Six Republicans Break Ranks to Oppose Trump on Immigration

With the six representatives’ help, House Democrats were able to force a vote on Haitians’ Temporary Protected Status in the U.S.

Six House Republicans sided with the Democratic Party Wednesday, forcing a vote on a bill that could expand protections for Haitian immigrants.

Republican Representatives María Elvira Salazar (Florida), Brian Fitzpatrick (Pennsylvania), Mike Lawler (New York), Don Bacon (Nebraska), Carlos Giménez (Florida), and Nicole Malliotakis (New York) voted alongside 212 House Democrats and one independent to advance a vote to extend Temporary Protected Status for Haitians for three years.

“I have one of the largest Haitian populations in the country in my district,” Lawler told The Washington Post. “If you end [temporary protections] without addressing work authorization, it will cause a huge crisis in our health care system, especially in an area like mine, where a lot of our Haitian TPS holders are nurses.”

The minority party utilized a discharge petition to bring the issue to the House floor, circumventing the whims of House Speaker Mike Johnson and Donald Trump.

Politicians across the country have argued that ending TPS for Haitians would threaten the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of families, disrupt state economies, and jeopardize the futures of the population’s American-born children.

Haitians have become a favorite target of the MAGA movement in recent years. In 2024, several prominent members of the party—including then–vice presidential candidate JD Vance—hurled racist and baseless accusations against Haitian immigrants in Ohio, claiming that they were causing “constant car crashes” and were capturing and eating their neighbors’ pets.

The Trump administration set an effective end date for TPS for Haiti of September 2, 2025, a decision that was expected to affect more than 348,000 people in the U.S. But the effort has since been held up in the judiciary as lower courts stepped in to prevent the suspension.

The admin has appealed the matter to the Supreme Court, which will hear the government’s argument on April 29. Nineteen attorneys general have jointly filed an amicus brief imploring the nation’s highest court to uphold Haitians’ legal status.

Pentagon Secretly Plotting Military Operations in Cuba Next

The order to do so reportedly came straight from the White House.

The Pentagon received direct orders from President Trump to prepare for a military escalation in Cuba, according to multiple reports this week.

USA Today and Zeteo, both citing anonymous sources, report that the Pentagon is ramping up planning for a military operation in Cuba, should Trump make the call. Zeteo noted that the order came straight from the White House.

Trump has been threatening Cuba for months now, and in January signed an executive order imposing tariffs on countries that attempted to send oil there, essentially imposing a catastrophic oil blockade on the island. On Monday, he said that “we may stop by Cuba after we’re finished with this,” in reference to his war on Iran, which still has no tangible end in sight. And last month, Trump said of Cuba that “it may be a friendly takeover, it may not be a friendly takeover. It wouldn’t matter.... They have no energy. They have no money. They’re in deep trouble on a humanitarian basis.”

Trump’s oil and aid blockade of Cuba has caused rampant human suffering on the island, as Cubans have experienced blackouts, food shortages, and inflation. While the Trump administration has framed this economic strangling as a liberatory endeavor, this kind of military escalation in a country that hasn’t been a threat in decades points to plans to impose its own agenda on Cuba and the rest of the Western hemisphere.

Trump Helped GOP Senator Push Land Sell-Off—Then Threw Him Under Bus

Senator Mike Lee’s plan to sell off public land was incredibly unpopular.

Utah Senator Mike Lee got help from the Trump administration on his disastrous plot to execute a large-scale sell-off of public lands—only to be left behind weeks later.

In June, Lee introduced a controversial measure to sell off 4.2 million acres of public land as an amendment to Donald Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill, after consulting with the Department of the Interior, Public Domain reported Wednesday.

The agency shared technical data about the proposal with the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, of which Lee is the chair, according to internal emails obtained by the Wilderness Society. The department also offered feedback on the proposal, which Lee used to craft talking points and respond to concerns.

In one email chain on June 10, Chris Prandoni, the committee’s deputy staff director, asked two Interior Department staffers to approve a quote that would accurately reflect the agency’s research.

“This is the quote I’ve been working up with your guys to accurately reflect your research: ‘The Department of the Interior estimates that the Bureau of Land Management has about 1.2 million acres of land within 1 mile of a population city center and another 800,000 acres within 1-5 miles of a population center. Much of this land may qualify for disposal under this section,’” Prandoni wrote.

Jeremy Arendt, who serves as the Interior’s deputy assistant secretary of natural resources and infrastructure, urged Lee’s staff to “include a % of total acres this represents for [the Bureau of Land Management], which is about 0.7% of the total, or about 30% of lands within 5 miles of population centers.”

“Good to go on the quoted content. Thanks for running it by us!” wrote Greg Wischer, the Interior’s deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management.

“Thanks, guys. See some of you all tomorrow,” Prandoni replied, implying that staff from the Senate committee would meet with Interior staff in person the next day, when Lee would announce his amendment to Trump’s massive budget reconciliation bill.

But just two weeks later, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum tried to distance the Trump........

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