News & Politics

Despite being inundated with criticism, far-right podcaster Candace Owens is doubling down on her attacks on Turning Point USA's (TPUSA) Erika Kirk. Owens is suggesting, without evidence, that Erika Kirk was somehow involved in the fatal shooting of her late husband Charlie Kirk, who founded the MAGA youth organization.

The criticism is coming from both the left and the right. Conservative media figures like The Daily Wire's Ben Shapiro (who Owens used to work for) and The National Review's Rich Lowry are calling her out, and liberals and progressives are saying that while they vehemently disagree with Erika Kirk's politics, Owens' YouTube video series "Bride of Charlie" (a play on "Bride of Frankenstein") is a mean-spirited smearing of a widow who lost her husband to gun violence.

Salon's Sophia Tesfaye, in an article published on March 4, argues that "Bride of Charlie" not only underscores Owens' willingness to promote unhinged conspiracy theories — it is also an indictment of right-wing media's business model.

"With Kirk's assassination at a Turning Point USA event in Utah last September, the MAGA movement faced a genuine tragedy," Tesfaye explains. "His widow, Erika Kirk, stepped in to lead the organization. But within weeks, before the grief had even begun to settle, Owens began publicly questioning the circumstances of Kirk's killing and spinning conspiracy theories on her podcast…. What started as insinuation soon metastasized into a serialized spectacle: 'Bride of Charlie,' a multi-episode YouTube series targeting Erika Kirk personally…. In the series, which is still ongoing, Owens hints that Kirk's murder was an inside job, suggests foreign agents may have been involved and implies that Erika Kirk has 'ulterior motives' in leading TPUSA."

Tesfaye notes that although "the conservative establishment has, belatedly, tried to fight back against Owens' accusations" against Erika Kirk, they "have largely failed to land a blow" — as the first episode of "Bride of Charlie" received "nearly 5 million views."

"The real reason right-wing media cannot stop Candace Owens is that they built her," Tesfaye emphasizes. "And, more importantly, they built the engine that fuels her: the machinery of conspiratorial media, which is immune to the tools that might once have contained it. For decades, conservative media has thrived on a business model that monetizes outrage and distrust. The more outrageous the claim, the greater the engagement. The more distrust sowed toward institutions — universities, media, elections, public health, the FBI — the more loyal the audience becomes."

Tesfaye continues, "In December, even as Owens was deep into Charlie Kirk assassination trutherism, Erika Kirk was urging TPUSA audiences to be tolerant of disagreeable views. By the time the right decided Owens had gone too far, she had already built a fully independent operation. The movement that once shielded Owens is now discovering that monsters raised on grievance do not recognize fences. The conservative movement no longer has credible gatekeepers."

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Wednesday faced Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) during a contentious line of questioning about the deaths of American citizens at the hands of federal agents.

The House Judiciary Committee ranking member probed Noem on why she attacked slain Minnesota protesters Renée Nicole Good and Alex Jeffrey Pretti as "domestic terrorists" before knowing any of the facts of the case.

Raskin walked through some statements from friends and family about Good and Pretti, who expressed compassion and love for all people.

Noem refused to walk back any of the mistakes by DHS in the days following the shootings.

"Based on what you know today, madam secretary, based on what you know today, were Renee Good and Alex Pretti domestic terrorists?" Raskin asked.

Noem claimed that there was still an "ongoing investigation," implying that the investigation could still find evidence that they were domestic terrorists.

"You didn't wait for the investigation or evidence. You proclaimed they were domestic terrorists at the time," said Raskin. "Why did you do that?"

Noem said only that the federal agents go "into dangerous situations." She went on to say that those situations included "violent rioters."

"So, you're proud of the fact that you called them domestic terrorists?" Raskin asked.

Over and over he probed her about the language she used, and over and over she refused to apologize or correct the record.

Appearing before the Senate on Tuesday, Noem refused to even look at American citizens who were arrested, detained and brutalized by agents in her department.

CNN data analyst Harry Enten reported on Wednesday that the impending runoff for the GOP may be at the top of the news after Tuesday's primary election in Texas, but there's a huge story in the numbers.

The top takeaway is that the Texas Democratic Primary may not have been close, but it was the highest ever turnout in a primary ever. It was so significant, he said, that Democratic turnout was more than the GOP turnout. However, the state has significantly more Republicans than Democrats.

"We're already up to 2.3 million. And that's only with 92 percent of the estimated vote in that will climb ever higher," said Enten.

The one that came closest was the race between President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton in 2008.

"As I said, the word to describe this is tremendous," Enten said.

"It's not just that this 2.3 million is such a large portion, the largest ever for a Texas Senate Democratic primary," he explained. "It's that more people voted in the Democratic Primary than the Republican Primary. Look at this, the share of Texas midterm primary ballots. Look at this 2000s average was less than a million."

In the past, there has been a 3-to-2 ballot selection in Texas primaries, with more choosing the GOP ballot than the Democratic ballot. This election, that changed.

"So far, Democrats, more people are actually choosing the Democratic ballot. This is extremely, extremely unusual," Enten said. It's particularly unusual given there is a highly contested Republican Senate race."

Former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance is disputing a Wednesday claim by President Donald Trump's administration that it can sideline investigations by Bar Associations around the country.

According to Bloomberg Law, the Justice Department is working to "suspend stat bar ethics investigations" targeting DOJ lawyers. The DOJ has clashed with judges across the U.S. and judgment, behavior and legal violations have prompted complaints to state Bar Associations as a result.

According to the proposal, which was posted in the Federal Register on Wednesday, the DOJ wants to do its own internal review of the lawyers rather than the regulatory association. Critics see it as diminishing the power of the Bar Associations as a whole.

Commenting on the report on X, Vance called it "bunk."

"State bars license attorneys and consider misconduct allegations. Historically, state bars have deferred to DOJ‘s internal discipline process as a courtesy, but they are not obligated to, and the AG has zero authority to suspend state bar operations," Vance said about Attorney General Pam Bondi.

"DOJ can’t avoid investigation and incredible allegations of clear, ethical violations, like lying to or misleading judges and failing to follow court orders if state bars want to pursue them," Vance added. "The process is usually long and involves wrist slaps instead of jumping straight to disbarment, but egregious cases deserve serious discipline."

University of Michigan Law School Professor Barbara McQuade agreed.

"All DOJ lawyers are members of a state or DC bar, and subject to its ethics rules and penalties, up to disbarment. Subverting state bar authorities would give DOJ lawyers carte blanche to violate ethics rules," she said about the report.

Self-described "recovering lawyer" Jeff Jacobs commented, "You would think that, given the ethical implications of many of the actions by this DOJ and its state-licensed attorneys, the administration would go out of its way to avoid antagonizing state bar associations."

In January, the Texas Supreme Court ended the 42-year reliance on the American Bar Association for law school accreditation because the ABA has diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) requirements. Florida has now done the same. Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) has proposed his own accreditor for Florida law schools instead.

If Bondi's proposal moves forward after a public comment period, “whenever a third party files a bar complaint alleging that a current or former Department attorney violated an ethics rule while engaging in that attorney’s duties for the Department, or whenever bar disciplinary authorities open an investigation into such allegations,” the attorney general “will have the right to review the complaint and the allegations in the first instance,” it states.

Bondi is calling ethics probes into attorneys at the DOJ part of an anti-Trump "weaponization" effort.

President Donald Trump made a damning admission by commenting on the war with Iran, and two political reporters illuminated just how careless he has been.

Speaking on Greg Sargent's "New Republic" morning podcast, Zeteo.com's Asawin Suebsaeng noted that during his comments Tuesday, the president speculated on the worst things that could happen. It indicated to them that Trump really hadn't thought through the Iran war.

"I guess, the worst case would be we do this and then somebody takes over who’s as bad as the previous person, right?" Trump asked the audience.

"You’d think he would have thought of that before," said Sargent. "He suggests here that he doesn’t expect that to happen. But it seems to me that what he really revealed here is that he hasn’t even bothered to imagine what additionally could go wrong — badly undermining his case. What did you make of it?"

Suebsaeng agreed that it was the damning admission about the decision to go to war.

"President Trump and the rest of the gang running the federal government right now are going about this with the exact same level of nobility and care and solemn posture that you or I would take while flipping through Hulu trying to find something new to watch," complained Suebsaeng.

What he said the team at Zeto discovered is that each time Trump was given briefings, he was completely uninterested in alternative options. There were plans and scenarios

"These were all things that, if he cared to pay attention, were put in his ear and in front of him over and over again in the weeks or months leading up to this thing," Suebsaeng said. "And you know what? Donald J. Trump said and decided firmly: I’m the decider. I think it’s worth it, f—— all that noise that you’re putting in my ear right now. We’re doing it. Let’s just do it and be legends. And he pulled the trigger on it."

He cited The New York Times reporting that said at least one top general had concerns about the war, and all Trump did was "tune it out — just closed his ears to all of it," Suebsaeng added.

Sargent said that Trump essentially undermined his own case for war by "basically admitting to how poorly thought through the aftermath of this truly is. And then note how he says it’s a good thing that the leadership in Venezuela was left virtually intact. So, does Trump want a change at the top in Iran or not? Does he want regime change or not? This is something they just can’t answer."

Many critics of U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to go to war with Iran are saying that he failed to adequately explain his motivations. Secretary of State Marco Rubio attempted an explanation on Monday, March 2, telling reporters that tensions between Iran and Israel played a key role in the decision — and suggesting that Trump acted because of Israel.

But now, according to The New Republic's Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling, Rubio "ate his own words" and is backtracking and trying to distance himself from his own statement.

"During a visit on Capitol Hill Monday," Houghtaling explains in an article published on March 4, "Rubio suggested that the U.S. jumped to action due to intelligence that indicated Israel was going to strike Iran. U.S. involvement was, according to Rubio, necessary to thwart retaliation against U.S. interests. ... But that was apparently not the pitch that Trump approved. Responding to questions from reporters at the White House the following day, the president rejected any indication that Israel had pushed the White House to act."

On March 3, when a reporter asked Trump, "Did Israel force your hand?," he responded, "No. I might have forced their hand. We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack first. They were going to attack. If we didn't do it, they were going to attack first. I felt strongly about that."

Later that day, Houghtaling notes, Rubio "changed his tune" and sounded "noticeably more stressed" than on the previous day.

A reporter told Rubio, "Yesterday, you told us that Israel was going to strike Iran and that's why we needed to get involved" — to which he defensively responded, "Your statement is false…. This had to happen anyway. The president made a decision, and the decision he made was that Iran was not going to be allowed to hide behind its ballistic missile program…. That decision had been made…. That's what I said yesterday."

Recollections differ between Vice President JD Vance and former New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan when it comes to their clash over immigration and the Catholic Church’s support for migrants.

Democratic operative Christopher Hale on X described Vance’s "escalating" clash with the Catholic Church.

Catholic convert Vance has stated that the Trump administration’s immigration policies prioritize the needs of American citizens, families and communities. That puts him at odds at times with the church on immigration issues.

Things peaked in a January 2025 interview in which Vance questioned whether the church’s pro-immigrant stance was influenced by financial gain to resettle immigrants using federal funds.

Dolan called the comments “nasty” and “untrue and scurrilous.” However, Dolan later said in a Feb. 19 interview with Catholic news outlet EWTN TV that Vance had apologized.

However, in a Washington Post interview, Vance claims such an apology didn’t happen, but hedged on specifics.

“I’m not saying he’s lying, but I mean, look, sometimes I say things too harshly. I say things too directly,” Vance said. He added that he told Dolan to “be careful your financial interests and the immigration issue don’t actually cloud your judgment.”

“I’m sure that I said something like that,” Vance added, “but I don’t remember exactly what I said.”

While Vance acknowledged the church has a duty to “minister to everybody,” he said he has a different duty.

“So that is going to inevitably lead to conflict between the government and the clergy,” Vance said. “What I try to do is come at that conflict in a spirit of charity.”

Scathing reactions poured in across social media on Wednesday morning after Donald Trump's Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, criticized the "fake news media" for covering American casualties in Iran, with one reaction calling the moment "truly rock bottom."

The U.S. has been engaged in a major joint military operation against Iran with Israel since Saturday, launching a barrage of strikes as the specific goals of the campaign continue to be uncertain. As of Wednesday, at least six U.S. service members are confirmed dead as a result of the Iranian military's counterstrikes.

Department of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth held a press conference about the operation alongside Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. During his remarks, Hegseth lashed out at the press over reports focused on the six American casualties, accusing them of trying to make Trump bad.

"This is what the fake news misses," Hegseth said. "We've taken control of Iran's airspace and waterways without boots on the ground, but when a few drones get through or tragic things happen, it's front page news. I get it, the press only wants to make the president look bad. But try for once to report the reality."

Reactions to this remark, which appeared to minimize the importance of American casualties, were swift, criticizing the secretary for his callousness and his lack of care for the responsibilities of the news media.

"Hegseth says reporting on American casualties is the 'fake news' trying to 'make the president look bad,'" Tommy Vietor, a former Obama administration National Security Council spokesman and "Pod Save America" co-host, wrote in a post to X. "This is truly rock bottom from the most selfish, arrogant, unqualifed Secretary of Defense in US history."

"Just a thought, maybe SecDef shouldn’t jerk himself off on live television at the thought of casualties in war," Angry Staffer, a prominent political accountant run by a former White House staffer, said in their own post. "War isn’t something to be giddy about. Were the most powerful nation on the planet. We’re supposed to be the quiet professionals, not carnival barking morons."

"To say that the deaths of our troops shouldn’t warrant front page news and that it’s only being reported on to make Trump 'look bad' inspires the kind of rage in me that would get me banned from this app," Joanne Carducci, a prominent online political commentator, wrote in her own post X.

"No, Pete Hegseth," Susan McPherson, an author and businesswoman, wrote in a post to BlueSky. "The media’s job is to tell the truth and report on the good, the bad and the ugly."

"Each thing Hegseth says is more insane, lawless and incriminating than the last," David Kaye, a former special rapporteur for the United Nations, wrote in a post to BlueSky about the press conference overall.

Hegseth also drew intense criticism for his overblown descriptions of military strikes in Iran, including his comments about "death and destruction" raining from the sky and the U.S. "playing for keeps."

"He’s like a really bad actor in a 1980's 'B' action movie that went straight to video," Ron Filipkowski, a former federal prosecutor and political commentator, wrote on BlueSky.

"More than 1,000 Iranian civilians have been killed already including 160 [plus] schoolgirls," political consultant Elizabeth Cronise McLaughlin wrote in her own post to BlueSky. "If and when there is a war crimes trial, Hegseth's prosecutors will have a wealth of evidence."

The DownBallot Substack by longtime elections reporter David Nir noted another red-to-blue pickup after Tuesday's elections.

In Arkansas, Democrat Alex Holladay won a seat that he nearly captured in 2024 when he ran against state Rep. Carlton Wing.

Wing has given up the post, however, to accept a position running the local PBS station.

The 70th District, just outside Little Rock, is a district that President Donald Trump carried in 2020 by a four-point margin, data showed. But Nir's calculations found that in 2024, Harris narrowly won the same district.

Nir noted that Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders didn't want to hold the election and instead scheduled it for June. It would have left the seat empty for eight months. So, Democrats sued and won, forcing the election to March.

Democrats have enjoyed huge successes in special elections throughout Trump's first year in office. However, the off-year elections in Virginia and New Jersey proved to be an outright bloodbath for Republicans.

The Independent reported last month that Republicans privately fear another bloodbath in November.

After former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave depositions in the House Oversight Committee’s Epstein investigation, calls have been growing for President Donald Trump to also testify, but Chairman James Comer says that he’s already cooperating.

The New York Times reported that the Clintons were questioned for a total of roughly nine hours “about their relationships with the disgraced financier and convicted sex offender who died in prison in 2019, and Ghislaine Maxwell, his longtime associate.”

Both Clintons “said repeatedly that they had no knowledge of any sex trafficking or sexual abuse by Mr. Epstein or Ms. Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex trafficking.”

CNN reported last week that the Clintons’ testimony could end up backfiring on President Trump. The news outlet asked, “isn’t there a double standard if Trump, who was mentioned in the files numerous times, is not also put under oath?”

“Some observers might wonder whether first lady Melania Trump might have similar insight” as Hillary Clinton’s “about the times her husband and Epstein moved in similar orbits before and after their marriage in 2005. While there would surely be a mighty constitutional fight over an attempt to compel testimony from a sitting president, the first lady has no formal constitutional role, and there appear to be no legal barriers to such a summons.”

Now, NewsNation reports that Chairman Comer says Trump is “turning over documents” and has answered “hundreds if not thousands” of questions regarding his committee’s probe into Jeffrey Epstein.

Comer did not appear to offer any insight into the methods by which Trump has been answering questions, nor how or what documents he has turned over.

“I’m very appreciative of the cooperation with the Trump administration,” Comer told NewsNation. “And President Trump’s answered hundreds, if not thousands, of questions about Epstein.”

Comer also said that the rich and powerful were not exempt from his committee’s investigation.

“It was always our plan to bring in rich and powerful people, anyone that had spent a lot of time with Epstein, anyone that was on the island or in the airplane just to try to learn about how Epstein was able to pull this off, any close associate,” he said.

He did not say that Trump would be brought in, but he was asked about “the knowledge that President Trump knows.”

Noting that “former presidents are now clearly on the table,” the NewsNation host asked, “so when he leaves office, will you ask the same of him?”

“We’re working with the president,” Comer said.

Appearing to sidestep the question, Comer replied that Democrats are “going to go after President Trump whether or not this Epstein investigation ever happened.”

Jeffrey Epstein survivor Danielle Bensky has been an outspoken critic of the U.S. Department of Justice's (DOJ) handling of its files on the late billionaire financier and convicted sex offender. Bensky, who met Epstein when she was a young ballerina and says she was abused by him, has been reaching out to a variety of media outlets —including those on the right.

But according to Bensky, Fox News and other right-wing media outlets are ignoring her.

In a Wednesday, March 4 post on X, former CNN host Jim Acosta — who interviewed Bensky for his internet show — tweeted, "A dancer abused by Epstein, Dani Bensky tells me she and other survivors are being ignored by 'Republican media' outlets like Fox. If you want to understand why so many people are giving Trump a pass on Epstein, it's partly because they’re watching Fox."

During the interview, Bensky told Acosta, "We're not able to get on Republican media a lot of the time. We've been hoping to get on Fox News. We've been trying to get on Newsmax. I think maybe two people had done a quick Newsmax. Stories are not even getting across the aisle."

Acosta responded, "Wow. Fox is not interviewing any of the survivors? You can't get on Fox?"

Bensky lamented, "Nope…. A lot of the time, Republican media will not take our stories at all. When I saw the State of the Union, I felt very clear that the chasm between Republicans and Democrats is so great…. There are some baseline things should just be, like, human."

Brig. Gen. Steve Anderson told CNN after the Wednesday morning Pentagon press conference, "somebody's smokin' something."

During his briefing, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth was asked how Iran had nuclear weapons when the administration said last year that they obliterated the weapons in the "12-Day War."

Hegseth told reporters that President Donald Trump believed Iran "had no intention of making a deal." He claimed that Iran didn't have nuclear weapons; rather, they "had the intentions" of getting such weapons. This conflicts with Trump's ongoing claims that Iran was at work on nuclear weapons again.

"They can’t do the nuclear… They’ve got to stop with the nuclear," Trump said in January at the World Economic Forum.

“After Midnight Hammer, they were warned to make no future attempts to rebuild their weapons program, and in particular nuclear weapons, yet they continue. They’re starting it all over… One thing is certain: I will never allow the world’s number one sponsor of terror, which they are by far, to have a nuclear weapon," Trump said during his State of the Union address, mere days before the strikes.

CNN's Natasha Bertrand reported that Trump administration officials acknowledged during a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday that they have major concerns about Iran's drone program because they haven't been able to intercept all of them, as evidenced by the six dead American soldiers in Kuwait.

During the briefing on Wednesday, both Hegseth and Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine agreed that the drones do pose a bigger problem than they anticipated.

The other problem, according to several reports, is that the U.S. is running out of weaponry because the administration has burned through the stockpile so quickly.

It was reported on Tuesday by several outlets that the military lacks the supplies to continue at the current level.

“It’s not panic yet, but the sooner they get here, the better,” a regional source told CNN.

Even the pro-Trump "America First Post" reported that Trump burned through five years of Tomahawk inventory in just three days.

Speaking to CNN after the press conference. Brig. Gen. Steve Anderson pointed to Gen. Caine's comments that they were switching from "stand-off munitions" to "stand-in munitions."

"What he's saying is that we're running out of precision-guided munitions," the retired general said. "That's what he's saying. That we're going to take advantage of our air superiority, our ability to loiter over targets and use other type munitions. In fact, the Secretary of Defense even talked about using dumb bombs, gravity-based bombs, and not laser-guided bombs."

He was asked if Hegseth's claim that the U.S. can outlast Iran was accurate.

"That's not how I see it at all. I mean, you know, it's going to take an awful lot to dig these people out. I mean, what we saw today was essentially the same briefing that was given in 2003 by Donald Rumsfeld and General Richard Myers," said Anderson.

He recalled that when they announced the attack on Iraq, there was also no clear definition of the objectives.

"But what we saw was the Secretary of Defense was a tough, macho guy talking about killing and shamelessly sucking up to the POTUS, but he really wasn't giving any specifics on what the long-term objectives are," Anderson continued. "And I would say that we're going to be in the same situation we were in Iraq. We're going to be able to knock out their defensive capabilities, their offensive capabilities, establish air superiority, but they're going to go underground. These are tough, resilient people. They're going to be able to outlast us."

He cautioned that if anyone thinks the U.S. can "bomb them into submission from the air, somebody's smoking something."

After U.S. President Donald Trump ordered missile strikes against Iran and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — the country's far-right Shiite fundamentalist leader since 1989 — was killed, a long list of other countries were drawn into the conflict. Iran launched retaliatory strikes against U.S. installations in Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia was attacked by Iranian drones.

Meanwhile, Israel and Hezbollah (a pro-Iran Shiite militia in Lebanon) fired missiles at once another. From Riyadh to Beirut to Dubai, the Middle East is on pins and needles.

Trump is claiming that going to war with Iran is necessary from a national security standpoint. But MS NOW's Zeeshan Aleem, in an opinion column published on March 4, argues that Trump's Christian nationalist allies view the conflict as a holy war for evangelical fundamentalist Christianity.

"President Donald Trump can't get his story straight on why he launched a war against Iran," Aleem argues. "But some commanders in the U.S. military are apparently telling service members that they're on a mission to fulfill biblical prophecy. The independent journalist Jonathan Larsen reported that the Military Religious Freedom Foundation has received more than 110 complaints from service members about their commanders' religious gloss on the war on Iran."

Aleem continues, "These complaints, according to Larsen's report, came from every branch of the military, across more than 40 different units, situated in at least 30 military installations…. MRFF President Michael Weinstein told Larsen that the complaints from service members shared a common feature: Commanders are describing the war as 'biblically sanctioned' and 'clearly the undeniable sign of the expeditious approach of the fundamentalist Christian End Times as vividly described in the New Testament Book of Revelation."

Weinstein told Larsen, "Many of their commanders are especially delighted with how graphic this battle will be, zeroing in on how bloody all of this must become in order to fulfill and be in 100 percent accordance with fundamentalist Christian end-of-the-world eschatology."

When military commanders "are reportedly selling American aggression on Iran as a holy war," Aleem warns, it is "deeply alarming."

"Weinstein told Larsen that the complaints violate the Constitution's separation of church and state," Aleem explains. "But regardless of its legality, telling American troops that they're fighting for a Christian god against a Muslim country is medieval madness. It isn't the role of the U.S., per the Constitution, to promote any religion over another. Furthermore, the reported remarks from these commanders is likely to prompt U.S. service members to dehumanize Iran's population, and help set the stage for viciousness in combat and human rights violations. The military is not supposed to be a crusading political-theological movement, but a professional defense force."

President Donald Trump’s hold over his MAGA supporters has truly slipped for the first time, contends Senior Editor Alex Shephard in the New Republic. And a prolonged conflict in the Middle East may lead to a further spiral downward.

So far, the story contends, "right-wing criticism of Trump’s war has mostly come from familiar MAGA cranks like Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson. But it could quickly spiral out of control."

"If it does drag on, it will become even less popular, including among Republicans,” Shepard writes. “Facing sustained criticism from the MAGA faithful who rightly see the war as a 'betrayal,' Trump could well spiral into unprecedented territory.”

Trump has always dealt with extreme opposition, and has a history of turning critics around. This time is different, Shephard claims. Previous bold moves — like the assassination of Iranian Quds Force leader Qasem Soleimani in 2020 or the kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in January — weren’t the same as an extended regional war. If Iran proves to be that, Shephard says, that will hang over the presidency.

The potential problems on the horizon are dire. Trump is now historically unpopular and facing a potential midterm massacre.

“But what happens when he is even more unpopular, overseeing a foreign war that’s out of control, and no longer has control of Congress? What happens when the subpoenas and investigations — and yes, impeachments — start? What happens if this becomes a regional war? What happens if U.S. civilians, stranded in a Gulf state, are taken hostage? What happens if U.S. ground forces start aiding one, or several, factions in an Iranian civil war?”

All of that can cause further erosion in Trump’s support.

The President claims “MAGA is Trump,” Shephard writes. “Before too long, that may be pretty much all that MAGA is.”

For many years, the U.S. Supreme Court leaned conservative but handed down many decisions that were applauded by liberals and progressives — from Lawrence v. Texas to Obergefell v. Hodges to Texas v. Johnson. Retired Justice Anthony Kennedy was a right-wing libertarian appointed by President Ronald Reagan, yet he often sided with liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg over Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia when it came to abortion and gay rights. And Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Reagan's first appointee, was another Supreme Court wild card who sometimes found common ground with the liberal justices.

But in recent years, the High Court — where Republicans now have a 6-3 supermajority — has been a frequent source of frustration to liberals and progressives as well as the libertarian right. And The New Republic's Matt Ford, in a biting article published on March 4, argues that the Court's GOP appointees aren't shy about putting partisan politics over the law.

"In the old days," Ford writes, "it used to require actual work to show that the Supreme Court justices were driven by their personal beliefs instead of straightforwardly applying law, precedent, and procedure. You'd have to connect dots across multiple rulings and explain intricate legal doctrines. Even then, it might be too speculative to be truly persuasive. These days, I could probably convince my two-year-old son of the High Court's shenanigans just based on a single day's rulings."

Ford makes his point by discussing the cases Malliotakis v. Williams and Mirabelli v. Bonta — which, he notes, are unrelated yet underscore the Court's partisan nature.

In Malliotakis, the six GOP appointees voted to save a congressional map favorable to Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-New York) — whose district includes areas of Staten Island and Brooklyn.

"The first case, Malliotakis v. Williams, is a challenge to the recently redrawn borders of New York's 11th Congressional District," Ford explains. "The state redrew its boundaries to, among other reasons, make it harder for New York Representative Nicole Malliotakis, a Republican, to win reelection this fall. She is one of many incumbents who will likely lose their seats amid the nation's gerrymandering wars over the last eight months. Malliotakis and a coalition of other litigants filed a lawsuit after the redrawn maps were issued, arguing that the Independent Redistricting Commission had impermissibly relied on race when it redrew her district's boundaries…. The other case, Mirabelli v. Bonta, involves a challenge by the parents of children who identify as transgender to a California law that forbids school officials from discussing a student's gender transition with their parents unless that student consents to it."

Ford continues, "Some of the plaintiffs with religious objections argued that the law infringed upon their First Amendment rights to instill their own religious faith in their child, pointing to last year's ruling in Mahmoud v. Taylor. In that decision, the Court's conservatives expanded the First Amendment to allow parents to opt out of LGBTQ-friendly teaching materials. Unsurprisingly, the conservative justices apparently agreed with that view. The other parental plaintiffs, however, argued that the California law intruded upon their rights as parents, which they said were guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause."

Ford emphasizes that the High Court needs "a majority of justices" who are "willing to consistently apply legal principles instead of zig-zagging to reach preferred policy outcomes."

"That majority does not currently exist," Ford laments.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) lost it with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem during a Tuesday hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, and one reporter thinks he knows why.

Tillis ripped Noem for shooting a puppy, failing to allocate disaster funds and obstructing justice. But, according to The New Republic's Greg Sargent, a letter might provide an important clue about what really motivated Tillis' attack.

The Homeland Security Inspector General wrote a letter saying that leaders under Noem "systematically obstructed" his inquiries, including a "specific pending criminal investigation."

“Does anybody have any idea how bad it has to be for the OIG in this agency to come out and do this publicly?" asked Tillis during the hearing. “That is stonewalling, that’s a failure of leadership, and that is why I’ve called for your resignation.”

The document, confirms quotes from the Wall Street Journal that Inspector General Joseph Cuffari, a Trump appointee, "attempted to access a database controlled by DHS, but was blocked from it unless he revealed details of the investigation to individuals who do not have a need to know, and who may be related somehow to the allegations or individuals under investigation.”

The letter posted by Sargent details 11 instances in which DHS leaders blocked the IG's investigations.

"In one instance, the inspector general said that Customs and Border Protection wouldn't allow his staff to access the database that has 'up-to-date data on CBP's border screening and admitting processes; OIG is unable to independently review data or conduct comprehensive risk analysis,'" the claims said of an incident in May 2025.

TSA denied the inspector general access to look at its Secure Flight System database. It means they couldn't do "risk analysis." Ultimately, they turned over some "data extracts," but the IG said it couldn't validate if they were real.

These weren't the only times CBP, TSA or ICE refused to allow oversight.

"One other key thing: The DHS's inspector general identifies multiple instances in which DHS is restricting access to information related to ICE and CBP, making it impossible for the IG to examine data/procedures. That's crying out for more scrutiny," wrote Sargent.

Another letter sent to Congress in February complained that DHS refused to address “significant” findings about airport security checkpoints that it told Noem about in a classified briefing.

Noem has been criticized over the past year for turning her DHS role into a kind of year-long cosplay photo-op, while ignoring actual homeland security.