Smoke rises as civil defense and firefighting teams arrive in the area to conduct emergency response operations after Israeli army carried out an airstrike in southern Lebanon on February 2, 2026. (Photo by Ramiz Dallah/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“This incident cannot be viewed in isolation from the scorched-earth policy pursued by the Israeli army,” said watchdog Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.
The Lebanese president has accused the Israeli government of committing “a crime against the environment and health” for allegedly spraying the herbicide glyphosate on agricultural lands in Lebanon and Syria.
As reported by Naharnet on Wednesday, Lebanon’s agriculture and environmental ministries recently conducted analysis of soil near the site where Israel had sprayed a chemical substance and found glyphosate “20 to 30 times higher than the average” in the area.
The ministries said that this level of glyphosate in the soil could cause “damage to agricultural production,” while also harming soil fertility.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun denounced the spraying as a “flagrant violation of Lebanese sovereignty,” and called on the United Nations (UN) and the international community at large to take action to stop future attacks.
Al-Jazeerareported on Tuesday that the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) was warned by the Israel military on Monday to stay away from the border area because it planned to deploy a “nontoxic chemical substance” there, forcing the peacekeeping forces to cancel over a dozen planned activities.
Stephane Dujarric, a spokesperson for UN Secretary-General António Guterres, condemned Israel for preventing UNIFIL from conducting operations, emphasizing that “any activity that may put peacekeepers and civilians at risk is of serious concern.”
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said on Wednesday that it has detected “Israeli aircraft spraying pesticides of unknown composition over farmland in the countryside of Quneitra in southern Syria” on January 26 and 27.
“This incident cannot be viewed in isolation from the scorched-earth policy pursued by the Israeli army,” the human rights watchdog said. “It forms part of a pattern of systematic destruction of agricultural land, including the burning of approximately 9,000 hectares during recent military operations using white phosphorus and incendiary munitions.”
US Border Patrol agents detain an unidentified man of Somali descent in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on January 8, 2026. (Photo by Octavio Jones/AFP via Getty Images)
A new database of sworn affidavits filed by the ACLU shows masked agents detaining citizens based on race without warrants, ignoring IDs, and pointing weapons at them.
Federal agents deployed to Minnesota by the Trump administration are systematically violating the rights of US citizens and lawful residents, according to more than two dozen sworn affidavits made available this week as part of a class action lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security.
The suit was filed last month by the ACLU of Minnesota and partnered law firms, which said that as part of President Donald Trump’s Operation Metro Surge, “masked federal agents in the thousands are violently stopping and arresting countless Minnesotans based on nothing more than their race and perceived ethnicity, irrespective of their citizenship or immigration status, or their personal circumstances.”
The case was launched by three plaintiffs, which include 20-year-old Mubashir Khalif Hussein, a Somali-born US citizen whose brutal arrest and detention was caught on video in December. He was placed into a headlock by masked agents and brought to an ICE office, where he said he was left in shackles for an hour and a half before being released miles from his home in the freezing cold.
The plaintiffs called it just one example of a “startling pattern of abuse spearheaded by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that is fundamentally altering civic life in the Twin Cities and the state of Minnesota.”
On Thursday, the online legal policy journal Just Security published a searchable database of the 29 sworn declarations filed so far as part of the case. Nearly all of them were filed by US citizens, while a few others were permanent legal residents or had pending legal status.
We just published database of @ACLU plaintiffs' sworn declarations of ICE enforcement actions in Minnesota case.
The statements detail numerous allegations that agents violated their basic constitutional rights, including by detaining them without showing a warrant; targeting Somali and Latino individuals based on their appearances; ignoring identifying documents that could prove their legal residency or citizenship; restraining them violently; and pointing weapons at them during searches.
Last year, the Supreme Courtsided with the Trump administration’s claim that when deciding whether to stop someone as part of “roving patrols,” agents had the right to consider certain factors, including “the type of work one does,” a person’s use of Spanish or accented English, or their “apparent race or ethnicity.”
While critics described it as an invitation to blatant and unconstitutional racial profiling and invasions of privacy, Justice Brett Kavanaughwrote in a concurring opinion that the practice should not prove burdensome to those legally in the US: “If the person is a US citizen or otherwise lawfully in the United States, that individual will be free to go after the brief encounter,” he said.
Ryan Goodman, a law professor at New York University and the co-editor-in-chief of Just Security,said that the “sworn affidavits show how, on the ground, this is simply not how ICE operates.”
“They did not identify themselves, and they did not present a warrant. They just opened my car door and started yanking me out of the car. I kept saying over and over that I was a US citizen.”
One 33-year-old Latino citizen who was born in the US was driving to Menards on January 10 when he suddenly found himself boxed in by two cars at a stoplight. Before he knew it, he said agents were banging aggressively on his windows and one had started pointing a gun at him. When he put his vehicle in park, he said the doors opened automatically.
“When the doors unlocked, the agents did not ask me anything, they did not identify themselves, and they did not present a warrant. They just opened my car door and started yanking me out of the car,” he said. “I kept saying over and over that I was a US citizen.”
“Once they did get my seatbelt off and finally [pulled] me out of the car, they threw me to the ground and pinned me,” he continued. “They were pulling on my arms so tight to put on the handcuffs. They ripped my jacket, and it was torn up. My wallet fell on the ground. I was still repeating that I am a US citizen. I repeated it over and over. They never asked for or looked at my identification.”
The agents hauled the man into their car and began driving him around and interrogating him for about 20 minutes. He said the first question they asked him was his name.
“It seemed if they were going to violently arrest me before even looking at my identification, that they should have known who I was,” the victim said.
Agents eventually realized they’d been searching for another person with the same name and birthdate. They drove their captive behind a warehouse, where nobody could see, and released him. But another agent had taken his car from the intersection. An agent said he’d only give it back if the agent could scan his face, which he did.
“I felt traumatized. My arm hurt, I had bruises from the handcuffs. They were so tight that half of my hand was numb for a few days. I guess it stopped the circulation to my hands while I was handcuffed. I had cuts on my face and hands,” the victim said. “Since this happened to me, I have to pass through that spot every time I drive to work. I keep going back to it and reliving it in my mind.”
According to the database, at least five other US citizens, lawful residents, or legal asylum seekers also claimed in court that they’d had weapons pointed at them by agents during their stops.
Two other US citizens and one lawful permanent resident detailed being subject to physical force during stops.
One 53-year-old Somali man, a US citizen since 2008, said he was physically grabbed and dragged from his car, handcuffed, and pinned against the vehicle by masked agents.
“One officer pressed his knee into my back,” he said. When I screamed out in pain, another officer put his elbow into my neck, and one of the officers yelled at me, ‘Shut the fuck up, son of a bitch!’ One of the officers responded, ‘Why don’t you go back to your country?’“
“I believe that I was stopped solely because of the color of my skin and our appearance, including wearing a hijab.”
One 22-year-old Somali-American citizen who was born in Minnesota said that on January 21, five agents hopped out of their car with multiple guns drawn as she was on her way to work.
She said they demanded to see proof of her citizenship, but rejected her valid ID, claiming it was fake. They demanded to see her passport, which US citizens are not required to carry under US law. The agents told her they did not believe she was a US citizen because of her “accent.”
“I believe that I was stopped solely because of the color of my skin and our appearance, including wearing a hijab,” she said. “It was clear that the ICE agents did not know who I was when they stopped me. I had not violated any traffic laws, and the vehicle I was driving was registered to my mother, who is a United States citizen.”
It’s one of at least five cases in the database in which agents dismissed proof of a citizen or legal resident’s status.
There have also been many other documented instances, including some caught on video, in which agents have detained a citizen or legal resident or refused to let them go because they believed the person’s “accent” did not sound American.
WATCH: CNN airs unearthed footage of a ICE Border Patrol agent harassing a ride share driver:
"If you were from this country, you would know I'm an immigration officer… I can hear you don't have the same accent as me." pic.twitter.com/CZ35TKPa6T
All 29 of those who filed affidavits in the case have alleged unconstitutional racial profiling.
One 25-year-old Somali man, a US citizen born in Atlanta, said a group of masked agents accosted him and his mother while he was shoveling snow.
He said they were joined by a pair of unmasked men who appeared to be livestreaming and helped the agents to box him in. He later identified one of them as a right-wing YouTube influencer named Ben Bergquam.
Even though the vast majority of Somalis living in the US are citizens, he said the agents and the streamers were laughing and referring to him and his mother as “illegal aliens.”
“I was unsure if I was going to be seriously injured or killed.”
At least 12 people in the lawsuit have filed sworn testimony stating that agents forced them to stop while they were driving.
In one case, a Hispanic US citizen said that after following him for a few blocks, agents put on their lights and “rammed” his car off the road.
“An agent came up to my window, asking if I was a citizen. I was furious. I told them I was a citizen and they damaged my car,” he said. “Instead of apologizing, they demanded that I produce documents to prove I was a US citizen. I was too angry. I told them again that I was a US citizen and I didn’t have to prove it to them.”
He said the episode lasted 45-60 minutes, with agents repeatedly demanding his ID, name, and place of birth. Eventually, he says, they confirmed his citizenship by taking photos and videos of him and scanning his license plate.
He said agents told him they would pay for the damages to his car, but that they drove away without providing any insurance information.
“Even though I am a United States citizen and I was carrying proof of my citizenship with me, ICE agents didn’t believe me,” he said. “I felt intense fear and shock. I was unsure if I was going to be seriously injured or killed.”
The affidavits were filed as part of the caseHussen v. Noem, which claims that agents have violated Minnesotans’ rights to equal protection and against unreasonable searches and seizures. A hearing is scheduled to take place later this month.
“The government can’t stop and arrest people based on the color of their skin, or arrest people with no probable cause,” said Kate Huddleston, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project. “These kinds of police-state tactics are contrary to the basic principles of liberty and equality that remain a bedrock of our legal system and our country.”
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Orcas discuss Donald Trump and the killer apes’ concept of democracy. Front Orca warns that Trump is crashing his country’s economy and that everything he does he does for the fantastically wealthy.
Demonstrators take part in a protest against Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Milan, Italy on February 6, 2026. (Photo by Mattia Rinaldi/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
One Olympic athlete, a skier representing Britain, registered his disgust with US immigration enforcement agents by urinating the message “Fuck ICE” in the snow.
Hundreds of protesters gathered in the streets of Milan, Italy on Friday to protest the presence of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at the 2026 Winter Olympics, with protesters waving “FCK ICE” signs and condemning Trump administration officials—including Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Reutersreported that demonstrators rallying ahead of the opening ceremony could be heard “blowing plastic whistles, which have become a symbol of anti-ICE rallies in the US.” The Trump administration said a small group of ICE officers would be traveling to Milan to help provide security for Vance and Rubio, who arrived in the city on Thursday.
One demonstrator, a Minnesotan currently studying in Europe, told the outlet that she “thought that this was a good opportunity to show that the rest of the world is not okay with what’s happening in Minnesota.”
“It’s not okay to just acquiesce and go with the status quo,” the protester said.
Demonstrators take part in a protest against US Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Milan, Italy on February 6, 2026. (Photo by Mattia Rinaldi/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
The protests came a day after Gus Kenworthy, a skier representing Britain, urinated the message “Fuck ICE” in the snow ahead of the winter games’ opening festivities and urged Americans to pressure their representatives to rein in the agency.
“Innocent people have been murdered, and enough is enough,” Kenworthy wrote on social media. “We can’t wait around while ICE continues to operate with unchecked power.”
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Orcas discuss Donald Trump and the killer apes’ concept of democracy. Front Orca warns that Trump is crashing his country’s economy and that everything he does he does for the fantastically wealthy.
It’s the rich that have destroyed the climate to be richer, far richer than they ever need to be.
Orcas discuss Donald Trump and the killer apes’ concept of democracy. Front Orca warns that Trump is crashing his country’s economy and that everything he does he does for the fantastically wealthy.
Trust him to count your vote? Donald Trump spies on his wife, Melania Trump, to see how she’s marking her ballot on Election Day 2016. The president is now angling to have his administration take over voting and ballot counting from the states, a move that is blatantly unconstitutional. | Evan Vucci / AP
WASHINGTON—Donald Trump wants to take over the 2026 elections, though “steal” might be a better word.
No, the president isn’t planning to send another 1,600 invaders—Proud Boys and other assorted thugs—to rampage through the U.S. Capitol, as they did five years ago in an attempted coup. Nor is he asking secretaries of state to “find” ballots for him this time around.
Instead, he’s working to rig things to ensure certain votes either aren’t cast in the first place or don’t get counted even if they do make it to the ballot box.
Since his 2020 loss to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, Trump has tried to stuff state and local elections boards with his sycophants. In some red states and red sections of “purple” states, he’s succeeded. But it’s not enough.
He’s once again talking about election “fraud” in majority-Black cities like Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Detroit and using that as justification for what he calls the “nationalization” of elections.
Trump has a four-part plan to commandeer states’ election machinery and have the federal government run the voting and the counting. Thus, no matter who you vote for at the ballot box this fall, it’s his administration that will take the tally.
Though many Republicans are downplaying the likelihood of Trump pursuing the plan, it’s clear that he’s got some willing helpers on Capitol Hill, especially in the GOP-run U.S. House. Last year, lawmakers there pushed a massive voter restriction bill called the SAVE Act. They tried to insert it into the money bill Congress approved the first week of February and have signaled that they’ll try again.
There’s just one big thing wrong with Trump’s plan: It’s unconstitutional. But when did the U.S. Constitution, which Trump swore an oath to “preserve, protect and defend,” ever stop him?
Unconstitutional
Trump’s been quite open about what he wants to do and how he wants to do it. The federal government should “get involved” in running the voting, he says—everything from demanding voter registration rolls from every state to banning mail-in ballots.
All but a few states have already received such demands. Half (24) have refused, so Trump’s Justice Department is suing them. Voter rolls contain personal information, such as addresses, phone numbers, and Social Security numbers.
Besides, the Constitution is explicit: Article 1 Section 4 says the states shall run elections. “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators” it says.
“The Supreme Court has interpreted the Elections Clause expansively, enabling states to provide a complete code for congressional elections, not only as to times and places, but in relation to notices, registration, supervision of voting, protection of voters, prevention of fraud and corrupt practices, counting of votes, duties of inspectors and canvassers, and making and publication of election returns,” says an authoritative source lawmakers use, The Constitution Annotated.
Now listen to Trump at an Oval Office ceremony this week:
“If a state can’t run an election, I think the people behind me”—Republican members of Congress—“should do something about it,” Trump said. “Because, you know, if you think about it, the state is an agent for the federal government in elections. I don’t know why the federal government doesn’t do ’em anyway.
“The federal government should get involved. These are agents of the federal government to count the votes. If they can’t count the votes legally and honestly, then somebody else should take it over.”
The Constitution’s rather explicit about that, too. Its 10th Amendment, part of the Bill of Rights, says powers “not reserved to the federal government” are “reserved to the states or the people.” Running elections is one of those latter powers.
Needless to say, Trump’s drawn flak for his comments. But his prior attempts to rig the outcome this fall appear to have flopped, so now he’s turning to the takeover.
Gerrymandering prelude
First, Trump demanded Texas redo its congressional districts to elect more Republican U.S. House members and preserve or even expand the GOP’s slim control there. The party’s majority is now 218-214, with three vacancies. Defection by two or three Republicans would doom Trump policy initiatives.
The Texas GOP complied with Trump’s order and redistricted the state’s map, potentially adding five GOP congressional districts. But it boomeranged. Democratic-run states, led by California, redistricted, too. Independent analysts call the national result a virtual wash.
And it didn’t help Trump’s temper when the GOP won only one off-year House election—in Tennessee, narrowly, in a GOP-gerrymandered district Trump carried by double digits in 2024.
MAGA Republicans have lost everywhere else since he’s returned to power: Governorships in New Jersey and Virginia, open-seat congressional races, the New York City mayoral race, where Trump endorsed loser Andrew Cuomo, and even two statewide Public Service Commission seats in Georgia.
The latest Trump loss was a 14-point win for a Democratic Machinists union local president, Taylor Rehmet, running on a progressive platform, in a Texas State Senate district. Trump won there in 2024 by 17%. The district had elected Republicans since 1979.
So, with the gerrymandering effort and off-year elections all failing to decisively shift the political terrain in Trump’s favor, he’s turned to the election “nationalization” scheme.
Trump’s four-part plan
Mark Elias, an election law specialist who often works with Democrats, says Trump would cancel the 2026 election, if he could. Barring that, though, Elias sees a four-step Trump plan to rig the vote.
“First, he will falsely claim there is widespread illegal voting,” Elias said in a post at Democracy Docket. “He will merge his demonization of immigrants with his long-standing election denialism.
Second, he will “use the pretext of non-citizen voting to execute a partisan takeover of voting rules and election administration in swing districts with high concentrations of Democratic voters.”
Trump is executing part one already and trying to launch into part two. At the White House this week, referring to undocumented immigrants, the president claimed, falsely: “These people were brought to our country to vote, and they vote illegally.”
He said the GOP in Congress has to be “tougher” in cracking down on non-existent migrant voter fraud. “The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over.’ We should take over the voting—the voting in at least many—15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.”
Saying he must prevent illegal voting, Elias speculates that Trump may even “use federal paramilitary forces already at his disposal to block voting access.” That means ICE and other federal agents could potentially be sent to patrol polling places.
Georgia General Election 2020 ballots are loaded by the FBI onto trucks at the Fulton County Election HUB, Jan. 28, 2026, in Union City, Ga., near Atlanta. The seizure aims to prop up Trump claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him while also making the federal seizure of ballots seem like a normal election procedure. | Mike Stewart / AP
Third, Trump will “use the Department of Justice to seize ballots and take over vote counting.” Elias argues that recent raid to seize ballots in Fulton County, Georgia, was in part “a dry run to work out the logistics” of how this could happen in the future in more places.
“With the public now accustomed to ballot seizures,” Trump will have set the stage, Elias believes, for trying to seize control of elections in at least 15 states in 2026.
“If this targeted approach does not guarantee a Republican majority,” Trump will go even further—to the fourth part of his scheme—“a complete federal takeover,” or what Trump is calling nationalization.
Voter purge already underway
Trump’s demand that the feds take over elections drew immediate criticism from non-partisan groups as well, with Eileen O’Connor of the Brennan Center for Law at New York University leading the way. She says that even if Trump’s nationalization plan isn’t carried out to the last detail, the situation is still bad enough.
“The Trump administration’s campaign to undermine future elections is in full swing,” O’Connor warns. “One part is its bid to sweep up voter rolls across the nation, which began last spring and has now made its way to the courts.”
Trump’s Justice Department began its voter roll campaign in May, demanding the lists from at least 44 states and D.C. “Most have refused to provide these records and instead provided publicly available versions of their voter files,” O’Connor says, so Trump Attorney General Pam Bondi is now suing 24 of the states. Trump and Bondi have already lost in California and Oregon.
“Make no mistake about what these actions represent: An attempt to take over election administration, a role the Constitution grants to states, not the federal government,” O’Connor continues.
“The Trump administration has made clear one of its goals in collecting nationwide voter files is to run its own analyses and attempt to force states to remove voters from the rolls based on incomplete and likely inaccurate information.”
In plain English, that amounts to a voter roll purge. The past U.S. history of such purges shows voters most likely to be tossed off the rolls, almost always illegally, are voters of color. As Trump and his allies know, they mostly vote Democratic.
Multiprong attack on democracy
Then, added to the mix, is the House GOP majority’s own voter suppression scheme: The SAVE Act, or the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, by its full name. It would require voters to prove they’re citizens before they can register to vote for a federal election.
The forms of proof would be limited, and the cost of getting them would be prohibitive for many. Only a passport or original birth certificate would suffice; driver’s licenses and tribal IDs won’t cut it. The legislation would invert the responsibility of eligibility verification from election officials to citizens and force them to convince the government that they have the right to vote.
In August, Elias explained this multipronged attack on democracy in stark detail and also predicted Trump will attempt to ban mail-in voting and decertify voting equipment he does not like. With fewer ways to vote, Elias expects the electorate to skew more Republican. If that fails, Trump would, he forecast, take over vote counting and ballot tabulation from the states. That is where we are now.
“The States,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, “are merely an ‘agent’ for the Federal Government in counting and tabulating the votes. They must do what the Federal Government, as represented by the president of the United States, tells them…to do.”
As a matter of constitutional law, this is flat-out wrong. “But Trump is not interested in following the Constitution. As we have seen before, he prefers to act by force” Elias said.
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Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Orcas discuss Donald Trump and the killer apes’ concept of democracy. Front Orca warns that Trump is crashing his country’s economy and that everything he does he does for the fantastically wealthy.
