The Official "Damned Trump" Thread: Phase II

[Alan V]

Trump Shares Post Depicting Obamas As Apes

A video posted by U.S. President Donald Trump's Truth Social account contained a racist depiction of Barack and Michelle Obama as apes.

At the end of the 62-second video—otherwise about voting machines—the Obamas' faces appear on apes' bodies for about 1 second as The Tokens' song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" plays.

"Disgusting behavior by the President," Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom said in a post on X, reacting to the video. "Every single Republican must denounce this. Now."

Given the bulk of the video is about elections, it is not clear if Trump watched the whole video and was aware of the content shared at the end.

https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-ob...t-11474903


There you go, they are already making excuses: "He posted a racist video, but maybe he didn't know what was in it and it's your fault for having problems with it because you're overreacting.

That's called bullying. [My bold.]

"Why do you keep hitting yourself?" said the bully.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Trump Shares Post Depicting Obamas As Apes

A video posted by U.S. President Donald Trump's Truth Social account contained a racist depiction of Barack and Michelle Obama as apes.

At the end of the 62-second video—otherwise about voting machines—the Obamas' faces appear on apes' bodies for about 1 second as The Tokens' song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" plays.

"Disgusting behavior by the President," Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom said in a post on X, reacting to the video. "Every single Republican must denounce this. Now."

Given the bulk of the video is about elections, it is not clear if Trump watched the whole video and was aware of the content shared at the end.

https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-ob...t-11474903


There you go, they are already making excuses: "He posted a racist video, but maybe he didn't know what was in it and it's your fault for having problems with it because you're overreacting.

That's called bullying.

It’s been a while since they even bothered to hide the racism.

Boru

[Fake Messiah]

Trump Administration orders National Parks Service to stop calling KKK members "racist."

The National Park Service has removed visitor brochures from the Medgar & Myrlie Evers Home National Monument. Among the anticipated changes? No longer calling his murderer a “racist.”

Edits to the brochure have removed that reference to Byron De La Beckwith, according to Park Service officials, who asked not to be named for fear of retribution. Other edits include eliminating the reference to Medgar Evers lying in a pool of blood after being shot.

In 1963, Beckwith shot the civil rights leader in the back on the driveway of the Evers family home in northwest Jackson. It would take 31 more years before a Mississippi jury would convict Beckwith.

Jeff Steinberg, founder of Sojourn to the Past, which regularly takes students and police officers on civil rights tours to the home, questioned the change to the Park Service material. “You can’t call Beckwith a racist?” he said. “If you opened a picture dictionary and turned to the definition for ‘racist,’ you’d probably find a picture of Byron De La Beckwith.”

The original brochures pulled from the home called Beckwith “a member of the racist and segregationist White Citizens’ Council.”

Stephanie Rolph, author of “Resisting Equality: The Citizens’ Council 1954-1989,” said the council “believed in the natural superiority of the Aryan race. They even went so far as to say that civilizations failed because of racial amalgamation.”

Beckwith also belonged to the nation’s most violent white supremacist group, the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, responsible for at least 10 killings in Mississippi.

https://mississippitoday.org/2026/02/05/...im-racist/

[Alan V]

Trump Administration orders National Parks Service to stop calling KKK members "racist."

Down is also "up" and bad "good."  "Don't believe your own lying eyes."

[Rev. Rye]

On a lighter note, apparently Donald Trump isn't the only person in his family just stealing other, more talented, creators' music for their own purposes:

Director Paul Thomas Anderson and composer Jonny Greenwood, his frequent collaborator, issued a statement today decrying the Melania documentary’s use of the score from their movie Phantom Thread. “It has come to our attention that a piece of music from Phantom Thread has been used in the Melania documentary,” the statement, shared with Vulture, reads. “While Jonny Greenwood does not own the copyright in the score, Universal failed to consult Jonny on this third-party use which is a breach of his composer agreement. As a result Jonny and Paul Thomas Anderson have asked for it to be removed from the documentary.” The composer of the Melania score, Tony Neiman, has yet to comment.

[Fake Messiah]

‘I saw the writing on the wall’: Austria offers safe haven for US academics as Trump wages war on universities

Wali Malik no longer has to worry that a rightwing bureaucrat – or influencer – will decide his research is “woke”.

He doesn’t have to fear government retaliation for speaking his mind or following the science wherever it may lead. And like others who have left a polarized United States for the calmer pastures of Austria, he need not fear his lab being decimated because the president decided he wants to deport the people who work there.

When he got the call about a position in Vienna, Malik had already begun to see the impact of Donald Trump’s assault on higher education and scientific research. He saw friends and family fall victim to mass layoffs at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and National Science Foundation, while his own work slowed as federal grants were rescinded.

He had never been to Austria, but the decision to leave the United States wasn’t hard.

“I saw the writing on the wall,” Malik explained. “It took trust for the US to become a scientific powerhouse. It took 70 years – and was destroyed within six months,” he said.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...safe-haven

[Angrboda]

In recent days, judges in Minnesota have expressed frustration that even when complying with their orders, ICE has been doing so in bad faith. Detainees that the agency had whisked to Texas, for example, were being released far from home with no way to contact loved ones or lawyers, and sometimes without their phones, documents or other possessions.

U.S. District Judge John Tunheim, a Minnesota-based Clinton appointee, recently included a requirement that a released detainee should not be “left outside in dangerous cold” and emphasized that ICE should coordinate the release with a detainee’s lawyer to “ensure humane treatment.”

Frank recently required that if ICE ultimately released a detainee, they must do so: “(1) in Minnesota; (2) with all personal documents and belongings, such as his driver’s license, passport, other immigration documents, and cell phone; (3) without conditions such as ankle monitors or tracking devices; and (4) with all clothing and outerwear he was wearing at the time of detention, or other proper winter attire.”

After a released detainee complained that ICE withheld his crucial documents and identification after releasing him from a Texas facility, U.S. District Judge Susan Nelson, a Minnesota-based Obama appointee, went as far as personally monitoring a UPS tracking number to ensure that the man’s belongings were returned to him. “It appears that the file was delivered today, February 6, 2026, at 9:50 a.m., and was received by a person named ‘Brian,” Nelson wrote in a Saturday order.

Blackwell said the increasingly specific conditions judges were applying to their release orders were responsive to hair splitting by the administration.

“If we say, release the person immediately, then we learn that, having transported him to El Paso or New Mexico, you don’t bring him back. We learn that somebody is put out on the street with just the clothes on their backs and have to figure out how to get back here when they should not have been arrested here in the first place, let alone flown halfway across the continent of North America,” Blackwell said in the Tuesday hearing.

“All right, so you brought them back,” he continued. “We can’t have them released when it’s minus 14 outside. And so now we have to address that. Don’t release them in the circumstances that might endanger their health or safety.”

How ICE defies judges’ orders to release detainees, step by step

[Mister Agenda]

‘I saw the writing on the wall’: Austria offers safe haven for US academics as Trump wages war on universities

Wali Malik no longer has to worry that a rightwing bureaucrat – or influencer – will decide his research is “woke”.

He doesn’t have to fear government retaliation for speaking his mind or following the science wherever it may lead. And like others who have left a polarized United States for the calmer pastures of Austria, he need not fear his lab being decimated because the president decided he wants to deport the people who work there.

When he got the call about a position in Vienna, Malik had already begun to see the impact of Donald Trump’s assault on higher education and scientific research. He saw friends and family fall victim to mass layoffs at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and National Science Foundation, while his own work slowed as federal grants were rescinded.

He had never been to Austria, but the decision to leave the United States wasn’t hard.

“I saw the writing on the wall,” Malik explained. “It took trust for the US to become a scientific powerhouse. It took 70 years – and was destroyed within six months,” he said.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...safe-haven

The USA has instituted a reverse 'brain drain'.

[Fake Messiah]

Gallup Will No Longer Track Presidential Approval Ratings

After nearly 90 years, the Gallup Organization will no longer track presidential approval ratings, which served as a steady way to measure Americans’ views of their elected leaders.

Gallup’s decision comes as President Trump has escalated his threats against the press, and sued at least one respected pollster, J. Ann Selzer. He accused Ms. Selzer and The Des Moines Register of election interference after publishing a poll just before the general election showing Kamala Harris leading in Iowa. Mr. Trump won the state by 13 percentage points.

Gallup’s last presidential approval rating, in December 2025, put Mr. Trump’s rating at 36 percent, among his lowest ratings as president.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/11/us/po...trump.html

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Gallup Will No Longer Track Presidential Approval Ratings

After nearly 90 years, the Gallup Organization will no longer track presidential approval ratings, which served as a steady way to measure Americans’ views of their elected leaders.

Gallup’s decision comes as President Trump has escalated his threats against the press, and sued at least one respected pollster, J. Ann Selzer. He accused Ms. Selzer and The Des Moines Register of election interference after publishing a poll just before the general election showing Kamala Harris leading in Iowa. Mr. Trump won the state by 13 percentage points.

Gallup’s last presidential approval rating, in December 2025, put Mr. Trump’s rating at 36 percent, among his lowest ratings as president.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/11/us/po...trump.html

Shame on Gallup.

Boru