White House calls critics “BUFFOONS”

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At a rally in Grand Island, Nebraska, Monday night, Trump told the crowd the price spikes from his Iran war were “just artificial.” Then he kept going.

“They could take out a city. Let ’em take out Los Angeles, let ’em take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay, and it’s gonna be over with very soon,” he said, according to the full transcript.

Parts of the crowd cheered.

When the Los Angeles Times reported it, the official White House Rapid Response account fired back: “No, he didn’t, you buffoons.” The account said Trump meant the U.S. is fighting to stop Iran from ever being able to nuke the two cities.

CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale said a viral clip of the line was missing context. The full quote above is the context.

Asked about it at the White House on Tuesday, Trump swatted the air and walked away.

Gov. Gavin Newsom called him “deranged and dangerous” and ordered the State Threat Assessment Center to watch for threats to California. Jimmy Kimmel, who Trump has demanded ABC fire over a joke, called it “one of the craziest, most indefensible statements” he’d ever heard.

San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria said it best:

“San Diego is not collateral damage. We are not expendable.”

Rosie O’Donnell says ABC shot down her plan to interview Jeffrey Epstein survivors during her week guest-hosting Jimmy Kimmel Live! in August.

“My idea for the last night was to do the Epstein reveal and they said that they were certain that could not happen,” she told The Jann Arden Podcast.

So she did it herself. In September she posted a video of eight survivors, all dressed in white, singing Helen Reddy’s “I Am Woman” with her.

Her caption went straight at Attorney General Todd Blanche:

“After the corrupt AG (Trump’s former personal lawyer) stated no men would be charged in the Epstein files — despite mountains of evidence — I called some Epstein survivors [and] asked them to sing with me.”

Now she’s planning in-depth interviews with the survivors, as a streaming documentary or on YouTube. ABC hasn’t responded.

For context, Kimmel pulled an interview with Texas Senate nominee James Talarico earlier this month over alleged FCC threats to ABC’s affiliates. On Tuesday, Disney’s ABC was in federal court fighting Trump’s FCC over free speech.

Trump went after Annie Andrews, the Democratic Senate nominee in South Carolina, in a Monday Truth Social post that used an anti-trans slur three times. Andrews is a pediatrician and a mother of three. She is not transgender.

“Annie ‘Tr*nnie’ Andrews is running against our wonderful Darline Graham for the Senate in South Carolina,” he wrote. He added that Andrews “is not for South Carolina.”

When NBC News asked the White House why the president used a slur, it pointed them back to the post.

Andrews didn’t take the bait: “As a mom and a pediatrician, I’m in this race to fight for my patients, my three kids, and South Carolina.”

Even former Republican Gov. David Beasley weighed in: “This is abhorrent. South Carolina deserves better.”

Trump doesn’t throw slurs at candidates he thinks are losing. The top GOP super PAC just pledged $5 million to rescue Graham in a state Trump won by 18 points. South Carolina hasn’t elected a Democrat to the Senate since Fritz Hollings.

Chip in to Annie Andrews’ campaign here.

Three years ago today, Hamas-led attackers crossed into southern Israel, killed about 1,200 people and dragged 251 hostages into Gaza.

This is the first anniversary with all the hostages home. Israelis gathered at bomb shelters, kibbutzim and the Nova festival site.

Elkana Bohbot, taken from the festival, is marking the day in Israel for the first time after 738 days in captivity. He says he was held in a small cell, given very little food and allowed to bathe only every few weeks.

In Gaza, the war Israel launched in response has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and left most of the territory in ruins. Israel struck Gaza again this morning, and Palestinian officials reported at least two dead.

The anniversary lands weeks before an Israeli election that’s effectively a referendum on Benjamin Netanyahu. Most of his rivals are demanding an independent national inquiry into how October 7 was allowed to happen.

Paramount’s $110 billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery closed Tuesday. The combined company is now called Skydance, after the studio David Ellison founded.

That puts CBS, CNN, HBO Max, Paramount+, MTV, Comedy Central, TBS, the DC Universe and Game of Thrones under one roof.

Ellison is chairman and co-CEO alongside former Mattel boss Ynon Kreiz. His father, Larry Ellison, is one of Trump’s closest billionaire allies.

A judge cleared the deal last week after Ellison settled with 12 states, led by California, that sued to block it. Under the settlement, Skydance can’t sell off either studio and has to release at least 30 movies in its first two years.

Ellison already owned CBS. Now he owns CNN, too.

Democrat Troy Jackson spent the first Maine Senate debate Tuesday night pressing Susan Collins on Brett Kavanaugh, the justice she voted to confirm who then helped overturn Roe v. Wade.

Collins has said Kavanaugh told her Roe was “settled law.” Pressed on stage, she denied feeling that he lied to her.

Jackson, a former logger and state Senate president, hit her for voting with Trump about 96% of the time. On tariffs, he landed the line of the night: “Mainers cannot afford to pay their bills with a press release or a strongly worded letter.”

Collins called the Iran war “not well thought out” and said of Trump, “I’m not exactly his favorite.” She dodged whether she’d stand with him if he campaigns in Maine.

She also had to answer a new ProPublica investigation alleging a pay-to-play arrangement with a Hawaii-based military contractor. She called it “completely false.”

Jackson leads by about a point in Decision Desk HQ’s polling average. Three debates to go.