Trump Administration
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Trump Set to End Venezuela Oil Deal, Citing Election Record and Slow Deportation Assistance
On Nov. 26, 2022, the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) issued a license authorizing the U.S. multinational oil and gas company Chevron Corp. to pursue business ventures in Venezuela.
President Joe Biden’s administration had offered the license agreement as Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro held talks with his political opposition to hold a free and fair election in 2024.
Trump said the reversal was necessary because of “electoral conditions within Venezuela, which have not been met by the Maduro regime,” he announced in a post on his Truth Social platform on Feb. 26.
During Trump’s first term in office, the United States officially rejected Venezuela’s 2018 election results in which Maduro was declared the winner.
DOJ Sends Antisemitism Task Force to 10 Universities
The move is the latest step by the Trump administration to fight campus antisemitism, which exploded after the Hamas terror attack against Israel on October 7, 2023, despite a Biden administration “strategy” on antisemitism.
The DOJ said in a press release:
Sunday Talks: NSA Mike Waltz Says Zelenskyy is Going to Need to Make Territorial Concessions
National Security Advisor Mike Waltz appears on CNN to outline how the U.S. team no longer sees Volodymyr Zelenskyy as a man who can lead his nation to a place of peace.
Waltz notes that at a certain point there are going to be negotiations and discussions about Ukraine territory that Zelenskyy is going to need to face with pragmatic honesty. However, at the current state of conflict Zelenskyy is intransigent toward any ceasefire agreement that does not include U.S. troops on the ground as a “security guarantee.”
If you agree to the idea of the US becoming a tariff revenue nation again, the logical conclusion is that the income tax either goes away or is greatly reduced.
Let’s dial down the burners of outrage and seek understanding of the decision itself. It was unsigned. It did not order Trump to pay anybody anything. Both Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Coney Barrett joined. (Which is another reason to ignore all the “Coney Barrett hates Trump” memes— remember, Chief Justice Roberts was who originally stayed the TRO that required Trump to pay the $2 billion by midnight. He joined the Majority, and nobody’s analyzing his body language. Let the libs think Coney Barrett hates Trump.)
The motion had arrived at the Supreme Court in an odd procedural posture. The DC Circuit had refused to hear the appeal, since it was an appeal from an “unappealable” short-term TRO. So one of the confusing issues was … exactly which order was on appeal to the Supremes? Judge Ali’s TRO order? Or the DC Circuit’s order refusing to hear the case? If the latter, which makes much more procedural sense, then the Supremes’ only option was to reverse the DC Circuit, uselessly bouncing the case back down so that hostile bench could performatively render an opinion that everybody knows would have upheld the TRO anyway.
I get it; we were all frustrated that the Court didn’t break the chain of command by reaching right over the lower appellate court and slapping Judge Ali’s TRO order right out of his hand, and that’s unfortunate. For its own reasons, the Court decided not to break several standing protocols. But … did it really toss President Trump under the bus and burn two billion dollars? Or did it throw Judge Ali under the bus?
The Court’s weapon is brains, not brawn. And if we stop to read the Court’s order, we find it slyly pulled Ali’s fangs, pushed him onto procedural quicksand, and invited Trump to appeal again as soon as Ali overreaches. Despite corporate media’s fondest wish, this was not a ‘whee! Trump just lost!’ moment.
It was a temporary strategic defeat teeing up a win. I’ll prove it.
The brief order included one long sentence that threw Trump several lifelines. Since, given all the conservative black-pilled hysteria over the decision, my analysis will be considered controversial, let’s carefully examine the order’s text:
Every single word has meaning. “The deadline in the challenged order has now passed” reinforced that Trump is no longer under any deadline at all. It’s gone. Judge Ali must now issue a new order setting a new deadline, all in the context of the looming March 10th date when his TRO expires four days from now. Ali’s new deadline-resetting order could be appealed again.
More significantly, Judge Ali must soon hold a full preliminary injunction hearing, providing even more opportunities for Trump to appeal— this time on the merits, such as on his argument for sovereign immunity (strongly endorsed in the Dissent), rather than appealing on much weaker procedural grounds.
Second, the Majority said “the District Court should clarify what obligations the Government must fulfill.” In other words, the Court, in effect, partially granted Trump’s appeal. The phrase suggested that Judge Ali’s original order requiring the government to pay all the contracts by midnight was simply too broad and lacked a good reason.
This places Judge Ali in a diabolical judicial minefield— his next order clarifying the original order has to provide more words, increasing the chances the inexperienced jurist will stumble on a buried appellate landmine.
The third requirement, that Ali’s next order must include “due regard for the feasibility of any compliance deadlines,” means that the Court told Judge Ali, “no more same-day deadlines.” It’s bigger than it look. Ali now must hold a hearing to allow argument over the government’s needs for time, to ensure that payments are feasible. This is all while the clock is ticking on holding the emergency preliminary injunction hearing.
If Judge Ali must have a hearing anyway, why not just go ahead and hold the preliminary injunction hearing, rather than a separate hearing to find out what should be in the next intermediate TRO order?
The bottom line is, it’s probably impossible for Judge Ali to satisfy those three reasonable-sounding conditions in the time remaining before the substantive hearing on the preliminary injunction.
Am I just seeing a glass half-full? Let’s discuss that next.
www.coffeeandcovid.com
The motion had arrived at the Supreme Court in an odd procedural posture. The DC Circuit had refused to hear the appeal, since it was an appeal from an “unappealable” short-term TRO. So one of the confusing issues was … exactly which order was on appeal to the Supremes? Judge Ali’s TRO order? Or the DC Circuit’s order refusing to hear the case? If the latter, which makes much more procedural sense, then the Supremes’ only option was to reverse the DC Circuit, uselessly bouncing the case back down so that hostile bench could performatively render an opinion that everybody knows would have upheld the TRO anyway.
I get it; we were all frustrated that the Court didn’t break the chain of command by reaching right over the lower appellate court and slapping Judge Ali’s TRO order right out of his hand, and that’s unfortunate. For its own reasons, the Court decided not to break several standing protocols. But … did it really toss President Trump under the bus and burn two billion dollars? Or did it throw Judge Ali under the bus?
The Court’s weapon is brains, not brawn. And if we stop to read the Court’s order, we find it slyly pulled Ali’s fangs, pushed him onto procedural quicksand, and invited Trump to appeal again as soon as Ali overreaches. Despite corporate media’s fondest wish, this was not a ‘whee! Trump just lost!’ moment.
It was a temporary strategic defeat teeing up a win. I’ll prove it.
The brief order included one long sentence that threw Trump several lifelines. Since, given all the conservative black-pilled hysteria over the decision, my analysis will be considered controversial, let’s carefully examine the order’s text:
Every single word has meaning. “The deadline in the challenged order has now passed” reinforced that Trump is no longer under any deadline at all. It’s gone. Judge Ali must now issue a new order setting a new deadline, all in the context of the looming March 10th date when his TRO expires four days from now. Ali’s new deadline-resetting order could be appealed again.
More significantly, Judge Ali must soon hold a full preliminary injunction hearing, providing even more opportunities for Trump to appeal— this time on the merits, such as on his argument for sovereign immunity (strongly endorsed in the Dissent), rather than appealing on much weaker procedural grounds.
Second, the Majority said “the District Court should clarify what obligations the Government must fulfill.” In other words, the Court, in effect, partially granted Trump’s appeal. The phrase suggested that Judge Ali’s original order requiring the government to pay all the contracts by midnight was simply too broad and lacked a good reason.
This places Judge Ali in a diabolical judicial minefield— his next order clarifying the original order has to provide more words, increasing the chances the inexperienced jurist will stumble on a buried appellate landmine.
The third requirement, that Ali’s next order must include “due regard for the feasibility of any compliance deadlines,” means that the Court told Judge Ali, “no more same-day deadlines.” It’s bigger than it look. Ali now must hold a hearing to allow argument over the government’s needs for time, to ensure that payments are feasible. This is all while the clock is ticking on holding the emergency preliminary injunction hearing.
If Judge Ali must have a hearing anyway, why not just go ahead and hold the preliminary injunction hearing, rather than a separate hearing to find out what should be in the next intermediate TRO order?
The bottom line is, it’s probably impossible for Judge Ali to satisfy those three reasonable-sounding conditions in the time remaining before the substantive hearing on the preliminary injunction.
Am I just seeing a glass half-full? Let’s discuss that next.
☕️ LITTLE RED HENS ☙ Thursday, March 6, 2025 ☙ C&C NEWS 🦠
SCOTUS outmaneuvers Judge Ali; Dem senatorial embarassment; progressives meltdown over Trump; Dem chaos nears collapse; ActBlue under fire; EU scrambles; Trump’s strategy unfolds; viral ex-Dem video.
www.coffeeandcovid.com
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Trump Admin To Deport Foreigners Who Come To American Universities And Shill For Terrorists
As reported by the New York Post, “Khalil and Columbia United Apartheid Divest, which has vowed to escalate its tactics ‘until the empire crumbles,’ were among those taking part in the campus takeover at the start of the school year.” Columbia United Apartheid Divest “sympathizes with terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah,” according to the New York Post.
Khalil also led a protest that sought the “total eradication of Western civilization,” according to the New York Post.
Khalil also told a Post reporter in September that protesters would “continue to resist” and set up encampments and additional protests.
During an April takeover of Columbia University, protesters, including those associated with Columbia University Apartheid Divest, broke into Hamilton Hall.
President Minouche Shafik said the protesters occupying Hamilton Hall broke the doors, damaged and destroyed property, and “mistreat[ed]” public safety officers and maintenance staff.
A statement from the university also said that the “disruptions on campus have created a threatening environment for many of our Jewish students and faculty.”
Khalil was also allegedly caught on camera at the recent protest that took place this month at the Milstein Library at Barnard College, according to the Post. “That protest featured violent propaganda flyers that purportedly came directly from the ‘Hamas Media Office,’ including one pamphlet titled ‘Our Narrative … Operation Al-Aqsa Flood,’ which justified the Oct. 7, 2023 attack,” the Post reported.
Jamal Khashoggi