Letters from an American – November 1, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson

Letters from an American, November 1, 2025

By Heather Cox Richardson, Nov 01, 2025

Yesterday I wrote that President Donald J. Trump’s celebration of his new marble bathroom in the White House was so tone deaf at a time when federal employees are working without pay, furloughed workers are taking out bank loans to pay their bills, healthcare premiums are skyrocketing, and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits are at risk, that it seemed likely to make the history books as a symbol of this administration.

But that image got overtaken just hours later by pictures from a Great Gatsby–themed party Trump threw at Mar-a-Lago last night hours before SNAP benefits ended. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel The Great Gatsby skewered the immoral and meaningless lives of the very wealthy during the Jazz Age who spent their time throwing extravagant parties and laying waste to the lives of the people around them.

Although two federal judges yesterday found that the administration’s refusal to use reserves Congress provided to fund SNAP in an emergency was likely illegal and one ordered the government to use that money, the administration did not immediately do as the judge ordered.

Trump posted on social media that “[o]ur Government lawyers do not think we have the legal authority to pay SNAP,” so he has “instructed our lawyers to ask the Court to clarify how we can legally fund SNAP as soon as possible.” Blaming the Democrats for the shutdown, Trump added that “even if we get immediate guidance, it will unfortunately be delayed while States get the money out.” His post provided the phone number for Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer’s office, telling people: “If you use SNAP benefits, call the Senate Democrats, and tell them to reopen the Government, NOW!”

“They were careless people,” Fitzgerald wrote, “they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”

This afternoon, Ellen Nakashima and Noah Robertson of the Washington Post reported that the administration is claiming it does not have to consult Congress to continue its attacks on Venezuela. The 1973 War Powers Act says it does.

In 1973, after President Richard M. Nixon ordered secret bombings of Cambodia during the Vietnam War, Congress passed the War Powers Resolution to reassert its power over foreign wars. “It is the purpose of this joint resolution to fulfill the intent of the framers of the Constitution of the United States and insure that the collective judgment of both the Congress and the President will apply to the introduction of United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, and to the continued use of such forces in hostilities or in such situations,” it read.

The law requires a president to notify Congress in writing within 48 hours of the start of hostilities, including the legal grounds for those hostilities, the circumstances that caused them, and an estimate of their scope and duration. The law requires the president to get the approval of Congress for any hostilities lasting more than 60 days.

On September 4, 2025, Trump notified Congress of a strike against a vessel in the Caribbean that he said “was assessed to be affiliated with a designated terrorist organization and to be engaged in illicit drug trafficking activities.” The letter added: “I am providing this report as part of my efforts to keep the Congress fully informed, consistent with the War Powers Resolution.”

Monday will mark 60 days from that announcement, but the administration does not appear to be planning to ask for Congress’s approval. It has been reluctant to share information about the strikes, first excluding senior Senate Democrats from a Senate briefing, then offering House members a briefing that did not include lawyers and failed to answer basic questions. The top two leaders of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Roger Wicker (R-MS) and Jack Reed (D-RI), have both said the administration has not produced documents, attack orders, and a list of targets required by law.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: November 1, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson

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Good News – A Court Rejects Trump’s Effort To Suppress The Vote

By Joyce Vance, Nov 01, 2025

Civil Discourse with Joyce Vance

Good News – A Court Rejects Trump’s Effort To Suppress The Vote

In March, Donald Trump issued an executive order titled “PRESERVING AND PROTECTING THE INTEGRITY OF AMERICAN ELECTIONS.” Predictably, it was designed to do anything but that. Its goal was to make it more difficult to register to vote.

In April, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, a senior judge in the District of Columbia, issued a preliminary injunction that temporarily prevented key parts of the executive order from going into effect while the litigation moved forward. The key problem Judge Kollar-Kotelly observed was that Trump was trying to usurp the power the Constitution affords to the states and Congress to run elections.

Friday, the Judge granted summary judgment in parts of the case, entering a permanent injunction that prevents the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) from implementing the worst provision of Trump’s executive order: one that purported to require proof of citizenship to register to vote.

The measure was designed to suppress voter participation in elections; a solution in search of a problem. It’s akin to the poll taxes used in the South before the Supreme Court put an end to them. Trump’s plan would require people to jump through expensive hoops to acquire proof of birth and costly forms of identification, like passports. At least 21 million Americans don’t have that kind of proof readily available. Only 51% of Americans have passports, which cost adults applying for the first time a $165.00 fee, not to mention assembling the documents you need, getting a photograph of yourself, and making it to an appointment. The problem is especially acute for young people and students who live away from home, and whose documents are with their parents, if they have them at all.

The Judge wrote, “The Constitution’s allocation of authority over federal elections between Congress and the States may not be intuitive. But it is no accident,” Judge Kollar-Kotelly wrote. “Instead, this design was the product of carefully considered compromises among our Constitution’s Framers.” Those compromisers were part of the attention to avoid rule by a king-a dictator.

Donald Trump has repeatedly tried to claim he has powers the Constitution does not give to the president. And this is especially dangerous when it comes to voting, given his track record. We the people must have the right to choose their leaders, not the other way around.

Tonight, another federal district judge stood up for the rule of law and for democracy, telling a power hungry president, “No.”

If you’re looking for something you can do to support the judiciary in this moment where district court judges are bravely standing for the rule of law even though they know that means the president could target them, let them know you support them. Send the Judge and others a postcard, like we do to encourage voters to participate in elections, and thank her for standing for the Constitution and the rule of law. It may seem like a small thing, but the judiciary deserves our support and our thanks for what they are doing. Let’s be visible and involved. Let’s make sure the courts know we are paying attention.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Good News: A Court Rejects Trump’s Effort To Suppress The Vote

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Top 10 states Americans want to move to most, according to moveBuddha

Life

This is the No. 1 state Americans want to move to most – People are ‘trading square footage for quality of life’

Published Wed, Oct 29 20257:05 PM EDT

By Celia Fernandez@cfernan6

moveBuddha ranked the states Americans are looking to move to right now.

In January, U.S. Census data showed that Americans were flocking to the Sun Belt states and according to a new report from moveBuddha that trend is still going strong.

The relocation tech company used proprietary data collected from 2020 through October 1, 2025, to analyze move trends. moveBuddha calculated the rates using an in-to-out ratio equation, based on the number of queries to move in divided by the number of queries to move out, using the company’s moving cost calculator.

The report found that four of the top 10 states people are looking to move to most are located in the South.

“The pattern is unmistakable: Americans are trading square footage for quality of life, megacities for mid-markets, and high costs for breathing room,” the report states.

Ryan Carrigan, founder of moveBuddha, tells CNBC Make It that the report confirms this trend that’s been established for a while: People are moving South.

“It’s just a very popular place to move. I think there’s a lot of affordability and housing availability. Those things are pretty big factors in terms of people moving,” he says.

Carrigan also said the report shows that some of the covid-19 trends are starting to reverse, as evidenced by California not seeing as high a rate of people moving out. Despite that, California remains an exit state with one of the lowest in-to-out ratios in the country.

“At some point, it had to reverse, but you don’t really see anything improving in California. They still have a lot of challenges, including cost of living, unemployment, and natural disaster challenges too. Everyone who was going to leave has left, but they are also benefiting from the AI boom, particularly in Northern California right now,” he adds.

For the sixth year in a row, South Carolina is the state Americans want to move to most

In-to-out-ratio: 1.97

South Carolina is the most popular state to move to for the sixth year in a row. Movers have shown more than double the interest in moves in than out.

According to the report, one big reason for that trend is that the state still offers affordability and access to nature, which boosts job growth. South Carolina was one of the five states with the highest net volume of move-related searches, at 13.7%.

Carrigan says another reason South Carolina came in at the top of the list is that it’s a major retiree state. According to a 2021 Population Reference Bureau report, 18.7% of South Carolina’s population is age 65 and over.

“Younger people aren’t really moving and moving has been generally slower since covid-19,” he says. “South Carolina benefits from being a retiree state, which is still a good portion of people moving, and it’s also the story that there’s still affordability and housing availability.”

South Carolina is the 27th-cheapest state to live in, according to data from the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center gathered in 2024. The cost of living in South Carolina is 9% lower than the national average, according to RentCafe. Housing is 18% lower than the national average but utilities are 10% higher.

The average South Carolina home value is $302,294, down 0.8% over the past year, according to Zillow.

The top 10 states Americans want to move to most 2025

1. South Carolina
2. North Carolina
3. Idaho
4. Alaska
5. Tennessee
6. Maine
7. Delaware
8. South Dakota
9. Alabama
10. Arkansas

North Carolina ranked second among the most popular states to move to, according to moveBuddha. The state had a 1.61 in-to-out ratio. North Carolina also had the highest volume of net searches in 2025 for people moving into the state from other states.

Carrigan says similar to South Carolina, North Carolina ranked highly because of the number of retirees continuing to move there. Florida was a popular state to move to during the covid-19 pandemic, but North Carolina remains affordable while Florida has not, he says.

“North Carolina is still a strong candidate to move to and it has a beautiful coast too,” he adds.

Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Top 10 states Americans want to move to most, according to moveBuddha

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One Trillion Web Pages Archived: Internet Archive Celebrates a Civilization-Scale Milestone | Internet Archive Blogs

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One Trillion Web Pages Archived: Internet Archive Celebrates a Civilization-Scale Milestone

Posted on October 31, 2025 by Caralee Adams

One trillion! There was no mistaking the number that was center stage at the Internet Archive in San Francisco on October 22.

“We are celebrating a major goal of one trillion web pages…shared by people all over the world, wanting to make sure that what they know is passed on,” said Brewster Kahle, Internet Archive’s founder and digital librarian. “It’s a fantastic, phenomenal success story.”

Watch the livestream: https://archive.org/embed/the-web-weve-built-2025?start=525

Since 1996, the Wayback Machine has been saving the digital history of the internet. In October, it surpassed the threshold of preserving one trillion web pages—a fact that was met with enthusiastic applause each time it was mentioned at the party held at the non-profit research library’s Funston Avenue headquarters in San Francisco.

People should not take for granted the important role that libraries, including the Internet Archive, have played in compiling accurate information and making it accessible to all, said California State Senator Scott Weiner, who presented a Certificate of Recognition from the State of California Senate to the Internet Archive. “We’re seeing now in this country people trying to rewrite history and come up with alternative facts,” he said at the event. “What the Internet Archive and the Wayback Machine does is to make clear that everything is there. I am so deeply grateful.” [watch remarks]

In a video message, Vint Cerf, creator of the Internet and vice president and chief internet evangelist at Google, said the one-trillion-page mark is an incredible milestone. “[The Internet Archive] has preserved an enormous amount of history over the course of their data collection, something which I feel is absolutely essential,” he said. “In the absence of what they have done, the 22nd century will have no clue what the 21st Century was all about.”

Looking Back, Looking Ahead

The program included a glimpse back at early days of the web and a hopeful vision for the future.

“There was this dream of an internet that was made for us, by us, to be able to make us better people,” Kahle said. “Yes, using technology. Yes, having games with lots of different players and winners—a fun and interesting world, and that is very much still within our grasp.”

Audrey Witters, a veteran of the early web, brought the audience back to 1994—when all existing websites could still fit on a single “What’s New” page. Reflecting on her early days at NCSA and her creative experiments on GeoCities, Witters shared the story of how a small animated alien GIF she helped create became an unlikely icon of the early web. “It’s so important for us to remember that context, that spirit, that joy of creation—what happens when you give people the tools and invitation to publicly and exuberantly celebrate themselves,” she said. Thanking the Internet Archive for preserving that era’s spirit of discovery and collaboration, Witters urged the next generation of creators “to look for new opportunities to promote exploration, collaboration, and joyful expression. Here’s to the next trillion!”

Lily Jamali, an investigative journalist with BBC News, said she appreciates the Archive’s public service mission and tools that are “absolutely fundamental” to hold the powerful to account. “They help us journalists fact check claims,” she said from the Great Room stage. “They help us see how companies and governments may have selectively edited online materials, or even deleted statements or social media posted that they would rather that the public didn’t see.” [watch remarks]

Journalists can no longer rely on their news outlets to store their work, Jamali said, so many turn to the Wayback Machine to access past articles and inform their reporting.

In a highly entertaining segment full of Wikipedia screen shots and laughs, Annie Rauwerda, creator of Depths of Wikipedia, spoke about the crucial partnership between Wikipedia and the Wayback Machine. She highlighted how archived pages make citations stronger and more durable by ensuring that even when the original source disappears, the evidence remains. “If Wikipedia is worth anything at all, it’s because of the citations,” Rauwerda said.

CEO of National Public Radio Katherine Maher offered her congratulations via video for the event. “One trillion web pages. That’s one trillion artifacts and snapshots of our interconnected world,” she said. “It’s a testament to the Internet Archives’ unwavering commitment to safeguarding the integrity of the open web and its history, ensuring that this vast digital record remains free and open for everyone.”

NPR and the Internet Archive share a deep commitment to providing access to information, a dedication to public service and a belief in strengthening societies through information and dialog, Maher said. “We live today in an era in which information is unstable. It emerges suddenly, decays rapidly, disappears instantly,” she said. “In this moment, the Archive’s role in preserving news, public discourse and our shared stories is more critical than ever.”

With Wayback Machine, ‘Knowledge Will Not Be Lost’

When the U.S. government websites started going offline after the change in presidential administrations earlier this year, Mark Graham, director of the Wayback Machine, said he wasn’t panicking. Why? Because since 2004 the Internet Archive has collaborated with many partners to save federal web pages, through the End of Term Web Archive effort. Since last fall, Graham described efforts to preserve more than 400 million web pages, 2 million videos and hundreds of thousands of data sets—all published by the U.S. government, and therefore available to the public. [watch remarks]

With the Wikimedia Foundation, the Archive has identified and fixed more than 28 million broken links from Wikipedia. It also added more than 4.2 million links to books and papers available from www.archive.org. Graham announced the new partnership with Automattic Inc. to make it easy for WordPress operators to automatically find and repair broken links with the Internet Archive Wayback Machine Link Fixer.

The Internet Archive faces challenges with the advent of AI. More services are blocking access, Graham said, making it harder for memory institutions, like the Internet Archive, to do their  jobs—yet, the team remains diligent in its efforts.

“We’re going to keep on building the library that the world deserves, one that remembers, one that connects us, and one that ensures no matter how much the web changes, that knowledge will not be lost,” Graham said.

The Path Forward

Luca Messarra, a humanities scholar and educator at Stanford University, said preserving webpages is important because the past is always shaping the present moment. “History is essential because it helps us understand how our own lives came to be. But more importantly, for me, history helps us understand how our lives can be made different,” he said. “The past tells us that the present does not need to be the way that it is.” [watch remarks]

Messarra said he has used resources from the Internet Archive to write conference papers, recover his old chat messaging history and recover a favorite family biscuit recipe.

“The Wayback Machine has tended to one trillion seeds that will nourish our future. All that remains is for us to harvest and use them,” Messarra said. “One trillion pages are one trillion opportunities to change our present moment. That requires that we look at the past not with nostalgia, but with initiative.”

The largest repository of internet history ever assembled is possible thanks to thousands of donations to the Internet Archive and 200,000 unique donors, said Joy Chesbrough, director of philanthropy. At the event, she announced a new campaign that encourages individuals to create their own fundraising teams to support the Internet Archive. See https://donate.archive.org/1t [watch remarks]

It was the largest gathering for the Archive’s annual party in years, said Chris Freeland, director of library services, and he hoped the gathering fostered a sense of connection.

“It was a nostalgic throwback, but it also showed people a path forward for a web that we want,” Freeland said. “I hope people come away with this sense of optimism and a thought that this is our web, and we can be in control of it again.” Posted in Announcements, Event, News, Wayback Machine – Web Archive | Tagged celebration, Wayback1T | Leave a reply

Continue/Read Original Article Here: One Trillion Web Pages Archived: Internet Archive Celebrates a Civilization-Scale Milestone | Internet Archive Blogs

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