Friday, March 27, 2026

The Snapshot

Friday, March 27, 2026.  Chump's illegal war of choice is harming the economy while exposing him as an idiot who has no idea what he's doing or how to fix it, Kristi's Corey got fired from the US government this week but, through March 31st, they can still travel on a private plane on the taxpayers' dime, Chump's friend Jeffrey Epstein continues to remain in the news cycle, and much more.



The war in Iran will lead to a surge in inflation this year, as the closure of the Strait of Hormuz pushes up prices for oil, gas and other commodities, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said on Thursday.

The inflation rate in the United States will average 4.2 percent this year, more than 1 percentage point higher than the group’s previous forecast, made late last year, the Paris-based organization said. Across the Group of 20 nations, inflation is forecast to average 4 percent this year, 1.2 percentage points higher than previously expected.


The war in the Middle East continued to weigh on the U.S. housing market, as mortgage rates climbed for the fourth week in a row, squeezing Americans already struggling with high housing costs.

The average 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage rate climbed to 6.38 percent, according to the mortgage-financing giant Freddie Mac, up from 6.22 percent the week before and the highest level since the first week of September.

That rate is still significantly below its peak of 7.79 percent in October 2023. Until the war started, rates had been gradually declining, falling below 6 percent in the last week of February. The drop in rates had offered hope that more prospective buyers would enter the market, but rates have since marched steadily higher.

Along with the financial cost, there's also the cost in human lives.   13 US service members have been killed and at least 200 injured.  At least 1500 Iranians have been killed as well.  Because there was no real planning for this war so many developments have arisen -- ones that should have been planned for if you're going to war.  That does include the concerns now on the part of the US government regarding the Strait of Hormuz.  (Malaysia states the Iranian government has given it permission to utilize the shipping lane.) 


The Iraqi government on Wednesday accused the United States of attacking a clinic on a military base in western Anbar province, killing seven members of the Iraqi military and injuring 13. The incident could strain relations between the two nations amid the war in neighboring Iran.
The airstrike constituted “heinous aggression,” to which Iraq reserved “the right to respond by all available means,” said Sabah al-Numan, a spokesman for the commander of Iraq’s armed forces. It “undermines the relationship between the peoples of Iraq and the United States of America,” he added.

The U.S. denied targeting a clinic but did not provide details. “We’re aware of the reports. U.S. forces did not target a medical clinic in Iraq,” Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins, a spokesman for Central Command, which oversees U.S. operations in the region, said Wednesday.

The incident may further complicate the dynamic between Washington and Baghdad. The U.S. military operates from installations within Iraq, including a strategic air base located northwest of where the strikes occurred. The Iraqi government has for years publicly said that it wanted U.S. forces to withdraw from the country, though it has relied on American troops in a shared fight against Islamic State militants in the region.

Jessie Williams (INDEPENDENT) notes, "Two people have been killed in Abu Dhabi after Iran launched a fresh barrage of missiles during its ongoing conflict with the US and Israel.  Another three people were injured in the attacks on the Emirati capital when debris from an intercepted missile fell, the emirate’s media office said."  


This morning, Ben (MEIDASTOUCH NEWS) notes Chump's lies about negotiations.




Donald Chump did not make a case to the American people.  He did not address the American people.  He taped a video that he posted to his social media in the dead of night.  He has not made the case for this war.  Can he?  Apparently, he cannot and that's why he's refused to make the case.  


Senior Republicans have gone public with a stinging rebuke of the Trump administration for keeping Congress in the dark over its Iran war strategy.

The salvo from Rep. Mike Rogers, 67, of Alabama—chair of the House Armed Services Committee and one of Trump’s most stalwart congressional backers of the strikes on Iran—is the starkest indication yet of an emerging divide within the party over the now four-week conflict, as NOTUS reported.

“We want to know more about what’s going on, what the options are, and why they’re being considered,” Rogers told reporters on Wednesday. “And we’re just not getting enough answers on those questions.”
His comments came after a weekly behind-closed-doors session for senior House and Senate defense lawmakers on Wednesday.

Rogers said he was asking not for sensitive operational specifics—those he understood were off-limits—but for some basic sense of direction. “We just wanted them to tell us what’s the plan, and we didn’t get any answers,” he said.


Senate Lindsey Graham is said to have spoken to Benjamin Netanyahu, prime minister of Israel, and coached him on how to approach Chump to get him to go to war.  March 7th, David McAfee (RAW STORY) noted:


Republican U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina has been exposed by the Wall Street Journal for "coaching" a foreign leader on how to influence Donald Trump.

The WSJ ahead of the weekend published a story called, "Lindsey Graham's Quest to Sell Trump on Striking Iran." In that piece, there is a nugget about the senator engaging in a campaign to help Netanyahu to persuade Trump to launch an Iran war.

"To help make the case on Iran, Graham traveled several times to Israel in recent weeks, meeting with members of the country's intelligence agency," the Journal reported Friday.

Graham is quoted in the article as saying, "They'll tell me things our own government won't tell me."

The report further states, "He spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, coaching him on how to lobby the president for action. Netanyahu showed the president intelligence that persuaded Trump to go ahead, Graham said."

McAfee quotes some people objecting to what Lindsey did and they're right to object, but let's be clear on what happened.  Lindsey is not a private citizen.  He is a US senator and has been one for 23 years and counting.  A member of the US government, who took an oath to the Constitution, collaborated with the leader of another nation on how to trick Donald Chump into going along with the foreign leader's plans to start a war.  Since the war started, Lindsey has become rabid and calling for killings.  There is some pushback against him from his own party.   Sophie Brams (THE HILL) notes:


Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) issued an indirect plea to President Trump on Wednesday to stop Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) from advising on the conflict with Iran, as the senator presses for a more aggressive approach to the war.

“I want President Trump to take Lindsey Graham out of the Situation Room,” Mace told CNN’s “Laura Coates Live.”
[. . .]
Mace argued that Graham has not “thought through or war gamed the consequences” of an operation on Kharg Island, which some have asserted would likely require putting American troops on the ground.

“Has he thought through what the Houthis are going to do? Has he thought through where Hezbollah is?” she said, also warning about Iranian retaliation that could further disrupt the economy.



Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.) suggested Wednesday that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) should have less access to President Trump as the conflict with Iran persists.

“I absolutely think he should have his Oval Office credentials revoked,” Cammack told Migrant Insider’s Pablo ManrĂ­quez as she departed the Capitol.




My deepest sympathies lie with the Iranian people, whose hearts are torn in many directions. Many long for freedom and dignity, yet they remain wary of the long history of Western imperial intervention across the world, including their own country.

The Iranian people who took to the streets in recent years did not call for one form of domination to replace another. They demanded an end to oppression in all its forms, not the beginning of a new round under the Western thumb. Nor did they want change at any cost.
At every step, history teaches us – these promises of freedom offered by the West are never fulfilled.

The reason is simple. The freedom of others is simply not on the Western agenda, no matter its public rhetoric. Imperialism of this nature does not want freedom; it wants control, domination, power and profit.

On March 4, as bombs were falling around him in Tehran, Mohamad Maljoo, an Iranian dissident, was finally able to connect to the internet. He wrote on his Telegram channel: “Those who claim that one can rain fire on the body of Iran in the name of striking the Islamic Republic while imagining that the people will remain unharmed either do not understand the reality of war or deliberately choose to ignore it. Bombs do not discriminate. Destruction does not operate selectively.”

The truth of his warning echoes from Palestine to Iran: “Life does not flourish in the shadow of oppression. Nor does it grow beneath the rubble of bombs.”


And what do the American people think?  Steven Shepard and Andrew Daniller of The Pew Research Center note a new poll:


Weeks into the U.S. military campaign against Iran, majorities of Americans say striking that country was the wrong decision and disapprove of President Donald Trump’s handling of the conflict.

About six-in-ten Americans (61%) disapprove of Trump’s handling of the conflict, while 37% approve.
The new Pew Research Center survey of 3,524 U.S. adults, conducted March 16-22, also finds a similar balance of opinion on whether the initial decision to use military force was right (38%) or wrong (59%).

And by nearly two-to-one, more say the military action is not going well (45%) than say it is going extremely or very well (25%).


Tomorrow, No Kings Protests will take place across the country.  Rachel Maddow noted this on Monday on MS NOW.


THE BULWARK noted the protests last night.


David Pakman noted the Saturday protests.


Robert Reich notes te protests.



Protests will be taking place across the country and you can visit the No Kings website to find a protest in your area. 



Immigration?  Donald Chump's war on immigrants is one of the things fueling the No Kings protests.  And for good reason.  Chump and ICE have been lawless liars.   Chloe Atkins (NBC NEWS) reports:


The Trump administration admitted in a court filing that it had erroneously relied on an ICE memo to justify arrests at immigration courthouses as part of an ongoing federal case brought by groups seeking to block the tactic.

Federal prosecutors said Tuesday that they had used the memo, titled “2025 ICE Guidance,” to defend the Trump administration’s deployment of ICE agents at courthouses, which led to numerous arrests of immigrants attending hearings.
The memo indicated that "ICE officers or agents may conduct civil immigration enforcement actions in or near courthouses when they have credible information" that a targeted individual would be "present at a specific location.”

But, the Department of Justice said in the court filing, the memo “does not and has never applied to civil immigration enforcement actions in or near” immigration courts.



The DOJ threw ICE under the bus for "agency attorney error," a "material mistaken statement of fact" repeatedly cited in briefs that undermines a "core" defense of civil arrests at or near the executive branch's immigration courthouses.

U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton, once the SEC chairman during President Donald Trump's first term, submitted a letter to U.S. District Judge P. Kevin Castel on Tuesday to "regrettably" inform the jurist that he issued a ruling in September based on false information from the government defendants.
"We write respectfully and regrettably to correct a material mistaken statement of fact that the Government made to the Court and Plaintiffs. Specifically, this morning, counsel from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement informed the undersigned of the following: the memorandum entitled Civil Immigration Enforcement Actions in or Near Courthouses, dated May 27, 2025 – which the Government relied on in presenting its arguments in this case and referred to as the '2025 ICE Guidance' – does not and has never applied to civil immigration enforcement actions in or near Executive Office for Immigration Review immigration courts," the letter said, acknowledging that a do-over will be needed to decide the plaintiffs' claims "on the merits."


And a change in the Secretary of Homeland Security hasn't changed much so far.  Isabel van Brugen (DAILY BEAST) reports:

Healthcare workers in Michigan warned of a “chilling effect” as patients increasingly stay away from hospitals and clinics amid a rise in ICE agents showing up at medical facilities.

President Donald Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) goons are increasingly showing up in and around the state’s hospitals and clinics, healthcare providers and immigration advocates said during a press conference Tuesday, Bridge Michigan reported.

It follows the Trump administration’s rollback last year of prior protections that limited enforcement in so-called “sensitive locations.”
Dr. Lauren Snyder, a family physician in Michigan, said she’s having to monitor for what she described as a “basic fear of safety” during routine check-ups at her office, and adjust to the presence of ICE agents at her workplace.

“They are here,” she said.

The Michigan Immigrant Rights Center and the ACLU of Michigan held a briefing as they released new guidance to more than 400 hospitals and providers statewide in response to the rising ICE encounters. The 12-page document outlined how facilities should respond to law enforcement activity.


ICE was hard on a lot of people.  It was hard on immigrants, it was hard on those perceived as immigrants, it was hard families and friends.  So when Kristi Noem rightly lost her job as Secretary of Homeland Security, there was some relief that someone was paying for the illegal actions and the cruelty.  Kristi had been traveling in her airplanes with her man Corey Lewandowski -- her alleged boyfriend -- and now Corey has been fired.  Laura Esposito (DAILY BEAST) reports:

Corey Lewandowski was fired from the Trump administration after he was spotted jetting off on a tropical getaway with his alleged lover, ousted Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.

A White House official and three sources close to the Trump administration confirmed Lewandowski’s ousting to the New York Post—Donald Trump’s favorite newspaper—after the special government employee was spotted with Noem, 54, in balmy Guyana, where temperatures ranged from 75°F to 83°F.

The final decision on Lewandowski’s future as a special government employee, where he served as Noem’s de facto chief of staff, reportedly came on Tuesday or Wednesday.
[. . .]
In Guyana, photos show the alleged couple meeting government and corporate officials.

The business meeting in the tropical country marked the first such public outing for Noem in her new role as Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas—a position created by Donald Trump after booting her from DHS and replacing her with former MAGA Senator Markwayne Mullin.
Lewandowski’s presence in Guyana was made public by the U.S. Embassy in Guyana on Wednesday, which shared several photos on X from the trip.



The photos marked the first time Noem was seen in public as she assumed her new role as Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas, a new position created by the Trump administration.

It remains unclear whether the recent firing will impact Lewandowski's ability to travel with Noem, who still enjoys exclusive government perks.
[. . .]
After persisting for more than four years, rumors over the affair peaked earlier this month when Noem refused to deny the affair while testifying under oath before a Senate committee.

Lewandowski is married to Allison Hardy, whom he met when he was in ninth grade and with whom he has four children. Noem married Byron Noem in 1992, and they have three children.


Photos of Noem’s visit to Guyana with Lewandowski sparked backlash online on Wednesday.

Meghan McCain, the daughter of the late Senator John McCain, asked on X, “GIRL WHAT IS YOU DOING?”

Billy Binion, a reporter for the libertarian Reason magazine, wrote on X, “Why are my taxpayer dollars funding Corey Lewandowski's travel to Guyana? How is that remotely acceptable?”


Chump's administration continues to waste money.  And on that, Simon Lewis and Ted Hesson (REUTERS) noted:


Noem, who continued to travel on a DHS jet with top aide Corey Lewandowski at her side, met Ecuadorean President Daniel Noboa on Wednesday, who awarded her an order of merit.

The former congresswoman and governor of South Dakota, who arrived in Washington in January 2025 as one of Trump's most prominent loyalists, now reports not to the president but to Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau as special envoy to the Shield of the Americas, according to a Trump official who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity to discuss internal operations.

Noem is expected to return to the United States later on Wednesday and is not anticipated to retain access to DHS aircraft afterward, the official said.

The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Noem's new role. Asked about Noem's use of the government plane and whether DHS officials had staffed the trip, an agency spokesperson said: "We are not going to comment on the whereabouts of our plane or DHS staff."


"We are not going to comment on the whereabouts of our plane or DHS staff."  Because they don't believe that they have to answer to the people.  Kristi's been allowed to break every rule there is including not supervising someone you're sleeping with.  Chump is a chump, an idiot and a buffoon. And this refusal of a federal agency to answer questions?  It's a motivating factor for people to turn out tomorrow and note that we have No Kings in the United States and that are government is supposed to serve us and be responsive to us.



Turning to Donald Chump's friend of so many years, the late Jeffrey Epstein.  The survivors of his abuse want justice.  Joe Sommerlad (INDEPENDENT) reports that Victoria Derbyshire spoke with five Epstein survivors on BBC NEWSNIGHT Wednesday:

All of the women interviewed said their experiences with Epstein began with them giving him a paid massage and escalated into sexual assault.

The group was also unanimous in their belief that Epstein did not take his own life in August 2019. They maintained that the personal arrogance he displayed in their presence indicated he always believed he would get away with his crimes.

Another victim, Joanna Harrison, who had never previously come forward but had felt “forced” to do so after her name appeared in the recently-released Epstein files unredacted by mistake, said: “It’s not normal to see your abuser’s face every day for six years on TV, hear their name, you walk in a store and you see him on a magazine.

“There was once, I even went to my mailbox, and there was a flyer with his face on it in my mailbox and that was devastating for me. And so it just kind of gets to a point where you’re being suffocated, and you need to breathe, and I feel this is my way of trying to breathe.”


Anna Betts (GUARDIAN) reports on another interview that aired Thursday on THE SHADOW SESSIONS podcast:


After casting her vote for Donald Trump in 2024 in hopes that he would bring transparency around the Jeffrey Epstein case, Epstein survivor Jena Lisa Jones said in an interview this week that she now fears “we’re not going to get justice in all of this”.

“I wanted my day in court,” said Jones, who has said she was abused by Epstein when she was 14, in an interview on the Shadow Sessions podcast that aired on Thursday morning. “I didn’t get that, and we were so close to it, it really got ripped from us, and then after [Epstein] passed, everything just went into a circus show.”
Jones said she backed Trump in the 2024 election because of his promises to release the files related to Epstein – who died in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal charges of sex-trafficking minors – and his network.
“Trump ran his whole freakin’ election on the release of these freakin’ files,” she said. “And it sparked it back all up again, gave us hope, gave me hope at least.

“He runs his campaign on this, and he runs it really, really hard to the point that a lot of us voted for him,” she added.

However, after the election, Jones said that she felt a shift.

“As soon as he gets in, we started pushing for the release of the files, and now it’s a ‘Democratic hoax’,” she said, referring to remarks Trump made in the fall in which he dismissed some calls to the release additional Epstein files as a Democratic “hoax”.

Meanwhile, questions remain regarding Epstein's final hours and the hours after his death, the immediate hours.  Isabelle Khurshudyan (CNN) reports: 


In the years since disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein was found dead from what was ruled a suicide in his prison cell on August 10, 2019, conspiracy theories have abounded about whether the convicted sex offender actually killed himself.

That speculation is likely to get new life now that Tova Noel, one of the prison guards on duty the night of Epstein’s death, has been asked to testify before the House Oversight Committee. Her testimony had been scheduled for Thursday but has been postponed due to scheduling issues.

[. . .]


The materials released in the files have only raised more questions, including new details about cash deposits Noel made in the months surrounding Epstein’s death. The files also show Noel Googled “latest on Epstein in jail” less than an hour before his body was found in his jail cell at around 6:30 a.m.

The files also include allegations from an inmate who reported that prison officials were shredding documents relating to Epstein in the days after his death.

In 2019, both Noel and Thomas were charged with conspiracy and falsifying records indicating they had checked on Epstein every 30 minutes as required that night.
Both were fired, but the federal criminal charges were later dropped under the terms of a deferred prosecution agreement that required community service and cooperation with a Justice Department inspector general review of the circumstances surrounding Epstein’s death.


Pam Bondi's refused to comply with the law passed requiring the release of the government's Epstein files.  She slow walked them and then only released about half.  She has been subpoenaed to testify before the House Oversight Committee.   THE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS offers:


Yet the nation's top law enforcement official has already signaled that she has no intention of complying with Congress' order, with Democrats walking out of a meeting with her Wednesday after she indicated that she would not abide by the subpoena.
There seems to be some confusion here; just because she leads the Justice Department does not mean that Bondi gets to decide what the law is or what constitutes compliance with subpoenas. She may be shocked to learn this, but her staff are not the only ones that have the capacity to conduct investigations in our government of checks and balances.

Once again, we must wonder what exactly is in the remaining and unredacted files that Bondi and the rest of the administration are willing to go to immense lengths, including unlawful ones, to prevent their release.

Of course, we all know broadly what this is about: it has to do with the man at the top. Trump was a longtime pal of Epstein's and features prominently in the files. This is the one story that seems to have really shaken the faith of the MAGA faithful, who once upon a time believed that Trump was a kind of savior that would finally shed light on the trafficking ring.

No matter how Trump tries to spin things now, his followers feel betrayed that he is so clearly attempting to protect his own self interest here. If Trump thinks even that loss of confidence is worth keeping the contents confidential in perpetuity, then all the more reason for lawmakers to zealously pursue full compliance with the law requiring total transparency.


Let's wind down with this from Senator Patty Murray's office:

Washington, D.C. — Today, Senator Patty Murray, Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, issued the following statement on funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

“Democrats have been clear for weeks: there is absolutely no reason that TSA agents’ paychecks should be held hostage to Republicans’ demands to provide another blank check for ICE and Border Patrol—and it is just plain wrong that their pay has been held up this long. But finally, Republicans have relented, and we are now on track to fund the areas we agree on and get TSA agents paid, get our airports moving again, and fund important disaster relief and cybersecurity work.

“This is very good news for the TSA agents who’ve been working without pay and all the families who are looking forward to spring break travel.

“But it is a shame that instead of working with Democrats to land the plane on several common-sense reforms to ICE and Border Patrol that the White House had already agreed to, Republicans walked away from constructive conversations and ultimately rejected some basic steps to reform these agencies. I will keep fighting to secure real, meaningful steps to help rein in these rogue agencies—we just need Republicans to join us.

“Because the American people spoke up and because Democrats stood their ground and stood united, we have already forced changes to the way this administration is conducting immigration enforcement, and we have rejected the ridiculous false choice that the only way to prevent chaos at our airports is by cutting another blank check for President Trump and Stephen Miller. Speaking up matters. We’ve got to keep fighting—and demanding the accountability the American people deserve. That’s exactly what I’ll keep doing.”

The funding bill released and passed by the Senate tonight mirrors the bill that Senator Murray introduced on March 5—and that Democrats have repeatedly tried to pass through unanimous consent, but that Republicans have blocked on each occasion.

The bill funds all of the Department of Homeland Security, except for ICE and Border Patrol, which receive no new appropriations in the bill. It includes necessary “start-up” language after a lapse of appropriations, guarantees backpay to workers who went without pay during the shutdown, and retains the new accountability measures included in the legislation introduced in January.

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