The Dictatorship

Trump is using his election denial playbook on Social Security

Published

1 year ago

April 17, 2025

Trump is using his election denial playbook on Social Security

Donald Trump’s administration has taken a sledgehammer to the Social Security system, and it’s using the president’s election denial playbook to do so along the way.

As with his attempts to overturn his loss in 2020, Trump began his political attack on Social Security with baseless claims of widespread fraud by millions of people — even sharing similarly inaccurate stories about dead people and undocumented immigrants.

He’s now moving on to the next phase: attempting to create some kind of paper trail. As part of his election denial efforts, his lawyers assembled hundreds of affidavits from people who purportedly witnessed fraud. But those affidavits fell apart once they were presented to judges, who largely found them unsupported or simply not credible.

This time, Trump is assigning federal prosecutors to look into Social Security fraud and directing an inspector general to investigate recipients over 100 years old with mismatched records under a memorandum signed at the White House on Tuesday.

As with election denial, there’s no evidence for the widespread fraud claims pushed by Trump and his billionaire adviser, Elon Musk.

The most recent inspector general’s audit found that over a five-year period ending in May 2018, an estimated $33.5 million in benefits were redirected to a different bank account, a typical form of Social Security fraud. That’s a relatively small number in a system that pays out $1.5 trillion each year in benefits.

Trump’s claim that “millions and millions of people over 100 years old” are receiving benefits has been thoroughly debunked.

And the wild claims about immigrants undermining Social Security turn out to be the opposite of the truth, as immigrants help support Social Security because they pay into the system without qualifying for benefits. Even undocumented immigrants were estimated to have paid $25.7 billion in Social Security taxes in 2022, according to a report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.

In 2020, Trump also sought to have legitimate votes thrown out in court. This time, his administration reportedly put 6,300 names of immigrants who obtained Social Security numbers through a legal process onto the “death master file” — essentially legally declaring them dead — with the goal of making it hard for them to access banking services like credit cards and checking accounts, according to reports in The New York Times and other outlets.

On election denial, Trump’s goal was to overturn his loss. This time, his goal appears to be to make dramatic cuts to a popular benefits program that might otherwise be politically impossible.

Subscribe toTrump’s First 100 Daysnewsletter for weekly updates on and expert insight into the key issues and figures defining his second term.

Ryan Teague Beckwith

Ryan Teague Beckwith is a newsletter editor for BLN. He has previously worked for such outlets as Time magazine and Bloomberg News. He teaches journalism at Georgetown University’s School of Continuing Studies and is the creator of Your First Byline.

The Dictatorship

Trump Media to sell Wall Street access to market-moving Truth Social posts

Published

14 hours ago

July 17, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Trump Media to sell Wall Street access to market-moving Truth Social posts

Christmas. 17, 2026, 12:57 PM EDT

Trump Media & Technology Groupa company owned by President Donald Trump, is offering Wall Street firms access to a new speciality service that rapidly delivers and curates market-moving posts from the president’s preferred social media platform.

Truth Social, which launched in 2022, has become the platform where the president offers high-impact statements and announces major decisions. Among those statements, Trump has frequently unveiled changes to U.S. tariff policy; discussed meetings with world leaders, like Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin; and, in recent months, provided updates on the ongoing war with Iran.

The service, announced Thursday, has been dubbed “Truth API.” An API, or application programming interface, allows software applications to communicate with each other.

“Markets already move on Truth Social posts,” said Kevin McGurn, interim chief executive offer of TMTGin a statement. “As adoption grows, we expect Truth API to become a meaningful, ongoing source of revenue for the company, creating lasting value for shareholders.”

Trump is the majority stakeholder of Trump Media, which positions him to profit from the company’s new revenue stream. The White House has said that while he is in office, Trump’s assets are held in a trust that is managed by his children.

While the company says the new service will include posts from high-ranking accounts, Truth Social is mostly an echo chamber for the president, his allies and his supporters. Aside from Trump’s own profile, other accounts rarely produce impactful news or information. That raises questions about whether the president will weigh how the service could benefit him financially when he posts on the platform.

The White House and TMTG did not respond to MS NOW’s requests for comment.

Wall Street investors already rely on other applications to provide real-time data and market-moving information to react quickly and integrate data from Truth Social and other social media platforms.

It’s unclear how Truth API will differ from existing services or how much the company plans to charge for the service. TMTG said it would rely on “industry-standard delivery methods” to deliver Truth Social posts to customers “in milliseconds.”

According to the company, clients have already signed up ahead of the service’s launch, which is slated for as soon as August. 1.

The stock market often reacts to Trump’s posts, even when the content later proves to be inaccurate, misleading or states something that ultimately does not come to fruition.

For example, Trump posted in April that Iran had agreed to “fully” reopen the Strait of Hormuz shortly before U.S. markets opened. Minutes later, he said a U.S. naval blockade would remain in place.

The president also vowed on the platform to increase tariffs on countries to 15% after a Supreme Court decision struck down his use of widespread tariffs. However, the tariff rate has remained at 10%, and it’s unclear if or when it might be raised.

Akayla Gardner is a White House correspondent for MS NOW.

The Dictatorship

Mullin threatens to penalize states that do not cooperate with DHS on election security

Published

14 hours ago

July 17, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Mullin threatens to penalize states that do not cooperate with DHS on election security

Christmas. 17, 2026, 12:50 PM EDT

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Friday that his department will penalize states that do not cooperate with the federal government to “secure our elections” ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Announcing in a news conference what he called a new Department of Homeland Security program to safeguard U.S. elections, Mullin said states that refuse to participate may be deprived of federal funds and resources to run their elections. State election officials may also be personally held accountable by fines, penalties and potential prison time, he warned.

“Working with [Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick]we are going to make our security enhancements mandatory, meaning that if these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to work or to run federal elections, they’re going to have to implement security issues,” he said.

Mullin said that states will have to “look at who voted in their states” and that if their election officials do not adhere to federal directions on security measures, “then those individuals can also be held accountable by fines, by penalties and even, depending on how far it goes, prison time.”

If states do not hand over voter roles to federal officials, Mullin said, the government will scour public records of voters.

“You must be a U.S. citizen, and you must be eligible to vote before and after the election,” he said. “We will scrub all election records,” looking for noncitizen voters and others ineligible to vote, including votes linked to deceased people.

“We will go through those records one by one, and we will pursue everybody,” he said.

He threatened to prosecute noncitizens for voting, which is illegal and a highly rare occurrence. An analysis by the Bipartisan Policy Center of Elections between 1999 and 2023 found only 77 instances of noncitizen votingeach of which was investigated by the authorities.

“If you’re illegal and attempted to vote, or you tried to vote illegally for someone else, we will find you, and we will charge you,” Mullin warned.

According to Mullin, DHS found hundreds of thousands of noncitizens who are registered to vote in California, New Jersey, Nevada and Pennsylvania, without presenting a breakdown of the data or explaining the department’s investigative process.

Mullin’s remarks follow President Donald Trump’s primetime speech on Thursday night, during which he again promoted conspiracy theories about his 2020 election loss and pushed for more voting restrictions.

DHS’ involvement in the campaign is a preview of what is shaping up to be a whole-of-government approach that could instill uncertainty in America’s election security ahead of the November midterms and impose stricter laws that civil rights advocates say will burden voters.

In his Thursday night speech, Trump repeated falsehoods about the 2020 election, saying it had been “rigged and stolen.” He accused China of buying and stealing tens of millions of voter data files and said Venezuela was capable of manipulating elections.

Declassified intelligence released by the White House that intended to prove his claims instead undermined it. Afterward, several Trump officials — including current and former intelligence and administration officials — told MS NOW that no U.S. intelligence exists showing that any foreign country influenced the outcome of the 2020 election

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

Julia Jester and Brian Bennett contributed reporting.

Clarissa-Jan Lim is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW. She was previously a senior reporter and editor at BuzzFeed News.

The Dictatorship

The average American is paying the price for Trump’s corruption

Published

14 hours ago

July 17, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

A federal judge this week rightly rebuked President Donald Trump’soutrageous $10 billion lawsuit against his own countrywhich originally ended in a bogus settlement that would have created a $1.8 billion taxpayer-funded slush fund for his allies and would have granted him and his family sweeping immunity from IRS audits. In ruling that Trump manipulated the judicial process for his own benefit, the judge reinforced what many Americans had concluded long ago: Trump has transformed the presidency into one giant grift.

Trump’s shameless attempts to cash in on the U.S. presidency are why I have introduced legislation to establish basic safeguards that should apply to every president, regardless of party. My proposals would require presidents to place their assets in blind trusts and prohibit sitting presidents from owning or trading individual stocks. I have fought to prevent presidents from receiving blanket immunity from federal tax law, and I have introduced a constitutional amendment that would let Congress review the most egregious abuses of the presidential pardon power.

Trump has transformed the presidency into one giant grift.

Most of these proposals have been flatly rejected by the Republican-controlled Rules Committee along party lines. My constitutional amendment has gained the support of one lone Republican, Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska, who’s retiring.

But these aren’t partisan ideas. Nor are they radical. They’re commonsense protections rooted in a simple principle: Public office exists to serve the public — not enrich the officeholder.

Because corruption isn’t just unethical. It’s also expensive.

Americans know what it feels like paying more for groceries, gas, housing, healthcare and energy. Families are stretching every paycheck and making impossible decisions about what they can afford. At the same time, Trump and his family are becoming wealthier — obscenely so.

According to newly released financial disclosuresTrump’s personal fortune grew by roughly $2 billion last year. From cryptocurrency ventures and foreign business deals to stock trades involving companies affected by government policy, the Trump family is amassing wealth because he’s president.

Take cryptocurrency.

Trump’s own financial disclosures showhe and members of his family made $1.2 billion through a network of cryptocurrency ventures last year. At the same time, his administration aggressively rolled back regulations and championed a crypto-friendly agenda that directly benefits those investments.

Those ventures have also attracted foreign investors seeking influence with the administration — including Binance founder Changpeng Zhaowhom Trump later pardoned for a federal money-laundering conviction.

In fact, an entire pardon-shopping industry has sprouted up around the president, with lobbyists reportedly charging as much as $1 million to seek clemency from the White House.

Those pardons have erased more than $1 billion in fines and restitution owed by duly convicted defendants. That money was intended to compensate victims and repay taxpayers. Instead, it disappeared with the stroke of Trump’s pen.

Those pardons have erased more than $1 billion in fines and restitution owed by duly convicted defendants.

Then there is the president’s personal stock trading.

Trump’s financial disclosures show him making an average of 80 stock trades a dayoften involving companies with business before the federal government.

He purchased substantial holdings in Palantir, a major federal software contractor, and then publicly promoted the company on social media. He bought shares of Nvidia a week before his administration approved the sale of advanced microchips to China, a market the company’s CEO has said could ultimately generate $50 billion annually.

Trump made more than 300 previously undisclosed stock purchases just one day before unexpectedly announcing that he would pause many of his import tariffs.

When the president can trade stocks and simultaneously move markets through official government actions, Americans have every reason to question whether public policy is serving the country or his personal investment portfolio.

When Trump isn’t enriching himself, he appears to be ensuring that family members and political allies benefit too.

One of his Mar-a-Lago neighbors — and a major political donor — received a no-bid contract to remediate algae in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Donald Trump Jr. holds a multimillion-dollar stake in a drone manufacturer that recently secured a major Pentagon contract.

Different schemes. Same basic story.

Every taxpayer dollar diverted through favoritism, every contract awarded based on political connections and every market distorted by self-dealing carries a cost to the taxpayers.

It means fewer resources to lower housing costs, strengthen public schools, improve infrastructure, expand healthcare and help working families make ends meet.

Different schemes. Same basic story.

The government should work for the American people, not for whichever politician occupies the Oval Office.

That’s why the reforms I have introduced matter.

Reforms that are not about one individual, but instead about restoring public trust in our democracy and ensuring that no future president — Republican or Democrat — can use public office as a personal profit center.

Corruption isn’t just immoral. It isn’t just illegal.

It’s expensive.

And American families are paying the price.

Rep. Johnny “Johnny O” Olszewski Jr. represents Maryland’s 2nd congressional district, which includes major portions of Baltimore County, Carroll County and parts of Baltimore City.