Trump Allies Freak Out About His Meeting With Netanyahu

Donald Trump’s allies are concerned that the president is about to get dragged into more fighting by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Netanyahu is meeting with Trump at the White House on Tuesday for the first time since February, when he ensured the U.S. was ready to go to war with Iran. The Israeli prime minister had spent months lobbying the White House, and Trump’s aides did little to dissuade the U.S. president from joining in on the attack. Now, Netanyahu may ask for more.

Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon told Politico that the anti-interventionist sect of Trump’s allies, who brand themselves as “America First,” aren’t happy.

“I think all of President Trump’s most ardent non-‘Israel First’ supporters are furious,” Bannon said. “Netanyahu has had twice as many visits to the White House in 18 months as Churchill had in all of World War II—with every one of them a disaster for America First.”

Netanyahu is visiting the U.S. for the seventh time since the beginning of Trump’s second term.

The meeting comes amid growing frustration between the two allies, as Trump and Vice President JD Vance have become more publicly critical of Israel and its continued aggression in Lebanon.

The meeting also follows Trump’s nascent nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia, which he has claimed is contingent on the country signing onto the Abraham Accords in order to normalize relations with Israel. Only it seems that the Trump administration has no idea how to enforce that, given that the deal is already signed.

Democratic Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear is demanding that Senator Mitch McConnell justify his weeks-long unexplained absence from Congress—or resign.

“I am addressing this letter to Senator McConnell under the assumption that he is capable of reading and responding verbally, and not incapacitated by means of consciousness or cognition. If the Senator is unable to respond for either of those or other conditions, consider this letter a demand for his Senate staff to be honest and transparent with the people of Kentucky,” Beshear wrote Monday in a letter to McConnell obtained by CNN.

McConnell has been in the hospital for a whopping 43 days with no explanation. He has not said what exactly is ailing him or when he will return. He hasn’t even spoken directly on camera, leading to speculation that he is verbally incapacitated after being found unconscious in his Washington, D.C., home. All he’s done is post two very unconvincing photos in which he is sitting and smiling blankly with his wife, Elaine Chao.

His office last released an update on Monday, writing in a statement (first person, in McConnell’s voice) that he wouldn’t return to Congress anytime soon, but was “looking forward to getting back to the Senate and to Kentucky.”

In an accompanying statement, the Office of the Attending Physician noted that doctors were meeting with McConnell every day. That wasn’t enough for Beshear.

“Even the attending physician’s written statement does not discuss your actual condition, including whether you can speak, reason, or carry out your duties as a senator. I understand anyone’s desire for privacy, but when you run for office and serve as one of a state’s two US senators, you willingly abdicate much of your personal privacy,” Beshear wrote. “As Governor of the state you serve, I am calling on you to directly and verbally address the people of Kentucky and provide proof of your capacity to serve, or resign.”

Beshear also urged Senate Majority Leader John Thune to press McConnell’s office for some real information in an effort to “be honest and transparent with the people of Kentucky.”

While the language in Beshear’s letter is strong, it likely won’t do anything. McConnell, like every member of Congress, can essentially go on paid medical leave for as long as he wants. The fact that our elected officials don’t really have to prove that they can walk, talk, and think coherently—while we still pay them—is disgraceful. Maybe Beshear should just pay McConnell a visit himself, and bring a camera crew with him.

The man temporarily serving as director of national intelligence just decided to fire 30 percent of America’s remaining intelligence community.

The jarring news came by way of a Trump-style X post early Tuesday, in which acting DNI Bill Pulte wrote that “in addition to the Historic DECLASSIFICATIONS (Transparency!) by the President, we are, this morning, Executing a 5th and Near Final Round of TERMINATIONS, an approximately 30% Staff Reduction from Weeks Ago.”

Pulte took over the office on June 19 following Tulsi Gabbard’s sudden exit. Gabbard had previously claimed she fired 500 people—also about 30 percent of the agency’s workforce at the time—during her 16-month stint at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

“The Intelligence Community must protect the American people, NOT the political whims of the bloated and corrupt elite class,” Pulte added.

It is unclear just how many employees Pulte has laid off at ODNI—an office created in the wake of 9/11 to improve communication between America’s powerful national security agencies—but earlier this month, The Washington Post reported that 200 ODNI employees had been laid off or reassigned since June 1.

The fifth layoff announcement came two days after Pulte released a batch of recently declassified documents detailing threats by foreign governments to influence prior elections—most notably, the 2020 presidential cycle.

Pulte, who also serves as the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, was a shocking choice for the job. The law requires national security experience for the position, but the 38-year-old came into the role with none—a failure that actually shut down negotiations in Congress last month as Democrats refused to entertain rumors that Donald Trump would nominate Pulte to take over ODNI in a more permanent capacity.

Yet Pulte’s time at ODNI will soon be up: His nominated successor, Jay Clayton, is expected to be confirmed by the Senate Tuesday night. Clayton will also enter the role with zero national security experience, and, like Pulte, has seeded doubts about the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.

It appears that two outgoing Republican senators are prepared to tank the nomination of Todd Blanche for attorney general.

Thom Tillis and John Cornyn, who hold Blanche’s future in their hands, are particularly concerned with the status of President Trump’s $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” a controversial move to provide financial assistance to anyone who feels they’ve been attacked for supporting the president. Cornyn noted in Blanche’s most recent confirmation hearing that even though Blanche claimed the fund was dead, there was no written agreement to actually kill it.

Now, he’s demanding it in writing.

“What I want is the written document to say the same thing he did in his sworn testimony in front of the Judiciary Committee, and, as you recall, what he said is the weaponization fund is dead. He said the audit immunity basically doesn’t extend to parties beyond the lawsuit, and it doesn’t also extend to future actions by federal agencies other than the IRS,” Cornyn said on Monday. “That’s what we’re trying to get them to agree to, which is again what his sworn testimony was. So I don’t know why they’re—I don’t know why they’re so reluctant to do that when he’s already sworn to it.”

Tillis, too, said he wants changes to the settlement agreement with the IRS, which created the $1.776 billion slush fund and gave the Trump family immunity from future IRS audits.

Tillis previously threatened to block Blanche’s nomination unless he met with survivors of Jeffrey Epstein. Blanche did so earlier this month, but survivors said the meeting was “demoralizing,” as Blanche continued to avoid answering their questions.

“It just felt like more political posturing and using survivors the way that we’ve been used as political pawns,” Epstein survivor and anti-human trafficking educator Elizabeth Stein said at the time.

Cornyn and Tillis’s “no” votes would effectively kill Blanche’s nomination, as he needs the support of all 11 Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee to move forward. As of right now, it looks like he won’t get it. The Senate Judiciary is planning to vote to advance fBlanche’s nomination on Thursday.

The Department of Justice’s own witness is undermining its case against David Hearn, the former Olympic canoeist charged with vandalizing and damaging the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

According to court documents, a grand jury witness for the government said that the pool was damaged before Hearn even approached it. NBC News reports that this witness was the only person who testified about damage to the pool.

Hearn, who has pleaded not guilty, maintains that “the condition of the Reflecting Pool was the same after I stepped away from the water as it was before I got there,” and that he only touched a part of the pool’s detached coating. President Trump claims that vandals used a knife or blade to cause a “gash” in the pool’s lining, but has no evidence to back up his claim.

Hearn has been charged with destruction of property, a felony, and accused of causing $1,000 worth of damage to the pool. His lawyers question the evidence behind that claim, noting that the alleged cost is the necessary threshold to charge him with a felony. At least three other people have been charged with misdemeanors related to incidents at the pool.

Hearn’s lawyers said that the government’s main witness testimony “established that the pool had substantial preexisting damage requiring repair before any alleged conduct by Mr. Hearn.”

“The government’s only witness on that element testified that the property was already deteriorated, that the identified repairs would have been needed even without Mr. Hearn’s alleged conduct, and that he could not quantify any loss caused by that conduct,” they continued. “Consequently, the grand jury’s indictment of Mr. Hearn is hard to explain. Mr. Hearn needs to learn whether the grand jury was properly instructed that the charge required him to have caused over $1,000 in damages, when the testimony failed to establish that he caused any damage at all. So does this Court.”

It would seem like the government’s case may soon fall apart, just like the pool lining, which was likely damaged by President Trump in the first place.