Democracy Now!

Democracy Now! recently interviewed U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk in Geneva, Switzerland. The wide-ranging conversation touched on immigration policy in the United States, climate change around the world, the global fight to preserve human rights and more.See Part 1 of our conversation with Turk, including his response to Israel's brutal war on Gaza.

A federal judge in New Hampshire has issued a nationwide injunction against President Trump's executive order ending birthright citizenship for children born in the United States since February 20. In a class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of immigrant parents, the ACLU argued that the order would leave children born to undocumented parents effectively stateless." We speak to ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt about the case, which he calls cruel" and without merit, as well as new evidence that the Trump administration is lying about its power over people it has expelled to the Salvadoran mega-prison CECOT.

Rescue teams in central Texas are still searching for about 160 people who went missing in the catastrophic flash floods on July 4. The official death toll has climbed to at least 121 victims. State policymakers are now in the spotlight, as questions swirl around Texas's lack of emergency precautions and the climate denialism of Republican political leaders. Many of those lost lives could have been saved if links in our disaster response chain hadn't been broken," says Monica Medina, a former official at National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the federal administration that, among other tasks, monitors extreme weather. NOAA has been hit by major cuts to funding and staffing under Trump, despite the increasing frequency and intensity of natural disasters from climate change. Medina is among many climate and policy experts sounding the alarm on the defunding of NOAA and other meteorological and disaster preparedness services. We are firing the people. We're stopping taking in the data. We're ending the research. We're turning off the satellites. We're doing everything we possibly can to put our heads in the sand in the midst of what is increasingly dangerous weather."

U.N.: Israel Has Killed 800 Palestinians Seeking Aid in Gaza, Many at U.S. Aid" Operation GHF, Israel Kills 16 Palestinians, Including 8 Children, Waiting for Nutritional Supplements, Gaza Doctors Using Incubators for Four Babies at Once Amid Israel's Blockade, Trump Ramps Up Tariff Threat on Canada as Brazil Vows to Impose Reciprocal 50% Tariff on U.S., U.S. Judge Blocks Trump's Birthright Ban, Allows Class-Action Lawsuit to Proceed, Protesters Confront Feds in Camarillo, CA, as Agents Target Farmworkers, CPJ Calls for Release of Journalist Mario Guevara, Trump Admin Withdraws Head Start Services for Undocumented Children, Gutting of State Department Resumes Following SCOTUS Ruling, Kristi Noem Blames FEMA for Slow" Response in Texas - FEMA Says Delay Caused by Noem Rule, Texas Flood Death Toll Reaches 121; 160 People Still Missing, Texas Dems Slam Gov. Abbott Gerrymander Attempt in Wake of Flooding Disaster, 4 Million People Could Perish in HIV-Related Deaths in Next Four Years Due to U.S. Aid Cuts, U.S. Cuts Aid to Somalia But Continues to Bomb It, Illegal and Inhumane": Rights Groups Condemn Greece for Halting Processing of Asylum Claims, Iranian Lawyer Says 100 Transgender Prisoners Died in Israeli Bombing of Evin Prison, CUNY Targets Pro-Palestinian Students and Staff in Latest Crackdown, Grok to Be Installed in Teslas Days After MechaHitler" Scandal, Video Game Actors Sign New Contract After Yearlong Strike

We speak with United Nations expert Francesca Albanese, one day after the Trump administration announced it is imposing sanctions on her over her advocacy for Palestinian rights. Albanese has served as the U.N. special rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territory since 2022. She recently released a report highlighting dozens of companies aiding Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory and fueling its genocidal war machine in Gaza, including U.S. tech giants. Secretary of State Marco Rubio characterized Albanese's work as political and economic warfare" against the United States and its allies.It seems that this administration is quite allergic to justice," says Albanese, speaking to Democracy Now! from Slovenia. It's trying to distract us from where our focus should be: What's happening to the Palestinians in the little that remains of their tormented land, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and East Jerusalem."

Brazilian filmmaker Petra Costa's latest documentary, Apocalypse in the Tropics, explores the impact of evangelical Christianity on Brazil's political landscape. Once a small minority, evangelicals now constitute about 30% of Brazil's population and played a key role in the rise of former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro. It's one of the fastest-growing religious shifts in the history of mankind," Costa tells Democracy Now! She says right-wing evangelicalism in Brazil is largely a U.S. import, after Washington sought to undermine the influence of left-wing Catholic teachings during the Cold War.U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday threatened to impose 50% tariffs on Brazil, partly as retribution for what he calls the witch hunt" against Bolsonaro, now facing trial in Brazil for an alleged coup attempt following his defeat in the 2022 presidential election to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.Apocalypse in the Tropics is available on Netflix starting July 14. Costa's previous film, The Edge of Democracy, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.

The Trump administration's immigration crackdown is sowing fear and chaos in communities across the United States, as heavily armed and masked agents descend on workplaces, schools and public spaces. In Los Angeles, dozens of federal agents, including some on horseback, swept MacArthur Park, located in a predominantly immigrant and working-class part of the city. It felt like an occupation of L.A.," says Vladimir Carrasco, who works with the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, or CHIRLA.Meanwhile, community leaders in Chicago are expressing outrage after federal immigration forces showed up at the National Museum of Puerto Rican Arts and Culture and refused to identify themselves. Although Homeland Security later claimed the agents were at the museum on an unrelated matter, We know that they were there to intimidate us," says Veronica Ocasio, director of education and programming at the organization. Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens.

Gaza's Doctors Warn Hospitals Will Become Graveyards" as Fuel Supplies Dwindle, Israel's Netanyahu Leaves D.C. Without Ceasefire Deal and with Carte Blanche to Continue Genocide, Trump Admin Sanctions U.N. Expert Albanese for Exposing Companies Profiting from Gaza Genocide, Four Dead, 11 Missing in Wake of Houthi Attack on Red Sea Vessel, New Gaza Freedom Flotilla Ship Handala" to Set Sail from Italy, Trump Threatens 50% Levy on Brazil, Citing Bolsonaro Witch Hunt," in Latest Wave of Tariffs, Trump Praises Liberian President Boakai for His English, Liberia's Official Language, Russia Attacks Ukraine as New Audio Reveals Candidate Trump Told Putin He'd Bomb Moscow, SoCal Bishop Tells Worshipers to Skip Mass over ICE Raid Fears, Advocates Warn Arizona Woman Could Die of Cancer If She's Not Released from ICE Jail, Outrage in Chicago After Immigration Agents Show Up at Puerto Rican Museum , Supreme Court Won't Allow Florida to Enforce Law Criminalizing Undocumented Immigrants, June Heat Wave Killed 2,300 People Across 12 European Cities, Shoot Their Legs": Kenyan President Orders Police to Further Crack Down After Deadliest Protest Day, Imprisoned Kurdish Leader Announces End to 40-Year Armed Struggle Against Turkey

The largest municipal workers' strike in decades in the city of Philadelphia has ended after 9,000 members of AFSCME District Council 33, who are primarily sanitation workers, walked off the job a week ago. Growing piles of trash on the streets of Philadelphia brought the strike into clear view for city residents. Labor historian Francis Ryan says the workers won the hearts of a lot of Philadelphians" with a popular social media campaign. What I saw on the picket lines last week was a spark of social justice unionism," says Ryan. The average sanitation worker salary in Philadelphia is currently $46,000 a year, which the union has argued is not a living wage for workers required to live within the city limits.

The first trial in a case challenging the Trump administration's policy of detaining and deporting international students and professors who participate in pro-Palestinian activism is underway in Boston. The American Association of University Professors and the Middle East Studies Association brought the lawsuit. Government lawyers tried to get it dismissed, but U.S. District Judge William Young, an 84-year-old Ronald Reagan nominee, ordered a trial, saying it was the best way to get at truth."Students and faculty all over the country are quite literally terrified about the possibility that their advocacy and expression will lead to detention," says Jameel Jaffer, director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University and one of the lawyers challenging the Trump administration. They are terrified that ICE agents will show up at their door any day and take them away."

Ukraine's Air Force says Russia launched its largest aerial attack overnight since its 2022 full-scale invasion, firing a record 741 drones and missiles, most of them targeting the city of Lutsk in western Ukraine. The barrage prompted Poland to activate its air defenses and scramble fighter jets. Russia's attack came after President Trump on Tuesday sharply criticized Vladimir Putin in his latest in a series of U-turns on Ukraine policy. We speak with Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy and former foreign policy adviser to Senator Bernie Sanders, on the latest developments. Trump is learning that it's actually not that easy," he says. And it's not that easy because Vladimir Putin is not interested in a peace deal."

President Trump met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House for a second straight day Tuesday, as Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, claimed Israel and Hamas were nearing a breakthrough on a ceasefire agreement. Israeli media are reporting Netanyahu is under extreme" pressure to reach a 60-day ceasefire deal, but Netanyahu's interests and the interests of his government remain to make this a perpetual, ongoing war," says Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy. The U.S.-Israeli proposal would see 10 living Israeli hostages released, along with the bodies of deceased hostages, in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails. Hamas negotiators are also seeking the withdrawal of Israeli forces, guarantees for an end to the war, the resumption of humanitarian aid shipments overseen by the U.N. and the International Committee of the Red Cross, and an end to the operations of the so-called Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.

Netanyahu and Trump Meet at the White House for Second Day Amid Gaza Ceasefire Talks, Starving Palestinians Move South in Search of Food as GHF Closes Central Gaza Aid Site, Gaza Fuel Shortage Reaches Critical Point" as Israeli Attacks Kill 100 Palestinians in a Day, Israel Once Again Breaches Lebanon Ceasefire with Deadly Strikes, Houthis Sink Cargo Ship in Red Sea, Killing 3 Sailors, Supreme Court OKs Trump's Mass Firings and Elimination of Federal Agencies, Three Killed in New Mexico Flash Foods; Texas Flood Death Toll Rises, with 170+ Still Missing, Russia Launches Massive Aerial Attack on Western Ukraine as Trump Blasts Putin, ICC Seeks Arrest of Taliban Leaders for Persecution of Women and Girls, El Salvador Says U.S. Controls Fate of Venezuelans Transferred to Notorious Mega-Prison, Immigrants Describe Torturous Conditions at Alligator Alcatraz" ICE Detention Camp, Democrats Demand Release of Trump-Related Epstein Files as AG Bondi Says No Client List Exists, First-Ever Treatment for Malaria in Infants and Children Wins Regulatory Approval, Doctors and Public Health Groups Sue RFK Jr. for Ending COVID-19 Vaccine Recommendations

What is MAGA imperialism? Monthly Review editor John Bellamy Foster says that, despite its feints toward anti-imperialist isolationism, President Donald Trump's foreign policy has coalesced into a hyper-nationalist" form of populism that rejects the U.S.'s post-WWII adherence to liberal internationalism and promotes dominance over other countries via military power rather than through economic globalization. Foster explains that this Trump doctrine is opposed to multi-ethnic empires and multi-ethnic nations," operating under a racial definition of foreign policy, with the notion that the United States is a white country and other ethnicities don't belong." And while some analyses of the Trump coalition locate its base in the white working class," in reality this ideology is rooted in the lower middle class, which owns more property and is less opposed to the wealthy capitalist class. If you go back to the 1930s, to Italy and Germany, it's the same constituency that drove the fascist movement, but it's a result of an alliance between big capital ... and the lower middle class."

We speak to Peter Beinart, editor-at-large at Jewish Currents, about changing popular opinion in the U.S. toward Israel and Palestine. I'm not sure there's any political issue in the United States, perhaps other than gay marriage, over the last couple of decades where public opinion has shifted as fast," he says, citing the surprise victory of pro-Palestinian mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani in New York City's Democratic primary as evidence of a shifting political landscape. We also discuss a recent article in The New York Times that criticizes Mamdani, a Ugandan-born Indian Muslim who immigrated to the U.S. as a child, for self-identifying as both Asian and Black/African American on a college application. Beinart, whose own parents are of European Jewish background and were raised in multiracial South Africa, explains how the limitations of formal racial categories often elide the true complexity of racial, ethnic and national identity. It's not the case that Zohran Mamdani was trying to pull some sleight of hand to try to take advantage of affirmative action. This was a very deep statement about what he believed it was to have grown up in Uganda," he says.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump this week in Washington, D.C. Trump and Netanyahu are discussing Israel's war in Gaza, with Netanyahu suggesting that new plans for the forced relocation of refugees to other countries would give Palestinians the freedom" to choose. But what Palestinians actually want is the freedom to return to the places from which their families were expelled," says Peter Beinart, editor-at-large at Jewish Currents and the author of Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza. What kind of freedom is it when you have an area where most of the buildings and the hospitals and the schools and the bakeries and the agriculture have all been destroyed, where you have more child amputees than any other place on Earth?"

The most important thing that we have to do right now is hold the Republicans that voted for this bill accountable for the devastation that they are causing and the lives that will be impacted." Democratic Congressmember Yassamin Ansari of Arizona explains how Trump's new federal budget, which introduces major cuts to Medicaid, food assistance, housing and education, will worsen wealth inequality and the health disparities, while actually increasing the U.S. deficit by trillions of dollars and supercharging spending for immigration and border enforcement. The congressmember shares her recent experience visiting a detention center outside of Phoenix, calling some of the conditions there the most dehumanizing" she has ever seen. Ansari, the first Iranian American Democrat to serve as a member of Congress, also condemns the Trump administration's strikes on Iran in June. I do not believe that the president of the United States should be conducting unilateral military action without authorization from Congress," she says.

Netanyahu and Trump Promote Plan to Expel Palestinians from Gaza, As Trump Hosts Netanyahu, Protesters Rally at White House Gates to Oppose Gaza Slaughter, Israel Continues Slaughter of Palestinians at Gaza Aid Sites, Homes and Schools, Death Toll from Texas Floods Tops 100 as Hope Fades for Missing Victims, Trump Administration Cancels Protected Status for Honduran and Nicaraguan Immigrants, Armed and Masked Federal Agents Descend on L.A.'s MacArthur Park, Your Silence Won't Save You": L.A. Activists Urge Communities Nationwide to Rise Up Against Fascism, 11 Killed in Kenya Protests Marking Anniversary of 1990 Pro-Democracy Uprising, Russian Attacks in Ukraine Target Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia and Odesa, Trump Sending More Weapons to Ukraine Because He's Not Happy with Putin", Trump Revives Tariffs Threat on 14 Countries Unless They Make a Deal with U.S. by Aug. 1, BRICS Meeting Kicks Off in Rio as Trump Escalates Tariff Threat on Global South Bloc, Judge Temporarily Blocks Ban on Medicaid Funding for Planned Parenthood

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the White House on Monday to discuss a possible new ceasefire in Gaza, we speak with Dr. Feroze Sidhwa about the humanitarian disaster in the Palestinian territory, where Israel has damaged or destroyed much of the health infrastructure since the start of the war in October 2023. Sidhwa is a trauma surgeon in California who volunteered at Nasser Hospital in Gaza. He says Israel's impunity in attacking hospitals across Gaza is outrageous behavior" that blatantly violates the rules of war. Literally every attack on a healthcare facility in Gaza has been justified by ... a willful misunderstanding of international law or just outright lies."

We speak with investigative journalist Antonia Juhasz about how President Trump's major tax and spending bill hurts environmental justice efforts in Louisiana communities affected by the climate crisis and pollution from oil and gas facilities. The Trump administration had already canceled much of the funding for local environmental monitoring and advocacy, and the so-called Big, Beautiful Bill further entrenches the power of the fossil fuel industry. It's a frontal assault on environmental and climate justice, and it will set us back significantly unless we take action to confront the climate crisis," says Juhasz, who wrote about the bill's impact for Rolling Stone.

President Donald Trump and his allies are celebrating the passage of his sweeping tax and spending bill, which he signed into law on July 4 after a monthslong effort to shepherd it through Congress. Ultimately, just three Republicans in the Senate and two in the House voted against the legislation. The so-called Big, Beautiful Bill includes about $1 trillion in federal cuts to Medicaid and could kick 17 million people off their healthcare. It makes the largest-ever cuts to food assistance benefits, could cause the closure of nursing homes and rural hospitals across the country, raises housing and energy costs, and supercharges the Trump crackdown on immigrants - all while delivering massive tax benefits for the wealthiest people in the country. This is the most massive transfer of wealth upward in American history," says John Nichols, national affairs correspondent for The Nation.

At least 82 people have died and dozens are still unaccounted for after flash flooding in central Texas over the weekend, when the Guadalupe River rose about 26 feet in less than an hour on Friday amid torrential downpours. At least 10 girls who attended Camp Mystic, a girls' summer camp located on the banks of the river, are among the missing. In Kerr County, the most devastated area, at least 40 adults and 28 children have died. The speed and scale of the natural disaster has raised questions about why officials weren't better prepared, and whether the Trump administration's cuts to scientific positions exacerbated the situation.The National Weather Service, like a lot of federal agencies, went through significant loss of staff back in the spring," says retired NOAA meteorologist Alan Gerard, now the CEO of Balanced Weather, which provides critical weather and climate alerts. Gerard says that while it appears there was appropriate staffing ahead of the Texas flood, the impact of current budget cuts and even deeper reductions being considered by the administration are a cause for concern. We still have all of hurricane season to deal with," he says.

Trump Signs Bill to Cut Taxes on the Rich, Gut Social Programs and Speed Mass Deportations, Texas Floods Kill at Least 82 People, with Dozens Still Missing and More Rains Forecast, Amid Grief and Anger, TX Officials Blame Federal Gov't While Trump Deflects Questions on FEMA's Fate, It's Criminal": Trump Admin Discontinues Publication of Federal Reports on Climate Crisis, MSF's Abdullah Hammad Killed by Israel, the 609th Medical Worker Killed in Gaza Genocide, Shoot and Ask Questions Later": U.S. Whistleblower Says Aid" Workers Told to Attack Palestinians, Israel Attacks Yemen Ports, Power Plant as Houthis Continue Attacks on Israel over Gaza Genocide, Netanyahu Visits U.S. Despite ICC Arrest Warrant as Trump Touts Possible Ceasefire, U.K. Police Arrest Activists, Including 83-Year-Old Priest, for Protesting Ban on Palestine Action, Eight Immigrants Expelled from U.S. Transferred to South Sudan After SCOTUS Ruling, 200 U.S. Marines Descend on Florida to Assist in ICE Crackdown on Immigrants, Donald Trump vs. Elon Musk Feud Escalates with Announcement of America Party", Philadelphia City Workers Have Been on Strike for One Week to Demand Dignified Wages

As part of our July Fourth special broadcast, we continue our extended interview with Karen Hao, author of Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI. The book documents the rise of OpenAI and how the AI industry is leading to a new form of colonialism. One of the things that you really have to understand about AI development today is that there are what I call quasi-religious movements that have developed within Silicon Valley," says Hao. The concept of artificial general intelligence is not one that's scientifically grounded."

In our July Fourth special broadcast, we revisit our interview with longtime technology reporter Karen Hao, author of the new book Empire of AI, which unveils the accruing political and economic power of AI companies - especially Sam Altman's OpenAI. Her reporting uncovered the exploitation of workers in Kenya, attempts to take massive amounts of freshwater from communities in Chile, along with numerous accounts of the technology's detrimental impact on the environment. This is an extraordinary type of AI development that is causing a lot of social, labor and environmental harms," says Hao, in an extended interview.

We begin our July Fourth special broadcast with the words of Frederick Douglass. Born into slavery around 1818, Douglass became a key leader of the abolitionist movement. On July 5, 1852, in Rochester, New York, Douglass gave one of his most famous speeches, What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" He was addressing the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society. The late actor James Earl Jones read the historic address during a performance of Voices of a People's History of the United States, which was co-edited by Howard Zinn.

As we broadcast, the House was soon set to vote on the so-called big, beautiful bill before the July 4 deadline imposed by President Trump. Should the House pass the legislation, the bill would be sent to Trump's desk to be signed into law. The bill massively increases funding for ICE, cuts $1 trillion from Medicaid over a decade and adds $3.3 trillion to the nation's debt.It makes people in the country who are in the bottom 30%, working hard to pay their bills, poorer, because it's stripping away healthcare from them, stripping away food assistance from them. And it is all in the name of giving tax breaks to the wealthiest. ... The top 20% in this country get 60% of the benefits," says Democratic Congressmember Ro Khanna.

In his first live broadcast interview since being released from ICE detention, Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil tells Democracy Now! about his experience behind bars, the ongoing threat of deportation that hangs over him and why he continues to speak out against the U.S.-backed Israeli war on Gaza. The Columbia University graduate was the first pro-Palestinian campus protester to be jailed by the Trump administration. Khalil is now reunited with his wife Noor and newborn son Deen, after he was released on bail last month by a federal judge. Khalil says the Trump administration's attempts to silence him are a distraction from the genocide in Palestine."

GOP Leaders Advance to Final House Vote on Bill to Slash Social Programs and Cut Taxes on the Rich, Israeli Strikes on Gaza Kill 300 Palestinians in 2 Days, Including Hospital Director, 33 More Palestinians Slaughtered While Seeking Food at Militarized Gaza Aid Sites, U.S. Approves $510 Million Sale of Bomb Guidance Kits to Israel, U.K. Lawmakers Approve Ban on Palestine Action, Adding It to List of Terrorist" Groups, U.N. Rapporteur Identifies 60+ Firms Profiting from Gaza Slaughter and West Bank Occupation, No God Bombs Children": Peace Activists Protest Gathering of Christian Zionist Lobby Group, A Hugely Important Decision": Judge Strikes Down Trump's Ban on Asylum Claims at Southern Border, Attorneys Say Kilmar Abrego Garcia Was Brutally Tortured at Salvadoran Prison, Stateless Palestinian Woman Released After 5 Months in Texas ICE Jail, Court Rejects Trump Admin Bid to Rearrest Georgetown Peace Scholar Badar Khan Suri, Elderly Cuban Immigrant Dies in ICE Jail, the 13th Such Death This Year, Sean Diddy" Combs Acquitted of Sex Trafficking But Found Guilty on Lesser Charges, Wisconsin Supreme Court Strikes Down 176-Year-Old Abortion Ban, Pardoned Jan. 6 Rioter Who Threatened Cops Takes Job at DOJ Weaponization" Office, Trump Reduces Tariffs on Vietnam as Trump Organization Looks to Expand Investments

In an effort to fulfill the Trump administration's daily immigration arrest quotas," federal agents and deputized local law enforcement are racially profiling and snatching people off the streets without due process. These arrests, carried out by armed and masked agents, are sowing terror and confusion in communities across the United States. Stephano Medina, a lawyer with the California Center for Movement Legal Services, shares how ICE regularly denies that it has taken people into custody, leading to family members scrambling for information about their loved ones. It's arrest now, ask questions later," adds Dominique Boubion, an attorney representing Andrea Velez, a U.S. citizen who was taken by ICE last month in what Velez has since described as a kidnapping."

Deep in the Florida Everglades, at an abandoned airfield surrounded by barren swampland, local law enforcement authorities are opening the doors to a huge tent facility that hopes to lock up immigrants swept up in the Trump administration's mass deportation machine. Republicans have branded the still-unapproved facility Alligator Alcatraz," with Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier boasting that the state can afford to keep staff and safety costs low because the wild animals of the swamp will provide security and prevent escapes. Immigrant rights advocates warn that the cramped facility will further isolate immigrants who are being rounded up indiscriminately and detained without charge, and could lead to life-threatening overheating and overcrowding. We speak to Nery Lopez of Detention Watch Network and Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the American Immigration Council for more about the inhumane" proposed detention camp.

The budget bill just passed by the Senate provides more than $170 billion in new funding for immigration enforcement and detention. Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, who worked on an analysis published by the American Immigration Council, says the new budget would make ICE the single largest federal law enforcement agency in the history of the nation."

After a contentious round of last-minute negotiations, President Trump's budget bill has passed in the Senate, squeaking by thanks to Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote. Three Republicans joined Senate Democrats in voting no" on the bill, which gives tax cuts to the rich and makes historic cuts to Medicaid and food assistance. The bill now heads to the House of Representatives, where Republicans hold a slim majority, for a final vote before Trump's July 4 deadline. Citizen groups, including the grassroots political organization Indivisible, are calling on Americans, particularly those living in Republican and swing districts, to contact their House representatives and urge them to vote against the bill. It's not a done deal," says Indivisible's co-founder and co-executive director Ezra Levin. They do not have the votes."

Senate Narrowly Approves Massive Bill to Gut Social Programs and Cut Taxes on the Rich, We Will Not Accept This Intimidation": NYC Mayoral Candidate Zohran Mamdani Rejects Trump's Threats, Israel Continues Attacks on Aid Seekers as Gaza's Largest Hospital Is Forced to Halt Dialysis, Study Finds U.S. Foreign Aid Cuts Could Kill 14 Million People by 2030, Trump Administration Withholds $6.8 Billion in Public School Funding, Judge Blocks RFK Jr.'s Plan to Radically Downsize Department of Health and Human Services, Trump Jokes About Alligators Eating Immigrants During Tour of New Florida ICE Jail, Trump Administration Transfers More Immigrants to Guantanamo, Trump Administration Sues Los Angeles over Sanctuary City Policies, Judge Pauses DHS's Termination of Protected Status for Haitian Immigrants, SCOTUS Rejects ExxonMobil's Appeal of $14 Million Fine for Air Pollution at Texas Plant, UPenn Bans Trans Athletes; DOJ Claims Harvard Violated Civil Rights Law During Gaza Protests, Paramount Will Pay Trump $16 Million to Settle Lawsuit Alleging 60 Minutes" Bias, Jury Continues Deliberations After Reaching Partial Verdict in Sean Combs Sex Trafficking Trial

A heat wave is raising temperatures to dangerous levels across much of Europe, just days after a heat wave in North America saw over 3,000 temperature records set. For more, we speak with climate scientist Michael Mann, who warns that heat domes and flooding have nearly tripled since the 1950s. At some level, this isn't that complicated. You make the planet hotter, you're going to have more frequent and intense heat extremes," says Mann, a professor of environmental science at the University of Pennsylvania. Mann's upcoming book, co-authored with vaccine expert Dr. Peter Hotez, is Science Under Siege: How to Fight the Five Most Powerful Forces That Threaten Our World.

There are many things that happened in this war that are clearly war crimes," Volker Turk, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, says about Israel's war on Gaza. Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman spoke with the top U.N. rights watchdog in Geneva this week at the headquarters of the United Nations Human Rights Council. Turk, who has characterized Israel's actions in Gaza as ethnic cleansing, discusses the ongoing suffering of the civilian population, how Israel has attacked the U.N. and its workers, and why he continues to hope for both Israelis and Palestinians to live side by side in peace."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is visiting the United States next week to meet with President Donald Trump and other top officials in the U.S. administration, supposedly to capitalize on the success" of the 12-day war against Iran. This comes after nearly 21 months of Israel's war on Gaza that has killed at least 56,000 Palestinians, with daily violence only increasing. There's basically an airstrike every other minute," says Palestinian writer and analyst Muhammad Shehada. There's nonstop artillery fire, gunfire, machine gunfire, as well as Israeli quadcopter drones that are swarming Gaza and shooting people at random." While there have been news reports of a possible ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas, Shehada says there are no negotiations," and therefore no end in sight to the daily bloodshed.

We speak with American neurosurgeon Dr. Abdul Basit Khan in Gaza, where he is volunteering at the Nasser Hospital. He describes treating patients with blast injuries and gunshot wounds from Israeli attacks, all while coping with a lack of basic medical supplies and widespread hunger. Food insecurity is rampant, from all levels of society. Even the physicians are not eating," he says. Multiple blasts were heard during the interview, with Dr. Khan describing his patients as people living in tents being indiscriminately bombed" by Israeli forces. This is the worst thing I've ever seen in my entire life, by far."

Israel Bombs Crowded Gaza Cafe, Killing Dozens, Including Children, Israel Continues Attacks on Gaza Aid Sites; Babies Starve as Infant Formula Is Exhausted, Veterans End 40-Day Fast with Protest Demanding U.S. Stop Arming Israel, Senators Near Final Vote on Bill to Slash Social Programs While Showering Tax Breaks on the Wealthy, Justice Department Seeks to Strip Some Naturalized Immigrants of Citizenship, Trump to Attend Opening of $450 Million Alligator Alcatraz" ICE Jail in Florida, ICE Raids Terrorize Farmworkers, Causing Crops to Rot in Fields Amid Severe Labor Shortage, Advocates Call on FIFA to Ban Immigration Agents from World Cup Games, ProPublica Investigation Finds Kristi Noem Secretly Took a Cut of Political Donations, SCOTUS Will Hear Republicans' Challenge to Campaign Finance Limits, Iran Says Israeli Attack on Evin Prison Killed 71, Rejects U.N. Inspection of Bombed Nuclear Sites, Europe Swelters Under Record-Breaking Heat Wave as Wildfires Erupt in France, Turkey, Nearly Half of Tuvalu's Population Applies to Relocate to Australia Amid Rising Seas, Hong Kong's League of Social Democrats Disbands Amid Beijing's Crackdown on Dissent

We go to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, where activists are shining a light on Morocco's brutal occupation of Western Sahara and its Indigenous people, the Sahrawi. The Sahrawi journalist and activist Asria Mohamed speaks with Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman about Jaimitna," an art installation that evokes the tents of Sahrawi people living in refugee camps. The installation features various melhfas, traditional clothing worn by Sahrawi women, and includes their stories. These women, they spent years and years in prison. They have been tortured. They have been beaten up. They have been raped," Mohamed says. We also speak with Maria Carrion, executive director of FiSahara, the Sahara International Film Festival, who says the story of the Sahrawi must be better known. Morocco has occupied Western Sahara since 1975 in defiance of the United Nations and the international community. The first Trump administration recognized Moroccan sovereignty in 2020 as part of a larger effort to normalize relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors.

The Supreme Court's term ended Friday with a decision that promises to further expand the power of the president. Conservative justices argued lower federal courts cannot issue nationwide injunctions - a decision that limits judicial checks on presidential power. We have an imperial court that has created an imperial presidency," says Dahlia Lithwick, writer and host of the legal podcast Amicus. The 6-3 decision, split along ideological lines, could dramatically reshape legal citizenship in the United States and clears the path for many other Trump orders to potentially go into effect. The court also ruled on a case that will allow parents to pull their children from classes including LGBTQ+ books. The conservative justices cast these books as coercive simply because they have LGBT characters," says Chase Strangio, lawyer and co-director of the American Civil Liberties Union's LGBTQ & HIV Project.

Senate lawmakers are debating President Trump's 940-page so-called big, beautiful bill as Republicans race to meet a Trump-imposed July 4 deadline and are set to vote on key amendments. Senate Republicans have deepened the cuts to Medicaid while cutting taxes for the wealthy and increasing the national deficit. Basically, you have Republicans taking food and medicine and other things away from vulnerable people in order to finance tax cuts for the rich," says David Dayen, executive editor of The American Prospect.Dr. Adam Gaffney, a critical care physician and professor at Harvard Medical School, co-authored a report that found the bill could lead to 1.3 million Americans going without medications, 1.2 million Americans being saddled with medical debt, 380,000 women going without mammograms, and over 16,500 deaths annually. I work in the ICU. I see patients with life-threatening complications of untreated illness because they didn't get care because they couldn't afford it. What happens when we add to that number massively?" says Gaffney.

Tens of Thousands Flee Gaza City as Israel Issues New Forced Evacuation Orders, Haaretz: Israeli Forces Ordered to Fire on Unarmed Crowds Seeking Food, Netanyahu Corruption Trial Further Delayed as Trump Calls for Charges to Be Thrown Out, Russia Launches Largest Aerial Assault" on Ukraine Since Full-Scale Invasion, Ukraine Withdraws from Landmine Ban Treaty, Following Poland, Finland and Baltic States, Supreme Court Strips Lower Courts of Power to Issue Nationwide Injunctions, Senators Debate GOP Budget Bill in All-Night Session Ahead of Trump-Imposed Deadline, Under Fire for Opposing Medicaid Cuts, Sen. Thom Tillis Says He Won't Seek Reelection, Trump Administration Ends Protected Status for Over 500,000 Haitian Immigrants, Judge Rules Trump Administration Breached 2023 Settlement over Family Separations, University of Virginia President Resigns Amid Trump Administration Attacks over DEI, Trump Administration to End Conservation Rule Protecting Nearly 60 Million Acres of Forests, Canada Scraps Tax on Big Tech Companies After Trump Threatens Tariff Increase, Istanbul Police Arrest Dozens Ahead of Pride Parade; 100,000 March in Hungary Despite LGBTQ+ Ban

The legendary journalist Bill Moyers has died at the age of 91. Moyers, whose long career included helping found the Peace Corps and serving as press secretary for President Lyndon Johnson, was an award-winning champion of public television and independent media. We feature one of his numerous interviews on Democracy Now! where we discussed the history of public broadcasting in the United States and the powerful role of money in corporate media. The power of money trumps the power of democracy today, and I'm very worried about it," he said in a 2011 interview. His comments hold particular resonance as the Trump administration moves to strip federal funding from PBS and NPR today.

Democrat Pramila Jayapal is holding a series of shadow hearings" in Congress on Trump's immigration actions. Jayapal, the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Immigration, Integrity, Security and Enforcement, explains how Trump's immigration crackdown has created a Catch-22" for asylum seekers, who are being targeted for expedited removal" at their own immigration hearings. If you show up, you could get detained and deported. ... If you don't show up, then you are now in violation of the immigration regulations, and you're deemed as an absconder." Jayapal also comments on Trump's big, beautiful budget bill," which she calls the big, bad, betrayal bill" for its cuts to Medicaid and other social services.

Over 100 days have passed since the Trump administration's unprecedented removal of more than 230 immigrants to El Salvador's notorious mega-prison CECOT. They were removed without any due process in the United States. Democracy Now! spoke with the loved ones of Andry Hernandez Romero, a 33-year-old gay makeup artist and asylum seeker who was told he would be sent home to Venezuela, according to his mother. But instead, he was sent to CECOT, where reports of torture and abuse are rampant. His mother Alexis Romero and his best friend Reina Cardenas have not seen or heard from him in three months. He has been identified in photos taken at CECOT by a photojournalist. Hernandez Romero was detained from the moment he showed up for his asylum appointment," says Cardenas. He never had due process." Adds Margaret Cargioli, a lawyer for the family, He sought asylum because he was persecuted due to his political opinion and because he's LGBTQ. ... It is quite astonishing that in the United States, people are being disappeared in this manner."

The Supreme Court has sided with South Carolina's efforts to defund Planned Parenthood. Lower court rulings allowed Medicaid patients to sue over the state's restrictions on Medicaid funding for their healthcare clinics, which the Supreme Court overturned in a 6-3 decision on Thursday. Rebecca Grant, who writes about reproductive rights, says South Carolina's restrictions will likely be taken up by other states and could result in the closure of potentially hundreds of reproductive healthcare clinics. Grant outlines the alternative healthcare methods that many are forced to turn to in the face of dangerous and, since the fall of Roe v. Wade, increasingly draconian abortion restrictions. We know throughout history that making abortion illegal or trying to ban it does not make it go away," she says. This underground network of abortion access in the United States is the subject of Grant's new book, Access: Inside the Abortion Underground and the Sixty-Year Battle for Reproductive Freedom.

Israel Continues Deadly Attacks on Gaza Aid Sites as 17,000 Palestinian Children Suffer Malnutrition, Senate Democrats Question Trump's Claim of Obliterated" Iran Nuclear Sites, U.S. and China Agree to Framework" for Trade Deal, Senate Parliamentarian Deals Major Blow to Trump's Big Beautiful Bill", Supreme Court Sides with South Carolina in Campaign to Defund Planned Parenthood, Supreme Court Grants Reprieve to Condemned Texas Prisoner Minutes Before Lethal Injection, Masked ICE Agents Arrest L.A. Resident and U.S. Citizen Andrea Velez on Her Way to Work, Walmart Worker and U.S. Citizen Is Released from Detention After Violent Arrest by Federal Agents, Attorney General Pam Bondi Denies Knowledge of Masked and Hooded ICE Agents, Federal Judge Will Allow ICE to Force-Feed Hunger Striking Asylum Seeker, Canadian Citizen and Mexican Immigrant Become the Latest to Die in ICE Custody, Advisory Panel Stacked With RFK Jr. Appointees Recommends Against Flu Vaccinations, NYC Mayor Adams Announces Reelection Bid as Independent; Cuomo to Remain on the Ballot, Legendary Television Journalist Bill Moyers Dies at 91

President Donald Trump has returned to Washington after a NATO summit where leaders agreed to increase their military spending to 5% of GDP by 2035, more than doubling the current target of 2%. The increase comes after years of pressure from Trump, who accuses other countries in the military alliance of not spending enough. What he is interested in is catering to the military-industrial complex of the United States," says Gilbert Achcar, emeritus professor of development studies and international relations at SOAS, University of London. When he asks these NATO countries to increase their military expenditure, he means 'buy more U.S. weapons.' That's what he is doing. He's a salesperson for the military-industrial complex."

The Trump administration is intensifying its campaign against vaccinations, with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. withdrawing U.S. funding for the world's preeminent international vaccine organization. The group - known as Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance - is the world's largest funder of life-saving vaccinations and says it has helped vaccinate more than 1.1 billion children in 78 lower-income countries, preventing nearly 19 million future deaths. Kennedy also recently stacked an important vaccine advisory panel with unqualified appointees, many of them holding anti-vaccine views.Anti-vaccine activists have been shouting from the sidelines for decades. Now they're making policy," says Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.