Lelo Self-Deports: The Washington farmworker and union activist Alfredo “Lelo” Juarez Zeferino arrested and detained by ICE this March while driving his partner to work in Mount Vernon has decided to leave the country “voluntarily.” Not that anyone who chooses self-deportation has much agency in the context of Trump’s mass deportation plan, but his attorney told The Seattle Times it could make a future return to the US easier. Back in March, activists told me Lelo has been organizing since he was a 14-year-old kid. It’s an enormous loss for farmworkers in Washington, particularly those in his Mexican Mixteco community.
Immigrant Rights Melt Like ICE: Immigration and Customs Enforcement says millions of undocumented immigrants won’t get a bond hearing when they fight their deportation in court. Acting director Todd M. Lyons told officers in a July 8 memo to hold undocumented immigrants “for the duration” of their months- to years-long immigration proceedings. In the rare cases immigrants are released on parole, it’ll be up to an officer instead of a judge. Congress has allocated $45 billion to jail immigrants over the next four years.
What’s Happening With That? In Florida, the Trump administration is packing migrants into cages at “Alligator Alcatraz.” Republicans call the facility “safe and secure.” Democrats say it’s “inhumane.” Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz told reporters cages are “wall-to-wall humans, 32 detainees per cage.” Detainees say there are worms in the food, human waste overflows from toilets on the floor, and air conditioners are abruptly shut off at night. (According to the National Weather Service, temps will be in the high 80s and low 90s this week.) According to public records reviewed by The Miami Herald and Tampa Bay Times, hundreds of the “vicious” and “deranged psychopaths” the federal government says it is holding there have not been charged with a crime.
Cash Out Out Of Cash: The Washington-based casino and card room operator Maverick Gaming filed for bankruptcy a year after a debt restructuring, prompting a hip hip hooray from the down and out it put in the same position. Maverick Gaming owns and operates 27 properties, including (the closing) Roman Casino in Seattle.
ICYMI: Jewish Voice for Peace protested outside Palantir’s Seattle office to pressure the state to divest. Activists said Washington has about $742,000 in the data-mining company. The state investment board says it’s more like $73 million.
Gay Summer Is Over: A King County Superior Court judge ruled that the city has two weeks to draw up a plan to end public sex, masturbation, and “nudity as constituted” at Denny Blaine. The ruling comes after the wealthy waterfront neighbors group Denny Blaine Park for All sued the city. The judge wouldn’t go as far as to close the beach like they wanted. The city has stepped on nearly every rake it could find handling this two-acre beach. It’s unclear what it’ll come up with. Denny Blaine Park for All said in a statement to The Stranger that the decision “confirms the city has failed to stop ongoing illegal activity at Denny Blaine Park.” (SPD Chief Shon Barnes has publicly said that nudity is not illegal in Seattle.)
Weather: It’s in the 80s, sunny and, if you’re out in Whatcom, Skagit, or northern Snohomish, a little hazy from Canadian wildfire smoke. Temperatures will dip to the low 60s tonight and pop up to a high of 90 tomorrow. Heat-related illness is serious. Throw those ice packs in the freezer, drink water and check on your humbug neighbors.
Gush: Heavy rain out east has caused flash flooding from New York to the other Washington (DC), stranding cars, buses, and trains. New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy declared a state of emergency after 3 to 6.5 inches of rainfall in the north of his state. So far, two people have been killed there.
In Texas rain is stalling an ongoing search for the missing after catastrophic flooding over the July 4 weekend.
AND … OH! LINDA MCMAHON GOES FOR THE CHAIR!!!! that she, the Education Secretary, will bring down on her department, the US Department of Education, in order to dismantle it completely. The AP reports she’s expected to move fast after the US Supreme Court cleared the way for mass layoffs in the department. This is a bad idea. I don’t think it’s going to, as President Donald Trump says, give the “Power back to the PEOPLE.” I think it’s going to give the “powher bahk to thuh pee pull” because no one will be able to fucking spell. That, and/or racism will continue its upward ascent in our society when we hand the department’s civil rights work over to Trump’s Department of (In)Justice. And I guess the Small Business Administration, no, wait, the Treasury Department is going to handle the small $1.6 trillion matter of student loan debt, which leaves school-aged kids with disabilities to Robert F. Kennedy’s Jr.’s Department of Health and Human Services. Gee, those complex issues sound interrelated. Should we have a department?
By the Way, the “PEOPLE” Want Their Education $$$: Twenty-four states and the District of Columbia (so, Democrats) sued the Trump administration over the $6.8 billion in education funds it withheld a few weeks before the school year. As we all know from the news, schools are overfunded. They’re so rich they won’t even miss the 14% of all federal funds for elementary and secondary education across the country. The states allege the President is violating the US Constitution by illegally withholding that money (Trump says nuh-uh). Only Congress can deprive us of our needs. That’s the system!
Take This American Institution and Shove It: Reuters reports that 69 of the 110 Department of Justice lawyers in the Federal Programs Branch, which defends the administration from lawsuits, have quit or have announced plans to quit since the 2024 election. One lawyer said that people come to the branch to defend “aspects of our constitutional system … How could they participate in the project of tearing it down?”
This Is All Such A Bummer: But sadness is okay. It leaves room for hope. Charles wrote about it.
Feel It:
