The Rogue Voice Podcast with Linsay Rousseau

Everybody in America is paying for Donald Trump's fecking war with Iran at the gas pump, except Donald Trump and his oil buddies, who are making a fortune off it. And a week before the midterms, he bragged about it at a rally.

Saturday, in Perry, Georgia: "My people say, please don't mention that, sir, people are paying a little higher." And then, "I don't give a damn, I'm gonna say it: We're making a freaking fortune."

Who's paying? You, for a war nobody but him asked for. Six in 10 Americans say attacking Iran was the wrong call. The other four are checking their Exxon stock.

"A little higher," he says. Gas was $2.98 before the war. Monday it was $4.29. That's up 44%. If my landlord raised my rent 44%, I wouldn't call it a little higher. I'd call it a hostage situation.

Diesel went from $3.76 to $6.35, almost 70%, and diesel hauls your groceries, so you're paying in the cereal aisle too. Remember when he promised to cut your energy prices in half? Wrong direction, my dude.

Democrats on the Joint Economic Committee say the average family has paid $856 more for gas since the war started. In Wyoming, it's $1,454. That's a car payment, and Trump picked the car.

Who's making the fortune? Big Oil. Countries cut off by his war are buying ours, and in his words, "they're coming to Texas and they're coming to Oklahoma and they're coming to Louisiana." Exxon's quarterly profit roughly doubled. Chevron's nearly quadrupled. When Trump says "we," he doesn't mean you.

In 2024, Trump asked oil executives at Mar-a-Lago to raise $1 billion for his campaign and called it a "deal." Now they're cashing the check, and you're covering it at the pump.

Of course Trump got a piece. It's the only reason he does anything. The same committee says he started this year with as much as $45.8 million in oil and gas stocks. Now it's as much as $81.6 million. And more than 94% of his oil and gas stock purchases this year came after he started the war.

He started a fire, then bought the gas station across the street.

The White House says his portfolio is "independently managed by third-party financial institutions." Sure. A totally independent manager who went oil shopping right after Trump bombed Iran. If that portfolio is wearing a blindfold, it's peeking.

So that's the ledger. You're out $856. Exxon roughly doubled its profits. Trump's oil stocks nearly doubled. The rich get richer, you get a gas light.

And he knew this war would pay. Two weeks in, he posted, "when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money." In September: "Right after the election, oil prices are going to be tumbling downward." Right after the election. Not now. After you vote.

Ten years of lying, and the one time he tells the truth, it's that he's getting rich off your gas tank. Remember that at the polls. Remember every Republican who let him get away with it, and the Democrats, like John Fetterman, who helped. You've been paying a little higher for months. Now it's their turn to pay.

Sources:

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-says-he-doesnt-give-a-damn-about-gas-prices-as-us-making-fortune-12615894

https://fortune.com/2026/10/26/trump-iran-war-gas-diesel-prices/

https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/882c6c1d-9f11-40d2-8b51-920a014788b1/final-oct-update-jec-report-on-trump-oil-and-gas-stocks-1-.pdf

https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-gasoline-prices

https://www.boston25news.com/news/business/his-own-words-trump/V6WOBMBQGA7I3NZAAY22QZZEVY/

https://247wallst.com/investing/2026/10/26/trump-says-were-making-a-freaking-fortune-from-the-iran-wars-oil-spike-heres-what-the-economic-data-actually-show/

https://www.mediaite.com/politics/trump/trump-stunned-oil-execs-demanding-they-raise-1-billion-for-his-campaign-promising-deal-of-lower-taxes-regulations-report/

https://www.aol.com/articles/6-10-disapprove-iran-war-163720743.html

https://abcnews.com/Politics/senate-fails-adopt-iran-war-powers-resolution-despite/story?id=136722629

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/trump-cut-energy-costs-oil-prices-rcna169004

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Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch ruled it "justified" when a Senatobia cop shot and killed 1-year-old Kohen Wiley over an alleged pack of Pampers. Two days later the cop quit, which sounds like accountability until you learn he kept his state police license. Any department in Mississippi could hire him tomorrow, and since he was never decertified, there's no national red flag stopping another state either.

Let's go to the body cam, which the state sat on for four months. June 14th. Officers are already inside the Walmart on an unrelated call when an employee runs in yelling, "the two girls are running." They're accused of taking diapers. Kohen's mom says her friend paid. She's in the front passenger seat with Kohen in her arms. Officers run out, guns drawn, and plant themselves in front of the car. The driver backs up, pulls forward, and swerves between two of them. As the car passes him, Sergeant Hunter Foster fires into the passenger side window. Foster is white. Kohen, his mom and her friend are Black.

Senatobia's own police policy says officers "will not" discharge firearms into a fleeing vehicle. Apparently that's printed in the same font as "employees must wash hands."

The state's version is that the car was "almost striking" an officer. The classic: they were trying to run us over. Turns out diaper theft is a gateway crime to vehicular homicide. Foster once got sued over a Southaven Waffle House call for writing in his report that a driver nearly ran over an officer, when the surveillance video showed no such thing. He denied it, and it ended in a confidential settlement. So "the car almost hit me" is less a defense and more his catchphrase.

Then Lynn Fitch, the state's top prosecutor, closed the case. No charges. She said there wasn't enough evidence for a grand jury. Kohen's grandmother found out on Facebook. By Fitch's own count, she's ruled police justified in 82 of 86 officer shootings. That's a 95% approval rating, a number normally reserved for rubber stamps and North Korean elections. She's running for governor next year.

Governor Tate Reeves said it was "very clear" the driver "attempted to run over the policeman." He admitted he hadn't watched the video. He found time to defend the cop. He couldn't find time to press play.

Kohen's grandmother watched it. Her review: "You shot my grandbaby from the side of the car."

At the hospital, an officer's body cam caught him saying, "I didn't even see a baby in her" bleep "lap." Which is why you don't fire into a car you can't see into.

The Department of Public Safety confirms Foster is still certified and another department "could legally hire him." In most jobs, killing a toddler gets you fired. In Mississippi policing, it's a lateral move.

That's how bad cops travel. The next department runs a background check and sees two words: resigned, certified. Kohen's family wants that license pulled and a federal investigation. From Trump's Justice Department, which tore up the police reform deals won after George Floyd and Breonna Taylor were killed. Good luck.

Lynn Fitch gets to run for governor. Hunter Foster gets to go find his next badge. And Kohen Wiley doesn't get to turn two.

Sources:

https://theintercept.com/2026/10/23/kohen-wiley-body-camera-police-shooting-justification/

https://mississippitoday.org/2026/10/19/breaking-kohen-wiley-death-senatobia-police-officer-use-of-force-attorney-general/

https://veritenews.org/2026/10/21/video-senatobia-mississippi-police-kohen-wiley

https://veritenews.org/2026/10/23/mississippi-officer-harms-way-shooting-kohen-wiley/

https://mississippitoday.org/2026/07/18/senatobia-officer-racially-offensive-remark/

https://www.mississippifreepress.org/senatobia-police-officer-who-shot-kohen-wiley-resigns-after-release-of-bodycam-footage/

https://www.mississippifreepress.org/kohen-wiley-shooting-video-leaks-but-bodycam-from-officer-who-fired-fatal-shot-left-out/

https://rollingout.com/2026/10/23/kohen-wiley-officer-resigns-mississippi/

https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/ap-top-news/2026/06/18/police-shooting-of-a-1-year-old-mississippi-boy-ignites-tension-between-police-and-black-residents

https://www.npr.org/2025/05/21/nx-s1-5406262/trump-administration-dismisses-police-investigations-minneapolis-george-floyd

https://www.everycrsreport.com/reports/IF11585.html

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Welcome back to This Week in Tyranny. While you were watching the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders take My Chemical Romance to court for dressing like them in a fake dictatorship, the real one had a busy week.

This week, Trump's Justice Department sues to stop a Senate race from being counted if the Republican loses, the Pentagon hides what Iran did to our bases, the Trump administration opens a donut bar for bears in Alaska's national preserves so hunters can shoot them, the State Department asks diplomats who they voted for, and ICE hits a guy and tells him to stop acting. Let's get into it.

Trump's DOJ Wants Alaska's Votes Counted Only If Sullivan Wins

Donald Trump's Justice Department sued to stop Alaska from certifying its Senate race if Republican Dan Sullivan loses. The trigger isn't fraud. It's losing. And Trump bragged about it: "I'm the one that said do it."

The excuse is a second guy on the ballot with the same name, Daniel J. Sullivan, a retired schoolteacher from Petersburg, Alaska. Republicans say Democrats planted him to confuse voters, and Trump calls him an "imposter." Democrats deny it, and a state judge found the evidence didn't show he was trying to confuse anybody. So DOJ wants certification frozen "pending an investigation to determine whether votes cast for Daniel J. Sullivan were meant to be cast for Senator Sullivan." Translation: anyone who voted for the other guy must have meant to vote for theirs.

Ballots are secret. How do you investigate what a voter meant? Knock on doors? Hold a séance? Ask the ballot how it's feeling?

And it wouldn't even save him. In the August primary, Democrat Mary Peltola beat Senator Sullivan by more than 8,000 votes, and the other Sullivan got 3,610. Pretend every one of those was a mistake, hand them all to the senator, and he still loses by more than 4,500. DOJ filed it hours after Attorney General Todd Blanche said it had no plans to block certifications, and a Notre Dame election law professor called the legal argument "one of the worst ones I've ever seen."

Alaska isn't the only place DOJ is trying to keep votes from counting. In California, it's suing to make the state set aside 20,000 ballots from a list of people it calls "likely noncitizens." Los Angeles County checked 200 of those names. Nearly 40% indicate they were born in the United States, and more than 70% had never voted at all. A top DOJ official admitted, "There may be some names on there who it turns out ultimately are citizens." Very chill attitude for a guy trying to throw out your ballot.

They're building the machine to toss votes before they're even counted. If it works in Alaska and California, it works in your state.

Iran Blew Up Our Bases, Hegseth Classified the Receipt

Iran's strikes damaged and destroyed hundreds of buildings at American bases and dozens of American aircraft, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth's Pentagon is keeping the bill classified.

Those numbers come from the Pentagon's own internal watchdog: bases in eight countries, 18 service members killed, 417 wounded. Back in March, Trump said Iran had "no navy." Turns out you don't need one when you've got missiles and drones. The acting Navy secretary says Iran "blew the hell out of" our Navy base in Bahrain.

When Hegseth put a price on this war, $37.5 billion, he left the base damage out completely. So what will it cost to rebuild? Nobody's allowed to know. Five senators got the number in a classified briefing and want it made public by November 2nd. That's the day before the election, so I'm sure it'll be ready on the 4th.

Military families are paying too. The Navy evacuated 1,300 sailors' family members from Bahrain, and some have spent tens of thousands of dollars of their own money, one family nearly $40,000. The admiral in charge told them, "We literally have been making this up as we go." Troops and spouses told MeidasTouch the Pentagon held off on getting families out because it would "make the situation look bad at home." One said, "We are sitting ducks."

And Trump promised he won't strike Iran again before the midterms. He didn't promise to stop. He promised to wait until after you vote. So the war has a schedule, the damage has a security clearance, and you get the bill once the polls close.

Trump Opens a Donut Bar for Bears, Then Shoots the Customers

Trump's Interior Department will let hunters lure black bears and grizzlies to piles of greased donuts in Alaska's national preserves and shoot them while they eat.

The preserves are about 20 million acres run by the Park Service, right alongside parks like Denali, Katmai and Gates of the Arctic, and they're where hunting is allowed. You pile up donuts and bacon grease, wait for a bear to show up for brunch, and shoot it. Hunting, but make it a Krispy Kreme drive-thru. The Interior Secretary calls it a "commonsense framework." A conservative conservation group says, "Bear baiting is not hunting." Animal rights groups call it "an ambush" and plan to sue.

And we already know it makes bears more dangerous. In 2023, the Park Service itself wrote that "bears are more likely to attack when defending a food source," putting anyone near a bait pile "at significant risk." The experts it consulted, "considering the potential for significant human injury or even death," rated the danger to visitors "moderate to high."

State Department Asks Diplomats How They Voted, Then Says It Never Asked

Marco Rubio's State Department asked diplomats up for promotion who they voted for in 2016, 2020 and 2024, and told them a donation to a Democrat would disqualify them.

That's according to six current and former officials who spoke to The Washington Sun. The job is representing the United States. The qualification is your ballot. Federal law bans promoting federal workers based on their politics, so the State Department first said it's "not about partisan behavior but rather about executing the president's vision for foreign policy." Seven hours later, it rejected the "absurd premise that individuals are being asked about their political affiliations." So it's about loyalty, and also it never happened.

If they can ask a diplomat how she voted, they can ask the nurse at your VA, the inspector checking your meat, and the forecaster tracking the hurricane headed for your house.

ICE Hits a Man, Accuses Him of Flopping

An ICE SUV knocked down a man filming agents in Woodland, California, and Homeland Security says he faked it.

Antonio Moreida, a community college student who volunteers as an observer, says, "I took the corner of the car to the chest." DHS says, "ICE did NOT hit a pedestrian," and that an "agitator jumped onto the hood." Then it accused him of "flopping for the camera," which is sports talk for faking a hit to draw a penalty. So in the DHS version, he threw himself at a moving SUV for the clout.

The problem for DHS is the cameras. Woodland's police chief watched the footage and said, "I've seen the video myself, and I find it very troubling." This keeps happening. Earlier this month in Houston, the DA said video contradicts ICE's story about a chase that broke a man's leg in multiple places. ICE hurts someone, blames them, and then the video comes out.

Speed Round

Okay, speed round.

Trump Has to Testify in His Own Lawsuit

Trump has to testify under oath in his own lawsuit. He sued the BBC for $10 billion over a documentary that spliced together two lines from his January 6th speech so it sounded like one call to march on the Capitol. To win, he has to swear he didn't cause January 6th. He skipped his first deposition for "other matters of national importance," which the BBC's lawyers say was a campaign stop in Georgia, so a judge ordered him to sit by December 11th. Nothing says confidence like ducking your own lawsuit.

Hegseth's Team Drops Eisenhower's Globe

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wanted a World War II globe believed to be Eisenhower's in his office, so his staff moved it themselves and dropped it, tearing a hole near Antarctica. Th…

Hey fam, welcome back to the Gilead Gazette, the news show for everyone whose body has been quietly reclassified as public infrastructure.

This week, Trump and Vivek Ramaswamy turn child sexual abuse into a campaign ad, abortion bans get linked to more women murdered, ICE skips prenatal care for a woman who already lost one baby, an Arizona man gets paid for his ex-wife's abortion, and both parties campaign on trans kids. Let's get into it.

Vivek Smears an Abuse Survivor, Trump Calls It Pay Dirt

Donald Trump says Vivek Ramaswamy's ad calling a child sexual abuse survivor a liar is "hitting pay dirt," as in, striking gold.

Vivek is the Republican running for Ohio governor against Democrat Amy Acton, who has talked publicly about being sexually abused by her stepfather from age nine to 12. So Vivek made an ad starring her estranged mother, the woman who stayed married to that stepfather, telling voters, "She's lied her entire life." Amy was taken out of her mother's custody, and the stepfather was indicted. Even the conservative magazine National Review says the court records back Amy up, and when National Review is fact-checking you on behalf of a Democrat, my dude, you've taken a very wrong turn.

Vivek is putting $4 million behind it, and his defense is, "We ran an ad about lying. They are lying about an ad that is about lying." That's what it sounds like when a man's brain is buffering.

Some Republicans, including Ohio's own Republican governor, said the ad went too far. JD Vance told them to "stop whining about an advertisement," which is rich coming from the guy who built a career whining about childless cat ladies.

Trump went further. He posted that the press says the ad is bad "because it's so good!" On Friday, an NBC reporter asked him if Amy's childhood abuse means anything to him. His answer: "Quiet!" and "You're a horrible little reporter, aren't you?" He says he doesn't "know anything about a stepfather," but the mother who stayed married to him? "A smart woman." His words: "Why wouldn't you listen to a mother that says that?"

Right-wing media is doing the same thing: calling a woman who reports sexual violence a liar. In Arizona, Democratic House candidate Bernadette Greene-Placentia says two men attacked her at 2 a.m. while she was fixing her campaign signs, and one raped her. The sheriff's office is investigating. The Charlie Kirk Show called her a hoaxer, compared her to Jussie Smollett, the actor who faked a hate crime, and read this viewer comment on air: "If she was too stupid to go to ER and do a rape kit, she's too dumb to be in Congress."

So that's the MAGA message to survivors. If it happened to you as a kid, it's opposition research. If it happened to you last summer, it's a hoax.

Abortion Bans Arrive, So Do More Dead Women

A new peer-reviewed study in JAMA Network Open, the American Medical Association's research journal, found homicides of women and girls of reproductive age rose 7% in 2023 and 15% in 2024 in states with abortion bans. That's about 135 extra women and girls dead.

The researchers can't prove the bans caused it, but here's their thinking. Homicide is already a leading cause of death for pregnant women, usually at the hands of a partner, and abortion can be a woman's way out of an abusive relationship. Take that away, and she's tied to him. In 2023, Gabriela Gonzalez traveled from Texas to Colorado for an abortion without her partner's permission. When she got home, he killed her. Pro-life, everybody.

ICE Holds a High-Risk Pregnancy, Schedules Prenatal Care for Never

In Arizona, ICE is holding 24-year-old Maria Alejandra Valero Brinez, five months into a high-risk pregnancy. She already lost one baby to a stillbirth, and she's having the same complications again. Since August, she's had no regular prenatal care, just ER trips for abnormal bleeding. Apparently ICE's idea of prenatal care is waiting until you hemorrhage.

Members of Congress visited her this week, and advocates are demanding her release. And she's not the only one. From January 2025 to February of this year, ICE recorded 16 miscarriages among the pregnant, postpartum and nursing women it held, and deported 363 of them.

Arizona Man Gets $67,500 for His Ex-Wife’s Abortion, Embryo Gets an Estate

Also in Arizona, a judge ordered an abortion clinic to pay a man $67,500 because his ex-wife had an abortion.

Back in 2018, when Mario Villegas's then-wife had a medication abortion at a Phoenix clinic, Arizona law spelled out exactly what a doctor had to tell a woman first, and let her husband sue if the clinic got it wrong. So he sued, and had himself named the official representative of the embryo's estate. The embryo had an estate. That embryo had better estate planning than most millennials. He even claimed its lost lifetime earnings, and decided it would have been a girl. First time a man in this movement has ever worried about a woman's earning potential.

The judge didn't buy that the embryo was a person, but ruled the clinic slipped on technicalities, like which doctor delivered the information and the wording on a form. Never mind that his ex-wife testified nothing would have changed her mind. So he got a $5,000 automatic penalty plus $62,500 for his "psychological, emotional, and physical injuries." Physical. From her abortion. Her body, his boo-boo. And that law? A state court struck it down as unconstitutional in February, but it was still on the books in 2018, so he gets paid anyway. Anti-abortion lawyers are calling the award a building block for personhood, which means every ex with a grudge just got a business model.

Republicans Spend $78 Million Panicking About Trans Kids, Democrats Ask for It in Blue

In Texas's Senate race, Ken Paxton's allies have spent $78 million, mostly Elon Musk's money, on anti-trans ads against Democrat James Talarico. One says he "believes there are six genders" and voted for "taxpayer-funded sex changes on kids." The vote they mean? He voted against Texas's 2023 ban on gender-affirming care for minors.

Then somebody mailed pamphlets to homes across Texas, addressed to "the student," dressed up to look like they came from the Transgender Education Network of Texas, a real trans rights group. They told kids where to get help if their parents don't support them, and how a minor can be legally recognized as an adult. TENT had nothing to do with it, calls it a smear meant to sway the election, and is now getting threats. Even the Republican district attorney investigating it as forgery says it looks like a bid to rile up voters. When a Texas Republican prosecutor is the voice of reason, check the water.

And Democrats don't get to sit this one out. The DCCC, the national party's House campaign arm, just paid for its first known anti-trans ad of the cycle, for Nancy Lacore, the Democrat running for Congress in South Carolina. In the ad, a Republican mayor endorses her and promises she'll "protect girls' sports," which her campaign confirmed means keeping trans girls out. Candidates panic. This is the national party spending its own money on a Republican talking point. Poll after poll says voters barely care, so Democrats looked at a strategy that isn't even working for Republicans and asked if it comes in blue.

Speed Round

Okay, speed round.

Education Department Finds One School at Fault, Spares Us the Crocodile Tears

Trump's Education Department got more than 200 complaints about schools and colleges mishandling sexual assault, investigated 29, and found a school at fault once. Its spokesperson told ProPublica, "Spare us the crocodile tears," and said the office is getting back to making sure students get an education "free from discrimination." Which, under federal law, includes sexual assault. We'll save the tears for the students you ignored.

Trump Creates a Women’s Health Division With No Budget, Brags About Cushions

Trump signed an executive order creating a women's health research division at NIH, with no research budget, from the administrati…

Two firefighting pilots died fighting a Yosemite wildfire that was climbing a remote mountainside, away from every home in the park, under Interior Secretary Doug Burgum's order to fully suppress every wildfire, no matter what it's threatening.

"For what?" one federal fire official told The Atlantic. "There's nothing out there. Just let nature do its thing." Another asked, "Did they die in vain?"

Burgum's new Wildland Fire Service runs firefighting in every national park, and his April memo calls for "the presumption of a full suppression strategy applied to every wildfire." It's a throwback to the 10 a.m. policy from 1935: every fire out by 10 the next morning. Yosemite started letting some fires burn in 1974, because putting out every fire is why Western forests are overgrown tinderboxes. One fire researcher told the AP, "The more you make fire go away, the more fuel accumulates." So we brought back fire science from the Dust Bowl. Can't wait for the comeback of leeches.

Yosemite got shock and awe. At least 17 helicopters. More than 1,000 firefighters. For a fire that burned about 6,700 acres of mountain and zero buildings, and cost at least $55 million. That's more than $8,000 an acre. For land we already own.

The crews knew. One told The Atlantic, "What are we doing? There's nothing out here. We're slamming this fire shut." Six firefighters got hurt or sick. Then a helicopter doing water bucket drops went down. Pilots Greg King and Ryan Cutter were killed. The crash is still under investigation. At least 17 wildland firefighters, pilots and contractors have died this year, already more than the full-year average of the last decade.

One of the best ways to stop monster fires is to set small ones on purpose, with a plan. The Forest Service's prescribed burning fell by about half last year after it lost 16% of its staff. Yosemite has done zero burns this year. Superintendent Ray McPadden canceled the one near the Mariposa Grove of giant sequoias, planned for around Memorial Day, because two people familiar with the decision say he was worried it would hurt visitation. What the actual feck. Four years ago, that grove survived a wildfire because the park had burned it on purpose more than 20 times.

So who comes out ahead when every fire gets the full air show? An aerospace analyst told the AP, "Anyone that has an air tanker benefits." Like Bridger Aerospace, an aerial firefighting company founded by Montana Republican Senator Tim Sheehy. The Forest Service has paid it more than $235 million since 2021. Sheehy pushed to scrap Forest Service inspections of firefighting aircraft, the same month one of his old company's planes failed one with a crack in its wing. His shares now sit in a blind trust. Blind. Like the policy.

Yosemite's former superintendent, Cicely Muldoon, says skipping the burns means "you're really putting people in harm's way." The kindling keeps piling up under giant sequoias older than most countries. They've survived centuries of fire. Let's see if they survive Doug Burgum.

Sources:

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/2026/10/yosemite-fires/689069/

https://www.eenews.net/articles/burgums-wildfire-mandate-smother-every-blaze/

https://wtop.com/national/2026/06/as-wildfires-worsen-trump-administration-revives-discredited-policy-to-stomp-out-all-fires-quickly/

https://www.opb.org/article/2026/05/04/wildfire-prevention-work-declines-under-trump-administration/

https://www.propublica.org/article/tim-sheehy-bridger-aerospace-forest-service-inspection

https://wildfiretoday.com/two-dead-in-helicopter-crash-at-the-dome-fire-in-yosemite-national-park/

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Donald Trump just told Marines poisoned at Camp Lejeune that they get their money only if Republicans win in November. His exact words:

If we don't win, there's no money. If we do win, you're getting it.

Ransom notes used to be cut out of magazines. Now they come with a teleprompter and a Lee Greenwood song.

From 1953 to 1987, the Marine Corps served its own people a tap water cocktail of dry cleaning solvent, degreaser and benzene. In 1982, one system tested at 280 times the EPA limit. The base is a Superfund site. They just put drinking fountains on it. About a million people were exposed. The VA links it to leukemia, kidney and bladder cancer, and Parkinson's. Marine Jerry Ensminger buried his 9-year-old daughter Janey in 1985. Leukemia.

Congress passed a law in 2022 to finally pay these families. More than 408,000 claims. As of August, less than 1% paid. The VFW says one law firm had nearly 10% of its roughly 2,000 clients die in the last two years. So the Justice Department has a plan for clearing the backlog. It's called waiting.

Congress has nothing to do with this. Settling these claims is a Justice Department call. He said so himself: "If we win the House and the Senate, I am directing the Department of Justice to settle all remaining legitimate claims." My dude. You run the Justice Department. You can direct them right now. You don't need the House to make a phone call. You barely need the phone.

Jill Steen Dilgard lost her father, an uncle and two cousins who all served at Lejeune. She filed in 2022. Still waiting. She asked: "If he has all the authority he says he does to make this happen, why didn't he do the right thing from the get-go?" Because the get-go wasn't two weeks before an election, Jill.

Same rally, Trump also said: "We will never abandon the heroes who served America." Never abandon! Just put them on layaway until November.

Then he blamed the lawyers: "We don't want to give any to the trial lawyers." The Justice Department capped lawyers' fees at 20 to 25% in 2023, so the money he's sitting on belongs to sick veterans and families. Wrong villain, Donald. Try a mirror.

Marines aren't the only ones in the program. In Kansas, he promised corn farmers year-round sales of E15, the ethanol gas made from their corn, unless the Democrat wins: "But if Adam Hamilton is in, I'm not doing it." In North Carolina, on hurricane aid and his Senate pick: "Now if Michael loses, I'm not sending it. No, I'm only kidding." Vote red, rack up points, redeem them for chemo.

Meanwhile, federal judges ordered the Justice Department to come up with a mass settlement plan by October 30th, and the first trial starts October 26th. Both before the election. Ensminger and fellow victim Mike Partain: "Justice is not tied to political allegiance! The court trials start next week and will speak for us." So now we find out who his Justice Department ignores first, a federal judge or a dying Marine. My money's on both.

Semper Fi means always faithful. Not always faithful, pending results.

Sources:

https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nc/charlotte/news/2026/10/21/trump-helene-camp-lejeune-water

https://ncnewsline.com/2026/10/21/trump-ties-nc-camp-lejeune-settlements-to-gop-win-angering-survivors/

https://www.wunc.org/2026-10-19/federal-court-rejects-camp-lejeune-settlement-calculation-challenge-as-documentation-backlog-grows

https://www.kaxe.org/2026-08-04/after-years-of-delays-alleged-victims-in-camp-lejeune-trials-may-see-progress

https://rollcall.com/2026/10/20/trump-ties-ethanol-boon-for-farmers-to-a-marshall-win/

https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/camp-lejeune/about/summary-of-the-water-contamination-situation.html

https://archive.cdc.gov/www_cdc_gov/washington/testimony/2007/t20070612.htm

https://www.va.gov/disability/eligibility/hazardous-materials-exposure/camp-lejeune-water-contamination/

https://www.stripes.com/branches/marine_corps/2023-11-08/camp-lejeune-toxic-water-marines-attorney-fees-11985138.html

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Donald Trump just launched a $25 million fraud bounty program, named himself the judge of who gets paid, and gave the first check to a 24-year-old right-wing YouTuber.

It comes out of Trump's fraud task force, which he set up in March and put JD Vance in charge of. Vance says the work is "fun." His pitch: "if you want to help us stop it, you get to share in the rewards." Which is exactly how every pyramid scheme I've ever been invited to started.

So how much do you get? Trump says 1% of whatever you uncover, no cap: "If it's $10 million, $200 million, $400 million, we're giving a 1% commission to that person." One percent of $400 million is $4 million. Six of those and the $25 million fund is gone. Meanwhile, the White House told reporters the max is $30,000. So it's worth either a fortune or $30,000, depending on who's answering the questions.

And when two people claim the same tip? Trump said, "I will be the arbitrator of all of these decisions." He called it "binding arbitration." Arbitration is when both sides hand the decision to a neutral party. He has appointed himself the neutral party. The man who paid $25 million to settle the Trump University fraud cases is now the judge of fraud, running a program that also costs $25 million. If you pitched that on a TV show, they'd send it back as too on the nose.

We already have a whistleblower reward, by the way. The False Claims Act has paid people 15 to 30% of recovered money since 1863. So they took Abraham Lincoln's program, cut the payout to a sliver, and made a game show host the judge.

The first winner, Nick Shirley, got $10,000 for his video claiming Somali-owned day cares in Minnesota were fake. Inspectors said the centers were operating as expected. The White House says one owner in the video later pleaded guilty to padding meal claims. After that video, federal officials announced about 2,000 more immigration agents for Minnesota, and during that surge agents shot and killed two Minneapolis residents, Renee Good and Alex Pretti. Two people are dead, and the guy who made the video just got a check from the White House.

Tips go through fraud.gov, which hands you off to an AI chatbot. This administration's last big AI project helped pick an elementary school in Iran as a target, so I'm sure this one will be fine.

But honestly? I love this program. Trump says it's open to everyone. So let's use it. Real tips only, since a false report to the feds is a crime, and lucky for us, this administration is a fraud buffet.

The $330 million ballroom. The Kennedy Center's allegedly missing $6 million. Don Jr.'s firm buying into Pentagon contractor Anduril. Kristi Noem's last-day $304 million plane deal for a donor. The meme coin dinner. $100,000 a month for early access to Trump's posts. $580 million in suspiciously timed oil bets. Kimberly Guilfoyle's $100,000 Amex ask.

Flood the system. The most corrupt administration in American history just opened a fraud hotline. Call it in, America. The fraud is coming from inside the house.

Sources:

https://apnews.com/article/trump-fraud-whistleblower-vance-cc7c155c06cbab74d423911c36f5ac78

https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nc/charlotte/politics/2026/10/20/fraud-whistleblower-incentive-program

https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/10/20/anti-fraud-whistleblower-reward-program-announced-by-president-donald-trump

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2026-iran-school-attack/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2026/10/15/secret-documents-reveal-donors-behind-330-million-trumps-ballroom/

https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/maga-blood-feud-between-alina-habba-and-ric-grenell-ties-back-to-17-million-transfer-from-account-tied-to-congolese-government-report/

https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/abc-news-acknowledges-errors-in-trump-sons-report-it-mysteriously-deleted/

https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/kristi-noem-seethes-after-ny-times-expose-on-a-plum-contract-dhs-gave-to-a-political-donor-on-her-last-day-as-secretary/

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-meme-coin-dinner-foreign-top-bidders/

https://www.courthousenews.com/doj-defends-trump-charging-100k-for-early-access-to-truth-social-posts/

https://truthout.org/articles/trump-admin-killed-insider-trading-referral-probing-iran-war-related-oil-sales/

https://www.tovima.com/wsj/honey-please-kimberly-guilfoyle-pushed-donor-to-wire-100000-to-her-amex-account

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Donald Trump's Treasury Department is getting ready to seize the tax refunds, Social Security checks and paychecks of nearly 10 million Americans who've defaulted on their student loans. And according to five sources who talked to The Washington Sun, they're not planning to announce it until after you vote.

Why wait? One source explained:

"It would be politically insane to do this before the midterms."

Politically insane. Not cruel. Not wrong. Just bad timing. They're not debating whether to mug you. They're debating whether to do it before or after you mail in your ballot.

Here's the plan. Private debt collectors could be hired as soon as November. Then the government grabs what it can: your tax refund, your earned income tax credit, your child tax credit, a chunk of your Social Security, and a slice of your paycheck straight from your employer. The target is the tax season ending April 15, 2027. So you file your taxes, wait for the refund you were going to use for rent, and find out Uncle Sam already cashed it.

And seniors are in the blast radius. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau estimates about 452,000 borrowers 62 and older are in default and likely collecting Social Security. The government can take up to 15% of that check. Nothing says golden years like a debt collector in your retirement.

Now my favorite part. Last year, the White House budget office helped the Education Department get ready to start seizing benefits and wages. Treasury blocked it. And Treasury staff warned their bosses, quote, "This is not who you think it is. The demographics are not good for us."

Translation: oh no, it's our people.

And they're right. Protect Borrowers found about two-thirds of defaulted borrowers live in states Trump won. The AP found the highest default rates in Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama. Turns out the guy drowning in student debt isn't a gender studies major in Brooklyn. He's in Biloxi.

It gets better. One economist told Common Dreams the people in default are "overwhelmingly people whose debts would have been erased" under the Biden debt relief that Republican-led states sued to block. So Republicans killed the relief, those folks fell behind, and now the same party wants to send the repo man. Are you fecking kidding me?

Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent rolled out something called the "Defaulted Loans Support Center" and called it "restoring fiscal responsibility." Responsibility. From the guys hiding the bill under the couch until the polls close. And one budget hawk says all this stalling has already cost taxpayers about $5 billion. Fiscal responsibility, everybody.

When the Sun asked the Education Department about all of this, it said, "We don't respond to fishing expeditions." Which is a bold thing to say right before you go fishing in somebody's paycheck.

And it's not just loans. Abortion, Every Day reports the White House is also waiting until after the midterms to go after abortion. They're not running on their agenda. They're hiding it in the trunk until you've voted, and what else is back there?

Politically insane is waiting until after the election to tell people you're taking their money. Politically sane is remembering that when you vote.

Sources:

https://www.washingtonsun.com/economy/trump-aides-plan-penalize-defaulting-student-loan-borrowers

https://truthout.org/articles/trump-officials-look-to-delay-going-after-defaulted-borrowers-to-after-midterms/

https://www.wtoc.com/2025/06/03/education-department-says-it-will-not-garnish-social-security-student-loan-borrowers-default

https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sb0639

https://jessica.substack.com/p/republicans-are-running-scared-the

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Trump's Justice Department just shut down a criminal investigation into whether Meta helped kids buy fentanyl pills on its apps, right after Meta's lawyers, including Trump's own personal law firm, went to DOJ's political bosses and asked nicely.

Since the pandemic, federal prosecutors in Virginia had a criminal grand jury investigating whether Meta helped create a market for young people to buy fentanyl pills and other addictive drugs, let prescription drugs get promoted to children, and made money off it. Meta executives had been subpoenaed to testify, the one notification you can't swipe away.

Last year, Meta's lawyers went to DOJ's political leadership to get the case dropped, and it kept going. They went back, and this time, Bloomberg Law reports, senior leaders at DOJ headquarters told the career prosecutors to stop. The department is weighing a fine or a deal where Meta doesn't get charged at all. Which is a great deal if you can get it. Just ask anybody doing time for selling one pill.

Meta's legal team includes a former Republican deputy attorney general and Sullivan and Cromwell, a law firm that also represents Donald Trump personally. So Trump's own law firm is lobbying Trump's Justice Department for a company that's been paying Trump. I'm sure those meetings are tense and adversarial. Nobody even gets a mint.

Meta has sent $31 million Trump's way. In 2024, Trump warned Mark Zuckerberg he could spend "life in prison" if he did anything illegal during the election. Then Zuckerberg had dinner at Mar-a-Lago. Then Meta gave $1 million to Trump's inauguration. Then Meta paid $25 million to settle Trump's lawsuit over getting suspended from Facebook after January 6th. They paid him for the ban. That's a bouncer tipping the drunk guy he threw out. Then $5 million for the White House ballroom.

Turns out life in prison comes with a cash option.

DOJ's explanation? The department "has ended the Biden-era days of aggressively and indiscriminately targeting corporations and businesses."

Indiscriminately. The case was about fentanyl and children. How were prosecutors supposed to go easier on that? Investigate it casually? Swing by on a Friday?

In 2024, a watchdog group found more than 450 ads on Meta's platforms selling drugs. One fake pharmacy listed Xanax, Percocet, OxyContin and fentanyl, like a drive-thru menu for overdoses. Meta says its ads get reviewed by "automated technology."

Meta's automated systems did manage to take down the No Kings Instagram account on the day of the protests. Meta called it an error. So the robot can't spot a fentanyl menu, but it found the protest account in record time.

Here's why every parent should care. If your kid buys a pill on Instagram, it could kill them. If they survive and get caught, they get a record. If the company accused of helping put those pills in front of your kid gets investigated, it gets a meeting with the president's lawyers.

This administration loves to talk about fentanyl. They've blown up boats over it. They say it's a war. Turns out the war has a VIP entrance, and the cover charge is $31 million.

Trump told Zuckerberg he could spend his life in prison. Instead, Zuckerberg helped pay for the ballroom.

Sources:

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/meta-platforms-drug-sale-criminal-probe-halted-by-doj-officials

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/meta-donates-1-million-trump-inauguration-fund-zuckerberg-mar-lago-mee-rcna184014

https://wjla.com/news/nation-world/meta-agrees-to-25-million-settlement-with-trump-over-jan-6-account-suspension-president-capitol-rotunda-mark-zuckerberg-tech-company-amazon-jeff-bezos-tesla-x-elon-musk-censorship-twitter-facebook-google

https://newrepublic.com/post/216672/list-white-house-ballroom-donors-trump-corruption

https://campaignforaccountability.org/ttp-report-meta-allows-drug-ads-selling-everything-from-opioids-to-cocaine/

https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/new-trump-book-defends-2018-putin-meeting-taunts-113256093

https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/october-17-2026

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Welcome back to This Week in Tyranny. While you were watching Elon Musk’s Roadster hop over a Cybertruck on 600 liters of compressed air like the world’s most expensive whoopee cushion, the Trump administration spent the week making sure nobody can stop it from doing anything.

This week: Trump let Putin off the hook to fix gas prices from his own war, his Justice Department threatened to jail election workers, two Democrats co-wrote a bill that locks judges out of protecting your public lands, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth fired the general who warned him about missile defense, Trump says he can pardon himself, and ICE says it was chasing a dead man. Let’s get into it.

Trump Bails Out Putin to Fix Gas Prices From His Own War

Late Friday night, Donald Trump signed an executive order waiving the Russia sanctions law he signed himself last month. It’s named after his late golf buddy Lindsey Graham, and the Senate passed it 86 to 11. The order is titled “Implementing the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act.” It implements it by not doing it, which is also how I implement my gym membership.

His official reason? “National interest.” The real one is at the pump. His war in Iran pushed gas past $4.30 a gallon, and those sanctions came with tariffs on countries buying Russian oil. So to clean up after his own war, he’s bailing out the guy bombing Ukraine. Russia said thanks that night with 332 drones and four cruise missiles, killing at least four people.

Even Republicans lost it. John Cornyn said, “Lindsey would be appalled.” Thom Tillis said if Trump wants lower energy prices, “he can do it by solving the Iran problem.” Don Bacon listed Trump’s lame-duck wish list, ballroom included, and said, “I think the agenda is dead.” Hold that thought.

Same week, Ukraine’s military Starlink slowed down mid-bombardment, grounding the drones that shoot down Russian drones. Two US officials told Reuters the order came from inside the White House. Trump: “it wasn’t me, and I don’t think it was Elon.” Elon: limits are “decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS.” So it wasn’t Elon, and it wasn’t Trump, except Elon just told the whole internet it’s always Trump.

DOJ Threatens to Jail Vote Counters, Sends the Password on a Sticky Note

Trump’s Justice Department just threatened to jail election workers in Los Angeles for counting ballots. It started with a thumb drive. DOJ sent California about 20,000 names of people who were mailed ballots, people DOJ claims are noncitizens. It gave the state 48 hours to pull their ballots and sent the password on a sticky note, like every phishing scam I’ve ever deleted. LA County wouldn’t open it, the deadline passed, and DOJ sued California, then warned that anyone who counts those ballots risks “becoming aiders and abettors to a federal crime.” Trump reposted it: “They will all go to jail for a long period of time!!!” Three exclamation points. That’s how you know it’s legally sound.

Where’d the 20,000 come from? DOJ won’t say. This year it charged about 50 people with voting as noncitizens. There are more than 227 million registered voters. And DOJ is 0 for 26 on these voter-roll lawsuits.

Threatening the vote counters is just plan A. Trump’s childhood friend Peter Ticktin, lawyer for pardoned election denier Tina Peters, told a MAGA livestream “there would have to be martial law” if there’s “another rigged election.” In this crowd, rigged means one they lose. Peters met with Trump earlier this month.

And sometimes they don’t even have to try. A lawsuit says Texas never recorded nearly 600,000 people who registered to vote at the DMV last fall and winter, because a state software update broke. Early voting starts tomorrow. Pick your weapon: a threat, a martial law fantasy or a broken computer nobody fixed. Fewer of your votes get counted.

Democrats Write Judges Out of Public Lands, Hand Trump the Bulldozer

Trump has spent this term handing our public lands to oil, gas and mining companies, and two Democrats just helped him get around the one thing slowing him down: judges. Senators Martin Heinrich and Sheldon Whitehouse co-wrote a bill with Republicans and the White House that would stop a judge from halting a mine, a pipeline or a drilling project on public land, even one that breaks the law.

The “only remedy” a court gets is sending the project back to the agency “without vacatur or issuance of an injunction.” Translation: the judge gets to say “you broke the law,” and the bulldozers keep going. It’s a speeding ticket that comes with a full tank of gas. Your window to sue drops from six years to 150 days, and mining companies could dump waste on public land for $80 an acre a year.

Their reason? Cheaper energy and more clean power. Whitehouse says it’ll “flood the grid with clean, affordable energy.” From the administration that froze hundreds of wind projects. Last December, Heinrich was asked whether this administration would even follow a permitting law. His answer: “Well that’s what the courts are for, right?” Martin. Buddy. You just wrote the courts out of it. More Than Just Parks broke this down. Go follow them.

Hegseth Fires the General Who Counted the Missiles, Then Runs Out of Missiles

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth fired the Army general who warned him we were running low on missile defense, and then the Iran war burned through most of it. CBS News reports that two months before the war, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George warned the Army was “critically short on missile defense munitions” and would stay “strategically low until 2030.” Hegseth fired him in April, in the middle of the war.

Since then, according to the think tank CSIS, we’ve used up to 61% of our prewar Patriot interceptors and about 82% of our THAADs. Those are the missiles that keep other missiles from hitting our troops. The Pentagon says, “Claims of U.S. munitions shortages are false.” In the Army, when somebody tells you you’re low on ammo, you count the ammo. You don’t fire the guy who counted.

The same Pentagon is holding its report on the US strike that killed at least 123 children at a school in Minab, Iran, until after the midterms. The report’s finished. The election just isn’t.

Trump Says He Can Pardon Himself, Hands His Staff a Permission Slip

Donald Trump told Newsmax, “I could have given myself a pardon the last time I left office.” No court has ever ruled on it, but the Justice Department’s position since 1974 is that he can’t, because nobody gets to be the judge in their own case. He also wants to pardon his staff, because “I don’t want to see people that work for me go through years of nonsense.” The nonsense is the justice system. A pardon promised in advance works a lot like a permission slip.

And the report he really doesn’t want you to read just got buried again: Jack Smith’s report on the Mar-a-Lago case, where Trump kept boxes of classified documents in a bathroom and a ballroom. An appeals court was set to hear arguments on releasing it November 2, the day before the election. Then Trump’s lawyer cited the campaign’s “extensive commitments,” a co-defendant’s lawyer cited a “nonrefundable” trip, and the hearing got canceled. Nothing protects a president like a nonrefundable plane ticket.

ICE Runs a Man Down, Blames a Dead Man

An ICE agent in Houston ran a man down with an SUV, and ICE’s excuse is a ghost. Agents tried to stop a truck, and Miguel Parra Hernandez, 48, jumped out and ran. Surveillance video shows an ICE SUV chasing him, and then he’s on the ground with a broken leg. ICE says he “ran in front of” the vehicle. The Harris County DA says it looks like the agent used the car as “a deadly weapon” and is weighing charges.

ICE says it stopped that truck because its target was inside. According to the immigrant advocacy group FIEL, the man in ICE’s photo died years ago, and his daughter handed over a death certificate. The DA’s office says the target wasn’t in the truck. So either ICE’s paperwork is fiction or its agents can se…