Breaking News
Breaking News
from Washington and beyond

GOP Politician’s Daughter Calls Him Total Loser After Netanyahu Visit

Why was a state senator invited to meet the Israeli prime minister? His daughter wants to know.

Screenshot of Maddie Block's TikTok with the caption "My Republican state senator dad met with Netanyahu in Israel?"
Screenshot/TikTok @maddie.block

New Mexico Republican state Senator Jay Block’s own daughter excoriated him for putting the priorities of the Israeli government over those of his constituents with a recent trip to Israel for the “50 States, One Israel” conference.

“My dad and a bunch of other loser politicians from New Mexico went to meet with Netanyahu, and I don’t know what they could possibly discuss,” Maddie Block, 28, said in a TikTok posted on Tuesday. “How does meeting with Netanyahu help the local people of New Mexico?”

“I genuinely belive that Israel is like, paying my dad now to pedal propaganda,” Maddie Block said, directly mentioning a “dissertation-length” pro-Israel post from her father. “He was … saying that the genocide is a lie, and that civilians aren’t being killed, and the IDF is doing everything they can to minimize casualities. And I’m like, how much are they paying my dad? How much is his soul? ’Cuz it seems like he has sold his soul to the devil.” 

@maddie.block Wtf does Netanyahu have to do with any local issues in New Mexico? Additional points of clarification: My dad is JAY Block, not John Block. Also, r*cist and/or antis*mitic comments will not be tolerated on my videos! #republican #newmexico #democrat #politics #politicstiktok ♬ original sound - Maddie Block

Senator Block was one of 250 politicians from both parties who attended the “50 States, One Israel” conference earlier this month, in which they were lobbied by the Israeli government for more funding in their genocide of Palestinians (and met with a uniquely awful rendition of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” that has now gone viral). That’s what Maddie Block’s father was doing instead of representing New Mexicans. 

“It was a privilege to be part of the largest diplomatic delegation to ever visit the state of Israel,” Senator Block wrote before moving to shamelessly deny and justify the genocide of innocent Palestians, which has left at least 65,000 men, women, and children dead. 

“If Israel has genocidal intent, they’re sure bad at it. Just one day of bombing Gaza (with the capabilities the Israeli Army and Air Force has) would utterly destroy them, but instead the IDF does everything possible to avoid killing Gazan civilians who are being used as human shields,” the Republican state senator said after the conference. “They strive to limit casualties by warning Gazans ahead of time to leave battle zones with millions of text messages, phone calls, dropping leaflets, and making smaller targeted attacks.” 

This is a false narrative straight from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel continues to bomb hospitals, execute aid seekers, and shoot children in the head for fun.  

MAGA Official Reveals School Partnership With Charlie Kirk’s Group

Charlie Kirk’s legacy will have influence over all schools in Oklahoma.

A person has an American flag draped around their shoulders and holds a photo of Charlie Kirk
Ying Tang/NurPhoto/Getty Images

Oklahoma will soon have Turning Point USA chapters in every high school across the state.

Superintendent Ryan Walters unveiled the alliance with the far-right youth organization via social media Tuesday, celebrating the partisan compact while accusing teachers across Oklahoma of “lying about American history.”

“Radical leftist teachers’ unions have dominated classrooms for far too long, and we are taking them back,” Walters said in a post.

The development comes barely two weeks after Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk was assassinated on a college campus in Utah. The announcement was recirculated by Turning Point’s X account.

There are some 900 official college chapters and around 1,200 high school chapters of Turning Point USA across the nation, but the conservative advocacy nonprofit received more than 54,000 inquiries for new campus chapters in the 48 hours after Kirk’s assassination, according to TPUSA spokesman Andrew Kolvet.

“We have seen the outpouring from parents, teachers, and students, who want to be engaged in the meaningful work going on at Turning Point,” Walters said in a video statement. “They want their young people to be engaged in a process that understands free speech, open engagement, dialogue about American greatness, and a dialogue around American values.”

Oklahoma’s educational bureaucracy has proven to be one of the most MAGA-friendly in the nation. Last year, Walters filled a 55,000-unit order for Donald Trump’s $60-a-pop God Bless the U.S.A. Bible to be used as classroom editions. Months prior, Walters unveiled new guidelines for teaching Bibles in schools, as well as new consequences for districts that refused to participate.

Walters also appointed Chaya Raichik—the woman behind the far-right, anti-LGBTQ+ social media account Libs of TikTok—to the Oklahoma state Department of Education’s Library Media Advisory Committee, allowing the MAGA influencer to decide what children across the state are allowed to read. Prior to her appointment, Oklahoma was ranked fourth in the nation for the most banned books, according to a 2022 report by Pen America.

JD Vance Rushes to Exploit ICE Shooting Before Knowing Any Details

Vance and Kristi Noem had an awful lot to say already.

Vice President JD Vance gestures while speaking at Charlie Kirk's memorial
Win McNamee/Getty Images

Top officials in the Trump administration rushed Wednesday to claim that a shooting at the Dallas Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office was part of a wider trend of violence targeting law enforcement.

It’s still unclear what the shooter’s motive was, or their intended target, but none of the victims of this shooting were ICE personnel. All three people injured were immigrant detainees who were being processed at the field office, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Two of those victims have died, and the shooter died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to NBC.

Without knowing any information about the shooter, and with no acknowledgment that the victims weren’t actually law enforcement, officials quickly painted a picture.

“While we don’t know motive yet, we know that our ICE law enforcement is facing unprecedented violence against them. It must stop,” wrote Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on X. “Please pray for the victims and their families.”

Vice President JD Vance echoed Noem’s attempt to tie the incident to a wider trend. “The obsessive attack on law enforcement, particularly ICE, must stop. I’m praying for everyone hurt in this attack and for their families,” he wrote on X.

These officials’ statements are just the latest in a series of attempts by the Trump administration to craft a narrative that law enforcement officers are under a broader attack.

Immigration authorities have put forward inconsistent claims about the rising rate of assault against ICE officers. In July, DHS claimed a nearly 700 percent increase in assaults against ICE officers—which is technically true, but raw data showed that was the result of low overall numbers. There were just 79 assaults against immigration enforcement agents between January 21 and June 30, up from 10 during the same period last year.

The actual figure wasn’t all that terrifying, especially when considering ICE’s embrace of warrantless arrests, masked agents, and aggressive policing tactics as part of its sweeping immigration raids. It’s also unclear whether this figure includes patently phony allegations of assault, which have become all too common. Across the country, Trump’s Department of Justice has repeatedly struggled to secure indictments against protesters accused of assaulting immigration officials.

Jesse Watters Suggests Deranged Plan to Take Revenge Against U.N.

Fox’s Jesse Watters made his own co-hosts cringe with his extreme statements on air.

Fox News's Jesse Watters on set
Jemal Countess/Getty Images

Fox News’s Jesse Watters joined the MAGA outrage Tuesday over a mishap that occurred during Donald Trump’s arrival at the United Nations earlier that day. Watters mused about the appropriate response to an escalator halting as the president stepped onto it, in a joke that didn’t land quite well among his co-hosts on The Five.

Watters claimed that the international body had “sabotaged” the president. “And they could’ve hurt the first lady. Trump would’ve fallen and gotten back up,” he marveled, before decrying another malfunction, in which the president’s teleprompter failed during the beginning of his address before the U.N. General Assembly.

“I mean this is an insurrection,” Watters said, “and what we need to do is either leave the U.N., or we need to bomb it.”

The joke didn’t quite land. After a momentary silence, co-host Greg Gutfeld hemmed. “Interesting,” he said, laughing.

“It is in New York though, right? Could be some fallout there,” Watters jokingly conceded, winning some laughter from another co-host, before doubling down. “Maybe gas it?”

His co-hosts could be heard squirming off-screen.

“No—” one of them said.

“Don’t gas it, OK,” Watters replied.

“Let’s not do that,” said Dana Perino.

“Oh my goodness,” said Fox contributor Emily Compagno. “He’s kidding, he’s kidding.”

Watters tripled down. “But we need to destroy it. Can we demolish the building? Have everybody leave, and then we’ll demolish the building.”

The host went on to get somewhat more serious, saying, “No, this is absolutely unacceptable, and I hope they get to the bottom of it. And I hope they really injure, emotionally, the people that did it.”

But he was, apparently, unknowingly wishing ill on Trump’s own team. In a statement Tuesday, a U.N. spokesperson said the escalator stoppage was due to a safety mechanism, likely triggered by a cameraman with the president’s delegation, who ascended the elevator before him. Trump’s team was also responsible for the teleprompter issues the president complained about, per a U.N. official who told ABC the White House was operating it.

White House Pulls 180 on Hundreds of Workers Fired by DOGE

The White House is asking employees axed by DOGE to please come back.

Elon Musk stands in the Oval Office of the White House and raises his arms as if to shrug. His young son X stands near Donald Trump as he sits behind his desk.
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

The Trump administration is begging General Service Administration employees fired by DOGE and Elon Musk to come back.

The GSA is a logistics-focused branch that acquires and oversees federal workplaces both physically and virtually. In March, Musk pushed thousands of GSA employees to either resign or retire early, and outright fired hundreds of others. Those who were fired by DOGE are now being given until the end of the week to decide whether to return to their jobs. If they accept, they will come back to work on October 6.

Musk’s impact on the agency has been debilitating. Headquarters staff was cut by nearly 80 percent, portfolio managers cut by 65 percent, and facility managers cut by 35 percent, according to an official who spoke with the Associated Press.

DOGE also planned to cancel more than half of the GSA’s 7,500 leases and sell hundreds of government-owned buildings. It’s clear now that it seriously overreached, with 131 leases expiring before employees actually moved out of the buildings.

The chaos DOGE caused—and the backtracking it’s doing now—shows that the federal bureaucracy is not as wasteful, fraudulent, and abusive as the world’s richest man constantly claimed it to be. DOGE’s “Wall of Receipts” pledged to save the United States $460 million just through lease cancellations. It didn’t even get close, as the savings are at an estimated $140 million.

“Ultimately, the outcome was the agency was left broken and understaffed,” former GSA real estate staffer Chad Becker, told the Associated Press. “They didn’t have the people they needed to carry out basic functions.”

GSA isn’t the only federal agency being negatively impacted by the cuts that were supposed to save it. From the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to the Social Security Administration, DOGE has absolutely failed to make anything more efficient, leaving only more mess behind.

Lindsey Graham Announces He’s Totally Fine With Trump’s Fascism

Lindsey Graham apparently has no issue throwing the Constitution out the window.

Lindsey Graham sits at the dais during a Senate hearing
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Senator Lindsey Graham said he hopes the president runs for an illegal third term.

Speaking on Fox New’s Hannity Tuesday night, the South Carolina Republican fawned over Donald Trump’s supposedly tough talk at the United Nations General Assembly.

“Trump 2028. I hope this never ends,” Graham said.

Graham was practically giddy as he recounted Trump’s surprising admission during a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy that NATO countries should feel free to shoot down Russian jets if they enter foreign airspace, following apparent incursions in Poland, Estonia, Norway, and most recently, Denmark.

“He’s tried to go out of his way to get [Vladimir] Putin to the table. We don’t want to humiliate Russia, we just want to end the war,” Graham said. In reality, Trump refused to say whether he still trusted Putin, granting Moscow yet another month to make progress on a deal with Kiev.

But Graham was mostly excited about Trump’s promise to supply weapons to NATO “for NATO to do what they want with them.” Russia would now face “high-end American weapons sold to NATO for the benefit of Ukraine, and this war is coming to your backyard here with no limitations like Biden,” Graham said.

“He’s everything Biden wasn’t. He stood up to the U.N. in the U.N. and called them out for who they are,” Graham said. Unlike Biden, Trump has figured out how to make a buck off the endless war, instead of sending military aid to finish it.

Graham wasn’t done singing Trump’s praises. “This guy is a cross between PT Barnum and Ronald Reagan,” he said. “He’s got—he’s in everybody’s head.”

The senator also applauded Trump for mocking Europe’s reliance on Russian oil. “We don’t have to live with a Europe that’s buying Russian oil at the time we’re all trying to stop the war with Russia and Ukraine. So I hope he runs again,” Graham said.

Again, the South Carolina Republican seems not to care that Trump’s remarks are part of his own plan for American energy expansion—though the Kremlin certainly saw it that way. Or maybe that’s what the fascism fanboy likes about the circus showman president: finding creative ways to make a dollar.

It’s not clear that Trump, who hocks “Trump 2028” hats, sees himself as constrained by the Twenty-Second Amendment—not to mention the Constitution in general. In March, he told NBC’s Kristen Welker that he was “not joking” about considering a third term, claiming that there were “methods” by which he could remain in the White House.

Trump Wants to Fire People Over U.N. Escalator. Who Wants to Tell Him?

Donald Trump’s own team may have been behind multiple mishaps.

Donald and Melania Trump stand on an escalator in the United Nations headquarters
Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images

Donald Trump’s flubdub at the United Nations is apparently going to get people fired.

The president and his administration are still fuming over two technical difficulties that Trump experienced at the U.N.’s New York City headquarters, including a teleprompter error and a “broken” escalator that left his posse stunned and confused about how to advance up the static staircase.

Speaking with Fox News Tuesday evening, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt stated that the mistakes appeared to be “sabotage” and that the administration would sic the Secret Service on the individuals responsible.

“It does appear to be sabotage with the escalator and the teleprompter,” said host Jesse Watters. “What is the White House going to do about that?”

“Well Jesse, that’s definitely what it appears to be to me,” Leavitt responded. “There was some concerning reporting from the London Times, as you pointed out that U.N. globalist staffers were basically plotting to set up the president of the United States.”

Leavitt was referring to an article in The Times that reported U.N. workers had been overheard joking about shutting the escalator down on Trump, though no evidence has emerged indicating that they followed through on the joke.

Leavitt further accused the U.N. of lowering the president’s audio during his speech, highlighting the paranoia rampant amongst the MAGA elite.

“First it was the escalator, then it was the teleprompter.… The audio inside of the room was much lower and different for the president of the United States than for the previous speaker,” Leavitt said.

“When you put all of this together, it doesn’t look like a coincidence to me,” she continued. “And if we find that these were U.N. staffers who were purposefully trying to trip up, literally trip up, the president and the first lady of the United States, well, there better be accountability for those people, and I will personally see to it, Jesse.”

Trump warned in real time that whoever was behind the teleprompter fiasco would have to face the fire for troubling the start of his speech.

“I can only say that whoever’s operating this teleprompter is in big trouble,” the president said, drawing laughs from the audience.

But as it later turned out, the problems likely stemmed from his own team. According to a U.N. official, Trump staffers were in charge of operating his teleprompter and had also accidentally triggered a stop mechanism on the escalator ahead of the president’s ascent.

MAGA Podcaster Slams DHS for Including Him in Their Deportation Video

Theo Von is pissed that the Department of Homeland Security used a clip of him in a video about mass deportation.

Theo Von wears a cap and sports an ugly goatee
John Nacion/Variety/Getty Images

Add Theo Von to the list of Trump-supporting comedians who are finally realizing that this brutal deportation campaign is indeed what they voted for.

On Tuesday evening, the official Homeland Security X account posted yet another bizarrely aesthetic, meme deportation video with a viral TikTok sound in the background.

The video opens with Von—who hosted President Trump and Vice President JD Vance on his podcast last year, and attended the inaugration—bluntly saying, “Heard you got deported, dude. Bye,” in response to a fan asking him to record a message for their recently deported friend. The rest of the video details DHS’s arrest and deportation numbers.

The borrowed clip was from January, when MAGA shill Benny Johnson and others on the right applauded Von. “Theo Von is all of us,” Johnson said at the time.

Now Von is having the same second thoughts that many MAGA-leaning comedians who openly endorsed Trump are having.

“Yooo DHS i didnt approve to be used in this. I know you know my address so send a check. And please take this down and please keep me out of your ‘banger’ deportation videos,” Von posted late on Tuesday night. “When it comes to immigration my thoughts and heart are alot more nuanced than this video allows. Bye!”

X Theo Von @TheoVon: Yooo DHS i didnt approve to be used in this. I know you know my address so send a check. And please take this down and please keep me out of your ‘banger’ deportation videos. When it comes to immigration my thoughts and heart are alot more nuanced than this video allows. Bye!

Von is reaping what he happily sowed. He had the president and his vice president on his podcast during the campaign to talk about cocaine, was a guest at the inauguration, has traveled with the president since then, and is now the unwilling face of deportation. (Additionally, asking for DHS to cut you a check before asking to take the video down is tacky at best, but what else is to be expected from the podcaster?)

Von isn’t the only “funny” guy regretting his decision to cozy up to Trump. In July, podcaster Joe Rogan expressed his shock and horror at Trump deporting innocent people with no criminal records.

“We were told there would be no—well, there’s two things that are insane. One is the targeting of migrant workers. Not cartel members, not gang members, not drug dealers,” he said. “Just construction workers showing up in construction sites and raiding them. Gardeners. Like, really?”

Comedian Andrew Schultz felt similarly.

“Everything [Trump] campaigned on I believe he wanted to do. And now he’s doing the exact opposite thing of every single fuckin’ thing,” Schultz said on his Flagrant podcast in July. “There’ll be people that like, they’ll DM me and be like, ‘You see what your boy’s doing? You voted for this.’ I’m like, I voted for none of this!”

All of these men are foolish for thinking Trump just wouldn’t be as brutal as he had promised over and over again he would be. It absolutely is what they voted for. Maybe next time they’ll think about this before they pick up the microphone.

Trump Threatens Jimmy Kimmel—Again—and Destroys MAGA’s Entire Defense

Donald Trump just blew up every right-wing talking point on Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension, threatening the late-night host again as he returned to television.

Donald Trump
Leon Neal/Getty Images

As Donald Trump’s allies and the Federal Communications Commissions chair scramble to pretend that the censorship of Jimmy Kimmel Live! was anything other than the president wanting to control the media, Trump himself revealed the truth while issuing a threat to ABC.

In a Truth Social post published an hour before the show returned to air Tuesday, Trump decried ABC’s decision to reverse its cancellation, accusing the network of being too favorable to his political opponents, and threatened to again go “after them.”

“I can’t believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back. The White House was told by ABC that his Show was cancelled!” the president wrote, later adding, “Why would they want someone back who does so poorly, who’s not funny, and who puts the Network in jeopardy by playing 99% positive Democrat GARBAGE. He is yet another arm of the DNC and, to the best of my knowledge, that would be a major Illegal Campaign Contribution.

“I think we’re going to test ABC out on this. Let’s see how we do. Last time I went after them, they gave me $16 Million Dollars. This one sounds even more lucrative,” he continued, referring to a $15 million settlement ABC News paid to Trump’s presidential library last year to settle a defamation suit.

Since Kimmel’s censorship, FCC Chair Brendan Carr and others have argued that the decision was the result of private entities making independent decisions about what to air (no matter that Carr had threatened companies that platformed the late-night host, or that the broadcasting companies that have yanked the show accordingly happen to have major business before the agency he heads).

In 136 words, the president blew all MAGA rationalizations out of the water: Trump just wants to punish media figures he deems guilty of lèse-majesté against him.

Trump Pulls 180 on Ukraine That Putin is Sure to Hate

Donald Trump has dramatically changed his stance on the outlook of the Ukraine war.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and U.S. President Donald Trump sit next to each other at the U.N.
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

After spending months making concessions to Russia, Donald Trump has suddenly changed his tune on the foreign power’s invasion of Ukraine, claiming that the non-NATO ally could reclaim all of its occupied territory—and then some.

“After getting to know and fully understand the Ukraine/Russia Military and Economic situation and, after seeing the Economic trouble it is causing Russia, I think Ukraine, with the support of the European Union, is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form,” Trump posted on Truth Social Tuesday.

Trump suggested that Ukraine had a fair shot at reclaiming its “original borders” so long as it received the financial support of Europe and NATO. Trump further derided Russia as a “paper tiger” that had, in its failure to completely decimate Ukraine, shown the international community that it was not a genuine military threat.

The president’s comments, which followed a raving speech he delivered before the U.N. General Assembly earlier Tuesday, were a stark reversal of his historically soft approach to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Trump has little to show for the profound international recognition he’s offered the Kremlin over the course of his second administration. Against the advice of world leaders, Trump invited Putin to Alaska in August—tasking U.S. soldiers to literally roll out the red carpet for the Russian dictator. It was the first time that Putin had stepped foot on U.S. soil in more than a decade.

But the unprecedented reception did not inspire the Kremlin to budge on its peace terms. The superpower has instead insisted on receiving “international legal recognition” of its 2014 annexation of Crimea, an internationally recognized portion of Ukraine, along with four regions it has claimed in the three years since it first invaded Ukraine.

“When the people living in Moscow, and all of the Great Cities, Towns, and Districts all throughout Russia, find out what is really going on with this War … Ukraine would be able to take back their Country in its original form and, who knows, maybe even go further than that!” Trump wrote, promising an uninterrupted supply of weapons to NATO allies. “Putin and Russia are in BIG Economic trouble, and this is the time for Ukraine to act.”

Notably, Trump has dramatically changed the nature of U.S. military aid to Ukraine. Since taking office, he has railed that the U.S. was getting the short end of the stick and forced the switch to a plan where Washington and its allies supply Ukraine with arms from American stocks using funds from other NATO members.

At one point, the Trump administration stopped aid to Ukraine altogether—a move that was quickly reversed when it was revealed that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had authorized the pause without actually telling Trump.

Read more about Trump’s stance on Russia: