Lone Candle
Champion of Truth
El Salvador had serious and deadly gang problems. They then heavily cracked down on crime while reaching out to youth with programs offering alternatives to a life of crime. The crime crackdown came with human rights issues and a weakening of democracy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-ed-O80Vtg
Trump called his Department of Justice lawyers weak and told them they needed to get on his retribution campaign. After this meeting, the lawyers went after the Fed chairman, Jerome Powell.
Unusually, some Republican Congressmen are breaking with Trump and criticizing this move.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owKy9QrEWZA
“First, the men at the center of the 60 Minutes segment were in fact shipped off to CECOT without any sort of judicial review. Second, even after the Supreme Court ruled that alleged “alien enemies” have a due process right to challenge their removal via habeas corpus petitions, the administration made that option nearly impossible to pursue in practice, as the Court subsequently recognized. Third, the government maintains that federal courts have, at most, a highly circumscribed role in these cases, saying they have no authority to question Trump’s historically unprecedented invocation of the AEA against alleged gang members.
Trump’s assertion of unreviewable power under the AEA is part of a broader pattern that became clear during his first year in office. He has made similar claims regarding his tariffs and National Guard deployments. In these and other cases, Trump’s position undermines civil liberties, the rule of law, and the separation of powers by attacking the crucial role that the judicial branch plays in making sure that presidents respect statutory and constitutional limits on their authority.”
https://reason.com/2026/01/01/3-areas-where-the-courts-pushed-back-against-trumps-attempts-to-avoid-judicial-review-in-2025/
Iran appears to be massacring its people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Grs_vJofF-k
“Rodríguez is neither gracious nor a reformer. She’s a self-identified communist who has held key positions under both former dictator Hugo Chávez and Maduro, Venezuelan political writer Paola Bautista de Alemán tells Reason. In 2017, Maduro tapped Rodríguez to be president of the illegitimate constituent assembly that usurped the powers of the elected National Assembly to silence the opposition. Later that year, Maduro appointed her to the “Anti-Coup Command,” tasked with taking measures against alleged coup plotters and terrorists, labels routinely applied to peaceful opposition figures.
As vice president, she oversaw the agencies responsible for repression and mass human rights violations. From 2018 until April 2021, Rodríguez exercised direct hierarchical control over the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (SEBIN), Venezuela’s feared intelligence service responsible for domestic surveillance and counterintelligence. Under Rodríguez’s leadership, the SEBIN acted as a political police to prosecute perceived enemies of the Maduro regime, including opposition leader Freddy Guevara, whom the agency detained in 2021, two days after Rodríguez publicly accused him of being involved in gang violence. Former SEBIN Director General Cristopher Figuera testified to the United Nations that he communicated with the vice president “practically every day,” including updates on wiretaps and surveillance of politicians.
In 2020, the U.N. concluded there are “reasonable grounds to believe” Rodríguez “knew or should have known” of crimes committed by SEBIN officials, including arbitrary detention and torture. Despite having the authority to prevent these crimes, she failed to do so.
In addition to human rights violations, Rodríguez has been accused of corruption and bribing international officials, as seen in the “Delcygate” scandal. Spanish investigators believe Rodríguez orchestrated a scheme in 2020 to sell 104 bars of Venezuelan state gold to Spanish businessmen through corrupt Transport Ministry officials. The deal allegedly took place at Madrid’s airport, where Rodríguez met with Spanish Transport Minister José Luis Ábalos despite being banned from entering E.U. territory.
The alleged operation extended further. After receiving $62 million in Spanish state aid in March 2021, Spanish airline Plus Ultra allegedly used the funds to repay “loans” to accounts linked to Venezuela abroad. Investigators believe the scheme laundered proceeds from both gold sales and embezzlement of Venezuela’s food distribution program—meaning funds meant to feed hungry Venezuelans may have been funneled into European bank accounts.
On top of this, there are accusations from former Venezuelan officials about Rodríguez’s role in the Cartel de los Soles
…
Rodríguez’s track record has earned her sanctions from the U.S., European Union, Switzerland, and Canada for corruption and undermining democracy.
…
When Maduro was captured, González and María Corina Machado, the opposition leader who won the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize and dedicated it to both the Venezuelan people and Trump, immediately called for González to assume his constitutional mandate as the legitimately elected president. David Smolansky, González’s official spokesperson, laid out the opposition’s vision: free political prisoners, restore democratic order, and welcome back the millions of Venezuelans forced into exile by the regime’s failures. Instead, Trump chose to work with Rodríguez, effectively sidelining Venezuela’s democratically elected opposition and forcing them to watch the U.S. partner with the very regime that stole their victory.”
https://reason.com/2026/01/06/who-is-delcy-rodriguez-venezuelas-acting-dictator/
“Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powellsaid Sunday the Department of Justice has served the central bank with subpoenas and threatened it with a criminal indictment over his testimony this summer about the Fed’s building renovations.
The move represents an unprecedented escalation in President Donald Trump’s battle with the Fed, an independent agency he has repeatedly attacked for not cutting its key interest rate as quickly as Trump prefers. The subpoena relates to his testimony before the Senate Banking Committee in June, Powell said, regarding the Fed’s $2.5 billion renovation of two office buildings, a project that Trump criticized as excessive.
Powell on Sunday cast off what has up to this point been a restrained approach to Trump’s criticisms and personal insults, which he has mostly ignored. Instead, Powell issued a video statement in which he bluntly characterized the threat of criminal charges as simple “pretexts” to undermine the Fed’s independence when it comes to setting interest rates.
“This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions — or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation,” Powell said.”
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/federal-chair-powell-says-doj-005819943.html
The reason so many Trump prosecutions are failing to get indictments is because he is charging people with weak evidence and for political reasons.
“Grand juries have emerged as a major stumbling block for Trump’s drive to use the criminal courts to exact retribution on his perceived political foes.
Federal grand juries operate in near-total secrecy and decide whether prosecutors can bring a criminal indictment in the first place. Unlike trial juries, they don’t need to be unanimous; rather, a majority of their 16 to 23 members must agree to return an indictment. And their only job is to determine if the Justice Department has brought a plausible case — a relatively low standard which led to the cliche that prosecutors could get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich.
But in the Trump era, grand juries are no longer a rubber stamp. Instead, they’ve become a headache for prosecutors trying to advance controversial Trump policies like mass deportations and militarizing law enforcement. Dozens of recent cases in Washington, D.C., have been met with so-called “no bills” — the shorthand for a grand jury declining to return a bill of indictment. And grand juries in other jurisdictions have turned down high-profile cases that Trump has prioritized.
…
The administration also seems to be losing because it’s pushing for indictments in cases with weak evidence, and due to the unpopularity in some parts of the country of tough tactics against protesters and of policies like Trump’s crackdown on undocumented immigrants. and
U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan recently marveled at the “apparent prosecutorial machinations” at work, emphasizing the “unprecedented” actions prosecutors have taken to bring cases — even when grand juries have rebuffed them.
“Most troubling, prosecutors have rushed to charge cases before properly investigating them,” the Washington-based Biden appointee lamented.
…
The Constitution’s requirement that a grand jury approve serious criminal cases was adopted as a safeguard against executive power and political prosecutions. The move stemmed from what many revolutionaries regarded as political trials instituted by British authorities.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2026/01/07/trump-grand-juries-letitia-james-comey-indictments-00713579
“Trump may have pardoned Cole last year as part of the sweeping clemency that he gave to Jan. 6 offenders on his first day back in office.
…
Trump’s proclamation commuted the sentences of 14 individuals and also granted “a full, complete and unconditional pardon to all other individuals convicted of offenses related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.” This immediately covered roughly 1,500 people, including hundreds of defendants who were charged with assaulting or resisting law enforcement officers.
Lawyers for Cole did not respond to a question about whether they intend to argue that Cole is entitled to a pardon if convicted. But there are several legal and factual points that are worth zeroing in on if they pursue that strategy.
For starters, it does not matter whether Trump specifically intended to pardon the person who planted the pipe bombs. Under the law, it is the text of the pardon that matters — not the subjective intention of the president or the DOJ’s interpretation of it.
…
Cheerleaders of the sweeping Jan. 6 pardon did not bat an eye when Trump knowingly freed people like Stewart Rhodes and Enrique Tarrio — leaders of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, respectively, who were convicted at trial of a seditious conspiracy to prevent the transfer of power to Joe Biden. And they have remained silent as some of the people that Trump pardoned have gone on to commit more alleged crimes — a predictable development given the empirical evidence on recidivism rates among convicted felons. Some of these crimes have been explicitly political in nature, including threatening to kill House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.
For all that’s happened in the last year, Trump’s Jan. 6 pardon remains one of his most stunning acts since he returned to office.”
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2026/01/06/jan-6-pipe-bomber-trump-pardon-column-00712039
Multiple law firms gave in to illegal, autocratic demands by the president. When it came down to it, big law firms didn’t want to risk resisting an aggressive president. Democracy is vulnerable and we won’t keep it unless people defend it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8mCMe9MDpk
“The Trump administration is using a law against impeding federal law enforcement to threaten and arrest people who are recording and protesting immigration officers. However, an unprecedented number of those cases are falling apart once they go to court, according to media investigations, think tank reports, and voluminous court records and video evidence.
…
“On their own, yelling, protesting, honking a horn, blowing a whistle, following, and recording are all clearly First Amendment–protected activities, even if done during law enforcement operations,” Bier wrote. “Of course, it is possible to follow an officer in a dangerous manner or physically interfere while recording an operation or protesting, but following and recording by themselves without physical interference are clearly protected.”
…
It would be tempting to call these cases failures, and they are in a legal sense, but the administration’s real goal isn’t to win cases. It’s to intimidate American citizens into giving up their First Amendment right to peacefully oppose and monitor the police.”
https://reason.com/2025/12/18/the-trump-administration-is-abusing-a-law-to-threaten-ice-protesters-the-cases-are-falling-apart/