Tag: donald trump

Trump Says He Will Speak to Taiwan President, Prompting Panic in China

President Donald Trump told reporters that he would speak to Taiwanese President William Lai Ching-te on Wednesday, downplaying the significance of such a conversation by adding, “I speak to everybody.”

Trump’s comment follows a visit to communist China just a week ago in which he claimed to have a positive personal relationship with genocidal dictator Xi Jinping. While the Chinese government attempted to describe Taiwan as an issue of significance in their conversations, the White House’s descriptions of the visit suggest that topics such as economic cooperation, the ongoing war with Iran, and Chinese students in American universities took priority over Taiwan.

Taiwan, formally the Republic of China, is a sovereign, democratic state off the coast of communist China. The Chinese government falsely claims Taiwan as a “province” that belongs under Beijing’s rule, disparaging its legitimate government as a rogue “separatist” entity. As a result of China’s outsized geopolitical leverage, Taiwan is routinely excluded from basic activities of normal states, such as participation in the United Nations or bilateral negotiations with almost all of the world’s countries, including America.

America’s recognition of China means that the United States does not technically recognize Taiwan as a country, a policy established by leftist former President Jimmy Carter in 1979. While Washington does sell weapons to Taiwan, no president has ever held a conversation with a Taiwanese president since Carter’s policy went into effect. The closest contact between a Taiwanese and an American leader occurred in 2016, when then-President Tsai Ing-wen held a phone conversation with President Trump, who at the time had yet to be inaugurated into the presidency.

Trump suggested on Wednesday that he could soon hold a conversation with Lai, Tsai’s successor, but offered no details.

“I’ll speak to him,” he said when asked while preparing to board Air Force One. “I speak to everybody… We’ll work ⁠on that, the Taiwan problem.”

Reuters cited a “person familiar” with the situation on Wednesday who said that no concrete plans for such a conversation had been formalized yet.

Lai issued a speech in Taipei on Wednesday defending the existence of his country and rejecting any foreign interference, first and foremost from China.

“Taiwan’s future cannot be decided by forces outside our borders, nor can it be held hostage by fear, division, or short-term gain. Taiwan’s future must be determined together by our 23 million people,” he said, according to the Taipei Times. “True peace can only be secured through strength.”

Lai was asked what he would say to Trump if he had the opportunity to speak to him.

“My government is committed to maintaining the status quo, and Taiwan is also a guardian of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait,” he responded. “Second, China is the one undermining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.”

The Taipei Times observed that Trump last year approved $11 billion in arms sales to Taiwan, a record high sum that indicated high support for the country. Trump has since suggested that any future sales to Taiwan would depend on America’s relationship with both Taipei and Beijing. He noted that he has yet to approve pending weapons sales to the country, telling Fox News, “I’m holding that in abeyance, and it depends on China. It depends. It’s a very good negotiating chip for us, frankly.”

“I want them to cool down. I want China to cool down,” Trump added.

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Blumenthal: If Dems Win Midterms We Can ‘Stop’ the Anti-Weaponization Fund

Thursday on MS NOW’s “The Briefing,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) said if Democrats win control of “one or both Houses of Congress” in the midterm elections, they could bring a lawsuit to stop the Department of Justice’s so-called anti-weaponization fund.

Blumenthal said, “I think that Trump may have taken the Republicans in the Senate a ballroom too far. The ballroom itself was absolutely abhorrent to them because it’s so deeply unpopular, and they didn’t want to vote on it. And behind the scenes, I will tell you, a number of my Republican colleagues told me they were absolutely delighted that the parliamentarian declared that it couldn’t be part of the reconciliation package.  And now Trump was forcing them to vote on something that would actually potentially doom them this November. And again, I talked to Republican colleagues who said that there was just no way they were going to vote for it, even before Blanche came to talk to them.”

He added, “I think there’s a real possibility for conscience to be demonstrated. And I know we’ve said it again and again and again, but now is the time. And there are other remedies to the possibility of legislation like these amendments that we’re offering, the possibility even of clawing back some of this money if there is a Democratic administration. The possibility that one or both Houses of Congress, in the event that we take control over them, could bring a lawsuit to stop it. These kinds of possible avenues of remedy and redress are there, apart from what Republican colleagues do. But there is also the opening for a real conscience driven action.”

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Trump Admin Moves to Supercharge Deportations with Unprecedented Immigration Judge Addition

The Justice Department announced on Thursday the onboarding of over 80 new immigration judges, the largest addition in agency history.

The Executive Office of Immigration added 77 full-time judges and 5 temporary ones, according to a DOJ news release.

“The Trump administration is committed to reestablishing an immigration judge corps that is dedicated to restoring the rule to the law in our nation’s immigration system,” Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said.

“Today, we are onboarding the largest immigration judge class in agency history. This could only happen thanks to President Trump’s decisive leadership and commitment to securing our borders. I also applaud EOIR’s leadership team for helping facilitate these hiring efforts and recruiting highly qualified and talented personnel in record time,” he added.

EOIR has hired 153 permanent immigration judges since the start of the fiscal year Oct. 1.

The DOJ noted, “Reducing the immigration court backlog remains one of the highest priorities for the agency. Since January 20, 2025, EOIR has completed more than 1.08 million cases and has reduced its pending caseload in immigration courts by more than 447,000 cases, bringing the pending caseload down from approximately 4 million to under 3.53 million, the sharpest decrease in caseload in EOIR’s history.”

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Electric Bills Could Be 2026 Election Shocker

If all politics is local, as former House Speaker Tip O’Neill said in tying politicians’ fortunes to constituents’ pocketbooks, then a voter’s electricity bill is about as local as an issue can get, landing on kitchen tables every month.

With electricity costs spiking for many of the nation’s 133 million households, this local issue could determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress or Democrats seize one or both chambers in November’s midterm elections.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, average residential electricity rates increased nationwide nearly 13 percent from April 2020 to April 2025. Since President Donald Trump returned to office in January 2025, they’ve increased 6 percent.

Electricity prices are expected to increase, on average nationwide, by another 6 percent in 2026, the administration projects, and as much as 40 percent by 2030, warns economic development finance firm ICF.

The reason is simple: supply and demand. The North American Electric Reliability Corp. projected in its 2026 long-term reliability assessment report that electricity demand will increase in the coming decade by 70 percent more than what was estimated in 2024. Many analyses find that overall demand will increase 25 percent by 2030.

The surge is driven by the development of power-hungry data centers, artificial intelligence computing, advanced manufacturing, and “the electrification of everything,” with the average home featuring up to 21 digital devices – all eating electricity all the time.

The solution is also simple: The nation’s 2,896 utility companies must increase the electricity their power plants produce with the most abundant, least expensive energy sources. Meanwhile, the nation’s seven major grid operators must add up to 7,500 miles a year to their 240,000-mile network of high-voltage transmission lines while also upgrading up to 100,000 miles of those live wires, through 2035.

But determining what solutions work best and what long-term investments to make is a complex $1 trillion challenge mired in partisan politics and buried in century-old federal, state, and local regulations.

Not only are utilities and regional transmission operators amping up from a standing start after nearly two decades of inertia, but many are scrambling to keep pace with swelling demand while also building out generation and transmission capacities to meet projected need.

The cost of these capital improvements is showing up in customers’ electricity bills, leading to heightened scrutiny of investment decisions and generation choices, as well as spurring debate about how individual communities want to develop, all while meeting a Trump administration mandate to expand rapidly to win the “AI arms race” with China.

The focus and investment is long overdue, said Robert Bryce, a film producer and author of a widely read Substack on the grid and seven books on energy policies, including, “A Question of Power: Electricity and the Wealth of Nations.”

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The Trump Administration Is Facing Scrutiny for How It’s Handing Out Billion-Dollar Border Wall Contracts

When Tommy Fisher set out to build a section of border wall in South Texas during the first Trump administration, the project quickly became ensnared in controversy. Experts raised concerns about shoddy construction and signs of erosion.

Beyond that, Fisher’s company had received funding from a group called We Build the Wall, an influential conservative nonprofit that included President Donald Trump’s then-political strategist Steve Bannon as a board member. Some of its leaders eventually went to prison for their involvement in the venture.

Even the president denounced the project.

“I disagreed with doing this very small (tiny) section of wall, in a tricky area, by a private group which raised money by ads,” Trump wrote on X in response to reporting by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune in 2020 detailing problems with the wall project.

“It was only done to make me look bad,” the post continued.

But none of this stopped Fisher’s company from getting subsequent border wall contracts, including from the state of Texas. And now the federal government has awarded his company over $9 billion to build even more border wall — including a $1.2 billion contract in the Big Bend region of Texas, where residents have continued to press for answers about the government’s plans in and around one of the country’s largest national parks.

And, as during Trump’s first term, Fisher’s work is stirring up controversy again. A New York-based construction company has sued the Trump administration after it awarded the bulk of new Texas border wall contracts to North Dakota-headquartered Fisher Sand & Gravel and another company.

Posillico Civil Inc.’s lawsuit, filed in the Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C., on May 13, offers one of the first public glimpses into the procurement process along the border in Texas. The suit claims that out of the 11 prequalified vendors for the wall projects, U.S. Customs and Border Protection awarded nearly $14 billion — about 73% of the value of the contracts — to just two: Fisher’s firm and Barnard Construction, based in Montana. The work also includes wall projects around El Paso, Laredo, Del Rio and the Rio Grande Valley.

The Trump administration has come under scrutiny for awarding no-bid contracts and for the lack of transparency around its accelerated border wall construction plans, moves designed to help the president achieve his key campaign promise of securing the border.

During his first term, Trump’s moves also faced criticism. A 2020 investigation by ProPublica and the Tribune found that the government was awarding contracts before acquiring titles to the land, leading to millions of dollars in costs related to delays. A review of federal spending data by the news organizations also revealed how the first Trump administration had made hundreds of contract modifications, increasing the cost of the border wall project by billions.

The administration has shown no signs of slowing down: The U.S. Department of Homeland Security secured $46.5 billion to build the border wall in 2025, thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

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Iran’s Controversial Bill Offers $57 Million Bounty for Assassinating Trump Amid Rising Tensions with the U.S.

As Iran’s foreign ministry evaluates a new U.S. proposal amidst escalating regional tensions, a controversial bill offers a reward for the assassination of President Trump and others.

Currently, Iran is assessing the proposal from the United States aimed at addressing ongoing regional tensions. This development coincides with a visit from Pakistan’s interior minister to Tehran, who is working to facilitate a potential agreement. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has issued a warning to the United States regarding the negotiations.

In parallel, President Donald Trump has reiterated that he is “in no rush” to finalize any agreement with Iran.

The Islamic Republic is also set to vote on a bill that would grant a significant monetary reward to anyone who kills President Donald Trump, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and/or CENTCOM commander Brad Cooper. The proposal requires the government to allocate the equivalent of $57,922,500 to any individual or organization that successfully assassinates President Donald Trump and others. This measure is framed as a response to the deaths of Iran’s leader and military commanders, for which the country holds the United States and Israel responsible.

Trump has faced multiple assassination plots since he ordered the killing of Qassem Soleimani, the commander of the IRGC Quds Force in Iraq, in 2020. Most recently, reports indicated that Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed in a joint operation carried out by the United States and Israel. Airstrikes were executed on February 28, 2026, aimed at destroying his compound in Tehran.

In response to the current ongoing conflict, Ebrahim Azizi, the head of parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, announced on state television that lawmakers have drafted multiple bills, including one titled “Reciprocal Action by Military and Security Forces of the Islamic Republic.”

He boldly declared that “the vile president of the United States, the ominous and disgraceful Zionist prime minister, and the CENTCOM commander must be targeted and subjected to reciprocal action.” U.S. Central Command is led by Admiral Brad Cooper, who took on the position in August 2025.

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US Deploys Aircraft Carrier To Caribbean As Trump Admin Pressures Cuba

The U.S. military command operating in the Western Hemisphere said on May 20 that an aircraft carrier strike group entered the Caribbean Sea, as the Trump administration heaps pressure on the Cuban communist regime.

In a post on X, U.S. Southern Command said that the USS Nimitz is now in the Caribbean and released video footage of the carrier group. Southern Command did not provide more details about why the carrier group traveled to the region.

The Nimitz, it said, “has proven its combat prowess across the globe, ensuring stability and defending democracy from the Taiwan Strait to the Arabian Gulf.”

The Nimitz, commissioned in 1975, carried out joint naval exercises with the Brazilian Navy off the coast of Rio de Janeiro last week, the U.S. Embassy in Brazil said in a May 14 statement.

On May 20, the Department of Justice (DOJ) unsealed a criminal indictment against former Cuban leader Raul Castro, and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio released a video in Spanish urging Cubans to reject the country’s communist leadership.

According to the DOJ indictment, Castro was indicted in connection with the 1996 downing of civilian planes operated by Miami-based exiles. Castro, now 94, was Cuba’s defense minister when the planes were shot down, killing four people.

The charges against Castro, the brother of former Cuban leader Fidel Castro, drew pushback from the country’s current leader, Miguel Diaz-Canel, in a post on X.

“This is a political maneuver, devoid of any legal foundation, aimed solely at padding the fabricated dossier they use to justify the folly of a military aggression against Cuba,” Diaz-Canel wrote.

This year, U.S. President Donald Trump has been ratcheting up talk of regime change in Cuba and said he would potentially initiate a “friendly takeover” of the country if its leadership did not open up its economy to American investment and kick out U.S. adversaries.

When asked what will happen next for the U.S. embargo on Cuba on Wednesday, Trump said, “We’re going to see.” He added that the U.S. government is ready to provide humanitarian assistance to what he described as a failing country.

Trump said that “there won’t be escalation” between the United States and Cuba, adding, “I don’t think there needs to be.”

“Look, the place is falling apart. It’s a mess,” Trump added. “They’ve really lost control of Cuba.”

In Cuba, there is no food, electricity, or energy, Trump said, adding that the U.S. government will have to act to assist the country.

Earlier this month, CIA Director John Ratcliffe traveled to Cuba to meet with the country’s top officials, a visit that came as the country’s energy minister said the island has completely run out of fuel and that its power grid is in a critical state.

In January, the U.S. military launched an operation in Venezuela that captured its president, Nicolas Maduro, an ally of the Cuban regime, and took him to the United States to face drug-trafficking charges.

Since September 2025, the U.S. military has been launching strikes against suspected drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean in what the military calls Operation Southern Spear.

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The US indictment of Raúl Castro and the record of CIA terror against Cuba

On May 20—marking 124 years since the US ended its military occupation of the island and the Cuban Republic was formally proclaimed in 1902—the Trump administration delivered its most naked threat yet against the island.

The US Justice Department unsealed an indictment on murder and conspiracy charges against Raúl Castro, 94, in connection with the 1996 downing of two aircraft operated by the Miami-based exile group Brothers to the Rescue.

Retired from public office for nearly a decade, Castro previously served as Cuba’s president and leader of its ruling party. He was one of the comandantes of the guerrilla army led by his brother Fidel that came to power in 1959.

Hours before the indictment was announced, Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted a Spanish-language video addressed directly to the Cuban people, demanding regime change and advocating the policy of recolonization that Washington is pursuing across Latin America.

The unsealing of the indictment in Miami Wednesday resembled less a legal proceeding than a campaign rally with Washington’s counterrevolutionary agents gathered to cheer for Donald Trump and applaud the prospect of direct US military intervention against Cuba.

Amid this right-wing celebration, one question was noticeably ignored: Who will be held accountable for the 66 years of unrestrained US violence, killings and terror against Cuba?

The indictment against Raúl Castro is an abominable act of political propaganda to justify a planned military aggression against an impoverished nation of less than 10 million people.

The three-decade-old incident referred to in the indictment is the February 24, 1996 shootdown of two Brothers to the Rescue planes over the Straits of Florida, which has been systematically misrepresented by every US administration since Bill Clinton’s. The Clinton administration, the Republican Party and the corporate media all denounced it as “cold-blooded murder,” invoking international statutes barring the use of military force against civil aircraft. The CIA insisted that José Basulto, the pilot of the plane that escaped, and the others were not paid US intelligence agents.

None of this was true. The Cuban Embassy in the United States responded to the indictment by recalling that Cuba had formally denounced more than 25 territorial violations by Brothers to the Rescue between 1994 and 1996—protests that Washington systematically ignored.

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GREENLAND TIES: US Opens New Consulate in Nuuk, Strengthening Its Presence in Arctic Island

The size of the new consulate spells the importance Greenland now has for the Trump administration.

The diplomatic dance continues between the United States, the presently leaderless kingdom of Denmark, and the autonomous territory of Greenland.

Three Days after special envoy Jeff Landry visited the island for a conference, the US inaugurated yesterday (21) a new consulate in Nuuk, while some Greenlanders turned up to protest.

The new US consulate in Nuuk shows the Donald J. Trump administration ‘sharpening its focus on the Arctic’.

Politico reported:

“The inauguration of the new, 3,000-square-meter complex in Nuuk’s city center has prompted protests from native Greenlanders, with the island’s premier, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, telling local outlet Sermitsiaq that he will not attend the event.”

“Trump reopened the American consulate in 2020 during his first term, but it initially had to be housed in a Danish Joint Arctic Command building.”

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Rep. Tim Burchett Warns GOP He’ll “Embarrass” Colleagues if Trump Agenda Stalls — Vows to Do “Whatever It Takes” to Push SAVE America Act Before Midterms

Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) is done playing nice.

In a fiery interview, the Tennessee congressman made it crystal clear that patience inside the Republican conference is wearing thin as key elements of President Donald Trump’s America First agenda remain bogged down in Washington gridlock.

Burchett blasted the slow pace of Congress and warned fellow Republicans that if they keep dragging their feet on critical legislation, including election integrity measures such as the SAVE America Act, they’re going to have a very uncomfortable time.

Burchett: If we listen to what President Trump proposes, and in his cuts and things, I think we would be ahead everywhere. But we’re not. We’re running our own little game, and that’s going to cost us. I believe the redistricting has helped us, mainly a Trump initiative.

The price of gasoline, honestly, I think is what people are going to be going to the polls about, either yay or nay, wherever it is. They have a very short memory that it was higher under Biden than it is even now. But with the media constantly bombarding them with all that, you’re not going to get that message.

So people are upset, and they have a right to be. I just wish we would follow President Trump’s initiative from day one and stop with all this nonsense.

You know, it’s like DOGE. I’m chairman of the DOGE Committee, and it’s just like pulling teeth to get any cost-saving measures through these committees.

But I’m just a little different. I don’t work for anybody up here. I work for the good people of Tennessee. And so I don’t care if I tick off every chairman up here. I don’t care. I’m going to embarrass them if they don’t start moving our legislation.

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