Republicans Scramble After Trump Says He Doesn’t Think About Americans

Republicans are scrambling to either justify or ignore President Trump’s shocking Tuesday admission that he doesn’t care “even a little bit” about the financial struggles of American citizens.

Journalist Pablo Manríquez asked multiple GOP senators about the president’s comments about 90 minutes after he said them, plenty of time for members of Congress to react.

“What do you think of Donald Trump saying he doesn’t think about the finances or the financial situation of the American people?” Manríquez asked Senator Cynthia Lummis.

“Did he say that? I don’t have a comment about that, mostly because I think he actually does care,” she replied with a laugh, claiming that the president didn’t mean something he doubled down on publicly.

Senator Roger Marshall, also smiling, refused to answer as well, claiming he didn’t know the “context” of the comment. And Senator Susan Collins stated she didn’t see the president’s comment at all.

For the record, Trump’s comments were crystal clear.

“When you’re negotiating with Iran, Mr. President, to what extent are Americans’ financial situations motivating you to make a deal?” a reporter asked Trump before he left for China on Tuesday, alluding to the skyrocketing inflation caused by the fallout from the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran and Lebanon.

“Not even a little bit,” Trump said. “The only thing that matters when I’m talking about Iran is they can’t have a nuclear weapon. I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation, I don’t think about anybody. I think about one thing: We cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon. That’s all. That’s the only thing that motivates me.”

You won’t believe who’s included in President Donald Trump’s corrupt caravan of CEOs headed for China. 

Trump travelled to China Tuesday for a two-day summit with President Xi Jinping, accompanied by more than a dozen American entrepreneurs, each hoping the president will clear the way for them to make even more money—including his own son.

Among those aboard Air Force One Tuesday were the president’s son Eric Trump and his wife Lara. While the White House has claimed Eric is attending the trip in a “personal capacity,” isn’t this the exact same thing Trump railed against former President Joe Biden doing with Hunter? 

As executive vice president of development for the Trump Organization, he’s helped to net lucrative real estate deals across Europe and the Middle East that directly benefit his father. Eric and Don Jr. recently merged their publicly traded golf course holding company with Powerus, a Florida-based drone company, with the goal of filling the gaps left by the Trump administration’s ban on Chinese drones. They also recently won a government contract of an unknown value.  

The Trump Organization does not currently have any upcoming real estate projects in China, but during Trump’s last term, China and its state-owned entities paid a whopping $5.5 million at vacation properties owned by the president’s family—far more than any other country.

Other CEOs who are planning to travel with Trump include Tesla’s Elon Musk, Apple’s Tim Cook, BlackRock’s Larry Fink, and Boeing’s Kelly Ortberg, as well as officials from Meta, Visa, Mastercard, Citi, Goldman Sachs, Blackstone, GE Aerospace, Cargill, and Illumina. The group also included CEOs from major semiconductor manufacturers Qualcomm, Micron, and Coherent. 

As a precondition of their selection, each company was tasked with developing a “tangible ask” that promised a concrete outcome, one source familiar with the matter told Reuters. For example, Musk is reportedly looking to acquire $2.9 billion of equipment to build solar panels and regulatory clearance for Tesla’s Full Self-Driving assistance system in China, the world’s largest auto market. 

Reva Goujon, a geopolitical strategist at Rhodium Group, told Reuters that aside from Boeing and Cargill, which are involved in purchase agreements, the rest of the cabal of wealthy entrepreneurs are there to deliver demands on critical input supply. “This could help the U.S. administration’s messaging that to even ​be able to discuss a board of investment, China needs to be a reliable investment partner and not weaponise supply,” he said. 

Also included in Trump’s caravan is director Brett Ratner, who directed Melania’s Trump’s vanity project documentary that turned into a box office flop. Ratner will spend his trip scouting locations for Rush Hour 4, which was greenlit at Trump’s demand, according to the New York Post.

FBI Director Kash Patel’s appearance before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee Tuesday fell apart as soon as he was asked about his widely reported drinking habits.

It was the bureau chief’s first time back on Capitol Hill since The Atlantic published multiple bombshell reports detailing how Patel’s alleged substance abuse and his unexplained absences had alarmed officials in and out of the agency.

But the topic was apparently still too hot for Patel to handle come Tuesday. In one particularly heated exchange with Senator Chris Van Hollen, Patel resorted to a barrage of lies and mockery in a futile attempt to deflect from his issues.

“You have publicly denied those allegations and filed a defamation lawsuit, so today as you testify before Congress, is it your testimony that those allegations are categorically false?” asked Van Hollen.

“Unequivocally, categorically false,” Patel said.

“So there have been no occasions in your tenure when FBI personnel were unable to promptly reach you?” pressed Van Hollen.

Patel insisted that federal employees have been able to reach him at any hour of the day. But the line of questioning flew off the rails when Van Hollen asked for confirmation that there had been “no occasions when [Patel’s] security detail had difficulty waking or locating” him.

“Nope, it’s a total farce, I don’t even know where you get this stuff, but that doesn’t make it credible because you say so,” Patel deadpanned, slowly blinking his eyes.

“I’m not saying it, Director Patel, it’s written and documented—” Van Hollen said, when Patel interjected: “You are literally saying it.”

“No, I am saying that these are reports, Director Patel,” Van Hollen clarified.

“Unlike baseless reports—the only person that was slinging margaritas in El Salvador on the taxpayer dollar with a convicted gangbanging rapist was you. The only person that ran up a several thousand–dollar bar tab in Washington, D.C. … was you,” Patel said, referring to when Van Hollen visited Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland constituent who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador’s mega-prison by the Trump administration last year, to advocate for his release.

“This is the ultimate example of hypocrisy. I will not be tarnished by baseless allegations … by the media,” Patel shouted.

“Director Patel, come on. These were serious allegations that were made,” Van Hollen said. “The fact that you mention that indicates you don’t know what you are talking about.”

President Trump could not care less about your financial struggles.

The man who pledged to fight for unseen Americans by lowering prices and ending endless wars isn’t doing either, and remained adamant that he’s still on the right path forward when asked about it on Tuesday.

“When you’re negotiating with Iran, Mr. President, to what extent are Americans’ financial situations motivating you to make a deal?” a reporter asked Trump before he left for China on Tuesday, alluding to the skyrocketing inflation caused by the fallout from the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran and Lebanon.

“Not even a little bit,” Trump said, shockingly out of touch even for him. “The only thing that matters when I’m talking about Iran is they can’t have a nuclear weapon. I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation, I don’t think about anybody. I think about one thing: We cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon. That’s all. That’s the only thing that motivates me.”

ABC News’s Karen Travers asked Trump to clarify his comments. The president doubled down.

“Did you say earlier that the only thing that matters to you when it comes to Iran is the nuclear weapon? You’re not considering the financial impact of this war on Americans?”

“The most important thing by far, including whether our stock market … goes up or down a little bit—the most important thing by far is Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon,” Trump replied.

“What about the pressure on Americans in crisis right now? What they’re paying for food—”

“Every American understands.… They just had a poll, like 85 percent … they understand that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. If Iran has a nuclear weapon the whole world would be in trouble. Because they happen to be crazy,” Trump said. “When it’s over, you’re gonna have a massive drop in the price of oil.… Oil is gonna drop, the stock market’s gonna go through the roof, and truly I think we’re in the golden age right now.”

These are gift-wrapped, made-for-midterm-attack-ad comments, and the political sphere reacted as such.

“Another absolutely horrendous quote that will be shoved down Republicans’ throats during the 2026 midterms,” podcaster Tommy Vietor wrote.

“If it wasn’t the the post world war 2 order and our whole damn democracy at stake you’d really have to laugh,” The Bulwark’s Tim Miller opined on X.

“Trump just admitted what we’ve known all along,” Representative Adriano Espaillait commented. “He does not care that Americans can’t afford to live.”

As of May 12, nearly every poll shows that the majority of Americans oppose the war on Iran.

The Trump administration produced a line-by-line spending plan Tuesday for how it plans to use $1 billion in taxpayer money on the White House ballroom, Axios reported. 

At a lunch with Senate Republicans Tuesday, Secret Service Director Sean Curran offered up a detailed outline of how the agency planned to use the $1 billion Republicans requested to implement “security adjustments and upgrades,” including those related to the ballroom’s construction. 

The White House said it wants $220 million for hardening security at the White House, including “bulletproof glass, drone detection technologies, chemical and other threat filtration and detection systems.” Republicans’ request had specified the money could go to “above-ground and below-ground security features” as part of Trump’s so-called “East Wing Modernization Project.”

A gentle reminder: Trump originally pitched that his ballroom would cost just $200 million total, which is less than the hardening costs alone. The funding for Trump’s ballroom was originally sourced from a cabal of private donors—many of whom had hefty government contracts. Now it will drain $1 billion out of taxpayers’ wallets, as well.

The request also contained another $180 million for an entirely new visitor screening facility and $100 million for security at high-profile events—ostensibly held at Trump’s behemoth venue.  

In addition, it contained another $500 million to specifically bolster the Secret Service, including $175 million for Secret Service training “in the modern threat environment, $175 million to improve security for protectees, and $150 million to fund the Secret Service’s “work to country drones, airspace incursion, unmanned systems, biological threats, and other emerging threats through investments in state-of-the-art technologies.”

The original budget was proposed as part of a $72 billion package to fund agencies under the Department of Homeland Security, including ICE and Border Patrol. The Secret Service was already appropriated $3.5 billion in fiscal year 2026, a $192 million increase from 2025. 

A federal appeals court tossed a chance Tuesday to rehear Donald Trump’s mega-lawsuit against his perceived political enemies.

Trump’s 2022 suit targeted former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former FBI Director James Comey (amongst others), claiming that they had participated in a broad racketeering conspiracy to create false allegations that his 2016 presidential campaign was tied to Russia. A district court dismissed the case in January 2023.

But the frivolous legal attack wasn’t just struck down in court—it also netted Trump and his personal attorney, Alina Habba, a nearly $1 million sanction. In November, Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals Judge William Pryor Jr. upheld the fine and noted that “many of Trump’s and Habba’s legal arguments were indeed frivolous,” echoing a lower court’s findings that Trump had made a “malicious prosecution claim without a prosecution” and a “trade secret claim without a trade secret.”

It’s been half a year since then, and on Tuesday, the Eleventh Circuit declined another opportunity to rehear Trump’s case.

Six of the 12 judges on the panel were Trump appointees. None of them sought a vote to rehear the case.

The next stop on this component of Trump’s retribution campaign would be the Supreme Court, if Trump intends to push the legal case to its very end. It’s unclear how the nation’s highest judiciary would vote, though in the last handful of weeks the court has made some wildly controversial decisions related to gerrymandering and voting rights that lawmakers, political commentators, and even members of the court have argued placed Trump’s interests above the parameters of the law.

The head of the Food and Drug Administration, Marty Makary, resigned Tuesday, becoming the latest Cabinet member to leave the Trump administration.

Makary is resigning from the agency after clashing with President Trump over vaping and other policy decisions, and his possible firing was reported last week by The Wall Street Journal. Trump was reportedly upset that Makary wouldn’t approve menthol, mango, and blueberry vape flavors from Glas because they would appeal to young, underage users. Trump promised to “save vaping” on the 2024 campaign trail.

Trump refused to say whether he fired Makary Tuesday, telling reporters on the White House lawn, “I don’t want to say, but Marty’s a great guy.

“He’s a friend of mine, he’s a wonderful man, and he’s going to be off, and the assistant, the deputy, is taking over temporarily, until we find—everybody wants that job. It’s a very important job. Marty’s a terrific guy, but he’s going to go on and he’s going to lead a good life,” Trump said. “He was having some difficulty. You know he’s a great doctor, and he was having some difficulty, but he’s gonna go on and he’s gonna do well. Everybody wants that job. Everybody.”

Makary was also criticized privately by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who questioned his management skills and was considering scaling back his role last year.

Under Makary, the FDA has faced heavy criticism for seemingly embracing anti-vaccination policies, and many staffers have left the agency or been laid off. The turmoil at the agency has alarmed pharmaceutical executives, public health experts, and medical professionals.

Trump has shaken up health care positions in his administration lately, naming former deputy surgeon general Erica Schwartz to head the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and nominating Fox News contributor Dr. Nicole Saphier as surgeon general last month.

Schwartz appears to be a conventional choice, while Saphier appears to fit the conservative MAGA mindset. Which direction will Trump go in for his next FDA commissioner?

This story has been updated.

A U.S. citizen is suing the Department of Homeland Security after ICE arrested him twice last year. ICE just arrested him a third time.

In a court filing last week, Leo Garcia Venegas said that on the morning of May 2, an unmarked SUV blocked him in his driveway at his home in Silverhill, Alabama. Before Venegas could produce his REAL ID proving his citizenship, two ICE agents pulled him out of the truck he was driving and arrested him. In the filing, Venegas said he was driving his brother’s truck because his broke down.

When ICE approached the truck, Venegas, remembering his previous arrests, tried to quickly prove that he’s a citizen, but the agents didn’t give him a chance even though he was holding his ID.

“Still without asking me a single question or issuing any lawful commands, the officers pulled me out of my car, tackled me to the ground, and shackled me around both my arms and legs,” Venegas said in a sworn declaration. “The officers did not listen when I said I was a citizen and they showed no interest in looking at my Alabama Star ID, even though it is a REAL ID issued only to people who can prove their lawful status.”

Venegas’s declaration said that he was shackled for 15 minutes while the agents digitally verified his identity, but he said they didn’t ask him any questions.

“At no point prior to physically detaining me did the officers ask me any questions about my identity, my citizenship, or my immigration status,” his court filing said. “They did not ask me to step out of the car. They did not even look at my ID before using physical force against me even though I had it in my hand.”

Venegas is the lead plaintiff in a class action lawsuit against DHS over their immigration enforcement policies, and he was detained twice last year in raids on construction sites he was working at, despite having his REAL ID both times. That may be on purpose, as a DHS official said in a declaration as part of Vargas’s lawsuit that “REAL ID can be unreliable to confirm U.S. citizenship.”

Bizarrely, DHS denies detaining Venegas, saying in a statement that “Leonardo Garcia Venegas was NOT detained last week. On Saturday, May 2, ICE conducted a routine vehicle stop on a car registered to an illegal alien. After Venegas’ identity was established, he was released.”

In October, a ProPublica investigation found that ICE had detained at least 170 U.S. citizens in raids or at protests, in some cases blatantly violating the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution by using excessive force and detaining people without probable cause. The agency has also been caught lying about the U.S. citizens they’ve detained and how they have treated them. Venegas alone has had three bad interactions with ICE. How many others are suffering?

Not even the highest-ranking military officer in the U.S. can confidently support President Trump’s claims that the joint U.S.-Israeli war on Iran is over, let alone that the United States is winning.

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Dan Caine and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth were questioned about their half a trillion dollar funding request for the Iran war at a Senate Appropriations hearing on Tuesday, two weeks after Trump told Congress that the conflict was “terminated.”

“General Caine, the president has claimed on several occasions over the past couple of months that the war is over, the conflict has been concluded. What were the goals of the U.S. conflict in Iran, and have we achieved them?” Senator Dick Durbin asked.

The general couldn’t offer a straight answer.

“Well, sir, I’m gonna be mindful of my need to maintain trust with a variety of stakeholders in the job that I’m in, which includes you, the American people, the Joint Force, and the president.… Only our political and civilian leaders set the national military objectives,” Caine replied, refusing to answer the question directly. “I’ll defer to the secretary and the president on other strategic objectives, but that’s what we’ve been focused on, sir.”

“Do you feel that the situation in the Strait of Hormuz indicates a victory on our side?” Durbin continued.

Caine once again deferred to the president, refusing to call upon his years of military expertise to give a simple judgment call on a question the entire world knows the answer to.

“Sir, only political leaders decide victory or defeat, and I’ll leave it to them to opine on that. They are the ones who invoke or stop the use of military force.”

“Well, let me put it in strictly military terms,” Durbin said. “Can you explain to the American people, who are facing these gasoline and diesel oil prices, what is going on in the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran—which was attacked by us—seemingly has the Strait of Hormuz at a standstill, with 1,500 tankers waiting for either permission or peaceful circumstances to navigate?”

“Militarily, it’s a case where Iran is choosing to hold the world’s economy hostage through their use of military power across their southern flank,” Caine replied. “And so I would encourage Iran to reconsider that. And I would encourage those allies and partners who have an opportunity to come assist with that tactical problem to do so.”

That answer certainly does not indicate victory.

The FBI is conducting loyalty tests to determine who belongs in the bureau’s rank and file, according to the last FBI chief.

Brian Driscoll was a decorated FBI agent with 18 years at the agency under his belt before he was offered the bureau’s number two job at the beginning of Donald Trump’s second term. A clerical error would ultimately place Driscoll at the top of the agency, making him the bureau’s acting director—an oversight that wasn’t corrected until the Senate confirmed Kash Patel at the end of February.

Driscoll wasn’t keen to take the reins of the FBI but told CNN Tuesday that he agreed to take the job after he was informed it was between him and a political appointee.

Yet as the weeks bore on, the questions he fielded from incoming Trump officials began to concern him. They inquired about his political affiliations, who he voted for, when he began supporting Trump, and if he supported a Democrat in recent elections.

Patel was more blunt. The onboarding wouldn’t be an issue so long as Driscoll wasn’t active on social media, didn’t donate to the Democratic Party, and didn’t vote for Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 election, Driscoll recalled Patel saying.

“It made the hair on the back of my neck stand up,” Driscoll told CNN.

Driscoll met with Patel after the latter had been confirmed. Patel flatly said that “the FBI tried to put the president in jail and he hasn’t forgotten it,” Driscoll recalled.

The issue came to a head two weeks after Trump’s inauguration. When the White House demanded the names of some 6,000 bureau staff who were involved in the January 6 probe, Driscoll refused, sparking accusations from then–Justice Department official Emil Bove that there was “insubordination” among the FBI’s leadership.

Driscoll said that when he confronted Bove about the need for a list, Bove blamed it on “cultural rot in the FBI.”

“I was telling them this is wrong,” Driscoll told CNN.

Driscoll was fired months later, in August, but the purge hasn’t quieted down for those left behind at the bureau. The agency, according to Driscoll, is still focused on punishing or removing any FBI agents who could be perceived as threats to the president’s agenda, at the White House’s behest. That includes sacking employees who were involved in investigating the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, as well as employees involved in Trump’s classified documents probe.

Driscoll is one of three former senior FBI agents who have sued the Trump administration for firing them as part of a “campaign of retribution.” That lawsuit is ongoing.