RFK Jr. Now Responsible for 35-Year Record High in Measles

Measles cases in the U.S. have surpassed last year’s totals to reach a new 35-year high, and we’re only in July.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Friday that there have been 2,318 measles cases in 2026 so far, more than the 2,289 cases reported in 2025 and many more than the 283 cases reported in 2024. The last time the numbers were this high was in 1991, and the past 18 months have seen more measles cases than the last 25 years combined.

The vast majority of infected people—93 percent—were unvaccinated, according to the CDC. The number is expected to only grow higher, as new outbreaks have been reported in Wyoming, Delaware, and Arizona. It doesn’t help that the CDC hasn’t had a permanent director for most of President Trump’s second term, and Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is skeptical of all vaccines, has a history of dismissing measles, even though it can be fatal.

In 2000, the U.S. had declared measles eradicated in the country, but the Pan American Health Organization will review that status later this year. Meanwhile, Kennedy’s HHS isn’t openly supporting vaccination, with the secretary suggesting that vitamin A is an effective treatment for measles.

Kennedy remains on the job, even though he has reportedly checked out of his responsibilities as a Cabinet secretary with the White House stepping in to manage HHS in March. Meanwhile, the country is dealing with an explosive diarrhea outbreak caused by a one-celled parasite linked to tainted lettuce, a flesh-eating parasite infesting cattle, and a new salmonella risk for millions of America’s eggs.

Americans have little, if any, confidence that government officials like Kennedy are up to the task of solving these public health crises. With all of the budget cuts to government regulators, the U.S. probably hasn’t seen the last disease outbreak of Trump’s presidency.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is literally running away from accusations of voter fraud.

A bombshell report earlier this month exposed Paxton for allegedly voting in six elections while registered at an address where he does not live.

On Friday, while entering the Ronald Reagan Republican Center in Washington, D.C., Paxton was asked point-blank whether he had committed voter fraud. Rather than face the music, the attorney general raced inside.

This isn’t the first time Paxton has run from questions about his alleged voter fraud. Earlier this week, Paxton fled a press conference when faced with tough questions, earning him the nickname “No Comment Ken.”

“This is at least the third time just this week he’s literally run away from questions of this sort,” journalist Aaron Rupar wrote on X.

In another tough moment on Thursday, Paxton refused to answer whether he was ready to debate James Talarico, the Democratic Texas Senate candidate, who has publicly accused his opponent of voter fraud.

This form of voter fraud is a second-degree felony punishable by a fine up to $10,000 and up to 20 years in prison. Paxton, a fierce ally of President Donald Trump, has previously advocated for cracking down on voter fraud, while also threatening to disenfranchise Democratic voters.

CBS News chief Bari Weiss has been so busy skewing the storied network’s coverage that she’s gotten basic facts wrong—including elementary details about America’s leaders and where they’re from.

Fired 60 Minutes correspondent Cecilia Vega spilled the tea at the National Association of Hispanic Journalists Conference in New Orleans Thursday, revealing that she had endured network pressure on a number of issues before she was canned, including one particularly stunning dispute over a story on SNAP benefit cuts in West Virginia.

While stopping short of referring to Weiss by name, Vega said her decision to tell the story strictly through the eyes of West Virginians had spurred backlash from CBS’s “new” top brass because she had not interviewed Vice President JD Vance or referred to his decade-old memoir, Hillbilly Elegy.

But Vance, as Vega pointed out, is from Ohio. Not West Virginia.

Other arguments bubbled up over the network’s new intent to insert political bias into the famed news magazine’s reporting, according to Vega. One such instance involved demands by network executives that she include footage of protesters attacking plainclothes Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in Minnesota—footage that her team discovered did not exist. She said she was also tasked with inserting a line into one of her scripts that claimed Iran was “totally outgunned” by U.S. and Israeli forces—a detail that she noted was a copy-paste administration talking point.

Weiss, the founder of the pro-Israel blog The Free Press and a former New York Times opinion columnist, was tapped to run CBS News late last year, despite the fact that she had never worked in broadcast journalism, lacked traditional reporting experience, and had also never run a major news operation.

Weiss’s business decisions atop the news giant have unequivocally and single-handedly divorced CBS News from its decades-long place within America’s prestige news media circuit. What was once crowned the “gold standard” of broadcasting and the home of some of journalism’s most venerable names, such as Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow, has since devolved into a graveyard for journalism ethics.

Under Weiss’s stewardship, CBS News has killed critical stories in order to save face for the Trump administration. In December, Weiss pulled the plug on Vega’s 60 Minutes segment investigating the result of Donald Trump’s mass deportation program, focusing on Venezuelan immigrants who were deported to El Salvador’s notoriously brutal CECOT megaprison.

The network has also lost a cadre of veteran journalists, ranging from Vega to 60 Minutes executive producer Bill Owens and the program’s de facto face, Scott Pelley.

A senior Pentagon official has been suspended after he was secretly filmed calling President Donald Trump a “textbook narcissist” and criticizing changes at the Department of Defense.

Right-wing activist James O’Keefe—founder of the far-right Project Veritas, known for its videos that capture individuals disclosing information about their employers—published a hidden-camera sting Wednesday that showed Brandon Newsom, the director of business operations for the U.S. Navy, complaining about changes at the DOD.

Newsom can be heard saying he hopes to “stay and stick it out” at the Pentagon, in the hopes that he can “undo whatever’s been done [by the Trump administration].” Pressed on what exactly he would undo, Newsom appeared to say that his work “challenges [his] morals.”

When asked what he would change, Newsom said he didn’t think there should be “one specific prayer service,” referring to the monthly Christian prayer services started by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The services have been widely criticized for violating the First Amendment prohibition against establishing a state religion.

Newsom also called Trump a “textbook narcissist,” and described the Iran war as “completely stupid” and “driven by one man’s ego.”

Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao announced Wednesday that Newsom had been placed on administrative leave as the agency determined next steps.

“Such statements and apparent intent to leverage a position to undermine the policies and direction set by our elected leaders are inappropriate and incompatible with the standards expected of Department personnel,” Cao wrote on X.

Republicans are trying to take JD Vance down, leaving the vice president worried about his political future.

The Washington Post reports that Vance is getting hit with attacks online from within the GOP, with sources close to him claiming it’s a planned “op” to hurt his prospects.

Vance has faced backlash in recent months over his involvement in negotiations with Iran, which led to an already collapsed ceasefire agreement, and over what critics claim are decisions that go against President Trump, according to the Post. He is even being compared to Republican bogeymen like former President Obama and Senator Bernie Sanders.

Vance’s inner circle believes it’s all aimed at preventing his ascension to the GOP’s 2028 nomination for president. Unnamed sources close to Vance complained to the Post that the criticism isn’t genuine and comes from a planned “op.” But Vance’s allies are trying to spin the attacks, claiming that coordinated opposition from “establishment” and “neoconservative” Republicans could actually help him.

“Loud Washington establishment voices form an online cacophony,” Steve Cortes, a conservative commentator, told the Post, “but they do not remotely represent the consensus views of Republican voters.”

Vance also took heat from many Republicans for criticizing Israeli opposition to the U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding last month, even though his criticism didn’t go that far. Those attacks were renewed earlier this month after Vance sat for an interview with podcaster Joe Rogan, in which he said that paid influencers were attacking him in “dishonest ways.”

“You know, my response to that is, ‘Well, go to hell,’” Vance said to Rogan. “I’m going to do what I have to do for the American people. I represent Americans first, and that’s the way that I’ve tried to do this job.”

Vance leads 2028 Republican presidential primary polls ahead of Secretary of State Marco Rubio and others, and even Trump seems to favor him as his successor. As the presidential election looms closer, Vance is going to be hit with more attacks and rival candidates will soon emerge. Will Vance overcome them, or will another candidate capitalize?