This Week in Democracy – Trump Accuses Obama of 'Treason' While Signaling a Pardon for a Child Sex Trafficker
From further crackdowns on the media and migrants, to Trump's desperate attempts to shut down the Jeffrey Epstein story, what a(nother) dark week for American democracy!
If there's a week since Donald Trump's first few days in office that perfectly encapsulates his "flooding the zone" strategy, it was this week. Ludicrous accusations against Barack Obama, a bizarre demand for an NFL team, and a massive document dump that almost no one was pushing for. Trump wanted to distract, distract, distract, as he continued to face pressure from Democrats and his MAGA base alike to release the Jeffrey Epstein files.
It doesn’t totally appear to have worked in MAGA world, parts of which are still angry over his administration’s handling of the Epstein files – and it certainly didn’t work at Zeteo where we, as we do every week, documented the latest on not only Epstein but also all the other actions Trump and his allies took that harm democracy, hurt common decency, and undermine the Constitution.
We also didn’t take our eye off the war crimes American taxpayers are funding in Gaza, as Israel-made starvation rages.
From ICE reportedly forcing detainees to eat “like dogs”, to fresh attacks on the press, to pulling the US out of UNESCO again, here’s your ‘This Week in Democracy – Week 27’:
Saturday, July 19
On Truth Social, Trump complained that “nothing will be good enough” for those who have been calling on his administration to release the Epstein files.
On Fox, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard accused, without evidence, former President Barack Obama and his administration of engaging in “treasonous conspiracy” to “effectively launch a years-long coup” against Trump after he won the 2016 presidential election. Asked about whether Obama should face criminal charges, Gabbard did not rule it out, saying that the actions “demand accountability.” Gabbard claimed Obama and his officials manipulated intelligence to undermine the legitimacy of Trump’s victory. But her claims contradict intelligence from a 2020 Senate investigation, and a recent CIA review that concluded that Russia indeed interfered in the 2016 election through a disinformation campaign that sought to harm Hillary Clinton’s candidacy.
Sunday, July 20
On Truth Social, Trump reposted a video from a TikTok user that included an AI-generated portion that depicted Trump and Obama sitting in the Oval Office and FBI officers handcuffing Obama, before cutting to the former president in a jail cell.
Trump threatened to interfere with a deal to build a new football stadium in Washington, DC, if the local NFL team didn’t change its name back to the “Redskins,” a name that was dropped in 2020 due to being considered a racial slur tied to the country’s genocide of Indigenous peoples. He also called for the Cleveland Guardians to revert to their former name, the “Indians.”
Trump renewed his call for Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff, who led impeachment proceedings against the president during his first term as a then-member of the House, to be prosecuted for mortgage fraud, calling him a “THIEF!” and sharing an affidavit related to one of Schiff’s properties. It’s unclear how Trump gained access to the document, but it has raised concerns about the president using bureaucratic agencies to target political opponents. The document doesn’t reveal anything that hasn’t already been addressed by Schiff, who noted during his bid for the Senate that his family uses both their Maryland and California homes throughout the year.
Monday, July 21
The Washington Post reported that in the six months since Trump took office, he and officials have been accused of defying one-in-three judges in lawsuits against his administration, including “snubbing rulings, providing false information, failing to turn over evidence, quietly working around court orders and inventing pretexts to carry out actions that have been blocked.”
The Department of Homeland Security restored Temporary Protection Status (TPS) and work authorization to tens of thousands of Haitians living in the US until at least February 2026 after a federal judge blocked the Trump administration from trying to terminate their statuses in early September.
Meanwhile, a federal appeals judge overturned a lower court’s order blocking the Trump administration from terminating TPS for roughly 14,600 Afghans and 7,900 Cameroonians.
A former Louisville, Kentucky, police officer who was convicted of violating Breonna Taylor’s civil rights during a March 2020 police raid that resulted in her being killed was sentenced to 33 months in prison. The sentence comes after Trump’s DOJ asked the judge to issue a single-day prison sentence for the officer, claiming that the case shouldn’t have been charged with federal crimes.
The Trump administration published 230,000 documents related to the 1968 assassination of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., a move that his family and supporters publicly opposed. In a statement, Rev. Al Sharpton called the release “a desperate attempt to distract people from the firestorm engulfing Trump over the Epstein files.” MLK’s daughter, Bernice King, said on Twitter, “Now, do the Epstein files.”
The Pentagon announced that the 700 active-duty Marines who were deployed to Los Angeles in June are withdrawing from the city, with spokesperson Sean Parnell saying in a statement that “stability [is] returning to Los Angeles.”
Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) sent a letter to Skydance Media CEO David Ellison, which was working on a merger with Paramount, asking whether there is any truth to Trump’s claims that Paramount will actually pay him approximately $32 million (including $16 million to $19 million in advertising value), double what was announced by the company earlier this month in their settlement related to Kamala Harris’ 2024 ‘60 Minutes’ interview. Paramount denied that the settlement included any side deal for advertising, while Skydance refused to comment.
Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, issued a subpoena to a DOJ prosecutor who investigated Trump under special counsel Jack Smith in cases related to Trump’s retention of classified documents and efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
A coalition of over 20 non-profit organizations that specialize in supporting victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, and unhoused individuals sued the Trump administration, arguing that new funding requirements from the departments of Housing and Urban Development and Health and Human Services could result in the loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal funding.
The White House pulled the Wall Street Journal off the reporters' pool covering Trump’s Friday trip to Scotland after the Journal published an article last week about a “bawdy” letter the president wrote to Epstein back in 2003. In response, the New York Times released a statement in solidarity with its competitor, writing that the move is “an attack on the core constitutional principles underpinning free speech and a free press.” The Times called it “simple retribution by a president against a news organization for doing reporting he doesn’t like. Such actions deprive Americans of information about how their government operates.”
Human Rights Watch published a harrowing report documenting the horrendous conditions immigrants detained in three Florida ICE facilities face, including being shackled for long periods on buses without food, water, or functioning toilets, extreme overcrowding in holding cells where people were forced to sleep on cold concrete floors, and being denied access to basic hygiene and medical care. In one instance, a detainee described a group of men being forced to kneel with their hands shackled behind their backs and eat “like dogs” after officers made them wait hours for their lunch.
A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to restore the ability for immigration judges to appoint legal counsel for immigrants deemed unable to represent themselves, such as those with severe mental disabilities.
A coalition of school districts and advocacy groups nationwide sued the Trump administration for freezing $6 billion in federal funding already allocated by Congress for key education programs.
On Truth Social, Trump lashed out at the federal judge overseeing Harvard University’s lawsuit against his administration over $2 billion in federal funding cuts, calling her a “TOTAL DISASTER,” an “automatic ‘loss’ for the People of Our Country!,” and a “Trump-hating Judge.”
CNN reported that the head of FEMA’s Urban Search and Rescue branch resigned, citing a delayed response by the agency in the wake of the Texas floods as the tipping point after months of efforts by the Trump administration to gut the agency.
A coalition of 21 Democratic attorneys general sued the Trump administration to block its efforts to restrict undocumented immigrants from accessing more than a dozen federal health and safety net programs, warning that changes have caused significant disruption and could lead to the “collapse of some of the nation’s most vital public programs.”
A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to restore a government website that featured a public spending tracker database overseen by the Office of Management and Budget, finding that its removal violated legislation passed by Congress requiring the agency to make apportionment decisions publicly available within two business days.
Federal judges in Maryland filed a motion to dismiss a lawsuit by the Trump administration against all of the state’s 15 judges, the court clerk, and the state US District Court, calling it a meritless “assault on the separation of powers.” The motion noted that “this unprecedented lawsuit is fundamentally incompatible with the separation of powers.” The suit came in response to an order blocking the administration from deporting immigrants in Maryland until at least 4 p.m. on the second day after they file a habeas corpus petition.
Tuesday, July 22
The Trump administration once again pulled the US out of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), a move that will take effect in December 2026. In response, the Committee to Protect Journalists’ chief global affairs officer called the decision to withdraw from UNESCO, which has a mandate to protect journalists and press freedom, “a clear declaration of disdain for facts and for the public’s right to be informed.”
On Twitter, Attorney General Pam Bondi published a statement from Deputy AG Todd Blanche announcing that he is arranging a meeting between Epstein associate Ghislane Maxwell and DOJ prosecutors. He claimed that, “Until now, no administration on behalf of the Department had inquired about her willingness to meet with the government.”
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump baselessly accused Obama of committing treason, falsely claiming the former president and his administration “tried to rig the [2016] election, and they got caught. And there should be very severe consequences for that.”
A spokesperson for Obama issued a statement noting that while they would “not normally dignify the constant nonsense” from the Trump administration with a response, the claims Trump made are “outrageous enough to merit one.” The statement noted that the president’s “bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at destruction,” and that “nothing” in documents issued by Gabbard last week “undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes,” — findings that were affirmed by the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee in 2020, which was led by now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
ABC News reported that trans women will no longer be eligible to compete for the US in Olympic or Paralympic Games in women’s categories after a policy change by the leading games committee, which cited Trump’s executive order banning trans athletes from girls’ and women’s sports.
During a press conference, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce noted that local journalists who are starving in Gaza aren’t “at the top of our list,” saying, “When you go somewhere and you know it’s a war zone, that’s a risk that is taken and accepted.” Bruce added that the department’s focus is on the “hostages” and the need to remove “a terrorist group controlling a section of a country.” Palestinian journalists in Gaza live with their families in the enclave area and, like the other 2 million Palestinians there, are not allowed to leave without Israel’s permission. For the last 21 months, Israel has also refused to allow any foreign journalists to enter the enclave outside of Israeli military-planned propaganda trips.
CNN reported previously unpublished photos and video footage of Trump and Epstein, including pictures of Epstein attending Trump’s 1993 wedding to Marla Maples and a video of the two men chatting and laughing at a 1999 Victoria’s Secret fashion show. Asked about the newly uncovered photos and videos on a brief call with CNN, Trump responded, “You’ve got to be kidding me,” repeatedly calling the network “fake news” and hanging up.
Hours after judges on the US District Court in New Jersey declined to appoint Trump’s former lawyer and interim US attorney for the state, Alina Habba, for a permanent position, AG Bondi accused the “politically minded” and “rogue” judges of refusing to allow her to continue in her position. Bondi also removed Habba’s court-appointed successor, Desiree Grace, who had been serving as the second-highest-ranking official in the US attorney’s office.
Trump wrote on Truth Social that his settlement with Paramount stemming from the 2024 ‘60 Minutes’ interview with Kamala Harris should put other media outlets “ON NOTICE that the days of them being allowed to deceive the American people are OVER.”
Bloomberg reported that the Trump administration awarded a $1.26 billion contract to build what would be the largest immigrant detention facility in the country at Fort Bliss, an Army base in Texas.
The Washington Post spoke with three men who were detained at El Salvador’s megaprison after being deported from the US, with one describing it as a “horror movie.” They said they were beaten with wooden bats, held in cells of nine to 15 people with metal benches for beds, and denied access to their lawyers. Additionally, they said guards fired rubber bullets and plastic pellets at some detainees.
CNN reported that approximately 2,000 National Guard troops are slated to be mobilized to provide assistance for ICE at detention facilities.
Wednesday, July 23
CNN reported that the Pentagon’s inspector general received evidence that the war plans Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shared with a group chat on Signal were taken from a US Central Command document, which was marked “classified” at the time, contradicting Hegseth.
The House Oversight Committee subpoenaed Ghislaine Maxwell for a deposition. Meanwhile, a committee spokesperson revealed that the body will also subpoena the Justice Department to release the Epstein files.
A federal judge rejected a request by the DOJ to unseal grand jury testimony from investigations into Epstein that took place in 2005 and 2007, writing that the court’s “hands are tied” due to precedents that prohibit the release of confidential grand jury material. His order also noted that the Trump administration itself conceded that the court lacked the authority to unseal the records, despite its motion to unseal them.
Two federal judges ordered the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who is currently in custody while awaiting trial on human smuggling charges. The rulings also required Abrego Garcia to be returned to Maryland from Tennessee and prevented immigration officials from immediately detaining him to initiate deportation proceedings.
The Venezuelan make-up artist who had also been sent to a Salvadoran prison and falsely accused of being part of the TdA gang said that he was mistreated and allegedly sexually abused by the guards in El Salvador.
The Wall Street Journal reported that AG Bondi told Trump in May that his name was in the Epstein files, following a review by Justice Department officials who discovered his name “multiple times” in the “truckload” of documents. The bombshell report comes one week after Trump told reporters that Bondi told him he wasn’t in the files.
The New York Times reported that the State Department is working on a plan to shut down PEPFAR, a federal program to combat HIV/AIDS in developing countries, in the coming years, and replace it with “bilateral relationships.” The reporting comes one week after Republican lawmakers voted to restore $400 million in federal funds for PEPFAR, which were initially on the chopping block in Trump’s $9 billion recissions package.
A federal judge threw out a case by the Trump administration that sought judicial permission to cancel dozens of collective bargaining agreements between several federal agencies and unions representing agency employees.
A federal appeals court ruled that Trump’s executive order to end birthright citizenship is unconstitutional, upholding a lower court’s ruling that blocked it from going into effect nationwide.
The Washington Post reported that Kari Lake, the special adviser for the US Agency for Global Media, locked the agency’s acting CEO out of his email and electronic systems. In addition, she also ordered the Voice of America director to accept a new position in North Carolina or be fired from the media organization.
Columbia University announced it reached an agreement with the Trump administration to pay a $200 million settlement in order to restore over $400 million in federal grants that had been canceled due to the administration’s perceived failure of the school to combat antisemitism on campus. The White House also said Columbia would pay an additional $21 million to resolve alleged civil rights violations against Jewish employees. As part of the settlement, the school will notify the Department of Homeland Security when international students are arrested. (Most universities only inform DHS when foreign students are suspended or expelled.)
During a press briefing, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called for the New York Times and the Washington Post to be stripped of their Pulitzer Prizes, which were awarded for their reporting on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
CNN reported that the Trump administration issued a new directive to Customs and Border Protection personnel, asking teenagers detained in ICE operations whether they would like to self-deport to their home country, a move to rapidly deport children who arrived in the US without a parent or guardian.
Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the Justice Department launched a “strike force” to investigate claims Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard made against Obama and his administration.
After Joy Behar accused Trump on ‘The View’ of targeting Obama out of jealousy, the White House threatened the co-host and the daytime talk show in a statement to Entertainment Weekly, calling Behar “an irrelevant loser suffering from a severe case of Trump Derangement Syndrome,” and warned that she “should self-reflect on her own jealousy of President Trump’s historic popularity before her show is the next to be pulled off air.”
The Department of Homeland Security posted to its Twitter account a picture of John Gast’s 1872 painting “American Progress,” hailing the genocide against the Indigenous people of the US, accompanied by text which seemed to match neo-Nazi rhetoric.
Thursday, July 24
The Washington Post reported that ICE directed staff in June to dramatically ramp up the use of ankle monitors on the roughly 183,000 adult migrants enrolled in the agency’s Alternatives to Detention program. In a memo to staff, an ICE official wrote, “If the alien is not being arrested at the time of reporting, escalate their supervision level to GPS ankle monitors whenever possible and increase reporting requirements.”
In a joint statement, AFP, AP, BBC News, and Reuters wrote, “We are desperately concerned for our journalists in Gaza, who are increasingly unable to feed themselves and their families.” They also urged Israel to allow journalists in and out of Gaza, adding that it is “essential that adequate food supplies reach the people there.”
Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) called on Attorney General Pam Bondi to appoint a special counsel to investigate the Obama administration’s intelligence assessments about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
A Venezuelan immigrant who the US deported to El Salvador’s megaprison in March filed an administrative claim, seeking $1.3 million in damages, arguing he was wrongfully removed from the US without due process.
Trump signed an executive order to make it easier for cities and states to remove people experiencing homelessness from the streets and into treatment centers. The order directs AG Bondi to overturn legal precedents and consent decrees limiting the ability of local and state officials to remove homeless encampments.
Despite threats from Trump, the Washington, DC, city council announced a deal on a stadium agreement for the Washington Commanders, pending additional votes. While the stadium is located on federal land, Congress gave the city permission in January to control the property for 99 years.
Trump signed the $9 billion recissions package into law, canceling roughly $8 billion in foreign aid and about $1.1 billion in federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which helps fund PBS and NPR.
On Fox, FCC chair Brendan Carr warned that potential “consequences” for Joy Behar and ‘The View’ are not “quite finished.” He added that the US media needs a “course-correction” in their coverage of the Trump administration, and said, “It’s time for America’s legacy broadcasters to return to promoting the public interest,” or “they’re going to continue to run into issues like Colbert, where it just doesn’t make economic sense to run a partisan circus.”
Trump’s former lawyer Alina Habba announced that she would serve as New Jersey’s acting US attorney, one day before her tenure as interim US attorney was set to expire, and after the Justice Department fired her successor earlier this week.
The Trump administration sued New York City over its sanctuary city policies that restrict police and jail officials from cooperating with ICE enforcement, claiming the policies violate the supremacy clause of the Constitution.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche met with Epstein associate Ghislane Maxwell. Afterwards, he posted on Twitter that he will continue his interview with her on Friday, and that the Justice Department “will share additional information about what we learned at the appropriate time.”
The FCC approved Paramount’s merger with Skydance Media, with chair Brendan Carr saying in a statement that Skydance committed to unbiased journalism and wouldn’t implement DEI policies or programs.
Far-right conspiracy theorist and Islamophobe Laura Loomer posted a photo on Twitter with the caption, “Productive afternoon of meetings at the State Department.” It’s unclear what the meetings entailed or why she was meeting with officials at the department.
The New York Times reported that the Justice Department is in possession of 100,000 pages of Epstein files that it is refusing to release to the public.
The Times also reported that Trump’s name appeared on a contributor list for a 2003 book celebrating Epstein’s 50th birthday, despite the president’s claims that he didn’t pen a “bawdy” letter or drawing for the book.
A former Jan. 6 prosecutor and two other DOJ employees sued AG Bondi over their terminations, accusing her of “disregarding long-standing statutory and regulatory protections that govern how and when members of the civil service can be terminated” and saying that they were given cause or required due process for their dismissals.
The Trump administration filed an emergency appeal with the Supreme Court, asking the justices to authorize the termination of millions of dollars in grants linked to diversity initiatives, including gender identity and equity in healthcare, at the National Institutes of Health. The funding cuts were deemed “void and illegal” by a federal judge earlier this year, who noted in his decision that he had “never seen government racial discrimination like this.”
Judge James Boasberg said he might initiate criminal contempt of court proceedings against Justice Department lawyers involved in a case surrounding the Trump administration sending Venezuelan immigrants to El Salvador in March, in violation of Boasberg’s court order.
Friday, July 25
Speaking to reporters, Trump said he hasn’t considered pardoning Ghislaine Maxwell, but noted, “I’m allowed to do it.”
Sources told ABC News that Maxwell, a convicted sex offender, answered questions from Deputy AG Todd Blanche, who also happens to be Trump’s former personal lawyer, for about nine hours over two days after being granted a limited form of immunity.
Asked about his administration’s lawsuit against New York City’s sanctuary city policies, Trump said, “We’re going against a lot of other places too,” and added, “That’s going to be a pretty routine filing with other cities too.”
The Trump administration said it will unfreeze more than $5 billion in federal education funding that was withheld from public schools for nearly a month.
A federal judge dismissed a Trump administration lawsuit against Illinois, Chicago, and Gov. J.B. Pritzker over the state’s sanctuary policies.
Another federal judge blocked the Trump administration from ending birthright citizenship, marking the third ruling banning the order from taking effect since the Supreme Court’s June decision restricting nationwide injunctions.
The Guardian reported on a video revealing immigration agents brutally arresting a teenage US citizen, who is Latino, and telling him: ‘You’ve got no rights.’
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What is sickening is knowing that Trump's going to get away with this with the full assistance of the Corporate Controlled Conservative Press...
I read this whole sad litany of abuses by Trump and his administration with disgust. What gives me some relief are the many court cases he continues to lose and the recent episode of the South Park premiere which The Guardian called 'lewd, crude and politically astute'. Don't miss it!