U.S. and world news for August 20

Texas Democrats take a stand

Some Democrats in the Texas State House of Representatives ripped up agreements they had signed allowing police assigned to them by the Republican speaker of the Texas House to monitor their activities. Instead, they spent Tuesday night in the chamber in protest. They joined state Rep. Nicole Collier, who on Monday refused to “sign away my dignity as a duly elected representative just so Republicans can control my movements and monitor me with police escorts.” Texas Republicans sought to sue the police to prevent the democrats from again leaving Texas and preventing the Texas House from having enough members present to legally conduct business. Republican efforts to redraw the state’s congressional districts so Republicans could gain five seats in the U.S. House of Representatives had been blocked by dozens of Democratic House members leaving the state. Upon their return to Texas on Monday, House Speaker Dustin Burrows ordered constraints put on their movements.

Trump steps up effort to rewrite history at the Smithsonian

Donald Trump escalated his efforts to rewrite history at the Smithsonian Institution alleging that its museums were too focused on the negative aspects of U.S. history, including “how bad slavery was.” The latest push to change what people see and experience at the Smithsonian came a week after the White House ordered a review of the Smithsonian’s museums and exhibits to ensure they align with what Trump wants. According to CNN, if the Smithsonian refuses to purge materials that conflict with Trump’s political directives, it could suffer a fate similar to the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the National Endowments for the Arts and the Humanities. Both organizations lost tens of millions of dollars in federal funding earlier this year, which has affected small museums, libraries, arts programs and research projects across the country.

Trump’s immigration officials to monitor social media posts

People applying to live or work in the U.S. will now have their social media posts screened for “anti-Americanism.” According to a new policy by the Trump Administration, immigration officers will be able to scrutinize applicants’ social media posts for any “anti-American activity.” Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, compared the move to McCarthyism in the 1950s, when authorities prosecuted people often without any evidence amid a widespread public panic over communism and its influence on U.S. institutions. “The term (anti-Americanism) has no prior precedent in immigration law and its definition is entirely up to the Trump (Administration),” Reichlin-Melnick said.

Show of military force intensifies in Washington

More National Guard troops arrived in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday in support of Donald Trump’s efforts to create a show of military force on the streets of the nation’s capital. The new troops, which were deployed from West Virginia, could begin operations as soon as today, a defense official told CNN. Republican governors from five other states — Louisiana, Mississippi, Ohio, South Carolina and Tennessee — have also promised to deploy their National Guard troops and escalate Trump’s efforts to amass armed forces in the capital. Trump claims he’s militarizing the city because of rising crime even though overall crime numbers in Washington, D.C., are lower this year than in 2024.

American Academy of Pediatrics defies RFK Jr. with vaccination recommendation

With Covid-19 levels on the rise in the U.S., and transmission increasing in at least 45 states, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) released its updated recommendations for vaccines on Tuesday, including Covid-19 shots. The AAP’s guidance is a break from the current Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommendations and defies Trump’s Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who announced in May that the CDC would no longer recommend Covid-19 vaccines for healthy children or pregnant women. The AAP, on the other hand, recommends that all children, ages 6 months through 23 months, should receive a Covid-19 vaccine unless they have allergies to the vaccine or its ingredients. It also recommends a single dose of the vaccine for children ages 2 through 18 years if they are at high risk of Covid-19, residents of long-term care facilities, have never been vaccinated against Covid-19 or live in a household with people who are high risk for Covid-19.

Executive change at Target

Target’s CEO Brian Cornell is being replaced by the company’s COO, Michael Fiddelke effective Feb. 1. The change was announced today, as Target reported another quarter of sluggish sales. Target reported net sales of $25.2 billion in the second quarter, down 0.9% from the same period last year. Second quarter operating income was $1.3 billion, down 19.4% from the second quarter last year. Cornell said that the second quarter results “showed encouraging signs of recovery, including improved traffic and sales trends — particularly in our stores — and disciplined cost management in a challenging retail environment.” Target operates just under 2,000 retail stores. Target said that for fiscal 2025 it expects sales to decline in the low single-digits.