DCUM Weblog

Cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump is waging a war against the state of Minnesota. There is really no other way to put it. He first sent in over 3,000 masked thugs in an attempt to brutally suppress the population. In reaction, thousands of Minnesotans mobilized to protect their neighbors and resist the federal occupiers. While agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol killed Renee Good and Alex Pretti, the federal forces were ultimately forced to concede defeat. But Trump has not given up on punishing Minnesota. Yesterday, Vice President and reply guy JD Vance announced that the federal government would halt $259 million in Medicaid reimbursements to the state. This is economic warfare targeting the most vulnerable Minnesotans.

During his State of the Union address, Trump engaged in his typical false and racist claims, exaggerating the extent of fraud in Minnesota's federally funded welfare programs. In addition, Trump announced that Vance would lead an effort to combat fraud. But make no mistake, fraud is not the motivating issue. Rather, fraud is a pretext to excuse another move by Trump to punish Minnesota for having the audacity to stand up to him. As I have previously written, this is an administration of Internet trolls. They have no interest in the tedious work of creating policies that improve people’s lives. Rather, they seek headlines and social media content, mostly aimed at demonstrating that they are "owning the libs." The idea that Vance is interested in combating fraud when the biggest fraudster in the nation is his boss is ludicrous. There has been well-documented fraud in the state of Mississippi in which Trump and Vance have shown no interest. Mississippi is a red state, and the fraud involves former National Football League quarterback and friend of Trump, Brett Favre. That is not a case that would be politically beneficial for Vance's photo-ops.

Today's post is not only going to be deep in the weeds, it is going to be buried in the soil beneath the weeds. Unless you are a fan of esoteric legal disputes, this topic will likely only be of interest to residents of the District of Columbia. I suspect even many who live in D.C. will be prone to skipping the post simply because it sounds boring. It is boring. But, this could have a major impact on your D.C. taxes and, potentially, even require you to refile your 2025 returns. The issue is a move by the D.C. Council in December to decouple the District's tax code from certain provisions of federal tax law.

First, what does it mean to "decouple?" "Decouple" may seem like a fancy word for divorce, and that is actually not too far off. Historically, the D.C. tax code, along with the tax codes of most states, was aligned — or coupled — to the U.S. tax code. As a result, if the federal government, for instance, decided to change the tax on widgets, the same modification would be reflected in D.C. taxes. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, passed by Congress and signed into law by cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump last summer, contained a number of tax cuts, mostly benefitting businesses. Glen Lee, the District's Chief Financial Officer, estimated that if D.C. taxes were similarly modified, the D.C. government would lose more than $600 million over the next four years. In response, the D.C. Council approved two bills to decouple, or unlink, D.C. taxes from several provisions in the U.S. code, in effect preventing the federal tax changes from being passed on to the local tax code.

Last night, cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump "truthed" on his Truth Social social media network that "Wow! Gavin Newscum just dropped out of the Presidential Race!!! President DJT". California Governor Gavin Newsom, in fact, has not dropped out of the presidential race and responded by imitating Trump's posting style and writing, "WOW. THE PRESIDENT IS SUNDOWNING HARDER THAN USUAL TONIGHT!!! — GOVERNOR GCN". It is hard to know what provoked Trump's assertion about Newsom, and it could be something as simple as viewing an artificial intelligence-generated video showing Newsom withdrawing. Regardless, the "truth" remains in Trump's feed, just another example of the disconnect from reality of our current president. It is under the leadership of this dimwitted, brain-addled candidate for an assisted living facility that we are apparently about to go to war with Iran.

Last Friday I wrote about bad economic news that cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump received, including a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that the reciprocal and fentanyl tariffs that have been Trump's favorite policy choice are unlawful. As expected, this sent Trump into a tizzy from which he has still not recovered. In that post, I suggested that Trump would find an authority other than the International Emergency Economic Powers Act – the legal basis for Trump's tariffs that the Court ruled did not provide authorization — but that no current law provided the type of authority that Trump desires. I speculated that "More than likely, Trump will simply impose tariffs, claiming authority that the law does not allow, and then wait for his action to be litigated in the courts." This is exactly what Trump did. While I was still writing Friday's post, Trump announced global tariffs of 10% based on authority provided by Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. However, a plain reading of Section 122 does not support a lawful invocation in current circumstances. Therefore, the newly imposed tariffs will almost certainly be contested in the courts and, more than likely, ruled unlawful.

Cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump has had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, and as I write this, it is not even 10:30 a.m. So far today, there has been nothing but bad news for Trump, most of it relating to the economy. White House staff has likely been forced to make Costco runs in order to get sufficient quantities of ketchup bottles to be thrown at the wall. This morning, gross domestic product numbers have come in lower than expected, inflation has been higher than predicted, and the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that Trump's tariffs — his absolute favorite policy to wield on any occasion — are unlawful.

Trump has been suggesting that 15% growth in Gross Domestic Product is possible. Today's release of GDP numbers, however, showed that in the fourth quarter, GDP only grew at a 1.4 percent annual rate. This is down from a 4.4 percent rate in the third quarter. For 2025 as a whole, GDP increased 2.2 percent, compared with 2.3 percent for 2024.

I have been writing for months about cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump's intention to interfere in the November midterm elections and, likely, any subsequent elections. Trump's motivation is easy to understand. He is currently running an authoritative regime that is almost as much a crime syndicate as it is a government. He is completely unhindered by the Republican-controlled Congress. However, the likely Democratic takeover of one or both chambers of Congress in November would bring Trump's rogue regime to a standstill. Suddenly, administration officials would be facing hearings and potential impeachment, there would be restrictions on administration behavior in spending bills, and, worst of all for Trump, he could no longer rely on Congress to be little more than a rubber stamp. So important are the midterms, and so likely are Democratic chances of success, that Trump has become increasingly desperate and increasingly obvious in his attempts at election interference. The most prominent attempt at election interference at the moment is the SAVE America Act, a bill that has passed the U.S. House of Representatives that places restrictions on voter registration and voting. Moreover, the bill requires states to submit their voter data to the Trump administration so that the government can identify ineligible voters who must be removed from the rolls. The SAVE America Act would give the federal government unprecedented control of the elections and provide Trump with the tools that he needs to affect the election outcome.

Yesterday, the world lost an icon of civil rights with the death of Reverend Jesse Jackson. It is a bit cliché and was said a lot yesterday, but Jackson was a bridge from the civil rights era to the present. Or, as someone else wrote, he linked Martin Luther King Jr. to Barack Obama. But another civil rights champion passed away yesterday as well. Reverend Graylan Scott Hagler was mostly unknown on the national scene and not nearly as well known in Washington, D.C. as he should have been, but he was a fierce advocate for social justice. I am going to skip my normal rant about cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump and his administration and spend some time reflecting on Reverend Hagler.

For those not familiar with Reverend Hagler, he was a leader of Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ (UCC) in Washington, D.C. for more than 30 years. He passed away yesterday after a struggle with cancer. At the time of his death, Hagler was Pastor Emeritus of the church. Reverend Jamall Calloway, who followed Hagler as senior minister, said that "This world will never know the true depth of our loss. He was utterly amazing. Now the days ahead will forever be filled with unimaginable grief and mourning."

Yesterday I wrote about the speech given by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Munich Security Conference held in Munich, Germany. The speech was the clearest indication to date of cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump's vision for a future international order. As I wrote, what Rubio outlined was a version of the current rules-based system with its worst aspects magnified. I should have added that the best aspects of the rules-based system would be weakened. The result would be an international system primarily aimed at benefiting the United States, with other countries expected to play little more than a supporting role. I ended yesterday's post by noting that much of Rubio's speech dealt with an ahistorical version of history. I will discuss that aspect of his talk today.

Two days ago, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio addressed the Munich Security Conference held in Munich, Germany. European leaders had been apprehensive about the speech due to recent friction between the United States and its European allies, which included threats by cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump to take over Greenland, and on-again, off-again tariffs on European imports to the United States. However, Rubio urged cooperation between the U.S. and Europe and a renewed and strengthened alliance. Ultimately, however, Rubio did not so much propose a new international system but rather a version of the old world order with some of its worst faults compounded. His version of the future provides a stark contrast to the remarks of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at the World Economic Forum held in Davos, Switzerland. In many ways, Rubio's talk justified the stance taken by Carney and could well provide additional impetus to Carney's perspective of the future.

Just over a month ago, I wrote a blog post titled "The Lies the Government Tells," which described how cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump and members of his administration constantly spread falsehoods. I specifically mentioned the shooting death by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer of Renee Good. Immediately after Good was killed, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem spread a number of lies about Good and what had occurred. When Alex Pretti was similarly killed a few days later, government officials again reflexively lied about him. To their credit, many mainstream media reporters have challenged Trump administration officials about the obviously false statements they have made. However, I am still not sure that there is a complete understanding of just how embedded lying is in the culture of the Trump administration. Today, I am going to discuss two additional shootings about which Department of Homeland Security officials immediately lied. However, while lying to the public and the media is one thing, lying to a court is quite another. In both of these cases, the truth came out during judicial processes.