Government - federal, state, local | Homeland Security Newswire

Armed Conflict? Trump’s Venezuela Boat Strikes Test U.S. Law
President Trump has declared that the United States is now engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels and has suggested further escalation. He has since signaled that his administration is preparing military options to target drug traffickers inside Venezuelan territory. These moves could mark a major shift in U.S. counternarcotics policy and raise legal and diplomatic questions by blurring the lines between law enforcement, interdiction, and war.
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ADL Split Marks FBI Shift Away from Targeting Right-Wing Violence, Scholars Say
FBI director Kash Patel last week announced that the FBI would end its working relationship with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). Scholars told Axios that the FBI’s split with the ADL is but the latest piece of evidence that under Trump administration the FBI is less interested or invested in investigating hate groups and right-wing domestic terrorism, focusing instead on investigating what it deems left-wing violence.
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Trading on Tom Homan: Inside the Push to Cash in on the Trump Administration’s Deportation Campaign
A Pennsylvania businessman who had Tom Homan on his payroll led companies to believe his connections to the future border czar could help advance their bids for government work, industry executives said.
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History is repeating itself at the FBI as Agents Resist a Director’s Political Agenda
President Trump has installed loyalists to head the DOJ and FBI – loyalists who are determined to use the organizations they lead to advance the president’s political interests. In the past 50 years, the FBI has had only one other director as overtly – if not as unabashedly — political as Kash Patel: L. Patrick Gray, who served for a year under President Richard Nixon. Gray was held accountable after he tried to help Nixon end the FBI’s Watergate investigation. Whether Kash Patel has more staying power is unclear.
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“See You in Valhalla”: How the FBI Director Waded into the Far-Right’s Obsession with the Vikings
At a press conference after Charlie Kirk had been killed, FBI director Kash Patel ended his speech, saying: “We have the watch, and I’ll see you in Valhalla.” References to Valhalla were an integral part of the Norse people’s mythology of Viking heroism and sacrifice — and were adopted by the Nazis, especially by Himmler’s SS, as an example of the Aryan white race supremacy. It is used today by the white supremacist elements of the far right. The majority of far-right memes on social media highlighted the apparent absurdity of someone of Patel’s ethnicity cosplaying as a Viking, but there were those who reveled in the fact that a stock phrase of violent white supremacy had found its way into the mouth of the director of the FBI.
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“Warrior Ethos” Mistakes Military Might for True Security – and Ignores the Wisdom of Eisenhower
Renaming the Department of Defense the “Department of War” represents far more than rebranding –it signals an escalation in the administration’s embrace of a militaristic mindset that, as long ago as 1961, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned against in his farewell address, and that the nation’s founders deliberately aimed to constrain.
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Making a Scarecrow of the Law: A Former Agent’s Reaction to Recent Events at the FBI
FBI Director Kash Patel’s ongoing campaign of political purges at the FBI leads former FBI agent Michael Feinberg to lament the assault on the Bureau’s integrity, professionalism, and political impartiality. He writes that “Right now there is some new agent trainee at Quantico, going through her paces at the FBI Academy, who will never know the honor of serving a Bureau unblemished by the taint of political weaponization. Her loss is something worth noting, and it is certainly something worth mourning.”
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Trump’s Targeting of “Enemies” Like James Comey Echoes FBI’s Dark History of Mass Surveillance, Dirty Tricks, and Perversion of Justice Under J. Edgar Hoover
As a candidate last year, Donald Trump promised retribution against his perceived enemies. As president, he is doing that. His campaign of vengeance will be helped by the FBI, the independence of which has been sacrificed by Director Kash Patel, who has, essentially, made the bureau an arm of the White House. It marks the first time since J. Edgar Hoover’s 48-year reign as FBI director that the FBI has been used to target people perceived to be political enemies.
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Kristi Noem Fast-Tracked Millions in Disaster Aid to Florida Tourist Attraction After Campaign Donor Intervened
The DHS chief has been widely criticized for slowing down FEMA’s response after natural disasters. Texts and emails obtained by ProPublica point to an effective way to get help faster: have one of Noem’s big donors make the ask.
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Health Officials from 10 Northeast States Officially Band Together
More states are responding to – and rebuking — Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s antivaccine efforts by pulling their resources so they can provide evidence-based, science-informed vaccine guidance and coordinate public health efforts which are independent of the federal government.
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As Tensions Over RFK Jr.’s Vaccine Policy Mount, States Act to Secure Access to Vaccines
In an effort to secure the health of their citizens, several states have acted quickly to preserve vaccine access through legislation, bills, executive orders, and regional collaborations that can issue independent recommendations and expand pharmacy-based administration of vaccines regardless of federal guidance. The action reflects a loss of confidence in the CDC and its vaccination committee which HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has stacked with vaccine skeptics.
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Vaccine Death and Side Effects Database Relies on Unverified Reports – and Trump Officials and Right-Wing Media Are Applying It Out of Context
In its meeting over the last two days, the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) has discussed reports linking 25 child deaths to COVID-19 vaccines. These death reports are derived from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, or VAERS, a database the anti-vaccine movement and conspiracy theorists have used to spread misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine.
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The Future of Malign Influence Campaigns Is Here: In Moldova, the U.S. Allows Russia a Free Play
The Trump administration has dismantled the U.S. capabilities built to track, thwart, and respond to Russian disinformation and influence campaigns both around the world and in the United States. Russia will not be the only one to exploit this unilateral U.S. disarmament: China, Iran, North Korea, and other adversaries of the United States will readily, and gratefully, exploit it, too.
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Two Decades Later, the Experience of Katrina Continues to Shape How the Nation Prepares for and Responds to Disasters
Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath exposed profound gaps in multiple systems, including flood protection, emergency response, health care, and housing. It marked a turning point in the way we understand the impacts of natural disasters.
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Kennedy Hearing Deepens Crisis Over Dismantling of CDC Leadership - Health Scholar Explains Why the Agency’s Ability to Protect Public Health Is Compromised
CDC, long considered the nation’s –if not the world’s –premier public health organization, is unraveling. The reason: HHS Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr.’s effort to emasculate the agency, undermine its scientific foundations, replace scientists in the agency with unqualified anti-vaxxers, do away with its evidence-to-recommendations framework, and promote skepticism, if not rejection, of science and scientific methods. Public health professionals are now warning the public that vaccine recommendations coming from the CDC may not be trustworthy.
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Government - federal, state, local

Armed Conflict? Trump’s Venezuela Boat Strikes Test U.S. Law

ADL Split Marks FBI Shift Away from Targeting Right-Wing Violence, Scholars Say

Trading on Tom Homan: Inside the Push to Cash in on the Trump Administration’s Deportation Campaign

History is repeating itself at the FBI as Agents Resist a Director’s Political Agenda

“See You in Valhalla”: How the FBI Director Waded into the Far-Right’s Obsession with the Vikings

“Warrior Ethos” Mistakes Military Might for True Security – and Ignores the Wisdom of Eisenhower

Making a Scarecrow of the Law: A Former Agent’s Reaction to Recent Events at the FBI

Trump’s Targeting of “Enemies” Like James Comey Echoes FBI’s Dark History of Mass Surveillance, Dirty Tricks, and Perversion of Justice Under J. Edgar Hoover

Kristi Noem Fast-Tracked Millions in Disaster Aid to Florida Tourist Attraction After Campaign Donor Intervened

Health Officials from 10 Northeast States Officially Band Together

As Tensions Over RFK Jr.’s Vaccine Policy Mount, States Act to Secure Access to Vaccines

Vaccine Death and Side Effects Database Relies on Unverified Reports – and Trump Officials and Right-Wing Media Are Applying It Out of Context

The Future of Malign Influence Campaigns Is Here: In Moldova, the U.S. Allows Russia a Free Play

Two Decades Later, the Experience of Katrina Continues to Shape How the Nation Prepares for and Responds to Disasters

Kennedy Hearing Deepens Crisis Over Dismantling of CDC Leadership - Health Scholar Explains Why the Agency’s Ability to Protect Public Health Is Compromised

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