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1:10 PM ET, February 28, 2025

memeorandum

 Top Items: 
New York Times:
How Elon Musk Executed His Takeover of the Federal Bureaucracy  —  The operation was driven with a frenetic focus by the billionaire, who channeled his resentment of regulatory oversight into a drastic overhaul of government agencies.  —  On the last Friday of September 2023 …
RELATED:
Josh Marshall / Talking Points Memo:   Two Good Reads.  —  There are two good, big feature pieces out from the Times and the Journal …
Jake Lahut / Wired:
Elon Musk's Takeover Is Being Aided by a Trumpworld Power Couple
Discussion: Raw Story
Wall Street Journal:   Inside DOGE's Clash With the Federal Workforce
Meridith McGraw / Wall Street Journal:
Trump to Sign Executive Order Making English Official U.S. Language  —  The U.S. has never had a national language in its nearly 250-year history  —  WASHINGTON—President Trump is planning to sign an executive order that would for the first time make English the official language of the U.S., according to White House officials.
RELATED:
Michelle L. Price / Associated Press:
Trump to sign order Friday designating English as the official language of the US
Kevin Breuninger / CNBC:   Trump to sign order making English the official U.S. language
RELATED:
Salvador Rizzo / Washington Post:
Judge blocks Trump administration's mass firings of federal workers
Zach Montague / New York Times:
Judge Says Trump Administration Memos Directing Mass Firings Were Illegal
Eileen Sullivan / New York Times:
Office Closures and Relocations Part of Trump's Plan for Large-Scale Layoffs
Discussion: USA Today
Isabella Cueto / STAT:
RFK Jr. moves to eliminate public comment on HHS decisions  —  In notice to Federal Register, health agency says public participation is not needed in many decisions  —  Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.  —  Friday proposing to strip public participation from much of the business his department conducts.
Pamela Herd / Can We Still Govern?:
Trump's Assault on Social Security  —  Social Security is our biggest and most successful safety net program.  The annual $1.6 trillion in benefits constitutes 21% of federal spending and 40% of older adults' income.  It lifts more people out of poverty than any other government program.
RELATED:
Justin Glawe / Rolling Stone:
Lies, Cuts, Closures: Trump and Musk Ravage Social Security Administration
William Vaillancourt / The Daily Beast:
Musk Makes Big Mistake While Trying to Smear CNN Legal Analyst Norm Eisen  —  CARELESS  —  The billionaire DOGE chief found a woman with the same last name as a lawyer he hates.  Cue the conspiracy.
Discussion: Electrek and emptywheel
Seth Borenstein / Associated Press:
Hundreds of weather forecasters fired in latest wave of DOGE cuts  —  Hundreds of weather forecasters and other federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration employees on probationary status were fired Thursday, lawmakers and weather experts said.  Federal workers who were not let …
RELATED:
Sahil Kapur / NBC News:
Republicans consider major budget change to obscure deficit impact of extending Trump's tax cuts  —  GOP leaders argue that extending Trump's expiring 2017 tax cuts shouldn't be treated as costing any money.  Democrats compare the tactic to nuking the 60-vote filibuster rule.
RELATED:
Andrew Solender / Axios:
Republicans fear their big budget win is a 2026 time bomb
Discussion: Raw Story, IJR and The Hill
Stephanie Nolen / New York Times:
U.S. Terminates Funding for Polio, H.I.V., Malaria and Nutrition Programs Around the World  —  Here are some of the 5,800 contracts the Trump administration formally canceled this week in a wave of terse emails.  —  Starting Wednesday afternoon, a wave of emails went out from the State Department …
Discussion: Politico
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Bloomberg Law:
US Attorney Ed Martin Demotes Jan. 6 Case Supervisors  —  Washington's top federal prosecutor Ed Martin has demoted multiple senior supervisors involved in Jan. 6 insurrection cases to work in significantly reduced capacities.  —  The supervisors oversaw the office's work on federal crimes …
Discussion: New York Post
RELATED:
Ashleigh Fields / The Hill:
Pardoned Jan. 6 protester: ‘The DOJ was not weaponized against me’
Discussion: Twitchy
Washington Post:
FBI takes up EPA probe amid pushback from judge, prosecutors  —  While career prosecutors in two U.S. attorney offices and a U.S. judge balked at a court-ordered freeze, Citibank has locked down billions without explanation  —  FBI agents this week questioned Environmental Protection Agency …
Discussion: Talking Points Memo and IJR
Stephen Robinson / Public Notice:
MAGA's Orwellian notion of “free speech”  —  🗣️ 💬 📣 With corporate outlets obeying in advance, supporting independent political media is more important right now than ever.  Public Notice is possible thanks to paid subscribers.
RELATED:
Garry Kasparov / The Atlantic:   The Putinization of America  —  Trump's deference to the Russian dictator has become full-blown imitation.
Andrew Egger / The Bulwark:
Democrats Are About to Eat Their Own  —  Expect a bizarre scene at the White House today, where Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is showing up to sign an agreement pledging some Ukrainian rare-mineral rights to the United States—theoretically in exchange for further U.S. opposition to Vladimir Putin engulfing his country.
RELATED:
Susan B. Glasser / New Yorker:
Why Aren't We in the Streets?  —  On Trump the Almighty and his so-far quiescent capital.
Discussion: Althouse
ProPublica:
Speaker Mike Johnson Is Living in a D.C. House That Is the Center of a Pastor's Secretive Influence Campaign  —  ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power.  Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they're published.  —  In 2021, Steve Berger …
Discussion: Diane Ravitch's blog
NBC News:
A top DOJ spokesperson says he is resigning due to a ‘hostile and toxic work environment’  —  Sarah Fitzpatrick  —  Michael Kosnar  —  Ken Dilanian and Rebecca Shabad  —  One of the Justice Department's highest-ranking spokespeople, Joshua Stueve, submitted a resignation letter today, citing a “hostile and toxic work environment.”
US Department of Justice:
Attorney General Pamela Bondi Releases First Phase of Declassified Epstein Files  —  Today, Attorney General Pamela Bondi, in conjunction with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), declassified and publicly released files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his sexual exploitation …
RELATED:
Dana Milbank / Washington Post:
Here's the real threat to ‘personal liberties and free markets’  —  The rapidly spreading authoritarianism coming from this administration threatens all of our freedoms.  —  Over the last 48 hours, I've been receiving from readers and friends the sort of notes one gets upon losing a loved one …
CNN:
Exclusive: US intel shows Russia and China are attempting to recruit disgruntled federal employees, sources say  —  Foreign adversaries including Russia and China have recently directed their intelligence services to ramp up recruiting of US federal employees working in national security …
Hailey Fuchs / Politico:
AOC wants answers from DOJ after Trump officials threaten investigation  —  Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is pressing the Justice Department to reveal whether she — or her office — is under federal investigation.  In a letter to newly confirmed attorney general Pam Bondi …
Discussion: Axios
RELATED:
Steve Inskeep / NPR:
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tells NPR: ‘Everything feels increasingly like a scam’
Rebecca Crosby / Popular Information:
BREAKING: SEC halts fraud prosecution of Chinese national who sent Trump millions  —  In December, Popular Information reported that Chinese crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun purchased $30 million in crypto tokens from World Liberty Financial (WLF), a new venture backed by President Donald Trump and his family.
ProPublica:
A Study of Mint Plants.  A Device to Stop Bleeding.  This Is the Scientific Research Ted Cruz Calls “Woke.”  —  The senator flagged thousands of National Science Foundation grants for using words like “female” and “diversify.”  A ProPublica analysis found numerous examples of projects caught …
Joe Kovac / Atlanta Journal-Constitution:
USAID cancels large contracts of Georgia peanut butter supplier  —  Mana Nutrition, nonprofit in Fitzgerald, says it employs more than 100 workers to feed malnourished children.  —  Editor's note: This article was updated Friday to include a statement from U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock.
Discussion: Raw Story
New York Times:
The MAGA War on Speech  —  In 1791, the nation's founders ratified the First Amendment to the Constitution.  It would come to offer protections in the new nation essentially never seen before: the right to ask things of and to criticize the government; to express opinions, popular or not …
Discussion: Instapundit
Jason Leopold / Bloomberg:
The Story Behind FCC Chairman Brendan Carr's Role in Project 2025  —  Dozens of pages of emails reveal how Brendan Carr, the FCC's Republican chairman and close confidante of President Trump, was cleared by ethics officials to write a chapter in the 922-page manifesto when he was a commissioner.
William Shoki / New York Times:
Elon Musk Is South African.  It Explains a Lot.  —  Elon Musk is everywhere.  —  He is firing federal employees, gaining access to important government data, popping into the Oval Office, appearing on Fox News alongside President Trump and even attending a White House cabinet meeting.
Noah Shachtman / New York Times:
Dead Athletes.  Empty Stands.  Why Are We Paying Billions to Keep This Sport Alive?  —  One by one, the horses trot up the ramp and onto the track, pulling single-seat chariots behind them.  Their drivers, dressed in garish green and bright pink silks, hop into position.
 
 
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 More Items: 
BBC:
Trump tells Zelensky 'make a deal or we're out' in angry White House meeting
Reuters:
Exclusive: Israel lobbies US to keep Russian bases in a ‘weak’ Syria, sources say
Tara Palmeri / Puck:
A Biden Family Insider Tells All
Karen DeYoung / Washington Post:
Trump revives Monroe Doctrine in U.S. relations with Western Hemisphere
Robert Reich:
Boycott tomorrow!  —  Join in tomorrow's economic blackout  —  A grassroots movement …
 Earlier Items: 
Garrett M. Graff / Doomsday Scenario:
Patel, Ratcliffe Set Up U.S. for a National Catastrophe
Paul Krugman:
Chaos Is Bad for Business
New York Times:
How Trump's Cabinet Scrambled to Respond to Musk's DOGE Email
Discussion: Musk Watch and Vanity Fair
Jennifer Bendery / HuffPost:
'He's Full Of S**t': Pediatrician In Congress Blames RFK Jr. For Child's Death From Measles