Listen in and read on to learn more about what’s happening on a local and national level—and how these stories are connected
This newsletter and accompanying podcast was produced by Aja Arnold, Mainline’s founder and publisher.
Former Atlanta Inspector General Shannon K. Manigault. Manigault resigned from her position at the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) on Feb. 18, 2025. Photo credit: Office of the Inspector General.
According to the Center for Civic Innovation, yesterday, the Atlanta City Council voted 14-1 to approve a charter amendment to overhaul the Office of the Inspector General. This came after the resignation from the Inspector General Shannon Manigault and six other governing board members earlier that day.
[ View the charter amendment considered by the city council yesterday here. ]
Manigault stated in a press conference that her resignation was due to persistent “threats, bullying, intimidation, and harassment” coming from the very people who were subject to the OIG’s investigations. The OIG was formed after 2017 federal investigations rocked City Hall and led to a number of criminal charges against then-city officials. According to other local sources, the OIG under Manigault’s leadership has released reports that allege abuses of power by a city commissioner, questionable city contracts with well-connected lobbyists, a bribery scheme in the city department of planning, and unfair advantages given to vendors during the bidding process.
[ View the entire press conference with the Office of the Inspector General here. ]
It’s worth noting that the Cop City lease agreement, which was passed by Atlanta City Council in September 2021, is one of those questionable city contracts. As I reported for Mainline and The Appeal in 2021, the paper was backed by a lobbyist working for the Atlanta Police Foundation named Nicholas Juliano of the local lobbying firm Impact Public Affairs. Other clients of Impact Public Affairs include Delta, Uber, and others. They are listed as the Atlanta Police Foundation’s lobbyist with a payment exceeding $10,000.
According to further research conducted by Mainline, it is also possible that the contractors who have been building Cop City, such as Brassfield & Gorie, were also given unfair advantages during the bidding process, which is actually a violation of the lease agreement that was passed between APF and the City of Atlanta in 2021. Under Section 8(C) of the lease agreement, it says the APF should engage all contractors or subcontractors through a competitive process; it also says in Section 8(D) that APF should ensure that it conducts all contractor business through the City of Atlanta’s Equal Business Opportunity Program. While we haven’t been able to confirm that APF did in fact violate these sections, we also haven’t been able to prove that APF has respected them, either.
This is one of several suspected lease violations we have flagged in our research about Cop City—and seems to fit into the pattern that the OIG has described during its investigations of corruption in the City of Atlanta.
Further, it’s hard to not notice the parallels between this story and what’s currently happening at a federal level, as the Trump administration and his technocrat colleague Elon Musk are essentially gutting the federal government through massive illegal terminations. Just last Thursday, over 200,000 federal workers were illegally terminated across all different agencies, including the Department of Health and Human Services, Small Business Administration, Department of Veteran Affairs, USDA Forest Service, Department of the Interior, Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, and more.
Mainline has been working with multiple sources that work in the federal government, who have requested anonymity of their identities and any identifying information in exchange for their involvement to support critical reporting at this moment. Our sources have described to us in great detail what they call “psychological warfare” tactics that have been employed by federal administrators who were placed by the Trump administration. The goal, they say, is to force resignations one way or the other to get people to abandon their posts, so that these positions can remain vacant for good—making the government much easier to control.
Musk and Trump claim that these forced resignations are to save money and to, well, make the government more efficient. However, there’s a few problems with that story. Many federal employees are saying online that these illegal firings actually will hinder government efficiency, as well as waste taxpayer money.
Our sources also disclosed to us that terminations were beginning at FEMA on Monday, simultaneously as the agency is managing the crisis of the Kentucky floods. While the President did authorize emergency funding to the state (and it’s worth noting that Republican-led states receive more federal aid than Democrat-led states), the agency that exists to manage crises is currently being rendered unable to fulfill its purpose.
To bring this back to Atlanta: former Inspector General Manigault stated her resignation was the result of “sustained, systematic, and savage” retaliation from the City of Atlanta government. This sounds synonymous with the psychological warfare being described by numerous sources within the federal government. And to top it off, the Atlanta City Council passed in a 14-1 vote legislation that would “overhaul” the OIG; meanwhile, all those positions remain unfilled and in limbo. Once again, we see City Democrat politicians doing fascist-coded things, similarly to their GOP counterparts.
Between this, Cop City, and the RICO indictment of 61 Cop City protesters … If anyone is mentally prepared for the rise of fascism, it may very well be Atlantans.
Lastly, it’s been reported that President Trump just claimed expanded power over independent agencies through yet another executive order. This order seeks to give the president greater power of independent regulatory agencies—government entities Congress set up to be shielded from White House control, according to NPR. Alt National Park Service, which is the official “resistance” faction of the U.S. National Park Service that was formed in 2017 during the first Trump administration and has been an inspiration for new “Alt Gov” resistance factions being organized now, said that, “We have been careful to avoid using the word coup, but it’s time to call it what it is—this is a coup. Trump signed an executive order granting only the attorney general or the president the authority to interpret laws executed by the executive branch.”
This expanded presidential power appears to be a continuation of the expansion and experimentation with the Unitary Executive Theory of Constitutional law that says the President of the United States has sole authority over the executive branch. (All that checks and balances stuff? Yeah, that’s not a thing under this theory.)
It is an “expansive interpretation of presidential power that aims to centralize greater control over the government in the White House.” And Trump isn’t the first president to invoke this level of power; he’s just the one currently pushing its limits. The Reagan administration was the first to cite the unitary executive theory. Since the Reagan administration, the Supreme Court has embraced a stronger unitary executive, which has been championed by conservative justices, the Federalist Society, and of course, the Heritage Foundation. The theory was also expanded during the George W. Bush administration, particularly under the direction of Vice President Dick Cheney. (For a good explainer of how this went down, check out the movie Vice directed by Adam McKay in 2018.)
Since its inception, the President of the U.S. has exercised significant authority over the executive branch, while presidents throughout history have sought to expand their reach. This obviously conflicts with Congress. And theoretically, it conflicts with the Constitution – but let’s remember, this is a theory of Constitutional law. Even Obama embraced the unitary executive theory during the 2010 midterm elections. So it seems like, rather than the Constitution being a framework by which this supposed democracy should be run, it’s more like something that can be controlled, managed, and manipulated by those in power in whatever means they see fit.
All of this brings me to my point: What we are witnessing now is nothing more than a continuation of the principles by which this so-called nation was founded. Those principles? Colonization and imperialism.
Listen in for more framing about this through the lens of colonization. For more coverage like this, please consider becoming a paid subscriber today.
Up next week: Our deep-dive podcast with internal federal government employees to discuss what’s been taking place since Trump took office.
