“I’m Worried”: Republicans Revolt Against Trump on Major Bill

President Donald Trump blew up his party’s own Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, renewal in order to install yet another wildly inexperienced MAGA loyalist.

A bipartisan coalition of lawmakers has been planning since April to pass a long-term extension of FISA Section 702, which is intended to shield U.S. citizens from the country’s warrantless surveillance program overseas.

The key spy power is set to expire Friday, but Democrats have pulled their support over Trump’s decision to install Bill Pulte as director of national intelligence.

The federal housing official has none of the military or intelligence background necessary to lead the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and has instead made a name for himself by being Trump’s pit bull, targeting the president’s political enemies and making himself wildly unpopular in the process.

“The idea that we’re going to allow Mr. Pulte to be potentially in charge of how this tool is used or manipulated, that’s going to be a very uphill path to convince Democrats,” Virginia Senator Mark Warner told CNN Sunday. “This was a self-inflicted harm.”

Trump’s move to place one of his goons at the head of the U.S. intelligence apparatus is yet another example of the president acting impulsively despite the fallout for his own party.

“I don’t think he thinks about the impact on us and the timing,” Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski told reporters. “Which is unfortunate because it really has had an impact. Quite honestly, I’m worried about what we’re going to do on FISA.”

Scott Pelley is going scorched earth on former boss Bari Weiss.

Pelley, a longtime 60 Minutes correspondent and CBS employee since 1989, was fired last week after months of discord between him and Weiss, the founder of The Free Press, who was controversially appointed CBS News editor in chief in October.

In Pelley’s resignation letter, he wrote that new management “instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias” into his work. Speaking to The New York Times’ Lulu Garcia-Navarro on Sunday, Pelley stated Weiss had put “a thumb on the scale” for President Donald Trump’s version of events.

When Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents violently besieged Minnesota last winter, Pelley said Weiss sent an email to Tanya Simon—at the time the executive producer of 60 Minutes—asking if the show could make local protesters appear more violent.

“We had gone out of our way in our plan from the very beginning to show the protesters for the responsibility that they had,” Pelley said. “We had already scrubbed the video archives looking for those scenes. But it somehow wasn’t enough for Ms. Weiss.”

After protester Renee Good was shot and killed by ICE agent Jonathan Ross, Pelley said Weiss sent an email asking staff to describe Good’s car as veering toward the agent, despite video evidence showing otherwise.

“The video showed that the officer wasn’t standing in front of the car, and she wasn’t driving toward him, but that’s what the president said,” Pelley said.

Since Weiss took over as editor in chief, her tenure has been marred by clashes with CBS’s experienced reporters. One high-profile conflict came in December, when she pulled a 60 Minutes report on the suffering of Venezuelans deported to CECOT prison in El Salvador by the Trump administration. Weiss argued the story was not balanced enough and suggested the reporters reach out to Stephen Miller, the curmudgeon behind Trump’s deportation policies, for an interview.

The journalist responsible for the CECOT report, Sharyn Alfonsi, wrote a damning email about the decision that was leaked to the press. “Our story was screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and Standards and Practices. It is factually correct. In my view, pulling it now—after every rigorous internal check has been met is not an editorial decision, it is a political one,” she said.

Weiss’s tenure has also coincided with the departure of Anderson Cooper, who left 60 Minutes in May. In his final episode, Cooper stressed the importance of the program’s editorial freedom, in remarks seen as a jab at Weiss and CBS.

Simon was fired and replaced by Nick Bilton, a tech journalist with zero experience in broadcast television, in late May. Pelley reportedly said in a staff meeting last week that Bilton would “never be welcome” at the show—the final straw for CBS’s new upper brass, who fired Pelley a day later.

President Donald Trump was once again humiliated by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as the war they started in Iran continued to spiral out of control.

After Iran launched a salvo of missile strikes against Israel Sunday, its first attack since the April 8 ceasefire, Trump insisted that he still maintained control of the situation.

The U.S. president told Axios that he would instruct Netanyahu to refrain from hitting back against Iran. “I am going to call Bibi right now and tell him not to retaliate. Each of them had their fun. Israel had its strike, and Iran had its strike. We don’t need another one,” Trump said.

The president separately told the Financial Times that Israel would have to accept any deal that he made with Iran. “I call all the shots. Netanyahu doesn’t call the shots,” he insisted.

Just a few hours later, however, the Israeli Air Force launched a series of strikes against Iran anyway. As Netanyahu continued to do whatever he wanted, Trump quickly crumbled from “I call all the shots” to Please stop shooting!

“Israel and Iran must immediately stop ‘shooting.’ President DONALD J. TRUMP,” he wrote on Truth Social early Monday morning.

An hour later, Trump spun a new narrative: “Both sides, Israel and Iran, are looking to do an immediate CEASEFIRE! Final negotiations on ‘Peace’ are proceeding, subject to ignorance or stupidity getting in its way. The Blockade will remain in place, and in full force and effect, until a ‘Final Deal’ is reached. Things should move quickly,” he wrote on Truth Social.

Iran said Monday that it would suspend its attacks on Israel but would resume them if Israeli strikes continued against Lebanon—which seems likely. A senior Israeli official said that Israel had halted the strikes against Iran at Trump’s request. It’s clear, however, that Trump was either unable or unwilling to stop Netanyahu from retaliating in the first place.

President Donald Trump is dodging questions on his humiliating stalemate with Iran.

Speaking to reporters on the tarmac outside Air Force One in Chippewa, Wisconsin, on Friday, Trump kept his remarks about Iran brief.

“We’re doing quite well. The situation with Iran seems to be going quite well,” Trump announced, before turning to leave.

“When was the last time you had discussions?” a reporter asked after him, but Trump had already started walking off to his car.

Where exactly did the president have to jet off to? A roundtable discussion with Wisconsin farmers. At the time of publishing, he had only just appeared onstage, more than an hour after the event was scheduled to start.

Crucially, contrary to Trump’s statement: The situation with Iran does not seem to be going well.

As of Wednesday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi reported that there had been “no tangible progress” in negotiations to end the ongoing war in the Middle East, but the line was still open to resume negotiations. On Friday, Araghchi warned that U.S. bases used to mount aggression toward Iran would be considered “legitimate targets.”

International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Grossi suggested Friday that negotiations were approaching a preliminary nuclear framework, but the outcomes of such a deal remain unclear as experts are still unable to verify Iran’s remaining nuclear stockpile.

It seems the phrase “approaching a preliminary framework” should go right up there with “concepts of a plan,” in terms of being absolutely meaningless.

The Trump administration says it’s looking at election fraud in California.

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said Friday that his office is investigating multiple instances of election fraud in the state as it continues to count votes from Tuesday’s primary elections, but he didn’t give any specifics.

“Protecting the integrity of California’s elections is a top priority for my office,” Essayli wrote on X. “We will follow the evidence wherever it leads and prosecute any violations of federal election law to the fullest extent.”

The day before, President Trump complained on Truth Social about “big cheating by the Democrats in California” and announced that federal prosecutors were investigating California’s gubernatorial election.

“The Dumocrats are at it again! They are trying to STEAL THE GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA PRIMARY, AND THE MAYOR OF LOS ANGELES, PRIMARY, AWAY FROM TWO GREAT REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES. Here we go with the very late and massive numbers of MAIL IN BALLOTS,” Trump also posted.

Trump hasn’t provided any proof for his claims, but it appears he has enlisted Essayli to try to find it, even though the prosecutor was reprimanded in October for staying as acting U.S. attorney for too long.

California, the most populous state in the U.S., with a strong Democratic voter majority, has an election system with all of the things Trump and Republicans rail against: universal vote-by-mail, no voter ID laws, and late deadlines for mail-in ballots. State officials aren’t paying heed to Trump’s attacks, and note that state law allows counties up to 30 days to count eligible ballots.

“Accuracy comes before speed,” California Secretary of State Shirley Weber said in a statement. “California is the nation’s largest voting state, with millions of ballots to process and count. Taking the time to do this work correctly protects voters’ rights and ensures the integrity of our elections.”

California Governor Gavin Newsom’s press office had more blunt words for the president on election night, posting on X, “Trump is lying about California again—time to take the phone away from grandpa and put him to sleep.”