Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is on Fox & Friends riffing about war strategy, because nobody in the Trump administration has real job duties beyond going on TV and fluffing the leader

New in PN: The Great Republican DHS Funding Rake-Stepping Fest "Faced with a metastasizing crisis Republicans deliberately inflicted on the country, Dems held firm. Rs, for their part, blustered, caved, caved again, blustered more, then swiftly rushed to bludgeon their faces w/ each other’s fists."

Trump starts the week with market manipulation and threats of war crimes

Quiet. Part. Loud.

Trump: "Look at how I did with the Hispanic population. And now I'm doing even better with the Hispanic population."

Trump says long lines at airports are "caused by Democrat terrorists. These people are sick."

Q: What do you think about Iran charging tolls and controlling the Strait of Hormuz? TRUMP: I have to find out if it's true. They're gonna do whatever they have to do. We could close that up in two minutes.

Q: Do you worry that that helps Vladimir Putin? TRUMP: He loses one boatload of oil. That's all it is. It's fine.

Trump on Iran: "They're gonna give up nuclear weapons. They're gonna give us the nuclear dust. They're gonna do everything that we want to do."

Q: Do you still have confidence in Tulsi Gabbard? TRUMP: Yeah, sure. She's a little different in her thought process than me, but that doesn't make somebody not available to serve

Q: Are you considering withdrawing Casey Means for Surgeon General and nominating someone else? TRUMP: Well, we're looking at a lot of different things. I don't know how she's doing in the nomination process. I'm more focused on Iran, but something like that would be possible.

Trump: "Cuba's gonna be next"

Trump claims that if the SAVE America Act is passed, Democrats "will never win another election"

Trump: "We don't want transgender mutilization of our children. We don't want the mutilization of our children."

Sitting here staring at the screen trying to figure out if Sen. Johnson thinks his *fellow senators* trained activists in MN, as opposed to anti-ICE activists emerging in states across the country and often openly voicing frustration with Democratic lawmakers for, they claimed, not doing enough.

They’re absolutely conditioning us to having ICE around before they start putting ICE at polling places

I am neither a theologian nor a perfect person by any means, but Trump's malignant narcissism—a morally and psychologically toxic mixture of egomania, remorselessness, mendacity, greed, sadism, spite, and vengefulness—strikes me as the dialectical opposite of what Christianity teaches people to be.

Tom Homan and I agree on one thing, cops don't understand the law

Crab cakes hit different in Baltimore

Rare to see a true "Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer" bit in the wild, but here we are.

My "We are won or winning" T-shirt has people asking a lot of questions already answered by my shirt.

"I'm a cop, I don't understand the law" is literally one of the most on-brand things I have ever heard in my life

Himes: "The standoff is not done yet. The president is illegally paying, apparently, TSA agents."

It is extremely wrong how Dems talking point on this is that paying TSA by EO is totally legal and he should have done it sooner. It is not legal, that $10B is only for border security and TSA is not border security. He's stealing the power of the purse, stop saying he should have done it sooner!

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Homan: "We're going to continue an ICE presence there until the airports feel like they're 100% in a posture where they can do normal operations. If less TSA agents come back, that means we'll keep more ICE agents there."

Andy Kim: "Homan did an excellent job dodging your question about why Trump didn't start paying the TSA agents sooner if he had the authority all along. I know the answer to that, the American people know. It's because he doesn't care about them."

Ron Johnson: "Even more deviously, they trained activists to obstruct justice, encouraged them to put themselves in harm's way, they got two martyrs, then they used their martyrs as their excuse to try to defund law enforcement"

BARTIROMO: People look at this situation and they don't understand. Republicans are in charge. You are running the House, Senate, and WH, and yet we have these fights and it's obvious that you can't get on the same page and it seems Democrats are still winning McCLAIN: It's extremely frustrating

WELKER: Do you agree with President Trump that the US has in fact won the war? LANKFORD: We are won or winning

Homan is modest about his own abilities. Just look at the "plan" he came up with to have ICE thugs wander aimlessly through crowded airports.

“I’m a cop, don’t ask me about the law” is quite a line 😳😳😳

Fortunately, I own a time machine and can fill up my tank with gas from March 2025.

He dug out a letter from last October. President Death Spiral really does feel the end is near, I guess.

Flying out of BWI is now an extreme sport. Seven-hour TSA lines, ICE agents roaming, no paychecks for staff. The 'joy' of Trump's America: every mundane task becomes a logistical nightmare. Hitchhiking might be faster. Or just accept Baltimore as your final form.

Trump just posted a letter from Franklin Graham assuring him that says "you commented to the media that you might not be heaven bound. Maybe you responded in jest, but it is an important issue to know for certain that your soul is secure and will spend eternity in the presence of God."

LMAO! Fox News is spinning Trump's high gas prices by touting the "average daily price per barrel of oil" throughout presidencies, as though the fact prices were low a year ago will be reassuring to people today

the arsonist is tackling fires

TAPPER: If Trump had the power to pay TSA agents this whole time, why only start going it now? HOMAN: Look, I don't understand -- I'm a cop -- I don't understand the whole appropriations language, appropriations law

I am supposed to fly out of BWI tomorrow which means the rest of my life is now a mystery. Do I wait in line for 7 hours? Stay in Baltimore forever? Hitchhike? Live off the land indefinitely? The joys of living in Trump’s America!

always a pleasure to spend some time in the Charm City

Look how aggressively we are sanitizing Kushner's conflicts. The NYT described Kushner as "having business interests" in the Middle East. KUSHNER IS BEING DIRECTLY PAID TENS OF MILLIONS ANNUALLY BY MIDDLE EASTERN GOVERNMENTS

while the country is at war, Trump is golfing

Monica Crowley: "It's called soft power and no one exercises it better than the First Lady. While the president is really focused on ending conflicts and unnecessary forever wars, the First Lady is focused on future generations."

Monica Crowley on Melania Trump: "Our spectacular First Lady is really bringing the world together to focus on digital literacy, artificial intelligence and education, and online safety and protection for children. It was a huge success and I'm so proud of her."

As I keep saying, the trick to post-truth authoritarian politics is not changing laws, it’s pretending that existing laws already allow anything. Words don’t have meanings, they’re merely tools to get what you want. If you don’t believe me on this, listen to the foremost practitioner explain it.

New episode of @davidnir.com and Rupar is live! We discuss why the GOP is in shambles, whether it comes to funding the TSA or winning special elections down in Florida. We had a lively conversation. Check it out:

So many law review articles and he just tweeted it out