Trump Secretly Suggests Giving Up His Biggest Goal in Iran

President Donald Trump may be willing to end the Iran war without a nuclear deal. 

The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that the president floated declaring victory in the war if Iran reopened the Strait of Hormuz without a deal on the country’s nuclear program. But that seems increasingly unlikely with Iran now demanding that U.S. soldiers leave the area, as well as an end to the American blockade and billions of dollars in payment. 

Trump has repeatedly threatened to escalate the war with more intense bombing of Iranian targets, but he hasn’t followed through, claiming that a deal is imminent. In reality, the America’s allies in the Middle East urged Trump not to ramp up bombing, and U.S. commanders have told him that missile and bomb stockpiles have dwindled. 

Iran’s stronger conditions for a deal signal it is digging in and willing to wait out Trump for a more favorable agreement, knowing that he has few options. Iran has proven that throttling maritime traffic through the strait is an effective way to secure leverage, causing gas prices to skyrocket worldwide and badly hurting the global economy. 

The longer the war drags on, causing the U.S. economy to suffer in the process, the worse it looks for the president and the Republican Party ahead of November’s midterm elections. Trump is desperate to end the war, but has backed himself into a corner by repeatedly pushing the talking point that he will never allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

One White House official told the Journal that the U.S. has completed all of its military objectives against Iran, and that Trump is only focused now on the free flow of oil through the strait. Trump himself told Axios on Sunday that he is “low-keying it” when it comes to negotiating with Iran. 

“We are only semi-negotiating with them,” Trump said. “We are just watching Iran with its huge inflation and the fact they have no money.”

“It will work out. It always works out. It’s like a chess game.”

That seems to indicate that the president is willing to swallow a deal that doesn’t mention Iran’s nuclear program, no matter how bad it makes him look.  

President Donald Trump is reviving his campaign to oust Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook.

In a letter signed by White House deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino, the White House informed Cook Wednesday that it was once again “considering” removing her from her position. The letter demanded Cook respond to the baseless allegations that she committed mortgage fraud within 21 days.

The Supreme Court ruled in June that Trump could not fire Cook, finding that the government had not afforded her the protections she was entitled to by statute, and as a result temporarily preserving the Federal Reserve’s independence.

Last August, Trump declared that he was booting Cook—the first Black woman on the Federal Reserve board—over claims she committed mortgage fraud by having two primary residences. Cook refused to step down and sued, stating that “President Trump purported to fire me ‘for cause’ when no cause exists under the law, and he has no authority to do so.”

Following the Supreme Court ruling, the case was set to be sent back to a lower court. The higher court declined to weigh in on Cook’s allegations, and did not lay out clear criteria for Trump to fire Cook.

In a statement, Cook’s lawyers stated that the allegations of mortgage fraud were “as baseless now as they were a year ago.”

Meanwhile, Trump’s own mortgage agreements appear to match the same criteria his Department of Justice has used to go after many of the president’s enemies.

The focus of the GOP’s first ever midterm convention in September won’t be Trump’s dismal approval rating, how to end the war on Iran, or the stagnant economy. They will be spending their time, resources, and funds focusing on democratic socialism.

Axios reported Friday that the GOP has spent months pulling together an “endless” video trove of attack ads targeted at progressive commentators like Hasan Piker, and Democratic Senate nominees Abdul El-Sayed and James Talarico.  

This seems like it’ll be quite the spectacle. The convention ends on September 10—the one year anniversary of Charlie Kirk’s death—and will feature speeches from Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. The convention plans to emphasize Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA movement and Vance’s anti-fraud task force, neither of which are particularly compelling. Trump is also expected to be in attendance. 

This is all occurring while the vast majority of Americans disapprove of Trump’s performance, and blame him directly for their economic woes—all while he drives gas prices up higher as he drags his war on Iran on longer and longer. This event will almost certainly be an endless blooper reel of Republicans calling on the spirit of McCarthyism to try and convince Americans that it’s bad to want more affordability and less deadly bombs to Israel.  

“While everyday Americans struggle to pay their bills, fill up their tanks, or put food on the table, Republicans are hosting a multimillion-dollar celebration to satisfy Donald Trump’s massive ego and tie vulnerable Republican candidates closer to his failed agenda,” DNC spokesperson Kendall Witmer said to Axios.

While the GOP itself is leading the charge against democratic socialism, Democrats are leaving it up to their PACs, as the dark money centrist thinktank Third Way just committed $15 million towards punching to their left on Thursday.

Amazon is quietly trying to build the biggest gas power plant in the country. 

The Distilled newsletter reported Friday that the megacorporation has bought land and acquired permits in Pecos County, Texas, for an AI data center powered by a 7.65 gigawatt gas power plant. The plant will be completely separate from Texas’s power grid, at least in the beginning, the permits show.  

The site, known as GW Ranch, got a state permit allowing the proposed power plant to emit 33 million tons of carbon dioxide, which would make it the biggest pollution site in the U.S., emitting more than the country’s biggest coal power plant, according to Distilled. That’s in sharp contrast to Amazon’s commitment to reach net-zero emissions by 2040 as part of The Climate Pledge.

Amazon filed three construction permits with the state of Texas this week to build three data center buildings immediately upon approval. Land clearing has already begun, according to satellite imagery. Amazon would join Microsoft, Google, and Meta in having its own off-grid gas power. 

Amazon says that it has 10 gigawatts of carbon-free energy across 40 projects to power its existing data center operations in Texas, and that the GW Ranch will use brackish groundwater that isn’t potable and thus can’t be used for irrigation or drinking. 

But that’s not likely to quell public opposition. Data centers are hugely unpopular across the country among Republicans and Democrats, both in rural and suburban areas. The centers don’t create many jobs or boost local economies. If connected to local power grids, they can drive utility rates up and cause black- and brownouts. Amid climate change and droughts, the claim that data centers will take advantage of unusable water will likely invite skepticism. 

The fact that Amazon is building its own power plant for the project will be a small comfort for residents worried about utility rates, but locals still will have concerns about pollution from a gas plant bigger than any other in the U.S. Rural Texas is deeply Republican, and despite President Donald Trump’s delusions about data centers’ popularity, opposition to them on the right is growing. Now that this project is public, a big backlash could soon follow. 

Representative Max Miller blamed a daycare after his daughter was rushed to the hospital last year with bruises.

Miller sued a Westlake, Ohio, daycare provider in February 2025, after the daughter he shares with his ex-wife Emily Moreno (the daughter of Ohio Senator Bernie Moreno) was taken to an emergency room with injuries “on her thighs, face, groin, and vaginal area of her body and she was caused to incur psychological trauma.” Her mother took the girl, then under two years old, to a hospital on January 27 after a daycare staff member alerted police as well as the Department of Children and Family Services.

The lawsuit doesn’t clearly state where her injuries came from, and Miller has a long list of abuse allegations against him regarding his ex-wife and daughter, even allegedly fracturing his daughter’s collarbone. His lawsuit, filed four months before his divorce was finalized, accuses the school and four named employees of “failing to properly train and supervise their staff in the proper treatment of children in their care. Defendants abused and neglected a child dependent upon them for protection.”

Miller is the only person named in the complaint, and Moreno isn’t mentioned. Miller claims in the lawsuit that an investigation from county authorities backs up his claims, along with video and audio evidence documenting alleged abuse and neglect. The school denied the allegations, stating that the toddler was not “injured, brutalized, or harmed in any manner while under the defendants’ alleged care and supervision.”

The case was dismissed four months ago, and if there was a settlement, it hasn’t been disclosed. In light of newly revealed allegations that Miller has a habit of holding his daughter’s beloved blue bunny hostage and his admission that he shared an inappropriate photo of her online, this lawsuit raises even more questions.