Iran Says JD Vance & Co. Blew Up Ceasefire Talks at Last Minute

Donald Trump’s negotiators scuttled talks with Iran at the last minute, according to Iran.

In a post on X Sunday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said that his country “engaged with U.S in good faith to end war.”

“But when just inches away from ‘Islamabad MoU’, we encountered maximalism, shifting goalposts, and blockade,” Araghchi posted. “Zero lessons earned. Good will begets good will. Enmity begets enmity.”

Trump claimed in an angry Truth Social post earlier that day that “IRAN IS UNWILLING TO GIVE UP ITS NUCLEAR AMBITIONS!”

“In many ways, the points that were agreed to are better than us continuing our Military Operations to conclusion, but all of those points don’t matter compared to allowing Nuclear Power to be in the hands of such volatile, difficult, unpredictable people,” Trump posted.

“My three Representatives, as all of this time went by, became, not surprisingly, very friendly and respectful of Iran’s Representatives, Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, Abbas Araghchi, and Ali Bagheri, but that doesn’t matter because they were very unyielding as to the single most important issue and, as I have always said, right from the beginning, and many years ago, IRAN WILL NEVER HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON!” Trump continued.

Iran has been a signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty since 1968, and its terms require them not to seek nuclear weapons. Since the Iran war broke out this year, though, Iranian lawmakers have pushed for the country to pull out of the agreement, citing the war and Trump’s decision to scrap the 2015 nuclear deal negotiated by President Barack Obama.

Iran’s former supreme leaders, the late Ayatollahs Khomeini and Khamenei, each made religious rulings against developing and using nuclear weapons. But facing a relentless bombing campaign from the U.S. and Israel, as well as broken deals and failed negotiations, Iran’s new clerical leadership might rule differently.

Boos and jeers erupted at New York Representative Mike Lawler’s town hall as he faced constituents frustrated with the Trump administration—and with his support for the chaotic, expensive U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.

Lawler, who claims to be a moderate but legislates as a MAGA Zionist, remained firm in his support for Trump and the war, stating that “we need to do everything we can to ensure that this regime never gets a nuclear weapon.” The crowd was unconvinced.

One man was escorted out of the Sunday night town hall after shouting that the Republican Party is “morally bankrupt” and led by “spineless liars” while the crowd cheered him on. “You must impeach. He’s a fraud, he’s corrupt, he’s an incompetent psychopath,” the man yelled, referring to Trump. “The Republican Party and you are enabling him.... He makes genocidal threats against millions of innocent Iranian civilians.... Don’t be spineless, impeach him!”

“Respectfully, you have abdicated your responsibility to the majority of the constituents in District 17,” another constituent who identified as a “military mother” told Lawler. “You have in fact endangered our young people, our service members of our country and killed civilians by not standing up to Trump on this unjustified war.”

This is just one of many rough town halls that Lawler has held, as his constituents grow tired of deference to an administration that they—and much of the country—are fed up with. The midterms can’t come soon enough.

MAGA treated Donald Trump like a messiah. Now they’re mad he’s comparing himself to Jesus Christ.

Trump leapt into hot water with his Christian fans Sunday, when he posted an AI-generated image of himself as literal Jesus on Truth Social. In the image, Trump appeared dressed as a biblical figure, healing a sick man in a hospital bed, surrounded by bald eagles, soldiers, fighter jets, and whatever this winged creature is floating in the background behind him.

Former MAGA Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene decried the implication he was “replacing Jesus.”

“It’s more than blasphemy. It’s an Antichrist spirit,” Greene wrote in a separate post. (Greene directly compared Trump to Jesus during his hush-money trial in April 2023.)

Riley Gaines, an anti-trans activist, struggled to make sense of the president’s post.

“Why? Seriously, I cannot understand why he’d post this. Is he looking for a response? Does he actually think this?” she wrote on X Monday. “Either way, two things are true. 1) a little humility would serve him well 2) God shall not be mocked.”

Megan Bashem, a culture reporter for the conservative outlet Daily Wire, also seemed confused.

“I don’t know if the President thought he was being funny or if he is under the influence of some substance or what possible explanation he could have for this OUTRAGEOUS blasphemy. But he needs to take this down immediately and ask for forgiveness from the American people and then from God,” she wrote on X Sunday night.

Mandy Arthur, a Christian influencer, made a plea directly to the creator. “God, we might have made a mistake and accidently elected the Antichrist. Send help,” she wrote on X Monday morning.

But Trump’s behavior should not come as a surprise. The president’s apparent God complex is the inevitable result of MAGA’s unwavering support and outright idolatry. These are some of the same people who insisted that Trump was saved from assassination by divine intervention for the purpose of saving the nation. Now they’re disgusted that he’s taken them seriously?

Trump’s blasphemous post comes amid a veritable fall from grace, as the president continues to plummet in the polls amid his increasingly unpopular war in Iran.

Monday’s post, made on Orthodox Easter, was only slightly more ridiculous than his actual Easter post: a threat to Iran proclaiming, “Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell—JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.”

The Holy See will continue to speak out against war, despite challenges from Donald Trump.

Pope Leo XIV brushed off the U.S. president’s verbal attacks Monday, telling journalists aboard a papal flight to Algiers that he’s not afraid of the Trump administration and uninterested in getting into a “debate” with the U.S. president.

“I have no fear of the Trump administration or speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel, which is what I believe I am here to do, what the Church is here to do,” Leo said in English. “We are not politicians. We don’t deal with foreign policy with the same perspective he might understand it, but I do believe in the message of the Gospel, as a peacemaker.”

Separately, the Chicago-born pontiff told Reuters, “I don’t ‌think that the message of the Gospel is meant to be abused in ‌the way that some people are doing.

“I will continue to speak out loudly against war, looking to promote peace, ⁠promoting dialogue and multilateral ​relationships among the states to look ​for just solutions to problems.

“Too many people are suffering in the world today. Too many innocent ‌people ⁠are being killed. And I think someone has to stand up and say there’s a better way to do this.”

Leo’s remarks follow several direct challenges from the president, as well as reports that emerged last week about a meeting between Pentagon officials and a U.S. Vatican ambassador in January that included suggestive threats and a mention of the Avignon papacy.

In a lengthy rant on Truth Social Sunday, Trump claimed that the leader of the Catholic Church was “WEAK on crime” and “terrible for foreign policy.”

“I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s terrible that America attacked Venezuela,” Trump wrote. “And I don’t want a Pope who criticizes the President of the United States because I’m doing exactly what I was elected, IN A LANDSLIDE, to do, setting Record Low Numbers in Crime, and creating the Greatest Stock Market in History.”

He added that Leo should be “thankful,” claiming responsibility for the pope’s appointment by suggesting that the religious order only put an American atop the Vatican in order to “deal with” Trump.

“Leo should get his act together as Pope, use Common Sense, stop catering to the Radical Left, and focus on being a Great Pope, not a Politician,” the president added. “It’s hurting him very badly and, more importantly, it’s hurting the Catholic Church!”

Trump continued to vent in front of reporters on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews minutes later, repeating that he’s “not a big fan of Pope Leo.”

“I don’t think he’s doing a very good job. He likes crime, I guess,” Trump said.

The president also suggested that Leo was inappropriately “worried about fear,” claiming that the Catholic Church arrested ministers and priests and “all those great people” during the Covid-19 pandemic. In fact, Leo was only installed in 2025, and Trump himself was in charge of the U.S. at the height of the pandemic.

The Catholic Church has 1.42 billion baptized members around the world, with more than 70 million in the U.S. Roughly 20 percent of Americans identify as Catholic, making it the second-most-popular religion in the country behind Protestantism.

House Judiciary Committee ranking member Jamie Raskin on Friday demanded that Donald Trump get his brain tested in light of the president’s recent comments on Iran.

The Maryland lawmaker sent a letter to White House physician Sean Barbabella, imploring the doctor to administer a cognitive test to the president. Raskin cited remarks Trump made earlier this week as justification for the exam, including Truth Social statements in which Trump threatened to annihilate Iran’s “whole civilization.”

“Experts have repeatedly warned that the President has been exhibiting signs consistent with dementia and cognitive decline. And, in recent days, the country has watched President Trump’s public statements and outbursts turn increasingly incoherent, volatile, profane, deranged, and threatening,” wrote Raskin.

“His apparently deteriorating condition has caused tremendous alarm across the nation (and political spectrum) about the President’s cognitive function and continuing mental fitness for the office of President, and prompted concerns about the President’s wellbeing,” Raskin noted.

Trump’s escalatory threats haven’t just alarmed his usual critics—they’ve also driven a wedge into the MAGA movement. Some of Trump’s longest and most fervent supporters denounced his warmongering behavior this week, including former Fox News titans Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly, as well as far-right influencers such as Alex Jones and Candace Owens.

The president then smeared his conservative acolytes in turn, claiming that they were losers with “low IQs.” That didn’t sit well with his voting base, who turned against the president en masse on his historically sycophantic social media platform Truth Social Friday. Many were shocked and appalled by the president’s brazen display of disloyalty to his own cause, announcing their sudden withdrawal from the MAGA movement.

“At a time when our country is at war—especially when the war was initiated by the President without congressional declaration or consent—the American people must be able to trust that the Commander-in-Chief has the mental capacity to discharge the essential duties of his office,” Raskin wrote.

Nonetheless, Trump’s White House staff brushed off Raskin’s message with an unserious smattering of insults.

“Lightweight Jamie Raskin is a stupid person’s idea of a smart person,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle told The Hill in an emailed statement. “President Trump’s sharpness, unmatched energy, and historic accessibility stand in stark contrast to what we saw during the past four years when Democrats like Raskin intentionally covered up Joe Biden’s serious mental and physical decline from the American people.”

Raskin had anticipated the Biden remark, claiming in his letter that Republicans’ fervent interest in Biden’s wellness was a good reason for them to take interest in Trump’s mental acuity.

The ranking member also demanded that the test be conducted before April 25, the results be made public, and that Barbabella testify before Congress regarding the findings.

Democratic lawmakers are demanding answers from Bill Pulte, director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, about a massive donation his organization made that may have lined the pockets of President Donald Trump.

In a letter Friday to Pulte, Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden and Senate Banking Committee Ranking Member Elizabeth Warren accused the president’s ally of sending Trump money under the guise of giving to charity.

In 2023, Team Pulte Inc., Pulte’s nonprofit organization, told the IRS that it had donated $65,000 to another One World Love LLC, another nonprofit, for the purposes of “assitance [sic] underserved people.”

Mother Jones first reported in February that One World Love LLC isn’t really a charity at all, but a corporate entity founded by a partner at Binnall Law Group, a firm that helped represent Trump after the deadly riot in the U.S. Capitol and in the wake of the 2024 presidential election.

Pulte’s donation to One Love LLC occurred just as the pressures of Trump’s legal bills started to escalate, the senators’ letter stated, and the so-called charity was dissolved later that same year.

“One World does not appear to be an actual nonprofit devoted to underserved individuals,” the senators wrote. “These facts raise serious concerns that Team Pulte Inc. may have illegally funneled cash out of a charity to support President Trump.”\

The Democrats also questioned Joshua Hinkle, current president and director of Team Pulte Inc. They requested the men turn over all documents from Team Pulte Inc. and its employees related to One World Love LLC or the Binnall Law Group, and their employees, by April 24.

Warren and Wyden also pressed Pulte and Hinkle on a series of discrepancies with their organization’s filings to the IRS. In tax filings, Team Pulte Inc. incorrectly listed One World Love as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, though the IRS has no entity with that name, and provided a fake tax identification number, as well as the address to a seemingly random apartment building.

President Trump has already promised presidential pardons to his staff, just barely over a year into his second term. This is the same move that Trump criticized former President Biden for at the end of his four-year term.

The Wall Street Journal has reported that Trump told staff in a private meeting that he’d “pardon everyone who has come within 200 feet of the Oval.” Another person told the Journal that the president said he’d pardon anyone who came within 10 feet. In fact, White House aides reported that Trump makes the claim quite often in meetings.

The White House claims that he’s obviously joking.

“The Wall Street Journal should learn to take a joke, however, the President’s pardon power is absolute,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said.

Biden pardoned several family members and top officials targeted by Republicans, like his son Hunter and former NIH head Anthony Fauci, before leaving office. Last year, Trump declared all of Biden’s pardons “VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT, because of the fact that they were done by Autopen,” an accusation that has little effect on the legitimacy of the pardons, which are still valid.

Trump has already pardoned a cadre of questionable characters, including former Honduran President and convicted drug trafficker Juan Orlando Hernández, dark web drug dealer Ross Ulbricht, Texas Representative and fraudster Henry Cuellar, and nearly every single convicted January 6 rioter, among others.

Donald Trump’s administration admitted that it spread faulty claims of health care fraud in New York state, raising questions about the federal government’s crusade to cut waste in Democratic states across the country, according to an exclusive report from The Associated Press Friday.

Last month, Mehmet Oz, the daytime television host who Trump tapped to run the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), claimed that last year, New York’s Medicaid program had provided five million people—nearly three-fourths of the state’s 6.8 million enrollees—with personal care services, meaning housekeeping, grooming, and meal preparation.

Oz announced on March 3 that CMS would launch a federal investigation into the apparent fraud. “Heart surgeons are trained to look at the numbers. When something doesn’t add up, you don’t ignore it, you investigate,” he said. “And right now, the numbers coming out of New York’s Medicaid program don’t add up.”

Apparently, they don’t add up because the ones Oz cited are just plain wrong.

CMS spokesman Chris Krepich told the AP that the number of New Yorkers who used personal care services last year was closer to 450,000, or between 6 and 7 percent of the state’s Medicaid enrollees.

He told the outlet that the agency had misidentified New York’s approach to applying billing codes. “CMS is committed to ensuring its analyses fully reflect state-specific billing practices and will continue to work closely with New York to validate data and strengthen program integrity oversight,” he said in an emailed statement.

Despite this revelation, Krepich said that the federal investigation of New York state’s high health care spending is still ongoing. Health analysts have argued that the state’s spending reflects higher costs for service and policies committed to providing New Yorkers with at-home care.

Not everyone is buying that this was an innocent mistake. Cadence Acquaviva, senior public information officer for the New York Department of Health, told the AP that Oz’s initial false claims about the program were “a targeted attempt to obscure the facts.”

Fiscal Policy Institute senior health policy adviser Michael Kinnucan said the discrepancy “could have been cleared up in a phone call.”

“It’s really slapdash,” he said.

The CMS administrator appeared to make other false and misleading statements in his video on X. He claimed that New York had lowered the bar for receiving personal care services to include providing aid to people who are “easily distracted”—a phrase that does not appear among the program requirements that have only become more rigorous in the past year.

New York is just one target of the Trump administration’s sweeping crackdown on supposed fraud in slue states. The Trump administration enjoys singling out Minnesota and California when discussing nationwide fraud, frequently equating the alleged fraud with its Democratic leadership, personified by Governors Tim Walz and Gavin Newsom.

Enthusiasm to actually fund the Gaza redevelopment proposal is waning.

The Board of Peace, a pet project cooked up by Donald Trump late last year, has received just a tiny part of the total $17 billion pledged to the charter by various countries, reported Reuters Friday.

Ten countries promised to cumulatively throw billions of dollars at the post-war remodel, which Trump has envisioned as a sprawling seaside playground similar to Dubai. Some of the nations that pledged their funds for the reconstruction effort—and the prerequisite peace plan—include Israel, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, and Turkey.

But practically none of them have actually put their money where their mouths are.

A person with direct knowledge of the peace board’s operations told Reuters that just three countries have donated to the board’s operations thus far: the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, and the U.S. itself. Together, their funds amounted to less than $1 billion.

The person added that the Iran war has “affected everything” and thwarted rehabilitation efforts for the devastated region.

The board was already off to a rocky start in February, when dozens of countries convened for the project’s inaugural meeting. Trump, however, had a difficult time pronouncing his peers’ foreign names. Last month, Semafor reported that $1.2 billion of Trump’s own pledged cash for the board was actually siphoned from State Department funds, effectively forcing the American taxpayers to pay for the enormous Trumpian construction plan. At the time, Trump said he would defer $10 billion to the Gaza scheme.

Countries interested in being permanent members on the board are required to pay $1 billion for their spot.

Trump initially floated his peace board idea back in September as part of a 20-point peace plan to control Gaza, promising to include major heads of state as well as former world leaders, such as former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair.

But the board’s charter makes little mention of Gaza. Instead, its goals appear to be as lofty as they are broad, seeking to “promote stability, restore dependable and lawful governance, and secure enduring peace in areas affected or threatened by conflict.”

The concept came under renewed scrutiny in January as Trump aggressed Greenland and NATO. The U.S. president has also invited leaders of nations with terrible track records on human rights, such as Russia and Saudi Arabia, to join the board.

Longtime U.S. allies warned that the Board of Peace could upend the current world order, with several refusing to join the board at all, including France, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Slovenia.

The White House revealed the designs for Donald Trump’s planned arch at Memorial Circle in Washington, D.C., Friday, and they heavily feature his preferred gold aesthetic.

The renderings were filed by the Department of the Interior along with the Commission of Fine Arts. The 250-foot arch will dwarf the Washington, D.C., skyline, sitting on a roundabout between Arlington National Cemetery and the Lincoln Memorial to commemorate America’s 250th anniversary.

The planned arch would be over twice the size of the Lincoln Memorial, which is about 100 feet tall, and would block views of the cemetery, one of the reasons why a veterans’ group has sued to block its construction. At 250 feet, the arch would even be larger than the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.

“I’d like it to be the biggest one of all,” Trump said in January. “We’re the biggest, most powerful nation.”

Harrison Design’s renderings show a white monument with a golden inscription reading “One Nation Under God” and a winged statue of Lady Liberty at the top. The arch’s base, with stairs, will have statues of four golden lions, an odd choice considering that the lion has historically been a symbol of England, not the U.S.

Trump is asking for $15 million in taxpayer funds from the National Endowment for the Arts to pay for the arch, despite previously claiming it would be paid for by leftover donations from his $400 million ballroom project, and spent part of Easter Sunday driving slowly around Memorial Circle observing the site instead of attending services.

Even with the economy struggling thanks to a war he started and is now desperate to end, Trump is prioritizing building monuments to himself without getting legal permission first. His ballroom construction has already been halted, and his arch could be next. But if there’s one lesson from Trump’s second term, it’s that he’s doing what he wants without any regard for the consequences.