Hartmann Report

"Remember that all through history, there have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they seem invincible. But in the end, they always fall. Always." —Mahatma Gandhi So far in this book, we’ve explored the making of a young Donald Trump, from the Queens mansion where Fred Trump taught domination as virtue, to Roy Cohn’s ruthless tutelage in shamelessness, to the golden façade he constructed that (with help from NBC and Mark Burnett) masked a lifetime of business failures. We’ve exposed the machinery that propelled him to power: a Republican Party that back during the Nixon and Reagan years first abandoned principle for tribal loyalty, the billionaire donors who funded extremism for tax cuts, and a series of billionaire-funded right-wing media empires that amplify outrage over truth on an hour-by-hour, day-by-day basis into tens of millions of American cars and homes.

The Best of the Rest of the News. — Well, that sure ended discussion of the Epstein files: welcome to the Putin Doctrine. — And then there's Iran: so much for the "peace president." Is Trump going full "emperor of the world" or is he just trying to help his fellow war criminal and Kushner family friend Netanyahu (with whom Trump met last week) start another Middle East war to insure the Israeli Prime Minister's political survival? — Surprised? Trump goes shopping for Italian marble as health insurance rises 114% and he freezes all childcare money to all states. — Speaking of grifters, a racist 20-something MAGA YouTube influencer showed up at a bunch of Somali-run daycare centers in Minneapolis, leading Trump to cut off all childcare funding to all 50 states. — Is "Tax the rich" coming soon…let's hope so! — How's Project 2025 going? — Billionaire Trump is destroying Social Security on behalf of his billionaire peers and the 13 billionaires in his Cabinet. — What you need to know about Jack Smith's deposition. — Geeky Science: Want to know what a longevity expert eats in a day?

A quiet USPS postmark change could turn "on time" ballots into "too late" ballots by the millions… It's not just a brand new year; it's a midterm election year. And the stakes this coming November are mind-boggling, so, of course, Republicans are starting to do everything they can to rig the election. Just a week ago, for example, Trump's Postal Service changed the rules about getting your mail-in ballot postmarked so it'll be counted. Instead of postmarking letters when they're received, Post Offices will now postmark them when they get "processed," which may happen days later. In the 2024 presidential election, the feds estimated that around 104,000 mail-in ballots nationwide weren't counted because they were postmarked late; with this change, the number this fall and for 2028 could be in the millions.

Billionaire cash steers the agenda, military and police power set the boundaries, and religious messaging sells it as virtue, all while taxpayers fund the very system that excludes them… The turn of the calendar is more than a ritual. It's a reminder that democracy is not self sustaining, not guaranteed, and not permanent unless we choose it again and again. If we want this new year to be about renewal rather than retreat, we need to give some serious thought to what it'll take to reclaim and defend the democratic republic that generations before us fought, organized, and sacrificed to build. The American Revolution was not just a revolt against British rule. It was a revolt against three ancient tyrannies that had dominated human society for thousands of years. Warlord kings. The morbidly rich. And theocrats.

The clock is ticking, and cynicism isn't a strategy. Here's the concrete, local, Tea Party-style roadmap to rebuild Democrats into a fighting progressive party… "You don't change a party from the outside lookin' in You don't win a war just complainin' again They took the house by the keys and the locks While we were shoutin', they were claimin' the blocks If you wanna turn the tide, if you wanna redeem it It's precinct by precinct Or you don't mean it" — from Louise's Daily Song "Precinct by Precinct"

A warning to every progressive voter: In America's election system, your third-party vote can be a gift-wrapped victory for the GOP… Here we go again, only this time it appears to be the Working Families Party that's fixing to help elect Republicans. They're proudly proclaiming that by the 2028 presidential election they hope to have candidates on the ballot in 18 states.

From 50-year mortgages to paywalled car features, the rental economy is replacing ownership with lifelong monthly bills... Yesterday, both Trump and his Secretary of Housing and Urban Development told us that 50-year home mortgages may soon be a thing. While seemingly insane (you could end up paying more than three times the cost of the house and never escape the burden of debt before you die), this is just the latest iteration of one of American businesses' most profitable scams: the rental economy. It's a growing threat to the American middle class that rarely gets named, even as it reshapes our lives every day. Over the past two decades, it's snuck in quietly, disguised as convenience, efficiency, and "innovation." As a result, nothing is "ours" any more. Instead, we're renting our lives away.

"Believe in truth. To abandon facts is to abandon freedom. If nothing is true, then no one can criticize power, because there is no basis upon which to do so. If nothing is true, then all is spectacle." —Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny Ruby Freeman just wanted to count votes. She wasn’t a politician or activist. She was a sixty-two-year-old grandmother running a small fashion boutique called “Lady Ruby’s Unique Treasures” in suburban Atlanta. In fall 2020, seeking to do her civic duty during a pandemic that kept many older poll workers home, she took a temporary job with Fulton County’s election office. Her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, had worked for the county elections department for a decade, and Ruby was proud to join her in supporting the democratic process, something particularly meaningful to her as a Black woman whose ancestors had been denied the right to vote.

The Best of the Rest of the News. — Lift a toast to all the new billionaires made in 2025, including 50 of them just in the tech arena. — Trump threatens Democrats on Christmas day, saying “Enjoy What May Be Your Last Merry Christmas!” — Drip, drip, drip come the rape and abuse allegations against Trump, who a jury has already found raped (according to the judge) E. Jean Carroll and more than 20 other women have accused of sexual abuse or rape. — Bondi’s Department of Justice now appears to be saying that if you’re taking pictures of masked ICE agents beating up, shooting, or otherwise abusing immigrants (or American citizens) you’re guilty of “domestic terrorism” and can be arrested by those same unaccountable ICE agents and disappeared into their growing collection of concentration camps. — The Trump regime is on the brink of turning routine travel into a permanent surveillance apparatus and most travelers have no idea. — Trump’s racism brings nursing home crisis. — The official White House Spiritual Advisor, Paula White, says of Epstein’s best friend: “To say no to President Trump would be saying no to God, and I won’t do that.” — Recession watch: Ten housing markets are in a crash right now, with more soon to come. — Racist MAGA goes nuts over King Charles III’s Christmas message. — Geeky Science: Eat your chocolate and drink your coffee!

The future lay before us now, and if we care about the country our children will inherit, we can't let this moral vandalism to go unanswered. Yesterday, on Christmas of all days, Donald Trump chose to call Democrats "scum." Not criminals. Not misguided. Not wrong. Scum. A word we usually reserve for things we scrape off the bottom of a shoe or skim off polluted water. A word whose entire purpose is to dehumanize. That moment matters far beyond the day's news cycle, and far beyond partisan politics. It matters because leaders don't just govern; they model.