The Malignant Fascist, returning from his Bribe Tour of Middle Eastern petro-autocracies, was welcomed back to America with three significant (if perhaps temporary) defeats.
In a setback, House Republicans failed Friday to push their big package of tax breaks and spending cuts through the Budget Committee, as a handful of conservatives joined all Democrats in a stunning vote against it.
The hard-right lawmakers are insisting on steeper spending cuts to Medicaid and the Biden-era green energy tax breaks, among other changes, before they will give their support to President Donald Trump’s “beautiful” bill. They warn the tax cuts alone would pile onto the nation’s $36 trillion debt.
The failed vote, 16-21, stalls, for now, House Speaker Mike Johnson’s push to have the package approved next week. But the Budget Committee plans to reconvene Sunday to try again. Lawmakers vowed to negotiate into the weekend as Trump is returning to Washington from the Middle East...
The "conservatives" (i.e., some paleo-right members of the "Freedom Caucus") are actually the purest expression of Republican MAGAt ideology -- fighting for even steeper cuts to Medicaid and green energy, and huge tax cuts for billionaire oligarchs.
SCOTUS Blocks Deportations Under Alien Enemies Act
The Supreme Court on Friday blocked President Donald Trump from moving forward with deportations under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act for a group of immigrants in northern Texas, siding with Venezuelans who feared they were poised for imminent removal under the sweeping wartime authority.
The decision is a significant loss for Trump, who wants to use the law to speed deportations – and avoid the kind of review normally required before removing people from the country. But the decision is also temporary and the underlying legal fight over the president’s invocation will continue in multiple federal courts across the country.
The justices sent the case at issue back to an appeals court to decide the underlying questions in the case, including whether the president’s move is legal and, if it is, how much notice the migrants targeted under the act should receive.
Two conservative justices – Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito – publicly noted their dissent...
Perhaps due process, currently on a ventilator, isn't quite dead yet?
The U.S. credit rating was downgraded by Moody's Ratings on Friday, highlighting investor concerns about the government's growing debt.
The downgrade from the top rating of Aaa to Aa1 "reflects the increase over more than a decade in government debt and interest payment ratios to levels that are significantly higher than similarly rated sovereigns," the credit rating firm said in a statement on Friday.
"Successive U.S. administrations and Congress have failed to agree on measures to reverse the trend of large annual fiscal deficits and growing interest costs," Moody's added.
Moody's also highlighted the environment of heightened policy uncertainty driven by Mr. Trump's evolving trade priorities.
Moody's is the last of the three major credit rating agencies to downgrade U.S. government debt. In August 2011, Standard and Poor's downgraded the U.S. from AAA to AA+, and in August 2023 Fitch Ratings cut the credit rating a notch from AAA to AA+. [snip]
The credit downgrade came as the House Budget Committee on Friday rejected President Trump's domestic policy bill, which would extend tax cuts from his first term.
If the 2017 Tax Cuts and Job Act is extended, it would add $4 trillion to the federal primary deficit (excluding interest payments) over the next decade, Moody's said Friday...
Don't worry! The demented six- times- bankrupted business genius and convicted fraudster will navigate us through these challenging economic times!
BONUS:
— Justin Wolfers (@justinwolfers.bsky.social) May 17, 2025 at 8:32 AM
Have to wonder how Trump & Co will threaten Moody's. There there will be bellowing and whining on UnTruth Social goes without saying.
ReplyDeleteThe man is as pure as driven snow and never puts a foot wrong, why can't everyone see it???? /s