Trump concedes to courts but controls narrative on Abrego Garcia’s return home

ALSO INSIDE: Army of veterans floods the Capitol to protest cuts to lifesaving benefits

Jun 07, 2025

Cam here 👋 bringing you your daily dose of what people are doing – good, bad, and otherwise – in the world of politics. We’re diving into the stories you won’t see anywhere else. And remember, you can also keep up with me over on TikTok and Bluesky.

What Happened

Kilmar Abrego Garcia is returning to the US, something the Trump administration has claimed was not possible and would never happen.

While the courts ultimately won this battle, Trump’s team has been laying the groundwork to heavily control the narrative so they could still claim victory. And so far, it’s working. In the lead-up to Abrego Garcia’s return, the US Department of Justice set up a human trafficking case against Abrego Garcia—which, while filmsy, has been enough to taint nearly every headline on the subject.

Here’s the reality:

Abrego Garcia was indicted by a grand jury, a body that sides with prosecutors 99.9% of the time.
The charges are based on a 2022 traffic stop where police let him go with a warning.
Prosecutors say the car Abrego Garcia was driving was registered to a witness who claims to have hired him to transport people, but there’s no incident report of the traffic stop to corroborate this.
The government claims, without evidence, that Abrego Garcia’s actions are due to his membership in an international gang.
The Trump administration now claims Abrego Garcia has been resisting their attempts to bring him back to the US, despite the fact that he never made this claim in court, in his communication with the judge who demanded they bring him back.

If the Trump administration is able to produce as much (or, I should say, as little) evidence for this case against Abrego Garcia as they were in the previous one, it will be equally as difficult to prove he’s guilty. But pending their loss in court, they’ve already scored a major victory in the court of public opinion, as anyone reading the news about the man they wrongly deported and incarcerated will be inundated with dubious claims that he’s a human trafficker.

Attempts to Sanewash

Far-Right Spin

Army of veterans flood the Capitol

Thousands of veterans filled the National Mall Friday to protest proposed budget cuts to veterans' benefits and the decreased quality of services as a result of the Trump administration’s mass firing of federal employees.

Veterans from nearly every state in the country wrote letters to the protest organizers, sharing their personal stories about how the services they had been promised had helped them, and what it would mean to take them away.

“I’m watching our benefits through a closing door,” wrote Jax, an Army veteran from Florida. “I do not have the retirement which existed when I joined. I’m watching my husband wait months at the VA and I already gave up and pay at a civilian facility.”

Should the Republican budget be signed into law, the VA is expected to cut another 80,000 jobs, which would result in a reduction of potentially lifesaving healthcare for nearly 9 million people.

Republicans have begun to sour recently on Trump’s massive budget, a sign that additional pressure from the public—like Unite for Veterans’ Friday protest, which the group says drew in upwards of 20,000 people—could sway enough votes to block it in the Senate.

US Rep. Andy Harris, Maryland’s 1st Congressional District

Since taking office in 2011, Rep. Andy Harris has:

Seen his net worth increase from $2.5M to $5.5M
Sponsored 34 bills
Authored one bill that has been signed into law, to rename a post office.

Fun Facts

Harris is an anti-immigration son of immigrants whose father served in World War II — alongside Nazis and Fascists in the Royal Hungarian Army.

He helped plan the Jan. 6 Insurrection, downplayed its severity after it failed, and tried to bring a gun on the House floor a few weeks later.

As an anesthesiologist, Harris has played fast and loose with his doctor’s notes, prescribing the deworming drug ivermectin to patients diagnosed with COVID-19.

As a state legislator in 2001, Harris attempted a filibuster to block a bill to prohibit discrimination against same-sex couples. His filibuster lasted for two hours, when a supermajority in the state senate voted for him to shut up.

While his only successful legislation was naming a post office, in 2019, he failed to block the renaming of a different post office after Maya Angelou.

Michigan could tax the rich to fund public schools

A coalition of education advocates his working to add a proposition to Michigan’s 2026 ballot that would enshrine an education tax in the state constitution.

The state currently has a flat tax of 4.5% for couples with a household income of $1 million. The proposed change would round that tax up to 5%, with the additional taxed amount going directly to the state’s education budget.

Adding a citizen’s initiative to Michigan’s ballot isn’t easy; organizers need to collect 600,000 signatures from eligible voters. If it does make it onto the ballot and is approved by voters, the new tax is estimated to bring in nearly $2 billion for schools.

Initiatives like this have had public support in other states. Arizona voters approved a similar measure in 2020, but the tax was challenged in court and thrown out by the state’s Republican-majority Supreme Court.

Read the full breakdown on Michigan’s attempt to tax the rich over at The ‘Gander, COURIER’s newsroom in the Mitten State.

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