasing unemployment, and possibly toppling their regime. So, if they don’t want their regime to fall, they better make a deal with us.” pic.twitter.com/4jtlrxpytQ

— SilencedSirs (@SilentlySirs) April 13, 2025

The report added, “Chang predicts the tariff back-and-forth between China and Trump’s America ‘can go on for a very long time.’” But he said Xi Jinping has put himself in a box.

“And I believe that if he comes to a deal with the U.S., he’s got to explain that to the Chinese people. That’s going to be very difficult for him. You can’t say, ‘Well, I’m now dealing with the U.S.,’ because that would be undercutting everything that he has said to his own people for years,” he said.

 

 

The judicial branch serves as a vital check on executive and legislative authority. This instrumental role has come into sharp focus during Donald Trump’s presidency. Courts have repeatedly challenged his policies, prompting forceful responses from Trump that have fueled debates over judicial independence.

The judiciary has intervened in several high-profile Trump initiatives. During his first administration in 2017, federal courts halted Trump’s executive order banning travel from several Muslim-majority countries, citing violations of constitutional protections. The president fired back, labeling one judge a “so-called judge” and questioning the judiciary’s legitimacy.

Another significant clash occurred in 2018 when courts blocked Trump’s attempt to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which shields undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as minors from deportation. He appealed these decisions, criticized judges as biased, and pursued a broader strategy of appointing conservative jurists—such as Supreme Court Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh—to reshape the judiciary.

Democrats, meanwhile, decried Trump’s various actions as assaults on the judicial branch’s supposed history of impartiality, ironically ignoring that they themselves had attempted to unravel the court’s apolitical nature through what Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called “court expansion.”

Democratic Party leaders like Senator Adam Schiff have continued to assert that Trump’s attacks on judicial rulings and his efforts to influence the courts mark an “unprecedented” breach of democratic norms. They point to his public denunciations and judicial appointments as threats to the separation of powers, suggesting a level of executive overreach unseen in prior administrations.

This view, however, does not fully account for the historical context of executive-judicial friction, which has flared up at key moments since the nation’s founding.

During the drafting of the Constitution, Anti-Federalists expressed alarm that an overly strong judiciary might usurp the authority of the people or other branches. The Anti-Federalist author Brutus contended that the true danger of the judiciary was that “there is no power above them, to control any of their decisions…. In short, they are independent of the people, of the legislature, and of every power under heaven.” In an 1815 letter to William Torrence, Thomas Jefferson asserted that judicial supremacy was a power not given to the court in the Constitution, and that the judiciary had no right to supersede the executive’s Article II powers.

Federalists, in contrast, defended judicial review as a necessary safeguard against tyranny.

This foundational debate established a recurring tension in American governance.

The debate reemerged under President Andrew Jackson. In 1832, Jackson vetoed the recharter of the Second Bank of the United States, despite the Supreme Court’s previous decision in McCulloch v. Maryland upholding the bank’s constitutionality. He argued that the president could independently interpret the Constitution, famously stating in his veto message, “The opinion of the judges has no more authority over Congress than the opinion of Congress has over the judges, and on that point the president is independent of both.”

That same year, in Worcester v. Georgia, the Supreme Court ruled Georgia lacked authority over Cherokee lands, yet Jackson defied the decision, declaring, “John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it.” Pointing to Federalist 78, which claimed the court has “neither FORCE nor WILL,” Jackson felt justified.

His stance underscored a bold challenge to judicial supremacy, continuing a controversy that resonates with the contemporary disputes in our current political climate. It is clear, then, that Trump’s confrontations with the judiciary, while striking, are not without precedent.

Since the beginning of his second term, the Trump administration has continued to echo earlier episodes in American history. Trump’s March 16th Truth Social attack on Judge James Boasberg over a deportation ruling, followed by continued flights despite a court order, and Vice President JD Vance’s February 9th X post questioning judicial supremacy amid defiance of a Rhode Island funding order, suggest a similar dismissal of judicial authority.

Viewed in this light, Trump’s actions represent a continuation of a long-standing struggle over the balance of power rather than a wholly novel disruption. Trump’s confrontations with the judiciary continue a centuries-old debate over the balance of power in American governance that shows no signs of abating.

Years before he ran for office, Donald Trump cultivated a style of speaking that was brash, blunt, and (in his opinion) totally honest. “I tell it like it is,” Trump said repeatedly on the campaign trail in 2016, breathing new life into a slogan used by politicians dating back to Richard Nixon, and hinting at a powerful rhetorical mode first described by the ancient Greeks.

In The Constitution of Athens, Aristotle tells a story of the tyrannical ruler Pisistratus, who went into the countryside to observe the farms upon which he imposed taxes. Seeing a farmer working a dry piece of ground, Pisistratus approached the man to ask what the land produced for him. Not recognizing Pisistratus, the man replied: “Aches and pains! And that’s what Pisistratus ought to have his tenth of!” As king, Pisistratus had the prerogative to kill the farmer on the spot, but he was so impressed with the man’s frank speech – his parrhesia – that he exempted the farm from taxation.

Since the beginning of Trump’s political career, nothing has bothered the establishment more than the way he speaks, and what he says. Whether the criticism is valid is irrelevant because Trump’s parrhesiastic style of speaking helped put him in the Oval Office.

In a series of lectures titled Fearless Speech, leftist French philosopher Michel Foucault derives five criteria that must be met to classify speech as parrhesiastic:

• The statement must be completely frank – the speaker cannot hold anything back and must “say everything.”
• It must be the truth as the speaker understands it.
• It must be unadorned: It cannot obscure the meaning with rhetorical flourishes, implicit claims, or abstractions.
• It must be critical: It voices criticism of the audience and tells them things they don’t want to hear.
• Finally, in order to qualify as parrhesia, the speech must entail some risk for the speaker

Leftists have long celebrated those bold enough to “speak truth to power,” and this phrase is an apt encapsulation of the concept of parrhesia. But as the American Left consolidated its control of the country’s most powerful institutions, they have become increasingly intolerant of speaking truth to power – at least when the power is theirs.

Unlike Pisistratus, who rewarded the farmer’s bold honesty with a tax exemption, American elites are intolerant of any criticism of their rule. They silence it when they can, and punish it when they can’t. Their refusal to accept and respond to criticism is a powerful demonstration of their unfitness to rule: They see themselves as above criticism, and they see parrhesia as a threat to their power. Thus, the self-appointed defenders of “our democracy” show themselves to be the enemies of democratic deliberation. Attacking and intimidating critical voices eventually can cause people to stop criticizing – and that is the antithesis of democracy and democratic deliberation.

Over the last 15 years, the institutional Left has aggressively censored and destroyed their critics. As a result, many people – at least those with something to lose – have gone silent. For a long time, the establishment took the absence of criticism as a tacit endorsement of their governance. Then came Trump, who only spoke louder as the censures, attacks, and penalties grew.

When the Left claimed that Trump was an elitist billionaire out of touch with regular people, those close to him defended him as a man of the people. His children recalled how their father talked to the workers at construction sites. “One of the reasons he has thrived as an entrepreneur is because he listens to everyone,” Ivanka Trump said in her 2016 speech at the Republican convention. “Billionaire executives don’t usually ask the people doing the work for their opinion of the work. My father is an exception.” Many corporate and government executives use power to insulate themselves from both their customers and the workers who create their products. Trump is different, Ivanka said, because he wants to see for himself whether things are working the way he’s been told. In other words, Trump wants to know the truth, as did Pisistratus in Aristotle’s story.

There’s a practical reason behind this: A leader needs good information to make sound decisions.

In 2017, when his three- and four-star generals advised that the best way to end the war in Afghanistan was by sending more troops, Trump dismissed his generals and called for a meeting with lower-ranked combat veterans who had experienced the war firsthand. “I don’t want any generals in here. I don’t want any officers,” Trump said. “I’ve heard plenty of ideas from a lot of people but I want to hear it from people on the ground.” They told him we were losing the war; they said it was unlikely we would prevail. The parrhesia of the enlisted troops impressed Trump, so he scheduled another meeting. Later, huddling with senior military officers in the Situation Room, Trump channeled his own parrhesia, saying that the troops knew “a lot more than you generals.”

For 10 years, Trump has built his political career upon frank, unadorned criticism of the institutional power base in this country and abroad. And although he occupies the most important position in the world, it would be a mistake to say that his parrhesia risks nothing. The entrenched power structure weaponized intelligence agencies against him, impeached him twice, unleashed personal attacks, exacted onerous legal penalties, barred placement of his name on state ballots, and, ultimately, tried to kill him. It’s not because he’s a boor; he’s always been one. It’s not because he’s rich; many wealthier people elude such persecution. It’s not because of his fame; those who seek to destroy Trump love celebrity. It’s because of his speech – what he says and how he says it. Trump doesn’t hold back. His critique of the system is plain, succinct, and brutal.

And that is what the establishment can’t stand.

Adam Ellwanger is a professor at University of Houston – Downtown, where he teaches rhetoric and writing. Follow him at @1HereticalTruth on X.

John J. Waters is a lawyer. He served as a deputy assistant secretary of Homeland Security from 2020-21. Follow him at @JohnJWaters1 on X.

The Trump administration dismantled a major marriage fraud operation that raked in millions of dollars attempting to give immigration benefits to illegal migrants.

Federal immigration authorities uncovered a “sophisticated network of individuals” who recruited, enticed and groomed American citizens into bogus marriages with foreign nationals in order for them to illegally obtain immigration benefits, according to a Friday press announcement by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). The major bust marked the Trump administration’s latest efforts to stop illegal migrants from taking advantage of the U.S. immigration system.

“Some marriages are made in heaven. Some are just made up,” USCIS spokesperson Matthew Tragesser told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“Our work with ICE in this investigation dismantled a major marriage fraud ring where U.S. citizens were paid to marry illegal aliens,” Tragesser said to the DCNF. “These criminals are now behind bars, reaffirming President Trump and [Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s] commitment to restoring integrity in our immigration system.”

Dubbed “Operation Bargain Bride,” federal law enforcement officials in March charged four individuals tied to the large-scale conspiracy in the Maryland area, according to USCIS. The individuals allegedly charged non-citizen clients anywhere from $20,000 to $40,000 per marriage union, generating an estimated $4 million in illicit proceeds.

“These arrests marked a critical milestone in our broader effort to dismantle a criminal network undermining our nation’s immigration laws,” Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Baltimore Special Agent in Charge Michael McCarthy said during the Friday press conference.

McCarthy added that investigators identified more than 100 cases in which immigration benefits were sought via allegedly fraudulent marriages. So far, USCIS has denied more than 100 petitions and applications filed by or on behalf of foreign nationals.

On Thursday, federal agents arrested 10 foreign nationals who allegedly “knowingly participated” in these marriage fraud schemes.

“Let me be clear, this is not a victimless crime,” McCarthy continued. “Marriage fraud compromises the integrity of our immigration system, it diverts critical resources and it erodes public trust.”

Operation Bargain Bride was conducted as a joint operation between Homeland Security Investigations Maryland and USCIS, with support from the U.S. Attorney’s Office from the District of Maryland. McCarthy said the investigation remains ongoing, and that they are continuing to pursue all those allegedly involved in the sophisticated marriage fraud scheme.

“Fraudulent marriages should never lead to U.S. citizenship,” Tragesser said to the DCNF.

Leftist judges appointed by extremists in American politics like Joe Biden and Barack Obama have been part of a strategic warfare against President Donald Trump, according to a new analysis by the Federalist.

And the failure of the Supreme Court to rein in their actions means the credibility of the Supreme Court itself is collapsing.

Recent polling, in fact, showed more than half of Americans have an unfavorable view of the court.

The analysis explained: “Throughout Wednesday and Thursday alone, judges across multiple venues handed down decrees barring numerous executive actions taken by the president since returning to office. From DEI to election policy, these cases are but a few of the more than 170 lawsuits Democrats and left-wing political actors have filed to sabotage Trump and the 77 million Americans who voted for him.”

This is the lawfare that the high court “seems to have no interest in stopping it,” it said. “The nation’s highest court has had ample opportunities to halt these lower court judges’ destructive antics but has repeatedly declined to do so.”

One missed opportunity was the March ruling in which the court, 5-4, refused to shut down a ruling from a Biden judge who demanded that the government hand out $2 billion in cash through USAID to various outsiders. The Trump administration had shut down those operations and canceled funding programs for their obvious bias and corruption.

Justice Samuel Alito pointed out the politics involved: “Does a single district-court judge who likely lacks jurisdiction have the unchecked power to compel the Government of the United States to pay out (and probably lose forever) 2 billion taxpayer dollars? The answer to that question should be an emphatic ‘No,’ but a majority of this Court apparently thinks otherwise.”

That decision, the analysis confirmed, “all but gave the green light to activist judges across the country to take similar actions on leftist-backed lawsuits filed in their respective jurisdictions.”

Why would the court move that direction? The analysis explained, “SCOTUS’s inclination to tolerate judicial tyranny among the lower courts is perhaps unsurprising, however, given that a majority of the justices have indicated their own infatuation with overstepping the constitutional limits erected by America’s founding document.”

That resulted in a decision, “in the dead of night on Easter weekend, without explanation,” when seven of the justices “essentially usurped the executive branch’s authority over immigration by blocking Trump’s deportation of Venezuelan gang members.”

The result, the analysis pointed out, is that “the high court’s antics are doing more damage to its reputation than leftists’ smear campaigns ever could.”

“By refusing to rein in the lower courts’ lawlessness, the justices have authorized a judicial coup that is stymying the will of the 77 million Americans who voted for Trump.”