It took less than 12 hours for President Donald Trump’s latest claims of victory in Iran to blow up in his face, as an Iranian Revolutionary Guard ship fired on a tanker in the Strait of Hormuz early Saturday.
Iran’s military announced that it was against closing the vital waterway and putting it under “strict control” until the U.S. ended its blockade. It was a dizzying reversal after Iranian officials and Trump had said the strait was open to commercial vessels again on Friday.
The 79-year-old president had called journalists with the news of his triumphs on Friday afternoon. In a phone interview, he told USA Today that the standoff over the crucial waterway was “over.”
“It’s over, it’s a great victory,” he said. “We’ve had a great victory and we’re going to finish it off.”
The lesson should have been learned years ago. Chump is a known liar. He's been one his entire life. If he makes a statement, present it as "Chump claims . . ." Not as a fact, never as a fact, until you can verify his claim. Many in the press didn't learn that lesson as Ben noted Friday on MEIDASTOUCH NEWS.
Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said on Sunday that gasoline prices in the United States had probably peaked but acknowledged that they could remain elevated for months, undermining President Trump’s earlier claim that high fuel prices would be “short-term.”
Mr. Wright had said in early March that the average gas price in the United States would fall below $3 a gallon within “weeks” after President Trump and Israel initiated airstrikes against Iran in late February. But on Sunday, Mr. Wright appeared to backtrack in an appearance on the CNN program “State of the Union” after the host, Jake Tapper, asked him when it would be “realistic” for Americans to see $3 per gallon prices at the pump.
“I don’t know,” Mr. Wright said. “That could happen later this year. That might not happen until next year. But prices have likely peaked.”
When asked again if he meant that gas prices might not return to prewar levels until 2027, Mr. Wright suggested that such price levels were “pretty tremendous” after accounting for inflation.
Last week in this space, I suggested that maybe Donald Trump was not quite all there. I would like to revise that opinion. I think he may be what we used to call stark raving bonkers.
I apologise for my use of rather blunt language. A reader cautioned me that the use of such terms was stigmatising of people with mental health issues. Of course, Donald Trump himself would regard this as woke nonsense. Only this week, he used the phrase “NUT JOBS” to describe four former cheerleaders who dared criticise his chaotic and murderous adventure in Iran. Tucker Carlson, Megyn Kelly, Candace Owens and Alex Jones were not only NUT JOBS, but they were also LOSERS with low IQs.
In
this spirit, I think Donald Trump would appreciate others using direct
speech. So let’s not pussyfoot around talking about his “erratic” or
“unpredictable” behaviour. Let’s just say all the signs are that he is
positively unhinged.
Let’s consider four episodes this week in which the president’s behaviour was straightforwardly loony.
The first was the Jesus image thing. Let’s say just say this slowly so that the full insanity of what happened can fully sink in. The most powerful political leader in the world posted an AI image of himself dressed up as the son of God, healing the sick.
How narcissistic do you have to be to do such a thing? What kind of delusions of grandeur do you have, what degree of messianic complex or hypomania?
A useful measure of abnormality would be to consider how an averagely well-run business or organisation would deal with a leader who behaved so aberrantly that it became routine for observers to suggest they had lost their marbles.
Donald Trump's ability to pack arenas is evaporating.
The president who once filled sports venues across the country couldn't even come close to filling a 4,500-seat Arizona church on Friday night, exposing the dramatic erosion of his political momentum.
According to the Washington Post, Trump was the featured speaker at a Turning Point USA rally in Phoenix at Dream City Church. Despite his boast earlier in the day on Truth Social about addressing a "BIG CROWD," the turnout was sparse and underwhelming.
The
attendance numbers tell the story. A Turning Point USA spokeperson
claimed only about 3,000 people attended — meaning the church was
roughly two-thirds full at best. For a president who once commanded
arena-sized audiences, the half-empty megachurch represents a stunning
reversal.
The demographic breakdown was equally telling, reports the Post. The megachurch was supposed to be a venue for Trump to drum up support among young voters. Instead, he found an audience whose members skewed older and were focused on divisions within their own party.
The only thing more messed up than Chump may be his administration. Friday, THE ATLANTIC published Sarah Fitzpatrick's "The FBI Director Is MIA: Kash Patel has alarmed colleagues with episodes of excessive drinking and unexplained absences." Jen Psaki spoke with Fitzpatrick about her exclusive Friday night on MS NOW.
Fitzpatrick's report opens:
On Friday, April 10, as FBI Director Kash Patel was preparing to leave work for the weekend, he struggled to log into an internal computer system. He quickly became convinced that he had been locked out, and he panicked, frantically calling aides and allies to announce that he had been fired by the White House, according to nine people familiar with his outreach. Two of these people described his behavior as a “freak-out.”
Patel oversees an agency that employs roughly 38,000 people, including many who are trained to investigate and verify information that can be presented under oath in a court of law. News of his emotional outburst ricocheted through the bureau, prompting chatter among officials and, in some corners of the building, expressions of relief. The White House fielded calls from the bureau and from members of Congress asking who was now in charge of the FBI.
It turned out that the answer was still Patel. He had not been fired. The access problem, two people familiar with the matter said, appears to have been a technical error, and it was quickly resolved. “It was all ultimately bullshit,” one FBI official told me.
But Patel, according to multiple current officials, as well as former officials who have stayed close to him, is deeply concerned that his job is in jeopardy.
The Atlantic report, published Friday evening, claimed that Patel is known to drink to the point of obvious intoxication at clubs in Washington, D.C. and his home city of Las Vegas, violating FBI conduct standards and potentially leaving the nation’s top law enforcement official vulnerable to coercion or exploitation.
The director’s drinking reportedly angered President Donald Trump, who is famously sober, and whose brother died from alcoholism-related health issues. Trump called Patel after the director was seen chugging beer with members of the victorious U.S. Olympic men’s hockey team to express his displeasure, according to the report.
Sources told The Atlantic that Patel’s alleged conduct at the helm of the FBI has alarmed officials about what would happen if the bureau was needed in a national crisis, such as a terror attack.
Friday’s Atlantic story also stated that Patel has drunk “to the point of obvious intoxication” in public, often at Ned’s in Washington, D.C., and at the Poodle Room in Las Vegas, where he lives. On occasion, the FBI has even reportedly had to reschedule meetings “as a result of his alcohol-fueled nights, six current and former officials and others familiar with Patel’s schedule” told The Atlantic.
In some cases, the director’s FBI security detail had difficulty waking him because he was so drunk. In one incident, the FBI had to use “breaching equipment” of the sort SWAT teams use:
On multiple occasions in the past year, members of his security detail had difficulty waking Patel because he was seemingly intoxicated, according to information supplied to Justice Department and White House officials. A request for “breaching equipment”—normally used by SWAT and hostage-rescue teams to quickly gain entry into buildings—was made last year because Patel had been unreachable behind locked doors, according to multiple people familiar with the request.
The report mentions Patel’s appearance in the U.S. men’s hockey team locker room after its win over Canada in the Olympic gold medal game in Italy. Patel was captured on camera chugging a beer. The scene reportedly prompted Trump to let Patel know he was unhappy with the director’s behavior.
Ka$h Patel. It's a long list of potential fires Chump's considering -- there's Hegseth, Tulsi Gabbard, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, and Ka$h are just a few of the names. That's what happens when you nominate unqualified people to posts. In most cases, they are not able to handle the job. And that means that they're always in danger of being fired.
Ka$h has misused government funds and resources on his girlfriend and on his hobby as a hockey nut and he's done a very poor job as FBI director -- one screw up after another, always quick to run to the press with self-congratulations only to have the 'we've done it!' explode in his face.
Bongino's gone, Bondi's gone. Ka$h is the last big name in his department and he could be next.
He gets so drunk apparently, per what Fitzpatrick told Jen Psaki, that the FBI had to force open his front door one morning when they couldn't reach him by phone and he wasn't answering his door. He apparently got blotto drunk and was passed out and unable to awaken on his own.
This is who's running the FBI?
Ewan Gleadow (RAW STORY) reports:
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) took to Bluesky and suggested an exclusive from The Atlantic would be enough to see Patel removed from his post. He wrote, "Stooge Patel getting sloshed at the 'Poodle Room' in Vegas? You simply cannot make this up!! Too good. Start the clock."
Former Trump administration staffer Olivia Troye, who is running for a Democratic Party House seat nomination in Virginia, added,
"Remember when I warned this would happen if Kash Patel became FBI
Director? I said he was unfit. He threatened to sue me. Now he is the
Director—and it’s happening."
Patel has exhibited erratic behavior, including unexplained absences and what witnesses described as "bouts of excessive drinking" that have alarmed FBI staff, according to Sarah Fitzpatrick's investigation in The Atlantic.
Meanwhile, Ka$h has retained an attorney to sue THE ATLANTIC:
The lawyer FBI Director Kash Patel has enlisted to help him go to war against The Atlantic for a report accusing him of “excessive drinking” is known for several unsuccessful MAGA-aligned lawsuits.
Jesse Binnall represented former North Carolina lieutenant governor Mark Robinson in a failed defamation lawsuit against CNN and also worked on President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
“See you in court,” Binnall posted on X following the publication of a Friday report by The Atlantic, which cited sources familiar with Patel, 46, alleging he was alarming officials with excessive drinking, erratic behavior, and unexplained absences.
In the days since Pam Bondi’s exit from Donald Trump’s justice department, Jeffrey Epstein survivors and transparency advocates have been confronted by mixed messaging, prompting questions about whether a full accounting of his crimes would ever be revealed.
Legal veterans told the Guardian that authorities’ decisions – such as Bondi’s failure to appear for a congressional subpoena about her handling of Epstein investigative files – portend poorly for accountability. Moreover, her replacement’s comments about the status of Epstein investigations has been perceived by some as an effort to acknowledge prior missteps without presenting definitive solutions.
Bondi’s non-appearance at her scheduled congressional deposition did not come as a surprise.
Trump’s Department of Justice, now helmed temporarily by his former criminal defense attorney Todd Blanche, had told the House oversight committee that Bondi would not appear for the 14 April hearing. Committee members said they were told this non-appearance was because Bondi “is no longer attorney general and was subpoenaed in her capacity as attorney general”.
A committee spokesperson said: “Since Pam Bondi is no longer attorney general, Chairman Comer will speak with Republican members and the Department of Justice about the status of the deposition subpoena and confer on next steps.”
Comer also reportedly engaged in behind-the-scenes efforts to avoid Bondi’s deposition prior to her removal, according to the New York Times.
Robert Garcia, the ranking Democrat on the committee, vowed that his colleagues would take action after Bondi failed to appear. “Pam Bondi is evading a lawful congressional subpoena by failing to appear before the oversight committee for a deposition about the Epstein files and the White House cover-up,” he said in a statement. “She must appear before the committee, and if she continues to ignore the law, Oversight Democrats will move forward with contempt proceedings immediately.”
Some say Chump started the Iran War to distract from The Epstein Scandal. Recently, Melanie publicly stepped into the picture causing everyone to wonder what was she attempting to distract from? Sarah Beth Spraggins (THE SPECTATOR) notes:
On April 9, Melania Trump held a lone press conference. She showed up in a charcoal suit, delivered a speech and turned to exit, runway style, without pausing. Melania doesn’t take questions from the press.
The facts, according to Melania: Jeffrey Epstein had not introduced her to Donald Trump. She met her husband, “by chance, at a New York City party, in 1998.” She and her husband were acquainted with Ghislaine Maxwell and Epstein, but this was “common in New York City and Palm Beach.” She had engaged Maxwell in polite “casual correspondence” over email. That was the extent of the relationship. “I am not Epstein’s victim,” she said somberly. White House staff were perplexed.
Why had the presser been called? There have been growing rumors that Paolo Zampolli – the modeling agent Melania credits with encouraging her to move to the United States – may have used his ties to the Trumps to have his ex-partner Amanda Ungaro deported.
Ungaro, who was part of President Donald Trump and Melania’s social circle for years, issued a number of angry posts on X directed at the first lady, the president as well as former U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi. “I will tear down your corrupt system, even if it’s the last thing I do in my life. I will go all the way — I am not afraid. Maybe you should be afraid of what I know … of who you are, and who your husband is,” she said in a post that was dated April 8 and tagged the first lady’s X account. She threatened legal action against the first lady “and your pedophile husband.” To Bondi, she said in a post: “Do you fully understand the information I possess regarding you and the individuals associated with you? I strongly advise you to consider the seriousness of these matters. Any actions taken against me or attempts to escalate this situation could have significant legal consequences.”
[. . .]
Ungaro, in a phone interview from Brazil, confirmed that she posted the remarks on X. She said she felt betrayed by Melania, with whom she had been friends for two decades. She said she had an expired visa and, before her arrest, she had applied for a new one. She said she reached out unsuccessfully to Melania — and then learned that Zampolli was responsible for having her picked up and jailed by ICE. She spent three months in a Miami detention center before she was deported in October. Zampolli, 56, is a former modeling agent who met Ungaro when she was 17. They were together for nearly two decades, and worked as diplomats in the first Trump administration. She was a United Nations ambassador to Grenada, and Zampolli was ambassador to Dominica, both Caribbean nations. He now serves as a special envoy for global partnerships in the Trump administration, and remains close to Trump and the first lady. Zampolli has said that he introduced Trump to Melania. Zampolli, whom Trump also appointed to the Kennedy Center board, reached out to a top ICE official and asked that Ungaro be deported, according to The New York Times. The Times reported that the official, David Venturella, called ICE’s Miami office “to ensure” that agents would pick up Ungaro from jail before she could be given bail. “During the call, Mr. Venturella noted that the case was important to someone close to the White House,” the Times reported. Zampolli told the Times he only reached out to inquire about the process for Ungaro’s deportation. The Miami Herald was unsuccessful in reaching Zampolli through the White House. The White House also did not respond to a request for comments about Ungaro’s allegations.
[. . .]
Ungaro gave an interview last week with the Spanish publication El Pais, where she described the flight she took on Epstein’s plane to the U.S. with her then-agent, Jean-Luc Brunel, and more than a dozen other girls in 2002, just before she turned 17. She declined to tell the Herald what information she has about Epstein or the Trumps, or others associated with them. But she did say she has damaging information.
Amanda Ungaro, a Brazilian former model, has leveled fresh accusations about first lady Melania Trump and alleged ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein during an interview that published Saturday.
Towards the end of the interview, Ungaro stated that while Melania never threatened her directly, the first lady "knows that I witnessed highly compromising interactions" over the two decades she was married to Paolo Zampolli, President Donald Trump's former business partner and current Special Envoy for Global Partnerships.
"Melania felt threatened, and while she did not threaten me directly, she knows that I witnessed highly compromising interactions over the course of 20 years," Ungaro said. "She does not know the full extent of what I know—for I lived with Paolo for 20 years."
She did not specify what those interactions might be, but when asked if she would testify before the House Oversight Committee, Ungaro said: "Absolutely."
If her Tweets prompted Melania' public remarks, it will be interesting to see what happens next. Constanza Pérez Z., Hannah Slack, Sebastián Casse, Elías Camhaji and Daniele Grasso (EL PAIS) do a deep dive into The Epstein Files:
The relationships the financier maintained with elites multiplied after his 2008 sentence: in at least 65 cases, their last contact with the magnate came after his prison term. Among others, the tech executive and one-time right-hand man of Donald Trump, Elon Musk, wrote to Epstein in 2012 to coordinate a visit to the island, though Musk says that the trip never came to pass. In 2018 and 2019, Epstein sought advice from the renowned linguist Noam Chomsky, who he had met in 2015, on how to rehabilitate his public image after the abuse charges. “What the vultures dearly want is public response, which then provides a public opening for an onslaught of venomous attacks, many from just publicity seekers or cranks of all sorts,” the philosopher told the magnate.
Some of the relationships lasted for decades. Larry Summers, former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, met Epstein when Summers was the president of Harvard, their friendship blossoming after the financier made a $6.5 million donation to the university. Richard Axel, a Nobel Prize winner in medicine in 2004, resigned from his multiple positions at Columbia University after it came to light that the two had been linked since the 1980s.
Epstein met supermodel Naomi Campbell around 2001, and she invited him to her exclusive 40th birthday party in Cannes in 2010 and sent emails asking to see him in 2015, although her lawyers say that she didn’t know that he had been accused of sexual assault.
Some of the public figures that have been linked to the case say they met the pedophile long before the first allegations against him were made public, like former U.S. president Bill Clinton, who took several trips in Epstein’s private jet between 2002 and 2003. It’s a similar case with Donald Trump, who also appears in the database, met the pedophile in the ‘80s and was a very close friend of his. Trump, who has been implicated in the scandal through photos he took with the multi-millionaire and allegations of abuse that authorities did not follow up on, says that their relationship ended in 2004.
The publication of the Epstein files has led to an avalanche of consequences in more than a dozen countries, which are now investigating whether any of his abuses took place in their territory. Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Turkey, Slovakia and Ireland are among them. At least 16 people related to Epstein have faced some kind of legal consequence, like judicial proceedings and lawsuits. Another 56 have encountered either personal or professional impacts.
In the United Kingdom, the multi-millionaire’s close relationship with the former Prince Andrew — and Andrew’s ex-wife, Sarah Ferguson — created one of the worse crises in the history of the British royal family. Meanwhile, the friendship between the pedophile and Britain’s former ambassador to the United States, Peter Mandelson, put the Keir Starmer’s administration on the ropes. Two members of the Labour government have even resigned, despite having no connection whatsoever to Epstein: Morgan McSweeney, chief of staff, and Tim Allan, director of communications.
The pedophile’s tentacles also extended to France, where the Paris prosecutor’s office opened an investigation into former Minister of Culture Jack Lang, his daughter Caroline and diplomat Fabrice Aidan, whose case is also being examined by the Foreign Affairs Ministry. Lang was forced to resign as the director of the Institut du Monde Arabe (Arab World Institute), a public organization based in Paris, as a result of his relationship with Epstein.
Yes, Chump did meet Epstein in the 80s and began hanging around with him back then. EL PAIS is correct. Too many outlets want to pretend as though it was much later than that; however, the two had a friendship which lasted decades. That lie is not unlike Todd Blanche's lies that there's no evidence to prosecute anyone for the Epstein crimes. Camaron Stevenson (COURIER NEWSROOM) reports:
The total amount paid by financial institutions, royals, and close associates of Jeffrey Epstein to keep their involvement in his international sex trafficking empire out of civil court has now surpassed $1 billion. At the same time, the Trump administration continues to insist there is no evidence to warrant any criminal investigation.
This week, Bank of America began the process of paying $72.5 million to roughly 75 women abused by Epstein, as part of a March 2026 settlement. Like other institutions, it admitted no wrongdoing. The settlement follows similar agreements by competitors JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank, both accused of ignoring Epstein’s blatantly illegal activity because it benefited them financially.
“Rather than merely providing routine banking services to Epstein, Bank of America went far beyond what a non-complicit bank would have done and instead assisted Epstein in setting up the necessary financial structure to operate his sex-trafficking venture,” the lawsuit alleged. “Instead of behaving as an ordinary provider of routine banking services, Bank of America instead assisted Epstein in covering up his past crimes and committing new ones.”
Suspicious Activity Reports filed by banks accused of enabling Epstein’s money laundering and human trafficking are riddled with the names of his alleged accomplices — Darren Indyke, Richard Kahn, Harry Beller, and Lesley Groff, among others. To date, the investigation into Epstein’s multi-billion dollar enterprise has resulted in just two arrests and one conviction.
“So the big misconception is that the Department of Justice or me has ever said ‘case closed,’” acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche told NBC News. “What we have said is that from the information that we have within the Epstein files, we do not have a case against anybody.”
While the DOJ does have an Epstein-related investigation underway, Blanche’s characterization of his department’s inquiry appears to be intentionally misleading. In reality, the DOJ closed its full investigation into Epstein’s sex trafficking operation in July 2025, and opened a narrower one five months later focused on finding ties between Epstein and Trump’s political opponents.
Omitted from the Trump administration’s current investigation are many of the individuals and institutions tied to Epstein’s operation who have collectively paid more than $1 billion to insist they were unaware of his well-documented and highly publicized illicit activity. In each lawsuit, as soon as trial dates were set, defendants moved quickly to instead settle for a hefty sum.
Litigation against major banks snowballed over time, after the $150 million fine given to Deutsche Bank in 2020 set the precedent for a successful case. Since then, victims have pursued cases one by one, securing settlements from Deutsche Bank in 2023, JPMorgan in 2024, and Bank of America in 2026. A separate lawsuit filed in October 2025 against Bank of New York Mellon, another longtime financial institution of Epstein’s, is ongoing.
Todd Blanche appears unwilling or unable to do his job a acting Attorney General. That job also involves public apologies to those that the Justice Dept screws over. Chelsie Napiza (INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS TIMES) reports:
Epstein survivor Juliette Bryant has publicly accused the US Department of Justice of publishing an alleged nude photograph of her, taken by Jeffrey Epstein without her consent, as part of its mass release of files from the convicted sex offender's investigation.
In a post to X on 17 April 2026, Bryant, who says she was trafficked by Epstein from South Africa in 2002, wrote: 'DOJ! SHARING NAKED PHOTOS OF ME THAT I HAVE NEVER SEEN. TAKEN BY EPSTEIN. DOJ IS SUPPOSED TO PROTECT VICTIMS NOT HURT THEM.'
Bryant, who was compensated through the Epstein Victims' Compensation Programme in 2020 and reached a separate settlement with JP Morgan Chase in 2023, has been one of the most publicly visible survivors throughout the file release process. Her latest allegation is among the most direct: that the agency tasked with delivering justice for Epstein's victims has itself become an instrument of their further violation.
Juliette Bryant is only one person that Blanche owes an apology to. And an explanation. Every page released was supposed to have been vetted. But somehow they released a new photo of one of the survivors? Blanche is acting Attorney General, he should be making a public apology.
He won't. He couldn't even own the 'mix up' when the Justice Dept refused to release statements on three interviews they had with Jane Doe who accused Chump of assault when she was a teenager. Marilyn W. Thompson and Mitchell Black (POST & COURIER) report:
The FBI had a heads-up that the former Hilton Head woman might have explosive charges. On July 8, 2019, a call came into a tip line the FBI set up after arresting Epstein on sex trafficking charges. William F. Sweeney Jr., then the assistant director-in-charge of the FBI’s New York field office, had urged women who believed they were Epstein’s victims to call.
One person reported that she had knowledge of a friend who claimed to have been sexually assaulted by both Epstein and Trump as a teenager after randomly meeting Epstein on Hilton Head. The tipster’s call was logged into FBI files, and records of it were later made public in such a way that the caller’s identity was exposed.
An FBI internal memo circulated last year included notes that used the caller’s first name and indicated that she had been charged in a criminal case in South Carolina. The Post and Courier discovered her full name by reviewing the archived case, which had been dismissed. She has declined to speak to The Post and Courier.
The DOJ has said it corrected any errors as soon as it learned of them, and it eventually redacted the caller’s first name.
The alleged victim then called the hotline two days later on July 10, 2019, records show.
An FBI employee recorded her initial tip and sent a file to the Seattle Field Office, asking agents there to interview the woman. Referring cases to field offices was common as calls poured in, saving time and money from having agents fly around the country, according to former FBI agents.
The downside was that field agents were not as familiar with the Epstein investigation, which was based in New York and involved a dedicated team of prosecutors and FBI agents. Investigators there had interviewed dozens of potential witnesses and resurrected files from Epstein’s state conviction in Florida in 2008 for soliciting prostitution of a minor.
The employee referring the case to Seattle asked agents to contact the Epstein team before arranging a sit-down interview. It is unclear if they did so.
Seattle agents conducted their first interview on July 24, 2019. The alleged victim discussed how Epstein lured her to a villa at Sea Pines resort for a babysitting gig, and then plied her with drugs and alcohol before repeatedly abusing her. The victim ended the interview without describing her alleged encounter with Trump.
Within the coming weeks, agents formalized handwritten notes into an interview summary. As is standard practice, that report offered no opinions about her credibility.
Donald Chump was Epstein's friend and Ghislaine Maxwell's friend. That's why Todd Blanche met with Maxwell last summer and why Ghislaine was moved to a Club Fed type prison. Maxwell is planning her release, waiting for it. At THE NEW HAMPSHIRE UNION LEADER, Rachel Cohen notes:
David Oscar Markus, an attorney for Ghislaine Maxwell, plans to eventually ask President Donald Trump to pardon her.
In an interview with Politico released Friday, Markus said it is “no secret” that Maxwell — the only convicted co-conspirator of Jeffrey Epstein — “obviously wants clemency.” But he acknowledged that he does not believe “now is the best time to do it, with everything going on,” appearing to reference how the Department of Justice’s handling of files tied to the late convicted sex offender continues to remain a major news story.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), a member of the Senate Budget Committee, questioned Russell Vought, Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), about President Trump’s Fiscal Year 2027 proposed budget and its eye-popping 42% increase in defense spending. Padilla highlighted the absurdity of the unprecedented proposal, particularly at a moment when Vought and this Administration refuse to tell the American people how much the unauthorized, unconstitutional war in Iran is costing taxpayers on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis.
“The public has seen this proposal for what it is. It is not a significant investment in health care. It is not a significant investment in housing. It is not a significant investment in energy assistance. It is not a significant investment in disaster preparedness. It is not a significant investment in job training,” said Senator Padilla. “It is a huge spike in defense spending.”
Padilla further hammered Vought on why he didn’t take the opportunity during his testimony in the House yesterday to encourage House Republicans to pass the Senate’s unanimous legislation to fund all elements of the Department of Homeland Security except for ICE and Border Patrol.
Earlier this month, Padilla released a statement on President Trump’s FY 2027 budget proposal, calling on Congress to reject it and “fight for one that reflects our values, not the whims of Donald Trump.”
Video of Padilla’s full questioning is available here.
A full transcript of Padilla’s questioning is below.
Full transcript:
PADILLA: Mr. Vought, several of us have recognized the $1.5 trillion increase in proposed spending for the Department of Defense. When that number first came out—that proposed budget first came out—to recognize a 42% increase, it didn’t just raise eyebrows, I think it raised alarm bells for a lot of people. Not going to, at this moment, get into a debate of defense spending versus non-defense spending and the historical balance we’ve tried to maintain, but just that 42% increase, $1.5 trillion, seems like a whole lot of money for someone who has a track record of talking about fiscal responsibility and concern about the deficit. As I’ve tracked, not just your testimony in the House yesterday but through public reporting, I understand you’ve tried to justify it by [saying] “it’s meant for significant paradigm shifting investment.” I think you used that language earlier today in this hearing, and that “for the industrial base to double and triple capabilities and build more facilities, cost has to be booked in the first year.” Is that still accurate? Then logic would tell me that if we are booking these costs in the first year, then we should anticipate significant reductions in your proposed budgets and needs in the next fiscal year and the fiscal year after that. Is that what we should anticipate for future budgets?
VOUGHT: This is viewed as one-time increase of this level. I don’t expect all of the defense levels into the future to be at this level.
PADILLA: So we would be able to count on significant reductions in your proposed budget next year and the year after that?
VOUGHT: I’m saying that we have not built that into the budget and it was meant to be a one-time, seize-the-moment, pay for what we can [to] ensure that we have people that are driving the best deals possible at the Department of War — what kind of deals can they secure if they have the money there. That’s where this was. I’m not going to speak to next year’s budget process other than to say that’s been our intent.
PADILLA: For somebody who really claims to pay attention a lot to dollars and cents, it sounds like very vague and unconclusive. Speaking of your testimony in front of the House yesterday, did you take the opportunity to urge House members, particularly House Republicans, to pass the bill that’s been passed twice unanimously by the Senate to fund TSA, pay those employees, to fund FEMA, pay those employees, fund the Coast Guard, pay those employees, fund CISA, pay those employees? Yes or no?
VOUGHT: Senator, you all shut the government down, the whole government down, and then you shut DHS down for a month.
PADILLA: The Senate has passed this bill twice on a unanimous basis.
VOUGHT: After a month, after a shutdown.
PADILLA: Did you take the opportunity to encourage the House to pass it, yes or no?
VOUGHT: Senator, of all those lines — yes, I would encourage the House to pass it — but all of those TSA lines are as a result of Senate Democrats’ shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security. I think the American people need to know that.
PADILLA: It’s not a Democratic shutdown, it’s a House Republican shutdown. We have a pathway forward and you had a golden opportunity yesterday and you didn’t take it.
Now, moving forward. As my colleagues have recognized, and every time we talk about the annual proposed budget, we talk about it being a statement of our values and our priorities. The public has seen this proposal for what it is. It is not a significant investment in health care. It is not a significant investment in housing. It is not a significant investment in energy assistance. It is not a significant investment in disaster preparedness. It is not a significant investment in job training.
It is a huge spike in defense spending. Now, some people, they’re trying to give us the benefit of the doubt, said “well, whether we like it or not, because we know it’s not authorized, but there’s this war in Iran that the President has dragged us into.” Maybe that would justify the big increase in spending, yet you refuse to give specific numbers. You refused yesterday in front of the House and you’re refusing here today to provide specific costs as to what this war is costing us on a
daily, weekly, or monthly basis and going.
We’d expect so much more from the head of OMB. It sounds like, it seems like you’re not taking this job seriously to stay on top of the dollars, let alone this being a complete abandonment of a promise that the Administration supposedly made to the American people to bring down costs. The cost of housing is still high. The cost of groceries is growing. The price at the pump that people are paying is still continuing to spike because of this unauthorized war. That’s not a question, that’s just my conclusion.
I do have one more question, though. When you were coming through for confirmation, several of us here raised questions and concerns about your prior statements—[an] objective you seem to have had to put federal employees into trauma. You remember those statements. You guys got off to a great start. Between DOGE experiments last year, funding freezes, layoffs, pushing people to retirement, the relocation of agencies — making it harder for people who wanted to stay working in departments and agencies that they love — the elimination of certain departments. There’s 350,000 fewer federal employees today, and those that remain, a good chunk of them are worried whether they may be next. What grade do you give yourself in successfully putting federal employees into trauma?
VOUGHT: I reject the premise of your question other than to say I’ll going to let the President of the United States grade my performance.
PADILLA: If the President asked you what grade you would give yourself, what would you say?
VOUGHT: I’m going to let the President of the United States grade my performance, Senator. Thank you.
PADILLA: We’re going to grade this performance in November real quick. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
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