Donald Trump has sweeping plans for a second administration. Here’s what he’s proposed

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How a Saved Smuggler Makes Hegseth’s Claims Even Fishier

Andres Fernando Tufino is the luckiest of the unlucky.

The luckiest of unlucky drug smugglers was one of two in a crew of four to survive a U.S. drone strike on a semi-submersible on Oct.16.

Had Pete Hegseth’s rebranded Department of War simply lived up to its lethal new name, the U.S. would have just sent another missile.

After all, that was what it did on Sept. 2 to kill two other survivors out of a crew of 11 in the first of the U.S. attacks ordered by President Trump on suspected drug boats in the open sea.

Maybe by Oct. 16, somebody suggested that the second strike constituted a war crime.

Instead of just unleashing an added missile to handle another pair of unwanted survivors from a suspected drug boat attack, the U.S. dispatched a rescue helicopter.

Where the two from Sept. 2 were obliterated, this subsequent pair was flown to a Navy warship. One of them, identified as 34-year-old Jeison Obando Perez, was treated for a serious head injury suffered in the strike that killed two others on the semi-submersible. He was intubated when he arrived at a hospital in his native Colombia, but is reportedly expected to recover. He is not expected to face criminal charges, making him doubly lucky not just to walk free, but to be walking at all.

Even luckier, and perhaps amongst the luckiest of all unlucky drug smugglers, is 42-year-old Andres Fernando Tufino Chila of Ecuador. He was not injured and also was not charged, despite a 2020 conviction for being the captain of a go-fast boat carrying more than a ton of cocaine.

Some bad luck came into play for Tufino Chila on Sept. 6, 2020, when a U.S. Maritime Patrol Aircraft spotted what court papers call “Go Fast Vessel 1 (GFV 1)” moving at a high rate of speed 380 miles east of Clipperton Island, a remote, uninhabited coral atoll in the north Pacific Ocean.

“Coast Guard Cutter STEADFAST diverted to intercept and launched a helicopter and two small boats with embarked boarding teams to interdict,” court papers say.

One of the small boats intercepted GFV 1 and ordered it to stop.

“Instead, GFV 1 began moving erratically and executing tight turns.”

The boarding team on the small Coast Guard boat fired warning shots across GTFV 1’s bow.

“The helicopter went over and GFV 1 stopped moving,” court papers recount. “One small boat came alongside GFV 1 and gained control. ANDRES FERNANDO TUFIÑO CHILA was identified as the master of the vessel and he made a verbal claim of Ecuadorian nationality for the vessel.

“The team reported the deck of GFV 1 had a fresh fiberglass patch around the entire deck… When the boarding team drilled a hole in the deck/hull of GFV 1, the drill bit came back covered in a white substance that field tested positive for cocaine. After removing the deck of GFV 1, the boarding team removed approximately 1,073 kilograms (2,360.6 pounds) of packages from GFV 1.”

The Maritime Patrol Aircraft spotted another go-fast boat, dubbed GFV 2 in court papers. It was approximately 26 nautical miles away on a high-speed course to rendezvous with GFV 1. The helicopter approached and ordered GFV 2 to stop in both English and Spanish. GFV 2 kept going.

“The helicopter first tried warning shots, which were ineffective. The helicopter then tried two rounds of disabling fire, which were effective in stopping GFV 2 approximately 11 NM north of GFV 1. A Coast Guard smallboat came alongside and gained control of GFV 2.”

The three men aboard claimed Mexican nationality and said they were shark fishing.

“But there was no fishing gear other than a net that was severely tangled in a ball, and there was no ice, bait, or catch onboard GFV 2.”

The boarding team did discover a large blue container with two chainsaws with full gas, extra chainsaw blades, several small hatchets and hammers, along with two pry bars, a fiberglass repairs kit, and piles of empty white burlap sacks “commonly used to package contraband such as cocaine.”

“None of this equipment is consistent with fishing,” court papers say. “Instead it is the equipment that would be needed to access the cocaine hidden beneath the deck of GFV 1.”

Tufino Chila ended up pleading guilty in San Diego federal court to conspiracy to distribute cocaine. The pre-sentencing report noted that he had been raised in poverty in a small village just north of the equator in Ecuador.

“He has eight brothers and sisters and never enough food,” the report says. “Mr. Tufino can hardly read or write. He left home at 12 to start his own fishing life.”

He also started his own family and has five children.

“Ecaudorian fishermen are aware of the drug trade, and the lure of easy money is always lurking,” the report says. “Last year, he was recruited for a king’s ransom—$6,000—to transport cocaine in a small board with a small crew on the high seas.”

He accepted.

“Once embarked, he and his fellow crew men took turns at the helm, refueling, and the like, for several days until the Coast Guard discovered them.”

On Dec. 6, 2021, Tufino Chila was sentenced to five years in prison. He caught a break and was freed early on Jan. 29, 2024.

But according to the U.S. government, Tufino Chila was back on another drug-laden vessel—this a semi-submersible—on Oct. 16. He had terrible, and then great luck as the boat was hit by a missile and then he survived, along with Perez.

Had they been the two survivors a month earlier, the end would have come moments later with a second strike. But somebody must have reconsidered, and instead of another missile there was a rescue helicopter.

Anything GV 1 may have been carrying was left behind and maybe sank with the boat. And, despite having a conviction for attempting to smuggle more than a ton of cocaine, he was reportedly allowed to walk free alive, seemingly because somebody high up in Washington must have decided that at least sometimes, it is better to go by the rules.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-smuggler-who-survived-trumps-drug-boat-strikes/?

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NY attorney general challenges authority of acting US attorney investigating her Trump lawsuits

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — President Donald Trump’s effort to install political loyalists as top federal prosecutors has run into a legal buzz saw lately, with judges ruling that his handpicked U.S. attorneys for New Jersey, eastern Virginia, Nevada and Los Angeles were all serving unlawfully.

https://apnews.com/article/trump-letitia-james-halligan-sarcone-subpoenas-4308a5f7927d9eecc2c139ee604ef4d6?

ps:Interesting? Loyalists? To who the people or to someone who thinks they are above the law??

• ? Library grants terminated by President Trump are being reinstated after a court found his order unlawful, The Washington Post reports. Gift link.

FIFA gives Trump a peace prize in a departure from its traditional focus on sport

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump was awarded the new FIFA peace prize on Friday at the 2026 World Cup draw — giving the spectacle to set matchups for the quadrennial soccer tournament even more of a Trumpian flair.

https://apnews.com/article/trump-world-cup-fifa-peace-prize-e14f95b8adaa197c869cad407b6ef604?

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Humiliating ICE Data Blows Up Trump’s Crackdown Excuse

Analysis shows high-profile raids mainly nabbed people with no criminal record.

Aggressive federal immigration raids touted by the Trump administration as crime-busting victories have mostly swept up people with no criminal record, according to a new analysis of publicly available data.

President Donald Trump and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have justified the deployment of armed masked officers in big Democrat-run cities by claiming local “sanctuary” policies shield criminal immigrants—repeatedly insisting they are targeting the “worst of the worst.”

But in headline operations across Los Angeles, Chicago, Massachusetts, and Washington, D.C., more than half of those arrested, often in brutal fashion, had no prior convictions at all—compared with roughly a third nationwide, the New York Times found.

The outlet analyzed a trove of arrest and detention records released by the Deportation Data Project that runs through Oct. 15, 2025.

It found that, ironically, the highest-profile sweeps proved the least effective at finding people with criminal histories, especially violent ones.

In the D.C. surge, the Times found 84 percent of arrestees had no previous convictions, and just 2 percent had convictions for violence.

In Illinois’s controversial “Operation Midway Blitz”—which was beset by allegations of Border Patrol brutality and legal wranglings—two-thirds of those rounded up had no convictions.

Massachusetts and the Los Angeles area showed similarly lopsided shares. Less than 30 percent of the people arrested in any of these operations had been convicted of a crime, the Times analysis found, and only a sliver had a violent conviction.

The most common non-violent priors were DUIs and traffic offenses, the paper found.

The Times also tracked the national picture. Since January, the share of detainees with criminal convictions has fallen to about 28 percent by mid-October, while arrests of people with no criminal history rose faster than any other category.

The portion with violent convictions fell to about 5 percent by mid-October, down from 15 percent in 2024, the newspaper reported.

Under President Joe Biden last year, 63 percent of ICE arrestees had prior convictions, and 24 percent faced pending charges.

The Trump administration has argued that aggressive city deployments are needed because “sanctuary” policies thwart efforts to target criminals, combining ICE with Border Patrol and National Guard units.

Traditionally, ICE relied on local jails and prisons—taking custody after people finished their sentences or were released.

DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin told the Times: “Seventy percent of illegal aliens ICE arrested across the country have criminal convictions or pending criminal charges just in the United States.”

The Daily Beast has approached DHS for comment.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/humiliating-ice-data-blows-up-trumps-crackdown-excuse/?

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Damning Leaked Figures Show ICE Barbie Is Failing to Arrest the ‘Worst of the Worst’

The Trump-ordered raids appear to be missing their claimed target.

Leaked Immigration and Customs Enforcement data show that nearly three-quarters of detainees have no criminal conviction, undermining President Donald Trump’s promise to remove “millions and millions of criminal aliens.”

The figures, leaked to the libertarian Cato Institute, expose the gulf between the administration’s rhetoric and results, as Trump’s top enforcer, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, insists the dragnet is targeting America’s “worst of the worst.”

Since Oct. 1, 73 percent of people booked into ICE custody had no criminal conviction, while nearly half had neither a conviction nor pending charges, according to the Cato analysis. Just 5 percent had a violent conviction.

ICE detained almost as many people for immigration offenses—such as illegal entry or re-entry—as for violent crimes.

The vast majority of people booked into ICE detention had no convictions. Cato Insititute

Cato’s director of immigration studies, David Bier, said: “President Trump’s deportation agenda does not match the campaign promises that he made, nor the rhetoric from his officials. The agenda is taking resources away from targeting true public safety threats, whether from immigrants or Americans. ICE should redirect its resources back toward serious public safety threats.”

Separate figures obtained by CBS News for Border Patrol’s latest operation in North Carolina suggest it is facing similar problems.

Addressing the data, the agency’s lead commander for its operations in Chicago and Charlotte, Gregory Bovino, who earlier this month was declared by a judge to be a liar after he falsely claimed he was hit in the head with a rock before lobbing tear gas at protesters, said to Bier on X, “Many immigration offenses are felonies and should be counted. Traffic offenses such as DWI sure as hell count.

“Thousands of dead Americans attention to that [sic]. You know, the dead Americans you ignore while you’re busy choosing illegal aliens over US citizens.”

Cato noted that the shift in arrests began after April 26, 2025, when the White House leaned harder into mass detentions. Compared with the October 2024–April 2025 period, 80 percent of the surge in daily ICE book-ins since October has come from people with no criminal convictions.

Other datasets back those patterns. A Freedom of Information Act release reviewed by the Deportation Data Project at UC Berkeley Law and UCLA School of Law found that by late July, 67 percent of ICE arrests were of people without criminal convictions, and nearly 40 percent had no convictions or charges.

Under President Joe Biden, just one in 10 arrests involved people with no criminal history, the researchers reported.

The scale of the increase is stark, with ICE arrests of immigrants without criminal convictions ballooning 571 percent from January, while arrests of people with no conviction and no charge jumped 1,500 percent, according to the FOIA dataset.

The graph shows off spikes in arrests in January and June. Cato Insititute

ICE’s own public-facing detention dashboard paints a similar picture. By mid-November, 69 percent of ICE detainees arrested by ICE officers had no criminal conviction, and 40 percent had no charge at all. Meanwhile, detainees who had criminal convictions but no pending charges skyrocketed from fewer than 1,000 in January to more than 21,000—a 2,370 percent increase.

ICE data show the share of people detained after an ICE arrest who have criminal convictions has dropped from 62 percent in January to 31 percent in November, while those held with no conviction or charge have jumped from six percent to 40 percent.

Deportation figures follow the same pattern. In November 2025, ICE’s data show that 70 percent of people it removed had no criminal convictions, and 43 percent had neither a conviction nor a pending charge.

ICE removals from detention between Nov. 1 and Nov. 16, 2025. Cato Insititute

CBS News reported that only one-third of Border Patrol arrests in Charlotte, North Carolina, during Trump’s high-profile “Green Army” deployment involved people with criminal histories.

A DHS spokesperson said the figures cited by CBS News were “likely inaccurate” but did not provide any alternate breakdown of criminality beyond what appeared in the document.

The department did, though, finally release some meaningful figures of its own. After months of offering only percentage increases, Noem posted on X that there had been a 1,153 percent increase in assaults on agents between Jan. 21 and Nov. 21 this year.

She said that figure represented 238 reported assaults against ICE law enforcement compared to 19 during the same period last year.

“President Trump and I will always stand with the men and women of @ICEgov who risk their lives every single day to arrest the worst of the worst.”

Noem posted about the number of assaults on ICE agents. X

The Daily Beast contacted the White House for comment.

DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said that “70 percent of illegal aliens ICE arrested across the country have criminal convictions or pending criminal charges just in the U.S.,” and that that didn’t “account for those wanted for violent crimes in their home country or another country, INTERPOL notices, human rights abusers, gang members, terrorists, etc.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/damning-leaked-figures-show-ice-barbie-kristi-noem-is-totally-failing-to-arrest-the-worst-of-the-worst/

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Fox News Host Confronts Top Trump Goon With Catastrophic Polling

Kevin Hassett scrambled to contend with the numbers right in front of his face.

Top Trump economic adviser Kevin Hassett got an uncomfortable reality check on Fox News Thursday as an unusually persistent anchor laid down the facts.

Martha MacCallum told Hassett that Americans are searching for answers on affordability like never before, and most are pinning the blame squarely on President Donald Trump.

MacCallum played a clip of CNN’s Harry Enten highlighting a surge in Google searches for “affordability,” up 110 percent compared to last year, and noting that cost-of-living concerns now outrank nearly every other issue, including the economy itself.

“He won on affordability and the cost of living in 2024—and he has completely lost the plot,” Enten said.

Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, tried to push back, insisting, “No, he absolutely has not,” and framing the conversation around what Trump calls the “Democrats’ affordability hoax.” He claimed inflation under President Joe Biden slashed Americans’ purchasing power by an average of $3,000 and suggested that under Trump, people had already gained $1,200 in purchasing power this year.

MacCallum pressed on, noting that wage growth still lags behind inflation. Hassett maintained his talking points, arguing the government shutdown and other factors were skewing perception.

Then came the hammer blow: 76 percent of respondents rated the current state of the economy “only fair” or “poor,” and 62 percent said Trump was more responsible for the country’s financial malaise than Biden.

“What would you say to people who are answering the survey that way?” MacCallum asked. Hassett pivoted to a mix of optimism and vague projections, citing holiday shopping trends and assurances from Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent that growth would improve in the first half of next year.

The exchange highlighted a stark gap between Trump administration messaging and voter sentiment. Even on a pro-Trump network, Hassett had to face polling showing the president faltering on affordability, the issue that powered his 2024 victory.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/fox-news-host-hits-trump-goon-with-catastrophic-polling-on-air/?

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Bongino Makes Jaw-Dropping Admission About His Unhinged Conspiracies

“I was paid in the past for my opinions,” former podcaster explained on Fox News.

FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino has publicly distanced himself from his own conspiracy rhetoric, offering a striking walk-back of claims he made before joining the agency’s leadership.

Bongino, who was sworn in earlier this year, was pressed by Fox News host Sean Hannity about his past claim that the FBI was complicit in planting pipe bombs near the Republican National Committee and Democratic National Committee ahead of the Capitol riots of Jan. 6, 2021. Bongino responded by admitting something shocking.

“I was paid in the past for my opinions, that’s clear, and one day I’ll be back in that space,” Bongino declared. “But that’s not what I’m paid for now. I’m paid to be your deputy director, and we base investigations on facts.”His transformation comes at a sensitive moment for the bureau. Just hours earlier, federal agents arrested Brian Cole Jr., 30, of Woodbridge, Virginia, who investigators believe planted the two explosive devices. Cole has been charged with transporting an explosive device in interstate commerce and malicious destruction by means of explosion.

Nobody was hurt by the bombs, but both devices could have been deadly if authorities had not been able to disarm them in time, according to the FBI.

The arrest directly undercuts Bongino’s earlier assertions. On his podcast in January—just months before taking office—he called the pipe-bomb case “the biggest scandal in FBI history” and alleged, without evidence, that the agency “knew” the identity of the bomber. He also claimed the devices were planted “to create a narrative that crazy MAGA people are trying to assassinate Kamala Harris.”

On Fox News, Bongino insisted the bureau would now move forward based solely on verified information. “We’re going to be guided by the facts as this thing goes forward,” he said.

The comments mark a rare public attempt by an FBI leader to walk back conspiracy-adjacent claims about an active investigation.

As a podcaster, Bongino built an entire brand on turbocharged conspiracies. He routinely pushed baseless claims that the 2020 election was “stolen,” elevating debunked voter-fraud theories.

He cast the federal government as a shadowy “deep state” cabal out to persecute conservatives, insisting that agencies like the FBI and Justice Department were weaponized against Donald Trump and his allies.

During the pandemic, he amplified COVID-19 misinformation while railing against vaccine mandates, despite being vaccinated himself. He also floated the idea of hammering political opponents with treason charges and using federal power to punish critics, from intelligence officials to President Joe Biden.

The FBI has been contacted for comment.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/bongino-makes-jaw-dropping-admission-about-his-unhinged-conspiracies/?

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Trump said the award was “truly one of the great honors of my life” in a speech where he bragged about World Cup ticket sales immediately after touting the wars he claimed he solved.

“The world is a safer place now,” Trump said. “The United States one year ago was not doing too well, and now I have to say we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world, and we’re going to keep it that way.”

Trump was welcomed onto the stage at the Kennedy Center by FIFA President Gianni Infantino, where he immediately put on the medal as the top soccer organization official sang his praises.

“You definitely deserve the first FIFA Peace Prize for your action, for what you have obtained in your way, but you have obtained it in an incredible way. ” Infantino said. “You can always count as a president on my support.”

Ahead of the announcement, Trump insisted he had not been told he would receive the prize, but he said it would be a great honor. He also bragged about solving eight wars with “another one coming.”

The “FIFA Peace Prize–Football Unites the World” was created in the weeks after it was announced that Trump was not being given this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.

Trump, 79, had conducted an all-out campaign to receive that long-coveted prize and remains deeply bitter that it slipped through his grasp this time. He continues to bring it up, including earlier this week.

Infantino even called for Trump to win the Nobel Peace Prize, but after the snub, Infantino came up with his own award to give the president he has wooed for months.

FIFA announced its peace prize last month, which it said would be given annually to individuals who have taken “exceptional and extraordinary actions for peace.”

Infantino has worked to ingratiate himself with the president at nearly every opportunity since Trump returned to office.

He has gushed over Trump and brought along trophies for the gold-loving president to hold and admire during their appearances together in the Oval Office.

The president also took center stage at the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup on July 13 where he stood in the middle of Chelsea players as they hoisted the trophy into the air.

Infantino was even seen handing a spare winners’ medal to Trump after the team received them, which he pocketed.

On Thursday, the president happily greeted Infantino when he spotted him in the audience at his event at the Institute of Peace. Trump went on to boast about World Cup ticket sales.

Infantino was also in attendance for Trump’s inauguration and the Sharm El-Sheikh peace summit in Egypt in October.

The president has wholeheartedly embraced the planning of the World Cup, which will hold games in the U.S. as well as in Mexico and Canada. He even established a task force to make sure it runs smoothly, led by Andrew Giuliani, the son of his former lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.

Friday’s World Cup draw event was a star-studded affair. with Heidi Klum and Kevin Hart co-hosting the final draw.

Performances included some of Trump’s favorite artists, including Andrea Bocelli and the Village People, as well as Robbie Williams and Nicole Scherzinger.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-gets-fake-peace-prize-at-tacky-kennedy-center-takeover/?

ps:What does Solomon have to say about this? "Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher; "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity."

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Suspect in DC pipe bomb case said to have confessed in interviews with investigators, AP sources say

The man accused of planting a pair of pipe bombs outside the headquarters of the Republican and Democratic national parties in Washington on the eve of the U.S. Capitol attack confessed to the act in interviews with investigators, two people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press. Brian Cole Jr. also indicated that he believed the 2020 election was stolen and expressed views supportive of President Donald Trump, said the sources. A spokesperson for the federal public defender’s office, which will be representing Cole at a Friday court appearance, declined to comment. Read more.

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The Blame Game (Patrick Smith / Getty)

View in browser President Donald Trump has promised not only that America will be “great again” but also that it will be “healthy again,” “wealthy again,” “beautiful again,” and—crucially—“affordable again.” Now, as the country faces persistent inflation, a housing crisis, and rising prices on consumer goods, he claims that affordability is nothing more than a “con job,” an opportunistic buzzword leveraged by a rival party. “The word affordability is a Democrat scam,” he said during a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday. Incoming presidents don’t get to pick the economy they inherit, but they can only credibly blame their predecessors for so long. In a Fox News poll last month, almost twice as many respondents said that Trump, not Joe Biden, is responsible for current economic conditions. Per new polling from Politico, 46 percent of Americans say the cost of living in the United States is the worst they can remember it being, and 46 percent think Trump is to blame for those high costs. The trend isn’t entirely new; voters have blamed Trump for the economy throughout the year. As frustration persists, the president is pointing fingers at the Democrats, but he can’t dispute the data. Americans now face both a weakening dollar and stagnant income levels. Trump’s surprise implementation of punitive tariffs this summer ended up making all sorts of goods, including clothing and beef, more expensive. Meanwhile, millions have left the country (voluntarily or not) amid the administration’s crackdown on immigration, according to the Department of Homeland Security’s estimates. This exodus, combined with a reduction in newcomers, has the potential to harm local economies. Trump has tried conflicting strategies to deal with voter frustration. He has a tendency to invoke the previous administration when things go wrong—at the start of his term, he said Biden’s name an average of six times a day, often to fault him for the economy or immigration issues. But during a recent meeting with New York City Mayor-Elect Zohran Mamdani, the president appeared to check his impulse to vilify Dems, beaming over Mamdani’s proposals to fix the cost-of-living crisis. “Some of his ideas really are the same ideas I have,” Trump said: “The new word is affordability.” About a week later, he dubbed himself the “AFFORDABILITY PRESIDENT” on Truth Social. But again, that only lasted so long: Affordability actually “doesn’t mean anything to anybody,” he said on Tuesday. Next week, he’ll pivot once more as he sets off on a national tour to assuage voters’ concerns about the economy and inflation. Sentiments about a president’s approach to the economy usually carry over to the incumbent party—and at the moment, Trump’s relative unpopularity is Democrats’ gain. The party has jumped at the chance to pummel Trump on affordability, which proved to be a winning issue in recent elections: The cost-of-living rhetoric that catapulted Mamdani to victory in New York City also helped two other Democrats win important races last month. The political scientist Lynn Vavreck told me yesterday that when Trump downplays the issue, he risks repeating some of what led to George H. W. Bush’s downfall in 1992: Bush lost that election to Bill Clinton in large part because his optimism about the economy failed to connect with voters’ reality. Biden suffered from a similar disconnect—and the same problem is creeping up on Trump ahead of the midterms. Approval ratings for a president’s first year in a new term often benefit from what the economic historian Robert J. Gordon calls the “honeymoon effect”—a bump that isn’t neatly explained by anything other than voters’ inclination to give leaders time to warm up. But by the time midterm season rolls around, voters tend to be less forgiving. Ten months into Trump’s presidency, the polling is starting to track a similar pattern: His approval ratings started at 47 percent and have since slipped to 36 percent (thanks to more than just affordability). Trump has been known to bounce back. But if the honeymoon is ending, that’s one thing he can’t blame Biden for. Related: Derek Thompson on the affordability curse Trump doesn’t understand inflation, James Surowiecki argues.

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Trump said 'we appreciate' that Colombia sells cocaine to the US

Claim:

U.S. President Donald Trump said: "I hear Colombia, the country of Colombia, is making cocaine. They have cocaine manufacturing plants, OK? And then they sell us their cocaine. We appreciate that very much."

Rating:

Correct Attribution

About this rating

Context

Trump's intent behind the remark was unclear. We have reached out to the White House to learn more. Right after making the statement, Trump said anyone bringing drugs into the U.S. "is subject to attack."

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-colombia-cocaine-us/?

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How Trump flipped America's race conversation

Photo illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

President Trump's Cabinet applauded him this week after he described Somali immigrants as "garbage" who "contribute nothing." He unapologetically condemned an entire community, with no fear of political backlash. Why it matters: Guardrails against racist, xenophobic or dehumanizing rhetoric have all but vanished on the American right. What was once disqualifying — or the exclusive domain of online trolls — is now a fixture of national political discourse, Axios' Zachary Basu and Russell Contreras write. ⚡ Flashback: Before Trump came on the scene in 2015, it was common in modern American politics for elected or appointed officials to face consequences for making racist or bigoted comments. In 2002, GOP Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott stepped down from leadership after praising Strom Thurmond's 1948 segregationist presidential campaign. Even during Trump's first term, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) was censured and removed from committees for questioning why terms such as "white nationalist" and "white supremacist" had become offensive. But Trump himself has been largely impervious to those norms, with public outrage over his caustic language growing more muted year after year. Trump vaulted into political prominence by promoting the racist conspiracy theory that President Obama wasn't born in the U.S. — a playbook he revived in 2024 against other rivals of color. His 2016 campaign-opening claim that Mexico was sending "rapists" into the U.S. triggered weeks of national uproar, as did his leaked complaint in 2018 about immigration from "shithole countries." ? Zoom in: Then came the 2024 election campaign, which blew open the Overton window on race and identity. Trump discarded any lingering restraint, declaring that unauthorized immigrants were "poisoning the blood of our country" (echoing a Nazi theme), and amplifying false claims that Haitian migrants in Ohio were eating pets. Conservatives mobilized around backlash to the 2020 racial justice movement, the Biden administration's immigration policies and perceived censorship of political speech by the left. Trump's MAGA movement treated his 2024 win as a sweeping cultural mandate — and grew more explicit in its mission to "defend Western civilization" and preserve white Christian identity. ? Zoom out: Nearly a year into Trump's second term, language that once led to denials, clarifications or resignations now circulates freely online and at the highest levels of government. GOP members of Congress reacted to New York Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani's election by posting images of the 9/11 attacks and calling for the Ugandan-born Democrat to be denaturalized and deported. DHS and White House social media accounts now routinely mock immigrants targeted for deportation, deploying trollish memes on official channels. White nationalist Nick Fuentes has edged into the mainstream, with Trump defending the Holocaust denier's interview with Tucker Carlson as legitimate political dialogue. White House Deputy Press Secretary Abigail Jackson told Axios: "It's not racist to want secure borders and to deport illegal aliens who are undermining our sovereignty and destroying our country. President Trump has never been politically correct, never holds back, and in large part, the American people re-elected him for his transparency."

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? Vaccine overhaul

Photo illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

President Trump ordered his top health officials last night to review all U.S. childhood vaccination recommendations and align them with the "best practices" from other developed countries, Axios' David Nather reports. Why it matters: Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his allies have gained the power to pursue sweeping changes in U.S. vaccine policies — driven by their embrace of discredited theories about vaccines' link to autism and other diseases. ? Trump's order is a vote of confidence in Kennedy's handpicked advisory panel on vaccines, which voted yesterday to drop the decades-old federal recommendation that all infants receive the hepatitis B vaccine at birth. The CDC panel "made a very good decision to END their Hepatitis B Vaccine Recommendation for babies, the vast majority of whom are at NO RISK of Hepatitis B," Trump wrote on Truth Social. The American Medical Association's Sandra Adamson Fryhofer said the CDC panel's vote "undermines decades of public confidence in a proven, lifesaving vaccine."

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National Park Service drops free admission on MLK Day, Juneteenth while adding Trump’s birthday

WASHINGTON (AP) — The National Park Service will offer free admission to U.S. residents on President Donald Trump’s birthday next year — which also happens to be Flag Day — but is eliminating the benefit for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth.

https://apnews.com/article/national-parks-free-trump-birthday-juneteenth-mlk-225b10728a9df22d54407ecaec1e5e5f?

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Trump bets party, presidency on AI

Photo illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios; Photo: Oliver Contreras/Pool/Getty Images

President Trump is betting his presidency — and the future of the GOP — on lightly regulated, fast expansion of AI, Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen write in a "Behind the Curtain" column. Why it matters: Yes, Trump zigs and zags into countless political and diplomatic issues. But none comes close to his sustained, and surging, all-in alliance with tech billionaires and AI companies reshaping the U.S. economy. He won on the backs of working-class MAGA. But he governs, socializes and surrounds himself with tech swells and moguls. From his inauguration to last month's glitzy White House dinner for the Saudis, Trump basks in the support, gifts and affirmation of the most famous AI leaders and companies in the world. ?️ The big picture: Trump has essentially fused Silicon Valley and government in a race to both beat China to all-powerful AI and rescue an economy that's treading water outside of the AI boom. He has rolled back regulations, awarded huge contracts, and downplayed concerns about AI safety or downside risk. Trump has prioritized maintaining U.S. dominance in AI, including a Week 1 executive order, "Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence" ... in July, an AI action plan, "Winning the AI Race" ... and last month, a "Genesis Mission" to "unleash a new age of AI‑accelerated innovation and discovery that can solve the most challenging problems of this century." Tech companies have been partially shielded from some tariffs. AI companies will benefit from foreign investment promised to U.S. cities for chip plants and data centers. And Trump has helped broker deals that benefit U.S. AI companies in the Middle East and elsewhere. On a Joe Rogan podcast this past week, Nvidia co-founder and CEO Jensen Huang said Trump "saved the AI industry." Huang told us Trump responds to his texts at any hour. In Washington meetings, Huang is pushing back against national security objections to Nvidia selling its prized AI chips in China, saying restrictions haven't slowed Chinese AI. The White House argues AI will augment, not replace, workers by making them more productive — and that jobs will be created in manufacturing, construction and energy services as America builds the physical infrastructure to support galloping AI. Kevin Hassett, director of Trump's National Economic Council, said on Fox Business this past week: "The AI economy is moving much faster than the dot-com economy in the '90s. And the coaches [co-pilots] that AI is producing are going to help make a lot of productive workers a heck of a lot of money." ? The political risk: Trump is flooring the gas pedal at the very moment some of his most ardent MAGA backers are warning AI could destroy the working-class Americans who brought him to power. The fear is that AI and AI-powered robots will eat vital American jobs before the nation has time to prepare the U.S. workforce for sci-fi-level change. ?️ Steve Bannon — host of "War Room," one of the most influential MAGA podcasts — has been privately and publicly lighting up the administration, calling the new tech alliance "crony capitalism" and warning that the "technocratic elite" are building a future threatening the jobs of much of the MAGA base. Bannon told us that catering to "arrogant" Big Tech is a trap for Trump, since such policies will be a loser with his hardcore supporters. "The broligarchs are detested not simply by MAGA but America as a whole — they actually unite the populist left and right," Bannon said. "The tech bros will be the first to jump ship when the midterm fight turns ugly, as surely it will." ⬇️ Column continues below.

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? Part 2: The economic split

Steve Bannon's fear is borne out by the data, Jim and Mike continue.

• While the AI sector is booming, traditional manufacturing is shedding jobs and losing business, weighed down by the administration's aggressive new tariffs — the opposite of what was supposed to happen.

? Reality check: If AI were a political candidate, it would be getting clobbered. Poll after poll shows deep concern about AI, especially among young people, and particularly among those nervous about getting or keeping a job.

• Because Trump is the AI president, and because his views are de facto GOP orthodoxy, Republicans are the AI party, even if some like Bannon or Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) are sounding alarms about high AI risk for kids, jobs and safety.

?️ Between the lines: The administration has pushed away regulation by trying to block state-level AI rules. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) have pushed language to preempt state action, most recently in the annual defense bill, Axios tech policy reporters Maria Curi and Ashley Gold tell us.

• Congress has rejected these efforts twice now. So the administration is turning to executive action. The White House's AI action plan aims to slash red tape as part of a hands-off, pro-growth approach.

? The intrigue: A leaked executive order that would have made internet grants and other federal funds conditional on limiting AI regulation was put on hold but is back in play, sources tell Axios.

• Such a move would likely face legal battles and anger MAGA types, who view it as a giveaway to the tech industry.

The bottom line: If White House AI and crypto czar David Sacks and others are right that AI juices economic growth and new jobs, Republicans will likely prosper. But if they're wrong, or the benefits come after a few years of pain, it could be politically catastrophic. That's Bannon's big concern.

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Trump’s Own Mortgages Match His Description of Mortgage Fraud, Records Reveal

For months, the Trump administration has been accusing its political enemies of mortgage fraud for claiming more than one primary residence.

https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-mortgage-fraud-florida-principal-residences?

Under Former Chemical Industry Insiders, Trump EPA Nearly Doubles Amount of Formaldehyde Considered Safe to Inhale

Chemical industry lobbyists have long pushed the government to adopt a less stringent approach to gauging the cancer risk from chemicals, one that would help ease regulations on companies that make or use them.

https://www.propublica.org/article/epa-formaldehyde-risk-assessment?

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Trump, 79, Cornered on Plot to Rename Kennedy Center After Himself

The president doesn’t sound like he’s joking anymore.

President Donald Trump is sounding increasingly serious about adding his name to the Kennedy Center.

After months of “joking” about renaming the iconic D.C. arts venue after himself, Trump clarified that a name change wasn’t only up to him—but suggested that the center’s hand-picked board, which he leads, was considering it.

Fielding softball questions on Sunday night ahead of the newly MAGAfied center’s annual ceremony honoring some of Trump’s favorite performers, the president was asked if the venue will eventually be named the Trump Kennedy Center.

“I hear that, but I don’t know,” he replied. “And that’s not up to me, that’s up to the board. The board makes that decision. We have a very prestigious board. If you look at the names—I don’t think there is a board like it.”

Trump purged the Kennedy Center’s bipartisan board of trustees in February and took over as chairman of the new board, announcing he would be actively involved in the center’s programming, and installing loyalist Ric Grenell as interim executive director.

The list of trustees now reads like a who’s who of the president’s supporters in business and media—and includes many of his own officials and their spouses.

Attorney General Pam Bondi, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, and Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino are all trustees, along with Second Lady Usha Vance and Allison Lutnick, who is married to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

On the media side, Fox News hosts Maria Bartiromo and Laura Ingraham are both trustees, as is country singer Lee Greenwood.

The beleaguered arts venue has since been plagued by boycotts, protests, and an embarrassing drop in ticket sales.

In the meantime, the president has been openly fantasizing since at least August about renaming the Kennedy Center in his own honor.

“GREAT Nominees for the TRUMP/KENNEDY CENTER, whoops, I mean, KENNEDY CENTER, AWARDS,” he wrote Aug. 12 in a Truth Social post.

On Thursday, he made a similar remark during an event at the Institute of Peace, which the State Department had renamed the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace a day earlier.

“You have a big event on Friday at the Trump Kennedy Center. Oh, excuse me, at the Kennedy Center,” Trump said. “Pardon me, such a terrible mistake,” he added as the audience laughed.

His remarks on Sunday, however, were offered with a completely straight face.

About 10 minutes later, another reporter asked Trump if he could imagine receiving the Kennedy Center honors next year.

“That’s an interesting one. I haven’t thought about that. Yeah, I think I’m going to nominate myself for next year,” he said while everyone laughed.

The Kennedy Center was commissioned as a “national cultural center” in 1958 under President Dwight Eisenhower. His successor, President John F. Kennedy, worked hard to raise funds for its construction after taking office in 1961, but was assassinated in November 1963 before that started.

The following year, President Lyndon Johnson, signed a bill to rename the future center after the slain president to honor his memory and his commitment to the arts. Construction of the sprawling building began in 1966 and it was finally opened in 1971, with Richard Nixon in the presidential box Trump now calls his own.

The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House for comment.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/donald-trump-79-cornered-on-plot-to-rename-kennedy-center-after-himself/?

ps:What a Vain human being!!!!!

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MTG Reveals Trump’s Mean Private Message After Death Threats

The Republican has revealed how the president reacted to her cry for help.

Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has revealed alarming details of a message Donald Trump sent her after she alerted the president about death threats to her son.

Greene, 51, shared details of her falling-out with Trump on Sunday’s 60 Minutes.

During the interview with Lesley Stahl, Greene shared the consequences of the 79-year-old’s comments labeling her Marjorie “Traitor” Greene after she spoke out against him on issues including the Epstein files.

“After President Trump called me a traitor, I got a pipe bomb threat on my house,” Greene told Stahl. “And then I got several direct death threats on my son.”

Greene confirmed the “subject line” for the “direct” death threats on her son read “Marjorie Traitor Greene.” She said, “Those were death threats... directly fueled by President Trump.”

The once-loyal Trump supporter admitted that after the death threats, she contacted both Vice President JD Vance and the president himself.

Greene said Vance replied, saying, “We’ll look into it,” and added that she got a response from Trump that “wasn’t very nice.” She said she preferred to keep the exact conversation private.

When pushed by Stahl, Greene expanded by saying of the message from Trump, “It was extremely unkind.”

The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.

During the interview, Greene also claimed she has Republican colleagues who ridicule Trump in private but would be too “terrified” to say anything in public.

“I watched many of my colleagues go from making fun of him, making fun of how he talks, making fun of me constantly for supporting him, to when he won the primary in 2024, they all started, excuse my language, Lesley, kissing his a--, and decided to put on a MAGA hat for the first time,” said Greene.

It was Greene’s first major interview since announcing she plans to resign from office. Greene first took issue with Trump focusing on global issues rather than local concerns.

“I have too much self-respect and dignity, love my family way too much, and do not want my sweet district to have to endure a hurtful and hateful primary against me by the President we all fought for, only to fight and win my election while Republicans will likely lose the midterms,” she wrote on social media at the time.

The 60 Minutes interview also saw Greene renounce the “MAGA” movement. “Are you MAGA?” Stahl asked. “I’m America First,” Greene replied, adding that “MAGA is President Trump’s phrase. That’s his, his political policies. I call myself America First.”

She went against the administration’s talking points again on Sunday by refuting the president’s claim that affordability is a Democrat “hoax.”

She also discussed her problems with Trump’s international agenda, rather than fixing issues at home.

“For an America First president the No. 1 focus should have been domestic policy and it wasn’t,” Greene told Stahl. “Once we fix everything here, then, fine, we’ll talk to the rest of the world.”

The Georgia congresswoman also called out Trump’s focus on cryptocurrency and listed other complaints about his priorities.

“He passed a crypto bill that helped out all the crypto donors. He has served Israel’s interest, even attacking Iran,” she said.

“He has served Big Pharma—he didn’t take away the COVID vaccines that we want to see taken away. So those are the areas that are still getting everything they want, while the people, we’re still out here saying, ‘We wanna see action on areas for the American people, not for the major industries and the big donors.’”

At one point, Stahl and Greene also clashed after the Republican was pressed on her “inflammatory” rhetoric.

It began after Greene said Washington currently has “the most toxic political culture” and that it is “not helping the American people.” Stahl poked back, telling Greene, “But you contributed to that. You, you were out there pounding, insulting people.”

Greene clapped back, saying “Lesley, you’ve contributed to it as well with your...”

“Me?” Stahl, 83, said.

“Yes, you’re accusatory, just like you did just then,” Greene replied.

“I know you’re accusing me, but I’m smiling,” Stahl said, before Greene interjected, “You’re accusing me! But we don’t have to accuse one another.”

Stahl tried to stay on topic. “I want you to respond to what you have done in terms of insulting people, yelling at people, and then saying...”

Greene interjected again: “I’d like for you to respond for that.”

“I don’t insult people,” Stahl concluded.

“You just, you do in the way you question,” Greene shot back. “And you are, you’re accusing me right now.”

Ahead of the 60 Minutes interview, Greene made a lengthy X post where she claimed her office had reported 773 death threats to Capitol Police since 2021, which does not include “countless” online threats.

“And through all of this, I was never given a security detail, like the secret service details the President, VP, Cabinet, Speaker, Majority Leader, Whip, Minority Leader and others have,” she wrote. “Not once.”

She also shared receipts of the death threats she forwarded to Trump, Vance, and FBI Chief Kash Patel, as referenced in the 60 Minutes episode.

“All of the death threats came from the ‘left’ until I stood with the Epstein Survivors, woman who were raped as teenagers, abused, and trafficked by rich powerful men, and that’s when President Trump turned on me and called me a ’traitor’ and then new death threats and harassments came from the ‘right’ or somewhere,“ Greene said.

She added she had sent the threats against her son to Trump and that “he responded with harsh accusatory replies and zero sympathy.”

“I also sent these threats to Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and Deputy Chief James Blair and received no response, nothing.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/marjorie-taylor-greene-reveals-trumps-mean-private-message-after-death-threats/?

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Kennedy Center Boss Fumes After Trump Suck-Up Sessions Exposed

Ric Grenell lashes out after a report said Kennedy Center board meetings have turned into Trump loyalty rituals.

Donald Trump’s Kennedy Center chief has furiously denied a report that board meetings at the D.C. arts venue now resemble Cabinet-style praise sessions for the president.Trump, 79, took over as chair of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts board this year and installed loyalist Ric Grenell, 59, as interim president after ousting longtime boss Deborah Rutter. Trump has also hinted at the possibility of renaming the venue after himself.

But a CNN article published on Sunday has given a glimpse behind the curtain about what goes on during Kennedy Center board meetings attended by Trump.

CNN White House reporter Betsy Klein quotes one attendee as saying that they “now mirror Trump Cabinet meetings, with members going around the room to ‘talk about how great and visionary the president is and how he has so much class and taste.’”

The outlet’s chief media analyst, Brian Stelter, honed in on that passage, quoting it in a post on X. Grenell hit back hours later, posting: “This isn’t remotely true. We’ve never done this. Stelter is so comfortable making stuff up.”

In the replies, it was pointed out to Grenell that Stelter hadn’t even written the piece, with others saying his reaction suggested the story was “100% true.”

CNN also described how Trump has moved the next trustees’ gathering to Palm Beach, Florida, nearly 1,000 miles from the D.C. venue, and has pushed a “Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture” at what he has called the “Trump Kennedy Center,” vowing it is “not going to be woke.”

The report detailed a sharp slide in ticket sales, including about 10,000 seats sold for this year’s Nutcracker across seven shows, compared with roughly 15,000 in earlier seasons, leaving the production about $500,000 short of its $1.5 million revenue target.

Internal data revealed by CNN also showed the center handing out about five times more complimentary tickets than in the previous four years.

Artists including Issa Rae, Renée Fleming, Shonda Rhimes, Ben Folds, and the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater have walked away from the center, according to CNN.

Former social impact chief Marc Bamuthi Joseph said leadership would ask if performers were trans and “make the conditions impossible for trans artists and gay artists to safely come,” adding that by driving away companies like Alvin Ailey, “You’re literally taking the culture out of the place.”

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, 70, has opened a Senate Environment and Public Works Committee inquiry into Grenell’s stewardship, alleging in a letter that the center is “being used as a slush fund and private club for Trump’s friends and political allies,” and citing documents that claim steeply discounted rentals for NewsNation and the American Conservative Union Foundation and “free and exclusive use” of the complex for FIFA—which handed Trump its inaugural peace prize at the World Cup draw at the center last week.

Kennedy Center spokeswoman Roma Daravi defended the finances, saying the Trump-led team had raised $131 million, and touting big corporate donations. A source told CNN that The Nutcracker alone could never cover the venue’s huge union and production costs.

It’s not the first time Grenell has lost his head on social media in the past few weeks. Last month, he had a furious reaction to Whitehouse’s corruption probe that saw him accuse critics of “Trump derangement syndrome” and boast of a “whopping $117 MILLION” in fundraising.

Then last week, he erupted on X after The New York Times published a story on plunging ticket sales.

The Daily Beast contacted the Kennedy Center and the White House for comment. A Kennedy Center spokesperson called CNN’s source’s claims “lies.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/kennedy-center-boss-ric-grenell-fumes-after-donald-trump-suck-up-sessions-exposed/?

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Immigrants ‘Plucked Out’ of Oath Ceremony Lines After Trump Order

The Trump administration has reportedly canceled the naturalization ceremonies of immigrants from certain countries.

Immigrants who are one step away from American citizenship have suddenly found themselves in limbo after President Donald Trump ordered a fresh immigration crackdown.

All over the country, the Trump administration has been canceling naturalization ceremonies of people from certain countries in the wake of the murder of a National Guardsman in Washington, D.C., according to reports by WGBH and The New York Times.

Project Citizenship, a nonprofit that works with immigrants in Massachusetts and New England, said that this month alone, 21 clients have received notices about the cancellation of their oath ceremonies, the last step in the lengthy process of becoming a U.S. citizen.

“One of our clients said that she had gone to her oath ceremony because she hadn’t received the cancellation notice in time,” Project Citizenship executive director Gail Breslow told WGBH. “She showed up as scheduled, and when she arrived, officers were asking everyone what country they were from, and if they said a certain country, they were told to step out of line and that their oath ceremonies were canceled.”

“People are devastated and they’re frightened,” she added. “People were plucked out of line. They didn’t cancel the whole ceremony.”

Last month, Trump intensified scrutiny of people from 19 countries deemed to be “of concern” after 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal—an Afghan immigrant granted asylum in April under the current administration—was identified as the suspect in the shooting of two National Guardsmen in D.C., which killed Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and injured Andrew Wolfe, 24.

The countries on that list include Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Cuba, Burundi, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela.

Joseph Edlow, director of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, vowed in a statement after the D.C. shooting to “ensure that every alien is vetted and screened to the maximum degree possible.”

“Effective immediately, I am issuing new policy guidance that authorizes USCIS officers to consider country-specific factors as significant negative factors when reviewing immigration requests,” he said. “American lives come first.”

An internal guidance at the USCIS obtained by CBS News instructed staff to “stop final adjudication on all cases,” including “all form types and making any final decisions (approvals, denials) as well as completing any oath ceremonies.”

The Department of Homeland Security, the parent agency of USCIS, confirmed in a statement to the Daily Beast that it “paused all adjudications for aliens from high-risk countries.”

“The pause will allow for a comprehensive examination of all pending benefit requests for aliens from the designated high-risk countries. The safety of the American people always come first,” a DHS spokesperson said.

The order halting naturalization ceremonies has stirred widespread confusion among immigrants and their lawyers, who are hard-pressed to provide answers.

“There is no time frame—nobody knows how long this is going to be,” immigration lawyer Teresa Coles-Davila told The Times. “Literally, no one knows what is happening.”

Rosanna, a student in Texas who was born in Libya and holds Canadian citizenship, told the outlet that she was looking forward to receiving an email setting the date for her oath ceremony but instead got a cancellation notice.

“It’s definitely disappointing. Having come from a third-world country, it’s just never-ending disappointment,” she said. “I definitely feel unwelcome here.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/immigrants-plucked-out-of-oath-ceremony-lines-after-trump-order/?

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Donald Trump Threatens to Intervene in Hollywood Megadeal

The president has admitted the multibillion-dollar Netflix deal “could be a problem.”

Donald Trump has threatened to personally intervene in Netflix’s $82 billion megadeal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery.

On Friday, Netflix agreed to pay $82.7 billion for Warner Bros., an offer that beat out bids by both Paramount and Comcast; however, the mammoth deal still needs to be approved by regulators.

During a red carpet appearance at the Kennedy Center Honors in Washington D.C., on Sunday, Trump confirmed he had met with Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos at the White House last week ahead of the winning bid.

“That’s gotta go through a process, and we’ll see what happens,” Trump said. “Netflix is a great company, they’ve done a phenomenal job. Ted is a fantastic man, I have a lot of respect for him... but it’s a lot of market share, so we’ll have to see what happens.”

The Netflix deal will give the company, which began as a DVD rental business, the Warner Bros. library and its intellectual property, which includes DC Studios comic creations, the Harry Potter franchise, HBO dramas including Game of Thrones, and over 100 years of films from the studio.

However, there has been backlash about how much market share the deal will give Netflix and what it will mean for the future of cinemas.

Republican Sen. Mike Lee, who heads the antitrust subcommittee, said that the deal “should send alarm to antitrust enforcers around the world.”

Lee posted on X, “This potential transaction, if it were to materialize, would raise serious competition questions—perhaps more so than any transaction I’ve seen in about a decade... increasing Netflix’s dominance this way would mean the end of the Golden Age of streaming for content creators and consumers."

Democrat Sen. Elizabeth Warren called the deal “an anti-monopoly nightmare.”

“A Netflix-Warner Bros. would create one massive media giant with control of close to half of the streaming market — threatening to force Americans into higher subscription prices and fewer choices over what and how they watch, while putting American workers at risk,” Warren said in a statement.

“Under Donald Trump, the antitrust review process has also become a cesspool of political favoritism and corruption,” she added. “The Justice Department must enforce our nation’s anti-monopoly laws fairly and transparently — not use the Warner Bros. deal review to invite influence-peddling and bribery.”

On Sunday, Trump was directly asked if Netflix “should be allowed” to buy Warner.

“Well, that’s the question,” Trump said, before indicating he would be personally involved in the negotiations over the deal’s approval.

“They have a very big market share, and when they have Warner Bros., you know, that share goes up a lot. So I don’t know. That’s going to be for some economists to tell… And I’ll be involved in that decision too, but they have a very big market share.”

Bloomberg first reported Sarandos spent an hour with Trump at the White House, where Trump said Warner Bros. should sell to the highest bidder.

The Netflix boss said the company was not an all-powerful monopoly and had survived shedding subscribers in the past few years. The publication reported Sarandos left the meeting believing he would not face immediate opposition from the White House.

On Sunday, Trump was asked if Sarandos had made “any guarantees” during their meeting about the merger if it was approved by regulators.

“No, no, not at all,” Trump insisted. “He came up. He was in the Oval Office last week. I have a lot of respect for him.”

Trump said Sarandos had “done one of the greatest jobs in the history of movies and other things,” before comparing him to Louis B. Meyer, who co-founded the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios in 1924.

“I mean, he had a company that was very troubled seven or eight years ago and he took it over and he really done a legendary job,” Trump said of Sarandos.

The president then circled back to the scope of the deal, admitting, “It is a big market share. There’s no question about it. It could be a problem.”

During a Friday conference call with Wall Street analysts, Sarandos said Netflix’s reputation had previously been for building content, not buying it.

“We already have incredible shows and movies and a great business model, and it’s working for talent, it’s working for consumers, and it’s working for shareholders,” he said. “But this is a rare opportunity and it’s going to help us achieve our mission to entertain the world and to bring people together through great stories.”

However, Cinema United, the largest exhibition trade organization in the world, spoke up for theatre owners. “The proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. by Netflix poses an unprecedented threat to the global exhibition business,” said its president and CEO, Michael O’Leary. The organisation said in a statement 25 percent of the annual domestic box office would be at risk if Warner Bros. movies go direct to streaming.

Former WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar said he could not think of “a more effective way to reduce competition in Hollywood than selling WBD to Netflix.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/donald-trump-threatens-to-intervene-in-hollywood-mega-deal/?

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Why Troops Are Blowing Whistle on Trump: Senator

Elissa Slotkin says troops and intel officers are quietly raising alarms about illegal orders.

One of the Democratic senators whom Donald Trump said should be executed for sedition isn’t backing down.

Sen. Elissa Slotkin, one of six prominent Democratic lawmakers and former service members who appeared in a video urging U.S. troops and intelligence officers to reject any unlawful commands, said on The Daily Beast Podcast that military personnel have expressed anguish to her over carrying out questionable orders since then.

“Certainly, since we made the video, people have been finding their way to us just to say, hey, we’ve been expressing this angst amongst ourselves,” the Michigan lawmaker said. “This was not coming out of nowhere.”

The lawmakers remind service members in the video that they took an oath to uphold the Constitution and can refuse to follow illegal orders under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

The group includes Slotkin and Sen. Mark Kelly, as well as Reps. Chrissy Houlahan, Chris Deluzio, Maggie Goodlander, and Jason Crow. “Know that we have your back, because now, more than ever, the American people need you,” the lawmakers said.

Though they didn’t specify which orders they were referring to, the video was released amid intensifying scrutiny over the president’s deployment of federal troops in American cities and the Trump administration’s strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean.

Following the video, Trump, 79, raged that the group should be punished by death in a Truth Social tirade: “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!” he wrote.But Slotkin said she’s undeterred. “I just feel very strongly that one of the worst things that can happen from any administration, but from this one in particular, is that American citizens doubt their military,” she said.

Citizens and lawmakers aren’t the only ones raising alarms, Slotkin added. Just last week, she recounted, a young Guardsman approached her after an event in Washington, D.C.

“This young man who works here in Washington came up to me, pulled me aside…said, I just wanted to thank you,” she said.

The Guardsman told her he and other intel officers worry they may be ordered to conduct “Intel collection and exploitation inside the United States.”

“That the skills we learn to protect against foreign adversaries…we’re now maybe gonna be asked to do that inside a detention facility or inside somewhere in the United States with American citizens,” Slotkin said.

“He said everyone was talking about it. That was the conversation quietly in the corners of the training.”

The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House and the Defense Department for comment.

The worry comes as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is in crisis mode after a blatantly illegal strike on a boat in the Caribbean was highlighted in a Washington Post report last week.

Two people survived the initial blast on Sept. 2 and were clinging to the burning vessel when a second strike hit—an incident that, if true, potentially amounts to a war crime. The strike was reportedly carried out under direct orders from Hegseth to “kill everybody.”

“This fall, it really turned and it became a lot of people who were involved in the operations around the Caribbean asking…..’Hey, I’m not sure, I don’t know if this is legal,” Slotkin said.

This week, members of Congress raised grave concern after viewing the video of the Sept. 2 boat strikes. Slotkin, who did not see the video, stressed it’s not a partisan issue.

“All I want is basic oversight,” she said. “I’m looking for them to do oversight over something that’s fundamental to who we are as Americans.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/why-troops-are-blowing-whistle-on-trump-senator/?

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Trump is giving farmers $12B in aid. They’ve been hit hard by his trade war with China

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump announced a $12 billion farm aid package Monday — a boost to farmers who have struggled to sell their crops while getting hit by rising costs after the president raised tariffs on China as part of a broader trade war.

https://apnews.com/article/trump-farmers-aid-07328f260d1ebf26c2bfde79b426230e?

ps:Repeat of his first term when he had to bailout farmers!!!!!

Trump’s former lawyer Alina Habba resigns as top federal prosecutor in New Jersey

President Donald Trump’s former personal attorney, Alina Habba, resigned Monday as the top federal prosecutor for New Jersey, leaving the job after an appeals court said she had been serving in the post unlawfully.

https://apnews.com/article/alina-habba-51e1fbd348adcc099c0e65338cbbd102?

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Trump Blasts ‘Jilted’ MTG in ‘60 Minutes’ Meltdown

The president slammed his former MAGA ally after her sit-down interview.

President Donald Trump went on a blistering tirade against his former MAGA bestie Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene after she criticized him on 60 Minutes and slammed Paramount for her appearance on the program.

The outgoing GOP congresswoman sat down with veteran journalist Lesley Stahl, where she talked about the threats she has received for going head-to-head with Trump and her disillusionment with MAGA.

Trump fired back with a long grievance-riddled post on Truth Social Monday morning where he ranted about Greene, Stahl and 60 Minutes’ parent company.

“The only reason Marjorie ‘Traitor’ Brown (Green turns Brown under stress!) went BAD is that she was JILTED by the President of the United States (Certainly not the first time she has been jilted!),” Trump wrote. “Too much work, not enough time, and her ideas are, NOW, really BAD.”

The president’s rage at the 51-year-old congresswoman comes after she surprised many by tangling with Trump over the release of the Epstein files.

Last month, she surprised many by announcing her resignation from Congress in January.

On the program Sunday night, the Georgia lawmaker described herself not as MAGA but “America First.”

“She sort of reminds me of a Rotten Apple! Marjorie is not AMERICA FIRST or MAGA, because nobody could have changed her views so fast, and her new views are those of a very dumb person,” Trump wrote in his post.

The president did not just melt down over Greene appearing on 60 Minutes, but also attacked Stahl. He called the longtime correspondent“ washed up” and “Trump hating.”

Trump argued Stahl “interviewed a very poorly prepared Traitor, who in her confusion made many really stupid statements,” but he wrote that wasn’t his biggest issue.

“My real problem with the show, however, wasn’t the low IQ traitor, it was that the new ownership of 60 Minutes, Paramount, would allow a show like this to air,” Trump wrote.

He declared the new owners of the media company better than the old ownership.

In July, the Federal Communications Commission greenlit the $8 billion merger between Paramount and Skydance Media. The new Paramount Skydance is led by CEO David Ellison, son of Oracle billionaire and Trump ally Larry Ellison.

The president has repeatedly praised the Ellisons in recent months as his supporters and declared they would make the right decisions when it came to CBS.

In his post on Monday, Trump claimed Paramount just paid him “millions of Dollars for FAKE REPORTING about your favorite President, ME!”

However, Paramount Global agreed to pay $16 million to settle the lawsuit brought by Trump over 60 Minutes’ editing of its interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris during the 2024 election, not over “fake reporting” on Trump.

The settlement was reached as the media giant needed federal approval of its merger, but it did not include an apology or CBS admitting fault.

Trump on Monday demanded a “complete and total APOLOGY” from Stahl and 60 Minutes for comments she made to him in 2020 about not covering the Hunter Biden laptop story.

It was similar to the demand Trump made in October 2024 after he suddenly backed out of a sit-down with 60 Minutes ahead of the 2024 election.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-blasts-jilted-mtg-in-60-minutes-meltdown/?

[phkrause]

Bondi Busted Promoting What Trump Thinks Should Be Punishable by Death

Pam Bondi highlighted that U.S. military personnel are required to refuse illegal orders.

President Donald Trump threatened to execute a group of Democratic lawmakers over behavior his very own Attorney General Pam Bondi was actively promoting just last year—as part of an effort to keep him out of jail, according to the New York Times.

“Military officers are required not to carry out unlawful orders,” Bondi wrote, in no uncertain terms, in a Supreme Court filing in March 2024, the NYT reported.

“The military would not carry out a patently unlawful order from the president to kill nonmilitary targets,” she went on. “Indeed, service members are required not to do so.”

She filed her “friend of the court brief,” the NYT reports, in her capacity as an attorney for conservative think tank America First Policy Institute, in March 2024, before Trump was re-elected in November 2024.

The document came in support of Trump’s appeal to the Supreme Court for immunity from prosecution over allegations of election interference.

Last month, Trump responded to a video posted by six Democratic lawmakers, reminding U.S. military service members they should disobey illegal orders, by claiming they’d committed “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOUR, punishable by DEATH!”

Under Bondi’s watch, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has requested interviews with those officials, and is reportedly considering an official probe. The Daily Beast has reached out to the DoJ for comment.The attorney general’s comments in her brief, which would appear to counter the basis of both the president’s and the FBI’s response to the video, came as part of a legal campaign to keep Trump out of jail for his efforts to undermine the 2020 election.

Bondi’s filing pertained specifically to a statement from one of Trump’s lawyers, D. John Sauer, who’d told an appeals court during earlier arguments that hypothetically, a president who’d ordered the military to kill a political rival should not be subject to criminal prosecution, the NYT reported.

After Sauer’s comments apparently went down poorly with the judge, Bondi intervened to argue the hypothetical had been irrelevant because military officials would likely have disobeyed that order anyway.

“A president cannot order an elite military unit to kill a political rival, and the members of the military are required not to carry out such an unlawful order,” she said. “It would be a crime to do so.”

Trump won the case.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/attorney-general-pam-bondi-busted-for-blatant-hypocrisy-over-illegal-military-orders-furor/?