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Browse major news stories and see what officials have said.

Sep 3, 2026

Treasury and the IRS Propose Stripping Tax-Exempt Status From Any Private School That Considers Race — as Many as 18,000 Institutions, From Elementary Schools to Universities — and the Top Ways and Means Democrat Calls It "Racist Weaponization of the IRS"

On September 3, 2026, the Treasury Department and the IRS issued a notice of proposed rulemaking titled "Racial Nondiscrimination in Private Schools." Under the proposal, a private school that "adopts, maintains, or enforces a policy or practice that discriminates on the basis of race, color, or national or ethnic origin" would not be treated as operated exclusively for exempt purposes and would lose its federal tax exemption under section 501(c)(3). The rule reaches admissions, educational policies, scholarships and loans, athletics, and every other school-administered program, and Treasury estimates it may affect as many as 18,000 private educational institutions — elementary schools, trade schools, professional schools, colleges and universities. The rule rescinds prior IRS guidance the administration says permitted racial preferences, and permits race-neutral substitutes such as income-based or geographic criteria. Religious schools may still impose religious affiliation requirements. The proposal was scheduled for publication in the Federal Register on September 4, with comments due sixty days later, and would apply to taxable years beginning on or after May 31, 2027. Because 501(c)(3) status also governs the deductibility of donations, the rule puts at risk the charitable deduction for gifts to affected schools — a point tax practitioners flagged immediately. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent framed the rule as civil rights enforcement. IRS chief Frank Bisignano said institutions that "promote discriminatory practices" would no longer receive the benefits of exemption. Rep. Richard Neal (D-MA), ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee, called it a racist weaponization of the tax code, and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund promised litigation.

“Under President Trump, this Administration is standing up for America's students by ensuring racial discrimination has no place in American education.”
Scott Bessent (R-SC) · Sep 3, 2026

A House Republican Proposes a Constitutional Amendment Barring Naturalized Citizens From Congress and the Federal Bench — Naming Three Democrats, and Disqualifying Four Republicans and a Republican Senator She Did Not Mention

On May 20, 2026, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) announced a joint resolution proposing a constitutional amendment that would require members of Congress, federal judges and Senate-confirmed appointees to be natural-born U.S. citizens — extending to the whole federal government a requirement the Constitution imposes only on the president. Naturalized citizens currently serving would be disqualified. Mace singled out three foreign-born Democrats in making her case: Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), born in Somalia; Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), born in India; and Shri Thanedar (D-MI), born in India. A May 1, 2026 Congressional Research Service report counted roughly 19 foreign-born members of the current Congress. Among them are four Republican House members the amendment would also disqualify — Reps. Victoria Spartz (R-IN), born in Ukraine; Carlos Gimenez (R-FL), born in Cuba; Juan Ciscomani (R-AZ), born in Mexico; and Young Kim (R-CA), born in South Korea — along with Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH), a Trump ally born in Colombia who became a citizen at 18. None of them responded to reporters' requests for comment. The Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus noted publicly that four sitting Republicans were not citizens at birth. Because it is a constitutional amendment, the measure would require two-thirds of both chambers and ratification by three-fourths of the states — a practical impossibility — but it has continued to shape the debate. On August 27, 2026, the Washington Post's Toluse Olorunnipa reported that the push had broadened: Republican lawmakers in several states have introduced measures to bar naturalized and dual citizens from running for state office, and at least five Republicans in Congress have called for barring them from federal judgeships, Cabinet posts, ambassadorships and congressional seats. The reporting tied the escalation to the rise of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and other naturalized officials. Democratic reaction was immediate and uniform; no Republican member has publicly endorsed the amendment on the record.

“This isn’t personal. It’s about what standard we want for the people entrusted with enormous power over the American people.”
Nancy Mace (R-SC) · Aug 27, 2026

ICE Signs a $16.7 Million No-Bid Contract for 6,000 Pairs of Gloves That Deliver Electric Shocks — Sixteen Senators Ask Why Its Existing Tools Are Not Enough, and the Border Czar Answers "You Can’t Just Go From 0 to 100"

On August 10, 2026 the Department of Homeland Security published a notice that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement intended to spend up to $20 million on the CTG-5 G.L.O.V.E. — for Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter — a patrol glove made by Compliant Technologies LLC of Kentucky that functions normally until an officer switches it into "electrical mode," at which point contact with exposed skin delivers a charge of up to 380 volts. ICE signed the contract on Wednesday, August 26 and posted the award on Thursday, August 27: $16.7 million, no bid, for 6,000 pairs at roughly $2,495 apiece. The agency wrote in its procurement documents that it "does not currently have an empty hand use of force device to provide to the field amidst unprecedented levels of threats and violence against ICE officers and agents." A DHS spokesperson said ICE is "constantly assessing the needs of our officers in the field." The purchase went through over two rounds of congressional objection. On August 20, Homeland Security Committee Democrats Bennie Thompson, Lou Correa and Shri Thanedar wrote to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin asking him to stop the procurement, citing what they called a pattern of DHS personnel permanently injuring and nearly killing people with weapons already labeled "less-lethal." On August 27 — the day the award posted — Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto led fifteen colleagues in a letter to Acting ICE Director David Venturella putting more than thirty questions to the agency about protocols, training, safety limits and accountability. The signers included Angus King, the letter's only non-Democrat. White House border czar Tom Homan had defended the device on Fox & Friends on August 13, framing it as a rung on the use-of-force ladder below lethal weapons. The device arrives against the record this site has already documented: fatal ICE shootings in Houston and Maine, an ICE agent charged with firing into a Minneapolis home, and a man in Arlington, Virginia tasered on his way to work who woke with a brain bleed.

“The blatant and tragic misuse of force in Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis, Houston, Maine, and other locations around the country raises significant skepticism about the agency’s professional capability to safely deploy a new tool that could be used to harm Americans without cause.”
Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) · Aug 27, 2026

Aug 25, 2026· Updated

The Navy Moves to Strip Doris Miller’s Name From the Aircraft Carrier It Named for Him During Trump’s First Term — and Internally Discusses Putting the Sitting President’s Name on It Instead

CNN reported on August 20, 2026 that the Navy is working to rename the Ford-class aircraft carrier CVN-81, which since January 2020 has been designated the future USS Doris Miller. Two of the three sources familiar with the internal discussions said there have been conversations about renaming it for President Trump — a step with no precedent, because no U.S. aircraft carrier has ever been named for a sitting president. Doris "Dorie" Miller was a mess attendant aboard the USS West Virginia at Pearl Harbor. He carried wounded sailors to safety and then manned a .50-caliber anti-aircraft gun he had never been trained to use, firing until the ammunition ran out. Admiral Chester Nimitz awarded him the Navy Cross in 1942, making him the first Black American to receive it. Miller was killed in 1943 when the escort carrier Liscome Bay was torpedoed. The decision to name CVN-81 for him was made during Trump's first term and made the ship the first U.S. carrier named for an enlisted sailor and the first named for an African American. According to the reporting, the effort has been under way since earlier this year; Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao's office has also been rewriting the official guidance on how ships are named and who may be named, including presidents. The Navy has effectively stopped using the name internally and refers to the ship only by its hull number. One source said the Navy intends to name a different, smaller warship for Miller and is recommending him for the Medal of Honor. The Navy is under time pressure: the keel-laying ceremony is expected at the end of 2026. A Pentagon official said there was "nothing official to announce at this time." Miller's family said they learned of it from the press. His great-nephew Thomas Bledsoe told ABC News that "for our family, it was quite a shock to hear that there was conversation about the possibility of renaming the Doris Miller carrier, and so not only was it a shock but it was a shock in that we found out from a news outlet." The two members of Congress who responded most directly are both combat veterans: Sen. Mark Kelly, a former Navy pilot who flew 39 combat missions, and Rep. Jason Crow, a former Army Ranger. NAACP President Derrick Johnson called the reported plan "a slap in the face to every war hero and every service member who has worn the uniform," and tied it to the conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, which had just returned from a record deployment.

“The audacity to even suggest that we replace the name of Doris Miller, a hero whose courage shined on one of our nation’s darkest days, with draft-dodging Donald Trump is disgusting.”
Donald Norcross (D-NJ) · Aug 25, 2026

A Career Civil Rights Lawyer Says the Administration's Campus Antisemitism Investigations Were "Predetermined, Without Regard to the Evidence" — and Jamie Raskin Opens an Investigation Calling Them a "Pre-Baked Frame-Up"

On August 18, 2026, lawyers for Haley Van Erem — a career attorney who spent nearly a decade in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division before being detailed to the multi-agency antisemitism task force — filed a 28-page whistleblower disclosure with the inspectors general at DOJ and HHS and with the Office of Special Counsel. The disclosure alleges that the Title VI investigations of Harvard, Brown, Columbia and Cornell were marked by "extraordinary procedural irregularities, predetermined outcomes without factual or legal support," that "the outcomes of the investigations were predetermined, without regard to the evidence," and that the whole exercise was a "politically mandated effort" to extract money through settlement demands and funding freezes. It says hundreds of millions of dollars were suspended before the investigations were finished, that Columbia investigators flagged false statements and constitutionally protected activity being cited as Title VI violations, that a Harvard-assigned attorney warned the proposed settlement demands were unrelated to remedying antisemitism and likely violated the First Amendment, and that the task force also targeted Muslim professors. Van Erem left the department in May 2025, she says, because she was "unwilling to be made vulnerable to further participation in politically motivated investigations unsupported by facts and contrary to law." Columbia agreed to pay $200 million over three years and Brown agreed to spend $50 million on Rhode Island workforce development, both without findings of wrongdoing. The same day the disclosure surfaced, Rep. Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on House Judiciary, wrote to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon demanding documents and a transcribed interview before September 1. A Justice Department spokesperson said Van Erem "did not work on university investigations" and that the department "stands behind the integrity of these investigations."

“It is a shameful stain on the Department of Justice and a clear and present danger to American academic preeminence in the world.”
Jamie Raskin (D-MD) · Aug 18, 2026

Congressional Black Caucus Asks Attorney General Blanche and FBI Director Patel for a Federal Review of Nolan Wells's Death, as Mississippi's Governor Blames Civil Rights Activists

Nolan Wells, an 18-year-old Black college athlete from Ocean Springs, Mississippi, went missing on July 4, 2026, after taking a boat to Horn Island — a barrier island off the Mississippi Gulf Coast — with a group of white friends for an Independence Day gathering. His body was recovered from the island's shoreline days later. State authorities have said he may have accidentally drowned; his family disputes that account, and a second, family-commissioned autopsy produced findings the family says the first did not. On August 12, 2026, Congressional Black Caucus Chair Rep. Yvette D. Clarke (D-N.Y.) and caucus members sent a letter to Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel asking the Justice Department to determine whether an independent federal review — including a possible civil rights investigation — is warranted, and demanding a written response within seven days. The letter said that "more than 30 days after his disappearance and death, significant questions remain unanswered about the events of July 4, 2026." The Justice Department confirmed receiving the letter and said the appropriate personnel were "reviewing it carefully." The caucus made its case publicly on August 13 at the National Association of Black Journalists convention, where Wells's parents appeared alongside Rep. Lucy McBath (D-Ga.), attorney Ben Crump, and the Rev. Al Sharpton. Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the state's only Black member of Congress, had already called for FBI involvement in late July, citing the state's history and inconsistencies between the two autopsies. Ocean Springs is not in Thompson's district. Mississippi's Republican statewide officials have pushed back on the pressure campaign. Gov. Tate Reeves blamed Crump and Sharpton for threats made against witnesses in the case, saying they were "stoking division for personal gain," and Attorney General Lynn Fitch defended the handling of the investigation by state and local law enforcement. Federal authorities separately arrested three people over alleged violent threats connected to the case, and the family's attorney has said a grand jury review could come within 30 days.

“Here we are again today, here for the loss of another black young man in our community. That is the reason why we’re asking for the accountability: to make sure that this is not just swept under the rug.”
Lucy McBath (D-GA) · Aug 13, 2026

DOJ Indicts Southern Poverty Law Center on Federal Fraud Charges

A federal grand jury on April 21, 2026 returned an 11-count indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center, charging the civil rights nonprofit with six counts of wire fraud, four counts of false statements to a federally insured bank, and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering. The Justice Department alleges that between 2014 and 2023, the SPLC secretly funneled more than $3 million in donor funds to confidential informants associated with violent extremist groups including the Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Nations, and the National Socialist Movement. Prosecutors say the organization used shell bank accounts under names like "Fox Photography" and "Rare Books Warehouse" to conceal the payments. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said the SPLC was "manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose." The SPLC denied the allegations and vowed to defend itself, saying its informant program saved lives. Democrats characterized the indictment as politically motivated, while congressional Republicans backed the prosecution.

“That indictment is free for everybody to read, and if the takeaway is that that's political, I mean, I think the opposite is true.”
Todd Blanche (R) · Apr 21, 2026