Saturday, September 6, 2025
■ The Week in Review
"The theory of Trumponomics is failing," said one economist.
By Brad Reed • Sep 5, 2025
"They're now using the failed War on Drugs to justify their egregious violation of international law," the Minnesota progressive said of the Trump administration.
By Brett Wilkins • Sep 4, 2025
"We use our primaries to settle our differences, and once we have a nominee, we rally behind that nominee," the New York Democrat said as the NYC mayoral election nears.
By Jessica Corbett • Sep 4, 2025
Progressive Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez suggested Thursday that the top congressional Democrats—and anyone else in the party refusing to support New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani—are setting a troubling precedent.
Like Ocasio-Cortez, both US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries are New York Democrats. Unlike the "Squad" member, who endorsed Mamdani—a democratic socialist currently serving in the state Assembly—before he beat former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the party's June primary, Schumer and Jeffries have continued to withhold support from their own party's nominee.
"We have a Democratic nominee," Ocasio-Cortez told reporters Thursday. "Are we a party that rallies behind our nominee or not?"
The congresswoman pointed to 2020, when she supported former President Joe Biden once he was the nominee, even though "he was not my preferred candidate in the primary," and last year, when she supported Vice President Kamala Harris after Biden dropped out of the race against President Donald Trump. She explained that she did so "because I am a Democrat and what we do is that we use our primaries to settle our differences, and once we have a nominee, we rally behind that nominee."
"I am very concerned about the example that is being set by anybody in our party" who isn't now supporting Mamdani, Ocasio-Cortez said. "I believe that we must set the example of supporting the party's nominee."
"If an individual doesn't want to support the party's nominee now, it complicates their ability to ask voters to support any nominee later, whether that is mayoral, presidential, what have you," she said. "And so I think, for the good of the party, we must put our differences aside and support our party's nominee."
Asked if she's specifically frustrated with Schumer and Jeffries, she responded: "This isn't about personalities... I think that we're in a moment of a Trump administration, the stakes are high, and I want, of course, to see our party come together and stick together, despite our differences."
Ocasio-Cortez isn't the only high-profile member of Congress vocally supporting Mamdani. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)—who twice sought the Democratic presidential nomination—also endorsed him before his primary win and is now planning a town hall with him on Saturday. It is part of Sanders' Fighting Oligarchy Tour, which has featured various progressive speakers, including Ocasio-Cortez.
While Schumer and Jeffries continue to withhold their support, they haven't gone so far as some Democrats overtly speaking out against the New York City mayoral candidate—such as Congressman Tom Suozzi (D-NY), who said in a recent televised interview that "Zohran Mamdani and every other democratic socialist should create their own party because I don't want that in my party."
Jeffries has met with Mamdani twice and was asked about his lack of endorsement earlier this week. He simply said, "Stay tuned."
Noting that Jeffries and Schumer have so far refused to endorse Mamdani, journalist Mehdi Hasan wrote in a Wednesday column for The Guardian, "If you want to understand why the Democrats are polling at their lowest point for more than three decades, look no further than these two uninspiring Democratic leaders in Congress."
After cataloguing how the pair continues to "embarrass themselves, undermine their colleagues, and demoralize their voters," Hasan said that "while younger Democrats like Mamdani and AOC offer energy and charisma, these two lackluster leaders in the House and Senate offer cringe chants and even cringier photo ops."
"It is past time for both Jeffries and Schumer to step down and step aside," he concluded. "This fascist moment, this age of Trump, demands outspoken, unrelenting, and fearless opposition. Whether you are a Democrat, or simply a democrat, we all deserve better."
"Hey, so changing what you call this bill actually doesn’t change the harm that’s in it," said one Democratic senator. "Hope this helps!"
By Brad Reed • Sep 3, 2025
The Republican Party's massive budget law has shown itself to be decidedly unpopular with voters, as polls consistently show Americans opposed to its $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid.
Because of this, reported Punchbowl News' Jake Sherman, US President Donald Trump met with GOP members of Congress on Wednesday morning to discuss how to boost the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act's popularity.
According to Sherman, Trump's message to the GOP is that the bill will become popular if "they completely rebrand it and talk about it differently."
Politico similarly reported that Republicans in Congress have been eager to rebrand the bill after enduring "a spate of angry crowds at... town halls and alarming polling that shows dismal views of the bill's safety-net cuts and deficit impact."
As Common Dreams reported last month, Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Calif.) faced angry constituents who yelled, "You cut our healthcare!" and called him a liar when he claimed the Medicaid cuts would improve healthcare services. Other Republicans have been confronted with similar outrage at town halls.
Republican pollsters are reportedly recommending that GOP lawmakers tout provisions in the bill such as eliminating taxes on some tips, although worker advocacy organization One Fair Wage has found that this provision won't benefit most tipped workers since two-thirds of them don't earn enough money to file federal income taxes.
In fact, New York Times congressional correspondent Annie Karni noted that Republicans started referring to the package as the "working families tax plan" after getting out of their Tuesday morning meeting.
But critics in the Democratic Party argued that a simple rebrand of the legislation is unlikely to be enough to rescue it in the court of public opinion, with Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) emphasizing that the problems with the law stem not from marketing, but from its substance.
"The poorest 25% of workers lose money under this bill while the richest Americans get a $270,000 tax cut," he wrote while sharing a chart of Congressional Budget Office estimates of the impact the law will have on different income groups. "They can rebrand all they want. The facts are the facts. They screwed working people to help their billionaire and corporate donors."
Several other Democratic lawmakers similarly pounced to mock the GOP's attempted rebrand.
Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) sardonically offered advice to her Republican colleagues, writing: "Hey, so changing what you call this bill actually doesn’t change the harm that’s in it. Hope this helps!"
Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) suggested a more accurate renaming of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act would be the “Tax on Working Families” plan.
"Under the GOP tax law, billionaires got the big tax cuts. In fact, thanks to Republicans, many working families will actually see their taxes go up," said Beyer. "And Trump's tariffs are a huge tax hike on working Americans."
Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D-Penn.) ridiculed the White House for "desperately" trying to rebrand the package because "working families think the GOP's plan to sacrifice their healthcare and SNAP benefits to give billionaires a tax cut is a bad idea."
"When we stand together, we can defeat authoritarianism and create an economy that works for all our people, not just the privileged few."
By Jessica Corbett • Sep 3, 2025
On the heels of a Labor Day rally in Maine with Democrats running for governor and US Senate, Sen. Bernie Sanders announced Wednesday that his Fighting Oligarchy Tour is headed to New York City for a town hall with mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani.
Sanders (I-Vt.) endorsed Mamdani ahead of the Democratic Party's June primary, in which he bested scandal-plagued former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Since then, deep-pocketed donors have aimed to defeat the democratic socialist. Cuomo remains in the race as an Independent, as does Mayor Eric Adams, who was elected as a Democrat. The Republican nominee is Curtis Sliwa.
The senator—who twice sought Democrats' presidential nomination—has stressed that Mandani faces "the entire establishment, the oligarchy, the billionaires coming down on his head, not only because he's demanding that the wealthy and large corporations in New York City start paying their fair share of taxes, they are worried that his campaign is an example of what can happen all over the country when you bring people together to demand the government that works for all of us and not just a few."
Sanders took aim at those same villains in his statement about the town hall, scheduled for 6:00 pm Saturday, September 6 at Leonard & Claire Tow Center for the Performing Arts in Brooklyn.
"At a time of massive and growing income and wealth inequality, we are building a strong grassroots movement to take on the billionaire class and corporate greed," he said. "The oligarchs are prepared to undermine democracy and spend tens of millions of dollars to buy elections. But candidates who stand boldly with the working class can—and will—beat them. When we stand together, we can defeat authoritarianism and create an economy that works for all our people, not just the privileged few."
Since launching the national tour earlier this year, Sanders and other progressive speakers have drawn more than 300,000 people to 34 rallies across 20 states, according to the senator's office. With the events, he hopes to not only mobilize organizers and voters but also inspire people to run for public office.
Mamdani has called Sanders "the single most influential political figure in my life," and highlighted how his example led to the mayoral candidate ultimately running for office. He currently represents the 36th District in the New York State Assembly.
"It is an honor to welcome Sen. Sanders to New York City as we fight against the corporate greed, billionaires, and corrupt politicians responsible for the affordability crisis," Mamdani said Wednesday, taking aim at President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly attacked and even threatened to arrest the candidate for mayor.
"While oligarchs and Donald Trump try to place their thumb on the scale of this election," Mamdani said, "we're laser-focused on the New Yorkers who built this city, call it home, and deserve a leader who will deliver dignity for all."
"Your family gets higher energy prices and cuts to healthcare. His family gets billions," said Rep. Greg Casar.
By Stephen Prager • Sep 3, 2025
In what Public Citizen called "the greatest corruption in presidential history," US President Donald Trump and his family added $5 billion in cash to their fortunes this Labor Day as his new cryptocurrency was opened to the public market.
The currency, known as WLFI, is owned by World Liberty Financial, a company founded by the president's sons, Donald Trump, Jr., and Eric Trump. A Trump business entity owns 60% of the company and is entitled to 75% of the revenue from coin sales.
As the Wall Street Journal reported Monday:
The trading debut was most likely the biggest financial success for the president's family since the inauguration...
WLFI is likely now the Trumps' most valuable asset, exceeding their decades-old property portfolio. While the president's family has continued to pursue property deals around the world since taking office, the fast-moving crypto business has had the biggest early impact.
Crypto is now the dominant source of Trump's wealth. As an investigation by the anti-corruption group Accountable.US found last month, "President Trump's net worth could roughly be $15.9 billion, with about $11.6 billion in uncounted crypto assets," meaning that the digital currencies now make up 73% of his total net worth.
In addition to the tokens owned by World Liberty Financial, it found that two Trump-affiliated companies owned 80% of the $TRUMP meme coin as of May and had collected over $324 million in fees since Trump took office in January.
Meanwhile, Trump Media, which owns his online platform Truth Social, bought $2 billion worth of Bitcoin in July and reserved another $300 million in Bitcoin options.
As America's self-proclaimed "first crypto president," Trump has sought to curb regulations against the volatile financial assets.
In July, Trump signed the GENIUS Act, which purports to establish the US's first regulatory framework for crypto. However, critics noted that the law designated so-called "stablecoins," of which Trump owns many, as "commodities" rather than "securities," allowing them to face much looser oversight.
Though the bill passed with support from over 100 Democrats, Rep. Maxine Waters (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, warned that the bill "legitimizes Trump actively building the most corrupt self-dealing crypto environment this country has ever seen."
Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) described Trump's latest $5 billion windfall as "blatantly corrupt and a brazen abuse of power."
"The current occupant of the White House," she said, "is putting personal profit above the people, using his power to illegally line the pockets of his family and billionaire friends while hanging everyday families out to dry by ripping away their healthcare, food assistance, raising the cost of consumer goods, gutting the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and more."
While cryptocurrency is often billed as an asset available to everyone that levels the playing field of the finance world, in practice, its ownership is largely concentrated among the wealthiest Americans. According to a Harris poll published in April, nearly half of all crypto owners have a yearly income of over $150,000, putting them in the wealthiest 10% of the country.
"Your family gets higher energy prices and cuts to healthcare. [Trump's] family gets billions," said Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. "Corruption, plain and simple."
Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash), a strong advocate for crypto regulation, said that such blatant profiting from the presidency makes Trump "easily the most corrupt president in our country's history," and emphasized that "Republicans in Congress are not lifting a single finger to exercise basic oversight."
According to data from OpenSecrets, just three crypto industry-backed political action committees (PACs) poured over $133 million into the 2024 election. Though they spent the majority of that money supporting Republicans, nearly 40% of it went to Democrats.
But although all this money helped to buy what Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong called "America's most pro-crypto Congress ever," according to Reuters, just 3% of legislators in the US House of Representatives and Senate own these assets themselves, including Sens. Dave McCormick (R-Pa.) and Tim Sheehy (R-Mon.), as well as Reps. Nick Begich (R-Ark.) and Mike Collins (R-Ga.).
But Trump's profiteering far exceeds the crypto holdings of every congressperson put together.
"We have only seen the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the damage that this corruption will inflict on the American people," said Bartlett Naylor, a financial reform advocate with Public Citizen. "The impact of attempts by the Trump family and others to buy and sell politics and politicians will continue to ricochet."
"This is not about drugs, crime, or national security," asserted one expert. "It is about oil that the US would rather not pay for."
By Brett Wilkins • Sep 2, 2025
Critics of US imperialism on Tuesday responded with skepticism after President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced a deadly military strike on what they claimed was a boat linked to a drug cartel off the coast of oil-rich Venezuela.
Trump said on his Truth Social network that 11 people were killed by a US attack in "international waters" on a boat "positively identified" as being used by the Tren de Aragua gang. Rubio said the "lethal strike" targeted "a drug vessel which had departed from Venezuela."
On the first day of his second term, Trump signed an executive order designating drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. Last month, the president reportedly signed a secret order directing the Pentagon to use military force to combat drug cartels abroad, sparking fears of renewed US aggression in a region that has endured well over 100 US attacks, invasions, occupations, and other interventions since the issuance of the dubious Monroe Doctrine in 1823.
Trump has deployed numerous US warships and thousands of sailors and Marines off the coast of Venezuela, a country he has repeatedly threatened with regime change in the face of defiant anti-imperialist resistance from Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
On Monday, Maduro responded to the US escalation during a press conference, telling reporters that he would declare a "republic in arms" in the event of any attack.
"In the face of this maximum military pressure, we have declared maximum preparedness for the defense of Venezuela," he said, calling the US action "an extravagant, unjustifiable, immoral, and absolutely criminal and bloody threat."
"Mr. President, Donald Trump," Maduro added, "watch out, because Mr. Rubio wants to stain your hands with blood."
Armed with the knowledge of more than a century of US meddling in Venezuelan affairs—a history that includes supporting coups and brutal dictatorships and policies of economic strangulation—anti-imperialist critics questioned the motives of Tuesday's attack.
"If Venezuela didn't have oil, none of this would happen," one user on the social media site X contended.
Another X user asked, "What happened to Trump campaigning on 'No New Wars?'"
"This has jack shit to do with America First," they added. "Venezuela is zero threat to us. Just another attempt to divert attention away the Epstein files which implicate the rich and powerful across every strata of society."
The independent news site Venezuelanalysis responded to Rubio's announcement in a social media post asking, "Fake propaganda underway?"
"Lil' Marco claims the US military conducted a 'lethal strike' against a drug vessel," the post added, using Trump's old nickname for Rubio. "How did they know it had drugs before striking?"
In an opinion piece published Tuesday by Venezuelanalysis, former Italian parliamentarian and organized crime expert Pino Arlacchi called the latest US aggression against Venezuela a "great hoax" and "geopolitics disguised as 'War on Drugs.'"
"This is not about drugs, crime, or national security," Arlacchi asserted. "It is about oil that the US would rather not pay for."
And the second biggest was about naming the enemy which his Senate campaign will seek to target: "the oligarchy."
By Julia Conley • Sep 2, 2025
Graham Platner, the Democratic hopeful in Maine looking to unseat US Sen. Susan Collins next year, received the largest applause of his Labor Day speech in Portland on Monday when he railed against the ill-spent taxpayer money used to support the Israeli genocide in Gaza—a sharp contrast with many in the party who have shied away from such direct criticism of Israeli's assault and the backing it receives from the US government.
Even as support for Israel's assault on Gaza has plummeted among US voters and Americans across the political spectrum have increasingly demanded an arms embargo on the country, a number of Democratic politicians have struggled to keep up with the electorate in recent weeks.
Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg called the conflict in Gaza that's killed more than 63,000 Palestinians and starved hundreds of people "complicated," while Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) last week accused a Jewish comedian of "justifying antisemitism" for noting that more than 80% of people killed by the Israel Defense Forces were civilians. Both responses garnered condemnation from Palestinian rights advocates and progressive commentators.
But on Monday—before a packed house of more than 6,500 in Portland—Platner took a much different approach.
"Our taxpayer dollars can build schools and hospitals in America, not bombs to destroy them in Gaza," said Platner, leading the audience to stand up and applaud for a full 30 seconds.
Platner, a military veteran and oyster farmer who is challenging Collins—a vehement supporter of Israel—has previously spoken about Gaza in an interview for Zeteo, calling Israel's US-backed attack on the territory "the moral test of our time."
He repeated his message on social media Tuesday, saying: "It's not complicated: Not one more taxpayer dollar for genocide."
Platner was speaking at a rally hosted by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), as part of the senator's ongoing Fighting Oligarchy tour—a project that some establishment Democrats have claimed is out of touch with the views of Democratic voters even as Sanders has filled arenas in both red and blue districts across the country.
Rep. Eliss Slotkin (D-Mich.) has claimed the term "oligarchy" is unfamiliar to Americans, but the audience of a reported 6,500 people in Portland evidently didn't have trouble understanding Platner when he named oligarchy as "the enemy" of working Americans.
The line also garnered a standing ovation.
"I've been waiting my entire life," said journalist David Sirota, "for a politician other than Bernie Sanders to just say this."
"No Kings is a non-violent movement that continues to rise stronger, and we’re uniting once again to remind the world: America has No Kings and the power belongs to the people."
By Common Dreams Staff • Sep 2, 2025
The organizers behind the anti-Trump "No Kings" demonstrations that saw millions take to the streets earlier this year announced Tuesday their next major protest will take place on October 18.
Following thousands of events nationwide on June 14 that brought millions of people out to decry the actions of President Donald Trump, the announcement for the new date, said organizers in a media alert,
comes amid President Trump’s latest escalations: threats to send militarized forces into U.S. cities, the continued detention and encampment of immigrants, and his recent remark that "a lot of people are saying, 'maybe we’d like a dictator.' The October mobilization is designed as a direct, non-violent rebuke to those authoritarian claims.
Fresh links on the website of the No Kings coalition—which includes Indivisible, the ACLU, the American Federation of Teachers, Public Citizen, SEIU, MoveOn, and dozens of others—include a place to 'learn more" about planned actions in your local city and ways to support the effort.
"Just picking a day on the calendar won’t be enough to generate the kind of response we need in this moment," said Invisible in a call to action sent to members on Tuesday. "A national day of protest takes time and immense resources to prepare—tech and online infrastructure, marketing materials, security investments, staging/sounds, and so much more."
With Trump "doubling down on his authoritarian tactics," the group continued, the need for sustained opposition has only grown more clear since the earlier actions.
Trump, said Invisible, "is disappearing immigrants to sprawling concentration camps, sending troops into our cities, threatening to interfere in elections, rigging maps to steal power from the voters, and orchestrating a massive giveaway to his billionaire allies as families struggle. Trump is ramping up his attacks on our rights and democracy, but we’re not backing down. On October 18, we're taking to the streets in more cities and in larger numbers to remind Trump, his cronies, and those on the sidelines looking for hope: America has no kings."
"It feels like it's on the brink, it's on the precipice of this recession," one economist said this week.
By Brad Reed • Sep 2, 2025
A new poll from The Wall Street Journal released Tuesday is sparking calls on more Democrats to embrace economic populism, as it shows that Americans are still feeling gloomy about their financial prospects.
According to the poll, a record-low 25% of Americans now say they have a good chance at improving their standard of living, while almost 70% said they no longer believe that merely working hard is enough to get ahead.
On top of all this, more than 75% lack confidence that future generations will be better off than they are today.
The poll shows that US President Donald Trump is facing problems similar to the ones that former President Joe Biden faced over his last year in office, in that economic pessimism appears high even as the unemployment rate and the rate of inflation appear low by historical standards.
One major issue that appears to be weighing down economic sentiment is the cost of housing, as The Wall Street Journal writes that "fewer than one-quarter of respondents said they were very confident they could buy a home if they wanted to," while "some 56% said they had little or no confidence they could do so."
Democratic pollster John Anzalone took stock of the poll in a post on X and said that it "shows how important it is for Dems to get a strong economic message" given that "70% of people said they believe the American dream no longer holds true."
Democratic media operative Dan Ancona zeroed in on a question in the poll showing that a majority of Americans agreed with the statement that Trump and the GOP "are trying to scare and divide Americans so they can cut their own taxes and keep wealth flowing to the very rich."
In fact, roughly 27% of respondents who voted for Trump in the 2024 presidential election either somewhat or strongly agreed with that statement. Given this, Ancona called the populist economic framing "a pretty good starting point."
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) also jumped at the findings of the WSJ poll and said that stamping out economic inequality in the US needed to be Democrats' priority.
"We must tackle the economic divides tearing our nation apart and make the economic independence of every family and community our highest mission," he declared. "I call it a new economic patriotism."
The WSJ poll showing Americans' sour economic mood comes as more economic forecasters have been raising the odds of a recession hitting the US economy.
Fortune reported on Tuesday that investment bank UBS believes the probability of a recession occurring in the near future has grown significantly in recent months, although it notes there is still a great deal of uncertainty over what the economy will look like in six months.
"The key message is the US economy, by these hard data measures, is locked in a prolonged phase of stagnation or slow contraction, warranting caution even as outright collapse has not yet materialized," wrote Fortune. "This aligns with other analysts' warnings that, even if a recession doesn't materialize, the economy is headed for a bout of 1970s-style 'stagflation,' a combination of a stagnating economy and rising inflation."
Moody's Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi has also been sounding the alarm about the state of the American economy, and he believes state-level data are already showing the US "on the edge of recession," according to Newsweek.
As Zandi explained this week, both California and New York, which together account for over 20% of American gross domestic product, are essentially flat at the moment, while southern states that have been the strongest in terms of economic growth in recent years have been slowing down.
"I don't think the economy is in a recession, at least not at this point," Zandi said in an interview with Newsweek. "But it feels like it's on the brink, it's on the precipice of this recession."
Along with a potential impending recession, former Labor Secretary Robert Reich pointed out that Americans are well aware of structural inequalities.
"CEO pay is up 1,085% since 1978, while worker pay is up just 24%. Millions live paycheck to paycheck as they struggle to afford basic goods," said Reich. "Is it any wonder why 70% of people said they believe the American dream no longer holds true or never did?"
Afghanistan War veteran Bajun Mavalwalla is among nine people facing conspiracy charges for protesting the Trump administration's anti-immigrant crackdown.
By Brett Wilkins • Sep 2, 2025
Free speech and veterans' rights advocates are among those this week condemning federal conspiracy charges against a former US service member who was among nine people indicted after attending a Washington state protest against President Donald Trump's anti-immigrant blitz.
On June 11, 35-year-old Spokane, Washington resident Bajun Mavalwalla—a former Army sergeant who according to The Guardian survived a roadside bomb blast in Afghanistan—heeded a Facebook call to action from former City Council President Ben Stuckart to intervene after a pair of legal asylum-seekers were apprehended by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operatives at the local Department of Homeland Security (DHS) office.
Mavalwalla, Stuckart, and others allegedly blocked a bus being used by ICE to transport the two asylum-seekers and deflated its tires. Several people were arrested; Mavalwalla was not among them.
According to The Spokane Spokesman-Review, Mavalwalla was arrested by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents a month later as he and his girlfriend were moving out of their shared home.
"This is not how I planned to spend my moving day," Mavalwalla says in a video of the arrest recorded by his father, Bajun Mavalwalla Sr. "I'm a military veteran. I'm an American citizen."
Mavalwalla Sr.—who is also an Army vet who was deployed to Afghanistan at the same time as his son—told the Spokesman-Review: "I demanded a warrant, they refused and wouldn't show it until everyone left the home. My son was protesting on June 11, they said he assaulted officers."
"My son worked in cybersecurity and was deployed to Afghanistan," Mavalwalla Sr. added. "He has no problems with the law."
On July 15, federal prosecutors charged Mavalwalla, Stuckart, and seven other protesters with conspiracy to impede or injure law enforcement. If convicted, they could face up to six years behind bars, a $250,000 fine, and three years' supervised release. Mavalwalla pleaded not guilty.
Following the protesters' arrest, Spokane Mayor Lisa Brown, a Democrat, said: "This politically motivated action is a perversion of our justice system. The Trump administration's weaponization of ICE and the [Department of Justice] is trampling on the US Constitution and creating widespread fear across our community."
Some observers noted that the case prosecutor, acting US Attorney Pete Serrano is a Trump nominee with no prosecutorial experience who called the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrectionists "political prisoners." Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who vows to block Serrano's US attorney appointment, has slammed his "extreme right-wing views" and argues that he is unfit for office.
As news of Mavalwalla's arrest subsequently spread, so did outrage and alarm.
"Here's a guy who held a top secret clearance and was privy to some of the most sensitive information we have, who served in a combat zone," retired Army Col. Kenneth Koop, an Afghan War veteran, told The Guardian Tuesday. "To see him treated like this really sticks in my craw."
Luis Miranda, DHS' chief spokesperson during the Biden administration, said of Mavawalla and the Trump administration, "He's a test case to see how far they can go."
Shawn VanDiver—an Afghan War veteran who founded and leads #AfghanEvac, which helps relocate and resettle Afghans who aided the US invaders—wrote on the social media site X Tuesday that "the FBI didn't arrest Bajun Mavalwalla II at the protest. They waited. Then showed up at his home—on moving day."
"No violence. No property damage. Just a veteran using his voice. And they shackled him in front of his family," he said. "Let that sink in."
VanDiver noted that Mavalwalla "served honorably" and that he "stood up for Afghan allies."
"Now the government is trying to silence him and scare us," he added. "We're watching."
Mavalwalla Sr. told The Press Democrat in a July interview that his son's prosecution is an "unbelievable overreach."
"Sending out all those agents, under the pretext that my son is somehow a threat," he added. "The craziest thing is they’re charging him with conspiracy. He was at the protest, but he'd never met any of these other people. You want to know the first time he met Stuckart? It was in the jail cell."
Under the proposal, the US would take control after "voluntary" relocation of Palestinians from the strip, where proposed projects include an Elon Musk Smart Manufacturing Zone and Gaza Trump Riviera & Islands.
By Brett Wilkins • Sep 1, 2025
The White House is "circulating" a plan to transform a substantially depopulated Gaza into US President Donald Trump's vision of a high-tech "Riviera of the Middle East" brimming with private investment and replete with artificial intelligence-powered "smart cities."
That's according a 38-page prospectus for a proposed Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration, and Transformation (GREAT) Trust obtained by The Washington Post and published in a report on Sunday. Parts of the proposal were previously reported by the Financial Times.
"Gaza can transform into a Mediterranean hub for manufacturing, trade, data, and tourism, benefiting from its strategic location, access to markets... resources, and a young workforce all supported by Israeli tech and [Gulf Cooperation Council] investments," the prospectus states.
However, to journalist Hala Jaber, the plan amounts to "genocide packaged as real estate."
The GREAT Trust was drafted by some of the same Israelis behind the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), whose aid distribution points in Gaza have been the sites of deliberate massacres and other incidents in which thousands of aid-seeking Palestinians have been killed or wounded.
According to the Post, financial modeling for the GREAT Trust proposal "was done by a team working at the time for the Boston Consulting Group"—which played a key role in creating GHF. BCG told the Post that the firm did not approve work on the trust plan, and that two senior partners who led the financial modeling were subsequently terminated.
The GREAT Trust envisions "a US-led multirlateral custodianship" lasting a decade or longer and leading to "a reformed Palestinian self-governance after Gaza is "demilitarized and de-radicalized."
Josh Paul—a former US State Department official who resigned in October 2023 over the Biden administration's decision to sell more arms to Israel as it waged a war on Gaza increasingly viewed by experts as genocidal—told Democracy Now! last week that Trump's plan for Gaza is "essentially a new form of colonialism, a transition from Israeli colonialism to corporate" colonialism.
The GREAT Trust contains two proposals for Gaza's more than 2 million Palestinians. Under one plan, approximately 75% of Gaza's population would remain in the strip during its transformation. The second proposal involves up to 500,000 Gazans relocating to third countries, 75% of them permanently.
The prospectus does not say how many Palestinians would leave Gaza under the relocation option. Those who choose to permanently relocate to other unspecified countries would each receive $5,000 plus four years of subsidized rent and subsidized food for a year.
The GREAT Trust allocates $6 billion for temporary housing for Palestinians who remain in Gaza and $5 billion for those who relocate.
The proposal projects huge profits for investors—nearly four times the return on investment and annual revenue of $4.5 billion within a decade. The project would be a boon for companies ranging from builders including Saudi bin Laden Group, infrastructure specialists like IKEA, the mercenary firm Academi (formerly Blackwater), US military contractor CACI—which last year was found liable for torturing Iraqis at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison—electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla, tech firms such as Amazon, and hoteliers Mandarin Oriental and IHG Hotels and Resorts.
Central to the plan are 10 "megaprojects," including half a dozen "smart cities," a regional logistics hub to be build over the ruins of the southern city of Rafah, a central highway named after Saudi Crown Prime Mohammed bin Salman—Saudi Arabia and other wealthy Gulf states feature prominently in the proposal as investors—large-scale solar and desalinization plants, a US data safe haven, an "Elon Musk Smart Manufacturing Zone," and "Gaza Trump Riviera & Islands" similar to the Palm Islands in Dubai.
In addition to "massive" financial gains for private US investors, the GREAT Trust lists strategic benefits for the United States that would enable it to "strengthen" its "hold in the east Mediterranean and secure US industry access to $1.3 trillion of rare-earth minerals from the Gulf."
Earlier this year, Trump said the US would "take over" Gaza, American real estate developers would "level it out" and build the "Riviera of the Middle East" atop its ruins after Palestinians—"all of them"—leave Palestine's coastal exclave. The president called for the "voluntary" transfer of Gazans to Egypt and Jordan, both of whose leaders vehemently rejected the plan.
"Voluntary emigration" is widely considered a euphemism for ethnic cleansing, given Palestinians' general unwillingness to leave their homeland.
According to a May survey by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, nearly half of Gazans expressed a willingness to apply for Israeli assistance to relocate to other countries. However, many Gazans say they would never leave the strip, where most inhabitants are descendants of survivors of the Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of more than 750,000 Palestinians during the creation of Israel in 1948. Some are actual Nakba survivors.
"I'm staying in a partially destroyed house in Khan Younis now," one Gazan man told the Post. "But we could renovate. I refuse to be made to go to another country, Muslim or not. This is my homeland."
The Post report follows a meeting last Wednesday at the White House, where Trump, senior administration officials, and invited guests including former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, investor and real estate developer Jared Kushner—who is also the president's son-in-law—and Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer discussed Gaza's future.
While Dermer reportedly claimed that Israel does not seek to permanently occupy Gaza, Israeli leaders including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes including murder and forced starvation in Gaza—have said they will conquer the entire strip and keep at least large parts of it.
"We conquer, cleanse, and stay until Hamas is destroyed," Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich recently said. "On the way, we annihilate everything that still remains."
The Israel Knesset also recently hosted a conference called "The Gaza Riviera–from vision to reality" where participants openly discussed the occupation and ethnic cleansing of the strip.
The publication of the GREAT Trust comes as Israeli forces push deeper into Gaza City amid a growing engineered famine that has killed at least hundreds of Palestinians and is starving hundreds of thousands of more. Israel's 696-day assault and siege on Gaza has left at least 233,200 Palestinians dead, wounded, or missing, according to the Gaza Health Ministry—whose casualty figures are seen as a likely undercount by experts.
