Lone Candle
Champion of Truth
“it would appear this would be another “emergency” that the president will declare to force through policy changes that in nonemergency times would require going through the federal rule-making process or even, gasp, Congress.”
https://reason.com/2025/09/02/the-trump-administrations-fake-housing-emergency/
A key part of keeping Peru’s currency stable are reforms that made their central bank independent from politicians. Trump is currently weakening this separation in the United States.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDayhEHc5OE
“A conservative election researcher whose faulty findings on voter data were cited by President Donald Trump as he tried to overturn his 2020 election loss has been appointed to an election integrity role at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Pennsylvania activist Heather Honey is now serving as the deputy assistant secretary for election integrity in the department’s Office of Strategy, Policy and Plans
…
The political appointment, first reported by Democracy Docket, shows how self-styled election investigators who have thrown themselves into election conspiracy theories since 2020 are now being celebrated by a presidential administration that indulges their false claims.
Her new role, which didn’t exist under President Joe Biden, also comes as Trump has used election integrity concerns as a pretext to try to give his administration power over how elections are run in the U.S.
The president has ordered sweeping changes to election processes and vowed to do away with mail ballots and voting machines to promote “honesty” in the 2026 midterms, despite a lack of constitutional authority to do so. Trump’s Department of Justice also has demanded complete state voter lists, raising concerns about voter privacy and questions about how the federal government plans to use the sensitive data.
…
Since 2020, she also has led a variety of election research groups whose flawed analyses of election data have fueled right-wing attacks on voting procedures, including in battleground states Pennsylvania and Arizona.
In 2020, her election research misrepresented incomplete state voter data to falsely claim that Pennsylvania had more votes reported than voters. Trump echoed the falsehood during his speech to supporters on Jan. 6, 2021, saying Pennsylvania “had 205,000 more votes than you had voters.” Shortly after, his supporters violently attacked the U.S. Capitol in an effort to prevent Biden from becoming president.
In 2021, Honey was involved in the Arizona Senate’s partisan audit of election results in Maricopa County, she confirmed in a podcast interview with a GOP lawyer. That review in the state’s most populous county, which spent six months searching for evidence of fraud, was described by experts as riddled with errors, bias and flawed methodology. Still, it came up with a vote tally that would not have altered the outcome, finding that Biden actually won by more votes than the official results certified in 2020.
In 2022, Honey’s organization Verity Vote issued a report claiming that Pennsylvania had sent some 250,000 “unverified” mail ballots to voters who provided invalid identification or no identification at all.
Officials in Pennsylvania said the claim flagrantly misrepresented the way the state classified applications for mail-in and absentee ballots. The “not verified” designation did not mean the voter didn’t provide accurate identification information, nor did it mean their ID wasn’t later verified.
Former Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer said he received dozens of public records requests related to elections from Honey during his time in office, which took up “scores of hours of staff time.” He said he was surprised to hear she had been elevated to a position of such “authority and responsibility.”
From what he saw, Richer said, she’s “not a serious auditor.”
Honey’s hiring at the Department of Homeland Security comes amid reports that Trump’s administration has met with several other election conspiracy theorists in recent months.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/26/dhs-election-security-2020-election-conspiracy-00527453
“Independence has underpinned financial markets’ trust in central banks for half a century and has provided much of the basis for the U.S.-led international economic order.
Across the Atlantic, Cook’s counterparts at the European Central Bank are alarmed that Trump’s moves could not only set a dangerous precedent — but also have a tangible impact on their own policymaking, which is inexorably influenced by the course charted by the Fed.
“Attacking the independence of the Fed, the Trump administration inflicts a serious damage to the American economy,” said Bank of Greece Governor Yannis Stournaras in emailed comments to POLITICO. “The implications will come sooner rather than later.”
When independence is threatened, monetary policy “becomes dysfunctional, it starts doing things that it shouldn’t do,” European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde told Fox News in an interview Sunday before Trump’s move to oust Cook, but after he had already signaled he wanted her out.
“The next step is disruption. It is instability, if not worse. So I think that this should not be debated,” Lagarde added.
…
Others expressed a similar wariness, with one Governing Council member, granted anonymity to candidly discuss the sensitive subject, fretting that a breach of the Fed’s independence could have “enormous repercussions on the financial world,” while also stressing the basic principle of due legal process that’s not been afforded to Cook.”
https://www.politico.eu/article/donald-trump-attack-federal-reserve-lisa-cook-alarm-europe-economic-stability/
““Deals with the Trump administration simply do not create the kind of lasting certainty everyone is desperate for, because certainty, predictability and strict fidelity to treaties are not White House objectives,” said Dmitry Grozoubinski, a former trade diplomat and author of the book “Why Politicians Lie About Trade.””
https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-faces-first-reality-check-fragile-trade-truce-donald-trump/
Trump’s clash with the courts is delaying trials in New Jersey and could drag on for months
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/26/trumps-courts-new-jersey-habba-00527352
“Pharmacists’ authority to vaccinate individuals varies across state lines. In some places, it’s dependent upon a federal advisory process that Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has upended.
At the same time, the Food and Drug Administration has signaled that it will only approve updated Covid vaccines for individuals 65 and older and for younger people considered to be at high risk for severe disease. People, regardless of where they live, may need to prove that they need the shot.
…
If the FDA narrows eligibility, people between 6 months and 65 years old who want a Covid vaccine this fall likely will have to navigate some roadblocks.
They, or their parents, may need to convince pharmacies and doctors that they have at least one of the underlying conditions that the FDA has suggested makes them eligible for a dose. The list includes asthma, diabetes, cancer, mood disorders and obesity. It’s unclear at this point what would serve as adequate proof.
…
Further complicating vaccination efforts for children this year: the FDA may pull Covid vaccine-maker Pfizer’s emergency use authorization for its shots for children under 5.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/22/covid-shot-hhs-recommendations-fall-00519315
The big city libs want to fund rural hospitals in flyover country. Trump does not.
“President Donald Trump pressed Congress in July to pass his big tax and spending law, which slashed more than $1 trillion from health care programs and could lead to an estimated 11.8 million people losing their health insurance. It also included cuts to what’s known as the provider tax, which nearly all states use to increase Medicaid payments to hospitals, in part to help them fund services in rural communities where providing care may not otherwise be financially possible.
By one estimate, the law’s tax cuts could force more than 300 rural hospitals to close. In Erwin, Tennessee, it may mean Unicoi Hospital never reopens, leaving the county without any hospitals or emergency rooms.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/22/54-survivors-a-flooded-hospital-and-trumps-political-bloodbath-00518507
Trump administration makes legal immigration more difficult.
“The Trump administration said Tuesday it will begin to interview neighbors and colleagues of some immigrants applying for U.S. citizenship, restoring a practice that hasn’t been used since the George H.W. Bush administration.
…
While the 1965 Immigration and Naturalization Act requires these neighborhood checks, the U.S. government hasn’t enforced that since the 1990s. Instead, U.S. officials have relied on the FBI to conduct background checks.
The change is the latest move by the Trump administration to add requirements or steps to the legal immigration process. In recent months, the administration has reduced the amount of time foreign nationals can stay in the United States on student visas and imposed new requirements on the diversity visa lottery requiring applicants to have valid passports at the time they submit their documentation. The administration has said its goal is to limit visa overstays and conduct proper scrutiny of migrants.
…
The agency added that it may also begin requiring applicants for U.S. citizenship to submit letters of recommendation from “neighbors, employers, co-workers, and business associates who know the alien and can provide substantiated information about the alien, including any of the requirements for naturalization.”
The memorandum said the agency will encourage applicants to submit these letters proactively and will consider the testimonials as part of its decision whether to conduct in-person checks of the applicant’s workplace and the surroundings of their home.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/26/trump-neighborhood-checks-citizenship-applicants-00527680
“In tossing out the lawsuit, U.S. District Judge Thomas Cullen — an appointee of Donald Trump — lamented what he described as the White House’s months-long “smear” of the federal judiciary.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/26/trump-judge-rebukes-white-house-smear-00525450