Trump Administration Accomplishments: October 2025 – Present, Part Two - Stu Cvrk

 

by Stu Cvrk

The most consequential presidency in generations.

 

President Trump remains focused on delivering his 2024 campaign promises with lightning speed. This is Part II of a two-part series that summarizes Trump administration accomplishments since October 2025. An article last November covered the accomplishments during the first nine months here.

Part I of this series summarizes domestic policy accomplishments; Part II’s focus is foreign and national security policy achievements.

AMERICA FIRST FOREIGN AND NATIONAL SECURITY POLICY ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Across both of his presidential terms, President Trump has been tackling heretofore seemingly intransigent problems that have existed across multiple presidencies. Several of those are discussed here.

VENEZUELA: OPERATION ABSOLUTE RESOLVE AND THE CAPTURE OF MADURO

The single most dramatic national security event of this period was the January 3, 2026 U.S. military operation—codenamed Operation Absolute Resolve—that captured Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, at a fortified compound in Caracas. Per the Congressional Research Service, the operation followed months of lethal U.S. strikes on vessels the administration linked to designated foreign terrorist organizations trafficking narcotics for Maduro’s regime, seizures of sanctioned Venezuelan oil shipments, and a drone strike on a port facility.

According to Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine, the operation combined a CIA-cultivated intelligence and cooperation network inside the Venezuelan security services with a Delta Force helicopter assault, launched the moment weather cleared over Caracas. U.S. aircraft suppressed Venezuela’s air defenses; special operations forces and FBI personnel breached Maduro’s residence and took him and his wife into custody before they could reach a fortified safe room. There were no reported U.S. casualties or equipment losses. Maduro and Flores were flown to the USS Iwo Jima and then to New York, where both face charges in the Southern District of New York for narco-terrorism, cocaine trafficking, and weapons offenses.

Cuba’s government confirmed 32 Cuban personnel embedded with Venezuelan forces were killed in the operation, underscoring the direct Cuba–Venezuela security relationship that has existed since 2008. President Trump announced the U.S. would administer Venezuela through a transition period.

The strategic logic tracks the IRGC-China-Cuba-narcoterrorist nexus of Maduro’s regime combined with Cuban intelligence support, Chinese economic and surveillance backing, cartel-linked narcotics trafficking (including alleged Tren de Aragua and Cartel de los Soles connections), and—per longstanding U.S. intelligence assessments—clandestine cooperation with Iranian and Hezbollah-linked networks operating in the Western Hemisphere.

Removing Maduro simultaneously disrupts a drug-trafficking node, a Cuban forward base, a Chinese hemispheric foothold, and an Iranian proxy access point—a genuine case of killing four birds with one stone, whatever one’s view of the operation’s legality or of what “safe, proper and judicious transition” ultimately means for Venezuelan sovereignty.

IRAN: MOU, THEN RENEWED WAR OVER THE STRAIT OF HORMUZ

Following the June 2025 Israeli-Iranian ceasefire and B-2 strikes on Iranian nuclear sites, documented in the November 2025 article, tensions reignited. On February 28, 2026, U.S. and Israeli forces launched a coordinated strike campaign against Iran, killing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and targeting nuclear and military infrastructure—precipitating the broader conflict now commonly referred to as the 2026 Iran war. Iran responded by closing the Strait of Hormuz to foreign shipping and mining and seizing commercial vessels; the U.S. followed with a formal naval blockade of Iranian ports (reinstated in April) and a sustained aerial campaign against Iranian targets along the strait.

On June 17, President Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian signed a 14-point memorandum of understanding—titled the Islamabad MOU—at the Palace of Versailles in Paris. Under its terms, Iran reaffirmed in writing (paragraph 8) that it would not procure or develop nuclear weapons; the two sides agreed to a 60-day window of toll-free commercial passage through Hormuz; and both paused the blockade pending a 60-day nuclear negotiation period.

The MOU did not hold cleanly. Iran read the safe-passage language as a license to continue asserting control over the strait; attacks on shipping resumed in early July, prompting President Trump to declare the truce “over,” reinstate the naval blockade, and briefly float—before walking back in favor of Gulf-state investment commitments—a proposed 20 percent U.S. toll on shipping through the strait.

The breaking point came on July 17 when an Iranian strike on U.S. forces at Jordan’s Muwaffaq Salti Air Base killed two American service members and wounded four more, prompting a multi-day U.S. retaliatory campaign against Iranian military, missile, and drone infrastructure.

Running in parallel to the military track has been an escalating financial pressure campaign led by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, publicly rebranded as “Operation Economic Fury.” Concrete documented actions include sanctions on dozens of shadow-fleet vessels and shadow-banking entities based in Hong Kong, the UAE, and Turkey; the April 2026 sanctioning of a major Chinese “teapot” refinery for buying Iranian crude; and a direct Treasury warning to Chinese banks that Iranian money flowing through their accounts would trigger secondary sanctions. On August 13, Bessent told reporters the administration would unveil a further round of measures “next week,” describing the combination of financial pressure and continued blockade as a “one-two punch” and promising “economic isolation like the world has never seen before.”

As a result of the sanctions, Iran’s currency collapsed sharply in late 2025—a development Bessent called the “grand culmination” of the pressure campaign—and inflation reached roughly 48.6 percent in October 2025, driving genuine social and economic strain and placing pressure on the Iranian regime to make a deal. Iranian inflation has increased to 87.9 percent as of July.

As of this writing, the situation remains fragile and unresolved. The blockade—reimposed July 14—is still in force. Iran and Oman are reportedly nearing an interim arrangement on shipping routes, but Tehran continues to insist that any full reopening of Hormuz is contingent on a U.S. withdrawal and financial concessions Washington has not granted. Skirmishing continues—a U.S. strike on a block-running vessel and Iranian attacks on UAE-linked tankers were both reported this week—and President Trump has both threatened further strikes (then canceled them) and floated, rhetorically, “declaring the Hormuz Strait a territory of the United States.”

At this juncture, the Trump administration has extracted a written Iranian reaffirmation against nuclear weapons development, memorialized in the June MOU, and has shown a sustained willingness—across repeated cycles of threatened, executed, and rescinded strikes—to use force to keep a critical energy chokepoint from falling under unilateral Iranian control. Paired with that is the most extensive sanctions architecture ever built against Tehran. President Trump’s apparent goal is capitulation by the Iranian regime; U.S. pressure shows no sign of being relaxed until that end is achieved.

GAZA: PHASE TWO, STALLED BUT NOT COLLAPSED

The 20-point Gaza peace plan President Trump unveiled on September 29, 2025 moved from Phase One (ceasefire, hostage return, humanitarian surge) into Phase Two (demilitarization, technocratic governance, reconstruction) around mid-January 2026, after Hamas returned the remains of the final deceased hostage.

UN Security Council Resolution 2803 (November 17, 2025) endorsed the Comprehensive Plan and established the Board of Peace, chaired by President Trump, with Bulgarian diplomat Nikolay Mladenov serving as Director-General overseeing the Palestinian technocratic committee (the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza—NCAG). The U.S. committed $10 billion in funding to the Board’s reconstruction mission.

Independent trackers, including a J Street analysis published in April 2026, found the plan’s headline achievements real (ceasefire holding in broad strokes, all living hostages and remains returned, a major humanitarian aid surge) but Phase Two implementation stalled on the harder points. Hamas has refused disarmament, citing continued Israeli strikes and aid restrictions as breaches of Israel’s own obligations; the Board of Peace and NCAG remain established on paper but not fully operational on the ground; and sporadic violations have continued on both sides.

This is a genuine, if partial, diplomatic accomplishment—ending the active war and returning every hostage is not nothing; however, final resolution of the Gaza issue remains a work in progress.

Note: The Israel-Lebanon front saw its own framework agreement signed at the State Department on June 26, 2026, addressing the Hezbollah conflict.

NATO AND BURDEN-SHARING: THE 5 PERCENT COMMITMENT MATURES

At the June 2025 Hague Summit, NATO allies committed to raising defense-related spending to 5 percent of GDP by 2035 (3.5 percent for core defense, 1.5 percent for broader security/infrastructure spending)—a doubling of the 2014 Wales 2 percent pledge and the single biggest structural shift in alliance burden-sharing in a generation, driven substantially by sustained U.S. pressure under President Trump’s leadership.

By NATO’s own March 2026 accounting, every member now exceeds the old 2 percent benchmark, with European allies and Canada increasing defense spending 20 percent year-over-year in 2025 alone (roughly $90–139 billion in additional spending).

The July 2026 Ankara Summit wrestled with implementation questions—a fivefold increase in air-defense capability targets, a 24-month compressed procurement cycle, and lingering gaps in Spain, Italy, the UK, and several Eastern European members who lack credible paths to the new target. But the trajectory—after years of European free-riding that has been documented extensively—is now locked in through 2035, reviewable in 2029.

INDO-PACIFIC: BUILDING THE FIRST ISLAND CHAIN

The most significant unsung national security story of this period is the quiet build-out of a layered missile and basing network across Japan, the Philippines, and Taiwan aimed squarely at deterring Chinese aggression.

The Typhon Mid-Range Capability system—capable of firing Tomahawk cruise missiles with a reach exceeding 1,600 kilometers, putting China’s Guangdong and Fujian coastal provinces and potentially Beijing itself within range from Luzon—conducted its first live-fire test in the Philippines on May 5, 2026, as part of Balikatan 2026, the largest U.S.-Philippine exercise in history: roughly 17,000 troops from seven countries, including the first Japanese combat firing of anti-ship missiles on foreign soil since World War II.

The February 2026 Philippines-U.S. Bilateral Strategic Dialogue secured an additional $144 million for Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement basing sites and a critical-minerals supply-chain MOU, while both governments jointly condemned Chinese “illegal, coercive, aggressive, and deceptive activities” in the South China Sea. More than 500 joint U.S.-Philippine military activities are scheduled for 2026—more than one a day.

COUNTERING CHINA: THE RARE-EARTH ROLLER COASTER

U.S.-China economic relations have swung sharply since last October. China’s October 2025 expansion of rare-earth export controls (covering the minerals essential to defense electronics, EV motors, and semiconductors) prompted President Trump to threaten a 100 percent additional tariff, pushing the effective China tariff rate toward 130 percent.

The two sides reached a one-year truce at the Trump-Xi Busan meeting in late October/early November 2025. China suspended the new rare-earth, lithium-battery-material, and superhard-material export controls and committed to large-scale soybean purchases (12 million metric tons in November–December 2025, 25 MMT annually 2026–2028); the U.S. suspended its heightened reciprocal tariffs and cut the fentanyl-related tariff from 20 percent to 10 percent, bringing the effective China tariff rate down to roughly 47 percent.

That truce proved fragile—China imposed fresh rare-earth restrictions on U.S. defense contractors in June 2026, again threatening the détente—illustrating that this remains a live, unresolved point of leverage, which reinforces the broader argument that Beijing treats critical-mineral dependency as a strategic weapon to be reapplied whenever convenient. President Trump has been the only U.S. president to address this issue head-on.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

Read together, last November’s article and this two-part series cover roughly eighteen months: the demolition of the Biden-era regulatory and DEI architecture, the largest tax-cut implementation in a generation with a genuinely novel ownership-society instrument in Trump Accounts, a border that by any honest measure is more secure than it has been in decades, a federal judiciary being reshaped at a pace not seen since Reagan with effects that will outlast this presidency by decades, a nation’s capital where the crime numbers are simply better than they were two years ago, a health bureaucracy being forced to litigate its own scientific assumptions in public for the first time in memory, a hemispheric narco-state decapitated by direct military action, and an allied burden-sharing framework that finally puts real numbers behind decades of American complaints.

It is also a record with important works in progress: the Strait of Hormuz remains a live shooting situation as of this writing, Gaza’s second phase is stalled on the hardest question (Hamas’s disarmament), and the MAHA vaccine schedule changes remain genuinely contested rather than settled science on either side.

The next 30 months promise more of the same intensity from a U.S. president who seemingly never sleeps. Whether the Democrats’ resistance and associated judicial and congressional lawfare apparatus can slow any of it down remains, as always, the open question. Americans should ask them which of the accomplishments documented in this two-part series should be reversed and why. 

Stu CvrkStu Cvrk retired as a captain after serving 30 years in the U.S. Navy in a variety of active and reserve capacities, with considerable operational experience in the Middle East and the Western Pacific. He is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, where he received a classical liberal education that serves as the key foundation for his geopolitical commentary.

Source: https://amgreatness.com/2026/08/21/trump-administration-accomplishments-october-2025-present-part-two/

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Israel targeted Syria airbase over planned Turkish troop, radar presence, source confirms to 'Post' - Idan Kweller, Corrine Baum

 

by Idan Kweller, Corrine Baum

The IDF struck the Abu al-Duhur military airfield after troops received intelligence that Turkey sought to place a radar with Turkish troops at the Syrian base.

 

Abu al-Duhur base is seen following reported Israeli strikes, Syria, August 18, 2026

(photo credit: REUTERS/STRINGER)

The IDF hit the Abu al-Duhur military air base after it received intelligence that Turkey was seeking to station a radar and an air defense system manned by Turkish troops there, sources confirmed to The Jerusalem Post.

Israel told the US that intelligence suggested that Turkey was set to dispatch radar, troops, and air defense systems to a base in Syria, KAN News reported on Saturday.

While the IDF did not detail when the Turkish military systems were set to arrive, officials pointed to the Abu al-Duhur base as a possible target due to its proximity to the Turkish border.

Israeli sources also told KAN News that the four IDF strikes were aimed at the base’s runway to prevent Turkish troops from landing.

“Since the diplomatic message did not get through, Israel delivered it through a targeted warning strike,” one official said.

Defense Minister Israel Katz. (credit: Nick Paleologos/SOOC/AFP via Getty Images)

Defense Minister Katz: IDF warned Syria directly before strikes on base

Defense Minister Israel Katz had said earlier on Saturday that the army issued a direct warning to senior Syrian officials before the strikes on the Abu al-Duhur air base “in an attempt to prevent the move.”

“Following several discussions that Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu] and I held with the IDF and the various security officials, it was agreed that before approval was given, a direct warning would be issued to the Syrian regime at the highest levels first in an attempt to prevent the move, and that is what was done,” Katz said.

“After the request went unanswered, the prime minister and I authorized the IDF to carry out the strike, which commenced successfully. [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan was caught with his hand in the cookie jar and was forced to back down,” the defense minister said. 

Idan Kweller, Corrine Baum

Source: https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-906261

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U.S.-Canada trade talks collapse, 50% tariffs go into effect - Ben Berkowitz Coutenay Brown

 

by Ben Berkowitz Coutenay Brown

It's an unprecedented breakdown in relations with the second-largest U.S. trading partner.

 

President Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at the July 2026 NATO summit. Photo: Harun Ozalp/Anadolu via Getty Images

 

Trade talks between the U.S. and Canada fell apart late Friday night, and both sides said steep new tariffs will go into effect.

Why it matters: It's an unprecedented breakdown in relations with the second-largest U.S. trading partner.

Catch up quick: Trump last month threatened to invoke Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930 to hit a slew of Canadian goods with additional 50% duties, including alcohol, hockey equipment, cement and dairy products.

• No president has ever used Section 338 to impose tariffs since it became law in 1930.
• The tariffs were scheduled to take effect at 12:01 a.m. ET Wednesday. The administration carved out key Canadian exports, including energy, potash and critical minerals, from the new tariffs.
• On Tuesday, Trump postponed the tariffs for three days, saying the two sides had a deal.

Driving the news: They did not.

• U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said late Friday that Canada had made last-minute demands that upset the pact, Bloomberg reported.
• Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, in a statement posted to X, alleged it was the U.S. that had made late changes to the terms, and said he had decided to suspend the negotiations.

Friction point: "Canada will match those tariffs dollar for dollar to protect our workers and businesses," Carney wrote.

• Carney said retaliatory tariffs would go into effect on Sept. 8 and would target dairy, appliances, agricultural equipment, pulp and paper, and electronics, the Associated Press reported.

By the numbers: Trade between the two countries totaled $376 billion in the first half of the year, per Census data — double China and trailing only Mexico.

The bottom line: After more than a year of threatening various stronger tariffs against Canada, the U.S. is making its most aggressive move yet to actually impose them.

Editor's note: This story has been updated to include additional details on Canadian retaliatory tariffs.

Ben Berkowitz Coutenay Brown

Source: https://www.axios.com/2026/08/22/us-canada-tariffs-trade-trump-carney

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“Loser with a low I.Q.:" Trump opens new front against Tucker Carlson - Israel National News

 

by Israel National News

US President Donald Trump has opened a new front against conservative media personality Tucker Carlson and former members of Congress Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie.

 

Donald Trump                                                             White House Photo by Daniel Torok

A new storm has erupted in the American political arena: US President Donald Trump attacked three prominent figures in the conservative camp on his social media platform-media personality Tucker Carlson and former members of Congress Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie.

Trump leveled a series of harsh accusations at the three following a meeting between them, calling them “LOSERS ALL!"

Trump directed the bulk of his remarks at former television host Tucker Carlson, who is known for his anti-Israel positions and antisemitic statements. Trump claimed that Tucker’s “‘Views’ have fallen through the floor," described him as “a very Low I.Q. individual," and said, “He could barely get out of College, and maybe he didn’t."

The President also addressed the possibility that the media personality might enter politics in the future and demanded that he be required to undergo a cognitive test, declaring: “He’s got no chance, but could probably take a couple of points away from whatever the Republican ticket happens to be! Tucker is a loser, and always has been!"

Regarding former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who was once considered close to him, Trump called her Marjorie “‘Traitor’ Greene" and described her as “a highly neurotic young woman." He claimed that she “went from Ultra Conservative to a Liberal ‘Fool,’ all in a matter of weeks."

Trump further said that Greene had been “way down in the Polls in Georgia (because I took away my Endorsement)," and that she “would have had no chance at winning," ultimately leading her to “QUIT!"

Regarding former Congressman Thomas Massie, Trump said he “has turned out to be a failed politician, and a real JERK." He accused Massie of believing that “it was really wonderful to vote, ‘NO,’ on everything, no matter how good, strong, or proper the Legislation would be."

Trump concluded by describing the three as “THREE LOSERS" and claiming that their only chance was “to join the Radical Left Dumocrats, and try breaking into the Primary System."

“To all of them I say, PRAISE BE TO ALLAH!" Trump concluded.

Israel National News

Source: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/432079

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Democratic Socialists of America: The Secret Stooges - Peter Huessy

 

by Peter Huessy

The issue is not between capitalism and socialism. It is between free enterprise and economic liberty on the one hand and a state-run, often totalitarian, market on the other.

 

• Who doesn't like free stuff? Capitalism, however, is not the villain. Without capital (funding), there would be no economy, free or state-run.

• The issue, therefore, is not between capitalism and socialism. It is between free enterprise and economic liberty on the one hand and a state-run, often totalitarian, market on the other.

• North Korea and Cuba also use capital. Both are, in a way, state capitalisms: the state has all the money; the citizens are the oppressed serfs. The state provides for them, to an extent, but is careful to do so as stingily as possible.

• The socialist or communist state's first concern will not be delivering services; it will be cutting costs. As the money that comes in becomes scarcer -- who is making money, the state? The first casualty invariably ends up being quality. Yes, there is free healthcare -- if you can wait months for an operation, and if you qualify for it under the state's cost-cutting rationing. Are you too old or too sick, or too medically compromised in some other way, and is someone younger and healthier more worthy of receiving the care than you?

• Yes, you receive free housing, but who will guarantee that there will be sufficient heat in the winter, clean running water, that the garbage will be collected, that there will be no vermin, or that the elevator will work.

• Under communism, land belongs only to the state. The price is immaterial. Ask the "kulaks," peasant farmers in Ukraine whose land and grain were stolen by Stalin's Soviet Union during the Holodomor in 1932-33, with the result that five million people in Ukraine starved to death.

• The DSA candidates do not describe themselves as communists. What does that mean, however, when many of the DSA's official policies are the essence of communism?

• Unlike the DSA, communist leaders from Lenin to Mao to Castro did not aspire to abolish the police, the military or the border patrol. If anything, these totalitarian rulers expanded the police, the prisons, and the military. They were more than happy to put millions in prison or the gulags while widening the powers of the police and security forces...

• What is being overlooked at the moment is that the current communist rulers from Cuba to China would love the DSA to abolish the police and border patrol in America, empty the prisons, open the borders, and shut down oil and gas production. Those moves would thoroughly cripple the United States and significantly weaken its ability to defend itself -- both internally and externally. No self-respecting communist government would ever adopt such crazy policies.

Commentator Ryan Mauro notes that New York City's DSA Mayor Zohran Mamdani and "chaos" funder George Soros both admire Slavoj Žižek, whose In Defence of Lost Causes calls for the return of the French Revolution's guillotine and what he calls "emancipatory terror." The goal, it seems, is the destruction of the West, to be replaced with Stalinist communism. Pictured: US Senator Bernie Sanders (R) speaks to the crowd at a rally for Mamdani (L) in New York City on April 12, 2026. (Photo by Jason Alpert-Wisnia/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)

The country is debating whether the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is the new face of the Democrat Party. There are two impediments, however, to accurately discussing what the DSA is all about.

The first is that Americans are learning about DSA through the lens of the dominant media -- what Rush Limbaugh often called "the drive-by media." Largely missing is a balanced media source despite the almost universal use of the term "mainstream media" to describe the current collection of highly partisan and slanted journalists from whom most Americans get their news. While "mainstream" implies balanced and informative, most of the dominant media of today are neither.

The second impediment is an assumption that advocates of the DSA are simply against a "capitalist" system they associate with greed, and instead favor of what they consider a benign, compassionate "socialist" economy where stuff is largely free. Who doesn't like free stuff? Capitalism, however, is not the villain. Without capital (funding), there would be no economy, free or state-run. The alternative is to go back to a barter system: I'll paint your apartment, you give me wood for heating my house.

The issue, therefore, is not between capitalism and socialism. It is between free enterprise and economic liberty on the one hand and a state-run, often totalitarian, market on the other.

Capitalism is not synonymous with free enterprise or economic liberty. The 1776 economic manifesto The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith never used the word. It was Karl Marx who used "capitalism" as a highly pejorative description of the economies of the affluent West. North Korea and Cuba also use capital. Both are, in a way, state capitalisms: the state has all the money; the citizens are the oppressed serfs. The state provides for them, to an extent, but is careful to do so as stingily as possible.

The socialist or communist state's first concern will not be delivering services; it will be cutting costs. As the money that comes in becomes scarcer -- who is making money, the state? The first casualty invariably ends up being quality. Yes, there is free healthcare -- if you can wait months for an operation, and if you qualify for it under the state's cost-cutting rationing. Are you too old or too sick, or too medically compromised in some other way, and is someone younger and healthier more worthy of receiving the care than you?

Yes, you receive free housing, but who will guarantee that there will be sufficient heat in the winter, clean running water, that the garbage will be collected, that there will be no vermin, or that the elevator will work.

Under communism, land belongs only to the state. The price is immaterial. Ask the "kulaks," peasant farmers in Ukraine whose land and grain were stolen by Stalin's Soviet Union during the Holodomor in 1932-33, with the result that five million people in Ukraine starved to death.

The DSA candidates do not describe themselves as communists. What does that mean, however, when many of the DSA's official policies are the essence of communism?:

• "[C]ollectively own the key economic drivers that dominate our lives, such as energy production and transportation..." (source)
• "[N]ationalize and socialize (through worker and community ownership and control) institutions of monetary policy, insurance, real estate, and finance..." (source)
• "Social housing must first be a redistribution of land from landowners to the landless... Social housing must expropriate property from capitalists and deliver it to the working class..." (source)

Members of the DSA, while not precisely following what communist enemies of the USA want to see happen in America, are nevertheless stooges -- dupes -- of our communist enemies -- what during the Cold War were known as "useful idiots." Walter Duranty of the New York Times wrote from the Soviet Union in the 1930s that "no actual starvation or deaths from starvation" in Ukraine and "there is no famine," and he treated the Moscow Trials as justified and credible. Prior to this, shamefully, Duranty had won the 1932 Pulitzer Prize, still unrevoked, for his reporting of fabrications from the Soviet Union.

Unlike the DSA, communist leaders from Lenin to Mao to Castro did not aspire to abolish the police, the military or the border patrol. If anything, these totalitarian rulers expanded the police, the prisons, and the military. They were more than happy to put millions in prison or the gulags while widening the powers of the police and security forces, whether the KGB, MININT or MMS. Certainly, they all markedly enlarged their military and security forces. How else could communist nations have killed some 120 million of their own people, just to secure and sustain power?

What is being overlooked at the moment is that the current communist rulers from Cuba to China would love the DSA to abolish the police and border patrol in America, empty the prisons, open the borders, and shut down oil and gas production. Those moves would thoroughly cripple the United States and significantly weaken its ability to defend itself -- both internally and externally. No self-respecting communist government would ever adopt such crazy policies.

Supporters of the DSA appear to think that mob violence -- such as was used in the summer of 2020 and currently characterizes the assault on immigration law enforcement -- will enable them to seize control of the House of Representatives, then the Senate, then the presidency itself. If the Supreme Court is a barrier to the totalitarian plans of the DSA -- whose plans would be so easy to implement if all that were needed was a simple majority vote in the House -- the logical plan is to abolish the checks and balances of in the US constitution to fundamentally transform the US.

The DSA appears impatient with the world. Their utopia cannot wait. A thoughtful discussion of America's future or reasonable analysis of the DSA's objectives will not happen. Any such debate would leave these candidates in the ditch. They argue for abolishing the police on Monday, they deny they said it on Tuesday. No discussion of ramifications. The drive-by media remain complicit in the rise of the DSA by ignoring or covering for them.

What can we expect? Commentator Ryan Mauro notes that New York City's DSA Mayor Zohran Mamdani and "chaos" funder George Soros both admire Slavoj Žižek, whose In Defence of Lost Causes calls for the return of the French Revolution's guillotine and what he calls "emancipatory terror." The goal, it seems, is the destruction of the West, to be replaced with Stalinist communism. Apart from their projected multiple trillions of dollars in new government spending that they cannot pay for, the DSA foreign policy agenda is also scary. The DSA seems to be pushing a global intifada, an embrace of Hamas terrorism, a wholesale rejection of Israel, and on top of all that, "defunding" the US Department of Defense.

The goals of the former Soviet Union are still being pursued -- not by the KGB or the Red Army but by DSA hucksters who sadly are nothing but suckers promising a false utopia to be built on the ruins of America.

Peter Huessy is president of Geostrategic Analysis.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/22785/democratic-socialists-of-america

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Iran: What Next? - Majid Rafizadeh

 

by Majid Rafizadeh

Economic measures must be paired with persistently removing the regime's ability to rebuild its war machine. The Trump administration, as distasteful as they might find the task, must urgently see to it that the regime is changed.

 

• What, then, must accompany economic pressure? First, the military option must remain explicitly on the table -- and be exercised, preferably before the regime uses President Donald Trump's ceasefires to organize attacks that are even more lethal.

• Recent reports indicate that Iran has been rapidly restoring its ballistic missile production and infrastructure after earlier strikes. Satellite imagery and intelligence assessments show reopened underground facilities, repaired access roads, and renewed manufacturing at a pace that has surprised observers.

• Economic measures must be paired with persistently removing the regime's ability to rebuild its war machine. The Trump administration, as distasteful as they might find the task, must urgently see to it that the regime is changed.

• Only adding military strikes to economic strangulation — and arming and training dissidents among the Iranian people — will create regime change. Anything less just leaves the threat intact — louder, more entrenched and more dangerous for the region and the United States sooner than you think.

Recent reports indicate that Iran has been rapidly restoring its ballistic missile production and infrastructure after earlier strikes. Satellite imagery and intelligence assessments show reopened underground facilities, repaired access roads, and renewed manufacturing at a pace that has surprised observers. Pictured: Iranian-made Zolfaghar missiles are displayed at Azadi Square in Tehran on August 2, 2026. (Photo by Atta Kenare/AFP via Getty Images)

The main focus in confronting Iran's regime and its sponsorship of terrorism has shifted toward economic sanctions and a naval blockade of Iranian ports. This pressure, driving oil exports to multi-year lows and squeezing the regime's primary source of hard currency, constrains the resources available for ballistic missiles, proxies, and internal repression. Yet it is a dangerous delusion to believe that sanctions and blockade by themselves will change the regime's fundamentalist and Islamist ideology or force a fundamental shift in its behavior.

The Iranian regime's only objective is to stay in power beyond the Trump Administration.

Iran's ruling elite lives in relative comfort, insulated by corruption and control of state resources. They divert public wealth into personal and institutional networks — real estate, front companies, and overseas holdings — while ordinary Iranians bear the brunt of inflation, shortages, and mismanagement.

From the regime's perspective, surviving two more years of intense pressure under the current administration is tolerable. Once the political window shifts, they plan to ramp up oil production, impose and exploit control over key waterways, and make more money by extracting fees from commercial ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz and leverage from regional trade.

They are prepared to accept lower revenues now in exchange for preserving the system that guarantees their power and making more revenues later. Black-market channels, overland routes through neighboring countries, ship-to-ship transfers, and sophisticated evasion networks have repeatedly allowed them to generate enough revenue to keep their core institutions functioning.

Even the most severe economic measures, therefore, leave the regime with sufficient resources to endure. Iran's oil exports may fall to historic lows, but the black market and alternative trade corridors still provide survival. While sanctions are essential — they degrade capabilities and raise costs — they are hardly decisive against theocratic totalitarian rulers who prioritize regime continuity over public welfare and everything else, and who think in generational time-frames.

What, then, must accompany economic pressure? First, the military option must remain explicitly on the table -- and be exercised, preferably before the regime uses President Donald Trump's ceasefires to organize attacks that are even more lethal.

Recent reports indicate that Iran has been rapidly restoring its ballistic missile production and infrastructure after earlier strikes. Satellite imagery and intelligence assessments show reopened underground facilities, repaired access roads, and renewed manufacturing at a pace that has surprised observers. Anywhere that Iran reconstructs missile plants, launch sites, or related military infrastructure, those facilities should be taken out. Continuous degradation of its ability to produce and field weapons is required; otherwise, the economic squeeze merely buys the regime time to rearm.

Senator Rick Scott (R-FL) captured the logic in a recent appearance on NewsNation's "The Hill":

"I think he's going to have to. I mean, here's a president that doesn't like war. None of us do. Here's a president that doesn't want to put troops in harm's way. None of us do. And so, he's given diplomacy a chance. Iran has walked away from it... at some point, he will not have a choice but to do more to destroy their ability to produce weapons. But they are not going to have a useful weapon while President Trump's president."

Economic measures must be paired with persistently removing the regime's ability to rebuild its war machine. The Trump administration, as distasteful as they might find the task, must urgently see to it that the regime is changed.

An Iranian leadership that threatens the United States and Israel cannot be allowed to stay. After the death of the previous Supreme Leader, a new hard-line figure — Mojtaba Khamenei — was elevated. The current Supreme Leader and his surrounding circle are more stridently anti-American and anti-Israel than their predecessors. Any threats against U.S. citizens or soldiers emanating from Iran should be met with decisive military action. The personal survival of senior regime figures should not be guaranteed. The regime has shown no interest in diplomacy apart from using it to buy time for reconstituting its military capabilities. Iran continues missile activity and regional provocations while using talks as opportunities to rearm.

Iran's Islamist regime will not abandon anti-Americanism or anti-Semitism because oil revenues temporarily decline. It is playing a two-year game of endurance and sanctions evasion to reassert its leverage over the region and beyond. Sanctions and blockade must be accompanied by sustained military denial of weapons reconstitution and by willingness to target Iran's leadership, or offer individuals to leave for a country of their choice, which carries the enormous risk of their regrouping abroad.

Only adding military strikes to economic strangulation — and arming and training dissidents among the Iranian people — will create regime change. Anything less just leaves the threat intact — louder, more entrenched and more dangerous for the region and the United States sooner than you think.

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Dr. Majid Rafizadeh is a political scientist, Harvard-educated analyst, and board member of Harvard International Review. He has authored several books on the US foreign policy. He can be reached at dr.rafizadeh@post.harvard.edu

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/22803/iran-what-next

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MAGA and the DSA, Part Two: Differences Between These Populist Antagonists - Thaddeus G. McCotter

 

by Thaddeus G. McCotter

MAGA seeks to reform government to restore liberty; the DSA seeks to expand government to remake America into a socialist state.

 

 

 

[This is the second in a two-part series comparing the two populist antagonists MAGA and the DSA. The first installment regarding their similarities can be found here.]

America’s dueling populist movements, the Right’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) and the Left’s Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), both believe a powerful, unaccountable entity or entities are unfairly exploiting them and obstructing their personal pursuit of happiness, often colluding among themselves to do so.

Exacerbating the situation, at least one of these powerful organizations, the government, is charged with protecting the individual from this very exploitation. Consequently, it is the collusion between the “Bigs” into what G. K. Chesterton and Hillaire Belloc deemed “business government” that the respective populist movements seek to remedy.

Yet, here is where MAGA and the DSA radically differ in their prescriptions. This springs from how each populist movement perceives America.

MAGA believes America is an exceptional nation in need of substantive reforms, with the goal being to protect the individual from the collective.

The DSA believes America is an irredeemably exploitative nation in need of radical transformation, with the goal being to promote the collective over the individual.

For all the media’s wailing and gnashing of teeth, MAGA is not a radical movement but a reformist one. Indeed, in instances of border security and immigration, MAGA is largely not advocating new laws but the enforcement of existing laws.

It is the same with voter security. Preventing voter fraud and ensuring only citizens vote in American elections is far from a novel idea. It is a call to restore the full power of citizens to self-govern and, yes, for civic sanity.

Further, MAGA’s call for the return of domestic industries that have been outsourced overseas, including through the imposition of tariffs to facilitate that return and balance the trade deficit, has long been a plank of the Democrat Party. Thus, MAGA’s support for them is actually an instance of bipartisan consensus. Equally, the movement’s call to curb the excesses of multinational corporations, especially Big Tech, is far from a radical right-wing proposition, as it too has resonance within leftist circles, notably in the area of AI regulation.

In international relations, the MAGA base’s neo-isolationism that rejects “forever wars” and foreign interventionism is also in bipartisan accord with the “peace wing” of the Democrat party that disdains American intervention as inherently dangerous and imperialist.

In sum, the MAGA agenda is aimed at curbing the excesses of both government and corporations to engender an equilibrium that facilitates—or at least does not obstruct—the individual’s pursuit of happiness, which the movement avers makes America an inspiring, revolutionary experiment in self-government.

Contrarily believing America is historically and intrinsically racist, sexist, homophobic, imperialist, etc., the DSA agenda eschews reform for radical, fundamental change.

In foreign affairs, though, the DSA agenda is a relatively traditional left-wing one. It wants to slash defense spending, shutter overseas bases, and redeploy troops home. While demanding an end to economic sanctions against communist and/or terrorist-sponsoring states, such as Cuba, Venezuela, and Iran, the DSA seeks to terminate all U.S. military and economic aid to our ally Israel. Of course, it would recognize a Palestinian state, as well as the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court and International Court of Justice.

It is in domestic affairs that the DSA’s radical agenda springs to the fore. It seeks public ownership of large corporations and critical industries; higher taxes on corporations and the rich; a shorter workweek with no reductions in pay or benefits; and more powerful unions.

Social programs, too, are to be immensely (and expensively) expanded. Public education from cradle through college would be free, and all student debt would be cancelled. Universal health care would be “free” to patients, including abortion and gender transition procedures. There would also be publicly funded housing and universal rent control for private residences. Further, there would be paid family leave and free childcare, although there may well be less of it due to their support for abortion on demand, including partial birth abortion.

On top of the typical socialist temptation of trading freedom for “free” stuff, the DSA wants the border demilitarized and open and immigrant detention facilities closed, and restrictions on migrant workers ended. Once in the country, migrants would be able to vote despite being noncitizens. And there will be more such individuals, as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) would be abolished.

The DSA would also grant full voting rights to individuals with criminal convictions. Under the DSA agenda, this will become less burdensome, as they also support defunding the police by steering monies to community services.

If the DSA has its way, citizens and noncitizens alike will be voting under a radically restructured, more massive, and more invasive federal government under a new constitution. It would institute a single federal legislature based on proportional representation and elect the president by popular vote, not the Electoral College. Prior to the implementation of this unicameral body, the DSA aims to expand membership of the House and end the Senate filibuster. The Supreme Court, too, will see its power of judicial review reduced. More nebulously, the DSA wants to end the two major parties and the influence of money in campaigns and move to a multi-party system.

All in all, in a curious case of illogic, the DSA seeks to empower the very government that has colluded with corporations. The theory seems to be that electing enough DSA members to public office is a sufficient reform that will allow for the vast expansion of governmental powers necessary to remake America into a socialist state.

Ergo, the DSA’s desire to erode many of the very checks and balances that help protect Americans’ unalienable rights would accelerate the rise of a totalitarian state that would coerce and compel our nation’s sovereign citizens into a socialist serfdom found in the “warm embrace of the collective.”

In conclusion, while the causes of the MAGA and DSA populist movements are similar, thus allowing for rare and specific instances of agreement, the overarching differences between their agendas are as stark and irreconcilable as their respective views of America and the power of its government.

A reformist MAGA seeks to “drain the swamp” to “make America great again.”

A radical DSA seeks to empower government to “flood the zone” to create a socialist hellscape.

And a frustrated electorate just wants practical results that work for them.

Students of history know of the failures and horrors of socialism. But they also know that in trying times, the temptation to trade freedom for “free stuff” can be powerful.

And that the DSA is banking on it.

Better to preemptively deposit their agenda into history’s dustbin with other failed socialist experiments and rededicate ourselves to reforming, restoring, and redeeming America’s revolutionary experiment in liberty, equality, and, above all, self-government.

Photo: Supporters of President Donald J. Trump watch while he speaks. At the Reading Regional Airport in Bern Township, PA Saturday afternoon October 31, 2020 where United States President Donald J. Trump spoke during a campaign rally for his bid for reelection. 

Thaddeus G. McCotter is an American Greatness contributor. The Hon. Thaddeus G. McCotter (M.C., Ret.) represented Michigan’s 11th Congressional district from 2003 to 2012 and served as Chair of the Republican House Policy Committee. Not a lobbyist, he is a frequent public speaker and moderator for public policy seminars, and a Monday co-host of the "John Batchelor Show" among sundry media appearances.

Source: https://amgreatness.com/2026/08/22/maga-and-the-dsa-part-two-differences-between-these-populist-antagonists/

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Why is Rep. Jamie Raskin enabling campus antisemitism? - Jonathan S. Tobin

 

by Jonathan S. Tobin

Notable victories have been achieved against campus Jew-hatred. But the Maryland congressman wants to stop the DOJ from turning the tide against woke discrimination.

 

House Judiciary Committee ranking member Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) speaks during a hearing titled “Silencing Dissent: The First Amendment Under Attack” in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 23, 2026. Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images.

The Jewish world has been shaken to its core by the global surge of antisemitism that followed the Hamas-led Palestinian Arab terror attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. But amid the heartbreak and justified anger about the mainstreaming of Jew-hatred in American education, culture, media and politics, there have been some notable victories.

A series of congressional hearings beginning in December 2023 and continuing into 2025 that exposed elite universities that tolerated and encouraged antisemitism on their campuses made it clear that the bullying and targeting of Jewish students wasn’t being ignored by everyone in power. That paved the way for the Trump administration’s efforts to take action on the issue.

His initiative has forced many schools to acknowledge their failures and to sign settlements either with the federal government or with private plaintiffs. They involved both financial compensation and necessary changes in the way administrations run their institutions. If enforced, these agreements will make a difference in how Jews are treated, as well as cause it to become harder for the sort of woke antisemitism that prevailed throughout academia to continue.

Enforcing Title VI

That some people are unhappy about this isn’t surprising. The academics who embraced toxic left-wing ideas like critical race theory, intersectionality and settler-colonialism—and falsely label Israel and Jews as “white” oppressors—are outraged about being held accountable for how they have normalized anti-Zionism and Jew-hatred. And they are particularly angry about being called out for the fact that their policies violated Title VI of the 1964 U.S. Civil Rights Act, which forbids discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin.

It is especially disturbing that one of the loudest critics of the push against campus antisemitism is a prominent Jewish member of Congress.

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, claims that Trump’s efforts to stop campus antisemitism were “fake, a pre-baked frame-up operation thoroughly political in nature.”

He cited a complaint by a federal bureaucrat who opposed the president’s determination to root out both the Jew-hatred and the way the woke catechism of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) had enabled discrimination, and then resigned and filed a “whistleblower complaint. He not only seeks to pursue retribution against members of the antisemitism taskforce, but also to possibly change the civil-rights laws that prohibit this illegal bias.

Raskin, like the academics who made anti-Zionism (indistinguishable from antisemitism) the new orthodoxy throughout American education and culture, thinks colleges and universities should be free to create hostile environments for Jews on their campuses. This is neither a matter of free speech nor academic freedom. A generation of faculty members and students who were indoctrinated in the “anti-racist” faith think advocating for Jewish genocide (“From the river to the sea”) and terrorism against Jews everywhere (“Globalize the intifada”) is a matter of free speech. Of course, these same voices would be in favor of the harshest retaliation for those who made similar threats against other minority groups, like African Americans or Hispanics. But when it comes to discrimination against Jews, it’s a different story.

As the heads of three such institutions—Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology—all said when they were questioned about it by Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) in December 2023, it depended on the “context” as to whether advocacy for Jewish genocide violated the rules of their schools. Yet Raskin thinks the ordeal that Jewish students have endured by not disavowing their connection to the land of Israel is somehow unworthy of public concern.

The antisemites’ political guardians

The claim that Trump was playing politics by targeting certain schools is more than disingenuous. In fact, it’s Raskin and others on the left now bending their knees to the antisemitic left that seeks Israel’s destruction—and which, as recent primary results indicate, now dominates the Democratic Party—who are playing politics by defending Jew-haters. His comments call to mind the private assurances that Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer gave to the board of trustees of Columbia University that “only Republicans” cared about the issue of campus antisemitism. Though these two Jewish politicians claim to oppose such hatred, their refusal to stand up to their party’s intersectional left-wing base has essentially led them to become the guardians of academic antisemites.

It boggles the imagination to contemplate their claim that Jews being prevented from entering parts of their campuses where pro-Hamas encampments were located, in addition to being shunned, targeted and singled out for violence, was no big deal. They similarly think that the people responsible for organizing and carrying out these outrages who were foreign nationals violating the terms of their visas, ought not to be deported.

Many liberals, including some who were outspoken about the post-Oct. 7 surge of antisemitism, opposed the Trump administration’s threats to pull federal funding from institutions of higher learning that were responsible for discriminating against Jews. Some did so for purely political motives; they have become so deranged by their detestation for the president that they’d be against anything he did. Some were worried about research that would be affected by funding cuts or the reputations of their favorite schools. But whatever you think about Trump or however loyal you might be to your alma mater, without those threats, the normalization of institutional anti-Jewish policies would have continued. Somehow, the enforcement of the Civil Rights Act—something that ought to be supported by all decent people—is considered wrong by liberals like Raskin if it involves stopping bigotry against Jewish youth and faculty.

Nor should we take the “whistleblower” complaint seriously. The individual who filed it was representative of most members of the vast federal bureaucracy not interested in enforcing the law due to their adherence to ideological and political agendas associated with “anti-racist” doctrine and Israel. This unaccountable and unelected fourth branch of government constitutes a roadblock to efforts to deal with the threat posed to American liberty by woke ideology. It took a president like Trump, who was determined to bulldoze the bureaucratic obstacles to action, for the government to finally start taking Title VI violations against Jews seriously.

And it was precisely those government actions that have now forced schools that were not under direct federal pressure to sign settlements changing their discriminatory actions.

A case study in tolerating Jew-hatred

One such place was Haverford College outside Philadelphia; it was sued by the Deborah Project public interest law firm. As I noted in 2024, when the lawsuit against Haverford was filed, what happened there was a case study in how respected liberal institutions were harming Jewish students. As Deborah Project legal director Lori Lowenthal Marcus said, the lawsuit details “incident after incident of horrible, vile antisemitic statements, actions, activities, chants, disruptions, intimidation, harassment and oppression by members of the Haverford College community” that were “ignored, condoned or even praised” by top college administrators.

While institutions like Harvard are fighting efforts to hold them accountable, Haverford surrendered earlier this month by signing an agreement with the plaintiffs that will end previous policies, which didn’t merely tolerate antisemitism but encouraged it.

Among the incidents cited in the suit was the refusal of the school to allow Jewish students to set up a table at a basketball game where materials would be available to promote awareness of antisemitism. Haverford dean John McKnight and the school’s athletic director, Danielle Lynch, told Ally Landau—the named plaintiff in the lawsuit and star player on the women’s basketball team—that she had to cancel the effort or else the game would be forfeited. Their reason was that the school believed that any talk about such bigotry would provoke “pro-Palestinian students” and lead to a riot. While McKnight claimed that the decision to withdraw the proposal was Landau’s, she said that was “a lie.”

Other highlights of the suit include the reaction of Haverford president Wendy Raymond when she was confronted about a series of social-media posts by a professor at the college who reposted an image of a bulldozer used in the Oct. 7 attacks with the text: “We should never have to apologize for celebrating these scenes of an imprisoned people breaking free from their chains. This was a historic moment to be recorded in the history books.”

At a Jewish student event on campus, Raymond was asked whether the post by Tarik Aougab, who remains a Haverford math and statistics professor, should be considered antisemitism. Raymond answered that his statement “could be perceived in many ways.” When asked how she perceived it, she answered: ‘I hear people breaking free from their chains.’” The president of Haverford was not ashamed to admit to considering an image of the Oct. 7 orgy of mass murder, rape, torture, kidnapping and wanton destruction committed by Hamas and its Palestinian supporters to be something she admired.

As egregious as that sounds, it should be understood that, in addition to the persistence and courage of the Deborah Project and its clients, the main reason Haverford agreed to settle was the result of pressure put on it by Republicans in Congress and the administration. Raymond was called to testify before the House Education and Workforce Committee, along with the presidents of DePaul University and California Polytechnic State University. As a result of her evasive answers, the Department of Education initiated an investigation of the school for violating Title VI.

While an academic giant like Harvard felt it had the resources to fight the federal government and await a change in attitude in Washington from a future Democratic administration, Haverford decided that discretion was the better part of valor.

Raymond, who will soon leave her job, stated in an email to the university community that as part of the settlement, the college is making clear that all students are “welcome” on campus. That includes Jews, Israelis and Zionists, whom she said can “enjoy equal access to the college and all of its educational programs and activities.”

She added that the college agreed to clarify that “harassing, excluding or seeking to silence Jewish community members on the basis of their beliefs, their commitment to Jewish observance or any other element of their Jewish identity, including Zionism, is anathema to the college’s core principles of trust, concern and respect.”

Raymond said that “this extends to our classrooms, offices and student-led organizations and activities, and it includes all employees—faculty, staff and administrators—and students.” Under the agreement, all of them will undergo antisemitism training based on the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition.

Given her previous attitude, this was an amazing victory and a standard that ought to be applied at every American college and university. It’s a tribute to both the Deborah Project and the Trump administration, which created the environment where those who winked at antisemitism in the past came to understand the need to change their tune if they were not to suffer for violating the law.

The victory at Haverford and the Trump administration’s settlements with universities like Columbia, Brown, Cornell, Northwestern, Penn and Virginia are important milestones in the effort to roll back the woke tide that has degraded the educational establishment and done so much to harm Jews. It will require even more such lawsuits aimed at other schools, as well as efforts to ensure that the leftists who still dominate academia and the woke commissars who enforce the DEI-based policies that enable antisemitism don’t intend to violate the terms of the existing agreements.

Still, if Raskin and many of his fellow Democrats have their way, the complacency about antisemitism in academia will return, along with, no doubt, a new round of outrageous actions by mobs of students and faculty that will again target their Jewish peers.

If instead of continuing to pressure academic institutions to stop tolerating antisemitism in ways they would never treat discrimination against other minorities, a Democratic-controlled Congress prefers to target Trump administration officials for fighting Jew-hatred, the woke reign of intolerance will make a comeback. It’s one thing to deplore the way a partisan scoundrel like Raskin is seeking to impede efforts to stop this scourge. But liberals and others who are appalled by the current surge of Jew-hatred need to understand the consequences of empowering someone like the congressman or a future Democratic president who will reverse Trump’s policies on academia. 

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor-in-chief of JNS, a columnist for Newsweek and a contributor to many other publications. He covers the American political scene, foreign policy, the U.S.-Israel relationship, Middle East diplomacy, the Jewish world and the arts. He hosts the JNS “Think Twice” podcast, both the weekly video program and the “Jonathan Tobin Daily” program, available on all major audio platforms and on YouTube. Previously, he was executive editor, then senior online editor and chief political blogger, for Commentary magazine. Before that, he was editor-in-chief of The Jewish Exponent in Philadelphia and editor of the Connecticut Jewish Ledger. He has won 60-plus awards for his columns, commentary, art criticism and other writing. He appears regularly on television, commenting on politics and foreign policy. Born in New York City, he studied history at Columbia University.

Source: https://www.jns.org/opinion/column/jonathan-s-tobin/why-is-rep-jamie-raskin-enabling-campus-antisemitism

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Jewish candidate for UN sec-gen falls to second place in new round of polling - Mike Wagenheim

 

by Mike Wagenheim

“After years of bias, failure and eroded trust, the organization needs a leader who is prepared to change the system,” stated Danny Danon, Israeli ambassador to the global body.

 

Rafael Mariano Grossi (front), Rebeca Grynspan (left), Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett (second from left) and Macky Sall, candidates for the position of next U.N. secretary-general, during a town hall debate at the U.N. headquarters in New York City, July 23, 2026. Credit: Mark Garten/UN Photo.

Rebeca Grynspan, a Jewish economist and United Nations executive, fell to second place in a second round of U.N. Security Council straw polling to select the global body’s next secretary-general.

The non-binding poll among the 15 council members is meant to gauge levels of support for the candidates and determine whether there is a chance for consensus. Further rounds are expected.

Grynspan is the daughter of Holocaust refugees and has ties to Israel. She is the former vice president of Costa Rica and is a longtime U.N. executive and the secretary-general of the U.N. Trade and Development agency.

During a U.N. hearing for candidates a few months ago, Grynspan, whose parents fled Poland during the Holocaust, opened by describing herself as a “product of peace.”

Her parents immigrated in the aftermath of World War II, she said.

Grynspan has decried Holocaust denial, has family connections to Israel and studied economics and sociology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. But she has spoken little about her Jewish identity.

She is largely considered to be moderate toward Israel, even as she harshly criticized the Jewish state in the early stages of the Israel-Hamas war.

On Friday, Grynspan received seven “encourage” and four “discourage” votes, along with four “no opinion” votes. That’s a steep drop from the 10 “encourage,” one “discourage” and four “no opinion” votes from the first round in late July.

The “discourage” votes are particularly important in the council’s straw polling, as they indicate opposition to a candidate.

If even one of those “discourage” votes comes from one of the five permanent members—the United States, China, France, Russia and the United Kingdom—it could doom a nominee’s chances.

Secret ballot

All voting is held via secret ballot, and later rounds will include color-coded envelopes for the five permanent members to help better determine who votes “discourage.”

There is no public indication yet if any permanent members voted “discourage” with respect to her candidacy.

Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett, of Guyana, won Friday’s straw poll with eight “encourage,” three “discourage” and four “no opinion” votes. (Although she won, Rodrigues-Birkett actually fared better in the initial July poll, with nine “encourage,” two “discourage” and four “no opinion” votes.)

Rodrigues-Birkett was her country’s first female foreign affairs minister and served on the U.N. Security Council. She also previously chaired the G77 coalition of developing countries.

Rafael Grossi of Argentina, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, struggled on Friday, with seven “encourage,” six “discourage” and two “no opinion” votes.

María Fernanda Espinosa, of Ecuador, a former U.N. General Assembly president and Ecuadorian foreign affairs and defense minister, held steady with four “encourage,” three “discourage” and eight “no opinion” votes. The latter suggested she still has room to shape opinions.

Michelle Bachelet, of Chile, an anti-Israel candidate and former U.N. official, logged only two “encourage” votes against six “discourage” and seven “no opinion” votes.

Ivonne Baki, a late entrant into the race, received not a single “encourage” vote while logging eight “discourage” votes, likely putting her run to a quick end.

An Ecuadorian politician and diplomat, Baki has personal ties to U.S. President Donald Trump and is of Lebanese heritage. She is billing her candidacy as one that can help build global bridges.

A pair of African male candidates received high numbers of “discourage” votes in a year where the field is tilting toward female, Latin American nominees.

“The election for the next secretary-general is a test for the future of the United Nations,” stated Danny Danon, Israeli ambassador to the United Nations.

“After years of bias, failure and eroded trust, the organization needs a leader who is prepared to change the system,” the Israeli envoy said.

“Israel will evaluate the candidates based on their record and their willingness to stand up to terrorism, antisemitism and hypocrisy,” he said.

Israel has not announced support for any candidate nor has it commented publicly on any nominee. 

Mike Wagenheim

Source: https://www.jns.org/news/world/jewish-candidate-for-un-sec-gen-falls-to-second-place-in-new-round-of-polling

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