Fascism watch thread/news and discussions

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Trump administration launches investigation into FEMA workers who warned disaster agency was at risk

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/trump ... r-AA1NaemX

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GOP Official Plans To Force Schools Into Creating Turning Point USA Chapters

Source: Huff Post

Sep 24, 2025, 12:36 PM EDT

Oklahoma State Superintendent of Schools Ryan Walters announced plans on Tuesday to establish chapters of conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s right-wing organization, Turning Point USA, in every high school in his state, threatening to revoke school credentials if they don’t comply.

“Radical leftist teachers’ unions have dominated classrooms for far too long, and we are taking them back,” Walters wrote on X, announcing a partnership with the conservative activist group.

Walters’ announcement comes after Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, took over the organization following his fatal shooting at Utah Valley University. It’s unclear if the widowed Kirk will continue to echo her husband’s thinking against immigrants, Muslims and the LGBTQ+ community or will move the organization further to the right.

“We have seen the outpouring from parents, teachers, and students that want to be engaged in a meaningful work going on at Turning Point,” Walters said. “They want their young people to be engaged in a process that understands free speech, open engagement, dialog about American greatness, a dialog around American values.” In an interview with local Fox affiliate KOKH-TV, he warns there will be repercussions for schools that refuse to have a Turning Point USA chapter.

Read more: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ryan-wal ... -news-unit

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Newly appointed US attorney will attempt to charge James Comey despite prosecutors finding no probable cause: Sources

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/newly-a ... =125906268

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Oklahoma superintendent who put Trump Bibles in classrooms resigns

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... an-walters

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Justice Department sues six US states over voter registration lists

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics ... r-AA1NjaYD

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Navy Commander's Career Shaken by Social Media Policy Probe

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics ... i-AA1NdRDT

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ICE releases Oregon firefighter detained while protecting community from wildfire

https://abcnews.go.com/US/ice-releases- ... =125932533

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Comey Indictment ‘Isn’t Justice–It’s Revenge’: Trump Weaponizes DOJ
By Jon Queally
September 26 , 2025

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) The federal indictment of former FBI Director James Comey on Thursday night unleashed a deluge of contempt directed at President Donald Trump, who pursued the case from his perch in the Oval Office, shattering the line that has long separated the operations of the Justice Department from direct presidential influence.

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, said the charges against Comey—filed by one of Trump’s former personal defense attorneys, Lindsey Halligan, installed as US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia just days ago, show that Trump “refuses to allow the facts or the law to stand in the way of his wrath and vengeance campaign.”

Comey is charged with lying to Congress and obstruction of congressional proceedings related to testimony he gave to a US Senate committee in 2020. Still, the previous prosecutorial team in the Eastern District concluded there was not sufficient evidence to bring such a case. Earlier this week, Trump forced Halligan’s predecessor, Erik Siebert, to resign after he refused to bring the charges. “He didn’t quit,” Trump said of Siebert, “I fired him.”

Trump has named Comey as a political enemy and accused the former director of misconduct in relation to the 2016 FBI investigation into Trump and his staff over alleged ties to Russian interference with that year’s presidential campaign, which Trump ultimately won against Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

The relentless pursuit of Comey by Trump since then, and now a federal indictment, say critics, shows that Trump is the one willing to weaponize the Justice Department against perceived political enemies, regardless of the existence or quality of evidence.

Read more here: https://www.commondreams.org/news/jame ... ndicted

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What is remarkable about this report (see below) is that it showed up on Fox News:

Fox Legal Analyst Tells Maria Bartiromo ‘I Don’t Think There Is a Case’ Against Comey
By Alex Griffing
September 26, 2025

Introduction:

(Fox News) Fox News legal analyst Andrew McCarthy told anchor Maria Bartiromo on Friday that he does not think there is a solid case against former FBI Director James Comey in the recent indictment against him.

Comey was indicted days after President Donald Trump publicly pressured his Attorney General Pam Bondi to start indicting his political foes – an unprecedented move that has set off alarm bells across the country.

Bartiromo began the segment asking, “First, give us your reaction to the indictment.”

McCarthy replied bluntly, “Well, I don’t think there’s a case. You know, the things that Kash Patel that you just played that he was talking about that you and I have spoken about for years, Maria, the Russiagate stuff. I’m as big a critic of that probably as there is.” He added:

• I wrote a book about it. I think it was a disgrace and history will remember it that way. This indictment is not about that, and it seems to be premised on something that’s not true, which is that McCabe said that Comey authorized him to leak to the Wall Street Journal. If you look closely at what McCabe said, what McCabe said was that he directed a leak to the Wall Street Journal and told Comey about it after the fact. So it’s true that Comey never authorized it in the sense of OKing it before it happened. So I don’t see how they can make that case.

Read more here: https://www.mediaite.com/politics/fox ... t- comey/

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The Road to the Camps: Echoes of a Fascist Past
By Henry Giroux
September 26 , 2025

Introduction:

(Counterpuch) The irony is unbearable. Trump has saturated public life in lies, turned immigrants and Black citizens into targets of contempt, and made corruption and violence the grammar of governance. He pledges loyalty to dictators, surrounds himself with sycophants and thugs, and uses state power to abduct foreign students, persecute immigrants, and declare war on the so-called left, grotesquely blaming them for Charlie Kirk’s death, even before a suspect was arrested. What should be a moment of grief over Charlie Kirk’s death has been twisted into a weaponized spectacle, with Trump and his allies rushing to frame the assassination as proof of leftist extremism.

As Jeffrey St. Clair observed, “Leaders of the Right didn’t waste much time counseling their ranks to restrict themselves to ‘thoughts and prayers’ over the murder of Charlie Kirk. Even before the assassin had been identified or a motive uncovered, they blamed the ‘violent rhetoric’ of the Left for Kirk’s death.” This is not mourning, it is the oldest trick in the authoritarian playbook: accuse first, investigate never, weaponize tragedy to consolidate power.

In this poisonous narrative, the real “enemies within” are not the racists, insurrectionists, corrupt corporations, and right-wing extremists who stormed the Capitol, but the critics of authoritarian power as well as groups designated as “other.” Against them, Trump and his allies wage war on the First Amendment, turning freedom of speech from a cornerstone of democracy into its target. In their framing, freedom of speech is recast not as a bulwark of democracy but as its enemy.

From comedians and journalists to students, educators, and independent groups, every dissenting voice is branded a conspirator in imagined crimes–their real offense nothing more than speaking against cruelty when silence was demanded. Or committing the crime of not being loyal enough to Donald Trump. As Hannah Arendt once warned, under totalitarianism thinking itself becomes dangerous.

Read more here: [url] [https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/09/26 ... -past/[url]