Job growth slows in August
Even before the Trump administration’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its jobs report this morning, Donald Trump was telling people not to believe the numbers. The numbers show that the unemployment rate rose to its highest level in nearly four years. The economy added just 22,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate rose to 4.3% from 4.2%, according to the BLS. Trump recently fired BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer because he didn’t like statistics put out by the bureau and claimed, without evidence, that disappointing data must have been “rigged.” The number of unemployed people in August was 7.4 million. The number of people who wanted full-time work but could only find part-time work in August was 4.7 million.
New U.S. sanctions imposed
The State Department has imposed sanctions on three Palestinian human rights groups: Al Haq, Al Mezan Center for Human Rights and the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights. In a statement, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the organizations “directly engaged in efforts by the International Criminal Court to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute Israeli nationals, without Israel’s consent.” Late last year, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes, including “starvation as a method of warfare” and crimes against humanity. Leading genocide scholars passed a resolution this week that declared Israel’s actions in Gaza had met the legal definition of genocide. Israel rejected the accusation. In a joint statement, the Palestinian groups described the U.S. sanctions as “immoral, illegal and undemocratic.”
Trump supports RFK Jr. after contentious Senate hearing
Donald Trump says he didn’t watch the Senate hearing during which his Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was raked over the coals by both Republican and Democratic senators but Trump said “I heard he did very well today. I like the fact that he’s different.” Kennedy and numerous senators got into shouting matches over Kennedy’s anti-vaccine and anti-science stances and his firing of experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other health agencies under his control. Sen. John Barrasso became the latest Republican lawmaker to voice alarm over Kennedy’s decision making, saying he’d grown “deeply concerned” about his stance on vaccines. When interviewed by reporters, Barrasso, the No. 2 Senate Republican, joined Senate Majority Leader John Thune in declining to say whether he still supported Kennedy.
Republicans in Missouri join gerrymandering push
With Texas adopting a gerrymandered Congressional District map to favor Republicans, the Republican-controlled Missouri legislature is redrawing its state’s map in order to target one Democratic-held seat in the U.S. House before next year’s midterm elections. President Trump and his allies have pushed Republican state lawmakers to engage in gerrymandering to prevent Democrats from taking control of the House. Since Republicans hold a supermajority in the Missouri legislature, it’s likely this new map will be approved after the Missouri legislature takes up the legislation next week.
Name change to Department of War
The Trump administration is changing the name of the Defense Department to the Department of War. “We call it the Department of Defense, but between us, I think we’re gonna change the name,” the president told reporters on August 25. Trump said calling it the Department of Defense is too much of a defensive posture and he wanted to go back to when it was called the Department of War during World War Two. While at Fort Benning yesterday, Secretary of Defense Hegseth indicated the name change would be coming today. An act of Congress that was signed in 1947 by President Harry S. Truman, merged the various military departments into the National Military Establishment, and in August of 1949 the National Military Establishment was renamed the Department of Defense.
Washington sues Trump
Washington, D.C., officials are suing the Trump administration, accusing the president of violating the Constitution and federal law by sending thousands of National Guard troops into the city without consent from local leaders. The lawsuit, filed Thursday by D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb, claims the troops have been deputized and are patrolling neighborhoods, conducting searches and making arrests, despite federal laws that generally bar the military from acting as local police. The lawsuit argues that the deployment undermines the city’s autonomy, erodes trust between residents and law enforcement and damages the local economy by discouraging tourism and hurting businesses. About 2,300 troops have been assigned to Washington. The lawsuit says, “No American jurisdiction should be involuntarily subjected to military occupation.”
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