Managing Trump: 1)Trump suspends green card lottery program that let Brown University, MIT shootings suspect into U.S; 2)Trump levels political attack on Rob Reiner in inflammatory post after his killing; 3)Ford cool to idea to sell off U.S. booze for charity

1)Trump suspends green card lottery program that let Brown Universit shootings suspect into U.S.

Courtesy Barrie360.com and The Associated Press

By Elliot Spagat and Hallie Golden, December 19, 2025

President Donald Trump suspended the green card lottery program on Thursday that allowed the suspect in the Brown University and MIT shootings to come to the United States.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a post on the social platform X that, at Trump’s direction, she is ordering the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services to pause the program.

“This heinous individual should never have been allowed in our country,” she said of the suspect, Portuguese national Claudio Neves Valente.

Neves Valente, 48, is suspected in the shootings at Brown University that killed two students and wounded nine others, and the killing of an MIT professor. He was found dead Thursday evening from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, officials said.

Neves Valente had studied at Brown on a student visa beginning in 2000, according to an affidavit from a Providence police detective. In 2017, he was issued a diversity immigrant visa and months later obtained legal permanent residence status, according to the affidavit. It was not immediately clear where he was between taking a leave of absence from the school in 2001 and getting the visa in 2017.

The diversity visa program makes up to 50,000 green cards available each year by lottery to people from countries that are little represented in the U.S., many of them in Africa. The lottery was created by Congress, and the move is almost certain to invite legal challenges.

Nearly 20 million people applied for the 2025 visa lottery, with more than 131,000 selected when including spouses with the winners. After winning, they must undergo vetting to win admission to the United States. Portuguese citizens won only 38 slots.

Lottery winners are invited to apply for a green card. They are interviewed at consulates and subject to the same requirements and vetting as other green-card applicants.

Trump has long opposed the diversity visa lottery. Noem’s announcement is the latest example of using tragedy to advance immigration policy goals. After an Afghan man was identified as the gunman in a fatal attack on National Guard members in November, Trump’s administration imposed sweeping rules against immigration from Afghanistan and other counties.

While pursuing mass deportation, Trump has sought to limit or eliminate avenues to legal immigration. He has not been deterred if they are enshrined in law, like the diversity visa lottery, or the Constitution, as with a right to citizenship for anyone born on U.S. soil. The Supreme Court recently agreed to hear his challenge to birthright citizenship.

2)Trump levels political attack on Rob Reiner in inflammatory post after his killing

Courtesy Barrie360.com and The Associated Press

By Michelle L. Price, December 15, 2025

U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday blamed Rob Reiner’s outspoken opposition to the president for the actor-director’s killing, delivering the unsubstantiated claim in a shocking post that seemed intent on decrying his opponents even in the face of a tragedy.

The statement, even for Trump, was a shocking comment that came as police were still investigating the deaths of the beloved director and his wife as an apparent homicide. The couple were found dead at their home Sunday in Los Angeles. Investigators believe they suffered stab wounds and the couple’s son Nick Reiner, was in police custody early Monday.

Trump has a long track record of inflammatory remarks, but his comments in a social media post were a drastic departure from the role presidents typically play in offering a message of consolation or tribute to the death of a public figure. His message drew criticism even from conservatives and his supporters and laid bare Trump’s unwillingness to rise above political grievance in moments of crisis.

Trump, in a post on his social media network, said that Reiner and his wife were killed “reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME.”

He said Reiner “was known to have driven people CRAZY by his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump, with his obvious paranoia reaching new heights as the Trump Administration surpassed all goals and expectations of greatness.”

Kentucky Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, who has bucked much of his party’s lockstep agreement with the president, criticized Trump for the comment.

“Regardless of how you felt about Rob Reiner, this is inappropriate and disrespectful discourse about a man who was just brutally murdered,” Massie wrote in a post on X. “I guess my elected GOP colleagues, the VP, and White House staff will just ignore it because they’re afraid? I challenge anyone to defend it.”

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican whom Trump branded a “traitor” for disagreeing with him, responded to Trump’s message by saying, “This is a family tragedy, not about politics or political enemies.”

Reiner was one of the most active Democrats in the film industry, regularly campaigning on behalf of liberal causes and hosting fundraisers. He was a vocal critic of Trump, calling him in a 2017 interview with Variety “mentally unfit” to be president and “the single-most unqualified human being to ever assume the presidency of the United States.”

The White House, which amplified the president’s post, did not respond to a message about the criticism it was receiving and calls for Trump to take it down.

The unsympathetic message was the latest example of Trump’s unsparing prism through which he views those he perceives as enemies.

He made retribution against political enemies a prime focus of his campaign for the White House last year. And he has in the past made light of violence when it’s befallen those on the other side of the political aisle.

When Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi, was attacked by an intruder looking for the former House speaker at the family’s San Francisco home in 2022 and beaten over the head with a hammer, Trump later mocked the attack.

That’s despite his comments after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk earlier this year. Trump said Kirk’s killing was “the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree.”

His administration then sought consequences for people who were critical of Kirk or even celebrated his killing.

Jenna Ellis, who was one of Trump’s lawyers and worked on his efforts in 2020 to overturn the results of the presidential election, pointed out Trump’s double standard and called his post “NOT the appropriate response.”

“The Right uniformly condemned political and celebratory responses to Charlie Kirk’s death. This is a horrible example from Trump (and surprising considering the two attempts on his own life) and should be condemned by everyone with any decency,” Ellis said in a post on X.

When Trump spoke at Kirk’s memorial service, he used his remarks to underline how he views his adversaries.

“I hate my opponent,” the president said.

3)Ford cool to idea to sell off U.S. booze for charity

Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press

By Allison Jones, December 15, 2025

Ontario Premier Doug Ford says his government has no plan to sell off a stockpile of American alcohol sitting in storage to benefit charities over the holiday season, for fear it could harm local producers.

The provincial Liberals have been pushing Ford to direct the Liquor Control Board of Ontario to sell the booze and donate the proceeds to charity, like food banks.

Ford pulled American alcohol off LCBO shelves in March in response to U.S. President Donald Trump imposing tariffs on Canadian goods.

About $80 million worth is in storage and about $2 million worth could expire in the next six months.

Ford says today that it’s not as easy as it sounds, and he doesn’t want to sell it during the Christmas holidays because it could stop people from buying local Ontario alternatives.

The premier says he would consider the move if the alcohol could be sold out of province.