As evidence mounts that the Iran war is strangling the economy—new Commerce Department data shows that annualized growth slowed to 1.5 percent in the second quarter of this year—the war itself continues to expand. Saudi Arabia joined in striking Iran for the first time yesterday, while Iran continues to lash out around the region, including in missile strikes against Jordan and Kuwait and an apparent drone attack in Egypt. Meanwhile, the Strait of Hormuz remains practically closed, and threats of Houthi attacks have slowed shipping through the Red Sea. Happy Thursday. The Bulwark promises you three things: Facts about the world, honesty about ourselves, and a commitment to freedom and democracy. Support our work by becoming a Bulwark+ member.
Springfield Needs Your Helpby Jim Swift Springfield, Ohio—Most of the routes from Cincinnati to Springfield, Ohio pass by Springfield-Beckley Municipal Airport, home to the region’s general aviation traffic and the Ohio Air National Guard’s 178th Wing. I stopped by on my way to Greater Grace Temple, where members of the G92 coalition, a network of churches that support the local Haitian community, were going to address the media about the imminent expiry of temporary protected status (TPS) for more than ten thousand Haitian immigrants in the region. As probably always happens when a stranger shows up to a small half-military airport with no luggage and starts taking pictures, an airport employee asked me, politely, what I was doing. I told him I think this quiet airport could soon become the setting of one of the biggest stories in America: deportation flights carrying Springfield’s Haitians. He shakes his head. “I seriously doubt that,” he says. I tell him I hope he’s right. The consequences of TPS expiring are already rippling through Springfield. Rick, a reader I met earlier this month, texts me about tearful conversations with friends whose Haitian coworkers and neighbors are suddenly being let go. “People can’t believe this is happening to their friends and neighbors,” he says. I got to Greater Grace a few minutes early. TV cameras were already lined up. Clergy mingled with reporters, waiting for the event to begin. Before long, eight Christian pastors and a Cincinnati rabbi took turns making the case that Springfield’s Haitian community deserves compassion. Rev. Carl Ruby of Central Christian Church set the tone: “We’re here to respectfully ask Homeland Security and ICE to do what President Trump has repeatedly promised, and that’s focus only on the worst of the worst.” “People in Springfield are getting letters asking them to go to Cincinnati for a check-in,” Ruby related. “Once they get there, they are asked to wear ankle monitors.” Similar requirements have drawn lawsuits from immigrant-rights groups elsewhere. Those who have already lost their TPS and their jobs don’t qualify for unemployment benefits or most forms of government assistance. As Ruby explained, that burden has fallen almost entirely on Springfield’s churches, food pantries, and nonprofits. Rev. Michelle Boomgaard of Christ Episcopal Church and the Springfield Neighbors United coalition reminded the room: “From our earliest days, Springfield has welcomed immigrants,” she said, noting that the city’s recent economic revival owes much to Haitians and other immigrants. Marjory Wentworth then read a statement on behalf of Haitian community leader Obed Lafaille. “Behind every policy are real people,” the statement began. “Springfield is more than the place we live. It is the community we have helped build together.” It continued:
Rev. Tim Voltz of Champion City Church challenged those in attendance to imagine the situation in their own congregation. “If tomorrow morning the federal government had taken away the rights of one-third of your church congregation,” Voltz asked, “what would you do? . . . What do you think Jesus would call you to do?” Pastor Jimmy Pierre of Gospel Grace Baptist Church, who is Haitian, said the uncertainty is taking a toll far beyond immigration paperwork. “The emotional burden is overwhelming,” he said. Many families, he explained, are dealing with anxiety, depression, and emotional exhaustion as they try to navigate an uncertain future. “Some have built small businesses, purchased homes, and invested years of work into this community.” Pierre pointed out that Springfield’s Haitian community did not create the legal limbo it now finds itself in. TPS does not itself provide a pathway to permanent legal status, he said, so many families have few realistic options as the program comes to an end. The only shred of hope is that a bill to extend TPS that passed the House might somehow pass the Senate, and then Donald Trump might decide to counteract one of his signature policies. It’s not really even much of a shred. Pastor Ruby praised Gov. Mike DeWine, who called ending TPS “a mistake,” and Springfield Mayor Rob Rue, for urging Congress to preserve legal protections for Haitians who have built lives in the city. Both DeWine and Rue are Republicans. Ruby’s attitude toward Ohio’s Senate delegation was, by contrast, righteously indignant and furious. “Sen. Moreno has made it clear he’s not going to support the bill. That’s between him and his God,” Ruby said. “But Sen. Husted has not yet spoken, and we have a right to know where he stands on that bill, and just want to publicly ask him today to come out with a statement making that clear.” Husted, appointed by DeWine to fill Vice President JD Vance’s vacant Senate seat, faces longtime former Sen. Sherrod Brown this fall. Asked what would happen if immigration authorities came to Springfield, Ruby said the coalition would encourage peaceful protest and that some were prepared to put themselves “between ICE and people who are targets for detainment and deportation.” He emphasized that any resistance would be nonviolent. “We believe that a part of civil disobedience is a willingness to pay the consequences,” Ruby said. “There are people and pastors in Springfield who are committed to doing that, no matter what it costs.” Ruby closed with an appeal for immediate financial help. G92 itself was not seeking donations, but local organizations are: the Haitian Community Help & Support Center, St. Vincent de Paul, and Second Harvest Food Bank were facing enormous demand. “These are all people who wanted to support themselves and who were supporting themselves,” Ruby said. “But now we have to come up with money to pay rent. We have to help families put food on the table.” Asked how long local groups could keep providing that support, he was blunt: “Money’s running out quickly,” adding that “they need millions of dollars.” “We can’t do this long-term.” Trump’s New Lowsby William Kristol As Jim notes above, Congress could act to stop or limit the Trump administration’s cruel and destructive mass deportation policies. Legislation to extend temporary protected status for Haitians living here has already cleared the House, with ten Republicans joining united Democrats in support. Right now, as Jim notes, it looks unlikely that the Senate will pass that bill—or choose to extend TPS for other groups like Salvadorans, whose protections are set to expire in September. On the other hand, it seemed unlikely until last night that Republican defections would pose a threat to Todd Blanche’s confirmation as attorney general. But the sweetheart IRS immunity deal granted to Donald Trump and his family has turned out, at least for now, to be a bridge too far for departing Republican Sens. John Cornyn and Thom Tillis. Could there be similar Republican defections ahead, perhaps by senators up for reelection, on other issues including mass deportation? It’s more possible today than it seemed a couple of weeks ago. That’s because, after temporarily stabilizing for a few months, Trump’s popularity has started falling again. The latest AP/NORC poll, released this morning, shows Trump with a 33 percent approval rating. A new CNN/SSRS poll, in the field late last week, has Trump at 34 percent approval and 66 percent disapproval among registered voters. A Quinnipiac survey also conducted late last week among registered voters has him at 32 percent approval vs. 58 percent disapproval, with 10 percent not offering an opinion. In both polls, Trump’s approval is at a new low. Immigration policy, once a bastion for Trump, has collapsed. His support on immigration isn’t quite down to the levels on some other issues—but in politics it’s as damaging when you lose your advantage on a good issue as when you do even worse on bad ones. At the beginning of Trump’s second term, he had an edge in the CNN poll in approval of his handling of immigration of 51 percent to 48 percent. Now he’s fallen to 39 percent approval, 61 percent disapproval. And Quinnipiac has very similar results, with Trump now at 40 percent approval and 57 percent disapproval on immigration. Moreover, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the face of Trump’s mass deportation policy, is strikingly unpopular. CNN finds Americans saying by a margin of 50 percent to 30 percent that enforcement actions by ICE are making cities less safe rather than more safe. Quinnipiac has 37 percent of voters approving of the way ICE is doing its job, while 60 percent disapprove. Could this lead some Republican senators, especially ones on the ballot in November, to vote to extend protections for Haitians or others? Could they be pressured to support other measures to make ICE accountable and responsible? It’s worth testing that proposition when Congress returns in September. And it’s worth making that argument throughout August. The economy and the Iran war remain Trump’s greatest vulnerabilities. But flipping immigration from a positive to a negative issue for Trump, and hammering home the fact that Republicans in Congress are refusing to do anything to stop his excesses, could turn a Republican defeat in November into a rout. AROUND THE BULWARK
Quick Hits86 47: James Comey’s attorneys this week released a trove of documents detailing Donald Trump’s Justice Department’s nakedly retaliatory attempt to put him in prison over an “86 47” Instagram post. The outrageous behavior they detailed could fill an entire newsletter: The documents, for instance, depict the complete collapse of all barriers to political influence in federal enforcement. To take just one example of many, the Secret Service officers tailing and surveilling Comey passed along regular updates to Trump’s personal protection detail to keep the president informed in real time. For our money, though, the funniest chestnut came the day after Comey’s post, when Trump took to Fox & Friends to fume that “He knew exactly what that meant. A child knows what that meant. . . . That meant assassination and it says it loud and clear. . . . He’s calling for the assassination of the president.” Trump’s comments, per Comey’s team’s filing, appear to have prompted an immediate change in Secret Service threat-monitoring policy. “Effective immediately, please include ‘8647’ in manual keyterm searches for threats to POTUS Trump. . . . ‘8647’ could be coded threat language for ‘kill the 47th President’. . . . The language itself could constitute a threat and it also could constitute unusual behavior.” The new policy lasted barely twelve hours. That same night, a new directive came down from an assistant director for the Secret Service: “I appreciate the team’s effort on this. As we figured, this is a lot and we can’t, nor should be expected to document all of these references to 8647. We should go back to business as usual, unless someone is inciting violence along with those numbers or adding egregious and threatening language.” The government’s official policy: When Comey says it, it’s a true threat to imminently assassinate the president. When anyone else says it, it isn’t even worth keeping a log of. (Which is good, because Congress or the Cabinet should absolutely 86 47.) FAUCI RELITIGATED: Perhaps the only surprising thing about Republicans’ abrupt attempt to relitigate the COVID-era culture war over Anthony Fauci is that it hadn’t happened until now. Unlike, say, James Comey, Fauci wasn’t a top target for retribution upon Trump’s return to office—the president had never considered him a personal enemy, and at any rate Joe Biden had issued the eminent epidemiologist a preemptive pardon. But for some other Republicans, Fauci has remained public enemy number one—particularly Sen. Rand Paul, who chairs the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs committee. Paul has long blamed Fauci—rather than Trump—for spearheading the government’s cautious approach to the early COVID pandemic, and has accused him, among other things, of wrongfully trying to smother the theory that the disease escaped from a Chinese lab. Paul has long sought to compel Fauci’s testimony before his committee, and yesterday he got his wish. Ahead of the hearing, Paul heightened the spectacle by releasing thousands of pages of Fauci’s personal journals—supposedly on the grounds of highlighting difference between Fauci’s private and public communications about the pandemic at the time, but transparently also hoping to embarrass the doctor by revealing, among other things, his bemused journaling about the public spotlight he’d suddenly found himself thrust into. Fauci showed up, but not to cooperate. In his opening statement, he cited Paul’s “unhinged obsession with me” to argue that “the sole reason he is calling me before this committee is to get me to say something—anything—that could vindicate his repeated public pledges that I end up, in his words, ‘behind bars.’” As a result, Fauci said, he would decline to answer any and all questions put to him by the committee, citing his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. Paul wasn’t pleased. After the hearing, he suggested that Republicans would pursue contempt charges against Fauci for his refusal to answer their questions. “Maybe the Fifth Amendment doesn’t attach when you have a pardon in place,” Paul said. NEW CHAIR, SAME AS THE OLD CHAIR: New Fed Chair Kevin Warsh isn’t giving Donald Trump what he wants, but the president isn’t holding it against him—yet. Trump spent more than a year making Jerome Powell, Warsh’s predecessor, miserable over what he saw as Powell’s unforgivable slowness in bringing down interest rates. But he’s also dealt Warsh an impossible hand this year by adding heaps of inflationary strain to the economy via tariffs and the Iran war, making speedy rate cuts all but impossible. Yesterday, the Fed board voted for the second time under Warsh to hold rates steady—with three dissenting votes that would have favored a rate hike. Trump, of course, doesn’t agree that cuts would risk runaway inflation. But he’s remained gracious to Warsh the only way he knows how: By blaming the rest of the Fed governors for a change. “Kevin’s fantastic, but he’s got a board,” Trump told reporters yesterday. “He’s got a board, and it’s a political board. And they want to keep rates up.” Cheap Shots
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