Good morning. I’m Corinne Straight, and this is AlterNet America.
A Texas oil company tied to Trump landed a dozen drilling containers on Greenland’s coast without permission and hired Dr. Phil to film it. Relatives of the sailors fighting Trump’s Iran war are outraged as troops are forced to shower with moldy spouts and ration meals. ICE is publishing detention contracts that flatly declare state and local inspection laws “shall not apply.” And Nebraska Republicans are suing to keep a party called America First off the ballot, claiming a leftist stole Trump’s brand.
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Greenland Issues ‘Strong Warning’ as Trump-linked Firm Prepares to Drill
Dr. Phil has been to war zones, addiction clinics, and custody battles, but a protected Arctic wetland might finally be the thing that’s out of his depth.
A Texas company connected to Trump is preparing to drill in Greenland, recently bringing materials ashore without permission from local authorities. The local government has issued a “strong warning” that “all future logistical matters must be advised and approved by the mineral resources authority.”
The company, called Greenland Energy, was set up just last year. It claims $1 trillion of crude may lie beneath the Jameson Land region, and intends to spend $60 million drilling to find out. Oh, and it hired Dr. Phil to make a documentary series about “these modern-day wildcatters.”
Two days after the warning, Trump posted this menacing image on Truth Social showing himself looming over a Greenlandic village.
Greenland stopped issuing new oil licenses in 2021 on environmental grounds, and the planned wells fall inside a conservation area protected by the Ramsar convention on wetlands. The decision to approve a permit for the project now lies with local officials, who have every reason not to.
If this were a pitch on Shark Tank, Mark Cuban would offer sixty million dollars just to make them stop talking.
Military Families Rage at Trump Over Gross Conditions for Troops
Two tortillas and a half-cup of rice is not a military meal, it’s what falls out of a Chipotle bag on the way home.
The U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln left San Diego in November for a deployment that was supposed to last seven months. Trump launched his air campaign against Iran in February and said the conflict would last a “few weeks.” It has now been five months, and the ship’s 5,000-plus sailors and Marines still have no homecoming date.
The crew has been on land for just two days in more than eight months, spending 208 unbroken days at sea before reaching Oman on July 7. It is the longest a U.S. carrier has gone without a break in the modern era.
Families describe out-of-service toilets, long stretches without hot water, and mold growing in faucets. Nicole Conrad, who voted for Trump, said her son messaged her about a meal that came to two tortillas and a half-cup of rice.
The families went public two days after Trump handed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s wife, Jennifer, control of a new panel on military family welfare during an executive order signing in the Oval Office on Monday.
When photos of near-empty meal trays spread online in April, Pete Hegseth called the coverage “fake news.” He’s doing a great job washing his hands of it, despite the mold growing in the faucets.
ICE Contracts Declare State Law ‘Shall Not Apply’
Most people at least swap a few sentences around when they copy the homework.
It took three years of lawsuits, 10 refusals of inspections and more than 3,500 detainee complaints before a federal judge told U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to allow health inspectors from the state of Washington into the Tacoma facility.
One day later, ICE published draft contract terms declaring that state and local laws “shall not apply” to its facilities.
The contracts read like they were written for one specific company: GEO Group. The private prison contractor is already running operations in some of the places where ICE says it will build its new prisons, and the number of beds they are required to have matches their current operations exactly. In Florida, 700 is the number of beds at the Pompano Beach detention center operated by GEO Group.
Under the proposed standards, facilities would be allowed to operate indefinitely at 85 percent staffing, including for medical staff. Inspections by third parties would be allowed, but only inspectors chosen by ICE.
Since 2024, two people have died at the Tacoma facility. A June inspection found that suicide-watch checks were being conducted nearly 14 hours apart when they’re supposed to be every eight hours, and a detainee received his required health assessment 22 days late.
Nebraska Republicans Are Suing to Keep America First Off the Ballot
“America First” is now a brand to be protected, not a principle to be shared, which is honestly the most Republican sentence ever written.
The Nebraska state Republican Party is suing to block the America First Party from appearing on the November ballot, asking a Lancaster County judge to declare the party’s name illegal and stop it from being officially recognized.
The party’s sponsor is John Cartier, attorney general of the Omaha Tribe, whose platform lists cracking down on illegal immigration, defending the Second Amendment, and opposing abortion.
The lawsuit calls the platform a “façade” that “crumbles under the slightest scrutiny,” arguing that Cartier is really a “well-known leftist political operative” hijacking “a nationally recognized brand inextricably linked to President Donald J. Trump.”
Secretary of State Bob Evnen agreed the party was likely created to cause confusion but declined to disqualify it unless ordered by a court, noting no other Nebraska party uses the words “America” and “first.”
A judge blocked certification of the America First Party until Monday afternoon, when a hearing is set for 2 p.m. By tonight, a Nebraska judge will have to rule on whether the words “America” and “First” can legally appear next to each other without Republican permission.
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POSITIVE STORIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED:
Impeachment Articles Filed Against “Unelected Shadow President” Russell Vought. Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove filed two articles of impeachment Thursday against White House budget chief Russell Vought, the Project 2025 architect, accusing him of unlawfully terminating funds Congress appropriated. The articles allege “abuse of power through improper impoundment” and “failure to faithfully execute the laws of the United States.” Last month, administration officials admitted in court filings they killed billions in Biden-era clean energy grants “based solely” on whether Kamala Harris won the state in 2024.
Senate Recesses Without Passing the SAVE Act’s Voter ID Measure. Without the SAVE Act, which would limit what kinds of photo IDs you need to be able to vote, the Senate adjourned for recess. It’s already failed in the Senate at least five times this year. Friday night, GOP leaders figured out that there weren’t enough votes for the whole thing, so they tried to pass just the voter ID piece. And that failed too, with just 52 votes for a bill that needed 60 to pass. Sen. Mike Lee called the result “tragic,” and said “we’re just getting started.” Voters ranked the issue fifth in importance in a recent poll, behind things that actually affect their lives.
Voter Turnout Surges in Tennessee After a Black-Majority District Is Erased. Days after the Supreme Court gutted Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act in April, Tennessee’s Republican legislature split Memphis’s 9th District, the state’s only majority-Black district, into three districts that stretch hundreds of miles into rural areas. It has since backfired, as Democratic primary turnout in Shelby County more than doubled compared to 2024, hitting its highest level in a decade. A fifth of all active registered voters cast ballots in Democratic House primaries, proving nothing gets people to the polls like being told their vote doesn’t matter.
