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THE BIG PICTURE
Trump publicly admitted he doesn't care "even a little bit" about Americans' finances while inflation hit 3.8% — and Republicans on Capitol Hill are desperately pretending they didn't hear it. Meanwhile, the president spent the overnight hours posting 55 times in three hours, his FDA chief is out after a vaping fight, and he's wheels-up to Beijing with 16 Big Tech CEOs in tow and a war that's going nowhere fast.
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KEY DEVELOPMENTS
1. "I Don't Think About Americans' Financial Situations" — The Ad That Writes Itself
Trump said the quiet part loud when he told reporters he doesn't care "even a little bit" about how the Iran war is hitting Americans' wallets (The New Republic). Republicans in Congress immediately scattered rather than defend it (The New Republic). The timing could not be worse: April consumer prices climbed 3.8% year-over-year, driven almost entirely by war-related energy costs (AP Politics), and a new poll shows Trump's approval on the economy — once his strongest issue — has cratered to a record low (The Daily Beast). Inflation has now wiped out wage gains for most working Americans (The Daily Beast). Democrats are already calling this the perfect midterm ad (Huffington Post News). It is.
2. Trump Goes to Beijing With the Billionaire Army — and Almost Nothing to Offer
Trump departed Tuesday for high-stakes talks with Xi Jinping, bringing 16 Big Tech CEOs along for the ride (Common Dreams). The stated goal is pressuring China to use its leverage over Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz (AP Politics) — but Beijing and Washington appear determined to keep their Iran disagreement from torpedoing the summit entirely, which tells you something about how much actual leverage Trump has (The Guardian US). Back home, the Iran war is now driving a global shipping fuel shortage threatening the entire maritime supply chain (AP Politics), and the Pentagon's war price tag keeps climbing by billions (The New Republic). The Joint Chiefs Chair refused to back Trump's public claims about the war's progress (The New Republic). Lindsey Graham, because he is Lindsey Graham, used a congressional hearing to beg Trump to blow up the peace talks entirely (The New Republic).
3. The DOJ Just Declared War on the Press
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced that reporters who receive classified information "should not be surprised if they receive a subpoena" — and called journalists who cover the Iran war "traitors" (The Daily Beast). This is a direct escalation from the FBI probe into CIA officers over Russia intelligence assessments that's already underway (Huffington Post News). The message to any national security reporter is explicit: the government is coming for your sources, and then for you. This is how press freedom dies — not with a single dramatic moment, but with budget hearings and subpoena threats.
4. The Redistricting Blitzkrieg Gets a Dissident — and a Dissent
One crack appeared in the Republican gerrymander machine: South Carolina. Republicans there defied Trump's demands to redraw their congressional map (The Guardian US), with their GOP leader openly acknowledging "likely consequences" for pushing back. But Justice Sotomayor made clear what the broader picture looks like, ripping the Supreme Court's Alabama decision as "inappropriate" as the Court greenlit yet another majority-Black district erasure (The New Republic). The New Republic's accounting is blunt: in five days last week, Republicans picked up roughly 10 congressional seats without a single vote being cast (The New Republic). South Carolina's defiance is real, but it's one state against a nationwide structural coup.
5. The FDA Chief Is Out, and the Cabinet Purge Is Back On
Marty Makary is resigning as FDA commissioner after clashing with Trump over fruit-flavored vaping products (The New Republic). A Trump loyalist with no regulatory background will serve as acting commissioner . This matters beyond the vaping fight: Makary, whatever his faults, was a credentialed scientist. His replacement is not. This is the same pattern — purge anyone with institutional expertise, install loyalists — playing out now at the agency that approves your medicine.
THINGS TO WATCH
Trump's overnight posting spiral as a governance signal. Fifty-five posts in three hours, followed by early morning continuation (The Daily Beast), while simultaneously the military's top officer is contradicting his war claims in public (The New Republic) — the gap between the president's social media reality and the actual conduct of a war is widening into something dangerous. Watch for how military officials continue to distance themselves from his public statements.
The ICE-targets-everyone story is getting harder to ignore. New government data shows ICE's "worst of the worst" crackdown targeted pregnant women and cancer patients (The Daily Beast), and a U.S. citizen is being repeatedly arrested even after suing (The New Republic), and a federal judge found ICE violated a court order in Colorado (AP Politics). These aren't isolated cases — they're a pattern of enforcement that's explicitly extralegal.
The Republican loyalty performance economy is collapsing into self-parody. John Cornyn's transparent stunt to win Trump's endorsement (Huffington Post News), the Katie Britt "loyal" exchange that unsettled even conservative commentators (Huffington Post News), and Laura Loomer publicly announcing who Trump has "frozen out" (The Daily Beast) — the sycophancy has become so visible and competitive that it's producing its own news cycle.
👀 KEPT OUT OF YOUR FEED
What the algorithm buried:
Trump's "Golden Dome" would cost $1.2 trillion — seven times more than he told you, and he wants it done by 2029.
Ted Cruz called AOC a "parasite sucking on the taxpayer" — then someone reminded him what he does for a living.
Sotomayor called it "inappropriate" — read what the Supreme Court just let Alabama get away with with Black voters' rights days before a primary.
Kash Patel just completely lost it on a senator during his own congressional testimony — and it did not go well.
Trump just banned fentanyl test strips from federal funding — and experts say people will die for it.
ICE arrested 130 pregnant women, 21 cancer patients, and 7 organ transplant recipients — meet Trump's "worst of the worst"
The sitting president of the United States posted an AI image of Biden, Obama, and Pelosi bathing in feces — because the $13.1 million reflecting pool repaint isn't going great and apparently this is how adults cope.
Jon Stewart has a truly unhinged theory about Trump's 22-foot gold statue — and honestly, it tracks.
Jimmy Kimmel's two-word reaction to Melania calling him "hateful and violent" is very, very funny.
Colbert aired a supercut of Trump saying the exact same thing six times in seven minutes — his "very simple plan" for Iran, on a seven-minute loop, straight from the White House lawn.
NOTICE POLLING
Yesterday, we asked, Who really controls America?
98% OF YOU SAID THE CORPORATIONS:
“The people lost control of our America when the Industrial Revolution built millionaires then, billionaires now, & democracy was bought & paid for by them, and is still bought & paid for by the billionaires!”
- tewalsh
“GREED rules this nation, NOT the rule of LAW.”
- michaelhogshooter“Corporations have the money and the politicians. The people have the vote, and that's being taken away from them. ”
- capthonb3
“It’s all big money.”
- fsnkp
A lot of new people joined this week. If you've been on the fence — now's a good time. Paid memberships are 50% off →
Until next time,
