We Resist: Day 391

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

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Here are some things in the news today:

Earlier today by me: This Is Very Scary.

[Content Note: Nativism] Sabrina Siddiqui at the Guardian: DREAMers Deadlock: Congress at Impasse as Pressure Mounts to Act.

US lawmakers remained at loggerheads on Tuesday over an immigration overhaul as pressure mounted for Congress to act before the expiration of a program that protects hundreds of thousands of young, undocumented immigrants from deportation.

The Senate was poised this week to begin a highly-anticipated debate on the issue, with Donald Trump seeking enhanced border security measures and other drastic changes to the immigration system in exchange for providing a pathway to citizenship to the so-called "DREAMers" — undocumented immigrants who were brought to the US as children.

But even as varying proposals were floated by members of both parties, senators voiced doubts that any of the plans put forward had sufficient votes to pass.

...Although Democrats and Republicans have both said they support enshrining protections for DREAMers into law, a list of priorities outlined by the White House last month drove a wedge into bipartisan negotiations.

In the framework, Trump embraced a pathway to citizenship for roughly 1.8 million DREAMers, going beyond those covered under DACA. But in exchange, the president demanded funding for his promised wall along the US-Mexico border, an end to the lottery program which allocates visas to immigrants from underrepresented countries, and a scaling back of visas for the families of legal immigrants.

Democrats and immigration advocates balked at Trump's plan, deeming it a nonstarter. But in a sign of the brewing partisan lines, McConnell said Tuesday that he would support legislation that addressed Trump's immigration pillars.

Trump also reiterated his aggressive stance on immigration during a roundtable with sheriffs at the White House on Tuesday.

"We're asking Congress to support our immigration policy that keeps terrorists, drug dealers, criminals, and gang members out of our country," Trump said.

"We want them out. We don't want them in."

[CN: Nativism] Samantha Schmidt at the Washington Post: An Immigrant Called 911 to Report a Crime; Police Took Him to ICE in Handcuffs.

At 5:30 a.m. Thursday, as Wilson Rodriguez Macarreno was getting ready for work, he noticed a stranger peering into his Tukwila, Wash., home.

Rodriguez, a carpenter and native of Honduras, had confronted a string of attempted intrusions to his home in recent weeks. He worried about his 3-year-old twins and 1-year-old son, his lawyer, Luis Cortes Romero, told The Washington Post. So the father decided to call 911 to report a possible trespasser.

Within minutes, police arrived at the home outside Seattle. They determined that the suspect had indeed trespassed onto Rodriguez's property, but they had no probable cause to arrest him, they said.

Then the officers asked Rodriguez for his identification. For about 14 years, Rodriguez had been living in the country illegally. He knew he lacked legal documents, but he agreed to give his name to the authorities, assuming it was for routine reporting purposes, Cortes said.

Moments later, the officers handcuffed Rodriguez and placed him into the back of a patrol car. A search for his name in the National Criminal Information Center database indicated an outstanding warrant against Rodriguez, police said.

Rodriguez overheard an officer discussing by speakerphone with someone on the other end of the line. It was Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Cortes said.

"Do you want us to bring him to you?" the officer asked, Rodriguez later recalled.

"That would be great," the voice responded.

Minutes later, the officers left Rodriguez at a nearby ICE field office. Rodriguez was shackled and later taken to the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, one of the largest detention facilities in the nation.

Rodriguez remains in detention, awaiting a possible deportation to Honduras, which could take place in a matter of days.

Rage. Seethe. Boil.

I will say once again: This administration's (mis)treatment of undocumented immigrants is their canary in the coalmine. Their targeting is intolerable on its face, but understand that whatever they are doing to undocumented immigrants, they will target others in the same way eventually. We must resist their nativist strategies not only because they are cruel and indecent and unjust, but also because if we fail to resist them, they will proliferate.

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Caitlin MacNeal at TPM: Trump's Lawyer Says He Paid Stormy Daniels out of His Own Pocket. "Michael Cohen, the longtime lawyer for [Donald] Trump, said on Tuesday that he paid $130,000 to porn star Stephanie Clifford, who uses the stage name Stormy Daniels, out of his own pocket. Clifford once claimed that she had an affair with Trump, though she denies it now. The Wall Street Journal previously reported in January that Cohen paid Clifford $130,000 as part of an agreement to keep her quiet on her affair with Trump. Cohen's Tuesday statement is the first time he acknowledged making the payment, but he did not say why he made the payment to Clifford. 'Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly,' Cohen said in a statement first obtained by the New York Times. 'The payment to Ms. Clifford was lawful, and was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone.'"

[CN: Sexual harassment] Christine Brennan at USA Today: As Shaun White Cements Legacy, Why So Little Attention Paid to Sexual Harassment Allegations? "Shaun White is an American cultural institution, winning the third Olympic gold medal of his pioneering career Wednesday at the 2018 Winter Olympics. But while we glorify him as an all-American athlete, consider this: In August 2016, Lena Zawaideh, the drummer in his band Bad Things, filed an amended complaint to a civil suit in San Diego alleging White had sexually harassed her, sending 'sexually explicit and graphic images' to her, text messages White later admitted to sending."

Erica Werner at the Washington Post: Trump's Military Parade Would Cost Between $10 Million and $30 Million, White House Budget Director Says. "Mulvaney offered the estimate during questioning at the House Budget Committee. He said the White House hasn't yet budgeted for the parade and would either rely on Congress to appropriate funds, or use money that already has been approved. ...It was the first cost estimate of the military parade Trump has directed the Pentagon to plan later this year. Democrats and some Republicans have questioned the need for such an event, suggesting it could have authoritarian overtones depending on how it's conducted."

[CN: Video may autoplay at link] Scott Galloway at Esquire: Silicon Valley's Tax-Avoiding, Job-Killing, Soul-Sucking Machine. "Over the past decade, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google — or, as I call them, 'the Four' — have aggregated more economic value and influence than nearly any other commercial entity in history. Together, they have a market capitalization of $2.8 trillion (the GDP of France), a staggering 24 percent share of the S&P 500 Top 50, close to the value of every stock traded on the Nasdaq in 2001. How big are they? Consider that Amazon, with a market cap of $591 billion, is worth more to the stock market than Walmart, Costco, T. J. Maxx, Target, Ross, Best Buy, Ulta, Kohl's, Nordstrom, Macy's, Bed Bath & Beyond, Saks/Lord & Taylor, Dillard's, JCPenney, and Sears combined."

[CN: Bullying; harm] Victoria Ward at the Telegraph: Peter Rabbit 'Food Bullying': Film Studio Apologises over Scene Showing Animals Pelting Allergic Man with Blackberries. "Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit stories have enthralled generations of children with their tales of warm camaraderie and gentle mischief. But filmmakers behind a new adaptation of the much-loved tale have been forced to apologise after facing calls for it to be withdrawn from cinemas over a scene in which the protagonist and his furry friends deliberately pelt an allergic man with blackberries. ...Carla Jones, [Allergy UK]'s chief executive, said: 'Anaphylaxis can and does kill. To include a scene in a children's film that includes a serious allergic reaction and not to do it responsibly is unacceptable. Mocking allergic disease shows a complete lack of understanding of the seriousness of allergy and trivialises the challenges faced by those with this condition.'"

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?