Power to the People News — March 17, 2026
March 17, 2026: Trump's $2B donor scheme, ICE warehouse prisons, and Project 2025 out in the open. Power to the People News from People Power United.
When Power Abuses, the People Respond
This week's stories share a single spine: what happens when power operates without accountability — to law, to people, or to the planet. From the Strait of Hormuz to the Illinois primary ballot, from melting glaciers to the Senate floor, the costs of unchecked authority are landing hardest on the people least responsible for creating them. The question before us is not whether the damage is real — it is who will organize to stop it.
📰 Stories Shaping Power to the People Right Now
The Iran War Is Now Targeting Drinking Water
Both the U.S. and Iran have been accused of striking freshwater desalination plants — the facilities that supply drinking water to millions of people across the Persian Gulf. Gulf states get up to 90% of their drinking water from desalination, and attacking those plants violates the Geneva Conventions. Climate change was already making the region more water-scarce; the war is now threatening the last lifeline. This is what fossil fuel dependence looks like at its most brutal: a region so parched it built its civilization on machine-made water, now watching those machines become military targets. Mother Jones
Oil Is Approaching $100 a Barrel — and $200 Is on the Table
With Iran blocking the Strait of Hormuz — through which 20% of the world’s oil flows — Brent crude has crossed $100 a barrel, and Iran’s military has threatened to push it to $200. That threshold, economists warn, would tip the global economy into recession. The IEA has authorized the largest emergency reserve release in history, yet prices keep climbing. This is fossil fuel dependence in real time: one war, one chokepoint, and the entire global economy holds its breath. The Atlantic
Maine’s Lobster Catch Falls for the Fourth Straight Year
Maine’s lobster haul dropped to 78.8 million pounds in 2025 — its lowest level since 2008 — as warming oceans push lobsters north toward Canadian waters. The industry lost more than $75 million in value in a single year. For generations of fishing families, this is not a statistic; it is a way of life disappearing beneath the surface of a hotter sea. Maine’s lobstermen didn’t cause the climate crisis — but they are paying for it in empty traps and a future that looks nothing like the past. Seattle Times
Austria’s Glaciers Are Vanishing — 94 Out of 96 Are Retreating
A new report from the Austrian Alpine Club confirms that 94 of Austria’s 96 glaciers retreated over the past two years, with some losing more than 100 meters in length. Austria’s largest glacier, the Pasterze, is actively disintegrating. The club’s vice president was direct: it is no longer a question of saving the glaciers as they were — it is about mitigating the consequences for the people who depend on them for water, power, and agriculture. What is happening in Austria is happening everywhere. This is the long-term cost of fossil fuel politics made visible in ice. Seattle Times
Republicans Stage a Senate Talkathon for a Voter Suppression Bill They Know Will Fail
Senate Majority Leader John Thune launched a days-long — possibly weeks-long — floor talkathon this week on the SAVE America Act, Trump’s self-declared “No. 1 legislative priority.” The bill would require every American to show a passport or certified birth certificate to register to vote, locking out an estimated 21 million Americans who lack those documents. Thune admits it can’t reach 60 votes; Sen. Thom Tillis put the odds of passage at “0%.” They are debating it anyway — to set up a stolen-election narrative if Republicans lose in November. The SAVE Act is not an election security bill. It is a voter purge bill. Seattle Times
Trump’s Tariffs Will Cost Families $2,500 This Year — Even After the Supreme Court Said No
After the Supreme Court struck down Trump’s sweeping tariffs as unlawful, the administration immediately rebuilt its tariff architecture under alternative legal authorities. A study from congressional Democrats on the Joint Economic Committee finds the new regime will cost the average household $2,512 in 2026 — a 44% increase over last year — on top of Iran-war-driven gas price spikes. When the Supreme Court says no and the executive branch says “watch us,” that is the authoritarian playbook in action. Working families bear the full cost. They always do. Seattle Times
AIPAC Floods Illinois Primaries With $20 Million in Dark Money
Today is primary day in Illinois — a direct test of dark money versus people power. AIPAC-linked shell PACs have spent over $20 million across four Chicago-area congressional races, backing centrist candidates against Justice Democrats-endorsed progressives including Junaid Ahmed in the 8th District and Kat Abughazaleh in the 9th. Ahmed is running on $57,000 in PAC money against nearly $4 million in AIPAC-linked spending for his opponent; in a last-ditch move, AIPAC-linked PACs even ran ads boosting a fringe candidate to split Abughazaleh’s vote. “Right now, this race is unlimited money versus people power,” Ahmed said. Follow the results tonight. Axios
The Supreme Court Temporarily Blocks Deportation of 356,000 Haitians and Syrians
The Supreme Court halted Trump’s plan to strip Temporary Protected Status from roughly 6,000 Syrians and 350,000 Haitians, blocking their deportation while cases continue. In an unsigned order, the Court set expedited arguments for April — with a final ruling expected by end of June — on whether TPS designations are reviewable by courts at all. Haitians have held these protections since a catastrophic 2010 earthquake; Syrians since 2012 — and Trump himself extended their status in his first term. This temporary stay buys time, but 356,000 lives hang on what nine justices decide this summer. NPR
Trump Attacks the Supreme Court and Misrepresents Its Tariff Ruling
After the Court struck down his tariffs as unconstitutional, Trump took to Truth Social to accuse the Court of “unnecessarily ransacking” the U.S. economy and falsely claimed the ruling endorsed his “absolute right” to impose tariffs in another form — a claim fact-checkers confirm the majority opinion does not support. He then publicly praised Justices Kavanaugh, Alito, and Thomas — who dissented — for their “wisdom and courage.” A president publicly rewarding the justices who ruled in his favor, on a Court with no binding ethics code and no independent oversight, is not a check on power. It is judicial capture in plain sight. The Guardian
Federal Judge Orders $175 Billion in Illegal Tariff Refunds — Administration Is Already Fighting It
Judge Richard Eaton of the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled that all importers who paid Trump’s now-illegal IEEPA tariffs are entitled to refunds — a potential $175 billion liability for the federal government. A second federal court rejected the administration’s attempt to slow the refund process, and U.S. Customs has acknowledged its system was never designed to process refunds at this scale. The administration collected more than $130 billion under tariffs it had no legal authority to impose, and is now fighting every mechanism designed to return that money. Taxation power belongs to Congress. Courts are saying so. The administration is defying them anyway. Seattle Times
💥 Your Power in Action: What You Can Do Today
⚡ Take action: Tell Congress to subpoena Hegseth about the Iran school attack
👉 Take action: Tell Congress to stop Trump from sending American troops into Iran — and vote no on the draft
🔊 Take action: Call your senator (202) 224-3121 and tell them to vote no on Mullin for DHS
📢 Take action: Tell state AGs to block the Warner-Paramount mega-merger
📋 Take action: Tell Congress to stop Trump’s illegal war in Iran
🎬 Take action: Tell your Secretary of State: No ICE at the polls
🚨 Take action: Speak out now to help stop the next Great Recession before it starts
🗳️ Bonus action: Register to vote, vote in every election, and help your community do the same. Reproductive freedom is won and lost at the ballot box.
👑 Bonus action: Sign up for the next national No Kings Day of Action and show up in solidarity with everyone whose rights are under attack.
The movement for progress and power to the people starts here.
🔥 What Comes Next: The Work Is Ours
This week’s stories are not ten separate events. They are one story told ten ways — about what it costs when power goes unchecked. Desalination plants destroyed. A $2,500 tariff bill landed on families after a court said no. Dark money purchasing congressional seats in broad daylight. Glaciers gone. Lobsters gone. The throughline is always the same: the people who bear the cost are never the people who made the decision.
And yet the resistance is working. Courts are ordering refunds the administration doesn’t want to pay. The Supreme Court blocked the deportation of 356,000 people. Organizers in Illinois forced a $20 million dark money machine to run desperate vote-splitting ads. None of these are final victories — but all of them prove that organized people can slow the machinery of harm. Show up. Stay in. The work is ours.
Together, we can champion our rights, freedoms, and democracy, hold our leaders accountable to the people’s will, and inspire voters to make a meaningful difference.
Laurie Woodward Garcia (paid with hugs and kisses, not bought by special interests) Leader, People Power United
People Power United | In this community, we will always speak out against racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia, antisemitism, homophobia, misogyny, sexism, ageism, ableism, sizeism, elitism, transphobia, misogynoir, and bigotry!
This is our moment to rise, resist, and reclaim our rights, freedoms, rule of law, and democracy. Millions of Americans are already refusing to back down — in the streets, at the ballot box, and in their communities.
Every movement that was ever won started with people who refused to quit. We are those people.
The future is not lost. It is being built — by us, right now.