This Week in Democracy – Week 40: The 'Extrajudicial Executioner' in the White House
Another week of more killings, more corruption, and more attacks on the Constitution from Donald Trump and his gang.
After the last nine months, Week 40 of Donald Trump’s second term certainly felt like a relatively slower news week than usual, but that doesn’t mean it was any less dangerous for US democracy.
Trump still pardoned a corrupt billionaire. He still carried out “extrajudicial executions” in international waters. He still asked the Justice Department to pay him $230 million in compensation for federal investigations into him. A Jan. 6 insurrectionist he pardoned was still arrested for allegedly threatening to kill the top House Democrat.
And perhaps the most concerning thing that still happened this week was something that didn’t get much attention at all, except in Zeteo’s new morning newsletter, ‘First Draft’ (do subscribe!): former Trump adviser Steve Bannon said “there’s a plan” to help the MAGA leader stay in office for a third term (that’s right, the president’s biggest cronies are already planning how to circumvent the 22nd Amendment of the US Constitution).
Maybe it wasn’t that slow after all?!
From shitting on pro-democracy protesters to ending trade negotiations with Canada over a television ad, to ominously warning that “we can never let what happened in the 2020 election happen again,” here’s what Trump and his allies did this week that hurt democracy, undermined the Constitution, and harmed free societies worldwide:
Saturday, October 18
Organizers said nearly 7 million people participated in thousands of ‘No Kings’ protests across all 50 states against Trump’s authoritarian agenda. An estimated 200,000 people turned out for the event in Washington, DC, where Mehdi addressed the crowd to denounce Trump’s attacks on immigration, free speech, and democratic institutions. (see more of Zeteo’s coverage)
On Truth Social, Trump posted an AI-generated video that depicted him flying a fighter jet labeled “King Trump” and dropping poop on protesters. A senior Trump administration official later confirmed to Zeteo, “It is shit. A lot of it…What else would that be?”
Sunday, October 19
Trump called the No Kings protests a “joke” and said the nearly 7 million demonstrators “are not representative of the people of our country.” He baselessly accused George Soros and other “radical left lunatics” of paying for signs used in the protests, and added his administration is “checking it out.”
Trump said that while his administration “reached a concept of a deal” with Harvard University, he may charge the school a $500 million fine, and suggested that he’s willing to impose additional fines on the university in the future.
Trump also said that he can “always use the Insurrection Act” to send more troops to US cities, and falsely claimed that one president invoked it 28 times. (It has only been invoked 30 times in over 230 years, with President Ulysses S. Grant doing so six times.)
On Fox, Trump said he will send National Guard troops to San Francisco, adding, “Our cities that are Democrat-run – exclusively just about – are unsafe cities. They’re a disaster, and I’m going to save the cities.”
Federal prosecutors leading the criminal case against James Comey accused the former FBI director’s lead defense attorney of being involved in leaking material to the media shortly after Trump fired Comey in 2017, a move they consider to be a conflict of interest and one that could result in his disqualification from the case. Comey’s legal team later responded, saying the filing was an attempt to “defame” the attorney with demonstrably false allegations, and adding, “There was no ‘leaking’ of classified information to the press by either Mr. Comey or his counsel. Full stop.”
The Washington Post reported that days before the Trump administration deported hundreds of Venezuelan immigrants to El Salvador’s mega-prison, Secretary of State Marco Rubio made a deal with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele to return nine MS-13 gang leaders in US custody, some of whom were “informants” under the protection of the US government.
The Financial Times reported that Trump urged Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to accept Russia’s terms to end the war, including surrendering the entire Donbas region to Putin, and warned Zelensky that Putin had said he would “destroy” Ukraine if it didn’t agree to the concessions. The “shouting match,” in which Trump reportedly was “cursing all the time,” happened during a White House meeting last week.
On Truth Social, Trump announced that he would halt aid to Colombia after President Gustavo accused the US of murdering a fisherman in what American officials describe as a counternarcotics strike off Colombia’s coast, escalating tensions between the two countries. Petro said the man, Alejandro Carranza, was adrift in Colombian waters when he was killed.
Monday, October 20
Politico reported that Trump’s nominee to lead the Office of Special Counsel, Paul Ingrassia, said in a group chat with fellow Republicans back in January 2024 that Martin Luther King Jr. “was the 1960s George Floyd and his ‘holiday’ should be ended and “tossed into the seventh circle of hell.” The message came one month after he used an Italian slur for Black people and called for Kwanzaa, MLK Jr. Day, Juneteenth, and Black History Month to be “eviscerated.” He also wrote, “I do have a Nazi streak in me from time to time, I will admit it.”
The Trump administration sent furlough notices to the vast majority of civilian staff at the National Nuclear Security Administration, which is responsible for helping manage the country’s nuclear weapons stockpile.
On Twitter, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt attacked HuffPost reporter S.V. Dáte, calling him a “left-wing hack” and adding, “Activists who masquerade as real reporters do a disservice to the profession.” Leavitt’s tweet comes days after HuffPost reported that she responded to a question from Dáte asking who suggested an upcoming meeting between Trump and Putin should take place in Budapest, Hungary, by saying, “Your mom did.”
A federal appeals court ruled that the Trump administration can move forward with deploying National Guard troops to Portland, with two Trump-appointed judges writing, “Even if the President may exaggerate the extent of the problem on social media, this does not change that other facts provide a colorable basis” to support his use of National Guard troops. A Clinton-appointed judge dissented, writing that the decision “is not merely absurd, it erodes core constitutional principles.”
Wired reported that the Trump administration has removed several blog posts from the Federal Trade Commission’s website published during the tenure of former chair Lina Khan related to artificial intelligence, including one that warned of “AI’s potential for real-world instances of harm—from incentivizing commercial surveillance to enabling fraud and impersonation to perpetuating illegal discrimination.”
Trump’s lawyers asked a federal judge to deny a request by the Wall Street Journal and its parent companies to dismiss the president’s $10 billion defamation lawsuit related to the Journal’s reporting of Trump’s letter and drawing that appeared in Jeffrey Epstein’s birthday book, calling the article and coverage of the material “a deliberate smear campaign designed to damage President Trump’s reputation” and subject him to “public hatred and ridicule.”
Crews began demolishing part of the White House’s East Wing to make way for Trump’s proposed $250 million ballroom (which he later said would cost $300 million), despite his earlier promise that the new addition wouldn’t “interfere” with the existing structure. The Wall Street Journal later reported that the Treasury Department told employees not to share photos of the demolition after some images went viral. The National Trust for Historic Preservation later urged officials to pause the construction of the ballroom, which is being funded by donors including Palantir, Lockheed Martin, and the Lutnick family, until it goes through a “legally required public review process.”
Lawfare reported that Trump’s hand-picked interim US attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Lindsey Halligan, engaged in a Signal exchange with reporter Anna Bower where she divulged details about grand jury testimony in Halligan’s criminal case against New York Attorney General Letitia James. Halligan later told Bower that their entire correspondence was off the record, despite the fact that those requests must be made in advance and agreed to by the reporter.
Zeteo reported that numerous Trump administration officials view Lindsey Halligan, Trump’s handpicked prosecutor going after his political enemies, as being in over her head, ill-prepared for her high-stakes role, and destined for a number of crushing defeats in court. One Trump-aligned federal law enforcement official called Halligan a “trainwreck” who is “going to be the most subpoenaed person” when Democrats regain control of Congress or the Justice Department.
Following a scoop in Zeteo’s inaugural edition of its morning newsletter ‘First Draft’ about Trump trying to get Office of Management and Budget (OMB) director and Project 2025 architect Russell Vought laid during his presidential campaign, a spokesperson for the OMB told the Daily Beast that the story “completely false” and attacked Zeteo reporter Asawin Suebsaeng, saying the scoop was “exactly what you’d expect from a deranged hack who couldn’t even hold a job at Rolling Stone and is now writing for a Greta Thunberg blog.”
Reuters reported that the Trump administration has assembled a wide-ranging interagency task force to carry out the president’s directive to purge the so-called “Deep State.” The group includes officials from the FCC, the FBI, the IRS, and other agencies.
CBS News reported that the Trump administration fired two federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of Virginia last week who opposed bringing criminal charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James.
The University of Arizona became the seventh school to reject a proposal from the Trump administration that would have given it favorable treatment for federal funds if it agreed to protect conservative voices, among other changes to its policies that reflect the president’s higher education agenda.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s lawyers subpoenaed senior DOJ officials, including Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, to testify at a hearing on Garcia’s motion to dismiss the indictment against him for vindictive prosecution.
Tuesday, October 21
CBS News reported that a Capitol insurrectionist pardoned by Trump was arrested over the weekend for allegedly threatening to kill House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. In a court filing, the man allegedly wrote in a text message, “Hakeem Jeffries makes a speech in a few days in NYC I cannot allow this terrorist to live.” The man was arraigned and pleaded not guilty. (Read more in ‘First Draft.’)
House Republicans referred former CIA Director John Brennan to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution, accusing him of lying to Congress about the 2016 Steele dossier. In a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, the committee claimed there is “significant evidence” Brennan made “numerous willfully and intentionally false statements” while testifying about the CIA’s involvement with the dossier. Brennan later called the criminal referral “ludicrous” and accused House Judiciary Chair Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) of “trying to get into the action of Trump’s revenge tour.”
The New York Times reported that Trump is demanding that the Justice Department pay him roughly $230 million in compensation for its federal investigations into him, and that any settlement could ultimately be approved by senior department officials who defended him.
The Times also reported that the Trump administration is close to finalizing a settlement with the University of Virginia, which, if approved, would be the first time a public university has reached an agreement with the Trump White House. While the details of the terms are unclear, the school wouldn’t be required to pay a fine or submit to a direct monitoring arrangement under the deal.
The Washington Post reported that the Trump administration’s plan to overhaul the country’s refugee resettlement process includes limiting the number of refugees to 7,500, with as many as 7,000 being white South Africans and the remainder being chosen based on their English fluency or their views on “free speech.”
The Post also reported that the Trump administration is considering moving a $15 billion program that supports students with disabilities to another agency as part of its efforts to shutter the Education Department altogether.
Axios reported that a group of bipartisan lawmakers wrote a letter to Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, urging the administration to negotiate policy changes to the H1-B work visa instead of introducing a $100,000 fee for applicants. The members of Congress warn that the fee is “prohibitively expensive for early-stage employers and small companies,” that it could lead to reductions in employment of US citizens by those same employers, and ultimately imperil the country’s “technological leadership and global competitiveness.”
The White House said there are no plans for Trump to meet with Putin in the near future, a reversal from less than a week ago when the US president said the two would hold negotiations in Budapest, Hungary, to end Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Paul Ingrassia, Trump’s embattled nominee to lead the Office of Special Counsel, announced on Truth Social that he would withdraw from a confirmation hearing “because unfortunately I do not have enough Republican votes at this time.” His withdrawal comes one day after Politico reported on Ingrassia’s racist texts, where he also bragged about his “Nazi streak.” The BBC later reported that a White House official confirmed that Ingrassia was dropped by the Trump administration as a nominee.
Politico reported that a federal appeals court appeared “deeply skeptical” of the Trump administration’s efforts to detain and deport Mahmoud Khalil through a rarely-used provision of immigration law.
Speaking to reporters, Trump warned that “we can never let what happened in the 2020 election happen again,” and said that “everybody is working on it,” including FBI Director Kash Patel and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard.
A group of independent UN experts said Trump’s strikes against Venezuela in international waters amount to “extrajudicial executions,” and that even if the president’s allegations of the boats carrying drugs are true, “the use of lethal force in international waters without proper legal basis violates the international law of the sea.”
Arizona sued House Speaker Mike Johnson and the US House of Representatives to compel the swearing-in of Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, who won a special election last month. Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes argues the delay violates the constitutional rights of the district’s 800,000 residents to representation. Democrats say the delay is politically motivated, as seating Grijalva could give Democrats the 218th signature needed for a discharge petition to force a vote for the release of Jeffrey Epstein-related documents.
Ecuador released the survivor of a US strike on a submarine the Trump administration accused of smuggling drugs in the Caribbean days after he was repatriated, with the country’s attorney general’s office saying that there was “no report of a crime that has been brought to the attention of this institution.”
Wednesday, October 22
The Pentagon announced a “new media” press corps, made up of 60 people from primarily right-wing outlets like Real America’s Voice, the Gateway Pundit, Lindell TV (created by MyPillow CEO and Trump ally Mike Lindell), and Turning Point USA’s media brand Frontlines, and Timcast, created by podcaster Tim Pool, who was among the conservative influencers linked to a media company secretly funded by Russian state media employees, which amplified Kremlin interests.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that his department, at Trump’s direction, conducted two additional strikes on boats the government claims without evidence were operated by a “Designated Terrorist Organization” and “conducting narco-trafficking in the Eastern Pacific.” The first strike killed two people. The second killed three others.
The New York Times reported that before she became the first-ever DHS deputy assistant secretary for election integrity, election denier Heather Honey suggested on a call with right-wing activists in March that the Trump administration could declare a “national emergency” to change voting rules and claimed it could be based on an “actual investigation” of the 2020 election if it showed there was a “manipulation” of the vote.
North Carolina approved a new congressional map backed by Trump that could give the GOP an additional House seat ahead of the 2026 midterms. Critics and voting rights advocates called the move a blatant gerrymandering aimed at consolidating Republican power and diminishing Black representation.
NBC News reported that ICE allowed some new recruits to begin training before being fully vetted, with officials discovering later that some of the new hires failed drug tests, had criminal records, or didn’t meet physical or academic requirements.
San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie announced that he signed an executive directive to ensure local law enforcement abides by “sanctuary city” policies barring police from cooperating with federal immigration enforcement as the city prepared for a surge in ICE operations.
Thursday, October 23
During an interview with the Economist, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon once again claimed that Trump will run for an unconstitutional third term and win, saying, “Trump is gonna be president in ‘28, and people just sort of [need to] get accommodated with that.” He added, “There’s many different alternatives. At the appropriate time, we’ll lay out what the plan is, but there’s a plan.”
Trump told a reporter he had no plans to seek Congressional approval for military action against suspected drug smugglers from Venezuela: “I don’t think we’re gonna necessarily ask for a declaration of war, I think we’re just gonna kill people that are bringing drugs into our country. OK? We’re gonna to kill them. They’re going to be, like, dead.” Meanwhile, a source close to the White House told Semafor that Trump will only look to seek Congressional approval for its covert and overt actions in Venezuela “when Maduro’s corpse is in US custody.”
The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump pardoned Changpeng Zhao, the founder of crypto exchange Binance, who had resigned as CEO and pleaded guilty in 2023 to failing to maintain an anti-money laundering program. The company lobbied for the pardon for nearly a year. Binance has also been a key supporter of the Trump family’s crypto venture, World Liberty Financial. Trump later said he issued the pardon “at the request of a lot of very good people.”
Trump reversed his plan to send National Guard troops to San Francisco, saying “friends” who lived in the area asked him not to go forward with it. He also claimed he told Mayor Daniel Lurie during a Wednesday phone call that “it’s an easier process” to combat crime in the city if the federal government deploys National Guard troops “but let’s see how you do.”
Also on Truth Social, Trump said he would terminate all trade negotiations with Canada over an advertisement taken out by Ontario’s government to air on US television that uses audio from 1987, when President Ronald Reagan warned of the harms of tariffs. Trump accused the Ontario government of using the advertisement to “interfere” with legal cases, including at the Supreme Court, about his authority to implement tariffs.
Democratic lawmakers in Virginia announced they would pursue a new congressional map to counter similar efforts by Republicans to gain more House seats in the 2026 midterm elections. Democrats currently hold six of Virginia’s 11 congressional seats, and a mid-decade redistricting could provide two or three additional seats for the party.
Time magazine published a full transcript of its Oct. 15 interview with Trump, where the president said an annexation of the occupied West Bank “won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries,” and added, “Israel would lose all of its support from the United States if that happened.”
CBS News reported that former special counsel Jack Smith’s lawyers said their client is prepared to testify in open hearings before Congress to answer questions about the federal investigations he oversaw related to Trump’s handling of classified documents and efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election with “assurance from the Department of Justice that he will not be punished for doing so.”
Trump claimed that he has the authority to continue striking boats in international waters without seeking a declaration of war from Congress, saying, “I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country,” but added that he would notify Congress before any operations on “land.”
NBC News reported that the federal mortgage fraud investigation into Senator Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) has stalled as prosecutors haven’t produced enough evidence to bring charges against him despite a months-long probe. One federal law enforcement official said the investigation “came to a standstill.”
A federal judge paused his ruling that disqualified Trump’s acting US attorney for Nevada for being unlawfully appointed while a federal appellate court considers an appeal from the Justice Department.
In a letter, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche threatened to prosecute officials in California if federal agents conducting immigration crackdowns are arrested while performing their duties, arguing the move would violate federal laws against impeding enforcement operations.
A Trump official told the New York Post that the administration prefers that Paramount Skydance buy Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns CNN, and noted that several other bidders would likely face hurdles from US regulators.
Friday, October 24
On Twitter, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell announced that Trump ordered an aircraft carrier strike group to the waters off Latin America, marking a significant escalation in the US’s military buildup in the region.
Meanwhile, Hegseth announced that Trump directed another strike on a boat in the Caribbean that the government claims was being operated by Tren de Aragua to traffic narcotics. Hegseth said the strike killed six people and warned that the Defense Department will treat “narco-terrorist[s] smuggling drugs…like we treat Al-Qaeda,” adding, “Day or NIGHT, we will map your networks, track your people, hunt you down, and kill you.”
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced that the US sanctioned Colombian President Gustavo Petro and his associates, including his wife, son, and several senior Colombian officials. Bessent claimed that Petro “has allowed drug cartels to flourish and refused to stop this activity.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James pleaded not guilty to federal mortgage fraud charges, and a judge set her trial date for Jan. 26, 2026. After exiting the courthouse, James noted that “this justice system…has been used as a tool of revenge and a weapon against those individuals who simply did their job and stood up for the rule of law.”
In a court filing, Justice Department lawyers said the Trump administration is now planning to deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Liberia. While the lawyers called Liberia “a thriving democracy,” a 2024 State Department human rights report noted that the country has engaged in numerous human rights violations, including “arbitrary or unlawful killings,” as well as “torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment” and “arbitrary arrest or detention.”
The Defense Department confirmed that the Trump administration plans to use a $130 million donation from an anonymous “friend” of the president to pay military service members during the government shutdown. The move has raised questions about its legality, with former Senate GOP budget aide Bill Hoagland noting that the Antideficiency Act prohibits federal agencies from using private donations to offset a lapse in appropriations.
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Thank you, Mehdi. I can hardly believe a President of the United States of America would send a video to his followers of himself wearing a crown and dropping shit on other Americans. The phrase man-baby is not quite fitting but it's the closest thing I can come up with to describe our anointed Marmalade Mussolini. Thank you for this newsletter. They make me sick but I so appreciate your efforts of condensing this week's crimes and outrages. DA
What about the shells fired over the highway in California on Oct 18? It was a real life demonstration of the shit bomb video that should be recorded for posterior … uh posterity.