Trump, 79, Wanders Off While Meeting Japanese Prime Minister

During a welcoming ceremony in Tokyo Tuesday, Donald Trump appeared to forget where he was going as he walked through a room filled with dignitaries and a military band, at one point even leaving Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi behind.

It’s another example of the president’s ongoing cognitive decline and health issues, which are becoming more apparent with each of his public appearances. On Monday, the president revealed on Air Force One that a visit to Walter Reed Medical Center earlier this month was to get an MRI as part of what he described as a “routine yearly checkup,” despite the fact that his yearly physical exam was six months ago.

Neither the president nor White House officials have revealed why he got the MRI, and Trump also talked at length about a very hard “aptitude test” he received at the military hospital, claiming that members of Congress such as Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jasmine Crockett wouldn’t have performed well.

Trump said the tests at the time included questions about “tigers, an elephant, a giraffe,” which sounds like he took a test to check for Alzheimer’s, dementia, or other cognitive issues. Such tests being conducted only six months after his yearly physical are a worrying sign, especially considering that Trump has also been spotted with discoloration on his hands and mysterious bruises.

Trump is visiting Japan hoping to shore up Japanese investment in the United States, just after the country elected the right-wing Takaichi as its first female prime minister. But aside from the U.S. economy’s health, the president’s health appears to be cause for concern.

Donald Trump has let thousands of criminals off the hook, so why not himself?

The president is pushing to appeal his criminal conviction in New York in an effort to undo his status as a convicted felon, reported Politico.

In a 96-page legal brief filed to the New York Supreme Court Monday, Trump once again argued that the outcome of the trial should be completely disregarded since the Supreme Court expanded the scope of presidential immunity.

“This case should never have seen the inside of a courtroom, let alone resulted in a conviction,” his attorneys wrote.

Trump was convicted in May 2024 after a high-profile trial found him guilty of issuing hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels, but he never faced consequences. He wasn’t scheduled to be sentenced until after the presidential election, the outcome of which effectively undid any chance of holding him accountable.

Instead, Justice Juan Merchan let Trump off in January with “unconditional discharge,” which he wrote at the time had become “the most viable solution” for Trump. As a result, Trump received a future in which he would not be hampered down with fines, court-appointed supervision, or incarceration for breaking the law.

Trump has tried several times to unravel his conviction. He was found guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. He will remain a felon until an appellate court overturns his case, an act that he and his attorneys have already tried a handful of times to achieve without success.

In the legal brief, Trump’s team argued that the Supreme Court’s decision should have precluded prosecutors from utilizing evidence tied to Trump’s “official acts,” such as testimony about communications between Trump and Hope Hicks, the former White House communications director.

President Donald Trump went on to troops about making old-fashioned battleships.

Speaking on the USS George Washington Monday night at the Yokosuka Naval Base in Japan, Trump went on a bewildering diatribe pushing the use of steam for catapults onboard warships, instead of the electronic or magnetic machinery used to launch planes on the USS Garland R. Ford class of Navy carriers.

“And I love the sight of that beautiful steam pouring off the deck,” Trump said. “With the electric you don’t have that.”

“They spent $993,000,000 dollars on the catapults trying to get them to work. And they had steam which worked so beautifully, and it has for 50 years, right? So, we’re gonna go back. Seriously fellas, I wanna make that change. I’m gonna do an executive order,” Trump said. “They’re trying to make it work, they’re trying so hard, and they have something that’s perfect. So we’re gonna go back on that, and the magnets.”

The USS Gerald R. Ford actually cost roughly $13 billion to make, and while the production of the ship was delayed and experienced cost overruns, it’s not entirely clear why Trump has decided that the magnets on these ships don’t work. Meanwhile, the maintenance on steam catapults is considered labor intensive and costly, compared to newer models.

Trump has previously claimed the Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System doesn’t work, though there is no evidence that this is true. In January 2024, Trump baselessly claimed that magnets stop working when placed in water, and therefore were a stupid thing to put on a boat.

Trump has said he wants a new “Golden Fleet” of warships. Shipping experts have said Trump’s dream of revamping the U.S. Navy to fit his aesthetic whims will likely cost billions of dollars—others say it is destined to fail.

Online retail giant Amazon plans to slash as many as 30,000 corporate jobs Tuesday, which would be the biggest number of layoffs at the company in three years. 

Reuters reports that the cuts would amount to 10 percent of the company’s close to 350,000 corporate employees, and would be across different departments. The last time Amazon cut this many jobs was 2022, when 27,000 were slashed late in the year. The move follows Amazon CEO Andy Jassy saying in June that AI tools would lead to job cuts. 

It’s not a good indicator for the economy under President Trump. The website Layoffs.fyi, which tracks job cuts, estimates that 98,344 technology employees have been laid off this year from 216 companies.  The site also estimates that 71,981 government employees have been laid off by Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, out of a total of 182,528 federal employees departing from the jobs. 

The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ jobs report last month showed unemployment at a four-year high, with only 22,000 jobs added in August (compared to a forecast of 75,000). Thanks to the government shutdown, job and unemployment figures from September aren’t known, but they are likely pretty bad. ADP, which processes payrolls, reported earlier this month that the private sector lost 32,000 jobs in September. 

While the shutdown hides an official tally of how bad employment numbers are in America right now, Amazon’s impending layoffs, and estimates from other sources, indicate that the economy isn’t very strong right now—and the buck stops with the president. 

California will send election observers to counter the “election monitors” that Trump plans on sending to multiple deep blue districts in the state ahead of next week’s special election.

“They’re not going to be allowed to interfere in ways that the law prohibits,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said Monday. “We cannot be naïve. The Republican Party asked for the U.S. DOJ to come in.”

“[Trump] is laying the groundwork. He is socializing an idea that is very dangerous,” Bonta added, noting that Trump still claims to have won the 2020 presidential election. “All indications, all arrows show that this is a tee up for something more dangerous in the 2026 midterms—and maybe beyond.”

Trump’s Justice Department last week announced it would send federal election monitors to several blue districts in California and New Jersey. In California, the Trump administration is likely well aware of Proposition 50, a ballot measure that would redraw the state’s congressional districts to help Democrats gain more seats in the U.S. House.

Trump’s DOJ monitoring a crucial election in California is a recipe for basic voting rights to be blatantly violated. Governor Gavin Newsom on Friday called it a “deliberate attempt to scare off voters and undermine a fair election.”

“They have no business doing that. They have no basis to do that,” he said in a video posted on X. “We have a statewide election for a statewide constitution. This is about voter intimidation, this is about voter suppression. Period, full stop.”

The Irish have had enough of Donald Trump.

McCormack’s Irish Pub in Richmond, Virginia, made waves earlier this month when its owner, William “Mac” McCormack, released some hot merchandise: a load of “Fuck Trump” black T-shirts, retailing for $11 a pop.

The shirts proudly display the pub’s logo: an antifascist emblem superimposed over a shamrock. A printed phrase circles around the icon, reading: “Fuck ICE, Fuck Nazis, Fuck Trump,” according to McCormack’s Facebook.

But the top did not resonate with those on the ideological right, who consumed the comment section before spilling over to the pub’s review pages on Yelp and Google. Some commenters scorned the pub’s self-advertised ideology as “disgusting,” deriding the shirts as a stunt that would “alienate half of [McCormack’s] clientele.”

One Yelp user, who goes by Marge and lives nearly 3,000 miles away in San Francisco, wrote that the service was “terrible” and the “food is almost as bad.”

“Save your time and money. This place sucks. Not a true Irish Pub,” the account wrote, leaving a one-star review on Saturday. “Liberals who think we care where they stand politically.”

But any regular would know that the shirt—and its message—are nothing unusual for McCormack’s.

“I was just making T-shirts that align with most of my customers, with the pub’s beliefs,” McCormack told RVA Magazine.

The shirt is really nothing new. There’s always been some variation of the shirt, according to its owner. “It used to just say, ‘Fuck Nazis.’ We just clarified who the Nazis were,” McCormack said.

McCormack’s is one of Richmond’s oldest dive bars. The successful institution has since expanded into two whiskey restaurants—McCormack’s Big Whisky Grill and McCormack’s Whisky Grill—but the original establishment has been proud to be punk since the 1990s, according to RVA.

“I’ve never hidden my politics there,” McCormack told the publication. “It’s bigger than just the bar, it’s what you believe. And it’s what I believe one hundred percent.”

Despite the backlash, there’s nothing illegal about voicing dissent against the government. Protesting the government is a protected right under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, as established by the Founding Fathers. Comparing MAGA politics to Nazi Germany, McCormack told RVA that small-business owners should stick by their principles. “I don’t think we should be silent,” he said.

Voicing his disdain for the current administration has actually turned out to be a positive business decision for McCormack, who told RVA that the shirts have since sold out and that “all three locations have been busier than normal.”

New customers, attracted by the firm political stance, are going out of their way to share a drink at McCormack’s. Some Facebook users said they would travel from as far as New Jersey to grab a pint at the bar if it meant supporting the cause.

McCormack’s advice to other small-business owners: “Don’t be scared to have an opinion.”

“You don’t have to do it like I did,” McCormack told RVA. “You can be more subtle, but if we don’t speak up then we’re just the same as those people in Germany who still live with three generations of regret.”

Indiana Governor Mike Braun is pushing President Donald Trump’s gerrymandering scheme forward in the Hoosier State—but Republicans still aren’t getting on the bandwagon.

Braun announced Monday that he was calling a special legislative session to vote on new congressional districts, ensuring Republicans maintain control of Congress in the 2026 midterm elections.

“I am calling a special legislative session to protect Hoosiers from efforts in other states that seek to diminish their voice in Washington and ensure their representation in Congress is fair,” he wrote in a statement.

But Molly Sigart, spokesperson for Rodric Bray, the Indiana Senate’s president pro tempore, told The New Republic Monday that the votes “still aren’t there for redistricting.” The 50-member Senate has only 10 Democrat members, meaning that more than a dozen of the remaining members also opposed the plan.

Last week, Bray’s office said that the Republican plan lacked the necessary support, raising red flags for Braun’s redistricting efforts. Meanwhile, Braun’s spokesperson claimed the governor was “confident” that he could secure a majority of state Senate Republicans’ support.

Braun initially floated the idea last month of calling legislators back and warned that there would be “consequences” for not keeping pace with the White House’s requests for redistricting, which have already been passed in Texas, Missouri, and most recently, North Carolina. The special session Braun called Monday, which will occur before lawmakers are set to return in January, will likely cost taxpayers a pretty penny.

In Indiana, things have gotten heated. Both Trump and Vice President JD Vance have personally connected with state Republicans about supporting a new congressional map. Last month, Indiana state Senator Jim Banks suggested that podcaster Charlie Kirk’s death was reason enough to do it. “They killed Charlie Kirk—the least that we can do is go through a legal process and redistrict Indiana into a nine to zero map,” Banks said.

Indiana state Senator Liz Brown, an assistant majority floor leader, published a statement supporting the move Monday.

“Redistricting isn’t a technical exercise. It’s power drawn on a map. And Democrats have been wielding it for decades,” wrote Brown on X. “Conservative voices have been thwarted for far too long by liberal states like Massachusetts who refuse to create competitive congressional districts.”

“Gov. Braun’s decision to call our legislature into session to address redistricting is welcome news,” she wrote.

Exxon is trying to claim that California’s climate laws infringe on its freedom of speech.

The oil company filed a lawsuit against the state Friday over two laws, passed in 2023, that require companies doing business in California to disclose carbon emissions and climate-related financial risks, with penalties if they don’t comply. Exxon claims that the laws, known as the California Climate Accountability Package, would force the company to “serve as a mouthpiece for ideas with which it disagrees.”

A spokesperson for California Governor Gavin Newsom, Tara Gallegos, told The New York Times, seemingly tongue in cheek, that it was “truly shocking that one of the biggest polluters on the planet would be opposed to transparency.”

The laws, which will be enforced beginning next year, “have already been upheld in court and we continue to have confidence in them,” Gallegos added.

Exxon said in the lawsuit that it already reports its carbon emissions and climate risks voluntarily but that the state laws would force it to change its framework to one it finds “misleading and counterproductive.”

Right now, Exxon uses a methodology to calculate its emissions developed by an oil and gas industry group, but would have to change to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol, developed by the research group World Resources Institute and business network World Business Council for Sustainable Development.

The company claims this framework would send “the counterproductive message that large companies are uniquely responsible for climate change no matter how efficiently they satisfy societal demand for energy, goods, and services.” Exxon additionally argues that the legal requirement to report its global emissions should only be focused on the company’s emissions in the state.

Exxon is also fighting against a provision in one law that requires companies to disclose how climate change threatens their business operations and what they plan to do about it. Exxon claims the law requires speculation “about unknowable future developments” and conflicts with securities laws.

There is another pending lawsuit against the laws from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the California Chamber of Commerce, and the American Farm Bureau Federation, with a trial expected next year.

The oil company is trying to dodge transparency about its operations, perhaps concerned about how bad these disclosures would make it look. It may also be hoping for the law to be struck down by conservative judges, or even the Supreme Court. President Trump is loudly dismissive of climate change and the threats it poses, and may take further action against California on his own.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford thinks that the Ronald Reagan anti-tariff commercial that set President Trump off was “the best ad I ever ran.” 

The TV ad featured an edited 1987 radio address from President Reagan, in which he stated that tariffs only serve to “hurt every American.” Trump was so bothered by the ad using someone he likes to compare himself to against him that he started another trade war with Canada, announcing an additional 10 percent tariff on its products over the weekend.

“Canada was caught, red handed, putting up a fraudulent advertisement on Ronald Reagan’s Speech on Tariffs,” Trump posted to Truth Social to justify the tariff hike. “The Reagan Foundation said that they, ‘created an ad campaign using selective audio and video of President Ronald Reagan. The ad misrepresents the Presidential Radio Address,’ and ‘did not seek nor receive permission to use and edit the remarks. The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute is reviewing its legal options in this matter.’”

But the premier of Ontario, which produced the ad in the first place, isn’t bothered.

“You know why President Trump is so upset right now? It was because it was effective,” Ford said on Monday. “The only people that win in a tariff war are the people around the world that don’t necessarily see eye to eye with us and with the United States.”  

Ford says the ad has received over “a billion impressions around the world.” 

This shared animosity underscores the schisms that Trump’s retaliatory tariffs have caused with some of America’s closest allies. 

“We can’t control the trade policy of the United States. We recognize that that policy has fundamentally changed from the policy in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, and it’s a situation where the United States has tariffs against every one of their trading partners,” Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told reporters last Friday, when Trump first began fuming about the ad. “What we can control, absolutely, is how we build here at home.… What we can also control, or at least heavily influence, is developing new partnerships and opportunities, including with the economic giants of Asia, which is the focus of this trip.”

Health care access could soon become a pipe dream for some Wisconsinites if Congress doesn’t muster up a budget.

The government shut down 27 days ago, in large part over a debate on the merits of the Affordable Care Act’s enhanced premium tax credits, which assist individuals making upward of 400 percent of the federal poverty level. Still, neither national political party appears willing to shatter Congress’s stalemate on how to fund Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful” budget, which included details to slice billions from Obamacare subsidies and Medicaid.

Open enrollment for the subsidized coverage is just days away, but failing to extend the premium tax credits could raise premiums by thousands of dollars a year for people within the affected income bracket all over the country. In Wisconsin, those hardest hit could see their premiums rise by more than $30,000 per year, Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers warned Monday.

Age and residency also factor into eligibility for the credits. In Barron County, a 60-year-old couple making $85,000 could see their premiums rise by 800 percent to an annual increase of more than $33,000. Roughly 32 percent of Barron County is above the age of 60, while 73 percent of the population makes less than $100,000 per year, according to 2020 census data.

In a statement, Evers argued that the ongoing congressional failure will make “healthcare coverage costs skyrocket.”

“Republicans’ reckless decisions are causing prices on everything to go up, from groceries to gas—Wisconsinites cannot afford to pay even more for healthcare, too,” Evers said. “Republicans need to end this chaos and stop working to make healthcare more expensive. It’s that simple.”

But Wisconsin is far from the only state expected to suffer. As of last week, more than a dozen states had opened up their Obamacare marketplace for a window-shopping period, including California, Georgia, Kentucky, Nevada, Maryland, and Maine. Individuals in those states could similarly see prices rise by thousands of dollars annually.

Idaho, which has roughly 135,000 enrollees on the marketplace, opened its Affordable Care Act marketplace portal Thursday with a slew of new price tags, offering the nation a glimpse into federal health care services sans federal support. More than 6 percent of the state population, roughly 13,000 people, stand to lose the premium tax credits.