Good morning. I’m Corinne Straight, and this is AlterNet America.
The USDA just recalled 30,000 pounds of Argentine beef days after Trump announced a plan to flood the market with foreign imports. Three journalists from Stars and Stripes are suing Pete Hegseth for firing them after they refused to let the Pentagon dictate their reporting. ICE just awarded a $16.7 million no-bid contract for 6,000 shock gloves. And the Department of Education posted a video comparing Trump to Adolf Hitler before quietly deleting it.
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USDA Recalls 30,000 Pounds of Argentine Beef as Trump Pushes Foreign Imports
The invisible hand of the free market is supposed to be a metaphor, not a description of the inspection process.
Nearly 30,000 pounds of raw beef imported from Argentina has been recalled in Texas and Florida because it was never inspected at the border. The agency’s Food Safety and Inspection Service classified the recall as a Class I health hazard, which is the highest risk category it can assign, though it didn’t mention a specific contaminant.
The distributor has not responded to requests for comment, and the USDA’s recall notice did not identify which retailers in Texas and Florida sold the beef. A Class I health hazard means there is a reasonable probability that eating the product will cause serious health consequences or death and that consumers who may have purchased the affected beef have no way of knowing if theirs was part of the recall.
The recall was issued just 48 hours after Trump announced on Truth Social that he would allow up to 300,000 pounds of foreign beef into the country over the next 90 days at 25 percent below market prices. When reporters asked Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins on Tuesday which countries will be exempted, she said she was “not privy to talk about that.”
Fired Stars and Stripes Journalists Sue Hegseth for Retaliation
The Confederate Army couldn’t kill Stars and Stripes, and neither could the Wehrmacht, but Pete Hegseth is giving it his best shot.
Three journalists with Stars and Stripes filed a federal lawsuit Thursday against the Defense Secretary, spokesman Sean Parnell, and aide Andrew Brey, alleging they were fired illegally for refusing to let the Pentagon dictate their coverage.
According to the lawsuit, the insubordination charge was based entirely on interviews two of the plaintiffs gave to CBS News for a “CBS Sunday Morning” segment that aired in July. In that segment, one said that she works for Stars and Stripes, not for the Pentagon and not for any administration.
More than a month later, Stars and Stripes published a story detailing flagging mental health and food and water shortages aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, which has been deployed for nine months. The day after that story ran, the third plaintiff was ordered to deliver their termination notices.
He refused to deliver the notices, and announced he would retire at the end of September. The Pentagon fired him before he got the chance.
ICE Awards $16.7 Million No-Bid Contract for Gloves That Electrocute People
Tyranny, right at your fingertips.
ICE has awarded a $16.7 million no-bid contract for 6,000 pairs of gloves that deliver painful electric shocks to detainees and protesters who resist. The agency published the contract notice just hours after 16 Democratic senators sent a letter begging it not to.
The devices are called the G.L.O.V.E. — Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter — made by Compliant Technologies of Lexington, Kentucky. They look like normal patrol gloves, but when pressed to bare skin, they deliver a shock.
The manufacturer warns that the gloves are not to be used for punishment, on people displaying “verbal defiance or belligerence” or on children, pregnant women, the elderly, or disabled people.
ICE said officers would use the gloves in “high-tension environments,” such as arrests and protests. The agency promised “approved policy, training, and accountability standards” but did not say what those are.
In their letter, senators pointed to ICE’s violent encounters in Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis, Houston, Maine, and beyond, asking why anyone should support a new way to hurt people when the agency hasn’t even answered for the old ones.
Trump’s Education Department Compares Him to Hitler
The Department of Education would like you to know that it did not do its homework.
The DOE’s official X account posted a video on Wednesday night that featured a clip from the 2017 film Darkest Hour, in which Gary Oldman plays Winston Churchill during World War II. In the clip, Churchill shouts that you cannot reason with a tiger when your head is in its mouth.
The department then cut to a montage of Trump set to techno music, with the caption “No one does it like us” and a tiger emoji. The problem is that the tiger Churchill was talking about in that scene was Adolf Hitler.
The post went viral almost immediately, and users on X flagged the connection with a community note linking to a longer clip from the film. The department quietly deleted the video without issuing a statement.
A DOE spokesperson later said a staffer created and posted the video based on a trending TikTok sound without understanding the context of the clip, and that it had been removed from all social media platforms. The department has laid off thousands of employees this year, but that staffer made the cut.
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POSITIVE STORIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED:
Andrew and Tristan Tate Will Stay in Federal Custody as They Fight Extradition. A federal judge in Miami delayed a bail decision for social media influencers Andrew and Tristan Tate, who have been in federal detention since their arrest on July 18. The brothers face a total of 59 criminal charges in the United Kingdom, including rape, sex trafficking and assault. Federal prosecutors said the Tates’ access to multiple passports and wealth makes them too great a flight risk for any bond. The U.K. has until mid-September to provide evidence to the State Department and the extradition process could take months or even years.
Alabama Town Takes Surveillance Cameras Offline After Residents Push Back. This week, a small town in rural Alabama voted to turn off its Flock Safety surveillance cameras after residents packed a public meeting and called for them to come down. Red Bay quietly installed two automated license plate readers earlier this year after striking a deal with the company in January. The cameras snap pictures and record the plate of each car that goes by and residents said they didn’t want their movements tracked. A final date for a decision on whether the cameras will return has not been set.
Federal Appeals Court Blocks Trump From Obtaining Trans Youths’ Medical Records. A federal appeals court has blocked the Trump administration from using grand jury subpoenas to obtain the medical records of transgender young people treated at NYU Langone and Mount Sinai, ruling that the Department of Justice cannot force the hospitals to identify minors. The case was filed in June by Lambda Legal, the ACLU and the New York Civil Liberties Union, and was supported by the administration of Mayor Zohran Mamdani, which filed an amicus brief and committed to $15 million for gender-affirming care programs for young people.
FDA Approves First Oral Treatment for Dermatomyositis, a Rare Autoimmune Disease. The FDA approved Lisraya (brepocitinib) tablets for the treatment of dermatomyositis in adults, the first oral drug ever approved for the condition. Dermatomyositis is a rare autoimmune disease that causes chronic inflammation of the muscles and skin, leading to progressive muscle weakness and characteristic rashes. In a phase 3 clinical trial of 241 adults, people taking Lisraya had a statistically significant reduction in disease activity compared to those taking placebo.
