Thanks to Iran, Trump’s Navy Is Falling Apart and Morale Is Sinking

The USS Benfold, a guided-missile destroyer, lost power for days while it was sailing with the George Washington carrier strike group through the South China Sea.

On July 24, the Benfold experienced an “engineering casualty involving its generator,” Commander Matthew Comer, spokesperson for the 7th Fleet told USNI News. Sailors went days without galley services, toilets and air conditioning, and their potable water was also affected. Four days later, the ship was towed into port, and power was restored on July 30.

These reports come amid mounting scrutiny over the toll of Trump’s extended reliance on the Navy to execute his aggressive national security priorities in Latin America and the Middle East.

Family members of sailors aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln have reported food shortages, and sanitation issues. During the Lincoln’s more than 200 days without a port call, there have been multiple instances where sailors have tried to jump overboard. Trump has repeatedly denied that sailors have experienced problems onboard the Lincoln. (The USS George Washington, deployed to replace the ship, appears to have its own mold problem.)

Now, other family members of sailors are coming forward. Sailors onboard the USS Carl Vinson, an aircraft carrier, also experienced a lack of water, with no warm water to shower and the water fountains were turned off, according to a series of texts a military spouse shared with Meidas Touch.

President Trump’s ballroom guy was sent to Russia for secret discussions.

The Financial Times reports that the chair of the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, Rodney Mims Cook Jr., was given a diplomatic passport before attending Russian President Vladimir Putin’s economic forum in St. Petersburg, Russia, in June. Cook, who is overseeing the White House ballroom construction, was assigned a diplomatic security detail.

While in Russia, Cook met with government officials on what he described as a “cultural visit” where he showed officials pictures of his “dacha” in Atlanta. However, Trump administration officials were hoping to make diplomatic inroads with the Russian government, and Cook met with Anton Koyakov, a senior aide to Putin.

The U.S. had boycotted the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum since 2019, following the arrest of an American businessman, and continued staying away after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Cook was the first U.S. official to attend since 2018. During his June visit, he witnessed a Ukrainian drone strike on a Russian oil refinery, telling the Financial Times it was “too close for comfort.”

Cook didn’t give the publication any details about his meetings with Russian officials, if he was there on Trump’s instructions, or whether he planned to visit Russia again, saying, “There are many requests. We’re working on that now.”

While on his visit, Cook took part in a “Russia-US: Dialogue of Cultures” panel, showing pictures of his Atlanta home that he said was built in the “Russian wooden vernacular, which has touched my heart over the decades.” He gave a presentation on Russian churches, public buildings, and homes he has helped to restore in the country, which he has been visiting since the 1990s. His fellow panelists were senior Russian officials and cultural dignitaries, some of whom are under U.S. sanctions.

“I know Russian culture, and I know most of the leadership of their cultural institutions,” Cook told the Financial Times. The panelists “included most of my old friends, which was really a great homecoming. The personal connection between all of us was very clear.”

Cook’s presentation didn’t mention the war in Ukraine until it was almost over, when he said, “My children don’t feel this anymore. We must educate them to understand this. But we must be at peace in order to achieve these goals.... Help us do this.”

He did hold a question-and-answer session with Putin the next day, where he relayed a “good hello from your friend, President Trump.”

“We have a lot of ideas to talk about between our two capital cities in the next week,” Cook said. Putin responded by thanking Cook and saying he “pushed the puck back” to Trump. Cook told the Financial Times that he got a hockey puck from a friend and put it on the Resolute Desk in the White House, “much to President Trump’s amusement.”

The whole visit, which Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in June he was “not aware” of, seems like it was designed to be under the radar to get around public criticism and scrutiny. The U.S. under Trump is still ostensibly backing Ukraine, although it isn’t funding any military aid, and it has temporarily eased some sanctions against Russia. Trump’s willingness to engage with Russia has been heavily criticized, and it’s not clear how much the administration was involved in Cook’s trip.

Disney and ABC are suing President Trump’s Federal Communications Commission, arguing that the administration’s demand that eight of their stations file their broadcast license renewals early is an attack on their free speech.

“Acting through the Federal Communications Commission, the Administration has waged a retaliatory campaign against ABC for a single reason: it disapproves of what ABC broadcasts,” the lawsuit reads. “That campaign began in this Administration’s earliest days and has only intensified since.... Again and again, the administration ​has attacked ABC’s speech — the stories its journalists report and the viewpoints its network programs air.”

This FCC’s threat to strip the ABC channels of their broadcast licenses followed a joke from late-night television host Jimmy Kimmel last spring, in which he said First Lady Melania Trump glowed “like an expectant widow” two days before the failed White House Correspondents’ Dinner attack. The joke caused a massive uproar from MAGAworld, including the president himself, who called for Kimmel’s termination. The lawsuit specifically cites Trump’s Truth Social posts calling for Kimmel’s termination as proof of the administration’s bias against him.

“The Commission issued an unprecedented order requiring the Stations to file early applications to renew their licenses—years before any of their licenses would have come up for renewal in the ordinary course and allowing only thirty days to file applications which ordinarily take months to prepare,” the suit continued.

Kimmel was also attacked by the Trump administration for joking about how Republicans responded to the death of Charlie Kirk last year. Disney briefly pulled Kimmell off the air after pressure from FCC Chair Brendan Carr.

The FCC attack came amid a probe into the daytime talk show The View for being too woke.

The lawsuit from Disney—one of the biggest and most recognizable media companies ever—is an aggressive defense of media freedom, rather than another capitulation as we’ve seen from other networks.

This story has been updated.

The Trump administration lashed out at Senator Jon Ossoff over his comments questioning the president’s close relationship with his assistant Natalie Harp because it shed national light on a dynamic the administration is already deeply insecure about.

“He golfs and trades stocks,” the Georgia senator said during a weekend rally in Atlanta. “See, he doesn’t want to do the job. He wants to build his ballroom and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the emir of Qatar.”

Harp, a former TV presenter at the far-right One America News, became an aide for Trump in 2024 and has been virtually inseparable from him since.

Semafor reported that the White House responded to Ossoff the way it did—calling him “Pee-Wee Herman,” “Jon Jackoff,” and a “feminine theatre kid cosplaying as Barack Obama”—because Harp’s closeness to President Trump is a sore subject internally. It has “unnerved” many staff members, who believe Harp “will ultimately jump the highest out of anyone in the room when [Trump] says jump,” according to an anonymous source. Another source close to the White House noted that “the first lady doesn’t like these types of things” and Trump gets “furious” when personal issues become the center of national attention.

The questioning of Harp and Trump’s close relationship is rooted in Harp’s own actions. She never leaves the president’s side, even making it onto his secret flight out of Turkey last month, while journalists and Cabinet members like Secretary of State Marco Rubio remained aboard the Air Force One gifted by Qatar that was reportedly the potential target of an Iranian strike. Harp’s estranged older brother told The Daily Mail that Harp and Trump’s relationship was “very unhealthy,” and New York Times writers Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan reported in their book Regime Change that Harp in 2023 left Trump what amounted to love letters, with one even reading, “You are all that matters to me.”

It’s not looking good for the disgraced MAGA Representative Cory Mills.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis told reporters Friday that he didn’t support Mills’s bid ahead of the state’s primary elections on Tuesday. Earlier this month, Florida Representatives Anna Paulina Luna and Mike Haridopolos endorsed Ryan Elijah, a former television anchor. While Donald Trump announced his endorsement for Mills in February, the president has remained quiet on the subject ever since.

An August survey found Mills only held a six-point lead over Elijah, and also revealed that a whopping 41 percent of Republican voters were still “undecided.”

Mills’s embattled bid for reelection may be coming to an end—in what would be a clear sign that President Donald Trump’s grip is loosening on Florida Republicans.

In the past year, the scrutiny has intensified on the numerous allegations against Mills. The Florida lawmaker has been accused of sexual misconduct, harassment, campaign finance violations, financial disclosure violations, accepting inappropriate gifts, and multiple ethics violations. He has faced a months-long ethics probe and is reportedly under investigation by the Department of Justice.

And then there’s his dating history. Asked by Mother Jones about reports that he had dated a 19-year-old while he was a sitting member of Congress, Mills had this to say:

“There’s nothing illegal about two consenting adults dating. The obsession over a man’s dating life is disturbing at best. I’ve been separated from my now ex-wife years prior to our divorce finalizing. Whether in office or as a private citizen, adults are entitled to date in their attempt to find their person. Sometimes you get lucky and find that immediately, but many are not so blessed. Feel free to run your new and slanderous hit piece.”

Still, Mills has resisted calls to resign. On Tuesday, Florida Republicans will make the decision to leave for him.