Dispatches from the Resistance
With the Trump administration engaged in self‑dealing on multiple fronts, it can be tempting to think corruption is now just part of American life. But most Americans aren’t corrupt and don’t condone corruption. They’re furious about it and increasingly see it as one of the forces breaking our democracy.
Every day, individuals, communities, and courts across the country are pushing back against Trump’s power grabs—and that collective action is starting to break through.
At the American Kleptocracy Clearinghouse, we aim to document and elevate these fights for accountability so they’re visible, connected, and harder for the powerful to ignore.
The Flamingo Revolution: Albanian Citizens Resist Kushner’s Land Grab
June 19, 2026
When Jared Kushner arrived in Albania to build a luxury mega-resort on protected wetlands, Albanians rose up, forcing an anti-corruption investigation, a freeze on project-linked assets, and a political crisis that effectively halted the project.
What they’ve done is a model for the rest of us.
Using State Power to Hold Federal Immigration Agents to Account
April 26, 2026
Since 2025, the Trump administration has deployed aggressive immigration enforcement operations across the country. And in the aftermath, it has gone out of its way to shield federal immigration agents from consequences and defang oversight bodies that could have investigated uses of force and deaths in custody.
To fill this accountability gap, states and local communities have stepped up to document abuses and create new pathways to prosecute federal agents for their misconduct.
Communities Pull the Plug on the ICE Detention Machine
March 12, 2026
The Trump administration’s immigration detention expansion is deliberate and opaque. Yet the federal government depends on public cooperation to make its detention machine run—and that cooperation can be withdrawn.
In today’s update, we explore how local communities can stop the spread of the ICE detention empire.