information

The most prestigious board ever put together.

That is how the president of the United States, a man convicted of fraud, described his new team focused on international relations. A team that does not include representatives from our closest neighbors — Mexico and Canada — but did save room for leaders accused of war crimes by the International Criminal Court.

Now, we do not know whether President Trump created his “Board of Peace,” which this week held its first meeting, specifically to undermine the authority of the United Nations. But we do know that the president has pledged $10 billion in tax dollars to the board’s mission while still owing the U.N. half that amount in back payments. We do not know whether Trump, who is indefinitely the leader of this peace board, intends to relinquish that power after he leaves the White House. But we do know he is still trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Whether the “Board of Peace” is the most prestigious panel ever assembled is debatable. What is not debatable is that it was conceived by an adjudicated sexual abuser who is referenced in the released Epstein files some 38,000 times.

That is not my take.

That is simply what is happening.

Which is why the president encourages his supporters to ban books and reject journalism. He doesn’t want voters to pay attention. He doesn’t want voters to understand his actions.

Ten years ago this month — after his Nevada caucus victory speech — Trump said, “I love the poorly educated.” And his reliance on this base is why, over the past decade, he and other conservatives have purposely misconstrued the term “woke” as a catch-all slur toward progressive and far-left policies. It used to mean “aware” and “informed.” The term was not born out of modern politics but rather the need to understand the history of the social economic systems we all are living in. The alternative is to be blindly led by an unscrupulous leader most concerned with his own well being.

Being “woke” is why the Boston Tea Party happened in 1773; it is why Thomas Paine published “Common Sense” in 1776; it is why Republicans formed the Wide Awakes to help get Abraham Lincoln elected in 1860. When voters understand the context in which decisions are made, we are better equipped to address shortcomings at the ballot box and in our daily lives.

Trump’s self-proclaimed love for the poorly educated has nothing to do with progressive policies or college degrees and everything to do with whom he can convince to believe him. And by making “woke” an insult, Trump and other conservatives have politicized the very tool necessary to help the country fulfill its promise: information.

This threat is the reason his administration attacks, and even arrests, journalists; the reason he refers to reports he doesn’t like as “fake news”; the reason he fired the labor statistics chief after an unflattering jobs report last year. He’s waging a war on information.

The reason 2025 marked the worst nonrecession year for job growth since 2003 isn’t that the country was “woke.” It’s because of shortcomings in leadership.

When Trump returned to the White House, he made lowering the U.S. trade deficit a key component to his economic policy. In 2024, the deficit was $903.5 billion. In 2025, it was $901.5 billion — and America’s families paid $230 billion more for goods because of his yo-yo tariff policies.

He told his supporters that other nations would be paying for the tariffs he enacted — obvious nonsense to anyone who attended a day of Econ 101. And we know that as a result of his reckless and ignorant policies, farmers in particular suffered. It’s not clear whether that financial burden was a consideration when the Supreme Court on Friday declared the president’s sweeping tariffs to be illegal. What we do know is before Trump entered politics, his businesses filed for bankruptcy six times — so perhaps he was never the economic savant he claimed to be.

Just as the saga of the Epstein files reveals he is not the protector of women and young girls that he claimed to be.

Just as his recent attacks on the 1st, 2nd, 4th and 14th Amendments show he was never the defender of the Constitution he took an oath to be.

Acknowledging the laundry list of untruths tied to his promises and presidency is not political or a symptom of “Trump Derangement Syndrome.” It’s simply having information: the one thing that helps voters understand why things are the way they are. The one thing the president hopes his supporters never wake up to see for themselves.

YouTube: @LZGrandersonShow

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department has opened a federal civil rights investigation into the shooting of Alex Pretti, the Minneapolis resident killed Saturday by Border Patrol officers, federal officials said Friday.

“We’re looking at everything that would shed light on what happened that day and in the days and weeks leading up to what happened,” Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said during a news conference. “That’s like any investigation that the Department of Justice and the FBI does every day. It means we’re looking at video, talking to witnesses, trying to understand what happened.”

There are thousands of instances every year when someone is shot by law enforcement, Blanche said, but not all are investigated by federal authorities.

“There has to be circumstances or facts or maybe unknown facts, but certainly circumstances, that warrant an investigation,” he added.

The Department of Homeland Security also said Friday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation will lead the federal probe.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem first disclosed the shift in which agency was leading the probe during a Fox News interview Thursday evening. Her department said earlier this week that Homeland Security Investigations, a unit within the department, would be heading the investigation.

“We will continue to follow the investigation that the FBI is leading and giving them all the information that they need to bring that to conclusion, and make sure that the American people know the truth of the situation and how we can go forward and continue to protect the American people,” Noem said, speaking to Fox host Sean Hannity.

Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin confirmed Friday that the FBI will lead the Pretti probe and that HSI will support them. Separately, Customs and Border Protection, which is part of DHS, is doing its own internal investigation into the shooting, during which two officers opened fire on Pretti.

DHS did not immediately respond to questions about when the change was made or why. The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It was also not immediately clear whether the FBI would now share information and evidence with Minnesota state investigators, who have thus far been frozen out of the federal probe.

In the same interview, Noem appeared to distance herself from statements she made shortly after the shooting, claiming Pretti had brandished a handgun and aggressively approached officers.

Multiple videos that emerged of the shooting contradicted that claim, showing the intensive care nurse had only his mobile phone in his hand as officers tackled him to the ground, with one removing a handgun from the back of Pretti’s pants as another officer began firing shots into his back.

Pretti had a state permit to legally carry a concealed firearm. At no point did he appear to reach for it, the videos showed.

“I know you realize that situation was very chaotic, and that we were being relayed information from on the ground from CBP agents and officers that were there,” Noem said during the interview with Hannity on Thursday. “We were using the best information we had at the time, seeking to be transparent with the American people and get them what we knew to be true on the ground.”

The change comes after two other videos emerged Wednesday of an earlier altercation between Pretti and federal immigration officers 11 days before his death.

The Jan. 13 videos show Pretti in a winter coat, yelling at federal vehicles and at one point appearing to spit before kicking out the taillight of one vehicle. A struggle ensues between Pretti and several officers, during which he is forced to the ground. Pretti’s winter coat comes off, and he either breaks free or the officers let him go and he scurries away.

When he turns his back to the camera, what appears to be a handgun is visible in his waistband. At no point do the videos show Pretti reaching for the gun, and it is not clear whether federal agents saw it.

Steve Schleicher, a Minneapolis-based attorney representing Pretti’s parents, said Wednesday the earlier altercation in no way justified officers fatally shooting Pretti more than a week later.

In a post on his Truth Social platform early Friday morning, President Trump suggested that the videos of the earlier incident undercut the narrative that Pretti was a peaceful protester when he was shot.

“Agitator and, perhaps, insurrectionist, Alex Pretti’s stock has gone way down with the just released video of him screaming and spitting in the face of a very calm and under control ICE Officer, and then crazily kicking in a new and very expensive government vehicle, so hard and violent, in fact, that the taillight broke off in pieces,” Trump’s post said. “It was quite a display of abuse and anger, for all to see, crazed and out of control. The ICE Officer was calm and cool, not an easy thing to be under those circumstances!”

Biesecker and Santana write for the Associated Press. AP reporters Alanna Durkin Richer and Eric Tucker contributed to this report from Washington.