In this Newsletter

• Chair’s Message
• Upcoming Event
• ICYMI
  
• Volunteer Opportunities
• DAGR News and Views
• On our RADAR - DA Priorities

Dear Friends,

Where to begin? This month President Donald Trump and his merry men voted another giveaway to billionaires, while stripping millions of Americans of healthcare, adding trillions of dollars to the national debt and costing the U.S. its last AAA credit rating

The Grifter-in-Chief also accepted a $400 million airplane as a “gift” from Qatar, hosted a dinner for “investors” in his cryptocurrency, declared ignorance when asked if he has to uphold the Constitution, mocked the Papacy, and stepped up his attacks on Harvard University. Meanwhile, the Trump Organization – led by his two eldest sons – inked billions of dollars in new business deals in the Middle East. (But, wait, what about Hunter Biden?)

The clown show continues and that’s my short list of disgraces. What are yours? I invite you to submit your “Trump Outrage-of-the-Month” by posting on the DAGR Members Chat group on Signal (to join, send a request to our secretary).

In the meantime, the courts continue to stymie Trump’s policies in trade, education and immigration, among other areas. Public disapproval has forced Elon Musk to step back from DOGE, and Wall Street has found a new trading strategy based on Trump’s fecklessness called the TACO trade (“Trump Always Chickens Out”).

Here in Greece we are keeping busy with a DAGR Kafeneion on the book Caste, a presence and protest at Athens Pride & No Kings Day on June 14th, plus our regular happy hours and coffee gatherings. Look for details on the DAGR website or our Facebook and Instagram pages.

Thank you again for being engaged.

Alkman Granitsas
Chair, Democrats Abroad Greece

Friday JUN 6 - Sunday JUN 8 - 15:30 EET
Democrats Abroad Annual General Meeting (AGM)
Three days of presentations, reports, and business. Election of international officers. And more. This is the important business that frames what DAGR and other country committees in all three regions do all year long. Any DA member is eligible to sit in. Our DAGR country Chair, Vice Chair and Voting Representative (we have ONE!) will be there throughout to listen, speak and vote. This is usually a live meeting in DC in the odd numbered years. This year, due to concerns about ICE et al, the meeting will be virtual! Check the details and RSVP for the meeting links here. 

Tuesday, JUN 10 - 18:00-20:00 EET
Happy Hour in Athens
Athens Chapter is happily meeting again at En Aithria, the Monastiraki-Thission venue tried last month. The milieu invites lively conversation about next steps in the resistance. No RSVP is needed. Details on the DAGR Events page.

Tuesday, JUN 10 - 19:00-20:00 EET
Happy Hour At-Large (on zoom)
Why quaff at home alone when you can meet up with a couple of friends at the local wifi hub and be happy with Dems Abroad from around the whole countryside? RSVP for the Zoom link and meet up with other members of the At-Large Chapter!

NOTICE: “Gone Fishing’ in Thessaloniki
Thessaloniki traditionally ‘clears out’ during the summer. Happy Hours and Morning Coffees will be on hold, resuming again in September. 

Wednesday, JUN 11 - 19:00 EET
DAGR Kafeneion: Book discussion, Caste by Isabel Wilkerson.
René Syler, who was with us in her own right last year for Juneteenth, will moderate the discussion of the highly acclaimed Wilkerson book. If you haven’t read it, you’ll still find the conversation interesting. Does racism drive us? Or is it a handy way to work out a social pecking order, i.e. caste. Read the NYTimes review of this 2020 release and whet your appetite. RSVP for the Zoom link.

Saturday, JUN 14 - 12:00 noon to wee hours
PRIDE Celebration at the DAGR booth and NO Tyrants!
Pass by. Drop in. Better yet, help staff the booth! Or come by about 7 p.m. to help carry the DAGR banner in the Pride Parade. Bring your own sign if you like. It’s important, now more than ever, to help show YKW that he doesn’t rule our hearts and minds! Also, Pride Saturday is always a lot of fun!

Monday, JUN 17 - 19:30 EET 
DAGR ExCom Meeting
The Dems Abroad Greece board, aka ExCom, meets every month. Members are welcome to sit in and come up to speed on the many things your board has to handle. Get a leg up on upcoming events in planning, and much more. Reply on this email for the WebEx link.

Thursday, JUN 19 - 10:00 EET
DAGR (virtual) Coffee Club
Gina and Erin, At-Large Chapter leads, are hosting their third morning get-together for those who prefer an earlier meet-up. RSVP here for the Zoom link and heat up the briki. 

Saturday, JUN 21 - All Day
Thessaloniki Pride Celebration
This was a great event in 2024 and it looks to be even better this year. We’re awaiting more details. Watch DAGR social media pages. In the meantime, check for updates at the Thessaloniki PRIDE website.

Monday, JUN 23 - 17:00 EET
DA ECCC Climate Cafe
The Environment and Climate Crisis meeting joins Brussels activist Larry Moffett at the mid-year UN climate conference in Bonn. This is a global caucus event and should be most informative. RSVP for the Zoom link.

Saturday, JUL 5 - Early Evening till ?
SAVE the DATE!
It’s that FOJ time of year, and Events Com is working on a stellar occasion in Athens. So, Saturday, JULY 5! And keep an eye out for other Dem-friendly celebrations that may be coming that week. There’s a growing body of interest in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution, those dry old documents that have kept us free and improving for 200 years.
PS - Down with Dictators, Oligarchs and Tyrants!   

And that’s not all …
See what other country committees and global caucuses are doing, on the DA website Events page.

We Will NOT Be Silenced! Hands Off Our Democracy!
Everett Kelley, president of AFGE (American Federation of Government Employees), speaks – well, breathes fire! – at a Bernie/AOC Fight Oligarchy rally. Kelley represents the essential workers that Trump and his tech-oligarchs are trying to replace with privatized functionaries and AI robotics. Put another way, Kelley represents all of us. Video.

Springsteen, in England, Blasts Trump Administration as ‘Treasonous’
His remarks, delivered to an audience abroad, stood out at a time when other superstar artists have seemed to mute their criticism of the president. Gift Link.

Climate Scientists Take On Trump Program Cuts!
Hopefully, this super-value 100-hr livestream of scientists talking about their work will be up and available for anyone to drop in and learn. The pieces of weather/climate science in the US fit together to protect the public. Or used to before TrumpCo came along to privatize it.

Mandatory Display of 10 Commandments Confronted in Texas
Another young Dem, Texas Rep. James Talarico, talks about separation of church and state and renewed efforts by Christian nationalists in TX to subvert the concept with local/state laws. It’s like watching Young Sheldon’s mom, without the basic common sense and charity.

Dems Abroad has been a major advocate for LGBTQ rights for decades, for the simple reason that a lot of Americans could not, for a very long time, move back to the US with their life partner. They lived abroad and worked for change. That change came. And came again, backlash, when Roe v Wade was rolled back. Will LGBTQ rights be the next to go? If Trump and the Project 2025 white boys have their way, that’s a yes.

So PRIDE becomes a crucial statement. Againl.

DAGR will be present at the Athens PRIDE celebration, on June 14, as it has every year since 2016. We’ll have a booth and we’ll carry our banner in the PRIDE Parade. Can you help?
Booth shifts start at noon and change every 3 hours. 

• Sign up for a shift!
• Sign up to cover a shift change if you’re short of time4

The Parade starts, let’s say, 7 ish.

• Strong hands are needed to carry the banner.
• Marchers are needed to show we care
• And to carry some cool signs!

You in? Contact DAGR Athens PRIDE organizer, Stacey Papaioannou. Let her know when you can help!

Our Voice in the Party
More than we may have felt participating in the US, membership in the Democratic party provides us with ways to help shape our platform and actions.

Hometown Press
Hometown newspapers, or major dailies of nearby cities, are a two-way flow of contact. Voters abroad can reach back, find out which issues are moving in-state citizens, and maybe even find old friends who still live there. At the same time, the Letters facility, among other means, offers us the chance to let the home folks know what we deal with while abroad.

The Kings We Like
It seemed like a good idea at the time ... that No Kings Day that someone came up with. It fit the Wannabe Potentate Comb-over the First to a T. And then someone pointed out, there are a lot of extant and quite benign kings/queens especially among our allies. There are also several Kings of note ... peaceful, postive, progressive note. So, it's NO TYRANTS Day, thank you!

Student Life in the Trump Era
DAGR members sat in on a recent presentation comparing student life 'at home' at U Alabama and here, visiting Aristotle U. Useful comparisons extend education beyond books and lectures. All useful.

DAGR’s Weekly Reader 
Included here are those mostly longer ones favored by political wonks (like us), with some shorter videos mixed in. Have a look over each week’s offerings. And do send us articles you think might fit here in the month ahead!
MAY w1   MAY w2   MAY w3   MAY w4

We had a tussle over the travellin’ music for June.

• Chair Alkman thought the Big Top was a good statement on Trump and his 2025 Clown Car filled with Pennywise clones.
• Vice Chair Karen liked the “pain of leaving, need for working” that Dana Lyons caught in June’s aComin’. Up the union!
• Finally, Everett Kelley said, Morning is Coming! Well, okay, then!

You? Do you have some music we should play?

Tears of Joy; More Yet to Come
The statements of Dr. Badar Khan Suri and his wife, Mapheze Saleh, on his release under court order after two months in the Texas ICE holding facility. But this is one case, and there are already hundreds of others as YKW ramps up his show-trial performance.

To What End?
Veteran newsman Dan Rather summarizes the what and who of the Trump 2.0 agenda to arrive at the end game: wealth and power, all his. America can be junked when the job is done.

From the Plaintiff’s Mouth
NPR and three public radio stations are suing the Trump administration (several key figures there of, including the President) for withholding funds mandated by Congress. The suit addresses First Amendment freedom of the press. Details here, from NPR. People’s Knight to King’s Square 1!

Norway: Auto Sales Last Month Were 97% EV!
How’d they do it? Sensible planning over 25 years, with a clear goal, and … they put their fossil fuel income to subsidizing the transition. Result? Cars in Norway are cleaner and run cheaper. Plus a lot of Norwegians heat their homes almost for free with geothermal. Gift link!

Project 2025 Tracker (reprise!)
With a word of caution re sourcing, this site does look fairly accurate. And ominous. Click on a department to get Trump’s objectives for it and how far each element has advanced (or finished), then click further to get the news source the completion info is based on. Keep in mind that some apparently completed objectives may well be the subject of lawsuits and TROs.

Trump and His Crew Are Nuts
The editorial stars who used to bring you the Washington Post, now at The Contrarian, beat around NO bush in calling out the Trump cabinet for what it is. And challenge the rest of mainstream media to live up to the task of reporting, not soft-peddling, the news.

DdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdDdD

June is a tough month. That 'big beautiful budget bill' (NOT!) is wallowing about the Senate right now. If enough of us call and write, especially to vulnerable Republican senators, we might get some of its worst points removed. Will we be able to stop the behemoth 'tax cut' aka 'transfer more wealth to the billionaires'? Maybe. This is just the beginning. It's going to be a hard year and a half. And it's going to go by faster than we can imagine.

Buckle up!

You can follow us here:

https://www.democratsabroad.org/