Politics

AOC Tears Trump Apart As ‘Authoritarian’ And Warns He Wants To ‘Carve Out The World’

Published

5 hours ago

15 February 2026

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Friday at the Munich Security Conference.

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez delivered a dire warning about President Donald Trump’s apparent ambition to destroy the international rules-based order and let authoritarians “carve out the world” — as long as he gets the Western Hemisphere.

The New York Democrat made her case on Friday during a panel discussion at the Munich Security Conference, beginning with a call for protecting the world’s democracies amid Trump’s controversial foreign and domestic policy actions that define this volatile “new era.”

“I think what we are seeking is a return to a rules-based order that eliminates the hypocrisies around when, too often in the West, we look the other way for inconvenient populations to act out these paradoxes,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

She continued with examples: “Whether it is kidnapping a foreign head of state, whether it is threatening our allies to colonise Greenland, whether it is looking the other way in a genocide, hypocrisies are vulnerabilities and they threaten democracies globally.”

Ocasio-Cortez delivered her most pointed remarks, however, when moderating New York Times journalist Katrin Bennhold asked which policies or institutions – such as NATO, the Paris Climate Accords or the Iran nuclear deal – a Democratic administration would save.

The progressive congresswoman began by arguing that the US must first revisit its commitments to foreign assistance through agencies such as USAID, and renew America’s political agreements with various allies that the Trump administration has abandoned.

“They are looking to withdraw the United States from the entire world so that we can turn into an age of authoritarianism, of authoritarians, that can carve out the world where Donald Trump can command the Western Hemisphere and Latin America,” she continued.

Ocasio-Cortez added that Trump sees the entire Western Hemisphere as “his personal sandbox.”

She further argued Trump wouldn’t care if strong-arm leaders such as Russia’s Vladimir Putin started to “saber-rattle around Europe” and militarily “bully” America’s allies there, reiterating that his goal is for “authoritarians to have their own geographic domains.”

Trump has admitted there is only “one thing” limiting his quest for land and resources, telling the New York Times, “My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”

“I don’t need international law,” he continued at the time. “I’m not looking to hurt people.”

Ocasio-Cortez on Friday finished making her case by returning to the moderator’s central question about which institutions or policies a Democratic administration might want to save, sparking renewed speculation of her potential presidential run in 2028.

She told Bennhold, “And it actually is the Trans-Pacific Partnership, it is our global alliances that can be a hard stop against authoritarian consolidation of power, particularly in the installation of regional puppet governments.”

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Reform UK’s poverty plan is to pretend it doesn’t exist

Published

3 minutes ago

15 February 2026

NewsAdmin

Reform UK's poverty plan is to pretend it doesn’t exist

If you’re wondering how Reform plan to tackle poverty, we now have an answer to that. The plan is to deny it even exists

Zia Yusuf claims that “real poverty does exist in this country.”
@TrevorPTweets challenges Reform UK’s head of policy on his comments ⬇️#TrevorPhillips https://t.co/LFPXoeri6h pic.twitter.com/lqN76RkQ1q
— Sky News (@SkyNews) February 15, 2026

Denial

In the clip above, Zia Yusuf says:

So firstly, it’s really important people understand when the term poverty is used primarily by left-wing politicians, let’s define that term. It is… a relative term, which means that you could literally – this is a mathematical fact – you could increase everybody’s incomes tenfold and that statistic would stay the same.

Oh my god, shut the fuck up, you oily, little nerd.

‘I can tell you mathematically what poverty is‘.

You sound like a Star Trek android, and not the good one.

We can tell you what poverty is, Zia, because most of us here at the Canary have experienced it.

Poverty is not having enough to get by.

Poverty is watching your outgoings outpace your incomings.

Poverty is spending hours a week figuring out how to make the money go around.

Poverty is constantly worrying about bills and life choices.

Poverty is fear and anxiety.

Poverty is the feeling that things will only get worse.

Yusuf thinks it’s a mathematical equation, because he has no idea what the fuck he’s talking about; he’s just another ex-Tory, ex-Goldman Sachs rich boy who wants to gut the welfare state to give his billionaire mates handouts.

Too much will never be enough for these people.

They will take more than they can ever spend, and they will shit, and piss, and moan as they bite the hand that feeds them.

Yusuf continued:

But the most important thing is that Reform, we are fiscally prudent, and we wanted to make sure anything we announced was going to be fiscally neutral.

“Fiscally prudent”, is it?

If you’re familiar with Curb Your Enthusiasm, start imagining the end credits now as you read the following headlines:

Reform have totally let the cat out of the bag about who they are.
Zia Yusuf lecturing that poverty and peoples everyday struggles with rising bills and rent is exaggerated.
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A party of the failed status quo, funded and representing big corporate interests. https://t.co/G000aCvbLl
— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) February 15, 2026

Social bullshittery

Phillips asked Yusuf if poverty measures are all made up, to which Yusuf responded:

No, it’s worse than that, because real poverty does exist in this country, Trevor. And absolute poverty does exist in very, very small pockets. If you actually want to do the right thing for as many people as possible in this country, then you need to create social mobility. That has been crushed by the Tory government and now this Labour government.

To be clear, ‘social mobility’ is not the phenomenon in which everyone becomes more affluent. It’s the phenomenon in which some working class people land middle class jobs. This is great for sly politicians like Yusuf, because it allows them to point at the fortunate few and say:

See – it is possible for you layabouts to earn more — anyone on poverty wages is just lazy.

If you’re old enough, you will remember the UK’s middle class did indeed expand in the 90s. Social mobility was happening on a larger scale, and we got the ‘lower middle class’ — i.e. working class families who could afford to alternate between taking their kids on holiday to Menorca and Butlin’s Pwllheli (if that seems oddly specific, I’m talking from experience).

This phenomenon happened because we took advantage of the cheap labour of countries like China, allowing us to live beyond our previous means. We could have locked in that progress, and ensured the country’s wealth was evenly distributed. We didn’t do that; instead we got runaway capitalism, with the rich claiming more wealth and authority, and the rest of us losing our rights and purchasing power.

Now, we’re at a point where social mobility can’t happen because even the middle class are fucking struggling. Tinkering around the edges or making savings here or there won’t cut it; we need to hobble the billionaire class, and we need to rob them of their power and influence.

Only then can we have a society in which people can live day to day without dreading tomorrow.

Bootstrapping

You’ve probably heard the phrase ‘pull yourself up by the bootstraps‘, but did you know where it comes from? As Useless Etymology report:

The phrase “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” originated shortly before the turn of the 20th century. It’s attributed to a late-1800s physics schoolbook that contained the example question “Why can not a man lift himself by pulling up on his bootstraps?”
So when it became a colloquial phrase referring to socioeconomic advancement shortly thereafter, it was meant to be sarcastic, or to suggest that it was an impossible accomplishment.

It’s literally impossible for everyone in a capitalist system to be well off and content, because it’s a tornado designed to pull everything up to the top.

In other words, beware of geeks bearing false grifts.

Backlash to President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown is putting vulnerable Republicans in a tough spot, forcing them to shift their tone to appease frustrated Hispanic voters — or risk losing key battleground seats.

It’s a delicate pivot for Republicans in South Texas, who spent years taking a hardline approach on immigration and flipped historically blue districts in the process.

Republican Rep. Monica De La Cruz, representing a majority-Hispanic district, has gone from calling for mass deportations to focusing on the “worst of the worst.” In lieu of expediting removals, she wants to create new visa categories for undocumented workers to fill jobs in construction and agriculture. And instead of slamming the Biden White House for its “border failure,” she’s setting up private meetings at the Trump White House to plead for temperance in immigration enforcement.

Rep. Tony Gonzales, whose district shares hundreds of miles with Mexico, wants his party to talk more about the border, and said he plans to “continue to advocate that the Republican Party needs to focus on convicted criminal illegal aliens” amid broad outrage over deportations of undocumented people with no proven risk to public safety.

Like other Republicans, they are trying to slowly distance themselves from the massive immigration crackdown that has quickly become political kryptonite for the GOP — but without being seen as disloyal to the president or undercutting their previous positions.

“President Trump made a promise, and he’s kept that promise by securing the border. That was stage one,” De La Cruz said in an interview. “Now we’re at stage two, which is having a conversation of true immigration reform.”

Republicans’ efforts to change the conversation will test their ability to maintain, or even extend, Trump’s 2024 gains with Hispanic voters — and play a pivotal role in the fight for control of Congress in November. A slew of polls in recent weeks has shown many Hispanic voters across the country, repulsed by the Trump administration’s aggressive deportation campaign, are souring on the Republican president they supported to a historic degree in 2024.

It’s a warning the White House appears to be taking seriously. In recent weeks, after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by an immigration enforcement officer in Minneapolis, the White House has signaled openness to paring back its deportation operation. On Thursday, border czar Tom Homan announced the administration’s massive immigration surge in Minneapolis would come to a close.

Latino voters’ embrace of Trump was a political earthquake, and South Texas was the epicenter.

De La Cruz’s district — which sprawls from the Rio Grande Valley on the U.S.-Mexico border up to the San Antonio suburbs — was represented by a Democrat in Congress for 120 years before De La Cruz won her seat in 2022. In 2024, Trump romped to an 18-point victory.

The 15th Congressional District was among those redrawn by the Texas legislature’s redistricting gambit last year, offering De La Cruz an even more favorable electorate. But that bet relies heavily on Hispanic voters sticking with the GOP: Nearly 80 percent of the district identifies as Hispanic or Latino, and if those voters flip back to the Democratic Party or stay home, it could erase much of the new map’s intended friendliness to Republicans.

“With the border secure and Latinos responding to ICE raids and government overreach, the districts that Republicans thought were their future a year ago are likely to be their undoing,” said Mike Madrid, a Republican strategist who is a frequent critic of Trump. “Hard to find another situation in the past 50 years where a political party has squandered a generational opportunity like this.”

Flipping De La Cruz’s district is a top objective for House Democrats this cycle, who are salivating at the prospect of winning back Latino voters. She’ll face either Bobby Pulido, a Tejano music star with widespread name ID recruited by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, or Ana Cuellar, an ER doctor who has an impressive penchant for fundraising.

Local Republicans have begun sounding the alarm.

Daniel Garza, president of the LIBRE Initiative, a grassroots conservative group based in South Texas, said “Biden’s border chaos” was directly responsible for Texas Republicans’ victories in recent election cycles, including De La Cruz’s, but that moving toward the other extreme — a harsh crackdown — could again dissuade Hispanic voters who might otherwise support the GOP.

“We don’t have to be a nation that has to decide between an ‘everybody-in’ or an ‘everybody-out’ approach,” Garza said. “I honestly feel that the counties across the entire Texan border shifted to the right because of the border chaos. … But this sort of everybody-out approach, I think, is also causing some reflection.”

The immigration crackdown has wreaked havoc for the area’s business community. Greg LaMantia, who runs a major beer wholesaler in the region, said his company’s sales are down as a result of the raids. “You have people that are legal that are scared to death to get caught up in this fiasco and deported,” said LaMantia, who voted for Trump and has donated recently to both Republican and Democratic lawmakers. “It’s caused sales to go down, no doubt about it. It’s chaos.”

Daniel Guerrero, CEO of the McAllen-based South Texas Builders Association, said rampant ICE activity has sent a shiver through the construction industry, leading to massive delays. He said ICE is notorious for following concrete trucks to job sites, then apprehending workers as they begin pouring a foundation, leaving half-poured concrete slabs.

“The sentiment is pretty clear across the table, that nobody really expected this magnitude of enforcement,” said Guerrero, who voted for Trump and De La Cruz in 2024.

He said the Hispanic Trump supporters he knows are souring on this administration, an observation supported by recent polling. In the latest warning sign, Latino voters helped a Democrat flip a reliably red seat in Fort Worth last month. Taylor Rehmet, who picked up a state Senate seat in a special election, won about 4 out of 5 Hispanic votes across the district, a massive 26-point improvement over Kamala Harris in 2024.

Many Republicans are trying to steer the discussion around immigration to focus on how border crossings have dropped to historic lows under Trump — which they hope will remind Hispanic voters why they should stick with the GOP.

“The Hispanic population gives President Trump and Republicans a lot of leeway with just how bad things were before and where they’re at now,” said Gonzales, whose sprawling border district is majority Hispanic. “They have a lot of leeway to get a lot of runway, if you will.”

De La Cruz successfully ran in 2024 on deportations and the “worst border security crisis in our nation’s history.” Now she’s proposing a new visa category, H-2C, allowing employers like those in construction and hospitality to hire foreign workers. She also introduced legislation which would expand the H-2A visa category for seasonal agricultural workers.

In recent weeks, De La Cruz said she has taken constituents to meet with the Labor Department, the White House and House Speaker Mike Johnson, pitching them on her bills and encouraging the administration to change its tact on immigration enforcement.

“There’s limited resources, period. And we want those limited resources to be focused on the worst of the worst, the criminal immigrants that have come in,” De La Cruz said. “We have legal immigrants in our district who have work visas that they don’t want to go out to work because some may have fear about the process that is currently being administered.”

But De La Cruz’s shift in messaging has simultaneously earned skepticism from some industry leaders and frustration with the base, underscoring the political tightrope she must walk until November.

Guerrero, the construction nonprofit leader, said he sensed political opportunism in De La Cruz’s newfound interest in helping his industry.

“People feel abandoned because you never showed face, and now that there’s an actual crisis, you want to show face?” Guerrero said. “It’s like, dude, it’s a little too late, man.”

The MAGA base, meanwhile, doesn’t love the shift, either. Patricio County GOP Chair Rex Warner thinks De La Cruz has become too soft on deportations. “I align with some of it, but very little,” he said.

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Politics

Nigel Farage Corrected 5 Times While Defending Jim Ratcliffe

Published

1 hour ago

15 February 2026

NewsAdmin

Nigel Farage Corrected 5 Times While Defending Jim Ratcliffe

Nigel Farage was fact-checked four times in a toe-curling interview over Jim Ratcliffe’s controversial claim that the UK is being “colonised” by migrants.

Ratcliffe, the billionaire co-owner of Manchester United, triggered major backlash last week when he said: “You can’t have an economy with nine million people on benefits, and huge levels of immigrants coming in.

“The UK is being colonised by immigrants.”

He claimed: “The population of the UK was 58 million in 2020. Now it’s 70 million. That’s 12 million.”

Ratcliffe offered a limited apology on Friday, saying he was “sorry that my choice of language has offended some people in the UK an Europe”.

But, he insisted it was still “important to raise the issue of controlled and well-managed immigration that supports economic growth”.

Speaking to Sky News, Farage defended Ratcliffe – who has previously described the Reform party leader as “intelligent” – saying he had only pointed out a “fact” that 12 million people have come into the country.

But presenter Matt Barbet corrected Farage: “Well, he got the dates wrong didn’t he?”

Farage admitted: “He said 2020 but he meant 2000. Since 2000, 12 million people is the population increase in Britain. Over 85% of that is the direct impact of immigration. That’s a fact.

“There are nine million living in Britain on benefits of some kind, although some of them in work benefits.”

Barbet cut in with a second correction: “Most of them are in work benefits, actually.”

Farage also alleged that Ratcliffe had only withdrawn the use of the word “colonised”, not the overall sentiment.

Asked about his use of that loaded term, Farage said: “I think it’s probably in the dictionary definition correct – but perhaps people aren’t quite ready for that.”

“It has historical overtones though doesn’t it?” Barbet said. “I want to ask you about the language, the rhetoric. People using words like that, people referring to Enoch Powell’s speeches, is that overshadowing having a considered debate on immigration?”

Farage said: “It’s just one word. Everything he said was right. One word can be used in a different context.”

The MP for Clacton claimed the Office for National Statistics (ONS) census also shows a million people can’t speak any English.

But Barbet pointed out: “It says they aren’t speaking good English. That doesn’t mean there’s a million who aren’t speaking any English at all.”

“Five million don’t speak good English,” Farage insisted. “A million don’t speak English at all. Those are the census facts we got a couple of years ago.”

Barbet then pointed out that Ratcliffe himself is an economic migrant as he lives in Monaco.

“He’s a tax migrant,” Farage replied.

“He’s an economic migrant then, isn’t he?” Barbet replied, but Farage dodged the comment by claiming Ratcliffe is not claiming social security.

“He’s spending lots of money in Monaco employing people and spending money on the high street,” the Reform Party leader said.

“Actually, Nigel Farage, he’s cut hundreds of jobs here in the UK, in Grangemouth,” Barbet said, with a cutting fifth correction. “He wanted to build Ineos Grenadier car in Wales, you know where it’s built now? It’s built in France.”

Farage just blamed the “moronic energy policy” put in place by Labour and the Tories.

.@MattBarbet asks Reform UK ‘s Nigel Farage whether Jim Ratcliffe was “right to apologise” for saying Britain has been “colonised by immigrants”.
Watch the full interview live on Politics Hub ⬇️https://t.co/x4wJcskjGb
— Sky News (@SkyNews) February 12, 2026

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Labour Together implicated in another spy story

Published

2 hours ago

15 February 2026

NewsAdmin

Labour Together implicated in another spy story

‘Labour Together’ — the sabotage outfit that brought down Jeremy Corbyn and conned Labour members into choosing Keir Starmer — paid investigators to spy on, and smear two Times journalists. Unsurprisingly, the pair — Harry Yorke and Gabriel Pogrund — have publicised their experience as unique.

@Gabriel_Pogrund and I were the subject of a disgraceful smear campaign — just for doing our jobs
I’m proud that The Sunday Times is calling it out on the front page tomorrow
Labour activists paid for smear campaign against journalists https://t.co/Uw9UjNJtzm
— Harry Yorke (@HarryYorke1) February 14, 2026
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Labour Together pursues journalists

The Sunday Times, which covered the story, reported that:

The group that helped to get Sir Keir Starmer elected as Labour leader hired lobbyists to investigate the personal, political and religious background of a Sunday Times journalist behind an article about secret donations that funded its work.
Labour Together paid £36,000 to Apco, a US public affairs firm, to examine the “backgrounds and motivations” of reporters behind a story before the general election.
The aim was to discredit The Sunday Times’s reporting by falsely suggesting its journalists might be part of a Russian conspiracy or had relied on emails hacked by the Kremlin.
Apco produced a 58-page report including almost ten pages of deeply personal and false claims about Gabriel Pogrund, the Sunday Times Whitehall editor. He and Harry Yorke, the newspaper’s deputy political editor, were named as “persons of significant interest”.
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Old news

But Pogrund and Yorke only stand out for being the only ‘mainstream’ hacks known to have been targeted by Labour Together. The pressure group was formerly run by disgraced Starmer adviser Morgan McSweeney and other ‘red Tories’ in Starmer’s faction. But these latest revelations and labour Together’S spying activities is not new — not in any real sense. Their not-so-covert operations have been in the public domain for months.

In fact, news of the spying broke on the Canary in September 2025. McSweeney’s outfit set investigators on Paul Holden, the author of The Fraud. This exposes Labour Together’s dark tactics and Starmer’s dishonesty. Furthermore, the book has been serialised by the Canary.

Labour Together did the same to Andrew Feinstein, the author and former Mandela government minister. He stood against Starmer in the 2024 general election and decimated his majority. Moreover, it did the same to journalists John McEvoy, Khadija Sharife and Peter Geoghegan.

Labour Together’s spies targeted Pogrund for being Jewish — ironic given their weaponisation of supposed ‘Labour antisemitism’ against Corbyn and the left. But they did the same to the Jewish Feinstein. They smeared Pogrund and Yorke as being linked to Russia — they’d done the same to Feinstein and Holden.

In fact, not even the ‘news’ about Yorke and Pogrund is new. The Canary reported it last week. No wonder McSweeney and his cadre are scared of the Canary. They have tried and failed to destroy it while Corbyn was still leading Labour.

Featured image via the Canary

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Politics

Experts Share Just How Often You Should Be Cleaning Your Car

Published

2 hours ago

15 February 2026

NewsAdmin

Experts Share Just How Often You Should Be Cleaning Your Car

During the winter months, it takes a lot more time and effort to go outside and clean the car. However, if you don’t clean your car regularly, it can cause damage to the whole car and can even decrease the value of it over time.

Car Care Expert Katie Newman from Carfume, shares just how often you should be cleaning your car and five reasons why it’s essential.

How often should you clean your car?

Washing your car regularly is really important for preventing all sorts of cosmetic and structural damage. Generally speaking, you should try to wash your car at least every two weeks. However, if you live in rural areas where your car is more likely to be exposed to dirt on the roads, then it might be better to wash your car weekly. Here are five reasons why it’s essential to clean your car regularly:

Dirt, salt, bird droppings and leaves can damage your car’s paintwork if not cleaned. Washing your car regularly will help to maintain the finish of the paint and prevent paying for any costly repairs.

Reduces the risk of mould

Fortnightly cleaning, such as hoovering or wiping down surfaces, will eliminate any potential mould and help to dry out moisture. Once the interior is clean and dry and you’ve addressed any moisture, then using an air freshener can keep the car smelling fresh and cleaner for longer.

Not only does a messy car look unsightly, but leaving belongings to build up in your car isn’t cost-effective. Extra weight from clutter can actually make your car work harder, reducing mileage over time, so not cleaning your car out regularly might just be costing you!

Cars often see lots of food and drink throughout the week. Whether it’s drink spillages or crumbs, this can leave a lingering unpleasant smell inside the car. Fortnightly cleaning of the interiors and regular air freshener usage can help to reduce any of those odours.

It’s really easy, especially in the winter, for mirrors, lights and windows to become dirty and reduce visibility. This can be extremely dangerous through the winter. Making sure you clean your windows, lights and mirrors will improve overall safety during the cold winter months.

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Exclusive: Greens Slam Reform ‘Frauds’ Over Poverty Claims

Published

2 hours ago

15 February 2026

NewsAdmin

Exclusive: Greens Slam Reform 'Frauds' Over Poverty Claims

The Green Party has slammed Reform UK for letting the “cat out of the bag” after Zia Yusuf suggested poverty rates in Britain are misleading.

Reform’s head of policy got into a spat with Sky News’ Trevor Phillips on Sunday over his party’s plans to keep the two-child benefit cap while cutting business rates for pubs.

“Reform’s policy is to let children go hungry so their parents can get in an extra round?” Phillips asked.

Yusuf replied: “Nigel’s position always has been and still is that he would lift the two-child benefit cap only for British families who are in work.”

He then added: “When the term poverty is used, primarily by left-wing politicians, it’s a relative term which means you could literally – this is a mathematical fact – increase everyone’s incomes tenfold and the statistics would stay the same.”

Phillips asked if Yusuf was trying to say poverty levels are an “illusion”.

The Reform politician replied: “No, it’s worse than that because real poverty does exist in this country, Trevor.

“Absolute poverty does exist in small pockets, if you want to do the right thing in this country, you need to create social mobility.

“There will always be a percentage of the public who are ‘in poverty’, and what that does nothing for is to help the middle classes or indeed the people who live in absolute poverty.”

Yusuf then claimed there are “very, very small pockets” of poverty in Wales.

He said: “The measure of poverty which has been used for years in this country is an unhelpful thing because it is relative to the mean and the median, it means you are always going to have a percentage of people who are there and that is not in the interest of people who need it.”

More than 3.8 million people experienced destitution in 2022 including a million children, according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

A Green Party spokesperson tore into Yusuf’s comments, telling HuffPost UK: “Reform have totally let the cat out of the bag this morning about what they really stand for.

“Zia Yusuf, a multi-millionaire, lecturing that poverty and people’s everyday struggles with rising bills and rent is exaggerated, shows what frauds Reform are.

“They are just another party of the failed status quo, funded by and representing big corporate interests.

“The Gorton and Denton by election is between the Greens and Reform.

“We are campaigning for lower bills and protecting public services by taxing millionaires and billionaires. Reform stand for the wealthy few.”

Reform, the Greens and Labour are all battling it out to win the crunch contest in Greater Manchester later this month, in the hope of securing another MP in the Commons.

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