Democracy Now! Audio - Democracy Now! 2026-08-26 Wednesday

Episode Date: August 26, 2026

Headlines for August 26, 2026; “They Threw Me to the Wolves”: Karen Attiah on Censorship Under Trump, Winning Her WaPo Job Back; Trump’s Contested Order to Restrict Mail-In Voting Could Disenfranchise Millions: Ari Berman; “Most Americans Are Getting Poorer”: Robert Reich on Inequality & the Failures of Corporate Democrats

From New York, this is Democracy Now. The Supreme Court's decision to temporarily allow President Trump's executive order severely restricting mail-in voting to proceed could lead to chaos in the midterm elections. And if this executive order is ultimately upheld on the merits, it could lead to the disenfranchisement of potentially millions of voters come November. With the midterm elections, less than 10 weeks away, Supreme Court has handed President Trump a temporary victory in his attack on mail-in voting. We'll speak to Ari Berman of Mother Jones.

Class will be joined by former Labor Secretary Robert Reich on his recent online fight with Treasury Secretary Scott Besant and how extreme economic inequality is reshaping the country. There's so much conspicuous consumption at the top. Wealth has moved, has been siphoned off, and it's because the economy, is rigged. But first, we'll speak to Karen Atiya. Last year, the Washington Post fired her over posts she made following the death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

Now, a private arbitrator has ordered the Washington Post to rehire her. All that and more? Coming up. Welcome to Democracy Now. Democracy Now.org. The War and Peace Report. I'm Narmine Sheikh. Amy Goodman will be back later this week. Iran announced that its resumed negotiations with Oman.

over managing the Strait of Hormuz. That's despite mounting economic pressure from President Trump. It comes as the U.S. says it has completed the clearing of mines from the Strait of Hormuz. An oil tanker was struck by an unidentified projectile off the coast of Oman on Tuesday. Meanwhile, the U.S. Secret Service said that it was tracking a recent video broadcast by Iranian state television to assassinate Trump's youngest son, Baron. The potential plot alleges that a $10 million bounty had been on. offered for his killing. In Gaza, Palestinians and Khan Yunus held a vigil at Nassar Hospital for journalists killed by an Israeli strike a year ago. On August 25, 2025, Israel struck Nassar Hospital,

killing at least 20 people, including five journalists, who worked for Reuters, the Associated Press, Al Jazeera, and other news outlets. Reuters, editor-in-chief, Alessandra Galoni, and the AP's executive editor, Julie Pace, issued a joint statement Tuesday saying, quote, we again call on the government of Israel to explain the deaths of these journalists and take every step necessary to protect journalists covering the conflict. We'll continue to seek answers, demand accountability, and call for access to Gaza to provide support to our colleagues who've been covering the war for almost three years now. These were the five journalists killed by Israel a year ago.

Reuters journalist Hussam al-Masri, who was killed while operating a live video feed at the hospital. Mariam Abu Dachah, who freelance for the Associated Press and other outlets. Mohamed Salama, who worked for Al Jazeera, Muaz Abu Dachah, a freelance journalist who worked with several news organizations, and Ahmed Abu Aziz. This is the brother of Reuters journalist Hussam al-Masri. They were not numbers, but they were lives moving among us. Each one of them had a dream, a hope, a home, children, and a wife. They were living their lives, but the occupation targeted them for no other reason than they were a voice for the truth, and they were the very symbol of this truth.

Inoccupied East Jerusalem, Israeli forces stormed the Kalandiyya Training Center, a major unrest facility in the Kaffir Akab neighborhood on Tuesday. Troops forced all unrest staff out of the facility and ordered them not to come back. The Jerusalem governor reported that five Palestinians were wounded by Israeli gunfire near the Kalandia training site. This is UN spokesperson Stefan Dujarik. Today's actions are the fifth instance of unauthorized entry by Israeli authorities in the center since May this year and follow other unacceptable breaches of inviability and of interference with unwar premises in occupied East Jerusalem, including the seizure and demolition of the Sheikh Jara compound,

as well as cutting off supply of water electricity to multiple other UNRWA facilities. Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, far-right Israeli lawmaker, Svi Sukkot entered the Palestinian village of Madama on Tuesday, escorted by soldiers and destroyed a limestone monument with a sledgehammer. Video verified by the New York Times shows at least two soldiers standing by without intervening. The U.S. has delisted Syria as a state sponsor of terrorism, eliminating what Damascus calls the last major obstacle to international investment. Syria had been on the list since 1979, after Washington accused Hafez al-Assad's government of backing militant groups. The designation

stayed in place under his son Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted in December 2024 by rebels led by Ahmed al-Shara, who is now Syria's president. Cuba, Iran, and North Korea, remain on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism. U.S. media reported that CIA director John Ratcliffe made an unannounced trip to Moscow after flight records showed an American military plane landing in the Russian capital. A U.S. diplomatic motorcade was also spotted. The CIA director's reported trip follows a breakdown in U.S. broker talks on ending the Ukraine war, though Russia did free a former U.S. Marine this month after nearly four years in detention.

Canada responded to President Trump's tariffs by doubling its tariffs on American steel and aluminum from 25% to 50% on Tuesday. Canada will also impose tariffs ranging from 15% to 50% on about 700 other products. The U.S. had imposed a 50% tariff on $20 billion worth of Canadian imports. This comes, as President Trump said on social media, he is, quote, giving serious consideration to renaming Lake Ontario, Lake America. Here in New York City, an interfaith coalition on Tuesday denounced the upcoming visit of a prominent Hindu nationalist leader from India at Madison Square Garden this Saturday. Mohan Bhagavut is the head of the RSS, a far-right paramilitary organization closely linked to India's ruling BJP Party. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a member of the group and Bhagwatra's rally in New York, Mark,

the beginning of a global speaking tour for the 100th anniversary of the RSS. Earlier this year, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom recommended the U.S. imposed sanctions against the RSS for their responsibility for and tolerance of attacks on religious minorities, including Muslims and Christians. This is Brad Lander, the Democratic Party's nominee for New York City's 10th Congressional District. This event harkens back to that 1939 Nazi rally that was hosted at Madison Square Garden with banners of swastikas and tens of thousands of people cheering ethnic and religious hatred and violence of a very similar sort to what Mohad Bhagwan and the RSS are proposing. And MSG said it wouldn't do that again, that it wouldn't host any more hate-filled, bigoted, rallies. It should not host this one.

ICE detained nearly 50,000 people in July, a record monthly high since President Trump returned to office. ICE has increasingly relied on collaboration from state and local law enforcement to arrest more immigrants at traffic stops, a partnership that's become key to Trump's mass deportation campaign. In related news, New York's legislation prohibiting state and local law enforcement agencies from cooperating with ICE went into effect yesterday. Under the Local Cop's Local Crimes Act, the agreements must be terminated setting up a potential legal battle with New York counties that have not yet committed to complying with the statute. This is New York Governor Kathy Hockel.

ICE is dangerous and aggressive tactics to pursue civil immigration. Again, I'm very clear here for civil immigration enforcement. This only continues to evoke fear on our streets. And our local cops will not be part of it. Because we hold our police to a higher standard. They hold themselves to a higher standard. Six immigrants who were deported from the U.S. to Liberia last week reportedly resisted getting off the plane

and were instead flown to Equatorial Guinea. The Trump administration has secretly expanded these so-called third-country agreements, deporting thousands of immigrants to dozens of foreign. countries they have no ties to. The immigrants who refused to get off the plane in Liberia were four men from Cuba, one from Brazil, as well as a woman from Cameroon, according to NBC News. The group was told they'd be returning to the U.S., but instead were taken to Malabo's city in Equatorial Guinea. In Texas, a federal judge on Tuesday ordered the release of a second

key witness in the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, the 52-year-old Mexican father who was killed by an ICE agent in Houston on July 7th. Daniel Tirado Pantoja was one of three passengers in Araujo's van the morning of the shooting, along with Araujo's younger brother, Victor Salgado, who is still in ICE detention nearly two months later. Pantoja must be released within 48 hours. This comes as the ice agents involved in Araujo's killing have still not been identified. To see our coverage of this case, go to our website. Colombia's new right-wing president, Abelardo de la Esprit, has vowed to deport thousands of immigrants, mainly Venezuelans, from the country.

According to the UN, around 2.8 million Venezuelans are currently living in Colombia. This is De La Esprit speaking Tuesday. The order to migration is clear start operations in coordination with the police in Barranquilla to find illegal immigrants. First, those committing crimes. Second, those with their situation not regularized. Who, in the end, will have to be deported. A federal judge has temporarily blocked the state of Ohio from requiring residents to present proof of citizenship documentation when registering to vote at motor vehicle officers. The decision is the latest legal setback against efforts by Trump allies to tighten voting restrictions in key states ahead of the midterms in November.

This comes as a federal judge in Massachusetts found the Trump administration violated a court injunction by finalizing new regulations with the U.S. Postal Service that would overhaul voting by mail nationwide if they're enforced. Tuesday's ruling prevents the measures from taking effect for now and comes in response to a motion by the League of Women Voters of Massachusetts. This follows a separate ruling by the Supreme Court on Monday, allowing President Trump to implement his examiner. executive order restricting mail-in ballots. House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries of New York, lashed out at critics of his meeting with Trump envoy and son-in-law Jared Kushner, writing on X, quote, No one from the Trump cartel is getting a pass. The New York Times reports the meeting was arranged by a mutual friend of Jeffries and Kushner and aimed at finding areas of, quote,

common ground if Democrats regained control of one or both chambers of Congress in November's midterm elections. News of the meeting prompted fresh calls for Hakeem Jeffries to step down from his leadership role as the top House Democrat. Tommy Vitor, a former aide to President Barack Obama, wrote, quote, Jared Kushner has no actual government job. He just uses his family connections to get money from Gulf autocrats and fund corrupt deals. The only way representative Jeffreys should work with him is with demands for documents and subpoenas, end quote. In North Carolina, Darlene Graham, the sister of the late Republican Lindsey Graham, won the state's Republican Senate primary runoff Tuesday. President Trump had thrown his

support behind her candidacy. Graham won the 52% of the vote. Her challenger, Congress member Ralph Norman, secured 48%. Darling Graham has never held public office. A federal judge on Tuesday rejected Galane Maxwell's bid to overturn her sex trafficking conviction and 20-year prison sentence, calling her claims, quote, demonstrably meritless. Maxwell was the former girlfriend and accomplice to the late convicted sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein. The judge said that Maxwell, acting as the woman in charge of Epstein's various residences, enforced an atmosphere in which employees knew not to speak. He said the tactics she and Epstein relied on were the same ones child predators typically use, and that Maxwell took part in the abuse herself. In Pennsylvania, two unvaccinated people have died from measles.

They're the first measles deaths in the U.S. this year. More measles cases have been reported in 26 than in any year since the virus was declared eliminated in 2000. This is Pennsylvania's governor, Josh Shapiro. So far this year, there have been 393 confirmed cases of measles in Pennsylvania. That is the highest number of measles cases since 1992. Nearly 20% of those cases have resulted in someone being hospitalized. CNN is reporting that members of a specialized team that responds to natural disasters and other emergencies in national parks have been sent to Washington, D.C., to work on

President Trump's pet project, ranging from the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool to fountain renovations and removing debris at the East Potomac Gulf Course. The officials are also compiling highly detailed status reports for Interior Secretary Doug Bergam. A longtime Park Service employee who spoke anonymously to CNN said, quote, political folks have wanted to know even the tiniest details, and it's always about schedule. Will it be on time? The focus on Trump's beautification projects comes as the Western U.S. confronts the most wildfires in a decade and a water crisis that has gripped several states. And legendary singer, songwriter, and country superstar Dolly Parton died Tuesday in Nashville, Tennessee, surrounded by loved ones. She was 80 and had reportedly

been battling cancer. News of Dolly Parton's death sparked tributes around the world, honoring a musical legacy that spanned decades. Dolly Parton won multiple Grammys and numerous other awards. Dolly Parton also starred in the 1980 film 9 to 5 with Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda. During a reunion with her co-stars in 2006, Dolly Parton did an impromptu version of her hit song from the film. Dolly Parton is also remembered as a champion of the working class, an acting class, an acting class, an advocate for children's literacy, education, LGBTQ plus, and women's rights, health care, and for her commitment to philanthropy. Dolly Parton created the imagination library, inspired by her

father's inability to read and write. The library has gifted more than 300 million books to children over the last three decades. She grew up in extreme poverty in the great smoky mountains of rural Tennessee and became one of the most influential artists in the United States. American history. This is Dolly Parton in her own words speaking when she was inducted into the songwriters' Hall of Fame in 2001. I do know that I'm so honored and so proud to be here, and I've been writing songs all of my life, and this beats the heck out of standing up on hill above the barn, singing to the cows and the chickens and the pigs practicing all the new songs. And a correction, Darlene Graham won the Republican Senate primary in South Carolina, not North Carolina.

some of the headlines coming up, we'll speak to Karen Attea. Last year, the Washington Post fired her over posts she made following the death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Now, a private arbitrator has ordered the Washington Post to rehire her. Back in a minute. No time for breezy. No time for arguments. There's no time for love like now. There's no time in the bardo. No time in the end between No time for love Like now Where did this all begin to change

The lockdown memories can't sustain This glistening hanging free I turned away From the glorious light I turn my head and cry No time for love like now. Michael Steip and Aaron Destiner performing on Democracy Now's 30th anniversary event at the Riverside Church earlier this year. This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report.

I'm Narmine Sheikh. A private arbitrator has ordered the Washington Post to rehire opinion columnist Karen Atia with back pay. Atia was fired last fall over comments she made following the fatal shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Atia is an award-winning journalist who served as the founding editor of the Post-Clobal Opinion Section. In 2019, she was named Journalists of the Year by the National Association of Black Journalists. She was recognized for her writings about Saudi dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was assassinated by a team of Saudi agents inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2018. Atiyah had recruited Khashoggi to be a columnist for the post.

But Atia's career at the Washington Post came to an abrupt end last year. Shortly after Charlie Kirk was fatally shot, Atier wrote online, quote, For everyone saying political violence has no place in this country, remember, two democratic legislators were shot in Minnesota just this year, and America shrugged and moved on. In a follow-up post, she wrote, quote, Part of what keeps America so violent is the insistence that people perform care, empty goodness and absolution for white men who espouse hatred and violence, she wrote.

During her arbitration hearing, Atia said, quote, my commentary in general was about how America responds to acts of political violence, and quite often that response is different depending on the identity of the perpetrators of that violence. Karen, Atia, joins us now from Washington, D.C. Karen, welcome back to democracy now. if you could respond to the Washington Post decision to rehire you following this lengthy arbitration process. Yes, it's good to be back. Thank you for having me on.

What can I say? I feel extremely vindicated. I feel quite tired, quite joyful. I'm sitting here and I'm reading red in honor of the Washington Post Guild. I'm a proud union member and my ability to even challenge my firing to file a grievance and then to go to arbitration was all thanks to the fact that the Washington Post Guild and the Washington Baltimore News Guild had in their contract for binding arbitration. So as much as this is a victory for me, this is a victory for guilds for unions. And as well as, you know, I'm feeling very much like this is beyond just a job, beyond just me, beyond just the Washington. Post. This is a victory for journalism, for anyone who wants to stand up for just speaking the

truth. I was just doing my job. So I really do see this as a symbol that it's worth it to stand up and fight for freedom of expression, for journalistic freedom. And when you fight, sometimes you win and sometimes you win big, like in my case. So Karen, could you tell us, have people from The Post been in touch with you since This was announced, and in particular, the Post's former opinions editor, Adam O'Neill. I have heard nothing from Adam O'Neill. The only time I've heard from him was once last year in a meeting, and then secondly, during the arbitration where he testified against me. My lawyers and reps at the moment are going back and forth with the posts, as I understand.

But for me, I have still not heard anything yet from the Washington Post. And explain Karen why exactly what the justification was that was given for the Washington Post decision to sack you from your post. They cited, among other things, security threats, but not security threats against you. Right. So two things. I mean, the Washington Post argued that my posts disparaged white men and were in violation. of their social media policy. Of course, anyone reading with any reasonable amount of reading and grammar comprehension could see that I was talking about white men who choose to engage in hatred and violence. So there was that.

And then the Post tried to make the argument that because the Charlie Kirk killing was such an overly emotional time that they had no choice but to distance themselves for me. And I think this is actually a really, really important point of the argument. arbitrator's decision, she reminded the post of their own policies to protect their journalists, especially in times of heightened social media abuse and attacks. I can say from my experience, frankly, the posts that I made did not engendered that much backlash. I was not aware of any threats. And instead of the Washington Post calling me, telling me about the post, they didn't even tell me to take them down. Instead, they threw me to the wall.

and basically blamed me for any supposed threat. The Washington Post basically manufactured a crisis of their own making in terms of the Post and used that as a reason to get rid of me. And could you place this, Karen, in the context of broader attacks on the media under the Trump administration and also about what's going on internally and has been going on at the Washington Post? So my firing, at the time, of course, people familiar with the Washington Post trajectory, particularly over the last couple of years, this came after Jeff Bezos said that the opinion section

was only going to cover personal liberties and free markets and nothing else. So there was already a chilling effect and a sense of censorship. There were buyouts that were offered to the entire opinion section, of which I refused. I decided I wanted to stay. And part of the reason why I wanted to stay was because I was the last full-time staff black opinion columnist in the section. And for a city that has historically been majority black, I guess I just felt a sense that I needed to stay and do as much of the work as I could. And in terms of the broader, broader picture, there's been an attack on the media. We've seen how specifically in the Charlie Kirk case, how J.D. Vance, members of the right wing, were explicitly telling people to go after any critics of Charlie Kirk and explicitly telling them to go after their jobs. Of course, we saw what happened to Jimmy Kimmel. All of this is coming in an environment where more and more media are facing pressure to kow to Kow to Kowtow to Maga.

And so for me, again, I think this is why my reinstatement and this win means so much for so many people, because they see this as a proxy for standing up to this wave of censorship and oppression and targeting, particularly of black voices and removing black voices deemed as DEI from the public sphere. And could you talk about in your recent substack piece, you mentioned Mark Thesson, the post columnist who encouraged Charlie Kirk critics to be doxed and set on social media using an expletive, F the media and liberal Democrats, but he still has his job at the post. Right. Well, it all goes back to how ironically the post treatment of me versus my white male colleagues just goes to the point of how men who encourage harm, or at least, supported or appear to platform it are coddled, are given a pat on the back and allowed to keep going, whereas myself, a woman journalist, a black woman journalist, I get the harshest

of punishments and not just the harshest of punishments, but I myself am label a threat. So for the post saying that my post went against journalistic integrity, perhaps they were more afraid that I actually clocked the behavior of America. and the Washington Post when it comes to white men who choose to engage in violence, I was just calling a thing a thing. And the Washington Post, once again, in their treatment of me versus my white male colleagues, proved me right. And before we conclude, Karen, so what is your plan now?

Do you plan to return to the Post? And many people are curious. What will happen with your substack? So the way I feel, I mean, right now I'm just savoring this victory as much as I can. I am very much ready and willing to go back to writing. My beat was writing about race, gender, human rights, and global issues. So I fully expect and frankly demand that I be able to publish freely, that I be able to write freely. So that is what is on the table.

They have their marching orders. I'm still waiting to hear from the post. And as far as my substock right now, my substock, I'm going to keep writing until I find out more about what's going to happen with the Washington Post. But as of now, all my options are still on the table. So for now, like I said, I'm savoring the victory and I'm hoping to at least pop champagne in the near future. Okay, congratulations again, Karen Atia is former Global Opinian editor for The Washington Post. We'll link to your latest substact piece. The Washington Post fired me, I fought and won my job back.

Coming up with the midterm elections less than 10 weeks away, the Supreme Court has handed President Trump a temporary victory in his attack on mail-in voting. We'll speak to Ari Berman of Mother Jones. Back in a minute. I decorate with tapestry in China plays two lamps with bulbs of different shades

one for the night one for the day a studio with cupboard space 600 squared inside my brain wooden floors in both hallways one for the night

one for the day Inside My Head by Suva the second. This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report. I'm Nermine Sheikh. With the midterm elections, less than 10 weeks away, the Supreme Court has lifted a lower court injunction on President Trump's executive order seeking to limit mail-in voting ahead of the midterms. Trump's order directed the Department of Homeland Security to create

state-by-state lists of eligible voters who are citizens. The U.S. Postal Service would then use the list provided by states to assess if voters should be allowed to vote by mail. On Monday, justices ruled six to three that California and 22 other states lacked standing to sue over the issue. The ruling, however, did not address whether Trump had authority to impose the rules. The court's three liberal justices dissented. Justice Katanji Brown Jackson warned that the majority opinion, needlessly injects chaos and uncertainty into the upcoming midterm elections. In related news on Tuesday, a federal judge in Massachusetts found the Trump administration

violated a court injunction by finalizing new regulations with the U.S. Postal Service that would overhaul voting by mail nationwide if they're enforced. While Trump has repeatedly attacked mail-in-voting, he continues to vote by mail himself. Voting records in Florida show the president voted by mail. in the recent Republican primary. He requested a ballot in late July. The ballot was returned on August 13th. Well, we're joined now by Ari Berman, National Voting Rights correspondent from Mother Jones. His new piece is titled, Scotus Hans Trump, a temporary win in his crusade to restrict male voting. Burman is author of the book Minority Rule, the right-wing attack on the will of the people,

and the fight to resist it. Welcome back to the program, Ari, if you could just respond to this news, the latest news. Hi, Nermin. Thank you for having me back on the show. So what the Supreme Court did is it temporarily allowed Trump's executive order severely restricting mail voting to go into effect. It said it was too early for states to challenge this. And this leads to a lot of uncertainty going into the midterms

because the Trump executive order would radically restrict vote by mail. It would instruct the Department of Homeland Security to create lists of voters that deem citizens. These lists are likely to be highly inaccurate based on the fact that the Department of Homeland Security has already made these egregious claims of voter fraud that have turned out not to be true. And then it says that the Postal Service can only deliver mail ballots based on these DHAs lists. And moreover, it will only deliver mail ballots in states that hand over their voter rolls, which includes sensitive personal information, to the federal government. This is essentially a form of extortion. The Department of Justice is 0.123 in federal court trying to force states to hand over their voter rolls. But the Postal Service is saying that we're not going to deliver your mail ballot unless you hand over this information to the Trump administration.

So it basically radically changes how mail voting would work in the U.S. It radically changes the job of the Postal Service from delivering the mail to essentially determining who gets a mail ballot. And if it ultimately goes into effect, it could disenfranchise. tries millions of voters in November. And could you explain, Ari, what is Trump's kind of personal animus against mail-in voting? He apparently thinks that he lost the 2020 election to Biden because of mail-in votes? Yes, he blames mail-in voting for his defeat in 2020, even though he clearly lost for other reasons, namely his handling of the pandemic.

Although Trump himself has voted by mail repeatedly. He voted by mail in Florida's primary in August. He voted by mail earlier in a state legislative election. So it seems like Trump's attitude towards male voting is male voting for me, but not for the. And the fact is, one in three Americans voted by mail in the 2024 election. It is an increasingly popular way of voting for a number of different reasons. There are states that conduct their elections entirely by mail. And this would radically change how male voting works instead of mail ballots being sent to all voters in states that have those kind of laws or being accessible to all voters, it would radically restrict mail voting. And the Trump administration

would basically decide who does and does not get a mail ballot. And that appears to be plainly unconstitutional because states with oversight from Congress run their elections. The executive branch has basically no say in how mail voting works. So this is a massive power grab by the by the Trump administration to try to restrict mail voting, and it's been blessed at least temporarily by the Republican majority on the Supreme Court. So what exactly does it mean? Because right now, the Supreme Court ruling does not have any bearing on voters who will vote in the midterm elections. Is that correct? Yeah, there's a separate injunction that blocks the Postal Service from carrying out Trump's

executive order. Now, the question is, what's going to happen with that? Is the Supreme Court going to block that lower court ruling? My expectation is that in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision, states and individuals are going to seek a new injunction blocking the Postal Service from carrying out this executive order, essentially arguing that the executive order itself is unconstitutional and the Postal Service has no legal status to carry it out, because the job of the Postal Service is to deliver the mail, not determine who gets a mail ballot. So this fight is far from over, but the fact that we're even having this conversation less than 70 days out of the midterms, and we're actually wondering, are people going to vote by mail in November? That is extremely disturbing because election officials and voters need certainty about whether they will be able to vote by mail and whether their mail ballots will be counted. And right now there's a lot of uncertainty about that. And just to give, you know, audiences some sense of what's at stake, mail ballots are increasingly. increasingly popular with voters of both parties. And according to federal data, about 30% of all ballots were cast via mail during the 2024 presidential election. And the process is almost entirely secure, a 2025 Brookings Institution study found only about four cases of fraud out of every 10 million male ballots cast. So if you could just, you know, talk about

that, you know, what is at stake in this? And what does Trump think he'll achieve if this executive order is put in place? Who will be excluded? Well, you're right, Nermine. There's been no evidence shown that mail ballots leads to widespread voter fraud. Every study has found the opposite that mail voting is safe and secure. So everything that Trump has said about mail voting has been a lie. And the fact that Trump himself continues to vote by mail shows that He actually doesn't believe what he's saying about mail voting. He clearly wants to do this to hurt the Democratic Party. He believes that Democrats vote by mail in larger numbers than Republicans.

That's certainly been true in more recent elections, but a lot of Republicans also vote by mail. And there's a number of competitive states this November in Florida, in Arizona, in Alaska, for example, where a lot of people vote by mail and a lot of Republicans vote by mail. So if Trump's executive order goes through, a lot of people, a significant number of Americans will not be able to vote by mail or will have significant trouble casting a mail ballot that may harm Democrats more than Republicans, but a lot of Republicans are going to be harmed too. And there could be a lot of collateral damage about this. And the fact is you're taking a method of voting that basically one in three Americans use and you're basically saying it's going to be. radically changed in the run-up to the election when mail ballots are going out to voters, to overseas voters, to military voters in a matter of weeks in certain states. Could you explain also, Ari, some of the limits on what is permissible prior to the midterms, if you could explain what's called the Purcell principle, and the fact that under the

Constitution, states and Congress determine voting procedures, not the White House or federal agencies. Yeah, the Constitution is very clear that states with oversight from Congress run their elections, that the president has basically no authority to interfere in state elections. So what the president is trying to do is he's trying to usurp power to take over voting that he doesn't actually have. And when it comes to the Supreme Court, they have been very hypocritical in judging election rules. They have said that it's too close to the election to challenge, for example, discriminatory voting maps, redistricting plans in places like Texas and Alabama and allowed those to go into effect. But then they just said in this case regarding mail ballots, it was too

soon for states to challenge Trump's executive order, even though the midterms were just 70 days away. So in the words of Justice Jackson, they seem to be injecting chaos into the system instead of quashing it. And the question is, when is it too late? Because if it's too early now for states to challenge Trump's executive order? Are they supposed to challenge it a month before the election when people have already begun voting by mail in large numbers? So the Supreme Court had a very clear opportunity to make sure the midterms would run smoothly and that people would know that their votes would be counted. And they did just the opposite. They emboldened at least temporarily a massive power grabbed by Trump that could disenfranchise tens of millions of people if it ultimately goes into

effect? Well, earlier this month, the Center for American Progress issued a report on how the Trump administration is interfering in the 26 midterm elections. The authors of the report, write, quote, perhaps no threat to the upcoming election would be more alarming than the possibility that Trump will declare a national emergency to postpone, cancel, or seize control of the midterm. In February, the Washington Post reported pro-Trump activists have distributed a 17 page draft executive order to declare a national emergency. Ari Berman, your response. Well, Trump has talked about this. He said, Stranger Things have happened in a recent interview. This would be a dramatic escalation of the Trump administration's attempts to interfere in the

midterms. What the administration would do was essentially lie that there was foreign interference in elections. That was basically the purpose of his primetime speech last month. And then they would say there's some kind of invented manufactured national emergency that would give us the power to ban mail ballots or to seize voting machines. I think that would clearly be unconstitutional, but it would scare a lot of people, and it would lead to chaos in the midterms. It could lead to ultimately a constitutional crisis, and I think people are concerned whether the Supreme Court, given what they've done already, would actually block it because the Supreme Court seems to be sending a signal that no matter how unconstitutional Trump's actions are, we are not going to

block him from interfering in the midterms. And that has led to a lot of concerns about how the midterms will go and what steps the administration will take to concretely interfere in the midterms. And I think that risk has increased based on what the Supreme Court did on Monday. And Ari Berman, as you've mentioned, the executive order, Trump's executive order called on the directed the Department of Homeland Security to create state by state lists of eligible voters who are citizens. I mean, if you could elaborate on the implications of that, and also explain, has the DHS played a role in elections before in American, recent American history? No. I mean, that's a really good point, Nermaine. I mean, the DHS should have no role

in playing elections. The only role a department. Homeland Security should play when it comes to elections is stopping some kind of cybersecurity threat to elections. And what they've done is they've systematically weakened defenses against cybersecurity. So they are trying to take power when it comes to elections that the agency should not have. They are trying to inject law enforcement into the election in a way that they should not be doing. And they're essentially trying to override state voter rolls. People vote based on their registration in a state. the Department of Homeland Security is trying to create these new lists of voters in each state that it claims are citizens. The problem is that that's not the job of DHS. They don't have this information. It's not their constitutional role.

They've also made these ludicrous claims of voter fraud. For example, they claim that 15,000 people, non-citizens, were registered to vote in Nevada. When a closer look was taken at that data, it turned out 185 non-citizens were registered. So they had dramatically overstated the number of of non-citizen voting. And that's the fear here, is that if voting proceeds based on these DHS lists, it's going to be inaccurate, it's going to be unconstitutional, and a lot of legitimate American voters are going to be wrongly labeled as non-citizens and unable to vote, either based on shoddy data or an intentional attempt by the Trump administration to prevent people from voting. And Ari, could you explain, I mean, kind of state by state, in what areas, where, Where are the places from which most people use mail-in voting?

Like what parts of the country, what states, and what areas within states? Well, certainly the west coast of the country conducts their elections almost entirely by mail, places like California, Oregon, Washington. There's large use of mail voting in Utah. But it's also used in a lot of swing states, Arizona, Florida. Michigan. These are all places in which a lot of people vote by mail. And ironically, mail voting was something that was used by Republicans more than Democrats until 2020. It was only in 2020 when Democratic voters took the threat of COVID more seriously than Republican voters that Democrats began

using mail voting in larger numbers. That's when Trump began to turn on mail voting. That's when he began to weaponize the postal service. And he's repeating that strategy today. He's is once again blaming mail voting because it appears that his party is going to lose the same thing he did in 2020. And he's once again weaponing the Postal Service to try to undermine mail voting because that's how people are going to get their mail ballot. So we've seen this playbook before. He tried it in 2020. It ultimately didn't work. And the hope is, is that it ultimately won't work in 2026 as well. Thanks so much, Ari Berman. We're going to leave it there. Ari Berman, National Voting Rights Correspondent from Mother

Jones, we'll link to your new peace. Scotus Hans Trump, a temporary win in his crusade to restrict male voting. Berman is also the author of the book, Minority Rule, the right-wing attack on the will of the people, and the fight to resist it. This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report. I'm Narmine Sheikh. Earlier this week, Treasury Secretary Scott Besson declared a new economic war against Iran in what the White House described as economic deed day. While Besson's focus this week has been on Iran and the bond market, earlier this month, he publicly attacked our next guest, former Labor Secretary Robert Reich. The spat was over the rising price of Big Macs at McDonald's and the state of the economy.

It all began when Robert Reich posted this video online. The Big Mac has a big problem. Rol, Rumble, Rumble. According to the CEO of McDonald's fast food chain saw a double-digit dip in visit. from lower and middle-income customers in the first quarter of 2025. The reason customers can't afford it. While the stock market is riding high and the Trump administration is slashing taxes for corporations and the rich,

nothing is trickling down to everyday Americans. What we see is it's really kind of a two-tier economy. If you're upper-income earning over $100,000, things are good. What we see with middle- and lower-income consumers is actually a different story. That last voice was the CEO of McDonald's, Chris Kempinski. Well, Treasury Secretary Scott Besson took issue with Robert Reich's video and posted a message online that read in part, quote,

McDonald's problem is called Burger King Professor. Bessent went on to suggest the University of California, Berkeley, should fire Reich. Besson's comment came shortly after he appeared on CNBC and said the economy is shifting. So we are starting to see, I got sick of hearing about this K-shaped economy. I can say here definitively the K-shaped economy is over. Robert Reich joins us now. He's Professor Emeritus of Public Policy at Berkeley University. He served as Labor Secretary in the Clinton administration from 1993 to 1997.

His latest book is just out in paperback titled Coming Up Short, A Memoir of My America. His recent article for The Guardian is headlined. We're finally witnessing the decline of corporate Democrats. Professor Reich, welcome back to democracy now. There are a number of things we want to talk about with you. But let's discuss first this altercation with Treasury Secretary Scott Besant. Well, we can, you know, he has the, it's not really an altercation. I'm a retired professor.

I was Secretary of Labor 30 years ago. He is the Secretary of the Treasury, the Treasury, He has the power. And if he's not willing to acknowledge that we have a K-shaped economy, which is a simple way of saying, the rich are getting richer, the poor getting poorer, wealth is going to the top, almost no wealth is going downward. If he doesn't say that and see that and understand that, well, frankly, that worries me. And Robert Reisch, were you initially taken aback by Besant responding to your video?

Well, I was taken back by his nastiness. You know, there's something in this administration. It's almost a kind of testosterone poisoning in which everybody has to be really nasty, put down everybody else. I think they're maybe emulating the president, you know, their boss. They maybe want to just look and act tough. So for Besson to say, Berkeley ought to fire me because I said we still have a K-shaped economy, is silly. It's just it's the kind of adolescent boy, you know, locker room stuff that a secretary of the treasury, presumably you would expect a little bit more intelligence, a little bit more dignity, a little bit more reality.

And Professor Reich, I mean, let's talk about this case-shaped economy, the inequality that you've pointed to. In your recent substack piece, you write, for example, and only one figure that I'm quoting, is, quote, the richest 1% holds more than half of the value of stocks listed in American stock exchanges, the richest 10% own 92%. So if you could talk about the significance of this, the value of stocks as opposed to the more common measurements of wealth or income distribution and how these plain numbers can be disputed. Well, I think this is very, very important because a lot of the administration, particularly

the president, thinks the stock market, is. is the major indicator of the success of the economy. And it's not. I mean, for years, we've known that there is a big gap between the Wall Street and Main Street. And that gap is getting larger and larger and larger. Because, again, you've got the top, the richest 1% of Americans owning almost half all of the shares of stock available in the United States. and you've got the richest 10% owning 92% of all the shares of stock. So if the stock market goes up, well, that's nice, I guess, for the people who own shares of stock.

But it doesn't do anything for most Americans. And even if you throw in the 401Ks and their pensions and everything else that may be connected to the stock market, it's only a very tiny portion of the stock market for most Americans. Most Americans rely on their wages. They don't rely on capital gains. Most Americans are finding that their wages are stagnant. In fact, the most recent data we have show that inflation, that is, price increases are rising faster than wages, which means that most Americans are getting poorer. When prices are going up faster than your paychecks, obviously by just mathematically you're getting poorer. And this is something that this is. administration, Scott Bessent and others, just don't either want to admit or don't want to see. And this is really a huge deal because I think the way you look at the economy indicates a lot about what you find in an economy. And if you're only looking at the stock market and if you're only looking at the indications, the indicators that have nothing to do with average working

people, you're going to miss out on the big question, which is how are average working people doing? And the answer to that big question is they're doing lousy. And so could you speak, elaborate on what the cost of living crisis, you've written about this extensively, of course, the cost of living crisis here in the U.S., and you've pointed out some of the causes more proximate, the Trump's tariffs, as well as the ongoing war in Iran? Well, the tariffs are obviously pushing up the costs of huge numbers of things. I mean, if we want a lot of new housing in the United States, for example, if you put a tariff on Canadian wood and Canadian wood products and lumber, you can see that the cost of housing

is going to be up even higher. If you are running gigantic $40 trillion deficits and you are having a war at the the same time in the Middle East that is taking billions of dollars a day, you can see that it's going to affect even mortgage rates that people have to pay. It's going to be, it's going to affect auto loans. There's a, there's a negative trickle-down effect from a lot of these policies that are affecting average working people. And this is, this is what's the heart of this election. I mean, why are, why are Democrats winning, who are progress, Democrats who call themselves socialists, why are they winning? Because they are focusing in on

these very practical questions of affordability and how, you know, at the kitchen table, how people simply are getting by. And Democrats, I'm happy to say, Democrats are doing that and are not paying attention to the corporate Democrats that Democrats used to pay attention to. So that is your piece in The Guardian. We're finally witnessing the decline of corporate Democrats. So you say in the piece also that you witness the rise of the corporate Democrats starting in the 1980s. And then you also have some advice to progressive Democrats in the upcoming midterms. Let's talk about that.

Well, what I saw in the early 80s was the Democratic Party deciding that they would drink from the same trough in terms of funding their elections as the Republicans. Because the Democrats thought Tony Coelho is the congressman who was head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee at the time, he thought that since Democrats had been in charge of the House of Representatives since 1955, he would be in charge forever. Democrats would be in charge forever. And therefore, why not make this pact with Republicans and basically drink the corporate funds, drink from the same trough of corporate funding. Well, it was a pact, unfortunately, an unholy alliance because it meant that in the 80s and

the 90s and the first decades of this century, the Democratic Party was much more dependent on corporate money than ever before. And in nature and in politics, the same rule holds. You don't bite, bite the hands that feed you. And if you're dependent on corporate money, you are not going to be as bold in saying we need Medicare for all. We need single payer. We need child care support. We need to take on these corporations in terms of no more monopolies.

We've got to have really rough and tough antitrust enforcement. These are the ways you bring costs down for average. working people. And corporate Democrats didn't want to do it. I think the Democrats now, because they are basically saying no to the corporate Democrats. More and more progressive Democrats are gaining ground. That's why we are seeing the changes we are seeing. And one final point. by far the largest and most powerful force in politics today is anger at elites that are disregarding what average people need and want. And that takes the form of progressivism and populism.

It takes the form in the Democratic Party of this great tide of mostly young progressives who are really where the energy is in the Democratic Party. And finally, we just have 30 seconds, Professor Reich. You've pointed out that the U.S. now owes $40 trillion in debt. You write, everyone has an opinion about why, but there's one question you almost never hear asked. Who is actually getting paid? Who is getting paid?

Well, it's going to the very wealthy. I mean, you know, the irony here is that, 40 years ago, 50 years ago, the very wealthy in this country supported the federal government through their tax payments. Even under General Dwight Eisenhower, President Eisenhower, the marginal top marginal income tax that were paid by the richest Americans was 91%. Well, after the Reagan tax cuts and the Bush tax cuts and the Trump tax cuts, what you find is that, no, the wealthy are not supporting the federal government with their taxes any longer. They're supporting the federal government by lending the government money.

And we, the rest of the country, are paying interest rates to the wealthy. I'm sorry, Professor Reich, we're going to have to leave it there. Professor Emeritus of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, served as Labor Secretary in the Clinton administration. I'm Nermin Sheikh. This is Democracy Now.