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Oh man. Same old clown show, awash with boondoggles, each more cringey than the last. As the mad man-child deconstructs DC and slaps his hideous face and name everywhere - historic buildings, fascist arches, garish statues, possibly imaginary gold phones - others have taken his lead with their own patriotic spinoffs. Cue "Fuck You" upgrades, a Strait to Hell arcade for a video-game war, and a Trump/Epstein "Memorial Reading Room" packed with 3.5 million pages of files, where "the truth is hard to deny."
Trump's narcissistic vandalizing of D.C. - couldn't his KKK dad have just hugged him now and then? - is "something dictators have done throughout history," noted Bernie Sanders of his proposed SERVE Act, or Stop Executive Renaming for Vanity and Ego. Co-sponsored by six Senate Dems, the bill would bar any sitting president from naming federal properties after themselves, an act both "arrogant" and illegal. At this rate many weary Americans would likely argue, "Let the chiseling off begin," but for now the bill sits in legislative limbo and we're stuck with the resulting atrocities; they continue to multiply like locusts, even as he's proposed a $10-billion fund for more "beautification" projects around "the capital of the greatest Nation in the history of the world."
Though he increasingly nods off in public - or per the White House, blinks - he still clutches at a farcical show of dominance he's leaned on in the endless self-glorification campaign that is his execrable life. There are posts quoting fictional "fans": "Remarkable leadership,” "Master of the Deal,” "THE GREATEST PRESIDENT WE HAVE EVER KNOWN." From the guy who's "confused the country for his living room," there's D.C's re-branding: the plaques, name changes, razed East Wing for a billion-dollar "albatross" nobody wants. There are new massive Stalin-esque banners at construction sites proclaiming, “Thank you, PRESIDENT TRUMP”- "like Michael Scott buying himself a World’s Best Boss coffee mug" we paid for - to which unenthused residents added, "Fuck You Cunt."
Snug in a delusional bubble where his approval is def not in the toilet, he feels free to rant, lie, melt down online without consequence. In one manic night, he posts 55 times in three hours: “Arrest Obama the traitor” and “DEMONIC FORCE,” also Hillary, Brennan, Comey, Kelly. Asked how much he thinks about the cost to Americans of his calamitous war, he blurts, “Not even a little bit.” His lackeys follow suit: Ka$h Patel yells, lies, hustles bourbon, pads his stats and takes a "VIP snorkel" in Pearl Harbor around the tomb of 900 U.S. soldiers as Sean Duffy takes his nine offspring on a "patriotic," seven-month Great American Road Trip filmed for YouTube and complete with "head-spinning" corporate sponsorship, both on the taxpayers' now-rapidly-shrinking dime.
Meanwhile, another project nobody asked for - draining and repainting the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, aka "reflective pond," from traditional grey to garish blue - has shockingly veered off course. After boasting his bestest golf course pool painters could easy-peasy do a no-bid, $1.8 million, "smart and beautiful construction" that Dems stupidly opposed - "Dumacrats love sewage" - the cost has soared to $13.1 million, it's now by a contractor he "did not know and have never used before,” staff are worried the job is behind schedule, with "uneven application" leaving bubbles, holes and "mottled shades of blue" in the pool, and a judge has set a May 21 hearing for a lawsuit charging the project wasn't properly vetted, ditto a color "more appropriate to a resort or theme park."
More winning in Miami, where another lawsuit charges three acres of multi-million-dollar waterfront land were illegally grifted by DeSantis to Trump for $10 for his presidential “library,” actually a gaudy hotel with no books but more vitally two gold statues of, you know. They will presumably join in grotesque kinship with the $300,000, crypto-bro-funded, bronze and gold leaf Don Colossus just unveiled at Doral Miami, "where the Republic is currently moldering." Before "a robotic chorus of evangelical functionaries who (have) transformed themselves into the most theologically humiliated cohort in modern memory," the statue was honored as, not an idolatrous golden calf, insisted Pastor Mark Burns, but "a celebration of life" and symbol of "the hand of God over (Trump’s) life." Definitely not a cult.

Despite being heralded as God's second favorite son - one who "understands the Scriptures better than the Pope" - Trump is also widely deemed "an economic serial killer" presiding over an "America First Corporate Graveyard," skyrocketing inflation, national debt, farm bankruptcies, and energy costs, and possibly "the largest single act of grand larceny in American history" with a $10 billion payout by his own DOJ against his own IRS to settle his bullshit lawsuit for their leak of his tax returns, which every other president has released. Still, because grifting chutzpah thy name is, and because there's never enough money to fill the ugly gaping hole where a soul should be, he's still running penny-ante scams. Up next: Trump Mobile, "for the forgotten MAGA man."
Last June, his huckster spawn announced the launch of "a sleek, gold smartphone engineered for performance.” The T1 Phone, "proudly designed and built in the United States,” would be available in August at $499. For almost a year, they urged followers to make $100 "deposits" to "pre-order" the beauties; over half a million did, ponying up about $59 million. Then, the bait and switch. The terms of service quietly changed: The "deposit" provided "a conditional opportunity" to buy if Trump Mobile chose to sell. Pricing, production schedules, shipping costs were "non-binding." "Made in the USA" became "Proudly American Designed." "Delivery" dates got pushed back. Unexplained charges appeared. A reporter who called "Customer Service" got “Omega Auto Care." To date, no fantasy Trump phones have shipped. Cheap Crooks 'R Us.

Also, liars. With even neo-cons now deeming the Iran War potentially more of a debacle than Vietnam, the good folks at Secret Handshake, creators of the Trump/Epstein bestie statues, decided that with the regime hyping war like a video game, they might as well turn it into one. Operation Epic Furious: Strait to Hell , which is also online, features three working, arcade video games set up inside DC's War Memorial; they promise "high-octane, flag-waving, boots-on-the-ground...pure pixelated patriotism," or, per Hegseth, "laser-focused maximum reps annihilation mission crushing (with) sustained unrelenting pressure." Battles - by tweet, not gun - pit US forces against ”Iranian schoolgirl,“ "DEIyatollah,“ low-flow shower heads, the Pope and other "threats to American freedom."
Games open with Trump declaring, “Another big, beautiful day as the best President ever.” Options for the prompt, “Ready to ROCK Iran back to the Stone Ages?” are “Not Yet...” “Yes” and “Hell Yes.” Yells Pete, “Let’s liberate some oil!” Trump can order a Diet Coke or bomb Iran; search for barrels of oil, ideas for Truth Social posts, or endless threats that lead nowhere; he vows to “fight this war and win it by hamburger o’clock.” Melania: “I WAS NEVER ON THE EPSTEIN JET...Did you burn the files yet?” JD, fat-faced: “I love couch.” The only way you can lose is by trying to hold Melania’s hand, which abruptly ends the game; otherwise, it’s impossible to end or win it. Irony never dies: Images have surfaced of bored National Guardsmen - a $1 million a day deployment - playing.
Another piece of protest art brings the truth of "one of the most horrific crimes in American history” to Trump's hometown. "The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room,” in New York's Tribeca, is a first-of-its-kind, 5,000-square-foot installation containing all the unsealed Epstein files - 3.5 million pages printed and bound into 3,437 volumes weighing 17,000 pounds, "a physical, undeniable record of corruption, cover-ups, and crime." The pop-up project in the Mriya Gallery was created by the non-profit Primary Facts; it took them about a month to print the files. The exhibit is on view through May 21; admission to groups for a one-hour session is free; organizers are raising funds to cover the New York premiere and bring it to other cities.
The Trumpsonian installation is built around a candlelit tribute to Epstein's more than 1,200 victims and survivors, whose names are all redacted here in closed binders - unlike at the DOJ, where they were badly, only partly redacted, a failure adding insult to injury along with an ongoing, multi-pronged cover-up. The Trump and Epstein Reading Room also includes a timeline documenting the decades-long crimes, legal proceedings and intersections between the two men's lives, all underlining the criminal absurdity of federal claims "there's nothing left to investigate." The vast trove of information, organizers say, is "what 3.5 million pages of evidence looks like." Trump, as deeply complicit as he is narcissistic, "wanted his name on stuff." Now, here it is.

A study published Monday warns that New Orleans must immediately begin planning and gradually implementing its permanent evacuation to avert a dangerously rushed exodus later, because it has passed a "point of no return" as climate-driven sea-level rise slowly swallows the storied city.
"With global temperatures poised to exceed the 1.5°C Paris Agreement threshold—a level that triggered substantial ice sheet collapse during the Last Interglacial—low-elevation coastal zones face sea-level commitments far beyond current planning horizons," says the study, which was published by the journal Nature Sustainability.
"With this geological frame of reference, we examine the impact of sea-level rise on what may be the most physically vulnerable coastal zone in the world using prehistoric and contemporary patterns of human mobility," the publication continues. "We highlight the positive aspects of the recently commenced out-migration in this region and argue that the fate of communities landwards of this coastal zone will be decided in the next few decades."
"While climate mitigation should remain the first step to prevent the worst outcomes, coastal Louisiana has evidently already crossed the point of no return,” the paper adds.
That's because rising waters are slowly eroding Louisiana's coast, including New Orleans, which “may well be surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico before the end of this century," according to the study's authors.
“Louisiana is a canary in the coal mine. It is one of the rare places where we’re already clearly seeing climate-motivated depopulation combined with other social and economic factors,” said Yale School of the Environment professor and study co-author Brianna Castro.
The authors argued that by acknowledging the inevitability of New Orleans' underwater future, government and residents can avert a fraught rushed retreat by planning and executing a managed multigenerational relocation and set an example for other threatened coastal communities.
According to one widely cited study published a decade ago, around 13 million Americans living in coastal areas could be forced to relocate to higher ground by the end of the century due climate-driven sea-level rise, with the Gulf Coast and Florida expected lose the most livable land. Globally, hundreds of millions of people are expected to be displaced by 2100 due to rising seas.
After Hurricane Katrina—which inundated the city and killed nearly 1,000 people in the New Orleans metro area—billions of dollars were spent fortifying the city's levee system, which failed catastrophically during the 2005 storm. However, experts warn that in the long term, levees won't be able to stop the rising waters any longer.
That's why the study's authors said officials must begin the city's orderly depopulation as soon as possible.
"What kind of retreat do you want?" asked Castro. "Do you want to incentivize it and then people go naturally for jobs, housing, and lifestyle amenities—or do you want people to wait and then have to leave abruptly in crisis?”
The global energy crisis caused by President Donald Trump's illegal war with Iran is set to worsen in the coming months, as The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that the world is "burning through its oil safety net."
Even though oil prices surged at the start of the war, which led Iran to close the Strait of Hormuz to commercial ships, that increase was temporarily mitigated by crude surpluses that allowed countries to add more petroleum to the market.
However, the Journal reported that those reserve stocks are being depleted at an unprecedented pace, with inventories declining by nearly 250 million barrels in just the first two months of the conflict.
This rapid drawdown has led oil executives and analysts to warn that "a harsh reckoning is set to upend the relative calm in energy markets" as "acute shortages of key fuels and soaring prices could emerge within weeks if the Strait of Hormuz remains shut," according to the Journal.
The Journal cited a report from consulting firm Eurasia Group estimating that, at the current rate of depletion, US diesel reserves are set to fall below 100 million barrels for the first time in 23 years by the end of this month.
Ellen Wald, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center, told the Journal that while the increased price of oil would be partially offset by a decrease in consumption, the sheer scale of the coming supply crunch is so big that prices will continue to spiral upward.
“You can only decrease consumption so much, and when inventories run out, they are going to run out,” Wald explained. “At some point the market is going to collide and prices are going to shoot up.”
This problem could be exacerbated further if Trump decides to renew attacks on Iran, which could lead to devastating Iranian counterstrikes on oil production facilities throughout the region.
Zeteo reported on Thursday that "preparations for an imminent new phase of Trump’s Iran war have accelerated," as the president "has grown increasingly frustrated by the state of peace talks."
According to Zeteo's sources, the US military campaign is set to ramp up shortly after Trump returns from his visit to China, with options that include "a potential massive new bombing campaign against the Iranians."
The US military bombed Iranian military targets and civilian infrastructure throughout the early weeks of the conflict, but the country has still refused to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
With peace talks stalled and the prospect of renewed hostilities on the table, the price of Brent crude futures surged on Friday, topping more than $108 per barrel.
Average gas prices in the US remained above $4.50 on Friday, and petroleum industry analyst Patrick De Haan estimated on Thursday that prices could soon jump to over $5 per gallon if the Strait of Hormuz isn't opened soon.
As the Israel lobby attempts to end his political career, the Republican Rep. Thomas Massie has introduced a bill that would require lobbyists working for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, commonly known as AIPAC, to register as foreign agents.
The bill, known as the Americans Insist on Political Agent Clarity (AIPAC) Act, would amend the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938 (FARA), which requires those working to influence government policy on behalf of a foreign power to register with the US Department of Justice (DOJ).
Most lobbyists and donors for AIPAC are American, leading the DOJ to classify it as a domestic, rather than foreign, lobbying group. But critics have argued that it engages in extensive coordination with the Israeli government and that groups lobbying for the interests of other countries are treated with stricter scrutiny.
“Today, I introduced a bill called the AIPAC Act… which would make AIPAC subject to the Foreign Agents Registration Act," Massie (R-Ky.) announced on Redacted News Thursday. "For some reason, they’re immune right now, and I think not just the money that’s spent in politics, but the lobbying that happens on Capitol Hill should be reported if it’s a foreign country. Whether it's Great Britain, Australia, Turkey, Qatar, or Israel, it needs to be reported."
Massie has established himself as the leading Republican critic of President Donald Trump in Congress, agitating for transparency from the DOJ on the Jeffrey Epstein files and stridently opposing increased military spending and the president's aggressive overseas wars, including in Iran.
He has also distinguished himself as one of the few Republicans willing to publicly criticize Israel and call for the US to "immediately terminate" military aid in response to its killing of tens of thousands of women and children in Gaza.
His debut of the AIPAC Act comes as he's in the fight of his political life in Kentucky, where pro-Israel lobbying groups have unleashed a flood of money to unseat him in next week's Republican primary.
The United Democracy Project, an AIPAC-affiliated super PAC, has spent about $2.6 million, according to Axios, while the Republican Jewish Coalition has dropped $4 million to support Massie’s opponent, retired Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein. The Christian Zionist group Christians United For Israel has dropped six figures on a campaign to blanket “every available billboard," it said, in Kentucky’s 4th congressional district with anti-Massie messaging.
Trump has also thrown his support behind Gallrein, and two of his senior political advisers, Chris LaCivita and Tony Fabrizio, have raised more than $2 million for their MAGA KY PAC from a trio of top pro-Israel billionaires—hedge fund manager Paul Singer, investor John Paulson, and a group linked to casino mogul Miriam Adelson, according to Axios.
In all, the GOP primary in KY-04 has become the most expensive House primary on record in US history, with more than $25 million spent on advertising in total, surpassing the 2024 Democratic primary in New York's 16th district, where AIPAC and its allies unleashed another torrent of cash and successfully felled the progressive Rep. Jamal Bowman (D).
"[The money] didn't come from regular people. It's come from billionaires, and 95% of it... has come from the Israeli lobby," Massie said of the funds spent to oust him during an appearance on Tucker Carlson's podcast last week. "Their position is more war, it's more strife, it's more bombs, it's more foreign aid, and those are the things that I've been voting against."
Right now, the ad blitz—which has portrayed Massie as disloyal to MAGA—has put the incumbent in a position to lose his race. A Quantus Insights poll earlier this week showed him trailing with 43% of likely voters to Gallrein's 48%.
Massie said: "The real reason that this race is a serious race, and I may lose, is because a foreign lobby has fully funded to the extent that they've never done in any Republican race ever before."
The World Health Organization's official designation of an Ebola virus outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda as a public health emergency of international concern on Sunday came just a day after the world learned that the disease was spreading at all—a highly unusual chain of events, public health experts said, and one that suggested the virus has been circulating for weeks without the outbreak being detected.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Sunday that eight laboratory-confirmed cases, 246 suspected cases, and 80 suspected deaths had been reported in at least three health zones across Ituri Province in the DRC. In Kampala, the densely populated capital of neighboring Uganda, two lab-confirmed cases and one death were reported within 24 hours of each other.
The victims in Kampala had no apparent link to one another; both had recently traveled from Congo.
The confirmed cases in Congo include some that have been reported in Kinshasa, the capital. The fact that the disease has been able to spread to two large cities with international airports, and the "clusters of deaths across the province of Ituri" point to "a potentially much larger outbreak than what is currently being detected and reported, with significant local and regional risk of spread," said WHO.
"At least four deaths among healthcare workers in a clinical context suggestive of viral haemorrhagic fever have been reported from the affected area, raising concerns regarding healthcare-associated transmission, gaps in infection prevention and control measures, and the potential for amplification within health facilities," the agency said.
Dr. Ashish Jha, who served as the White House Covid-19 response coordinator, said the numbers being reported could make the outbreak "one of the 10 biggest Ebola outbreaks in history."
"We're just hearing about this now? That makes no sense. Those numbers take weeks to accumulate," said Jha, adding that the fact that suspected cases have been detected in capital cities as well as Bunia, the provincial capital of Ituri, "matters enormously for spread."
Tedros emphasized that the outbreak is considered "extraordinary" because there is no approved vaccine or therapeutics for Ebola caused by the Bundibugyo virus, as this strain is. WHO sent a team to investigate in Ituri after first being notified of suspected Ebola cases on May 5, but initial samples tested negative, as available field equipment was only able to detect the Zaire strain of the disease.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and global partners "need to surge resources in," Jha said. "A slow response creates unnecessary risks to people everywhere."
WHO, which President Donald Trump withdrew the US from last year, said the public health emergency designation was made to ramp up surveillance and infection prevention in the countries where the outbreak is occurring, enhance preparedness in bordering countries, and spread awareness in the international community.
The Ebola outbreak is the second to hit Uganda since Trump slashed foreign assistance funding, including by dismantling the US Agency for International Development. Earlier this month, CNN reported that the administration plans to divert $2 billion in global health program funding to cover the cost of closing USAID.
US foreign spending dropped by 56.9% after Trump shut down the agency as well as smaller aid programs and pushed Congress to rescind previously approved foreign assistance. USAID played a critical role in responding to the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa.
In March 2025, when an Ebola outbreak was reported in Uganda, US officials warned that Trump's actions on foreign assistance at that point, including the termination of USAID grants, was impeding the Ugandan government's ability to procure lab supplies, diagnostic equipment, and protective gear for medical workers.
Dr. Herbert Luswata, president of the Uganda Medical Association, told The New York Times at the time that the country's ability to respond to Ebola was notably different than it had been during a previous outbreak in 2022, when dozens of medical workers volunteered to help treat patients.
The lack of funds and protective equipment had "left many afraid to help this time," the Times reported.
“With no USAID money and CDC expertise, it was like Uganda was left to die," Luswata told the Times.
Dr. Craig Spencer, an emergency medicine physician who survived Ebola in 2014, told CBS Saturday that "before the second Trump administration, USAID would have been on the ground" to respond to the current outbreak.
"The CDC would have been on the ground at a moment's notice, maybe even before a moment's notice, of a new outbreak of Ebola because we were in a bunch of countries," said Spencer. "We created relationships beforehand."
Last year, Trump megadonor Elon Musk, who was then leading efforts to slash government spending at the Department of Government Efficiency, said DOGE had "accidentally" canceled US support for Ebola prevention but claimed the funding had been "restored...and there was no interruption.”
But a number of Ebola-related contracts were in fact cut, accounting for $1.6 million out of $2.2 million that had previously gone toward the prevention efforts.
In recent weeks, public health experts have also warned that Trump's cuts to the CDC and other public health programs have left the US ill-prepared to respond to the hantavirus outbreak that originated on a cruise ship.
Jeremy Konyndyk, president of Refugees International and former leader on USAID's Covid-19 and disaster relief response work, said the current Ebola outbreak is "very worrying" and appeared to be the result of a "massive surveillance failure."
"It is really unusual for an Ebola outbreak to get to this scale before being detected; particularly in DRC, which has a lot of Ebola experience," said Konyndyk.
"I can't help but wonder," said Konyndyk, "if the drawdown of USAID and CDC health interventions by DOGE undermined some of the surveillance and detection initiatives that might have helped to catch this earlier."
WHO emphasized that the current crisis in DRC and Uganda requires "international coordination and cooperation to understand the extent of the outbreak, to coordinate surveillance, prevention, and response efforts, to scale up and strengthen operations and ensure ability to implement control measures."
The director of the US Central Intelligence Agency met with Cuban officials in Havana on Thursday after the island nation's government said it had completely run out of fuel due to the Trump administration's oil blockade.
The CIA's X account posted photos of some of Director John Ratcliffe's meetings, blurring the faces of US intelligence officials who accompanied the agency chief. In a statement, the CIA said it met with Raúl Rodríguez Castro, the grandson of former Cuban President Raúl Castro; Interior Minister Lázaro Álvarez Casas; and the head of Cuba's intelligence services.
Havana, Cuba pic.twitter.com/7S7TtJPyf5
— CIA (@CIA) May 14, 2026
"This is one of the most sinister and ominous social media posts I've ever seen," legal scholar Maryam Jamshidi wrote in response to the CIA photos.
Ratcliffe, the highest-ranking Trump administration official to visit Cuba, decided to visit "to personally deliver President Donald Trump's message that the United States is prepared to seriously engage on economic and security issues, but only if Cuba makes fundamental changes," the CIA said.
A CIA official told NewsNation that "while the director emphasized that President Trump prefers dialogue, the Cubans should have no illusions that the President will not enforce red lines."
Trump has repeatedly threatened to seize Cuba by force, describing the island country as his next military target after Venezuela and Iran. Fears of an imminent military attack have grown in recent weeks amid Trump's belligerent rhetoric and surging US surveillance flights off Cuba's coast.
"I think I can do anything I want with [Cuba], if you want to know the truth," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office in March. "A very weakened nation."
"This failed policy needs to end immediately. Every day, we are contributing to immense suffering in Cuba and a worsening humanitarian crisis."
The spy chief's trip came a day after Cuba's energy minister announced that months after Trump imposed an oil blockade on the island, "we have absolutely no fuel oil, absolutely no diesel."
The same day, the US State Department dangled "$100 million in direct humanitarian assistance to the Cuban people." Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla said Cuba's leadership is "willing to hear the details of the offer and the manner in which it would be implemented."
"We hope it is free of political maneuvers and attempts to exploit the shortages and suffering of a people under siege," he added. "The best aid that the US government could provide to the noble Cuban people at this or any time is to de-escalate the measures of the energy, economic, commercial, and financial blockade, intensified as never before in recent months, which severely affects all sectors of the Cuban economy and society."
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel echoed that sentiment, writing in a Thursday social media post that "the damage could be alleviated in a much easier and more expeditious way by lifting or easing the blockade, as it is well known that the humanitarian situation is coldly calculated and induced."
Progressive lawmakers in the US are imploring the Trump administration to end US economic warfare against Cuba, engage diplomatically with the country, and drop any plans for a military assault.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), who has come under attack from Republican lawmakers for visiting Cuba in April, said Thursday that "Cuba has run out of diesel and fuel oil and is enduring some of the worst blackouts in decades because of the US’ cruel oil blockade."
"This failed policy needs to end immediately," said Jayapal. "Every day, we are contributing to immense suffering in Cuba and a worsening humanitarian crisis."
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer urged the GOP to "realize that this war didn't end at the 60-day mark and will not end until Republicans show some backbone and support Democrats' war powers resolution."
As President Donald Trump announced Monday that he hit pause on a planned attack against Iran at the request of three Gulf monarchs, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer renewed Democrats' push for a war powers resolution to end the illegal conflict.
Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform Monday afternoon that "I have been asked by the Emir of Qatar, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, and the President of the United Arab Emirates, Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, to hold off on our planned Military attack of the Islamic Republic of Iran, which was scheduled for tomorrow, in that serious negotiations are now taking place, and that, in their opinion, as Great Leaders and Allies, a Deal will be made, which will be very acceptable to the United States of America, as well as all Countries in the Middle East, and beyond."
"This Deal will include, importantly, NO NUCLEAR WEAPONS FOR IRAN!" the president continued. "Based on my respect for the above mentioned Leaders, I have instructed Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, The Chairman of The Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Daniel Caine, and The United States Military, that we will NOT be doing the scheduled attack of Iran tomorrow, but have further instructed them to be prepared to go forward with a full, large scale assault of Iran, on a moment’s notice, in the event that an acceptable Deal is not reached."
Responding to the post on X, Trita Parsi, co-founder and executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, concluded that "once again, Trump has realized that escalation will end up badly for the US. That does not necessarily mean, though, that the necessary realism, discipline, and creativity will be mustered for the talks."
Prior to the president's Monday announcement, Parsi had warned that "the Middle East is once again teetering on the brink as Trump appears poised to reignite war with Iran," pointing out reporting that he would convene military advisers on Tuesday and that he had "flooded Truth Social with a barrage of incendiary threats."
The Trump administration partnered with Israeli forces to launch an assault on Iran—without authorization from Congress and in violation of the United Nations Charter—on February 28. Just hours after Trump's genocidal threat against Iran on April 7, a ceasefire agreement was reached; it has since been extended, though the US has maintained its naval blockade while Iran has continued to restrict ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.
The beginning of this month marked a key deadline under the War Powers Act, which the administration tried to dodge by claiming that the current ceasefire means the conflict has been "terminated." While key Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson (La.), have tried to stick to that talking point, Democratic leaders and legal experts aren't buying it.
Nope.Not how this works.A naval blockade is an act of war and U.S. armed forces remain engaged in hostilities for the purposes of the War Powers Resolution.
[image or embed]
— Brian Finucane (@bcfinucane.bsky.social) May 17, 2026 at 10:15 AM
Congressional Democrats have repeatedly tried to pass war powers resolutions in the Republican-controlled chambers.
Last Thursday, Congressman Jared Golden (D-Maine) cast the deciding vote on the latest war powers resolution considered in the House of Representatives. The retiring former Marine sided with all Republicans except Reps. Tom Barrett (Mich.), Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.), and Thomas Massie (Ky.) to block the measure.
As The Hill reported Monday:
Golden, a former Marine who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, has indicated he'll support the next war powers resolution. He said he only opposed the last measure because it had a withdrawal deadline that had already passed.
"I look forward to voting for a clean, relevant resolution as soon as possible," Golden said in a statement Wednesday.
And Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.) could return to Congress after being absent for four weeks and not voting on any issue since April 17. Wilson released a statement Thursday that she recently underwent eye surgery and was unable to fly but plans to be back in Washington, DC, soon.
With Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-NJ) also absent since March 5 because of a "personal medical issue," Republicans can't have more than two defections on an otherwise party-line vote.
In other words, "it may [come] down to absences," as Punchbowl News reporter Anthony Adragna said on social media Monday.
Like in the House, the latest Senate vote also came down to a Democrat: Sen. John Fetterman (Pa.) has repeatedly voted with nearly all Republicans against war powers resolutions on Iran, and did so again last Wednesday. Unlike Golden, Fetterman told Semafor on Monday that Senate Democrats know he's "pretty much locked and loaded" regarding his support for Trump's war.
"Something like this is much more important than just voting what your base might demand. Because I think things are much bigger and more important than that. And Iran with a nuclear bomb is one of those things," Fetterman said, taking aim at anti-war campaigners. "I'm very much aware how damaging it is as a Democrat to hold these views. I had 20 CodePink dopes in my office."
CodePink held a "brown bag teach-in" lunch last week. The group said that "many of Fetterman's constituents feel betrayed by the person they campaigned to elect in 2022. Since becoming a senator in 2023, he has repeatedly broken with fellow Democrats to support Trump's wars and militaristic policies. Constituents hope this lunchtime educational session will help him better understand the human consequences of these positions and the growing opposition among Pennsylvanians to endless war and continued support for Israel."
While Fetterman opposed the latest resolution, Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) all voted in favor of it, and Schumer (D-NY) made clear on the chamber's floor Monday that he's pushing for an eighth vote.
"Over the weekend, Donald Trump told Iran, 'The clock is ticking, and they better get moving, fast, or there won't be anything left of them,'" Schumer noted. "How can Donald Trump say the clock is ticking when he told the Senate that the clock had paused when his war recently passed the War Powers Act's 60-day threshold to either end hostilities or get congressional authorization?"
"Senate Republicans need to stop playing dumb and realize that this war didn't end at the 60-day mark and will not end until Republicans show some backbone and support Democrats' war powers resolution to end the fighting," he declared. "This week, Democrats will force an eighth vote on our war powers resolution to withdraw our troops from hostilities with Iran."
Schumer added that "I urge Republicans to support our war powers resolution, end the war, get the troops out of harm's way, or else Republicans will learn that the clock is ticking not only on this war but on their own political futures."
Christian Castro "is an ICE agent, but his federal badge does not make him immune from state charges for his criminal conduct in Minnesota," said Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty.
Minnesota state prosecutors on Monday charged and issued a nationwide arrest warrant for a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in connection with the shooting of a Venezuelan man during the Trump administration's deadly anti-immigrant crackdown in the Twin Cities area.
The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office charged 52-year-old ICE agent Christian Castro with four counts of second-degree assault with a deadly weapon and one count of falsely reporting a crime after Venezuelan national Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis was shot in the leg on January 14.
“Mr. Castro is an ICE agent, but his federal badge does not make him immune from state charges for his criminal conduct in Minnesota,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said in a video announcing the move. “There is no such thing as absolute immunity for federal officers who commit crimes in this state or any other.”
Federal authorities initially charged Sosa-Celis and his roommate, Alfredo Alejandro Aljorna, with assaulting an officer with a broom handle and a snow shovel that day.
Then-US Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin claimed that Sosa-Celis and Aljorna “began to resist and violently assault" Castro, who fired his gun while on the ground out of fear for his life. Former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem accused Sosa-Celis and Aljorna of “attempted murder."
However, US District Judge Paul Magnuson subsequently dropped the charges after video evidence directly contradicted the administration's claims, prompting Democratic Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey to assert that "bare due diligence would have shown that the agents were lying.”
Moriarty said Monday that Castro's "narrative about what he said happened before, like he was hit with a shovel and broom and all of that, in the head multiple times," was disproven by "a thorough examination, including X-rays."
“There’s no demonstrable trauma to his body, except for an abrasion to his left hand at the base of the thumb," she added.
As The Minnesota Star Tribune reported:
Last month, the city of Minneapolis released surveillance footage that its cameras captured near the duplex where Sosa-Celis and Aljorna live with their partners.
Aljorna, who was making a DoorDash delivery, called home in the middle of a car chase after he fled a traffic stop by Castro and another ICE agent in an unmarked vehicle. The federal agents believed they were stopping an immigration enforcement target, but it ended up being a case of mistaken identity. One of the adults in the duplex called 911 to report what was happening and Moriarty said an emergency dispatcher turned the camera to face the duplex.
The video evidence showed Aljorna racing to the house after he crashed his car into a light pole. Castro pursued him. Sosa-Celis was waiting outside. There was a brief scramble in the yard as the three men were entangled. A shovel and broom were present near the area, but there was no indication they were used as weapons.
A Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension investigation showed that the shot Castro fired passed through Sosa-Celis' leg and then penetrated a nearby home, lodging in the wall of a bedroom where several small children sleep.
ICE agents then broke down the home's door and arrested Sosa-Celis, Aljorna, and three other people. Gabriel Alejandro Hernandez-Ledezma, who had nothing to do with the incident, was accused of attacking Castro and jailed for two weeks without charges in Texas. Two women—who had no criminal records and were also not involved in the incident—were separated from their young children and also detained in Texas for two weeks before being released without charge.
Castro is the second ICE agent that Moriarty's office has charged in connection with Operation Metro Surge, the Trump administration's 70-day Twin Cities blitz. Last month, Gregory Donnell Morgan Jr. was charged with two counts of felony second-degree assault after he allegedly pulled a gun on two local residents during a February traffic dispute.
On Monday, Moriarty also addressed public concerns about why her office hasn't yet charged ICE officer Jonathan Ross, who fatally shot Minneapolis mother Renee Good in January, or Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez in connection with the deadly shooting of Department of Veteran Affairs nurse Alexi Pretti later that month.
“I have really a lot of empathy for everybody who has said, ‘You have the videos, why haven’t you charged?’ We get that,” she said. “From the inside, we are doing a lot of work. These are unusual cases. It’s just a very unique scenario."
“We obviously are trying to be very thoughtful and intentional," Moriarty added. "While I understand people really want accountability, and they saw what they saw in the videos, this is incredibly complex. The last thing we want to do is make a mistake if we feel something is appropriately charged and get dismissed out of federal court.”
In March, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison sued the Trump administration over its refusal to cooperate with state probes into the shooting of Good, Pretti, and Sosa-Celis.
Moriarty's announcement was hailed by immigrant rights advocates and opponents of Trump's sweeping crackdown, with one popular progressive account on Bluesky welcoming the prosecution of what it called a "lying ICE goon."
"This is BIG," attorney and American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick said on X. "These are the first charges relating to an incident that occurred during an enforcement operation. The officers involved lied under oath about this shooting, as the Trump [administration] admitted."
"President Trump does not need more people in Washington who are trying to make a point," said the Defense Secretary. "Especially from his own party."
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is being accused of violating long-standing Pentagon policy by going scorched earth on the campaign trail in Kentucky against the leading Republican critic of President Donald Trump's war against Iran, Rep. Thomas Massie.
Massie (R-Ky.), who has denounced the war as unauthorized and unconstitutional and become a leading Trump antagonist on other issues like the Jeffrey Epstein files and his plans to renovate the White House ballroom, has been hit with an avalanche of spending from MAGA-aligned and pro-Israel donors seeking his ouster on Tuesday in a Republican primary that has become the most expensive in the history of the US House of Representatives.
Trump has thrown his full weight behind Massie's challenger, retired Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein, who polls show about even with or slightly ahead of Massie.
It may be another case of Trump using his bully pulpit to turn GOP voters against Republicans who dare defy him, with Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) being the most recent casualty. The senator, who voted to convict Trump for his role in inciting the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection, was defeated in his primary over the weekend after Trump deemed him a "disloyal disaster" and endorsed a challenger.
On stage at a campaign event for Gallrein on Monday, in what The New York Times described as a "highly unusual" display of partisanship from an active defense secretary, Hegseth fulminated against Massie for showing anything less than absolute fealty to the president.
"President Trump does not need more people in Washington who are trying to make a point, especially from his own party. He needs people willing to help him win, to vote with him when it matters the most," Hegseth said. "And too often, Thomas Massie has acted like his job is to stand apart from the movement that President Trump leads instead of strengthening it."
"When President Trump needs backup, Massie wants to debate process," Hegseth said, referring perhaps to Massie's joining with Democrats to introduce war powers resolutions to require congressional approval of Trump's military actions in Iran and Venezuela.
"When the movement needs unity, especially at the biggest moment, Massie is willing to vote with Democrats," Hegseth continued. "When conservatives are fighting the most radical left in American history, too often Massie's instinct is to throw elbows at fellow Republicans instead of the people who are destroying our country or want to destroy our country, and there's one man standing in their way, and it’s Trump."
The watchdog group Democracy Forward sent a letter to the Defense Department's inspector general on Monday, arguing that Hegseth's speech violated the Pentagon's 2026 political activity rules under the Hatch Act, which says that Senate-confirmed presidential appointees are “expressly prohibit[ed]” from “taking an active part in... political campaigns," including making speeches for specific candidates.
The letter also notes that Hegseth was previously scheduled to "headline" a Top Gun-themed political fundraiser for Rep. Zach Nunn (R-Iowa) in March before it was abruptly canceled due to the Iran War.
“While flagrant violations of ethics laws and policies seem to be commonplace for this administration, Secretary Hegseth appears to have doubled down, violating his own agency’s specific regulations against politicking,” said Skye Perryman, the president and CEO of Democracy Forward. “Our national security and those charged to protect it must be above brash partisan politics."
For his part, Massie thinks the Trump administration's full-court press against him may play out in his favor. In response to a post on Truth Social by Trump, who called him the "worst Republican congressman in history," Massie said Sunday on ABC News, "I think it's going to help my fundraising," and said that "every time" the historically unpopular president "tweets about me, it's good for some money coming in because people don't like that."
"How did this race become the most expensive race in the history of Congress for a primary?" he continued.
"It's because three billionaires from outside of Kentucky have funneled millions of dollars in here," he said, referencing the $2 million donated to the MAGA KY PAC by a trio of top pro-Israel billionaires—hedge fund manager Paul Singer, investor John Paulson, and a group linked to casino mogul Miriam Adelson—which has been used to fund ads accusing Massie of disloyalty to Trump.
He said these donors, and other groups spending big money to oust him, like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and the Republican Jewish Committee (RJC), were "all part of the Israeli lobby" backing his opponent. Massie has been the most vocal Republican critic of Israel, calling for US military aid to be cut off in response to the genocide in Gaza.
He said his race "will be a referendum on foreign policy and whether Israel gets to dictate that by bullying members of Congress," adding, "I'm the one they haven't been able to bully."
Massie claimed he was "ahead in the polls" and that the Trump camp was "desperate."
"That's why they're sending the secretary of war to my district... That's why the president's losing sleep and tweeting about this. That's why AIPAC has dumped another $3 million into my race this weekend," he said. "It's because they're panicked."