Congratulations to the Indiana Hoosiers! When this college football season began, that was the losing-est program in college football history. Now they are undefeated, and national champs (and they've been overtaken by Northwestern as the new king of losing).

Minneapolis Is Apparently the Hill that The White House Wants to Die On, Part IV

There is an old, rather ribald, and apparently true story about the movie Spartacus, a film that now gets its second mention from us in less than a week. That was a three-hour, epic film. That is, in and of itself, a recipe for a VERY long shoot. On top of that, it was directed by Stanley Kubrick, which is also a recipe for a VERY long shoot. It dragged on so long that, on a tough day, about 6 months into filming, star Tony Curtis grumbled, "Who do I have to fu** to get off this picture?" And star Jean Simmons responded, "If you find out, let me know."

This story is on our minds, of course, because the Minneapolis mess just keeps growing and growing in scope. This series began as a single item, and then we accepted that it would have to be two parts, then three, then four. Well, we've done the first three parts, plus an intermission, and today we have Part IV. And guess what? We are going to have to do at least two parts AFTER this one. Today, we are going to insert an item that just updates everyone on all the drama since the last time we wrote about this subject. Then, tomorrow, we'll (hopefully) be able to proceed on to an item about the other acts of violence from ICE, and then finally we will do an item about the response thus far. Maybe we'll complete it this week, though the universe might have different ideas. For now, the latest:

Minnesota Resists

There aren't too many states that have a more interesting political culture than the North Star State. It's center/center-left, of course, but beyond that there's a strong current of self-reliance, and some populism, and a fair bit of rebelliousness. There is a reason that this is the state that give election victories to Hubert H. Humphrey, Paul Wellstone, Al Franken, Gov. Tim Walz (DFL-MN), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (DFL-MN) Jesse Ventura and Walter Mondale, among others. Those are some pretty different kinds of politicians (excepting the Wellstone/Franken pairing and maybe the Humphrey/Mondale pairing), but they all express well-established elements of the Minnesota milieu.

What it amounts to is that there MIGHT be states that would allow themselves to be invaded by ICE, without much in the way of complaint. We are not sure what states those might be, but they COULD exist. What we do know is that Minnesota definitely is not one of them. Certainly it's not a state that WE would want to try to impose our wills upon. And that's before you add in the cherry on the sundae, at it were, namely what season of year it is. There's a humorous observation going around right now, first brought to our attention by reader P.K. in Marshalltown, IA, that goes like this: "ICE made the decision to attack a city... full of the descendants of Vikings... in the middle of the winter."

The most prominent figures in pushing back against the Trump government, of course, are Walz and Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey. Walz has mobilized, and is getting ready to deploy, the Minnesota National Guard to protect his citizens. Trump may well try to seize control, but recall that the law says that's only legal when states are refusing to enforce federal law (most obviously, this happened during the Civil Rights Movement). If the White House does try to take over, it will claim that is what is going on here, and Walz will run to court so fast that it will make Trump's head spin. At that point, the administration will have to try to convince a judge that what it's doing is legal, and what Walz is doing is illegal. This is not likely to turn out the way the administration wants.

Meanwhile, Frey has been all over the media, and has been sharing some strongly worded verbiage. For example, he appeared on Face the Nation on Sunday and referred to ICE as an "occupying force." He added that "This is not about safety. What this is about is coming into our city by the thousands and terrorizing people simply because they're Latino or Somali. And yeah, people in Minneapolis are speaking up. They're speaking up peacefully."

Some of Frey's widely circulated remarks have been, uh, a bit less family-friendly. Still, he's young (44), and a man of conviction, and he's very charismatic and telegenic. He could well have a future at the state, or national, level. And with Walz being somewhat calmer and older and wiser, they make a pretty interesting pairing, something along the lines of Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker, or Jean-Luc Picard and Will Riker, or Batman and Robin.

In addition, the citizenry of Minneapolis (and other places in Minnesota) is up in arms, and is taking it to the street, despite the frigid temperatures. There have been a lot of protests and protesters, and, as Slate's Aymann Ismail writes, they are turning into a disciplined resistance movement. Their anti-ICE activities have become regularized (e.g., people taking assigned shifts monitoring agents) and they are developing a vocabulary appropriate to the context (e.g., tailing ICE agents in unmarked cars is now known as "commuting"). These are folks who look to be in it for the duration, however long ICE decides to remain in town.

The Trump Administration Strikes Back

The White House continues to flex its muscles about as aggressively as it can. Given the potential problems with nationalizing the Minnesota National Guard, the administration is reportedly preparing to dispatch 1,500 regular troops to Minneapolis to support ICE. As we learned in Los Angeles, those troops' powers will be limited, unless the Insurrection Act is invoked. More on that later.

Meanwhile, Trump is currently making extensive use of his very favorite weapon, the Department of Justice. Among the current targets are:

• Politicians: The DoJ has opened investigations of both Walz and Frey, based on statements the two men have made about ICE. Instead of us telling you what an overreach this is, how about former prosecutor and CNN legal analyst Elle Honig?: "DoJ has lost its damn mind. If you have public officials, as we do here, making political speech, even if it's explosive, inflammatory, aggressive, and then that causes people to protest, or to call 9-1-1, that is simply not obstruction of justice. If they bring an indictment for obstruction, I promise you, they will lose."
  
  
• Protesters: A group of anti-ICE protestors entered a church where an ICE officer, who is also a part-time pastor, was conducting a service. This is illegal in most places, including Minnesota, so the protesters were ejected and some of them were detained. Now, the DoJ's civil rights division is mounting a "full investigation" with an intent to press charges. For those keeping score at home, it means that you should never enter a church as part of a protest, but if you want to invade the Capitol, you're A-OK.
  
  
• Journalists: Several reporters were present to cover the church protest. Some of those reporters were among the people arrested. That includes Don Lemon, formerly of CNN, who is also—wait for it—being investigated by the DoJ.

It is possible that the investigation of the protesters might lead to something in terms of an indictment/conviction, but probably not much. The other investigations are going nowhere. And the whole point, of course, is to send a message to other politicians, protesters and journalists: Don't dare oppose us. This is not generally an effective way of silencing people.

There is also another clear goal, besides silencing opponents. Trump badly wants to invoke the Insurrection Act, so his administration can really crack down on the people of Minnesota. But again, it requires that the people of a city or a state be actively breaking federal law. Thus far, that hasn't happened in a manner that would have any hope of passing muster with a federal judge. So, what the White House really wants is to turn up the heat to the point that something really bad and illegal happens. For example, if an ICE officer were to be shot to death, Trump would publicly pretend to be sad, but he'd secretly be thrilled, because then he could declare Minneapolis to be in a state of rebellion, and could assume the powers granted by the Insurrection Act.

Sending more ICE officers is part of turning up the temperature. Sending actual soldiers is part of turning up the temperature. Threatening investigations and lawsuits against anyone and everyone is part of turning up the temperature. Arresting anyone with skin darker than that of Lt. Cmdr. Data is part of turning up the temperature. DHS Secretary Kristi Noem just announced that ICE "arrested over 10,000 criminal illegal aliens who were killing Americans, hurting children and reigning terror in Minneapolis." This is a lie (or a half-truth, at best), since the actual total number of arrests since ICE invaded Minneapolis is actually about 3,000. And even then, they're only getting to that total by running roughshod over many people's constitutional rights.

Meanwhile, Stephen Miller, who surely must have a permanent erection right now, has been getting in on the act. For example, Il Douchey got onto eX-Twitter on Sunday night and announced, of Minneapolis: "Only federal officers are upholding the law. Local and state police have been ordered to stand down and surrender." Miller either doesn't understand how a federal system works, or doesn't care, or some combination of the two. In any event, even the president cannot order local law enforcement to stand down. Certainly a wannabe tinpot dictator can't do it.

Don't Forget the Courts

As we note above, there aren't just two opposing factions in this dispute, there's also the umpires who wear black robes. Thus far, things are not going well for the White House on that front. Specifically, on Friday, U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez of Minnesota issued a Preliminary Injunction prohibiting ICE officers from: (1) "retaliating against persons who are engaged in peaceful and unobstructive protest activity, including observing activities of Operation Metro Surge;" (2) "arresting or detaining persons who are engaged in peaceful or unobstructive protest activity... in retaliation for their protected conduct" and without probable cause or reasonable suspicion that the person has committed a crime "or is obstructing or interfering" with ICE activities; (3) "using pepper spray or similar non-lethal munitions and crowd dispersal tools against persons who are engaging in peaceful and unobstructive protest activity... in retaliation for the protected conduct" and (4) "stopping or detaining drivers and passengers in vehicles when there is no reasonable articulable suspicion that they are forcibly obstructing or interfering with [ICE]. The act of safely following [ICE] agents at an appropriate distance," Menendez added, "does not, by itself, create reasonable suspicion to justify a vehicle stop." The order remains in effect until the operation concludes or "conditions change such that it is no longer necessary" at the judge's discretion.

The lawsuit was filed last December, about three weeks before Jonathan Ross shot and killed Renee Good. The ACLU brought the suit on behalf of six protesters who were attacked by ICE agents for engaging in lawful and protected First Amendment activity. One woman was thrown to the ground and forcibly arrested while observing ICE activity in her neighborhood and after asking an agent, "Are you ICE?" Another man, Abdkadir Noor, an American of Somali descent, happened to be driving with his wife and a friend when several ICE agents stopped a car in front of them driven by two Latinos. He had pulled over after hearing the sirens behind him and observed agents breaking the car window and dragging the two Latinos out. Other people observing this started to yell at the agents. Noor was observing this activity and was urging people to remain calm. More agents arrived, some of whom spotted Noor, and told the other agents, "let's get this guy." They grabbed him, threw him to the ground and arrested him. He was shackled and placed in a cell while being taunted by agents with slurs like "Somalis should go back home" and "Somalis drained Minnesota." He was released several hours later without charges or any paperwork or any explanation as to why he was arrested.

The order protects not just the six named plaintiffs but a class of people, defined as "all persons who do or will in the future record, observe, and/or protest Operation Metro Surge and related operations" in the district. The Judge denied defendants' request for a stay pending appeal so the order took effect immediately. It's possible this will have some deterrent effect on the indiscriminate arrests occurring in the Twin Cities, or at least will protect people from being dragged from their cars when they happen upon an ICE raid. But with this administration, don't count on it, especially given that it really, really wants a violent confrontation.

Menendez is also presiding over a separate lawsuit filed by the ACLU on behalf of Minnesota and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul for a temporary restraining order to halt the ICE operation altogether for constitutional violations in indiscriminately harassing and rounding up anyone they come across who appears non-white. At a hearing on Wednesday of last week, she asked for further briefing before ruling. Assuming she agrees with the state and restrains ICE activities, it will be interesting to see how the conservative Eighth Circuit responds to the inevitable appeal, as well as how Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh, the Supreme Court justice who presides over emergency stay applications from the Eighth Circuit, responds. Kavanaugh has the dubious honor of having these unlawful and violent detentions named after him: They're now known as "Kavanaugh stops" because of his endorsement of ICE tactics in his concurrence, on the shadow docket, in a case that reversed a California district court's ruling that ICE's random sweeps targeting minorities at Home Depots and car washes were unlawful.

Concluding Thoughts (For Now)

These latest developments make very clear, once again, that both the administration, and its opponents in Minnesota, have decided this is a battle they want to have. Minneapolis presumably didn't expect to be on the front lines of this conflict, but sometimes it happens. Ask Gettysburg, or Sevastopol, or Agincourt, or Marathon, or Waterloo. And now that the city is where it is, it appears to be ready to fight.

It is true that Minnesota is cold, and that Minnesotans are pretty rough and ornery. But it is also true that Minneapolis is the 46th most populous city in the country, and that even if you throw in St. Paul, the duo only jumps to 18th (about the same as Denver or Seattle). And look how much difficulty the White House is having in imposing its program. What will happen if it tries this new, more aggressive approach in a larger city, or in several cities at the same time?

The lesson here is that when you crack down on people, they tend to fight back. By all indications, Donald Trump does not like Xi Jinping, but Trump surely must admire Xi's ability to stifle dissent. What Trump does not seem to appreciate is that: (1) Xi controls the courts, (2) Xi benefits from generations of stifling of dissent, (3) Xi is all-in, all-the-time on keeping his people under his thumb, and (4) Xi and his people are much more competent than Trump and his people. And even with all those advantages, China's government still loses control on occasion:

Yes, the leader then was Zhao Ziyang, not Xi, but they're pretty interchangeable. It's the system in China much more than it is the leader. And if Trump thinks he can somehow re-create that, or some version of it, in the U.S., he's in for an unpleasant surprise. A surprise that looks to be unfolding as we speak. (Z & L)

Greenland Is Apparently the Hill that the White House Wants to Die On, Too, Part I

Domestically, people are unhappy about Minneapolis. Internationally, people are unhappy about Greenland. In the past 48 hours, there were four different responses about the situation, from various notable folks, which we thought we would pass along:

Norwegian PM Jonas Gahr Støre: Støre received a letter from Trump, one of those "open letters" that was also shared with many European ambassadors. Since the missive is therefore not a secret, Støre decided to share the message with the world. Here it is:

Dear Jonas: Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America. Denmark cannot protect that land from Russia or China, and why do they have a "right of ownership" anyway? There are no written documents, it's only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago, but we had boats landing there, also. I have done more for NATO than any other person since its founding, and now, NATO should do something for the United States. The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland.

Thank you!

President DJT

How much of something like this does Trump really believe? You never know, but it's probably a lot. For the record, Trump did not stop eight wars plus, there are MANY written documents (including some signed by the U.S.) confirming Demark's relationship with Greenland, Trump has done nothing for NATO (much less more than any person since its founding), and "a boat landed there hundreds of years ago" could also describe the United States' claim to ITS territory.

We'll also note the disrespect entailed in using the PM's given name, rather than his title and last name. There's also the problem of holding Støre responsible for what the Norwegian Nobel Committee does; that's like blaming Trump if Leonardo DiCaprio does not win the Oscar for Best Actor this year. Finally, note that this administration does not seem to notice (or maybe it doesn't care about) the implications of its words. That first sentence makes very clear that, at least up until this year's Nobel Peace Prize was announced, Trump was sometimes putting his personal needs ahead of those of the United States. But at least he's not going to do that anymore. Right?

Francis Fukuyama: The prominent political scientist, and one-time neoconservative, actually shared his views on YouTube on Sunday, but they didn't get public attention until yesterday. In the latest installment of Frankly Fukuyama, the Stanford prof opined:

I want to say this straight out: as an American, I have one thing to say to my many European friends—do not back down in this confrontation. Up to now, both the E.U. and the major European powers have sought to appease Trump by offering him concessions, flattery, personal gifts, and other forms of tribute. This strategy has not worked and should be abandoned immediately. Donald Trump is fundamentally a bully who wants to dominate everyone around him.

Trying to placate him with concessions is a fool's errand. He despises weakness and those who display it. Last spring, the E.U. cut a trade deal with him that accepted a 15% tariff on all European goods with no retaliation against American products. This was a bad decision. The E.U., which in terms of population and wealth is on a par with the United States, should have taken a common position and retaliated. What makes any European think that conceding Greenland will mollify Trump? He will simply come back for more later.

The arguments that Europeans have used for a concessionary policy is that they are still dependent on the United States for security and need help in dealing with Russia. They also argue that they don't want to provoke a mutually destructive trade war. But at this point, Trump's America has amply demonstrated that it will not be a reliable ally when push comes to shove.

It has already abandoned Ukraine and stated in its national security strategy document that Europe has fallen behind the Western Hemisphere in terms of American priorities. Europeans should keep in mind that those countries that stood up to Trump's threats in 2025, which include Brazil, India, and China, have actually done well for themselves. They've increased domestic support, and in the case of China, they forced America to back down.

My European friends need to keep in mind that Donald Trump is not the United States. A majority of Americans are dismayed and outraged by his policies, and they will likely vote against him and the Republican Party in the coming November election. It may be the case that the world will have to suffer a global recession as more countries stand up to Trump and retaliate against his policies. But a U.S. politician who wants to weaponize trade and use it as an instrument for territorial aggrandizement really needs to be stopped. Thanks for listening.

We don't see anything there we disagree with. And we are confident that world leaders and their advisors, around the globe, have done this same analysis. They just can't say it out loud, like Fukuyama can.

Stephen Miller: White House capo Stephen Miller appeared on the show of Fox entertainer Sean Hannity, and unleashed his inner imperialist. He decreed:

The new domain of international competition is going to be polar competition. That is where more and more resources are being spent by our nation's adversaries and rivals is the ability to control movement, navigation, lanes of travel in the polar and arctic region. To control a territory, you have to be able to defend a territory, improve a territory, inhabit a territory. Denmark has failed at every single one of these tests.

There is nothing there that Rudyard Kipling or Theodore Roosevelt would disagree with.

However, there are some very good reasons that imperialism disappeared from the globe in the first half of the 20th century. It's out of step with modern values, of course. But imperialism is also bad for trade and the economy, since it cuts off at least some trade partners who are political and military rivals. Also, it's all good and well for people with guns and cannons and airplanes to impose their will on people with, say, spears or swords or bows and arrows. But when anyone in the oppressed group could plausibly get a suitcase nuke, or some other devastating weapon, the risk-reward analysis doesn't work so well.

We also wonder, at this point, whether it's fair to call Miller a fascist. Yes, fascism is a violent system, and a system based on racial purity, and one that is at least implicitly expansionist. Miller embraces all those things. But it also has a philosophy behind it (albeit an abhorrent one). Miller seems to have little in the way of philosophy, and seems to be advocating plunder and conquest for the sake of plunder and conquest, which is more in line with imperialism than it is fascism. Maybe he's more Leopold II than he is Benito Mussolini.

We will also note that Miller is a supporter of Israel, or at least he claims to be. If the standard is that to control a territory, a nation must be able to defend a territory, improve a territory, inhabit a territory, well... Israel might not be doing so well on those fronts if it had to rely solely on itself for arms and funding. It's yet another example of this administration saying things without thinking through the implications of their words.

The fact that Miller is going on TV and pushing this cockamamie Greenland stuff probably tells us that he's one of the White House insiders driving the whole thing. And it definitely tells us that the administration is serious about this, at least until a future TACO moment (if it comes).

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX): This was also on Sunday, and involved an appearance with Fox entertainer Maria Bartiromo. Cruz allegedly has been won over to the merits of the Greenland plan, and is now singing its praises. During his appearance, he declared: "I believe it is overwhelmingly in America's national interest to acquire Greenland." He said that the territory has incredible natural resources AND strategic importance, which means it's a two-fer. Left un-asked, because it was Fox, was why the U.S. could not achieve its goals through trade pacts and alliances, and instead had no options other than outright acquisition.

While managing to keep a straight face, Cruz also went so far as to compare the acquisition of Greenland to the acquisitions of the Louisiana Purchase and Alaska. He even noted that Alaska was once called "Seward's Folly," obviously strongly implying that one day, Trump would be proven to be a visionary. We know, of course, that Donald Trump is an ignorant man with a 4th-grade grasp of U.S. history, at best. Cruz, however, is not (B.A. Princeton, J.D. Harvard Law School). So, he surely knows how dishonest his examples are, since both France and Russia WANTED to sell, to the point that it was they who approached the U.S. and not the other way around. You can tell that Cruz knows he's selling a load of manure, because he neglected to mention the other really big land purchase in American history, namely the Mexican cession. For that one, the U.S. invaded a weaker country, beat the crap out of them, and then forced a giant sale of land at gunpoint. How did that one happen to slip your mind, Rafael? Perhaps it was a little too on-point?

We pass this along, in part, because other Trump allies are also committing crimes against the historical record in order to make it seem like "buying" Greenland is totally normal, totally healthy. But we also pass it along because we continue to be amazed that Cruz is still looking in the mirror and seeing a future president. The Senator is a hawk, certainly, but he doesn't believe in acquiring Greenland any more than we do. He is just saying what he is saying to kiss Trump's rear end, and to position himself to take over the MAGA throne.

Cruz is, to say the least, delusional. We cannot think of any current Republican officeholder where the gap between "name recognition" and "influence on the Trump White House" is larger. The administration has no use for Cruz; they've got his vote on everything in the Senate already because he's beholden to MAGA voters. And the administration has no respect for Cruz, since they know full well he's a craven opportunist and a chameleon, and his apparent Trumpism is entirely a pretense. Republican primary voters have already made clear twice that they are not interested in what Cruz is selling, and that's not going to change in 2028, 2032, or any other year beginning with "20." If you're going to completely sell out your integrity (not to mention your wife, whom Trump insulted) for a chance at the presidency, then at least you'd better have... a chance at the presidency. Cruz doesn't.

We don't believe there will actually be an invasion of Greenland. That said, lots of people believed there would not be a second world war just a couple of decades after the first one. So, because we could be proven wrong, we would like to share some reader analyses of why such an invasion would be folly for the United States. We were going to do that today, but we don't want to overdo it on length. That's why we just slapped a "Part I" on the headline for this item. So, tactical analyses are up tomorrow! (Z)

And the Grift Goes On

This president has his hand in so many cookie jars that it's easy to miss one or two or even ten instances of grifty behavior, behavior of the sort that would surely have gotten any other president impeached (and probably removed). Here are a few current ones that are getting a little attention, and should really be getting a LOT of attention:

1. Stocks and Bonds: Donald Trump, who has always been known as a real estate developer, is very interested in the stock market these days. According to his financial disclosures for 2025, the people managing his investments made 191 different transactions on his behalf, or about one every other day. That includes some very timely investments, such as multi-million-dollar investments in Warner Bros. Discovery and Netflix, which are in the middle of a merger that will have to be approved by the Trump administration.
   
   Trump spokespeople claim that his investments are managed by third-party financial institutions. They describe an arrangment that would be a blind trust, and yet they do not use that phrase. For us, this brings to mind the occasion when NFL QB Aaron Rodgers answered questions about being vaccinated by saying, "Yes, I am immunized." It turned out that meant he had burned some sage or something, and NOT that he had been vaccinated.
   
   So, we are suspicious of the financial arrangements that Trump's people describe, and we are VERY suspicious of claims that Trump has no way to signal what to invest in and would never dream of doing so, even if he could. The one thing we can say for certain is that if Barack Obama or Joe Biden was investing in companies that had business before their administrations, it would trigger cases of apoplexy on the right (and, in some cases, on the left) that would make Hillary's e-mails look like child's play.
   
   
2. The Price of Peace: In order to bring peace to Israel, Trump and his team have cooked up an idea for what they call the "Board of Peace." The notion for this body is that it will oversee Gaza, and will impose its plan on that region, as it sees fit, without input from Palestinians. Nothing colonialist about that. No sir, nothing at all.
   
   We concede that sometimes these sort of entities are needed, and that they work out OK. After World War II, both Germany and Japan were temporarily governed by arrangements like this. That said, this is not 1945, and the U.S. is not trying to stamp out the remnants of a brutal fascist regime in Gaza. Further, the membership of the Board does not exactly say "serious effort at peace." Here are the members who have been announced already:
   
   
   • Former British PM Tony Blair
   • Canadian PM Mark Carney
   • World Bank head Ajay Banga
   • Trump
   • Secretary of State Marco Rubio
   • Deputy NSA Robert Gabriel
   • Trump envoy Steve Witkoff
   • First Son-in-law Jared Kushner
   • Billionaire businessman Marc Rowan
   • Argentinian President Javier Milei
   
   The list starts out OK, then goes off the rails. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey and Vladimir Putin of Russia have also received invites, but have yet to respond. Except for el-Sisi (and he's a maybe), none of those make us feel any better about the project. Invites have also gone out to currently unnamed officials in Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
   
   So, what's the grifty angle here? Well, Trump envisions his peace board lasting a very long time. And those who have been favored with an invite will get to serve for 3 years. Any nation that did not get an invite, or that wants to be a permanent member of the peace board, can make their dreams come true for the cool sum of $1 billion. Footage has already leaked of Trump announcing to the leaders of the world what the fee wil be:
   
   
   
   It is not unreasonable to expect participating nations to foot some portion of the bill for these sorts of efforts. However, throwing the opportunity open to anyone willing to pay certainly does nothing to make the proposition look legitimate. Also not good is that the Trump administration is not answering questions about where the money will go, or what it will be used for. It is not hard to imagine that the President is drooling about yet another pot of gold that he thinks will be placed at his disposal, this one to be used to develop Trump International Resort, Golf Course, and Spa — Gaza.
   
   
3. Greenland: Anytime the Trump administration does anything wacky, you have to at least keep your eyes peeled for the profit angle. And we don't mean the national profit angle (though that may be present, too, given that everything is transactional with Trump). We mean the personal profit angle. So it is with Greenland.
   
   For some reason, Trump has many more billionaire "friends" these days than back when he was a real estate developer and reality TV star. Funny how that works. One of those "friends" is Ronald Lauder, whose last name may clue readers in to the fact that he's one of the heirs to the Estée Lauder fortune. Lauder's money may come from cosmetics, but lately he's been doing a little land speculation, having acquired significant mineral rights in two places, Ukraine and Greenland. He's talked to Trump several times about the amazing opportunities for moneymaking in those places. Oh, and in a completely unrelated note, Lauder has donated at least six figures, and very likely seven figures, to Trump's various PACs and projects (remember, many of the inaugural and/or ballroom donors remain unknown).
   
   Surely, Lauder's lobbying is not the sole driver behind the Greenland madness. But could it be a piece of the puzzle? Definitely.

And that's this week's Grift Report. How long until we'll have enough material for another one? Probably about a week. Sigh. (Z)

One Year, One Walkout

Today marks the 12-month mark since Trump v2.0 began. Feels like it's been far longer than that, at LEAST 12 kalpa.

Who knows how Trump will commemorate the occasion. An invasion of Greenland? Arresting every single resident of Minneapolis? Taking over another South American country, like maybe Val Verde? Slapping 1000% tariffs on every Chinese restaurant in the U.S.? Renaming the White House as Trump Tower, Pennsylvania Avenue? Posting AI-generated videos of him flying a plane and dropping manure on Govs. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) and JB Pritzker (D-IL)? Launching a new crypto venture, $RUBESONLY? Forcing J.D. Vance to do a one-man performance of The Pirates of Penzance, highlighted by an a capella rendition of "I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General"? Your guess is as good as ours (though we'd pay good money to see that last one).

What we do know is what the resistance, or at least part of it, is planning today. Various activist groups are working together to organize the Free America Walkout. The higher-profile element of the plan is protests; there are going to be at least 1,000 of them in various cities across the nation. The potentially much-further-reaching element of the plan is, in effect, a brief general strike. The organizers want people to stop whatever they are doing—school, work, commerce—at 2:00 p.m. local time today, and take to the streets, even if only for a short time. If readers are interested in finding a local action in which to take part, the link for that is here.

This event will not put up the gaudy participation numbers that the No Kings protests have; those attracted millions of folks to protests around the country, while today's protests will be fortunate to make it to hundreds of thousands. After all, today is a weekday AND the day after a holiday. Also, those counts of participants can only ever include the folks at large-scale events; anyone who gets up from their desk and goes outside in a solo act of resistance will never be included in any sort of overall total.

This weekend, we answered a question from reader M.O. in Metamora, wondering why there isn't more pushback against the Trump administration. Our answer, in so many words, was that there has been some, but that resistance movements tend to pace themselves, because it's a marathon, not a sprint. We got a lot of pushback in response to that answer. This letter from reader R.O. in Providence, RI is representative:

I could not disagree more with your response to M.O. in Metamora. I see organized pushback being virtually nonexistent. I lived through the civil rights and Vietnam eras, and the pushback to this administration pales in comparison. Why aren't there thousands of people surrounding the White House, the Capitol, and the Supreme Court building all day, every day? Just stand there silently, so there cannot be any allegations of misconduct; the sheer numbers would certainly be a more effective protest than the little that is going on now. An even better example of a lack of effective pushback is this: I have been an immigration lawyer for over 30 years. I have heard Trump on hundreds of occasions call the people he is persecuting criminals, rapists, drug dealers, insane asylum escapees, etc. over and over and over again. I have yet to see united Democratic officeholders get on TV over and over and over again and say no, 99% of these people are good people who came here to make a better life for themselves. They are not committing crimes, they are cooking your food, caring for your elderly parents and young children, cutting your lawns, cleaning your bathrooms. Virtually crickets in this regard. We need a coordinated, much, much stronger resistance before the battle is lost.

Again, we got quite a few e-mails like that.

The pushback we got from readers has not caused us to reconsider our view that successful protest movements tend to be slow and steady (e.g., the Civil Rights Movement), nor our view that expecting large numbers of people to make protest a full-time job right now is not realistic. However, if we could go back, we would have added the following observations to our original answer:

1. The people serving in elective office are rarely the driving force behind grassroots activism. Such activism is bottom-up, not top-down, and always has been. The politicians might sometimes come along for the ride, but they are virtually never in the driver's seat. So, anyone expecting radical resistance from the politicos, outside a few outliers, is setting themselves up for disappointment. That was true in 1966, and it's true in 2026.
   
   
2. One protest is news. A protest every day, for 100 straight days, is not. One strong statement on Trump immigration policy, say from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), is news. A statement every day, for 100 straight days, is not. The current level of pushback might not be to the liking of some readers, or some Americans, but do keep in mind the possibility that there's a fair amount of pushback you're not hearing about, specifically because it's become regularized.
   
   
3. Undoubtedly, folks who grew up in the 1960s and 1970s look at protest through the lens of how protest was done in that era. Maybe that is the correct lens, maybe it's not. It's at least possible that, in the Internet Age, the battle for hearts and minds is fought at least as much online (TikTok, Instagram, etc.) as it is on the streets. If that is true, then someone who is looking ONLY at the streets is missing a big part of the picture.

All of this said, boots-on-the-ground protest requires a lot of preparation and a lot of practice. It takes time to grow the movement. It takes time to determine what participants are willing and able to do. It takes time to figure out exactly what works, for your particular context, and what does not. It takes time to develop a vocabulary of protest. That is clearly happening in Minneapolis (see above), and it's happening nationally. Axios spoke to Dana Fisher, who works at American University and studies protest movements, about today's events. And Fisher said: "The vanguard in this are starting to think about how... one day, peaceful, legally permitted marches are not enough to push back. And they're starting to think through what types of tactics are ones that people are comfortable with and would be willing and open to participating in to expand the toolbox."

In short, even if readers like M.O. in Metamora and R.O. in Providence are not happy with what they are seeing out there right now, they do at least have some reason for optimism. (Z)

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