I do not like Alien Musk. But I
had a tiny bit of respect for him when he begun standing up to Chump.
That's gone as he does everything he can to get back on Chump's good
side. Kay Banks reports:
Elon
Musk's friendship with Donald Trump has always seemed strange, but
their breakup definitely takes the cake. Although Musk's June 2025
social media posts destroyed the bond he built with Trump — whom he
spent several hundred million dollars to help get elected to the
presidency in 2024, per CBS News, and with whom he went to work for in
the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) shortly after Trump took
office — it seems he's had some conflicting emotions about their fall
out. And it's giving desperate.
[. . .]
Elon
Musk has an interesting way of breaking up with someone. Even though
his relationship with Donald Trump descended into a vicious feud in June
2025, he still made sure to donate several million dollars to super
PACs belonging to Trump and other Republicans. According to AF Post,
Musk allocated $5 million to the central PAC benefitting Trump in June,
the same month he appeared to be cutting ties with the controversial
president. Aside from the mind-boggling optics, Musk's shocking
financial support for Trump suggests he was, at least temporarily,
feeling regret for ending their relationship in such a messy, public
manner. It also highlights that Musk has a habit of stuffing Trump's
pockets with money.
Elon Musk’s image has tanked so badly that he is now the public figure that Americans dislike the most, according to a new poll.
Gallup
asked Americans between July 7 and July 21 what they thought of 14
well-known U.S. and global figures, with 61 percent of respondents
having an unfavorable opinion of the Tesla billionaire. Six percent said
they had no opinion of Musk, while just 33 percent reported a positive
view.
The Tesla CEO bankrolled President Trump’s march
to the White House, splurging almost $300 million backing his campaign.
Musk grew close to the MAGA leader, becoming known as his “first buddy”
and heading up his cost-cutting task force, the so-called Department of
Government Efficiency.
However,
the relationship soured as quickly as it blossomed, and Musk was sent
packing from Trump’s administration with little to show for it.
This
has been reflected in several polls, most recently the damning Gallup
survey that shows his popularity below even that of Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Compared to
January’s findings, Musk’s reputation has plummeted faster than Tesla’s
sales. His net favorability rating of -4 at the start of the year has
worsened to -28 now.
Spineless. We see him for the coward -- and racist -- that he is.
Wednesday, August 6, 2025. Chump still can't silence the Epstein story,
survivors continue to speak out, his was on immigrants gets hammered by
actual truths, and much more.
Last
night, Jeffrey Epstein survivor Haley Robson spoke with BBC NEWSNIGHT's
Matt Chorley Haley was only 16 when Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell
began exploiting her.
Newsnight hears from a
survivor of Jeffrey Epstein's abuse, Haley Robson, who delivers an
emotional plea to Donald Trump. She also says convicted sex trafficker
Ghislaine Maxwell’s move to a minimum security prison is "a slap in the
face" to all of Epstein’s victims. Interview by Matt Chorley.
As
Convicted Felon Donald Chump moves pedophile and sex trafficker Maxwell
to Club Fed and works on a sweetheart deal for her (and her silence),
we need to remember that this isn't one girl who got victimized or two,
it was hundreds. It wasn't one day's activity, it was a crime spree
that ran for years.
Haley asks, "To be clear,
Ghislaine Maxwell’ is in prison for her counts of child exploitation and
trafficking why would anyone give somebody like her who is a monster
and a liar a time of day to explain anything?"
In 2007–2008, as U.S. attorney, Acosta approved a plea deal that allowed child-trafficking ring-leader Jeffrey Epstein to plead guilty to a single state charge of solicitation, in exchange for a federal non-prosecution agreement.[2] After Epstein's arrest in July 2019 on sex trafficking
charges, Acosta faced renewed and harsher criticism for his role in the
2008 non-prosecution agreement, as well as criticism and calls for his
resignation as Secretary of Labor; he resigned on July 19 and was
replaced by Eugene Scalia.
Acosta, then the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, agreed to a plea deal,[29]
to grant immunity from all federal criminal charges to Epstein, along
with four named co-conspirators and any unnamed "potential
co-conspirators". That agreement "essentially shut down an ongoing FBI
probe into whether there were more victims and other powerful people who
took part in Epstein's sex crimes". At the time, this halted the
investigation and sealed the indictment.
Renewed interest
In
2017, Acosta was nominated for Secretary of Labor. His handling of the
Epstein case was discussed as part of his confirmation hearing.
On November 28, 2018, as rumors circulated that Acosta was being considered as a possible successor to Attorney GeneralJeff Sessions, the Miami Herald published an investigation detailing Acosta's role in the Epstein case.[27]
That story revealed the extent of collaboration between federal
prosecutors and Epstein's attorneys in their efforts to keep victims
from learning of the plea deal.
The Miami Herald describes an email from Epstein's
attorney after his off-site meeting with Acosta: "'Thank you for the
commitment you made to me during our Oct. 12 meeting,' Lefkowitz wrote
in a letter to Acosta after their breakfast meeting in West Palm Beach.
He added that he was hopeful that Acosta would abide by a promise to
keep the deal confidential. 'You ... assured me that your office would
not ... contact any of the identified individuals, potential witnesses
or potential civil claimants and the respective counsel in this matter,'
Lefkowitz wrote."
The Miami Herald article stated that certain aspects of
Acosta's non-prosecution agreement violated federal law. "As part of the
arrangement, Acosta agreed, despite a federal law to the contrary, that
the deal would be kept from the victims. As a result, the
non-prosecution agreement was sealed until after it was approved by the
judge, thereby averting any chance that the girls — or anyone else —
might show up in court and try to derail it." Victims, former
prosecutors, and the retired Palm Beach police chief were among those
quoted criticizing the agreement and Acosta's role in it.[30]
Victims' rights violation
After
a lawsuit was filed in federal court, in 2019, a court ruled that the
non-prosecution agreement was invalid and that prosecutors had violated
the victim's rights with their non-prosecution agreement.
On February 21, 2019, a ruling in federal court returned Acosta's role in the Epstein case to the headlines.[31] The decision to keep the deal with Epstein secret until after it was finalized was found to be a violation of the Crime Victims' Rights Act of 2004
(CVRA), which requires notifying victims of the progress of federal
criminal cases. The CVRA was new and relatively untested at the time of
the Epstein non-prosecution agreement. In 2008, representatives for two
of Epstein's victims filed a lawsuit in federal court aiming to vacate
the federal non-prosecution agreement on the grounds that it violated
the CVRA.[30]
For more than a decade, the U.S. Attorney's office denied that it acted
in violation of victims' rights laws and argued that the CVRA did not
apply in the Epstein case.[32]
The government's contention that the CVRA did not apply was based on
questions of timing (whether or not CVRA applied prior to filing of
federal charges), relevance (whether the CVRA applied to non-prosecution
agreements), and jurisdiction (whether the case should be considered a
federal case or a state case under the CVRA). The court rejected those
arguments in the February 21, 2019 ruling, finding that the CVRA did in
fact apply and that victims should have been notified of the Epstein
non-prosecution agreement in advance of its signing, to afford them the
opportunity to influence its terms. At the conclusion of his ruling, the
federal judge in the case noted that he was "not ruling that the
decision not to prosecute was improper", but was "simply ruling that,
under the facts of this case, there was a violation of the victims
rights [for reasonable, accurate, and timely notice] under the CVRA."[33]
Because the CVRA does not specify penalties for failure to meet
victims notification requirements, the judge offered both parties
opportunities to suggest remedies—Epstein's victims who were party to
the suit asked for rescission of the federal non-prosecution agreement
with Epstein, while the government suggested other approaches,
maintaining that other victims were against rescinding the agreement due
to privacy concerns and possible impacts to restitution paid under the
agreement.[34]
Following the Herald investigation and related news coverage,
members of Congress submitted a formal request to the U.S. Department of
Justice for review of Acosta's role in the Epstein deal,[35] and several editorials called for Acosta's resignation or termination from his then-current position as U.S. Labor Secretary.[36][37] In February 2019, the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility notified Senator Ben Sasse that it had opened an investigation into Epstein's prosecution.[38][39]
Epstein's arrest and Acosta's resignation
On
July 6, 2019, Epstein was arrested by the FBI-NYPD Crimes Against
Children Task Force on sex trafficking charges stemming from activities
alleged to have occurred in 2002–2005.[40]
Amid criticism of his mishandling of the Epstein case, Acosta
resigned his role as Secretary of Labor effective July 19, 2019, after a
public outcry.[41]
An anonymous source claimed that when Acosta was vetted for his cabinet
post in the Trump administration, he stated “I was told Epstein
‘belonged to intelligence’ and to leave it alone.”[42]
According to an internal review conducted by the Department of Justice's Office of Professional Responsibility
(OPR), which was released in November 2020, Acosta showed "poor
judgment" in granting Epstein a non-prosecution agreement and failing to
notify Epstein's alleged victims about this agreement.[43]
In the report, Acosta denied that Epstein was an intelligence asset.
The OPR report also stated that it found no evidence that Epstein was a
cooperating witness or an intelligence asset.[44]
Seems
to me if you're trying to find out what happened and how, you start
with the man who gave the sweetheart deal that shut down the FBI
investigation.
Also speaking of Maxwell yesterday was Chump. This is from MSNBC's THE LAST HOUR WITH STEPHANIE RUHLE.
No concern expressed over the victims from Chump's mouth.
Two victims of sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein attacked President Donald Trump's administration in letters to the court where grand jury testimony in the case remains sealed, according to CNN.
The
victims, who remained anonymous, both filed letters with the court
Monday, "condemning the Justice Department’s request to unseal grand
jury testimony" and citing a lack of respect toward them by Trump and
the DOJ.
“Dear United States, I wish you would have
handled and would handle the whole ‘Epstein Files’ with more respect
towards and for the victims," one woman wrote. "I am not some pawn in
your political warfare. What you have done and continue to do is eating
at me day after day as you help to perpetuate this story indefinitely."
The other victim accused the administration of only caring about the “wealthy men” involved in the case.
“(I)
feel like the DOJ’s and FBI’s priority is protecting the 'third-party',
the wealthy men by focusing on scrubbing their names off the files of
which the victims, 'know who they are,’'” she wrote.
One
letter continued, “I appreciate your time reading my short thoughts and
feeling and my anxiety and frustration is NOT aimed at you, obviously.
It is aimed at the very government here, the ones asking to release
these transcripts, exhibits, etc., of which the victims are not privy to
while they have concluded that there is nothing more to see on the
files they hold. Yet no one has seen them, but them," adding, "I am
beside myself.”
The story is
not going away. Today, there's a big meet-up with Vice President JD
Vance where they're going to try to figure out a way of addressing this
topic and bringing it to a close. That is just not happening. Chump
acts guilty in public and his actions are questionable.
Lawrence O'Donnell covered many of the new issues that have arisen in the video below.
Donald Trump was warned about Jeffrey Epstein’s conduct around “younger girls” over a decade before he was exposed as a pedophile, said an author who has written extensively about the financier.
Barry
Levine, author of The Spider: Inside the Criminal Web of Jeffrey
Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell and former executive editor at the
National Enquirer, told CNN’s OutFront that Trump was cautioned back in
1992 not to host a party at which he and Epstein would be the only two
men present.
“There was a 1992 party in which
Donald Trump had 28 young women at a party at Mar-a-Lago, his only guest
at that particular party was a man named Jeffrey Epstein,” Levine told
OutFront host Erin Burnett.
“The Florida
businessman who put this party together for the ‘calendar girls’
competition that took place at Trump casinos, specifically told Donald
Trump… ‘I’m going to ban Jeffrey Epstein from events like this, I don’t
like him going after younger girls.’ And he was very concerned about the
party on this particular night.”
Levine
was referencing a claim first made by The New York Times in July 2019
after Epstein’s arrest on federal sex trafficking charges. The article
details how Trump and Epstein had been friends for years, but Trump
insisted they hadn’t spoken for over 15 years following a reported
falling out over a Palm Beach real estate deal.
The businessman in question was George Houraney, who organized the 1992 “calendar girl” competition party at Trump’s request.
Houraney told The Times how Trump dismissed his warning about Epstein after learning he would be at the Mar-a-Lago event.
“I
said, ‘Look, Donald, I know Jeff really well, I can’t have him going
after younger girls,’” Houraney told the Times in 2019. “He said, ‘Look
I’m putting my name on this. I wouldn’t put my name on it and have a
scandal.’”
Houraney added that Trump “didn’t care” and that he “pretty much had to ban” Epstein from his events.
Trump
eventually barred Epstein from Mar-a-Lago in late 2007, more than a
year after Epstein was first accused of soliciting underage
prostitutes.
The media
continues to discover new information daily. This story is not over and
the American people aren't buying what's been put out by Chump. Oliver O'Connell (INDEPENDENT) reports:
A new poll on his performance
has President Donald Trump underwater by 20 percentage points, with
Americans disapproving of him on every major issue, including
immigration.
Of
those surveyed, 63 percent believe the administration is withholding
information about the case and 81 percent specifically hold the
president responsible.
Just
as Donald ignores the suffering of Epstein's victims, he ignores the
suffering of the immigrants whose lives he is destroying. At HUFFINGTON POST, Ian Kumamoto notes:
The first time
I learned of Donald Trump’s political aspirations was in 2015, when he
announced his intent to run for president and made a speech claiming
that Mexico was sending scores of violent criminals over the border.
As
an immigrant from Mexico, hearing him talk about my community in that
way was jarring. But like many others, I didn’t think he could actually
rise to power, given his political inexperience and, well, his personality.
Ten
years later and just a few months into his second presidential term,
Trump is just as eager to purge the U.S. of its Latin American
immigrants. This time around, he’s realizing it won’t be as easy as he
thought.
When
he started his second presidential term, Trump was ambitious. White
House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller announced in May that
Immigration and Customs Enforcement would seek to arrest at least 3,000
immigrants per day to reach the administration’s mass deportation goals,
as severaloutletsreported.
The
number is outlandish; it’s assumed that he’s looking for people who
have committed crimes, but those who are paying attention are seeing it play out differently.
In
a court filing last week, Justice Department lawyers said the
Department of Homeland Security had never actually set such a quota for
arrests and deportations, The Guardian reported.
This
sudden amnesia about that lofty quota feels a bit suspect. Trump’s
whole campaign was run on the premise of arresting and deporting as many undocumented people as possible.
In his process of trying to get rid of them, it seems that Trump is
learning how beautifully entwined immigrants are in the fabric of this
country.
The
backtracking on this 3K-a-day quota might boil down to the reality that
there aren’t nearly as many undocumented criminals as the
administration had hoped. ICE has resorted to arresting people who are leaving immigration courts,
some of whom are in the middle of seeking legal asylum. Even when
allegedly playing dirty, the administration has managed to deport only
around 700 people per day. On top of that, 65% of the immigrants
detained since last October have no criminal convictions, according to the Cato Institute.
People
are noting the very real damage that ICE is doing. They're talking
about it to neighbors, they're protesting in the public square, they're
writing letters to the editor.
“California law targets ICE agents’ use of masks,”
(sacbee.com, July 22) When ICE sweeps people off the streets without
identifying themselves and holds them in detention without due process
or contact with their families, it is acting as if this country were a
repressive totalitarian government. Justifying this practice as a thinly
veiled need to protect ICE officers’ safety and security is absurd.
Other local, state or federal law enforcement officers who also face
safety dangers carry out their duties without the need for masks. The
purpose of this ICE practice is solely to intimidate and sow terror and
fear in our communities. California Senate Bill 627 — as well as federal
legislation — is needed to reject this horrendous policing practice.
Shirlie Marymee North Highlands
Lives have been destroyed and lives are being destroyed. David Dayen (TAP) notes that local economies have also been destroyed:
The absurd yet dangerous removal of the commissioner of
the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the offense of reporting jobs figures
as they are collected has overshadowed the reasons why U.S. employment is struggling. There’s the argument that tariff uncertainty has finally caught up to the real economy, and the argument that the country only produces AI data centers and sick people
for the health care system to manage. But one important issue has been
pushed off to the side: the predictable economic impact of ICE’s terror
campaign against immigrant communities.
This will have long-term macroeconomic consequences. Net immigration,
which provides a steady supply of available workers in key fields, is way down this year. Employers are scrambling to find substitute workers and worrying about productivity losses. Remittance payments to Mexico have plummeted,
suggesting a decline in these workers’ economic contributions, not only
to their relatives, but to industries like home care, agriculture, and
construction. Recent drops in residential construction could result from a lack of available workers as well.
This story was originally published by Boyle Heights Beat on July 24, 2025.
By
midday on a recent Monday, only a few customers had trickled into La
Chispa de Oro, a once-busy Mexican eatery on Cesar Chavez Avenue in
Boyle Heights.
Behind the counter, owner Melchor Moreno monitored
the money in his till, counting the few hundred dollars in sales — about
half a typical weekday.
He glanced at his staff, counting with his fingers how much he’d owe in wages that day. The math didn’t add up.
“It doesn’t help that there’s no foot traffic, too…. The streets are empty. It’s kind of scary,” Moreno said.
Since
immigration raids began sweeping through Los Angeles neighborhoods,
Eastside restaurants have been scraping by, as even longtime customers
are keeping themselves and their dollars at home out of fear of
potential immigration enforcement. While the full economic toll is still
uncertain, many business owners already feel the squeeze.
Moreno has cut staff hours. He’s stepped in to wash dishes. With fewer customers, his staff goes home with fewer tips.
“They’ve
noticed it. The waitresses are taking less money home every day,” he
said. “I don’t know how much longer we can keep doing this.”
Moreno,
who is still paying off electricity bill debt accumulated during the
COVID-19 pandemic, estimates his restaurant has lost more than $7,000
since the raids began on June 6. To stay afloat, he’s now closing
Tuesdays through the summer until fear stemming from the ICE raids
fades, he hopes.
Other than terror and destruction, what is ICE accomplishing? Blaise Malley (SALON) points out, "According to internal figures obtained by CBS News, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
is holding roughly 59,000 people in detention, likely the highest
number in American history. Nearly half have no criminal record."
B-b-b-but Chump said these were violent criminals!
Chump lies a lot.
These
are not violent criminals. These are not criminals. These are people
who go to work and school and try to make a difference in their families
and their neighborhoods and they're being terrorized.
And this is happening not just to immigrants, it's happening to American citizens as well. Cerise Castle (TAP) notes:
Since federal agents descended onto Los Angeles streets in early
June, several United States citizens have been detained and held in
immigration detention centers. A Capital & Main review of local
reporting, video and social media posts found at least nine citizens
were taken into custody by agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement or U.S. Customs and Border Protection after protesting near
or observing immigration raids in the Los Angeles area since June 6. Two
are currently facing federal charges.
Job Garcia arrived at the Home Depot in Hollywood for his delivery
gig for another company on the morning of June 19 expecting to have a
regular day. But moments later, Garcia — a U.S. citizen — was tackled,
arrested and detained by federal agents.
Garcia said he spotted vans pulling into the store’s parking lot, and
began filming as federal agents started breaking the window of a truck
with a man sitting behind the wheel. Videos taken by Garcia and other
bystanders show several masked men in green vests that read “POLICE” and
“U.S. Border Patrol” approach Garcia and tackle him to the ground.
“Give me your f**king hand! You want it, you got it,” one agent said. “You want to go to jail? You got it.”
The agents took Garcia to Dodger Stadium, where he told Capital &
Main he was held for hours before being transported to the Metropolitan
Detention Center in downtown L.A. The federal prison’s basement has
been turned into a detention facility for people apprehended by federal
immigration enforcement officers, where civil rights advocates say
detainees are being kept in grossly overcrowded, dungeon-like
conditions. One of the Border Patrol agents who detained Garcia is the
same man who was subsequently arrested and charged with assaulting a
Long Beach police officer and resisting arrest in a separate incident,
according to Capital & Main’s review of the footage. “This matter is
under investigation,” a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson
said in a statement to Capital & Main.
“This is a case of Border Patrol and ICE essentially punishing
citizens for exercising their First Amendment rights. It goes against
the values of this country,” said Ernest Herrera, an attorney at the
Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, who is representing
Garcia in a claim against Customs and Border Protection, Border Patrol,
and ICE. “It looks more like the behavior of a crackpot military
dictatorship in a different country. But it’s here. This is happening
right now in our country.”
It’s unclear how many U.S. citizens federal agents have arrested
since undertaking a series of immigration raids in Southern California
starting in June. Federal officials did not answer Capital & Main’s
questions about the detention of U.S. citizens.
Under the Trump administration's aggressive immigration
crackdown, more women detained by immigration authorities are being
exposed to sexual violence, mistreatment, and the denial of basic rights
in detention centers across the United States, according to a new report.
Many women interviewed by the HuffPostsaid
they were raped, denied medical care during their pregnancies, and
subjected to other serious human rights violations while in U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody.
Serious
pregnancy complications, sexual assault allegations, and suicide
attempts are among the most frequently reported issues in ICE detention
facilities, the report added. These incidents accounted for 60 percent
of 911 calls made from the 10 largest ICE centers nationwide, according
to a WIRED investigation published in June.
As
of late June, about 22,000 women were being held in ICE custody —
nearly 40 percent of the agency's total detainee population — according
to Detention Reports, a platform that analyzes publicly available data on immigration detention.
Advocates
for women's rights told HuffPost that ICE's refusal to release
gender-specific detention data is itself part of a broader pattern of
rights violations and institutional opacity.
"They're
creating this black box of impunity, where they're keeping women who
are pregnant or who have advanced health needs," Zain Lakhani, director
of migrant rights and justice at the Women's Refugee Commission, told
the outlet. "There's no one watching for human rights abuses."
The current administration made
sweeping mutilations of policies, institutions
and programs which celebrated and protected
diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Cuts in
Medicaid, veterans’ affairs, education for
public institutions and housing directly
impact Black people. Attacks on voting rights,
LGBTQA+ rights and workers’ rights is about
us. The rise of the police state targets us.
Immigration and the travel ban restrictions
include us. Black livelihoods and Black bodies
are all in the crosshairs. To pretend that
trump’s policies will not disproportionately
affect poor and working-class people,
especially Black folks, is disingenuous.
Further, any effort to persuade Black folks
against fighting for their survival and
uniting with other groups of people with
common cause, is counterrevolutionary.
We are in dangerous times and
our people need more guidance and motivation
to get organized, not less. This is not the
first regime in history to consolidate state
power, to silence the media, to dismantle
internal checks on abuse of power, to
legitimize the criminalization of sectors of
society, to expand the police state and target
dissidents. Let us recognize the period we are
in, learn from the lessons of the not-so
distant past, and prepare our communities for
the battles ahead. One important lesson to
highlight is that a passive or an unorganized
response to fascism doesn’t end well for a
democracy and its people.
Let's wind down with this from Senator Patty Murray's office:
Republicans just passed $1 trillion in health care cuts and are kicking roughly 15 million
people off their health care; Republican bill bans Planned Parenthood
from receiving federal Medicaid reimbursement funding—threatening to
shutter clinics across the country
ICYMI
on Friday: Senator Murray Statement on Trump Ripping Away Access to
Abortion Care for Women Veterans Who Were Raped or Whose Health is in
Danger
Seattle, WA – Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray
(D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and a senior
member and former chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and
Pensions (HELP) Committee, held a roundtable discussion with patient
advocates and health care providers from Washington state and Idaho to
discuss how recent moves by President Trump and Republicans in Congress
to attack access to health care—especially reproductive health care—and
slash Medicaid are harming people in Washington state and across the
entire Pacific Northwest.
Joining Senator Murray for the event were; Rebecca Gibron, CEO,
Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawaiʻi, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky;
Dr. Keemi Ereme, OB/GYN at UW Medicine and Assistant Professor of
Obstetrics and Gynecology; Dr. Caitlin Gustafson, family physician from
rural Idaho and co-president of the Idaho Coalition for Safe Healthcare;
Kayla Smith, a patient storyteller who traveled to Washington from Idaho for necessary abortion care and former plaintiff in Adkins v. State of Idaho;
Emily Cuarenta, a patient storyteller and student at Eastern Washington
University; and Heather Mullin, a patient storyteller and local
advocate from the Seattle area.
“The horror stories caused by abortion bans have not stopped
since Republicans ended the right to abortion, implemented cruel bans,
and plunged this country into a full-blown health care crisis. And
unfortunately, Republican attacks on abortion care have not stopped.
Republicans passed devastating new attacks on health care and
reproductive rights as part of their Big Ugly bill, which ‘defunds’
Planned Parenthood—a longtime dream for the far right and an absolute
nightmare for everyone else. Clinics will close, putting abortion care,
birth control services, cervical and breast cancer screenings, and other
basic preventive care out of reach for millions of women,” said Senator Murray. “And
let’s not forget all the other ways Trump and Republicans are attacking
abortion. Trump ripped away protections ensuring women can get abortion
care to save their lives. He put in place a near-total abortion ban for
veterans and servicemembers at DoD and VA. He and Republicans are
packing our courts with the most radical anti-abortion extremists.
Meanwhile, Republicans are still trying to rip away access to safe
medication abortion and advance dangerous ‘fetal personhood’ provisions,
and they are still trying to ban abortion nationwide and put women and doctors in jail—blatantly overriding the will of the American people.”
“But we are still pushing back and fighting for reproductive rights in every way we can,” Senator Murray continued.
“As Appropriations Vice Chair, I am working to reject Trump’s proposal
to slash Title X and eliminate the Teen Pregnancy Prevention program,
among other awful ideas. The funding bill we passed out of committee
last week funds these programs. Democrats are pushing to reverse the
damage from Trump’s Big Ugly Bill, so we can restore Planned Parenthood
funds, save patients from losing care, and save hospitals. And we are
keeping our spotlight on how Republicans’ anti-abortion extremism is
hurting women every day. From abortion care to rural hospitals, health
care is under attack here in America. The fight to change this is today
and every day until we can reverse these cuts and keep making progress.”
Defunding Planned Parenthood puts at least 200 health centers across
the country at risk of closure—90 percent of them in states where
abortion is legal—and will rip away health care for more than 1.1
million people, many of whom might not be able to get care anywhere
else. Every year, Planned Parenthood provides health care to more than
two million people, including STI testing and treatment, cancer
screenings, birth control, HPV vaccines, wellness exams and other
critical services. Recent research from the Guttmacher Institute found
that, contrary to Republicans’ claims, Federally Qualified Health
Centers do not have the capacity to
readily serve the millions of people who currently rely on Planned
Parenthood for care. Defunding Planned Parenthood will cost an estimated
$261 million over the next decade.
President Trump also has taken direct aim at reproductive health care in the first few months of his term through a multitude of executive actions—issuing anti-choice executive orders, pardoning violent anti-abortion extremists, and taking a host of other actions to roll back efforts to protect access to reproductive health care across the country. On Friday, the Trump administration moved to revoke
women veterans’ ability to receive abortion care through the Department
of Veterans Affairs (VA) when their pregnancy is putting their health
at risk, or is the result of rape or incest, which Senator Murray
swiftly condemned as an attack on the reproductive rights of women
veterans.
“In the fall of 2022, my husband and I found out we were pregnant again with our second child. And this was just after Roe was overturned,” Kayla Smith, a patient storyteller and former plaintiff in Adkins v. State of Idaho. Kayla was Senator Patty Murray’s State of the Union guest last year. “The
only thing that we were concerned about was preeclampsia, because that
was what I had dealt with before in my prior pregnancy. And then, the
day after the trigger law went into effect to ban abortion in the State
of Idaho, we found out that our son had several fatal fetal anomalies.
And so our maternal fetal medicine specialist shared with us that,
unfortunately, if we wanted to end this very wanted pregnancy, that she
would no longer be able to help us in the state of Idaho… We had to take
out a $16,000 personal loan to drive eight hours from Idaho here,
actually to the University of Washington… It was the most tragic thing
we ever had to deal with to make that decision, but then to also be
forced to flee our state to have to go somewhere else to get care that
we should have gotten was just devastating… In that moment, I did not want
an abortion, but I needed one. And I felt like my providers were not
able to give me that standard of care that should be available to
everyone… These abortion bans are not saving lives, they are actually
putting more lives at risk.”
“Access to safe and legal abortion through Planned Parenthood
saved my life,” said Heather Mullin, a patient storyteller and local
advocate from the Seattle area. “I
was the victim of a predator who was a respected person in our
community and used his position of power and access to harm children. He
once told me that he had noticed me when I was in the sixth grade,
which makes me about 11 years old. I was repeatedly sexually assaulted
from the age of 13 until I became pregnant when I was 15. And I knew
that when I became pregnant at the time that I was not going to have the
baby. I felt very afraid and alone, and I didn’t want my abuser’s baby
to be my life sentence. So, I sought out a legal and safe abortion at
Planned Parenthood. I took the bus during spring break of my freshman
year of high school, when my parents thought I was at track practice.
And I got an abortion, and nobody knew about it for a really long
time—and I didn’t really talk about it publicly until the Dobbs
decision. And I really felt it was important for people to know that
all sorts of reasons there are for having an abortion, that you probably
know someone who has had an abortion. And when I started talking about
my story, I realized it was really a much more common experience than we
sometimes think about and talk about. In our current state where we
have outright abortion bans, including no exclusions for rape or incest,
we’re talking about forcing children to give birth. And that’s the kind
of thing that really keeps me up tonight, and why I’m here today to
talk about the importance of funding abortion care and access to
abortion. It’s disturbing to me that some of our government officials
seem to be protecting predators instead of victims.”
“Before the ban on abortion care in the state, I was able to
help my patients through deeply personal and often complicated
decisions, in the privacy of an ER bay or exam room. Even our ability to
do the jobs we were trained to do in time-sensitive and
health-threatening emergencies, such as bleeding or infection or organ
failure, put us in the crosshairs. Would we provide the stabilizing care
they needed in their community healthcare system, with the providers
they know and trust, and where their support system is in place for
them, but risk going to jail for doing so?,” said Dr. Caitlin
Gustafson, a family medicine obstetrician in rural Idaho for two decades
and President of the Idaho Coalition for Safe Healthcare Foundation,
representing over 1,500 Idaho healthcare professionals and concerned
community members. “A maternal health care
crisis has ensued. The longer Idahoans must travel out of state to get
the care they need, not only will we face increasing maternal health
complications, but also worsening physician shortages. By 15 months
after the Dobbs decision and the Idaho trigger ban going into
effect, nearly a quarter of my OBGYN colleagues and more than half of
the maternal fetal medicine specialists I previously referred my
patients with high-risk pregnancy conditions to stop practicing
obstetrics in our state; and we have been unable to recruit physicians
to replace them because of the chilling effect of these abortion bans.
And it got worse after the initial exodus: In a peer-reviewed study
published in the Journal of the American Medical Association last week
by an Idaho colleague of mine, Idaho has suffered 35 percent net decline
in OB/GYNs who practice obstetrics in Idaho since Idaho’s abortion bans
went into effect. What this has meant is that Idaho continues to lose
much needed medical professionals that are the cornerstones of women’s
healthcare, not just during pregnancy, but across the entire lifespan.
For example, I have patients suffering from post-menopausal bleeding who
must wait months to get into an OBGYN to consult for the hysterectomy
that they need. The reduction in this workforce further threatens
healthcare access, not just for women but for all Idahoans. With pending
Medicaid cuts looming, our ability to do our jobs to keep our
communities safe and healthy will become that much more difficult.”
“Planned Parenthood affiliates in Washington provide high
quality reproductive health care to more than 100,000 patients every
year, including patients who come across state lines because their state
has eliminated preventive care access and banned abortions entirely.
But care in Washington is at risk like it is everywhere else: the
Republican budget bill will eliminate health insurance for tens of
thousands of Washingtonians, and will defund Planned Parenthood by
banning us from Medicaid,” said Rebecca Gibron, CEO of Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai’i, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky.
“Without support from state and local governments to fill the gap,
health centers in Washington will close and patients will lose access to
care. We are thankful to Senator Murray for being the national leader
on reproductive health and rights as she fights to restore funding and
reverse the ban, and we are thankful for leaders in Washington who are
committed to finding local revenue to keep our doors open.”
“My husband serves in the Air Force, and attacks on
reproductive freedom and access to health care feel like a slap in the
face. We worry about the hostility of the next state we are stationed
in,” said Emily Cuarenta, a student at Eastern Washington
University who lives with her husband on an Air Force base in Spokane.
Emily spoke about the abortion care she received in Georgia prior to the
Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, where she was
forced to travel and undergo a waiting period, an ultrasound, and
medically inaccurate counseling that misinformed her about the risks of
having an abortion. “The Dobbs decision opened the
floodgates to oppressive, medically inaccurate laws that endanger the
lives of pregnant people. In addition to suffering poor maternal health
outcomes, pregnant people now fear criminalization of their pregnancy
outcomes.”
“This legislation strips people of their access to
reproductive healthcare, their choices in family planning and their
fundamental human right to health care. This legislation will lead to
many preventable deaths, and that is simply unacceptable,” said Dr.
Keemi Ereme, an OB/GYN at UW Medicine and Assistant Professor of
Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Senator Murray has been the leading voice in the Senate speaking out and raising the alarm against Republicans’ efforts to defund Planned Parenthood through their One Big Beautiful Bill Act. She has held constantrecentevents—including multipleevents in Washington state—to sound the alarm on the devastating cuts in Republicans’ reconciliation bill. As the Senate was considering the legislation, Senator Murray put forward an amendment to
strike a provision of the legislation that achieves anti-abortion
extremists’ long-sought goal of “defunding” Planned Parenthood;
Republicans blocked the amendment. Recently, Senator Murray introduced legislation to reverse the massive health care cuts Republicans passed into law last month and restore federal Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood.
Senator Murray is a longtime leader in
the fight to protect and expand access to reproductive health care and
abortion rights, and she has led Congressional efforts to fight back
after the Supreme Court’s disastrous decision overturning Roe v. Wade. Murray has introducedmorethan a dozen pieces of legislation to protect reproductive rights from further attacks, protect providers, and help ensure women get the care they
need; Murray has led efforts to push for passage of these bills on the
floor multiple times. Last January, on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, Murray led her colleagues in
hosting a “State of Abortion Rights” briefing with women who have
suffered firsthand from Republican abortion bans, and last June, she
chaired a HELP Committee hearing titled “The Assault on Women’s Freedoms: How Abortion Bans Have Created a Health Care Nightmare Across America.” Recently, Murray helped lead efforts to force Republicans on the record on votes to protect access to contraception and access to IVF (twice) last year, and she led her colleagues in
raising the alarm about the threat a second Trump administration would
pose to reproductive rights and abortion access in every state, as outlined in Project 2025. At a forum Senator Murray held this year on the anniversary of the Dobbs decision, Senator Murray spoke about Republicans’ plan to institute a backdoor nationwide abortion ban, including by defunding Planned Parenthood.
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