A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
It’s Only Going To Get Worse From Here
The sacking of top generals and lawyers at the Pentagon is merely the first step in what is expected to be a widespread politicization of the nation’s military. The weekend developments included:
- The removal of Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The four-star Air Force general, who is Black, was apparently penalized in part for a moving four-minute video he sent to airmen in his command in the aftermath of the police killing of George Floyd.
- The firing of Adm. Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to be chief of naval operations.
- The sacking of Gen. James Slife, the Air Force’s No. 2 officer.
- The purging of the judge advocates general for the Army, Navy, and Air Force.
- Some 5,400 civilian Pentagon employees will be purged.
Trump’s proposed replacement for Brown, retired Air Force Lt. General Dan Caine, would require Trump to issue a waiver because he doesn’t meet the qualifications set by law for the job.
The Pentagon purge comes as the Trump administration is ramping up plans to detain undocumented immigrants at U.S. military sites and has threatened to use the military in domestic law enforcement.
But perhaps the biggest threat to the professionalized U.S. military is stacking the mid-level officer ranks with loyalists whose rise is based on partisan political considerations instead of performance.
‘The First Thing We Do, Let’s Kill All The Lawyers’
Hegseth says firing of top military lawyers was about making sure "they don't exist to be roadblocks to anything that happens."
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) February 23, 2025 at 9:58 AM
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Purge Tracker
- USAID: The Trump administration purged some 2,000 USAID workers over the weekend
- HUD: The Trump administration is projected to purge HUD’s workforce by half, cutting it from about 8,300 employees to just over 4,000, the WaPo reports.
- ICE: Trump has sacked his own choice of acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement for not moving fast enough on mass deportations.
DOGE Watch
- Elon Musk’s DOGE sent an insane government-wide email demanding that recipients respond by midnight tonight with a list of five things they achieved last week. Online, Musk claimed that failure to respond would result in termination; the email didn’t threaten termination. The administrative arm of the federal courts instructed the judicial branch to disregard the email, TPM’s Josh Kovensky reports. Elements of the executive branch, especially in the national security realm, gave similar guidance to ignore Musk.
- U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas of Manhattan extended her order keeping DOGE out of the Treasury Department payment systems because the Trump administration’s process for granting access to the sensitive data was so flawed and haphazard.
- DOGE staffer Edward “Big Balls” Coristine is the grandson of KGB agent Valery Martynov, who was executed by the Soviets for spying for the United States, Jacob Silverman reports:
Quote Of The Day
“The point isn’t to clown on [Kevin] Hassett—the world is full of silly people—but rather to demonstrate how bankrupt the conservative intellectual world has become. Because no system based on any kind of merit would elevate a man like Hassett to the heights he has reached.”–Jonathan V. Last, on Trump’s director of the National Economic Council
Just When You Thought Things Couldn’t Get Worse At DOJ
- President Trump announced that the conservative commentator and conspiracist Dan Bongino will be the FBI deputy director, a role typically held by a veteran agent who runs the bureau day to day. Trump has installed two political loyalists at the top of the premier federal law enforcement agency, neither of whom has any FBI experience.
- FBI Director Kash Patel will be dual-hatted as acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
- Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove was nearly demoted for his harsh management style back when he was a federal prosecutor in Manhattan, Politico reports.
- Acting DC U.S. Attorney Ed Martin spent the past two years on his personal podcast talking about investigating the DOJ officials involved in prosecuting Donald Trump.
Stroke Of Genius
U.S. District Judge Dale Ho declined to rule immediately on the Justice Department’s corrupt motion to dismiss the criminal case against NYC Mayor Eric Adams. Instead, Ho appointed Paul Clement, the skilled conservative legal stalwart who served as solicitor general in the Bush II Justice Department, to create a more adversarial setting so that Ho can parse the various issues raised by the corrupt DOJ scheme. Clement is a highly respected Supreme Court advocate with a strong sense of DOJ’s traditions and protocols. The one knock against him is that he doesn’t have a criminal law background.
The Courts Alone Won’t Save Us
- DEI: In a new ruling, U.S. District Judge Adam Abelson in Maryland blocked the Trump administration from terminating federal grants and contracts related to DEI
- OSC: The Supreme Court declined to intervene for now in U.S. Special Counsel Hampton Dellinger’s claim that he was illegally fired by President Trump.
- Trans in Military: The Justice Department sent a complaint to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals accusing U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes of misconduct for allegedly showing bias in her handling of a challenge to President Trump’s ban on transgender people serving in the military.
Trump White House Sued For Constitutional Violations
The Associated Press has sued Trump White House chief of staff Susan Wiles, deputy chief of staff Taylor Budowich, and press secretary Karoline Leavitt over being denied access to presidential events as retaliation for refusing to adopt “Gulf of America” in its new stories. The case was randomly assigned to perhaps the Trumpiest federal judge in DC, Trevor McFadden.
Pure Thuggery
The President’s taunting, threatening, bullying hectoring of Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D) – in public at the White House – ostensibly over trans athletes was a gratuitous bit of performative misogyny. The partial transcript below doesn’t fully capture the exchange so make sure to watch the full video:
TRUMP: The NCAA has complied immediately. That's good. But I understand Maine — is the governor of Maine here? JANET MILLS: Yeah I'm here TRUMP: Are you not gonna comply? JM: I'm going to comply with state and federal law T: You better do it bc you're not gonna get any federal funding at all
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) February 21, 2025 at 2:01 PM
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Ukraine In The Trump Wringer
The Trump administration has raised the specter of cutting off Ukraine’s access to Elon Musk’s Starlink service if it doesn’t agree to an extortionate deal to sign over its mineral wealth and other national assets to the United States as purported “payback” for providing aid to fend of Russian invasion. As the historian Timothy Snyder put it: “It is morally grotesque, during this war, to put imagined American grievances first.”
The Great Resegregation
If the Great Resegregation proves successful, it will restore an America past where racial and ethnic minorities were the occasional token presence in an otherwise white-dominated landscape. It would repeal the gains of the civil-rights era in their entirety. What its advocates want is not a restoration of explicit Jim Crow segregation—that would shatter the illusion that their own achievements are based in a color-blind meritocracy. They want an arrangement that perpetuates racial inequality indefinitely while retaining some plausible deniability, a rigged system that maintains a mirage of equal opportunity while maintaining an unofficial racial hierarchy. Like elections in authoritarian countries where the autocrat is always reelected in a landslide, they want a system in which they never risk losing but can still pretend they won fairly.
Too Much … Even For Nick Fuentes?
Hitler-loving white nationalist Nick Fuentes reacts to Steve Bannon throwing a Sieg Heil at CPAC: "It's getting even a little excessive for me."
— Right Wing Watch (@rightwingwatch.bsky.social) February 21, 2025 at 2:03 PM
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For the record, Bannon later denied that he was making the Nazi salute.
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