Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana is ringing the alarm that his party is headed for big trouble in this year’s midterm elections, singling out the ongoing failure of the Trump economy as a key factor. In an interview with The Hill, Kennedy advocated for Republicans to pass more legislation via the reconciliation process used to pass the “One Big Beautiful Bill” in 2025. Kennedy argues that Republicans need to address rising costs or else they will be punished this fall. He notes that installing pro-Trump operatives in the government and in the judiciary hasn’t helped the party’s approval. “We’re not going to win the midterm by going to the American people and saying, ‘Look, we passed 11 out of 12 appropriations bills and we confirmed all of President Trump’s nominees,’” Kennedy said. Related | American optimism hits new low Kennedy went on to explain, “[Voters are] worried about the cost of living. … In their minds, they’re tired of selling blood plasma to go grocery shopping.” But ironically, Kennedy was one of 51 Senate Republicans who voted for the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” which passed on a party-line vote opposed by every Democrat. The bill cut subsidies for the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), contributing to the increase in health care costs that has been a part of the affordability problems booming under Trump.  The senator is a part of the problem he is now openly worrying about. In Trump’s first year back in office, the economy added almost no jobs—a reversal from the strong job gains that had occurred under former President Joe Biden and a return to Trump’s poor job performance in his first term. Policies like the Big Beautiful Bill and huge tariffs have acted like an anchor on the economy, raising taxes and costs instead of helping consumers. Things have gotten so bad that even a handful of congressional Republicans recently joined with Democrats to symbolically rebuke and rein in Trump’s tariff powers. Recent special election results and races last year have almost uniformly shown voters shifting towards the Democrats, with even Republican wins in previously safe areas showing much narrower margins. There are clear signs of a coming blue tsunami of votes in favor of the Democrats, which has left Republicans scrambling to rig election rules to preserve their party’s power. It hasn’t helped Republicans that Trump’s approval ratings have nosedived. He did not start out his second term from the strong position of other recent presidents like Obama and Biden, and his failures on economic policy have been compounded by his abuse of migrants, embrace of racism, and stumbling on the world stage. On the key issue of affordability, Trump has made things difficult for Republicans trying to win races. He has falsely declared that inflation has been “solved,” and argued that the very notion of affordability was a “hoax” pushed by Democrats. Kennedy is unlikely to get his wish of a Republican bill designed to stop Democratic gains in this year’s elections. Instead, he and his party are stuck with Trump’s poor economy while voters are set to punish the GOP’s failures. Again.

A cartoon by Clay Jones. Related | Trump posts video of the Obamas as apes—and won't apologize

When Victor Villa arrived back at his taqueria in Los Angeles—just 24 hours after appearing alongside Bad Bunny in the Super Bowl halftime show—confetti streamers filled the air as his parents embraced him.  The owner of Villa’s Tacos was among the revelers featured by rapper Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio (aka Bad Bunny) during his iconic performance highlighting the deep, colorful Latino culture that has long existed across the Americas. And the message couldn’t have come at a more crucial time for the U.S.  In the past year, Latin Americans and Latino immigrants have become targets of the Trump administration’s cruel mass deportation plan.  “I pray for [the immigrants]. And more than anything, I pray for discernment for ICE agents, that they can open their hearts,” Villa told Daily Kos.   x x YouTube Video When Bad Bunny turned towards the camera on Feb. 8, he was surrounded by a makeshift Puerto Rican sugar cane field. Various other scenes familiar to Latin Americans played out across the performance. All of them aimed to bolster a sense of pride for people and cultures currently under attack by the Trump administration.  “The lady on the corner selling flowers isn't the problem,” Villa said, explaining that the countless arrests happening likely aren’t targeting the hardened criminals the Trump administration claims to be going after.  Related | All the Easter eggs in Bad Bunny’s halftime show While other nationalities have been impacted by Trump’s chaotic deportation crusade, ICE data shows that people from Central and South American countries in particular have had the highest number of arrests. Latinos across the U.S. have been in a state of terror and shock by the federal government’s aggressive approach. Doors remain locked, school graduations have been missed, people aren’t going to work—all out of fear that they or someone they love will be snatched and disappear in Trump’s callous deportation system.  And their fears are increasingly shown to be justified. In the past year, ICE detention facilities saw the highest number of deaths in over 20 years. Meanwhile, men accused of being gang members have been sent to a notorious prison in El Salvador, despite no due process and many not even being from that country.  Many others have been deported to countries other than their homelands, as well.  Leading up to the Super Bowl, headlines swirled with threats of ICE’s presence outside of the Bay Area stadium. And MAGA supporters seethed over the concept of a halftime show by the Puerto Rican artist, who isn’t bringing his new world tour to the U.S. over fears that his shows will be targeted by immigration authorities. But at the Super Bowl, that fear was set aside for at least 13 joyful minutes. Villa, standing behind a mobile grill for his Michelin-recognized tacos, was among the many celebrating that day—both on the field and at home watching the show on TV. Another featured guest during Bad Bunny’s performance also made the magical moment memorable with a legitimate proposal.  x x YouTube Video Daily Kos also spoke with Victor Dimaren, who got on one knee during the performance. He confirmed via text that the proposal to his now-fiancée, Emma Eldridge, was real. Still, after the dust settled and Villa returned to Los Angeles, the business owner’s whirlwind moment of celebration came juxtaposed with the reality of why Bad Bunny closed his performance by saying, “Mi patria, Puerto Rico, seguimos aquí (My country, Puerto Rico, we’re still here).” Latinos, including Puerto Ricans—who are definitely American citizens no matter how many times Republicans forget it—are facing cultural erasure in the U.S.  Related | MAGA freaks out as millions of normal people enjoy Bad Bunny But Villa, after handing out beers to the excited patrons standing in a long line waiting to try his tacos after his Super Bowl cameo, told Daily Kos that he has nothing but pride.  “I started this business, my parents were immigrants and I'm a byproduct of those immigrants,” he said.  “We look at everybody as just people, they deserve to be loved. They deserve to be appreciated. They deserve to be treated with respect.”

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez continued to command the world stage, providing at least one sane emissary from the United States amid the rise of Donald Trump’s chaotic, autocratic movement.  In a wide-ranging interview Sunday at Technische Universität Berlin with German Bundestag member Isabel Cademartori, Ocasio-Cortez took aim at the architects of MAGA’s «anti-cancel culture» movement who are now trying to dodge accountability over the Epstein files—and slammed attorney general Pam Bondi’s pathetic performance before Congress. x x YouTube Video Ocasio-Cortez described the “cancel culture” narrative as a politicization of decency.  “That's the erosion in culture [and] morality that is being hinted at here when Pam Bondi says there's no more work here to be done,” she said. “Really? You are the Attorney General of the United States of America and you don't want to hold any one of these pedophiles accountable. Resign or be impeached.” Bondi’s bizarre performance last week did little to ease the public's frustration over the Trump administration’s handling of the long-promised files.  Related | Pam Bondi loses her sh-t at Epstein hearing The well-earned public scorn being experienced by many powerful figures does not preclude the need for true accountability, and Ocasio-Cortez could run for any office on that—and maybe she will.

Have you been feeling like you need to rush to get a passport in case the SAVE Act voter suppression jamboree becomes law? What if, somehow, President Donald Trump signing a piece of paper means that the provisions of the SAVE Act go into effect even without legislation?  Well, good luck scoring that passport in time.  In what is a nakedly transparent move, even for this administration, the State Department announced that it is just straight-up making it harder to get a passport. Nonprofit libraries were just informed that they can no longer process passport applications. Though the administration teed this up last November when it began sending cease-and-desist letters to nonprofit libraries, it didn’t bring the hammer down nationwide until last week. Oh, and it’s already in effect as of February 13, 2026. Related | GOP's new voter suppression bill won't SAVE anything It sure looks a lot like this is being done with the hopes that either the SAVE Act passes or Trump’s big cool conservative friends on the Supreme Court bless Trump’s assertion that he can just singlehandedly impose a voter ID requirement nationwide. How is the administration justifying this? Well, like so many things—birthright citizenship, sending the military into cities, firing everyone at independent agencies—the administration has decided that decades of settled law and regulations have simply been interpreted by the courts and Congress wrongly all this time. According to the State Department, they’ve suddenly discovered that an obscure 1920 law forms the basis for prohibiting nonprofit libraries from issuing passports.   There’s no explanation as to why, even if the State Department’s novel interpretation had any merit, this had to be rushed through. There’s also no explanation as to why the State Department has repeatedly reviewed, approved, and reauthorized nonprofit libraries to process passport applications in the past, only now discovering it is super-illegal. Government-run libraries are not affected by this announcement, so if your library is run by the county or the city, for example, you’re in luck. Nonprofit libraries are independently run and, gosh, whaddya know? They are most common in Northeastern states: Connecticut, Maine, New York, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island.  Huh. It’s probably just a coincidence that this would disproportionately affect blue states, right? Roughly 21 million people lack access to the additional documents required to comply with SAVE’s requirements. Driver’s licenses aren’t enough, so people need an additional document like a birth certificate or, you guessed it, a passport. No surprise the administration thus wants to make passports harder to obtain.  Related | Republicans bail on states’ rights so Trump can rig elections You also won’t be surprised that the State Department is lying about the scope of this, saying it only affects “less than one percent of our total network” of 7,500 passport processing facilities. However, the American Library Association—which, let’s face it, is going to be far more reliable here than the administration—says it affects about 1,400 nonprofit libraries, a good deal more than 1%. While this move is no doubt part of an overall voter suppression plan, it’s also part of the administration’s overall attack on libraries. A public service open to everyone? With books about everything? That provides additional support and services to a community? Well, we can’t have that.  At the start of his second term. Trump tried to kill the Institute of Museum and Library Services, firing the board members, placing nearly all staff on administrative leave, and cutting off grants for libraries nationwide. States had to sue to restore the funding, and a court ordered the administration to reinstate the grants last November. IMLS grants are the primary source of federal funding for state libraries, providing about $160 million each year, representing about one-third to one-half of library budgets.  Barring nonprofit libraries from offering passport services is also a financial hit. In Connecticut, for example, one library processed almost 8,000 applications in the last year and received just under $200,000 for those services.  Finally, eliminating nonprofit libraries makes it more likely that people will have to go to government-run offices to get passports. Naturalized citizens are entitled to vote and entitled to a United States passport. However, the administration desperately wants to strip citizenship from naturalized citizens. Where doing so has been quite rare in the past, the administration is shooting for 100-200 of these per month. Sure would be nice and convenient to be able to snatch people up right from the passport line, right? And given that Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been given the authority to racially profile people and detain them if ICE decides their proof of citizenship just isn’t valid, based on vibes, it’s likely that plenty of people will just choose not to get a passport at a government-run office.  Nonprofit libraries, on the other hand, often have longer hours, have a space for children to stay occupied during a parent or caregiver’s application process, and assist with language barriers. In short, they make it much safer and easier for people with less means to get a passport, and that’s exactly what the administration seeks to prevent.  It’s tempting to fall back on saying this is a nonstarter because elections are run by the states, and the Supreme Court will not agree that a random executive order is suddenly the law nationwide, but the Supreme Court has been asleep at the wheel when it comes to curbing Trump’s excesses. And of course, the court’s conservatives are also extremely into voter suppression.  Isn’t it fun that the very foundations of American democracy are now based on the whims of the very worst people?

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«A photograph is only a small piece in the jigsaw that makes up the big picture, but sometimes it is these small pieces that open our eyes.» Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $7 per month. The article ‘Where the World is Melting’ Documents Communities Amid Indelible Changes in the Arctic appeared first on Colossal.

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