Fed Agent Permanently Blinds, Fractures Skull of Anti-ICE Protester
A 21-year old anti-ICE protester has been left permanently blinded in California after a Department of Homeland Security agent shot him in the face with a nonlethal round at point-blank range on Friday.
Kaden Rummler can be seen on video rushing to help a fellow protester at Civic Center Plaza in Santa Ana before being shot by a federal agent. He crumples to the ground in a heap, covering his face before an officer drags him away by his hoodie. Rummler’s aunt said he was left with a fractured skull and shards of plastic, glass, and metal stuck all throughout his eyes and face, and would have died if not for the six hours of surgery he went through.
“That could have cost him his life,” Jeri Rees told the Los Angeles Times. “But now, for the next six weeks, he can’t sneeze or cough because it could do a lot of damage.… The other officers were mocking him, saying, ‘You’re going to lose your eye.’”
This is one of countless instances of excessive, brutal force being used against U.S. residents in the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Rummler’s blinding happened just two days after ICE shot and killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis.
Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin described the scene as “a highly coordinated campaign of violence where rioters wielded shields,” but had no comment on the use of excessive force from her agents. A spokesperson from the Santa Ana Police Department said the only coordinated violence they saw were demonstrators throwing orange cones.
The FBI searched the home of a Washington Post reporter on Wednesday, as part of what government officials said was an investigation into the sharing of government secrets, The New York Times reports.
Hannah Natanson has been covering the White House’s efforts to cut down the federal workforce and reshape the civil service to support President Trump’s agenda. In her work, she spoke to several government employees frustrated with the Trump administration. The Post said that the bureau was investigating a government contractor accused of illegally holding onto classified materials.
Federal agents searched Natanson’s home as well as her personal devices. The search warrant stated that the investigation concerns Aurelio Perez-Lugones, a system administrator in Maryland with a top-secret security clearance accused of accessing classified intelligence reports. Perez-Lugones allegedly took the reports home, and they were found in his lunchbox and basement, according to an FBI affidavit.
Natanson told the Post that a phone and a smartwatch were taken by agents. While Trump and other administration officials have a reputation for being hostile to the press, a search of a reporter’s home is extremely rare.
This story has been updated.
The Michigan Ford autoworker who screamed “pedophile protector” at President Trump on Tuesday—eliciting a “Fuck you” and a middle finger from the president—has been suspended from work.
White House communications head Stephen Cheung described the man as a “lunatic” who was “wildly screaming expletives in a complete fit of rage.” But TJ Sabula, a 40-year-old United Auto Workers Local 600 line worker, seems to be in his right mind, and says he would probably do it all over again.
“As far as calling him out, definitely no regrets whatsoever,” Sabula told The Washington Post, after confirming that he was the one to heckle the president. He also added that he believes he’s being “targeted for political retribution” for “embarrassing Trump in front of his friends.”
Am I crazy or did Trump just flip off some hecklers? 😂 pic.twitter.com/Zm3cRdD31O
“I don’t feel as though fate looks upon you often, and when it does, you better be ready to seize the opportunity,” said Sabula, an independent who is particularly disturbed by the lack of transparency surrounding the Epstein files. “And today I think I did that.” A fundraiser for Sabula has already raised $150,000.
Donald Trump has stepped up his rhetoric on Greenland hours before Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance will meet its foreign minister along with Denmark’s at the White House.
Early Wednesday morning, the president posted on his Truth Social account, “The United States needs Greenland for the purposes of National Security.
“It is vital for the Golden Dome that we are building,” he added, referring to the massive © New Republic
