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Ken Calvert

House Republicans Dismiss Angry Constituents As 'Misinformed' On Budget

Multiple House Republicans have been met by protests against proposed cuts by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Many of these lawmakers remain unswayed, Politico reported Monday.

“When the Republican lawmakers returned to the Capitol on Monday, few had wavered in their support for Elon Musk or his attempts to cut giant swaths of the federal government,” Ally Mutnick and Lisa Kashinsky write at Politico. One major concern among protesters is that Republicans could cut Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security in their proposed bill to enact Trump’s tax cuts.

“It’s easy to be critical, but the people voted for change in November, and that’s exactly what they’re getting,” Rep. Jay Obernolte (R-CA) told Politico. He was booed at a town hall last week. “It’s unfortunate,” he said, “that the other party’s chosen to turn this into a political stunt.”

“I think they were uninformed people, so I really kind of discount that,” said Rep. Glenn Grothman (R-WI), who, like Obernolte, was booed at a town hall last week. “I think once you’re informed you realize that we’ve got a lot of financial problems,” he said.

“I’m used to it,” Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA) said of protesters at his office. “It’s just another day in paradise.”

Rep. Cliff Bentz (R-OR) as well as Reps. Scott Fitzgerald (R-WI) and Mark Alford (R-MO) were also met with angry crowds. Rep. Rich McCormick (R-GA) tried to settle the crowd as they booed him and chanted “shame.”

“Yell all you want. I can’t understand ten people let alone 100 people at once,” McCormick said in a video posted to X by an Atlanta Journal-Constitution journalist last week, AlterNet reported.

Unlike others, McCormick changed course, saying Monday that he “plans to reach out to Elon Musk to urge him to show more compassion on DOGE cuts & layoffs,” NBC News’ Melanie Zanona reported.

“The town halls were concentrated in deep-red districts where GOP members could expect to find a friendlier audience,” write Mutnick and Kashinsky. “They are not the districts that will determine the House majority, but the fact that even those events have been marked with rancor could signal a broader discontent with Musk and his actions.”

GOP lawmakers told Politico that their constituents back Musk’s cuts, despite polling that suggests his unpopularity is growing.

“I’ve not heard anybody say they didn’t want to cut anything, it’s just they don’t like Elon,” Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK) told reporters. He, too, faced a tough crowd last week. “We’re moving forward with the cuts,” he said.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Congressional Republicans Heading Toward Clash With Trump And Musk

Congressional Republicans Heading Toward Clash With Trump And Musk

Republican lawmakers are getting fed up with President Donald Trump’s chaotic moves to slash the federal government. Continued firings, funding freezes, and cuts to federal agencies by the Department of Government Accountability could mean an escalation, Axios reported Wednesday.

“The job and funding cuts are now hitting GOP lawmakers' districts and states. There's also a larger conflict brewing over whether the administration can simply bypass Congress on these decisions,” write Andrew Solender and Stef W. Kight.

"I think you're going to see a clash when they ... start abolishing [agencies]," a Republican lawmaker said. "Say like USAID, right? We authorized that. That's a creature of Congress."

"If they try to do something like that, then you're going to get into a constitutional argument or crisis,” the lawmaker added.

Trump dismantled USAID, but the halt on foreign assistance is being tried in the courts. The lawmaker also referenced the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, where a judge blocked major layoffs last week.

"We all want efficiencies, there is a way to do it, and the way these people have been treated has been awful in many cases. Awful,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). She also said that she is concerned about the federal workers in her home state.

"Before making cuts rashly, the Administration should be studying and staffing to see what the consequences are. Measure twice before cutting. They have had to backtrack multiple times," Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) said.

“DOGE's spree of job cuts is starting to target federal roles that even some of Trump's Republican allies in Congress may deem too essential to sacrifice,” Solender and Kight write.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) told Axios that Trump was moving "too fast." She also said that DOGE should wait until heads of agencies receive confirmation, when they can use "a more surgical approach."

Some recent actions "violate restrictions that are in current law" and DOGE is "making mistakes," she said, in reference to the recent firing, then rehiring, of employees at the U.S. Department of Agriculture working on bird flu.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Bannon Berates 'Parasitic Illegal Immigrant' Musk: No Respect For 'Country's Values'

Bannon Berates 'Parasitic Illegal Immigrant' Musk: No Respect For 'Country's Values'

Steve Bannon, President Donald Trump’s former advisor, attacked Trump crony Elon Musk, saying his moves to cut the federal government are disrespectful to the country’s values. The comments were reported by UnHerdin an article posted Tuesday.

"Musk is a parasitic illegal immigrant. He wants to impose his freak experiments and playact as God without any respect for the country's history, values, or traditions," Bannon told UnHerd.

DOGE has made cuts at USAID, the Department of Education, and DEI programs.

"Musk is the one with power at the moment," Bannon said. "The Democrats are nowhere to be seen."

He also called Musk’s handling of the budget “performative.”

"DOGE is sitting there with the budget, but where the f--- are the DOGE cuts?" Bannon said. "We are 30 days away from approving a budget for the entire year with $2 trillion already baked in, and not one penny of anything that DOGE found. It's ludicrous."

"There's hesitancy to take on the Pentagon," Bannon said, adding that he wants significant cuts. "I want $100 billion cut from its $900 billion budget—really a trillion."

“This is not the first time the 78-year-old strategist has attacked Musk's past. Bannon has gone as far as to call Musk a "racist," grouping him with other South African-born tech moguls, Peter Thiel and David Sacks, whom he accused of influencing U.S. politics without any real allegiance to the country,” Jesus Mesa writes at Newsweek.

Bannon pleaded guilty last week in a case involving defrauding people who donated to a private attempt at building a wall on the southern U.S. border.

Pope Francis

'God Bless This Pope': Francis Harshly Admonishes Trump And Vance

Pope Francis harshly criticized the Trump administration for its mass deportation of migrants in a public letter to U.S. bishops published Tuesday. In it he argues that the administration's treatment of migrants goes against church social doctrine and says that a policy built on force “will end badly.”

“The act of deporting people who in many cases have left their own land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment, damages the dignity of many men and women, and of entire families, and places them in a state of particular vulnerability and defenselessness,” the Pope writes.

The letter comes after Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic convert, called on theology to legitimize a crackdown on migrants. “You love your family, and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country,” Vance said on Fox News. “Then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.”

“Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups,” the first Latin American Pope writes. “The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the ‘Good Samaritan,’ that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.”

“God bless this Pope,” Mehdi Hasan, editor in chief of Zeteo, posted on X.

“When you get your Catholic teaching so wrong the Pope himself has to issue a correction,” Mollie Wilson O’Reilly, editor at large for Commonweal Magazine, posted on Bluesky. She added: “I'm being glib, but this is truly beautiful,and clarifying.”

“The Pope's letter today takes aim at every single absurd theological claim by JD Vance and his allies in conservative Catholicism (and the Catholic electorate) but he also defends the chief target of Trumpism -- the rule of law -- in a way few seem able to articulate,” David Gibson, director of the center for religion and culture at Fordham University, posted on X.

Gibson pointed to a portion of the letter: “This is not a minor issue: an authentic rule of law is verified precisely in the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and most marginalized,” the Pope writes.

The letter comes after Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic convert, called on theology to legitimize a crackdown on migrants. “You love your family, and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country,” Vance said on Fox News. “Then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.”

“Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups,” the first Latin American Pope writes. “The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the ‘Good Samaritan,’ that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.”

“God bless this Pope,” Mehdi Hasan, editor in chief of Zeteo, posted on X.

“When you get your Catholic teaching so wrong the Pope himself has to issue a correction,” Mollie Wilson O’Reilly, editor at large for Commonweal magazine, posted on Bluesky. She added: “I'm being glib, but this is truly beautiful,and clarifying.”

“The Pope's letter today takes aim at every single absurd theological claim by JD Vance and his allies in conservative Catholicism (and the Catholic electorate) but he also defends the chief target of Trumpism -- the rule of law -- in a way few seem able to articulate,” David Gibson, director of the center for religion and culture at Fordham University, posted on X.

Gibson pointed to a portion of the letter: “This is not a minor issue: an authentic rule of law is verified precisely in the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and most marginalized,” the Pope writes.

“The true common good is promoted when society and government, with creativity and strict respect for the rights of all — as I have affirmed on numerous occasions — welcomes, protects, promotes and integrates the most fragile, unprotected and vulnerable. This does not impede the development of a policy that regulates orderly and legal migration. However, this development cannot come about through the privilege of some and the sacrifice of others. What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly” he adds.

The Pope also references Pope Pius XII, who wrote what Francis calls the “Magna Carta” of how the Church thinks of immigration. “The family of Nazareth in exile, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, emigrants in Egypt and refugees there to escape the wrath of an ungodly king, are the model, the example and the consolation of emigrants and pilgrims of every age and country, of all refugees of every condition who, beset by persecution or necessity, are forced to leave their homeland, beloved family and dear friends for foreign lands,” Pope Pius XII writes.

“This is the Pope also directly countering misinformation about the Catholic faith that is being expounded by the Catholic vice president,” Gibson told The Associated Press. “And it is the Pope supporting the Bishops as well."

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.