The Hound | Aug. 11

Hi there,

It’s Tuesday. Trump's decision to keep National Guard troops deployed in Washington, D.C., through the end of his second term is expected to cost taxpayers an additional $1.4 billion — on top of what has already been spent since August 2025. The justification was fiction. The occupation is real — costing taxpayers more than a million dollars a day to have soldiers walk American streets, rake mulch, and prune trees, with no end date except Trump's personal satisfaction.

🖊️ Sign the petition to call on the media to cover the National Guard deployment in Washington not as a public safety initiative, but as what it is: an indefinite military occupation of the nation's capital, built on a lie, sustained by political will, and funded by taxpayers who deserve to know what their money is actually buying.

This is not a crime story. It is a power story. A president manufactured a public safety emergency in the capital city he directly controls, used it to deploy thousands of armed troops indefinitely, and has since expanded the playbook to Los Angeles, Chicago, and Portland. The chairman of the D.C. Council put it plainly: "The presence of armed soldiers on American streets is not a good look." It is also not normal. The public deserves reporting that calls an occupation an occupation.

In addition,

Read about these, and more, with today’s stories:

Washington grapples with a National Guard deployment extended until 2029 (AP News)

Trump Blurts Out Huge Admission of Midterm Weakness as MAGA Cracks Up (The New Republic)

Regulators Finally Poised to Review America’s Biggest Rail Merger (The American Prospect)

State Department Wants Palantir’s Advice on Free Speech and “Countering Digital Surveillance” (The Intercept)

How a family swimming spot at a national forest became ‘a trap’ for an ICE raid (The 19th News)

A Very American Invention, Pushed to an Extreme (Inside Climate News)

Until next time,

Harry from The Hound

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