Youth Advocacy
Youth Advocacy
Year 4, Week 40 (290 total reports)
24.12.2025-29.12.2025
REVIEW and ANNOUNCEMENTS
Dr. Jerry Goebel
Award-winning journalist, Rachel Maddow, of MSNow, tells us that “the story is the people, not the administration.” How can we follow her hopeful advice in examining what really matters in the news today?
Visual Stories!
Trumpism is targeting specific groups to make them feel disempowered and weak. It is an intentional design of Project 2025 to target women, the LGBTQ+ community, minorities, the poor, and—of course—immigrants. We need to be their advocates! This soulful song, Protect the Weak and Powerless, encourages us to act on their behalf.
Top Links of the Week
30.12.2025
Why ICE Is Getting Away With It
This well-researched article by Nancy Gertner of The Atlantic examines the background of why I.C.E. is able to consistently get away with ignoring the human and constitutional rights of immigrants and citizens in the United States. Primarily, she tells us we have two Supreme Court Justices to thank for their immoral (but legal) behavior. One was a 1984 decision by conservative Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, in which she rejected the “Exclusionary Rule” for immigrant courts. As Gertner points out, “the exclusionary rule is designed to deter police misconduct—the idea being that the police will avoid such conduct if it risks undermining a conviction.” The other is a ruling by conservative Justice Clarence Thomas, which Gertner points out, “appears to have eliminated, or at least seriously limited, the possibility of lawsuits for damages after individuals are unlawfully detained, searched, or experience excessive force at the hands of ICE.” Together, these rulings basically gave I.C.E. free reign to forget the Constitution in arresting (kidnapping) people off the streets of the United States. We need to do all we can to protect the victims that this administration and conservative interests, like Day O’Connor and Thomas, are targeting. They are purposely trying to undermine the rights of women, LGBTQ+, immigrants, and minorities. If we are allowed to elect a new wave of politicians in the mid-term elections, we need to make sure that, along with impeaching Trump and his sycophants, they also reform the Supreme Court of John Roberts, which has become an arm of this administration.
29.12.2025
Rachel Maddow calls on the media to cover “the people,” not Donald Trump
John Russell of LGBTQ Nation writes about an award speech given by Rachel Maddox last week that has important implications for all of us. She asks journalists to recognize that the real story in an authoritarian takeover (such as the one the U.S. is experiencing) is not the politicians, but the people. In elaborating on this, she tells journalists they need to focus their attention more on what people are doing to stop this regime, rather than what this regime is doing to disempower people. How does this apply to our own lives? What can I do daily to focus more on the true power of democracy—people—and less on T.R.U.M.P. and his regime? I find this a very hopeful outlook that I promise to focus on myself.
26.12.2025
Supreme Court Suggests Trump Might Use Insurrection Act
Some people are celebrating the Supreme Court’s recent decision to uphold a lower court’s ruling that T.R.U.M.P. cannot send the National Guard to Chicago. Khalid Rahman, of Newsweek, tells us to beware of celebrating too early. This ruling is a wolf in sheep's clothing. Already, conservatives like Brett Kavanaugh are giving Donald a masterclass in invoking the Insurrection Act and calling the military, rather than getting the National Guard to do his dirty work, to occupy “Blue Cities” across the United States. Apparently, this administration needed a primer in the "How-To's" by inside folk at SCOTUS (The Supreme Court of Trump - US) because no one in the White House was bright enough to figure this out themselves. Now, conservatives across the U.S. are jumping onboard and calling on T.R.U.M.P. to invoke the Insurrection Act and take over the country militarily. As the election nears, and this administration’s approval ratings continue to plummet, look for increasing desperate acts for them to retain power. This Supreme Court is a radical conservative’s dream team and will do all it can to make sure the conservatives stay in power. Prepare for more intense attempts to use military action inside the U.S. and outside. They are getting desperate.
25.12.2025
Tracking how much of Project 2025 the Trump administration achieved this year
What would a White Nationalist government look like in the United States? One need look no further than Project 2025 as implemented during the T.R.U.M.P. Administration. After initially lying to the American public (no surprise there), he knew little to nothing of the Project 2025 agenda, appointed three of the original writers of Project 2025 to his cabinet. According to Amanda Becker, who originally wrote this article for The 19th, “There is a saying in Washington, D.C., that personnel is policy: the people put in charge of implementing key policies shape their ideologies.” The T.R.U.M.P. appointees include Russell Vought, of the Office of Management and Budget, Peter Navarro, one of Trump’s top trade advisors, and Brendan Carr, now in charge of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Together, with the full support of this administration, they have focused their sights on dismantling reproductive rights, LGBTQ+ rights, education, and the military. They seek nothing less than to destroy democracy and turn the United States into a White Nationalist, fascist, autocracy. They are not done with their agenda; in fact, they are doubling down. Do not underestimate them. They have everything at stake to retain power and undermine the Constitution. They see this as their religious duty. They are dangerous fanatics, and T.R.U.M.P. is just the frontman. For the sake of our children’s future, we must resist them, and to do so, we must recognize how deeply they are embedded in the right's agenda and administration.
Russell Vought, one of Project 2025's key architects, heads Trump's Office of Management and Budget, which he has likened to the "nerve center" through which a president can exert their influence across the federal government. Peter Navarro, who wrote Project 2025's section on trade, is a top trade adviser to Trump. Brendan Carr, who wrote a section suggesting reforms to the Federal Communications Commission, is now in charge of the agency.
Reproductive Rights, LGBTQ+ Rights, Education, and the Military,
24.12.2025
December 21, 2025
In this Substack commentary, Heather Cox Richardson reminds us of the history of the separation between church and state. She does this in the face of this administration's attempts to politicize religion. Most recently in the inept form of J.D. Vance’s speech to the MAGA cultists at a Turning Point convention. Richardson reminds us that this is not the first time a political entity has tried to force religion on the public. During the Civil War, resurrectionists attempted to force citizens to accept Christianity as a state-imposed religion. Repeatedly, some voices have held the line. Despite what Vance and Project 2025 went to venerate, this was not formed as a Christian country. This is a country of religious freedom. It seems that conservative Christians have yet to learn that a right comes with a responsibility. The right of religious freedom comes with the responsibility to protect the freedom of others' religion.
