Ben covers the news of Chump's conceding to Tehran in the latest version of a deal.
Three months after President Trump launched war on Iran, his seemingly haphazard approach to the conflict is bewildering allies at home and abroad as he veers between diplomatic dealing, military strikes and increasingly far-fetched ideas.
It is possible that Mr. Trump is near a breakthrough in the form of what both sides call an interim agreement that would reopen the Strait of Hormuz and begin detailed talks on Iran’s nuclear program. But U.S. officials said on Thursday that Mr. Trump had not yet signed off on the agreement, and several others like it have fallen apart.
Now let's turn to Chump's war on the economy.
Though
con man Chump would love to believe the country believes him when he
blames inflation on Joe Biden, that's not the case. Groceries and gas
and energy are all much more expensive over a year and a half into
Chump's reign than they were under Joe. In fact, Alicia Wallace (CNN) notes inflation is at a three year high. Economic professors D. Brian Blank and Brandy Hadley (THE CONVERSATION) explain:
Americans don’t need a press release to know that inflation is rising. Gasoline is above $4 per gallon amid the ongoing conflict in the Middle East and closure of the Strait of Hormuz, and the release of key price data on May 28, 2026, underscores why policymakers are worried these pressures could spread into the broader economy.
The
report offered a mixed but still uncomfortable picture. The
month-to-month rise was softer than expected, but the change year over
year still points to concern: a 3.8% jump from a year earlier, the
fastest pace since 2021, and a less volatile index that excludes food
and energy up 3.3%.
This increase suggests
inflation isn’t limited to gasoline. Housing, utilities and recreational
spending are also keeping underlying inflation elevated, even as other
data shows a slowing economy and weaker income growth.
Yeah
and it's all happening under Chump. And it was his tariffs that first
wrecked the economy and his war of choice on Iran that destroyed the
economy. No pinning this on Joe Biden. The economy was recovering
(from COVID and Chump's first term) under Joe. No blaming this on Joe.
It's Donald Chump's economy. No one else is to blame. Adam Lynch has some bad news for Chump:
Economist
and public policy scholar Justin Wolfers says Republicans and President
Donald Trump have not only set themselves up for a brutal midterm, but
voters will probably be holding them accountable for high inflation and
fuel prices for years.
“There is a bomb that
has hit the world economy and to any of us who watch the economy,
there's no question that the economy today is different than it was in
February,” Wolfers told podcaster Jacqueline Cole.
The
damage Trump and the GOP have done doesn’t amount to a dip or a drop.
It’s much bigger than that — and more permanent. Wolfers described it
more as a “crater” resulting from Trump’s bomb
“Okay,
so we'll start with the oil prices. Oil prices today are higher than
they were — they’re about $100 a barrel. They were $60, but I can see
oil price futures, which tells me how long oil prices will be higher
than they would otherwise be and the answer is ‘for several years,’”
said Wolfers. “It could be that they think this conflict goes on for
longer or they think that this conflict is laying the ground for future
conflicts. But get used to it. Energy is more expensive and will be for a
while.”
The
combination of forces bearing down on Trump’s economy spells trouble
for Republicans in the upcoming midterms. The president’s economic approval rating is at an all-time low. Gas prices have been stuck above $4 per gallon for weeks due to the war with Iran, according to AAA. Yields on long-term government debt
and mortgage rates have spiked as inflation rose — and are now being
further stoked by rising energy costs and mounting piles of government
debt.
Chump elected to go to war on Iran with the belief that it would be a two week or so operation. Yesterday ended three months of ongoing war. And it's still not over. He thought he could do this on the quick and that it wouldn't harm GOP chances in the midterms.. Monday, it will be June. Midterms take place at the start of November.
"He's walking away with a nuclear Iran," Joe Scarborough declared today on MS NOW's MORNING JOE.
Jake Sullivan points out that every new 'deal' Chump comes up with gives Iran a little more. And its continuation, the war's continuation, just continues to kill the US economy.
There's a call for North Carolina lawmakers to do more to help college graduates as they enter the workforce.
ABC News finds that the unemployment rate for recent college graduates sits at 5.6 percent, which is notably higher than the overall unemployment rate.
The New York Federal Reserve calls the job market for grads this year "challenging."
Annabelle Rosse received her diploma from NC State earlier this month and wants to call Raleigh home.
Her immediate family is planning to move overseas and she'll be here on her own building a life.
Rosse says she's struggled to find a job in this economy.
"It's
definitely a little bit shaky. Definitely a bit unstable in terms of
there's not a lot of opportunities out there and if there are, they want
you to have a multitude of experiences," she said.
At FORBES, Bill Conerly notes the failing consumer confidence, "The
Index of Consumer Sentiment, has been published by the University of
Michigan since 1952, but has never been as low as the May 2026 level.
Both of the major subcomponents, current conditions and expected
conditions, fell."
Again, no blaming Joe Biden for this. It's all on Chump. Steve Benen (MS NOW) points out:
Donald
Trump and his allies, on a nearly daily basis, tell the public the
current American economy is the “greatest” ever. During one of JD
Vance’s recent Fox News appearances, the vice president celebrated the “Trump boom.” A week earlier, Peter Navarro, a leading White House voice on trade and economic policy, told Fox News that the U.S. economy was “perfect.”
Widespread
polling shows broad dissatisfaction with current economic conditions.
Team Trump seems to think incessant happy talk can change public
attitudes.
The problem for White House
officials isn’t just that their rhetoric appears wildly out of touch,
it’s also that reality keeps getting in the way of their claims.
This not what Americans were told to expect. As recently as August, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confidently predicted to a national television audience that the U.S. economy is “really going to pick up in the fourth quarter” of 2025. It did not, and as the spring of 2026 continues, Americans are still waiting for conditions to really “pick up.”
Similarly, in early September, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said during a CNBC interview that Americans will see robust growth “six months from now.”
That was eight months ago. He’s still wrong.
What’s more, earlier this year, Lutnick predicted,
“I think we’re going to grow more than 5% GDP this quarter.” As of
Thursday morning, we now know that growth in the first quarter was
actually 1.6% — roughly a third of his prediction.
In other news, David Edwards (RAW STORY) reports
that Chump has filed another lawsuit against the press. This time?
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL and he's filing it (again) over their coverage
of Jeffrey Epstein and Chump -- Two roll dogs in love and lust:
President
Donald Trump has refiled his $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the
Wall Street Journal — and to bolster his case, he's leaning on a key
witness interview conducted by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, the
president's own former personal attorney.
In
an amended complaint filed Tuesday in federal court in Miami, Trump's
lawyers cited a July 2025 interview with Ghislaine Maxwell as evidence
that the Journal's reporting was false. What the filing doesn't mention
is that the interview was conducted by Blanche who was serving as Deputy
Attorney General at the time and has since been elevated to Acting
Attorney General — and who granted Maxwell limited immunity to
participate.
The lawsuit centers on a July 2025
Wall Street Journal story reporting that a bawdy birthday letter bearing
Trump's name was included in a 2003 album Maxwell compiled to celebrate
Jeffrey Epstein's 50th birthday. The letter, the Journal reported,
featured a typewritten note framed by a hand-drawn outline of a naked
woman, with a signature mimicking pubic hair. Trump has denied writing
it.
The amended complaint argues Maxwell's
statements to federal investigators undercut the Journal's reporting.
"Maxwell has stated, subject to penalty of perjury for lying to a
federal officer, that she did not remember President Trump submitting a
letter for Epstein's 50th birthday," the filing reads.
Penalty of perjury for lying? Maxwell lied throughout the interview with Blanche. November 18, Brian Bennett (TIME) reported:
On
a Friday night in August, a top Trump official announced on X that he
was releasing the transcript of his interview with Jeffrey Epstein
conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell. "Except for the names of victims, every
word is included. Nothing removed. Nothing hidden," wrote Todd Blanche,
Trump’s Deputy Attorney General and former personal lawyer.
The
transcript, which showed Maxwell saying she didn’t recall ever seeing
Donald Trump at Epstein’s house, did little to quell the furor among
Trump's base around allegations that it was covering up damaging
information on Epstein. Now the interview and the Justice Department’s
actions around it are coming under renewed scrutiny in the wake of
emails released by Congress last week, including one from 2011 in which
Epstein apparently told Maxwell that Trump had previously spent “hours”
at his house.
Maxwell is serving 20 years in prison for conspiring with Epstein to sexually abuse minors over the course of a decade. Blanche interviewed
Maxwell in Tallahassee, Fl., on July 24 and 25. Days after the
interview, Maxwell was transferred from a low-security federal prison in
Florida to an all-women minimum-security prison northeast of Houston
called Federal Prison Camp Bryan. The Department of Justice did not
respond to a request for comment for this story.
[. . .]
During
the interview, Blanche asked Maxwell about Trump and Epstein’s
relationship. “I don't think they were close friends or I certainly
never witnessed the President in any of -- I don't recall ever seeing
him in his house, for instance,” Maxwell said. “I actually never saw the
President in any type of massage setting. I never witnessed the
President in any inappropriate setting in any way,” she said. Maxwell
had been told she could face consequences if she lied. During the
interview, Blanche told Maxwell if she says something that’s not true,
“we can bring a prosecution against you for what's called false
statements.”
In an email released last week
and dated April 2, 2011, Epstein appears to have written to Maxwell: “i
want you to realize that that dog that hasn’t barked is trump. [VICTIM]
spent hours at my house with him .. he has never once been mentioned.”
Maxwell replied: “I have been thinking about that…”
During
the interview, Maxwell repeatedly claims that she did not introduce
Epstein to any minors over the course of their relationship together.
Some attorneys have also questioned the validity of Maxwell’s words, as
she has in the past been charged with perjury for lying under oath.
[. . .]
She
also claimed that neither she nor Epstein ever poached workers from
Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, which was down the street from Epstein’s Palm
Beach home.
“I’ve never recruited a masseuse
from Mar-a-Lago,” Maxwell said, despite the accusations of the late
Virginia Giuffre, who claims she was recruited at 16 by Maxwell from
working at Mar-a-Lago and then later paid to have sex with Prince
Andrew. Though Giuffre was never named in the interview, Maxwell denies
Giuffre’s claims.
Maxwell’s
words contradict those of the President, though, who told reporters
late last month that Epstein “stole” young women who worked at his
Mar-a-Lago beach club spa, which led to Trump banning Epstein from his
estate.
[. . .]
The
family of Virginia Giuffre said they were “outraged” about the
interview and that the information directly contradicts her conviction
of child sex trafficking.
“During DAG Todd
Blanche’s bizarre interview, [Maxwell] is never challenged about her
court-proven lies, providing her a platform to rewrite history,” the
family said in a statement released on Saturday. “This travesty of
injustice entirely invalidates the experiences of the many brave
survivors who put their safety, security, and lives on the line to
ensure [Maxwell’s] conviction, including our sister.”
A
federal judge dismissed the lawsuit last month, ruling he couldn’t
claim the paper published the story with actual malice. Then Trump
refiled and ran into another stumbling block on May 13, when U.S.
District Judge Darrin Gayles ruled
that he couldn’t use the discovery process in his claims that the
newspaper defamed him. In the new lawsuit, Trump’s lawyers wrote that
the Journal’s reporters tried to “falsely pass off as fact that
President Trump, in 2003, wrote, drew, and signed this letter” but
“failed to show proof.”
Trump’s reasoning for the lawsuit is hollow, especially considering that the House Oversight Committee included
the birthday book, complete with the drawing from Trump, in a September
release of Epstein materials from his estate. It’s more likely that
Trump is trying to shake down the Journal for a big settlement and
intimidate its owners, the Murdoch family, into favorable coverage.
It’s
a pattern that Trump has followed against other media companies, which
ended up forking over money that supposedly is going to Trump’s presidential library. Trump also has pending defamation lawsuits against The New York Times for $15 billion and the BBC for $10 billion. It seems that he won’t stop until he’s made them pay for reporting that he doesn’t like.
Still on Epstein but let's bring in Pam da Bimbo Bondi.
NEWS NATION's Diana Falzone (at THE HILL) reports:
Survivors of the disgraced financier Jeffrey
Epstein have little faith former U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s
upcoming appearance before a congressional committee will help address
any of their unanswered questions about the Justice Department’s release
of the Epstein files.
Bondi — who
was removed as attorney general earlier this year — is set to appear
before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Friday
about DOJ’s handling of the documents.
Danielle
Bensky, a 2004-2005 Epstein survivor, told NewsNation she has a list of
questions about the release, including the decision-making process
surrounding redactions.
“Why are perpetrators
and abusers redacted, when survivors’ personal information including
addresses, phone numbers, intimate details of abuse and nude photos were
released. Why was the release deadline delayed, if not for the
protection of victims? What was the point of the slow rollout? Who were
the lawyers involved in charge of redacting? The list goes on,” Bensky
said.
She told NewsNation in February she was improperly named in a release of 3.5 million documents and called the DOJ’s handling of the case “egregious.”
Bensky added that leaving her name unredacted felt like an attempt to discredit her and other victims.
That's
later today that da Bimbo Bondi is expected to appear before the House
Oversight Committee. She is no longer Attorney General -- Chump fired
her April 2nd. Life has not gone well for da Bimbo. She's currently
being treated for thyroid cancer. And she's facing a complaint. Tom Latchem (DAILY BEAST) notes:
Former U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has been hit with a damning new ethics complaint demanding she be investigated and possibly disbarred.
The
complaint was lodged on Wednesday with the Florida Bar by Peggy Quince,
78, a retired chief justice of the Florida Supreme Court, and is backed
by more than 120 judges, law professors, and attorneys.
It is their second attempt after the Florida Bar rejected an earlier bid last June,
while Bondi, 60, was still in office, on the grounds that it does not
investigate sitting federal appointees. President Donald Trump, 79,
fired her in April, removing that hurdle.
The
coalition—backed by Lawyers Defending American Democracy, the Democracy
Defenders Fund, and Lawyers for the Rule of Law—says Bondi strong-armed
DOJ lawyers into compromising their ethics or losing their jobs. “No one
lawyer is above the law,” Quince said in a statement.
Much
of the complaint zeroes in on Bondi’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein
files. It accuses Bondi of misleading the public about a supposed
“client list” she once claimed was on her desk, then bungling the
document release so badly that unredacted names, birth dates, and even
nude photos of the disgraced financier’s victims spilled out.
Lawyers
for the survivors branded one January dump “the single most egregious
violation of victim privacy in one day in United States history,” with
Virginia Canter, chief counsel at the Democracy Defenders Fund, saying,
“Lawyers have been disbarred for less.”
The
complaint also charges that Bondi waved through prosecutions lacking
probable cause against Trump’s foes—among them former FBI director James
Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose cases a
federal judge threw out in November—and against protesters swept up at
immigration raids. Comey was re-indicted in late April on a different
charge, under her replacement, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who
was formerly Trump’s personal attorney.
THE LOS ANGELES TIMES' Ben Wieder explains differences between how da Bimbo will present and respond as opposed to the way others have been required to do:
For
one, the former attorney general will not be under oath in a sworn
deposition but will provide a transcribed interview, which is voluntary.
Bondi’s interview with the committee will happen behind closed doors
with members of the committee and staff and will not be filmed. The
committee says it plans to release a transcript soon after the hearing.
And
Bondi will be represented at her interview by Assistant Atty. Gen.
Harmeet Dhillon, which legal experts say raises the prospects that the
Department of Justice could direct Bondi to not answer some questions
posed by the committee.
Former Atty. Gen.
William Barr, former President Clinton and former Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton all gave sworn depositions.
Rep.
James Comer (R-Ky.), the chair of the committee, rejected the Clintons’
offer to provide a transcribed interview, rather than sit for a
deposition, out of concern that someone giving a transcribed interview
could “refuse to answer whatever questions he wanted for whatever
reasons he wanted.”
Julie K Brown serves up some reality on why Bondi has questions to answer:
Pam Bondi has a lot of explaining to do.
In
July 2025, she and FBI Director Kash Patel announced that the Epstein
case was closed, and there was no evidence of additional crimes
committed by Epstein or others associated with him.
Case closed.
Let
me say this in another way: One of the most prolific sex offenders in
history — someone who made millions and perhaps even billions of dollars
— without any real investigation into his finances or his businesses
and associates — basically committed all this crimes all by himself.
He created a worldwide criminal syndicate in which no one was involved except for two people: him and Ghislaine Maxwell.
Even
Bondi isn’t stupid enough to believe this. She knows that, over the
decades since Epstein served jail time in his nice office in Florida
that he was still manipulating the levers of power.
Turning to Chump's corruption, Edith Olmsted (THE NEW REPUBLIC) notes:
A top White House adviser intervened to send a massive defense loan to a company linked to Donald Trump Jr., ProPublica reported Thursday.
In
November, the Pentagon announced a $620 million loan to Vulcan
Elements, a start-up manufacturer of rare earth elements. Just three
months earlier, Don Jr.’s venture capital firm 1789 Capital had
purchased a large stake in the company. When the Defense Department deal
first came together, those involved were quick to deny allegations of
political favoritism.
But in fact, the deal was reportedly the work of the White House.
The
massive loan was personally directed by Peter Navarro, a White House
adviser who is also a friend of the president’s son, according to
interviews and DOD records obtained by ProPublica. Of the many companies
being considered to receive funding, Vulcan was the only one that
garnered the attention of one of the president’s top aides, one Pentagon
official told ProPublica.
Crony corruption. Don Junior handed millions. Let's move to Robert Faturechi's PRO-PUBLICA article:
The
deal is one of many actions by the Trump administration that have
helped companies in which the Trump family holds stakes. Government
contracts and other benefits have gone to various Trump-linked
companies, prompting allegations of self-dealing by Democratic lawmakers
and good government experts. But ProPublica’s reporting on the Vulcan
loan represents the first time the awarding of a contract from a federal
agency has been directly linked to White House intervention.
The
loan was a massive financial commitment from the Pentagon in its effort
to fund companies that could help the U.S. reduce dependence on China’s
critical mineral supply chains. The deal was a dramatic win for Vulcan,
a North Carolina rare-earth magnet company launched just two years
earlier. Estimates of its valuation grew tenfold after the deal was
announced. It was also a win for Trump Jr.’s venture capital firm, which
took a stake of undisclosed size in Vulcan about three months before
the Pentagon announced the deal.
And there may be
more good news on the way for the president’s eldest son. Among other
companies under review for a Pentagon loan was a drone parts
manufacturer that Trump Jr. advises and owns a stake in, according to
one of the defense officials who spoke to ProPublica.
Navarro,
who served as trade adviser in Trump’s first term, and Trump Jr. have
formed a close bond in recent years. The president’s son visited Navarro
in prison while he served time for defying a subpoena from lawmakers
investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot. Trump Jr. was one of the
small group of people Navarro dedicated his latest book to for having
“my back when it was against the wall.” And a week before the Vulcan
deal was announced, Trump Jr. hosted Navarro — now the president’s
senior counselor for trade and manufacturing — on his streaming show,
encouraging his nearly 2 million subscribers to buy Navarro’s book. That
interview was not long after word came down from Navarro to Pentagon
staff to make the massive loan to Vulcan, one of the defense officials
involved in the deal said.
Let's wind down with this from Senator Patty Murray's office:
Government Accountability Office (GAO) announces investigation into transfer of defaulted student loan portfolio from Education Department (ED) to Treasury Department, other interagency agreements
Washington, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senators Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Ranking Member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies, received a response to their request from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), an independent government watchdog, confirming the expansion of its investigation into the Department of Education’s (ED) transfer of critical programs to other agencies through interagency agreements (IAAs), including the transfer of student loan default collections to the Department of the Treasury. Following a letter from Senators Murray, Warren, Sanders, and Baldwin, GAO previously confirmed it had initiated an investigation into ED’s transfer of grant programs for career and technical education and adult education to the Department of Labor.
“These illegal agreements jeopardize the resources students and families rely on and weaken our nation’s education system,” said Senator Murray. “The GAO’s investigation is an important step in protecting the programs that serve our students and the rights they are entitled to by law. I’ll keep fighting back to ensure our students and schools receive all the support they deserve.”
Last summer, the Trump administration formalized an IAA moving the day-to-day management of career and technical education and adult education grant programs, like Perkins V and AEFLA, from ED to the Labor Department. The Administration has since entered into nine other IAAs moving the administration of large parts of the Department of Education to other federal agencies. On February 19, the senators asked GAO to investigate the agreements’ impacts on program costs, timely access to funding, access to services, and quality of technical assistance for grantees.
On March 11, the GAO confirmed it had opened an investigation into ED’s transfer of grant programs to the Department of Labor and other agencies, writing: “GAO accepts your request as work that is within the scope of its authority.”
Now, GAO is expanding its probe. In the new letter, GAO wrote that it has initiated work in response to the lawmakers’ February request for a review of the impacts of ED’s IAAs and that it intends to initiate additional workstreams reviewing other IAAs announced by ED, including the transfer of student loan default collections from ED to the Treasury Department.
The full text of the letter is available HERE.
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The following sites -- plus Trina's "White Wine-Garlic Pasta with Scallops in the Kitchen" and Mike's "Chump and his love slaves Prissy Pete and Miss Sassy" -- updated:
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Chump's make up is not working6 hours ago
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