The Gov Hub Newsletter: January 27, 2026

This is an evolving story with many moving parts This weekend in Minneapolis, ICE officers executed Alex Pretti [an ICU Nurse at the VA] in broad daylight while Alex tried to help a woman that ICE had pushed to the ground. ICE’s reaction was to beat Alex and then execute him at point blank range, while laughing about it and counting the bullet holes in lieu of medical care. The murder has furthered a continued inflection point of ICE’s and the Trump Administration’s violence against citizens and non-citizens alike. At first reaction, the White House and its goons, Bovino and Noem denied and blamed until the cows came home trying to claim that Pretti was violently attacking police and brandishing a gun [he had a phone in his hand recording and his legally licensed gun was holstered, and he was disarmed when he was shot]. Cue, the gun rights groups and caucuses getting involved, including the NRA, who still somehow found a way to blame the Democrats. Somewhere in there, Pam Bondi sent essentially a ransom note to the state of Minnesota saying that if they want ICE to leave that they would have to give the Trump Admin all of the state’s Medicaid and SNAP data, MN facilities must cooperate with ICE, and lastly, to turn over Minnesota’s voters rolls to the feds, to which Minnesota’s Secretary of State essentially said f*ck no. Fast forward to now, while backlash continues, the White House is trying to PR itself around the situation by allegedly pushing Bovino [short guy who wears the Nazi-like uniform] out of his job and back to California, while having calls with Gov. Walz and Mayor Frey at the same time as they’re hitting send on posts blaming Walz and Frey… Meanwhile, in DC, more Senate Democrats are issuing statements saying that they’re refusing to greenlight more funding for DHS, which is likely going to lead to a government shutdown if the Republicans can’t get them on board. As for the Libertarians, they apparently say what the majority of Americans have been polled in saying, “Abolish ICE.” 

A haunting ACLU report that includes testimony from 45 people on their experiences at the Fort Bliss detention center in Texas includes details of the abuses faced by detainees, including a number of male detainees being beaten and sexually abused by officers who would “crush their testicles during beatings.” Per the report, beatings and abuse often came in response to asking for one’s medications.

At the Dilley Detention Facility, also in Texas, video captured children screaming “let us out” and aerial footage capturing families protesting with signs that said “liberty for kids.” This is the facility where five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos is allegedly being held.

60 Minutes sat down with Marimar Martinez, a teacher’s assistant from Chicago, who was shot five times by a Border Patrol agent in October and miraculously survived, to discuss her story and what these agents are actually doing on American streets. 

Keeping with Trump Admin’s theme to label anything they don’t like as “fraud” [another example below, btw], their very own budget office has ordered gov agencies to compile data on the federal money that’s sent to 14 states and D.C. Those states are… you guessed it, blue states! The request follows Trump’s threats to cut off federal funding to states with “sanctuary cities” in them, and is also in concert with Trump demanding that Congress pass legislation to outlaw sanctuary cities.

Two of Elon Musk’s DOGE employees were referred by the Social Security Administration to the DOJ over potential violation of the Hatch Act. In court documents related to the matter, it was revealed that the two were alleged to have been in contact with a group that has the goal of overturning election results in specific states. Also in the documents was the allegation that one of the two had signed an agreement that may have involved Social Security data to match state voter rolls.

NYT Magazine did a deep dive on the reported devolving chaos at Kash Patel’s FBI, interviewing 45 current and former employees about their Patel’s meltdowns and mis-handlings, including after the murder of Charlie Kirk, berating a special agent and then going on to focus not on the manhunt, but on him and then FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino’s social media strategy.

The White House posted a drastically digitally altered picture of Nekima Levy who was arrested after an ICE protest. As seen with the split screen, the image was altered to show Levy crying, darkened her skin, contorted her expressions, and even nixed her lipstick. When asked about the deepfake that they were pushing out, the White House did what a weird teenager who is in trouble does aka make this comment.

Trump’s Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer has been accused of having an affair with a staffer, drinking in her office during the workday, and taking subordinates to a strip club while on a government trip. In line with the Trump Admin’s policy on corruption, this is how they’re generally handling it, albeit a member of her security detail has been put on leave. 

Nike has announced that it’s laying off more workers, this time 775 workers that work in distribution centers in Tennessee and Mississippi. The company cites a move toward automation and to improve its profit margins.

A new poll has revealed that 64% of poll respondents disapproved of Trump’s handling of the cost of the living issue, and 58% disapproved of his handling of the economy.

Following the murder of Alex Pretti by federal agents in Minneapolis, CEOs of the state’s largest companies wrote a letter…we’d call it a “strongly written letter,” except it was… well, you can find the GATG opinion on it in the comments of this Morning Brew post.

A number of Fortune 500 companies have contracts with ICE, including these 14 companies.

The current president claimed that the reason his eyes are always closing in his round-table pressers is because “it’s boring as hell” and that he “can’t wait to get out.”

A leading GOP candidate for governor in Minnesota and the lawyer for the ICE Agent that murdered Renee Good – Chris Madel – has dropped out of the race, citing that while he originally supported Operation Metro Surge, he believes it has gone way beyond its initial scope. He told the WSJ, “I can’t look my daughters in the eye and say I’m running as a Republican, when they’re pulling over Hispanics and Asians because of the color of the skin and what they look like.”

NYC is suing Dr. Phil’s son aka Jordan McGraw, who’s the president of McGraw Media, Inc to prevent the release of a NYPD reality show out of concern that it endangers officers, especially those undercover. The show was filmed during the Eric Adams Admin. 

A new report from VoteHub shows the breakdown of political affiliation of 1,506 professional athletes across the five largest leagues: WNBA, NBA, NHL, NFL, and NFL. Of the leagues, the WNBA was the most liberal the MLB was the most conservative in terms of party registrations. 

On Saturday evening, at a private party at Sundance, Congressman Maxwell Frost [D-FL] was punched in the face, after a man first told him that “Trump was going to deport him.” The man, Christian Joel Young has since been arrested and charged with aggravated burglary, assaulting an elected official, and assault.

A whistleblower group has obtained and shared with Congress an internal DHS memo that was allegedly circulated in May 2025 that authorized ICE agents to enter homes without a judicial warrant [a warrant signed by a judge], and can instead enter homes with an administrative warrant.

An investigation led by reporters at ProPublica found that ICE agents have used banned chokehold moves and others that cut off air supply in at least 40 different instances. 

57 Swastikas were found painted over a playground in the neighborhood of Borough Park, Brooklyn, a predominantly Jewish neighborhood. So far, two 15-year-olds were arrested in connection with what is being investigated as a hate crime.

California’s AG Rob Bonta is suing the Trump Admin for approving a plan from a Texas-based company [Sable Offshore Corp] to resuscitate two oil pipelines off of California’s coast. The pipelines are located in the water off of Santa Barbara and were ground zero for an environmentally devastating oil spill in 2015 – they’ve been shut down ever since.

The City of Philly has sued Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and National Park Service Director Jessica Bowron, following the National Park Service removing a historic exhibit on slavery at Philadelphia’s Independence National Historical Park. The exhibit was removed under the guise of following Trump’s EO about “restoring truth and sanity to American history.” Translation: whitewashing, removing, and trying to rewrite history.

New Mexico’s AG Raul Torrez has filed a lawsuit against three Midland, Texas oil execs, accusing them of running a “fraudulent scheme” to pocket dinero from oil and gas wells located in New Mexico, while offloading the cost of plugging up the wells onto the state’s taxpayers, notably by using bankruptcy protections and moving wells through LLCs and shell corps.

NY Gov. Kathy Hochul [D] sat down with three very young constituents [pre-school] to get their reaction on universal childcare. The Reel has all the makings of a comedy – small chairs, a fish, and excitement.

Hudson County [NJ] Executive Craig Guy [D] brought the “Hudson County Mascot” that is this woof to make an announcement about properly protecting one’s pets during snow storms and winter weather – and it’s getting the pawfect reception.

CT AG William Tong [D], who is fostering a puppy with his wife, shared some of the insanely racist, vile comments that they’ve gotten in sharing that experience on social, connecting those comments to the dehumanizing rhetoric that’s long-been coming out of the White House.

Illinois Gov. Pritzker [D] chatted with journalist Jessica Yellin about what he believes the goal of Trump’s escalation with ICE is. The long of it here, the short of it is that Pritzker believes Trump is provoking violence to justify invoking the Insurrection Act.

In an incredibly on-brand move [Millennials and above will know], The Dixie Chicks, now the Chicks, posted this protest sign.

Congressman Pat Ryan [D-NY] didn’t mince words with this post dedicated to his GOP colleagues.

In a move that unfortunately everyone saw coming following an executive order from Trump last year, the U.S. officially withdrew from the World Health Organization [WHO]. In reaction, California became the first U.S. state to join WHO’s Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network.

Clocking a win for trans kids that received healthcare at the Children’s Hospital LA, Trump’s DOJ has agreed to end its witch hunt to obtain personal and medical details on 3,000+ young patients. The witch hunt had stemmed from the Trump Admin’s fave accusation to throw around when it doesn’t like something – “fraud” – resulting in subpoenas being sent to 20+ medical providers that had offered gender-affirming care for minors. 

ICE has been deploying green gas toward protestors and residents of Minnesota, prompting questions on what it is and how it could impact one’s health. MotherJones reporter Samantha Michaels took those questions to a professor at Duke University’s School of Medicine and got these answers. 

A definitive oh sh*t situation has emerged in the DMV, with a pipe that’s charged with moving millions of gallons of sewage has broken, resulting in wastewater flowing into the Potomac River. While crews are scrambling to remedy the sitch, it’s overall unclear how much has spilled into the river so far.

NY Mag: Your Friendly Neighborhood Resistance

Politico: This pharmaceutical executive has Trump’s ear

AP: He left the US for an internship. Trump’s travel ban made it impossible to return

ProPublica: How “Bitcoin Jesus” Avoided Prison, Thanks to One of the “Friends of Trump”