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Wayne Allyn Root and Donald Trump

White House Aides Face MAGA Extremists Urging 'Martial Law' On Election Day

On Wednesday, new reporting revealed that many in President Donald Trump's orbit believe he will declare "martial law" to seize control of the midterms. This is according to The Atlantic, which spoke with several people close to Trump who asserted he is likely to claim a "national security emergency" to justify efforts to "seize control of the federal elections."

For example, attorney Peter Ticktin -- who went to school with Trump when they were teenagers, helped Trump sue Hillary Clinton, and pushed the president to pardon convicted election equipment tamperer Tina Peters — said there are three possible outcomes in November. As The Atlantic notes, he asserts that, "The first — a smooth election — won’t happen in his view because, he claims without evidence, Democrats already cheated in the primaries. The second is that Trump takes action before the election to prevent cheating. The last option is that Trump tries to declare martial law on or around November 3."

Or in Ticktin's words, "Either martial law, or step aside." When The Atlantic's reporters raised the possibility of riots if Trump were to overturn the election results, Ticktin said he was not concerned: "Believe me, our armed forces are a lot bigger than they are."

Trump has not been shy about signaling his intention to meddle in the midterms. As The Atlantic explains, "In August, when the television and radio host Wayne Allyn Root pushed Trump to declare a 'national-security emergency' to require proof of citizenship, voter ID, and other measures, Trump played coy: 'Let me just say that stranger things have happened, okay? I’ll leave it at that.' Later that month, Trump posted a Root column on the topic, with a headline that described the plan as 'foolproof.' Peters announced after meeting with Trump in June that the president 'basically said to his lead counsel to do what I was asking.' In a prime-time address at the Republican midterm convention in Dallas, Trump again repeated the false claim that he had won the 2020 election, and sarcastically encouraged his supporters to 'cheat like hell' in the upcoming elections."

And MAGA literally applauds such plans. Speaking at a recent conference for election deniers, Root described a "nightmare scenario" in which Democrats won, flipped Congress, then impeached the president. He received a standing ovation after assuring attendees that, according to research done by a friend, the election would be upended if Trump were to declare a national-security emergency."

Trump is so adamant about these efforts that, according to The Atlantic, "Trump’s White House and Cabinet advisers have been working for months to move Trump’s focus away from baseless theories of election fraud peddled by people like Ticktin, Root, and Peters ... But the prospect of Trump deciding to act on the demands of his most fervent election-denying supporters has remained a constant threat, one that even Trump’s inner circle admits remains possible."

Reprinted with permission from AlterNet


Former RNC Chair Defects To Endorse Democrat In Razor-Close Montana Race

Former RNC Chair Defects To Endorse Democrat In Razor-Close Montana Race

A former chair of the Republican National Committee and two-term GOP governor has endorsed a Democratic House candidate running for a battleground seat in Montana. According to MS NOW, “Marc Racicot, who won two terms as Montana’s governor in the 1990s before leading the RNC during George W. Bush’s first term, is set to endorse Sam Forstag’s bid for the state’s 1st Congressional District, currently held by a Republican.”

“He cares about what he’s doing. He’s very well prepared. He has the right priorities in terms of character and virtues and values and belief in the Constitution,” Racicot told MS NOW. “It’s not even a close call for me to stand in Sam’s corner.”

This is an important endorsement for the Democrats with the midterms just around the corner. The party is hoping to win the majority in the House, and to do so in purple-shaded red states like Montana requires the support of independents and Republicans who have been disappointed by President Donald Trump.

Racicot – a critic of Trump – has backed a number of Democrats in recent years, including Joe Biden in 2020. As MS NOW explains, “The public embrace from Racicot could go toward helping the kind of crossover appeal Forstag likely needs to do what no Montana Democrat has been able to do since the 1990s: win a U.S. House seat in the state.”

The seat is currently held by a retiring Republican, and Forstag is running against Aaron Flint – a combat veteran and former conservative radio host who is running under Trump’s endorsement. According to MS NOW, “Forstag, who worked as a smokejumper after lobbying in Montana for the state’s American Civil Liberties Union wing, won a divided primary despite warnings from some critics that he was too liberal for the district.

Since then, he’s built an unusual profile in a state where the national Democratic brand has proved corrosive. He is one of only a handful of congressional Democrats endorsed by both progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders and the centrist Blue Dog political outfit. Racicot’s support on top of that offers some Bush Republican-era nostalgia for voters as Forstag tries to cut into the state’s rightward drift.”

Polls currently indicate that the race is razor close. According to the latest survey, the two candidates are running dead even with 44 percent each. That's bad news for the Republican Party, which has been working to consolidate its hold on Montana, but is expected to take major losses in the midterms due to backlash from Trump's historic unpopularity.

“We’re in a hole that both parties have been digging for us,” Forstag said, urging support for a kind of Democrat “that could actually improve your life, and is actually going to prioritize doing so, because I know what it’s like on a day-to-day basis.”

Reprinted with permission from AlterNet


Hoekstra and Trump

70,000 Canadians File Petition To Oust Meddling US Ambassador  Over Provocations

After nearly two years of hostility from President Donald Trump and his MAGA allies, Canadians are fed up, and now more than 70,000 have signed a petition calling for the expulsion of the U.S. ambassador. According to the BBC, “The online petition accuses Pete Hoekstra of ‘making repeated interventions in Canadian political discourse’ and of having ‘normalized the Trump administration's threats to annex Canada as the “51st state”’ of the US.”

The petition – which comes as the two countries are engaged in fierce trade negotiations with the goal of securing an agreement before new tariffs leveled by Trump take effect next Wednesday – was launched by a Calgary resident. “It requests Ambassador Hoekstra be formally removed from his role, and a parliamentary committee review ‘US diplomatic interference in Canadian domestic affairs,’” reports the BBC. It also raises concerns about meetings in Washington between U.S. officials and a group of Alberta residents who want the province to secede from Canada.

Petition creator Leanne Walker was surprised by the response, saying, "It's beyond what I expected out of this. It tells me that it's not a fringe issue, and that a lot of Canadians are uncomfortable with how Hoekstra has been repeating Trump talking points about our sovereignty and Canada as a whole."

“A Republican and a Trump ally, Hoekstra has been a fierce defender of US President Donald Trump's trade policies, saying they are meant to secure the safety and prosperity of Americans,” the BBC explains, noting that his tenure has been characterized by tension between the neighboring nations. “There was a dust-up between Hoekstra and Ontario's trade representative, and the ambassador has been criticized for reposting Trump's comments about Canada becoming the 51st state and telling reporters it would be a "great discussion to be had" by the leaders of the two countries.

Most recently, he faced criticism for inviting one of the leaders of the 2022 Freedom Convoy movement to his official Fourth of July celebration. He has also described some of the political rhetoric in Canada as ‘anti-American’ and has frequently expressed frustration at the decision by most provinces to remove US alcohol from store shelves - a key point of friction in the current trade talks.”

Canadian Green Party leader Elizabeth May will bring the petition for Hoekstra’s recall to parliament later this year. As her office explained in a statement, “She has an obligation to sponsor petitions brought forward by citizens, regardless of whether she personally agrees with what the petition is asking for.”

As the BBC explains, “The House of Commons allows for Canadians to submit petitions, and there are dozens open at any given time, many receiving just a few hundred signatures. Once a petition, which must be submitted by a Canadian resident, is authorized by a member of parliament, it is posted on parliament's website. If it reaches at least 500 valid signatures, it is then presented in the House and requires a government response. The petition reached that bar as of Wednesday morning, garnering more than enough support to be presented in Canada's House of Commons.”

According to the BBC, “It comes at a time when Canadian negotiators are working urgently to avert a planned 50 percent American tariff on roughly $20bn to $28bn in Canadian goods. Last month, Trump announced the proposed tariffs in retaliation for what he called ‘unequal treatment’ of U.S. cars, dairy and alcohol. Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney warned in response that a potential further retaliation was on the table if the new tariffs were enforced.”

Reprinted with permission from AlterNet


Conservative National Review Urges Trump Impeachment Over Latest Grift

Conservative National Review Urges Trump Impeachment Over Latest Grift

On Wednesday, the National Review – the preeminent conservative magazine since 1955 — called it: President Donald Trump has done the “impeachable.”

“There is no plausible defense of Trump's TruthSocial scheme,” declared National Review Senior Editor Charles Cooke. “It is flagrantly corrupt. It is impeachable. Congress should intervene. (It won't, I know.)” He posted this assertion over his latest article, entitled “Truth Social’s Early-Access Scheme Is Indefensible.”

As he explains, over the weekend, the Trump Media & Technology Group announced the creation of a “real-time feed on the Truth Social website that will give paying institutions early access to certain high-profile posts for between $60,000 and $100,000 per month.” Cooke doesn’t hold back with his assessment of the scheme, writing, “There is no credible defense of this. The only reason that anyone would want priority access to Truth Social is to gain priority access to President Trump’s pronouncements on that platform. And the only reason that anyone would want priority access to President Trump’s pronouncements on that platform is to act on them for pecuniary gain.”

As Cooke elaborates, “Trump often uses Truth Social as the primary forum for his announcements — announcements that include changes to personnel, the imposition or rescission of tariffs, key foreign policy decisions, and more. These announcements are extremely useful to financial institutions, and, in the age of high-speed trading, the faster those financial institutions can obtain them, the more money those financial institutions can make. Facilitating this access is not a byproduct of Truth Social’s API offering; it is its core — perhaps its sole — purpose. Simply put: President Trump is charging Americans a fee — a fee that, in part, goes into his family’s pockets — for the privilege of receiving news about his official actions earlier than those who do not pay.”

According to Cooke, it is “obvious how unequivocally corrupt this setup is. Technically speaking, the beneficiaries will not gain the information they seek directly from Trump himself, but indirectly, via an API (Application Programming Interface) whose output will be processed by a bunch of semi-autonomous servers and acted upon according to a set of predetermined parameters. But the results will be the same as if Trump had personally picked up the phone.”

He continues, “Good traders do not react to the news on the fly; they have plans of action, which are to be implemented if a war starts or ends, if taxes are raised or cut, if the Federal Reserve’s next chairman is expected to be hawkish, dovish, or somewhere in between, and so on. If, instead of using Truth Social as the middleman, President Trump announced that, for a hefty annual charge, he would call a select group of brokers at the stock exchange to inform them of his important decisions, and thereby give them a head start in executing their plans, we would call that what it is: corruption. Why not here?”

Here Cooke concludes in rare agreement with Democratic lawmakers, writing, “Senators Warren and Schiff have described Trump’s plan as ‘an outrageous abuse of the President’s office for his personal benefit that undermines everyday investors and the integrity of our markets, while enriching Wall Street and other wealthy insiders.’ They are correct… It is certainly a grave offense against honesty, transparency, and good government. If it has any self-respect, Congress will respond to the president’s brazen provocation by passing a law that renders his model flatly illegal. And, if that fails to persuade him, it will impeach and remove him from office, the better to drain the swamp.”

Reprinted with permission from Truth Social

Megyn Kelly and Trump

As Midterms Approach, MAGA Influencers See Their Audiences Shrinking Rapidly

With the midterms so close they’re effectively “happening now,” the “MAGA media machine” that carried President Donald Trump into office is falling apart. According to a new report by the New York Times released Friday, while they were once united in their support for Trump, “right-wing influencers are embroiled in feuds and losing viewers, creating a problem for Republicans in the midterm elections.”

“The vote is in November, but the heart of the midterms is happening now,” said Ryan Broderick, the founder of Garbage Day, a newsletter about online culture and influence. “A lot of the propaganda that they’re pushing out just isn’t really connecting the way it would have even three or four years ago.”

As the Times details, much of that “propaganda” used to come via an army of online influencers, like Benny Johnson, Dan Bongino, Megyn Kelly, Candace Owens, Ben Shapiro, and more, the majority of whom have seen their audiences shrink dramatically over the course of Trump’s second term. Per the Times, “The shifts add to a growing body of evidence that suggests the audience for pro-Trump content has fallen from its heights and, for some creators, has reached new lows. Views are dropping for many of Mr. Trump’s greatest allies, while some figures on the right who have taken to criticizing Mr. Trump are showing uneven gains.”

This situation has threatened the media messaging ecosystem that the Republican Party depends on. According to the Times, of the dozen leading MAGA content creators analyzed, “Only a few saw their audiences grow since Mr. Trump’s inauguration, while many more have seen their viewerships decline. Some creators, like Ms. Owens drew new audiences by posting about a broader range of topics.”

Experts attribute the shift to a number of factors, “including the difficulty in stoking political outrage while Republicans control Washington, along with a quieter midterm season. All content creators are also subject to the whims of algorithms, like on X, which can change without explanation and impact their reach. A fresh generation of influencers, such as Clavicular and the YouTube creator Asmongold, have also siphoned away viewers by speaking about politics alongside other topics like gaming and relationships.”

“It seems that everyone in the space is experiencing a drop-off in views from 2025,” wrote Nick Fuentes, a white nationalist influencer who was once an avid Trump supporter but has become deeply critical of the president. “Seems as though 2025 was the anomaly either due to organic interest or potentially artificial boosting.”

In fact, after a period of declining viewership, both Fuentes and Owens have seen their audiences grow more recently as they’ve begun criticizing Trump. According to the Times, “The success of disaffected Trump supporters like Mr. Fuentes and Ms. Owens suggests they will play a larger role in the future of right-wing content online.”

Reprinted with permission from AlterNet

New Poll Finds America's Moms (And Dads!) Strongly Disapprove Of Trump

New Poll Finds America's Moms (And Dads!) Strongly Disapprove Of Trump

Mothers have had it with President Donald Trump. This is according to the latest polling, which found that parents in general have made a dramatic move away from Trump, with moms accounting for the biggest shift.

The Echelon Insights survery shows that since July 2025, support for Trump has plunged by almost 30 points among moms, resulting in a net approval of -20. It also found that the majority of fathers disapprove of him. Overall, the new poll found that 61 percent of voters are negative on Trump, resulting in a total net approval of -23.

According to the Daily Beast, “It’s more bad news for Trump heading into the midterms, as cost of living concerns drive voters, and their opinions of him and his administration. Mothers are often in charge of the family budget, managing household bills and grocery shops, and have noticed the ballooning cost of living, much of which can be directly linked to decisions of the administration. Contributing to household belt-tightening are Trump’s deeply unpopular war in Iran, his tariffs on imported goods, the removal of health care cost protections, increased barriers to Medicaid, and his decision to allow the freeze on student loan payments to expire.”

The new survey found that 62 percent of moms think the economic situation will continue to get worse, while 60 percent disapprove of Trump’s handling of the economy. What’s more, 80 percent of mothers say they intend to vote in the midterms, which doesn’t bode well for Republicans, who worry about losing their majority in the House and potentially even the Senate.

“Although 54 percent of the moms surveyed identified as Republicans, compared with just 43 percent of dads, that partisan advantage did not translate into support for the president,” noted the Daily Beast. “Only 37 percent said they considered themselves primarily Trump supporters. Asked who they voted for in 2024, 50 percent of moms said Donald Trump, with 48 percent nominating Kamala Harris.

The drop in support for the president comes as he continues to focus on issues that don’t affect voters or their budgets, but do prop up his ego, like Trump’s obsession with his conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was rigged to ensure he lost.”Trump’s fallout with moms comes as he’s seen a string of key voter blocs abandon him. In early July, a survey found that he is rapidly losing support among men, who have historically been his most loyal voters.

Last month, polls showed that the president is falling behind among the so-called “Reluctant Right” who express they are more likely to vote Democrat in the midterms. Shortly before that, another poll revealed that Trump has dropped to a new low among rural Americans.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet

Trump's DJT Stock Dives Amid Accusations Of Insider Trading And Fraud

Trump's DJT Stock Dives Amid Accusations Of Insider Trading And Fraud

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump’s DJT stock symbol plummeted to its lowest point ever, plunging to $7.53 per share as of this writing. According to Futurism, the stock — which represents Trump’s Truth Social social media platform — has been “circling the drain for over a year now.”

The DJT stock made its public debut in 2022 for just under $10 per share, and it was rapidly hyped up to its all-time high of just under $94.20 before dropping back into the low teens. Then in early 2024, it was relaunched after a merger, briefly shooting up to around $60. Since then it has lost nearly 90 percent of its value, and the decline shows no sign of slowing.

According to Futurism, the DJT symbol is “part of Trump’s efforts to build out his ailing conservative social media network and personal megaphone, Truth Social. However, desperate stabs at reinvention, from attempts to break into the prediction and cryptocurrency markets to a bizarre and unexpected merger with a fusion power company called TAE Technologies late last year, have done little to instill confidence.”

Futurism suggests that confusion surrounding the company’s future is likely hurting its stock, explaining, “Earlier this month, TMTG announced it was abandoning plans to spin off Truth Social into a separate publicly listed company, with the help of a special purpose acquisition company called Texas Ventures Acquisition III, without ever elaborating why. Instead, the company reaffirmed plans to merge with TAE, cementing its efforts to break into the fusion energy industry — unproven tech that has nothing to do with a far-right microblogging platform.”

The company’s numbers have also undoubtedly scared off potential investors. As Futurism notes, "Beyond the chaos and a continuously revolving door of executives, TMTG has been burning through cash at an alarming rate. Last month, the company posted a stunning net loss of more than $400 million in the first quarter of this year alone — while netting less than $1 million. That’s in large part due to its steep investments in cryptocurrencies, tying the value of its operations to speculative assets that have also been plummeting this year.”

As Futurism reports, the failure of DJT comes amid accusations of wide-ranging insider trading and similar grift within the administration, including allegations that Trump himself has been buying stock then publicly praising the companies to drive up their prices. And the DJT stock has not been spared from suggestions of illegal activity.

In June 2024, Bloomberg reported that the Securities and Exchange Commission was hit by a wave of complaints from analysts warning of shady behavior regarding DJT. As one complaint asserted, “The Market Makers in DJT are manipulating the OPTIONS prices. I am a leading expert in OPTION FRAUD and a former member of the CBOE, CBOT and CME [referring to leading exchanges]. I know what is going on.”

Reprinted with permission from Alternet

Republicans Erupt In Angry Debate Over Trump's 'Terrible Deal' To End Iran War

Republicans Erupt In Angry Debate Over Trump's 'Terrible Deal' To End Iran War

As the war with Iran enters its fourth month and President Donald Trump struggles to reach a peace deal to end the conflict he started, The Hill reports that Senate Republicans have become deeply divided over how to proceed. This ‘messy debate’ comes as the GOP is already at odds over several key legislative priorities.

According to The Hill, several hawkish Senators led by Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Roger Wicker (R-MS), Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) reject the deal that has been emerging with Iran, urging the president “not to agree to any deal that would allow Iran to continue its nuclear enrichment program or ease sanctions while it continues to support Hezbollah and Hamas.”

American Enterprise Institute senior fellow Danielle Pletka typifies this view, “arguing that it would be even weaker than the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that the Obama administration negotiated with Iran in 2015 — a deal Trump abandoned in his first term.”

“The reporting on it suggests that it’s a terrible deal, that the president has gotten basically nothing that he said he was getting, and that his negotiators have embarrassed him,” she said. “Anything that ends with Iran believing that it can open and close Hormuz at times of its choosing is a loss for the United States.”

For the senators’ part, Wicker has warned that the deal would be a “disaster,” Graham argues that it would make Iran the region’s “dominant force,” and Cruz asserts that giving Iran billions in sanctions relief while allowing the country control over the Strait of Hormuz would be a “disastrous mistake.” According to Republican strategist and ex-Trump National Security Council spokesperson John Ullyot, however, “They will certainly make their feelings clear, and loudly, but it’s hard for the Senate to stand in the way of a deal by any president in an ongoing military operation since it’s not subject to a vote that would block it.”

But the views of other GOP lawmakers have the party further divided, as “a growing number of Republican senators are losing patience with the lack of a clear plan for ending the conflict, which has caused gas prices to rise by nearly $1.40 per gallon since late February.” Four Republican senators recently voted to discharge a war powers resolution that would have directed Trump to withdraw U.S. troops from the war. These include Republican Senators Rand Paul (R-KY), Susan Collins (R-ME), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), and Bill Cassidy (R-LA), and the measure advanced because three Republicans were absent. It would have passed if just one more Republican had voted for it, “sending a loud rebuke to Trump over his handling of the conflict.”

“The Senate is expected to vote this week on a motion to proceed to the resolution to end the war, but Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) need to work out a time agreement,” explained the Hill. “The measure is close to having enough support to pass the House as well, though Trump is certain to veto it.”

According to The Hill, Republican senators on both sides of the divide will likely extend Trump some latitude as the deal is negotiated, but that once details are revealed, the backlash could be pronounced.

Many are watching how Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) votes as he just lost a primary race to a Trump-endorsed opponent. Now that Cornyn knows he’s leaving office, he has little incentive to bend to Trump’s will, who has recently accused the senator of being “very disloyal.”

Reprinted with permission from Alternet


Pollster: Young Voters' Fury Over Economy (And Trump) Boosting Democrats In Midterm

Pollster: Young Voters' Fury Over Economy (And Trump) Boosting Democrats In Midterm

According to a new Harvard Youth poll, faith in the American government has sunk to a new low of just 15 percent among young Americans aged 18-29. A slim 13 percent think the country is on the right track, however only 33 percent say they trust the upcoming midterm elections will be fair.

The director of polling at the Harvard Kennedy School's Institute of Politics, John Della Volpe, joined MSNOW on Friday to discuss the survey’s findings, saying he hasn’t seen anything like it in America over his 25 years as a pollster.

According to Della Volpe, young voters are concerned about “a stack of issues.”

“It's inflation, cost of living, housing, health care, paying more, getting less,” he explained. “The day-to-day concerns financially and otherwise related to the war. These are all adding up to a generation that is highly anxious, incredibly stressed out by this, and talk about not even living day-to-day, but surviving day-to-day.”

And, says Della Volpe, young Americans have heard a lot of talk from President Donald Trump, but the “rhetoric” doesn’t align with what they’re experiencing.

Instead of addressing voter concerns, agreed host Alex Wagner, the administration is “doing nothing about the rising cost of health care, literally letting Obamacare subsidies expire and raising the cost of health care on 23 million Americans, many of whom are young.”

Trump is also “not addressing the future of joblessness, which is artificial intelligence taking over many of these jobs that these young people would have once had… This president has not shown that to be a priority.” Then there is the environment: “Who's going to inherit a heated-up, broken earth but young people? They have every reason to feel incredibly bummed out about the direction.”

As Wagner notes, many of these young voters have now spent a decade having Trump tell them they can’t trust elections.

“This administration has done more to erode confidence in the levers of our democracy than any other presidency,” she asserted. “Telling them that their votes don't count, telling them the elections are fraudulent, telling them that there's an unseen enemy pouring across the border to change the fabric of this country.”

Della Volpe points out that much of the electoral disillusionment is among Republican and independent voters, explaining, “Younger folks who identify as Democrats…are significantly more likely to say they will vote in November than young Republicans and independent or indifferent voters…So still you see that advantage for Democrats.”


'Crashing Out': Why Trump Runs When Asked About Orban's Landslide Defeat

'Crashing Out': Why Trump Runs When Asked About Orban's Landslide Defeat

On Sunday, far-right Hungarian strongman Viktor Orban was voted out of office after 16 years of dictatorial rule. His defeat not only spelled significant change for the nation of Hungary, but was widely interpreted as a major blow against far-right movements around the world, including MAGA in the United States. As a result, President Donald Trump is “crashing out” in the face of a bad sign for his authoritarian political project.

Following Orban’s loss, Trump — usually not shy about sharing his thoughts on any subject — declined to answer questions from reporters about the election, making a quick escape to board Air Force One. Many who watched this exit online were struck by the typically wordy president’s lack of response.

"You can tell he’s so close to crashing out lmao,” wrote one commenter on a NewsNation broadcast of the moment. "He can't handle the truth," said another, with a third still declaring, "LOL. This has been a week of huge losses in the life of this big loser."

It may seem strange for an American president to hang so much importance on a Hungarian election, but not only has Orban been a longtime “illiberal” ally of Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, but he had become something of a superstar within the MAGA movement, garnering headline appearances at events like CPAC due to the popularity of his conservative, anti-immigrant, authoritarian policies within the Republican Party.

Orban’s election or lack thereof was viewed as so symbolically vital to MAGA that Vice President JD Vance was sent to Hungary during the final days of the race in an attempt to help build support. Vance’s appearance did not have the desired effect, as Orban’s party was defeated by a landslide.

For many within the MAGA-sphere, the rise of figures like Orban and Trump has been embraced as a signal of the growing power of the far-right movement and its righteous if not outright fated assumption of power around the globe. But Orban’s loss suggests that history is not as inevitable as they thought.

As Ivan Krastev, chair of the Center for Liberal Strategies in Sofia, Bulgaria, explained, Orban’s loss will have “an incredible psychological impact” on the far-right. Or as Orban biographer Pal Daniel Renyi put it, the election is proof to Orban, Trump, and their followers that “nothing lasts forever.”

Reprinted with permission from Alternet

Sex Trysts In SUV? New Details Of Epstein's Sweetheart Plea Deal In DOJ Papers

Sex Trysts In SUV? New Details Of Epstein's Sweetheart Plea Deal In DOJ Papers

While many aspects of the Jeffrey Epstein case have been scrutinized over the years, one sticking point that many keep returning to involves the notorious criminal’s 2008 plea agreement, which has been criticized as an overly “sweetheart deal” considering the severity of his crimes.

Facing dozens of accusations of underage sex trafficking that should have been prosecuted on a federal level, Epstein instead had the most egregious charges shelved in favor of lesser state charges in exchange for pleading guilty. As a result, Epstein served fewer than four months in jail before he was given a unique arrangement in which he was allowed to leave prison for 16 hours a day, six days a week under a work release program.

Now thanks to documents released by the Department of Justice, new details have been revealed about the privileges Epstein was granted, including an SUV that was specially outfitted for sex.

For his work release, Epstein was transported daily between jail and his downtown office in an SUV that had been equipped with a bed. Along the way, said a woman interviewed by the FBI, the SUV would park in the prison parking lot where she and Epstein would have sex.

According to the woman, she was a former model from Slovakia whom Epstein had begun grooming when she was in high school, and by the time he was arrested, they’d been sexually involved for several years. While some have suggested that the woman was responsible for recruiting Epstein’s victims, she was one of four “assistants” given immunity in exchange for his “sweetheart deal.” The two then, she asserted, maintained their sexual liaison while he was technically imprisoned — a situation allowed by members of the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Department, who she said were on friendly terms with Epstein.

"A number of survivors have made clear that Epstein's exploitation did not stop during his incarceration,” said Lauren Hersh, director of the anti-trafficking group World Without Exploitation. "At best, Epstein's highly unusual arrangement demonstrates law enforcement's negligence. More likely, this is symptomatic of a system that prioritized accommodating a predator over delivering justice for survivors and protecting vulnerable girls and women."

"If all of this is true,” said Spencer Kuvin, a Florida attorney who represented many of Epstein's accusers, “they allow a sexual predator to continue his activities even while he was supposed to be in custody, and it just highlights the nature of the sweetheart deal that he got and the preferential treatment he received because of his wealth.”

Reprinted with permission from Alternet

'5D Chess': Bannon Says ICE Agents At Airports Is Test Run For Midterm Election

'5D Chess': Bannon Says ICE Agents At Airports Is Test Run For Midterm Election

Over the weekend, President Donald Trump announced plans to distribute ICE agents to airports across the country in an effort to alleviate long security lines caused by TSA staffing issues, which are in turn the result of a congressional standoff over Department of Homeland Security funding. With funding suspended, high numbers of TSA workers are calling in sick or quitting, and the ICE agents are purportedly being sent to fill the gaps.

But according to longtime Trump ally Steve Bannon, sending ICE agents to airports is really a “test run” for deploying them during the upcoming elections.

Speaking on his War Room podcast this morning, Bannon said, “We can use this as a test run, as a test case, to really perfect ICE’s involvement in the 2026 midterm.”

Bannon — who has been a key framer of the MAGA movement since its inception — has been advocating for Trump to place ICE agents at polling sites since last month, arguing it was necessary to prevent Democrats from “stealing” the election. Critics, however, say this is a blatant attempt to intimidate poll workers and voters with hopes of influencing the outcome.

The idea of putting ICE at polling stations has been gaining traction among conservatives, even though federal law expressly forbids deploying military or law enforcement at poll sites.

Bannon floated the idea to far-right lawyer Mike Davis, who said, “I think we should have ICE agents at the polling place because if you’re an illegal alien, you can’t vote. It’s against the law. It’s a federal crime for you to vote in federal elections. And so if you’re an American citizen, you should be happy that ICE is there, because you’re not going to have illegal aliens cancelling out your vote.”

Claims about widespread voting fraud have been thoroughly debunked, but that hasn’t stopped the president and his supporters from arguing that such voters stole previous elections from Trump. His opponents, however, say that placing ICE at polls would in fact be part of a Republican attempt to steal elections.

These opponents argue that such efforts have come in many forms, such as redistricting to shape the electorate to suit GOP needs, and the seizure of voter data and ballots from previous elections, typically in blue states or districts. Monday, a Republican sheriff in California seized more than 650,000 ballots in an attempt to overturn Democratic efforts to redistrict the state that were launched in response to similar efforts in Texas. And previously, Trump has said that he regrets not ordering the National Guard to seize ballots during his attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

If deploying ICE to airports doesn’t decrease security lines, says Trump, he will “bring the National Guard” next.

“Perfect training for the fall of 2026,” said Bannon. “This is another 5D chess move from President Trump.”

Reprinted with permission from Alternet