Hegseth Makes Fun of War Crimes With Twisted AI Children’s Book Meme

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted an AI image of popular children’s character Franklin the Turtle extrajudicially blowing up “drug boats,” just days after it was revealed he potentially committed a war crime of his own. 

Hegseth’s post—another installment in the GOP’s AI image fetish—is modeled after the cover of the Franklin children’s books, and reads “A Classic Franklin Story: Franklin Targets Narco Terrorists.” It shows the turtle in full U.S. military combat gear, launching a missile at brown-skinned men in their boats from a helicopter. 

“For your Christmas wish list …” Hegseth captioned the post.

The Trump administration has killed at least 80 people in its attacks on boats in the Caribbean Sea, claiming they are trafficking drugs to the United States. 

On Sunday, The Washington Post reported that on September 2, Hegseth gave a direct vocal order to kill every single person on an alleged drug boat off the coast of Trinidad. After the smoke cleared from the first strike, two people were left hanging onto the burning wreck of the ship, fighting for their lives. To comply with Hegseth’s instructions, the Special Operations commander ordered them to be bombed again, a “double-tap” attack that is widely considered a war crime. 

Hegseth spent the weekend defending his attack on a boat that posed no military threat to the United States whatsoever. 

“As usual, the fake news is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland,” he wrote on Sunday. “Biden coddled terrorists, we kill them.… Our current operations in the Caribbean are lawful under both U.S. and international law, with all actions in compliance with the law of armed conflict—and approved by the best military and civilian lawyers, up and down the chain of command.”

This isn’t a great defense of using wartime tactics to kill people the U.S. is not currently at war with. 

“I think it’s very possible there was a war crime committed; of course for there to be a war crime you have to accept the Trump administration’s whole construct here—which is we’re in armed conflict, at war,” Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen told ABC News on Sunday morning. “It’s either murder from the first strike, if their whole theory is wrong—and I think the weight of the legal opinion here is that they’ve concocted this ridiculous legal theory. But even if you accept their legal theory, then it is a war crime. And I do believe the secretary of defense should be held accountable for giving those kinds of orders.”

Hegseth’s bizarre post on Sunday was rightfully met with outrage.  

“Shouldn’t they be hanging off the boat asking to be saved and then you killing them anyways?” one user asked. 

The bill mandating the Department of Justice to release the Jeffrey Epstein files has been signed into law, but certain parts may still never be seen by the public.

That’s at least in part because the DOJ has been paying FBI agents nearly $1 million in overtime to work on the “Epstein Transparency Project” at a bureau facility in Winchester, Virginia. FBI Director Kash Patel has tasked nearly 1,000 agents on the project, which, according to internal reports, has also been referred to as the “Special Redaction Project.”

Between March 17 and March 22, the bureau spent $851,344, according to a Bloomberg report, and agents racked up 4,737 hours of overtime pay between January and July looking through the DOJ’s evidence on Epstein. This included the investigation into Epstein’s 2019 prison death, as well as “search warrant execution photos,” “street surveillance video,” and aerial footage.

The DOJ’s remaining, unreleased Epstein documents amount to nearly 100,000 pages, and Patel and Attorney General Pam Bondi have told the FBI to flag every mention of Donald Trump. There are also 40 computers and electronic devices, 26 storage drives, more than 70 CDs, and six recording devices collectively containing over 300 gigabytes of data.

Physical evidence includes photographs, travel logs, employee lists, over $17,000 in cash, five massage tables, blueprints of Epstein’s island and Manhattan home, four busts of female body parts, a pair of women’s cowboy boots, one stuffed dog, a logbook of visitors to Epstein’s private island, and a list described as a “document with names,” which could be Epstein’s rumored client list.

It’s no secret that Trump, backed by his allies in Congress, fought long and hard to delay the Epstein files’ release, only to relent last month when Representative Adelita Grijalva was sworn in and cast the last needed House vote to authorize the release. This project, ostensibly to protect the privacy of Epstein’s victims and people not involved in his crimes, could also be a way to prevent exposing Trump and his allies when evidence gets released.

Two National Guard members were shot just blocks away from the White House Wednesday, and although the identity and motive of the assailant is still unknown, MAGA Republicans are already blaming Democrats for the shooting.

Right-wing commentators rushed to their social media accounts after the shooting to hurriedly (and baselessly) connect the violent incident to their political opposition.

Benny Johnson was one of many who attempted to link the shooting to a group of Democratic lawmakers who’d published a video urging members of the U.S. military and intelligence community not to follow illegal orders.

“Just a few days ago, six Democrats claimed President Trump was issuing ‘unlawful’ orders to the military and that troops must resist. Two National Guard Members were just targeted and shot in Washington DC.,” Johnson wrote on X.

Eric Daugherty, a right-wing commentator, also attempted to connect those Democrats’ message to the violence in Washington. “They say Trump is using the military as his ‘personal gestapo,’” he wrote. “Two troops were shot today, right outside the White House. This should send shivers down the spine of every American.”

Greg Price, another right-wing commentator, linked the shooting to one of the lawmakers in particular, Senator Elissa Slotkin. He wrote that she “went on TV last Sunday and claimed that National Guardsmen were going to start shooting at American civilians.”

Crucially, those Democratic lawmakers hadn’t said anything about citizens taking up arms—or even protesting—against the government. They didn’t even mention Trump by name. They simply advised those who had sworn an oath to protect the U.S. Constitution to uphold the nation’s laws.

Only Trump advocated for violence against the government, claiming that the Democratic lawmakers had committed sedition “punishable by death.”

Additionally, Alexis Wilkins, the country singer girlfriend of FBI Director Kash Patel—who has proved increasingly expensive for taxpayers— decided to lend her salient political voice to the discussion surrounding the shooting.

“While everyone on X is fighting, the left is still attacking people who wear the uniform and support this country simply for doing so. There are more important things in this world and far bigger enemies who actually hate us and do, in fact, want to kill us,” she wrote on X Wednesday, urging people to “pray.” So, thank you for that, Alexis.

Last week, a federal judge ruled that the Pentagon had “exceeded the bounds of their authority” by ordering troops into the nation’s capital for “non-military, crime-deterrence missions.” But she stayed her decision until December 11 in order to give the Trump administration time to appeal the decision. Following the shooting Wednesday, Trump reportedly asked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to deploy an additional 500 troops to the nation’s capital.

The condition of the two National Guardsmen was not immediately clear Wednesday afternoon, after West Virginia Governor Patrick Morrissey said he’d received “conflicting reports” about their health status. D.C. Metropolitan Police confirmed that one suspect had been taken into custody.

This story has been updated.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday barred Donald Trump from firing the director of the U.S. Copyright Office for the time being.

Shira Perlmutter will stay in her job, part of the Library of Congress, while the court rules on two related cases. Trump had made an emergency appeal to the court to get her removed immediately, which has worked in the past for the administration with other officials.

This time, though, Perlmutter’s position has the word “Congress” in it, and she argued in court that this meant she was part of the legislative branch of government and thus couldn’t be fired from the executive branch. Perlmutter’s lawsuit also noted that Trump disagreed with a report she authored, in which she said that tech companies would likely have to pay licensing fees to access copyrighted materials for artificial intelligence models.

“Today, the administration’s unlawful executive overreach was not greenlit by the U.S. Supreme Court,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, which represented Perlmutter. “We are pleased that the Court deferred the government’s motion to stay our court order in a case that is critically important for rule of law, the separation of powers, and the independence of the Library of Congress.”

The other cases the court is reviewing involve Trump’s removals of Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter and Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook. Slaughter is challenging her firing, saying that Congress requires the president to show cause when firing members of independent agencies, but the court allowed Trump to remove Slaughter until the case is decided next month. Cook was allowed to remain in her position, and her case will be heard by the court in January.

In May, a number of Trump appointees showed up at the Library of Congress with a letter from Trump claiming that they were now in charge, only to be rebuffed by library officials who filed a lawsuit. For now, the president has been rebuffed from his attempt to take control of an independent library. But with the conservative bent of the current Supreme Court, it may only be a speed bump.

A Democrat is on the brink of winning a special election in Tennessee’s deep-red 7th congressional district—leading GOP Republicans and even President Trump into a frantic last-minute attack. 

An Emerson College Polling/The Hill survey released Wednesday has Democrat Aftyn Behn nearly tied with Republican Matt Van Epps, 46 percent to 48 percent—with 2 percent voting elsewhere and 5 percent undecided. 

A victory here would continue an upward trend for Democrats on the local level, as Behn would be yet another Democrat to win on the state level this fall. Both Behn and Van Epps are vying to replace former Republican Representative Mark Green, who resigned from Congress in July.

Van Epps is the Trump-endorsed former commissioner of the Tennessee Department of General Services and an Army helicopter pilot running on issues like “the woke left’s push for gender surgeries and mutilation on minors,” making sure America “never abandons” Israel, and “advancing President Trump’s America First agenda: keeping our borders secure, rebuilding our military strength, protecting American workers, and restoring the values that make our nation great.”

Behn is a Tennessee state representative and former community organizer who is endorsed by the Knoxville Democratic Socialists of America. Her campaign has focused on a policy-minded, anti-corporate approach to the affordability crisis.   

Behn’s surge has the right exhausting all efforts. Conservative super PACs have already spent $3.3 million against her. And the social media attacks have been constant. The RNC Research X page spent all day Wednesday posting and reposting weak shots at Behn, and sharing old screenshots of her saying things like “cops do not keep us safe.”  

“She gets more demonic with each video that resurfaces,” anti-transgender activist Riley Gaine commented on a recording of Behn very calmly explaining how she disapproves of religions being “at the core of everything we do in the legislature.” 

Trump also began his day Wednesday morning offering his support for Van Epps, and was perhaps the only person on the right not to bombard Behn. 

“I am asking all America First Patriots in Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District, who haven’t voted yet, to please GET OUT AND VOTE for MAGA Warrior Matt Van Epps, tomorrow, November 26th, the last day to vote early in person,” he wrote. “You can win this Election for Matt! PLEASE VOTE FOR MATT VAN EPPS, who has my Complete and Total Endorsement.” Polls close at 12 P.M. NOON in most of TN-07, and every vote counts. IF YOU ARE IN LINE BY 12 P.M., STAY IN LINE, AND THEY MUST LET YOU VOTE! TN-07: Early Voting ends November 26th, and Election Day is December 2nd. GET OUT AND VOTE FOR MATT VAN EPPS—HE WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN!” 

It’s obvious that Republicans see this race as a five-alarm fire, especially as they come off one of their worst weeks to date, with Marjorie Taylor Greene predicting a midterm loss in 2026 and more resignations on her way out, and other Republicans complaining about feeling walked all over by the Trump administration. 

Former Trump White House strategist turned podcaster Steve Bannon is facing fire and fury from his listeners after new details emerged about his cozy relationship with child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

Bannon was a vocal proponent earlier this year for the release of the federal government’s Epstein files—before the extent of his relationship with Epstein became public knowledge, reported Media Matters Wednesday.

Bannon assisted Epstein in navigating the political and legal quagmire that was the last year of his life. As part of that, Bannon conducted a series of interviews with Epstein between 2018 and early 2019, totaling about 15 hours of unreleased footage.

The strategist was reportedly working on a pro-Epstein documentary up until the day of Epstein’s arrest, according to a trove of emails released by the House Oversight Committee two weeks ago.

Since then, Bannon has gone quiet on the issue, allowing the high drama of the Epstein files to fall into the background of his noisy War Room podcast. But the silent treatment has not played well with his audience, who claim they were betrayed by the far-right conspiracist.

“So Steve advising Epstein how to sugarcoat his depravities. I’ve been watching Steve for 6 hours per day since 2020, I’m so done with the ‘MAGA’ whisperer! Hypocrisy is not only Democrats disease!” wrote one user on X the day the emails were released.

Another X user condemned Bannon as a “fat pedo lover.”

Critics on Bannon’s Rumble page mocked him as “Epstein’s PR guy” and implored the far-right personality to “explain his relationship with Epstein.”

“PLEASE RELEASE THE OTHER 15 HOURS OF EPSTEIN INTERVIEW YOU HAVE IT’LL SHOW WHO YOU REALLY ARE WHICH IS WHY YOU HAVEN’T RELEASED IT,” commented one Rumble user.

Epstein, a New York socialite who orchestrated an international child sex trafficking ring to service the sick desires of the ultrawealthy, is believed to have abused hundreds of young girls.

His network included an array of high-profile, powerful individuals, including former treasury secretary and ex–Harvard University president Larry Summers, Victoria’s Secret chief executive Les Wexner, Wall Street titan Leon Black, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor (formerly Prince Andrew), and President Donald Trump.

After months of dragging their feet, Republicans in both chambers of Congress passed a bill to release the investigation files related to Epstein and his potential associates. Trump signed the bill on November 19, starting a 30-day timer on the documents’ release.

It seems that bulldozing the White House wasn’t enough for Donald Trump.

The builder in chief declared his intention Wednesday to “fix” the 100-year-old Reflecting Pool on the National Mall in Washington. Fix what, exactly? Your guess is as good as ours.

“Study it hard because you won’t be seeing this Biden filth and incompetence much longer!” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.

This is just the latest ridiculous renovation project that has pulled Trump attention away from, well, actually governing.

Trump is reportedly battling with his handpicked architect, who has warned that the new $300 million ballroom will dwarf the White House. In October, the president had completely razed the White House’s East Wing after promising just months earlier that his ballroom would not touch the existing structure. Trump plowed forward without prerequisite congressional approval, having conveniently begun demolition during the government shutdown.

It’s still unlikely that Trump plans to seek permission before making any changes to the Reflecting Pool. Last month, Trump fired all six members of the Commission on Fine Arts, which is charged with advising the federal government on the art, design, and architectural development of Washington. An official said the members would be replaced by those who were “more aligned with President Trump’s ‘America First’ policies,” but a month later, the seats still remain empty.

At the same time, Trump has redone the Oval Office in the gaudy gold style of Mar-a-Lago, added stupid signs and white marble bathrooms to the White House, paved over the Rose Garden, and even pitched an “Arc de Trump” monument.

Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene is sick and tired of hearing her former MAGA allies complain about her early retirement.

The Georgia lawmaker shocked her constituents just as much as the American public last week when she announced that she will be exiting her post early, capping a tumultuous tenure in Congress by January 5.

The news came on the heels of a fierce battle between Greene and her political idol, Donald Trump, over the release of the Epstein files. Greene fought vehemently to make the documents public, eventually splitting with the president as he tried to convince Republican lawmakers to vote against the effort.

Greene may be entirely washing her hands of the conservative ecosphere. Responding Wednesday to criticisms by her ex-allies over her decision to leave early, rather than at least complete her current term, Greene asked on X if she hadn’t “suffered enough” while they “post all day behind a screen.”

“Do I have to stay until I’m assassinated like our friend Charlie Kirk. Will that be good enough for you then?” Greene wrote. “Shit posting on the internet all day isn’t fighting.

“Get off YOUR ass and run for Congress,” she continued. “I fought harder than anyone in the real arena, not social media. Put down your little pebbles and put your money where your mouth is.”

But right-wing influencers weren’t moved.

“This is pathetic,” responded Nick Fuentes, a known white supremacist and Hitler fan.

Greene, who won her district in 2020 without the president’s endorsement, has publicly broken with Trump several times since his inauguration in January. She has differed from her “favorite president” on issues ranging from artificial intelligence to the government shutdown, was one of the few Republicans to describe Israel’s actions in Palestine as a “genocide,” and also has sparred with the White House over its handling of the Russia-Ukraine war.

Donald Trump has already spent $70 million of taxpayer money on golfing in less than a year as president. If this pace keeps up, he will spend $300 million playing golf by the time his second term ends. 

HuffPost reports that the president on Wednesday made his sixteenth trip this year to his Mar-a-Lago estate and went golfing. Each trip carries a $3.4 million bill in travel and security costs. If Trump decides to go to Mar-a-Lago twice more before the end of the year, he will have spent a total of $75 million on golf, which, repeated each of the following three years, would result in $300 million spent on the trips.

That’s nearly double the $151.5 million in tax dollars Trump spent golfing in his first term as president. Trump spent a third of 2017, his first year as president, hanging out at his private clubs. This time, Trump has also made nine trips to his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, spending $1.1 million on each trip. He also went to Aberdeen, Scotland, in July to promote a new golf course at his resort there, spending close to $10 million on the trip.  

The security costs Trump incurs on his Florida trips can get pretty high, with machine gun–mounted patrol boats manning the nearby Intracoastal Waterway and the Coast Guard patrolling in the vicinity in the Atlantic Ocean. Using Air Force One costs $273,063 per hour to fly to Palm Beach International Airport, meaning that one four-hour round trip to Mar-a-Lago costs the taxpayer $1.1 million. 

In 2016, before Trump was elected, he mocked President Obama’s work ethic, claiming that he was “worse than Carter” for how often he golfed. In the end, Obama only spent $85 million of taxpayer dollars in his eight years as president on golf. 

Meanwhile, Trump has not only eclipsed that in his nearly five years as president, he’s shaped his presidency around golf. He has promoted his golf business on the White House social platform and even decided to deploy the National Guard in Washington, D.C., because he hated seeing homeless people on his way to play golf. 

Last month, Trump took dirt from his White House demolition and sent it to a golf course he’s taking over in Washington. It’s a fitting act for his presidency: taking something from the taxpayer and putting it toward playing an expensive game that he appears to cheat at. 

President Trump has finally released the names of 46 wealthy donors who bankrolled his transition into office. The list predictably consists of billionaires, lobbyists, and people Trump appointed into his Cabinet.

The donors raised just over $14 million, although the Trump administration didn’t clarify who donated what.

“President Trump greatly appreciates his supporters and donors; however, unlike politicians of the past, he is not bought by anyone and does what’s in the best interest of the country,” Trump transition spokeswoman Danielle Alvarez told The New York Times. “Any suggestion otherwise is simply false.”

That statement is dubious, at best.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and Middle East special envoy Steve Witkoff—all of whom are at least millionaires (McMahon and Lutnick are billionaires)—are listed as donors. So are Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodard Jr. and U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio Dominick Gerace II.

Billionaire businessmen Jeff Yass and Paul Singer are also listed.

This list was delayed because the Trump transition team refused to sign the General Services Administration agreement requiring them to disclose the names of their donors and the amounts donated within 30 days of the inauguration.

Here are the donors:

Linda McMahon

Howard Lutnick

Robert Johnson

Suzanne Johnson

Marlene Ricketts

Robert Bishop

Samantha George

Stephen Plaster

Adam Clampitt

Jeff Yass

Paul Singer

Steve Witkoff

Robert Bigelow

Stanley Woodward

Gene Ventura

Andrew Cuff

Elias Levy

Jeff Littlejohn

Stephen Dewey

Robert Turley

James Tuell

Michael Desmond

Susan Silverie

Jonathan Slemrod

Thomas Schiavone

Marcel Kaminstein

Conor Sheehey

Wade Eyerly

Robert Foran

Kenneth Bridger Roy

Dominick Gerace

Kameel Ali

Matthew Iager

Robert Newton

Anita Winsor

Jeremy Isenberg

Scott Pillath

Harry Jackson

Douglas deWysocki

Jesus Cuartas

Thomas Griffy

Frederick Wilson

Charles Mccarthy

Hector Wong

Brigette Frantz

Catalina Lamontain