David Corn's Blog, page 2

Donald Trump: The Boy Who Cried Hoax

So often when Donald Trump is cornered, he manages to escape thanks to a simple tactic: He cries hoax. With his latest troubles—caused by his administration’s declaration that there’s nothing new to see or investigate regarding deceased pedophile and sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein—Trump is once again screaming “hoax.” Yet it is not quite doing the trick.

One of Trump’s brilliant moves as a demagogic politician was to train his supporters to believe that he was the target of conspiratorial forces and “fake news.” So whenever he was hit by a critical news report or investigation, he could explain it away by declaring that he was a victim of evil forces that aimed to destroy the nation.

This began in the earliest days of his first presidency. As the press, the FBI, and congressional committees investigated Moscow’s attack on the 2016 election and interactions between Trump’s campaign and Russia, Trump tried to swat all that away by declaring it was a “hoax” and a “witch hunt”—a product of “fake news.” No matter that the intelligence community, a special counsel, and congressional committees repeatedly confirmed the basic facts of that scandal—Vladimir Putin launched a covert operation to try to help Trump win, and Trump and his campaign aided and abetted that attack by repeatedly echoing Putin’s false denials—Trump consistently repeated these catchphrases. “Russia, Russia, Russia” became the derisive nickname he deployed to obliterate a significant reality of the 2016 election.

It worked.

His devotees fully embraced his characterization. Right-wing media constantly cast the Russia investigation as a scheme orchestrated by Democrats, something called the Deep State, and mainstream media. For Trumpland, it was indeed a “hoax.” For instance, Kash Patel, now Trump’s FBI director, has routinely asserted that the Russia inquiry was “the greatest political scandal” in US history, describing it as a con job entirely cooked up by spooks, Dems, and journalists. He has gone so far as to claim absurdly that Russia did not intervene in the 2016 election.

Once Trump established this Russia hoax narrative, he found he could apply it to other jams. When he was impeached for the first time for having threatened to withhold weapons from Ukraine unless its president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, launched an investigation of Joe Biden, Trump called this affair a “hoax,” comparing it to “Russia, Russia, Russia.” It was also a “witch hunt,” a “scam,” and a “sham.” Once more, Trump was the victim of diabolical plotting. During the impeachment hearings, Trump’s Republican defenders tried to deflect from the topic at hand by tossing out conspiracy theories about the Russia investigation.

When Trump lost his re-election bid in 2020, it was, in his view, another “hoax.” The Deep State—along with China, Venezuela, Dominion Voting Systems, the media, Italian satellite operators, and election workers in Atlanta—had rigged the election. Trump’s assaults on the news media for covering up the purported theft of the election were a callback to his “Russia, Russia, Russia” rhetoric.

After the insurrectionist January 6 riot that Trump incited, as the House moved toward a second impeachment of Trump, he again hurled the same charge: “The impeachment hoax is a continuation of the greatest and most vicious witch hunt in the history of our country.” For Trump, every new political or legal threat he faced was an extension of the vicious and underhanded war against him that began with the Russia investigation.

When the FBI raided his Mar-a-Lago residence in search of classified documents Trump took with him when he left the White House, his spokesman declared, “The Democrats have spent seven years fabricating hoaxes and witch hunts against President Trump, and the recent unprecedented and unnecessary raid is just another example of exactly that.” Trump called the prosecution that ended with him being convicted of 34 felony counts a “scam” and a “sham.” And E. Jean Carroll’s lawsuit accusing Trump of sexual assault? “It is a hoax and a lie just like all the other hoaxes that have been played on me for the past seven years,” Trump said in a deposition. At her one debate with Trump during the 2024 election, Kamala Harris slammed Trump for having said there were “very fine people on both sides” following the 2017 rally in Charlottesville organized by white supremacists that became violent; two days later, Trump called this the “Charlottesville hoax.”

In each of these episodes, the hoax strategy succeeded. At least with his people. MAGA World stood by him, and the right-wing media embraced his false accusations. So much so he won his way back to the White House.

Now he’s facing a tsunami of outrage and criticism from Republicans and MAGA champions for sitting on Epstein material that they assume would bolster their long-running QAnon-ish conspiracy theories. And Trump, yet again, is turning to his standby sidestep. He’s calling this a “hoax.”

As the anger swelled among his flock this past weekend, on his social media platform, Trump compared the fuss to the “Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax.” He complained that “selfish people” were trying to “hurt” his “PERFECT Administration” over Epstein. He asserted that the Epstein files were “written by Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration.” That is, he was advancing another conspiracy theory: His enemies had concocted fake Epstein files. That didn’t make much sense. But Trump was trying to rope this latest hullabaloo into his long-running “hoax” narrative.

That post did not stem the fury from the right. Many replies to it were from self-declared Trump backers who expressed dismay that Trump was not keeping what they believed was a promise to tell all about Epstein. MAGA influencers called for firing Attorney General Pam Bondi. Congressional Republicans urged the release of files from the Epstein case.

On Wednesday, Trump tried again with another post. He once more proclaimed the whole Epstein thing was a hoax akin to “Russia, Russia, Russia.” He brayed, “these Scams and Hoaxes are all the Democrats are good at – It’s all they have… Their new SCAM is what we will forever call the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax, and my PAST supporters have bought into this ‘bullshit,’ hook, line, and sinker. They haven’t learned their lesson, and probably never will, even after being conned by the Lunatic Left for 8 long years.” He pulled out his classic pushback: the “Fake News” and Democrats were orchestrating “the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax.”

Talking to reporters in the Oval Office later in the day, Trump reiterated his new mantra: “I know it’s a hoax. It’s started by Democrats. It’s been run by the Democrats for four year….Some stupid Republicans and foolish Republicans fall into the net… I call it the Epstein hoax.”

Factcheck: Trump was not telling the truth. Most of the noise about the Epstein files has arisen not from Democrats but from MAGA—people who Trump now denounces as idiots and “past supporters.” And Trump, no surprise, did not specify what he means by “Jeffrey Epstein Hoax.” There’s no question that his Justice Department and FBI released a memo declaring that Epstein had committed suicide and that there were no new and undisclosed revelations—and no so-called clients list—within the files of his two criminal cases. Where’s the hoax? It looked as if Trump believed that after all these years of pushing the “hoax” button, he could do so once again as a getaway. Drop the H-word and—presto!—his believers will fall in line.

But the MAGA crowd wants more. After years of the right promoting conspiracy theories that demonized Democrats and elites as cannibals and pedophilic globalists—see Pizzagate and QAnon—Trumpers expected the Trump administration to finally produce the goods with presumed evidence from the Epstein case. Patel, Donald Trump Jr., deputy FBI director Dan Bongino, and other MAGA leaders had long demanded the Epstein files be released. Trump himself had indicated he would do that if elected to a second term.

Instead, nothing has been revealed, and Trump is saying it’s time to move on and castigating his fans who feel betrayed. That’s not playing well. There’s no telling yet if his familiar move of yelling “hoax” will work this time. His steady shouts of “hoax” over the years have themselves been a long-running hoax. Usually, his voters responded as he wished. This time they may see the real hoax.

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Trump’s IRS Gives Christian Nationalists a Big Boost

My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this beautiful Sunday morning, I stand behind this pulpit to share with you—and the tens of thousands of other believers who are watching—a troubling and painful fact: Congresswoman Smith is a tool of Satan. She has sided with him on issue after issue. She is an impediment to the establishment of a godly government run in accordance with the words of our Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. Brothers and sisters, you know I do not say this lightly, but she must be cast out. The Bible commands all of us to marshal our time and talents and resources and do whatever is possible to remove her from office, and to elect T.R. Jones, a righteous man and soldier for Christ. You must align your vote with the Holy War that is underway for nothing less than this nation’s future. And the urgency is such that it is time to stretch, to give even more than you think you can by donating to the Jones campaign the maximum of $3,500—a small price to pay for receiving God’s blessing. But your commitment to the Lord does not end there. You must also contribute to the Say-No-to-Satan PAC, a Christ-loving political action committee that can accept unlimited—yes, unlimited—donations. Much as your love for Jesus Christ our Savior is unlimited. You can show what that means right now. There’s a QR code on the envelope in your pew and on the screen…

This week, the IRS submitted a court filing in a lawsuit filed by two Texas churches and an association of Christian broadcasters that declared that churches and other religious entities can now endorse political candidates, thus ending a decades-old prohibition on political activity for tax-exempt houses of worship.

As Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer, a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, explained to the New York Times, “It basically tells churches of all denominations and sects that you’re free to support candidates from the pulpit. It also says to all candidates and parties, ‘Hey, time to recruit some churches.’”

Churches have long been allowed to participate in politics in various ways. Clergy could address political issues from the pulpit, and churches could distribute so-called educational material related to elections (such as the voting guides that the Moral Majority and other fundamentalist outfits have produced comparing candidates, which functioned as de facto endorsements). Inviting candidates to speak to congregations has been a popular action within Black churches. But churches were explicitly not allowed to back the election of a specific candidate. Support had to be delivered with a nod and a wink.

This constraint was part of a broader ban on campaigning by non-profits, which has been in place since 1954—a prohibition known as the Johnson Amendment, named after former President Lyndon Johnson, who introduced this provision as a senator. But now, under the new IRS guidance, houses of worship are freed from this rule, which still applies to other tax-exempt organizations. In this filing, the agency said that a church directing its flock whom to vote for or against is akin to a private matter, like “a family discussion concerning candidates.”

It’s easy to imagine what this IRS decision will yield.

Endorsements from church leaders will not remain between clergy and their congregants—especially those made by prominent ministers, priests, rabbis, and imams whose sermons and statements are amplified by television and radio broadcasts, live-streaming, podcasts, and other platforms—and these thumbs-ups will be covered as major news events. Videos and accounts of these endorsements will become political fodder, deployed in ads, campaign literature, and social media posts. Candidates and their campaigns will search and compete for religious leaders who can direct money and votes their way. Presumably, PACs and campaigns could even put religious leaders on the payroll—or find indirect methods to compensate churches and clergy for their valuable endorsements. (Will there be pay-to-pray scandals?)

A bishop delivering a sermon that endorses or denigrates a candidate will generate significant news. The media will report on it. Clips will fly out. Ads will be cut. The clout of religious leaders of various denominations will increase, as campaigns jockey to nab the most influential clergy. Men and women of the cloth will find themselves pressured to yield to the worldly temptations and shenanigans of politics.

This will be a bonanza for many religious outfits and movements, including Christian nationalism. Its adherents, as they aim to transform government into an extension of right-wing Christianity, often proclaim that only those who follow their ultra-conservative faith deserve to be in positions of authority. Christian nationalist pastors are now free to directly use the power of the pulpit to advocate for the election of far-right candidates who share their theocratic desires. They can fundraise for these candidates. Their blessings can be political gold.

Other denominations and sects can do the same. Many Black church leaders have long signaled to their congregations which candidates warranted their support. Now they can make it official. Yet the core mission of Christian nationalists is to win over the government and make the United States a Christian country. With this IRS filing, these fanatics have won the proverbial lottery.

Half a century ago, leaders of the New Right concocted a plan to recruit evangelical Christians and Catholics—many of whom had voted Democratic up to then. They succeeded wildly in politicizing religion by weaponizing wedge issues—abortion, gay rights, school prayer, and pornography—to draw many of these voters into the Republican coalition. Ever since, right-wing Christian leaders have held an influential role in American politics, and the votes of this bloc have fueled GOP victories. Each time Trump—hardly the exemplar of Christ-like behavior—ran for president, he pocketed about 80 percent of the white evangelical Christian vote, his most reliable group of supporters.

This IRS decision will undoubtedly super-charge the participation of religious leaders in American elections. For Christian nationalists, it’s a godsend.

A July 4th Reflection

The below article first appeared in David Corn’s newsletter, Our Land. The newsletter comes out twice a week (most of the time) and provides behind-the-scenes stories and articles about politics, media, and culture. Subscribing costs just $5 a month—but you can sign up for a free 30-day trial.

As the nation celebrates its 249th birthday, it’s hard not to wonder about the future of the American experiment. Two-and-a-half centuries ago, a collection of disparate colonies overcame regional differences to forge a nation. Sure, on slavery, the most divisive issue of the time, they punted. And the mighty rhetoric of freedom and liberty was deployed to the advantage of wealthy male landowners. Nevertheless, despite their differences, they banded together beneath a banner of ideals for a common cause.

These days, the people in charge do not seem keen on bolstering our communality. President Trump and his MAGA cult are propelled more by animus and retribution—let’s crush the libs!—than by a desire to strengthen the bonds among the diverse citizens of this large nation. In a highly symbolic act that did not receive sufficient attention, Trump declined to attend the funeral of former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, who had been assassinated by a Trump supporter who opposed abortion rights and gay rights. The day of that memorial ceremony, Trump golfed with Republican leaders and posted on social media, “WHY ARE THE DEMOCRATS ALWAYS ROOTING AGAINST AMERICA???” Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance spends much of his time snarkily trolling progressives and Democrats on social media.

This pair evinces absolutely no interest in bridging gaps, healing wounds—much less in serving as role models of comity and decency. At every opportunity, they choose bombast and insult over discourse and debate. They seek to divide and conquer, and they define their politics by identifying and pummeling enemies. In one conversation I had with Barack Obama when he was president, he remarked, “I am the president of all Americans, including those who did not vote for me. I have to consider what’s best for them, even the ones who don’t like me.” That’s not how Trump and Vance see it.

Trump has no recognition of the public interest, only his own self-interest. Which is how we ended up with the atrocious legislation passed by congressional Republicans this week. As we have heard repeatedly, it gives to the wealthy (handing them huge tax breaks) and robs from the poor (stripping millions of Americans of their health care coverage and slashing food assistance for children). Even Republicans who initially opposed these draconian provisions—including those who represent huge numbers of Medicaid recipients, as well as other constituents who will be severely harmed by this legislation—allowed themselves to be bullied by Trump and his MAGA henchmen into voting for it. The measure is estimated to expand the deficit by $3.3 trillion or so over 10 years (and maybe more). It will pour $100 billion into ICE and border enforcement, bolstering the burgeoning police state that the Trump administration is creating to deport law-abiding and hard-working residents. (For comparison’s sake, the annual FBI budget is $11.4 billion.)

The message to many Americans is this: We will pick your pocket to deport people who work the jobs you’d rather not.

Besides breathtaking cruelty, this bill features an absurd internal logic. Trump claimed that undocumented immigrants must be rounded up for the sake of American prosperity. Yet to pay for this operation, he and his Republican minions will decrease after-tax income for some Americans within the lower 20 percent and snatch health insurance from millions—and cause fiscal instability. Moreover, expelling millions of migrants will likely trigger a labor shortage that will spur a rise in prices. The message to many Americans is this: We will pick your pocket to deport people who work the jobs you’d rather not.

In a much-noticed social media post, Vance declared that the impact of the cuts in Medicaid and nutrition assistance of the bill were “immaterial compared to the ICE money and immigration enforcement provisions.” As if persecuting immigrants will offset the human suffering this bill yields. Try telling that to a parent whose child goes hungry or an adult child whose parent loses his or her care for dementia. Or a low-income family that will have to get by with several hundred dollars less a year.

The gleeful malice of the past few months has been nauseating. Trump, Elon Musk, and their crew relished demolishing USAID, not pausing for a nanosecond to consider the dire consequences. A new study concludes that from 2001 to 2021 USAID programs prevented 92 million deaths in 133 nations. This included 25 million deaths caused by HIV/AIDS, 11 million from diarrhea diseases, 8 million from malaria, and 5 million from tuberculosis. The study forecasts that the annihilation of USAID will lead to 14 million deaths in the next five years. Yet Trump, Musk, and others have cheered the demise of this agency. How can plutocrats be so mean? The USAID budget last year was a mere 0.3 percent of the total federal budget.

Down the line, Trump and his MAGA band have expressed little concern or empathy for those clobbered by their vengeful policies. They are smashing the scientific research infrastructure of the nation and assaulting universities. They are demonizing public servants. They are eviscerating laws that protect our water and air—the common resources we share—and sacrificing our children’s future by unplugging programs that address climate change. All while recklessly vilifying their fellow Americans who disagree with these moves as enemies of the nation. Hatred is the currency of their realm—and crypto is the currency of their corruption.

This is a far cry from the originators of the union who were forced to overcome differences to achieve independence and place America, with all its ills, on the path to becoming one of the most dynamic forces in human history.

So on July 4, 2025, we can celebrate the imperfect start of our national enterprise, despite the dark turn it has taken. As we do so—and as we contend with the discouraging and disturbing developments of the moment—we ought to keep in mind a fundamental fact: There are more of us than them. More Americans reject the cruelty of Trump’s mass deportation crusade than accept it. More Americans oppose the profoundly unfair billionaires-enriching-Medicaid-slashing-deficit-busting tax-and-spending mega-bill than embrace it. More Americans disdain the Trump presidency than hail it.

The question at hand, all these years after Thomas Jefferson provided the original pitch deck for American democracy, is whether the majority can triumph. Can it overcome institutional barriers, disinformation, and distraction and find a path toward responsible governance that addresses the shared interests and values of the citizenry? We all may have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But it demands great work—eternal vigilance, you might say—to protect that right so we all can put it to good use.

Enjoy your burgers, hot dogs, tofu sausages, and ice cream.

Here are the Declaration of Independence’s Grievances Against King George III. Many Apply to Trump.

When Thomas Jefferson was writing the Declaration of Independence in the weeks leading up July 4, 1776, he wanted to not only rely on just high-falutin enlightenment ideals to justify the case for separation from Great Britain. His aim was also to present a slam-dunk indictment of King George III—to prove that the royal was a “tyrant” and that he and Parliament had forfeited their right to rule the Americans by breaking their own laws and trampling on the rights of their people. This is why about half of the Declaration is a list of 27 specific grievances lodged against the King and his regime.

Two hundred and forty-nine years later, many of these grievances apply to the reign of Donald Trump. Here’s a look at how Trump stacks up against the Mad King.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

This grievance refers to the King refusing to approve laws passed by the colonies. Trump used his veto power a few times during his first presidency and has not had to do so this year. But he’s shown his disregard for Congress by simply ignoring existing laws. The Elon Musk-led DOGE attack on the government violated numerous laws—including those governing privacy and data. Trump paid no heed to the War Powers Resolution when he launched a military attack on Iran. He illegally impounded funds approved by Congress. He has misinterpreted the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to claim powers not afforded the president. Legal experts have said that Trump’s firing of inspectors general and commissioners of independent government commissions is illegal—though some of these cases are still being litigated in the courts. He has also issued an executive order to end birthright citizenship, which is enshrined in the Constitution.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

Trump’s Medicaid-cutting-deficit-busting-billionaires-enriching tax-and-spending megabill tried to prevent state legislatures from passing specific laws with a provision that would ban states from enacting measures to regulate AI for the next 10 years. (That piece was stripped out on Tuesday.) He threatened to withhold federal funds from the state of Maine if it did not ban transgender girls from participating in women’s sports, which, according to Gov. Janet Mills, would entail the state violating state law.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

Trump threatened to deny disaster relief to California if it did not abandon its legislative independence and change its water policies to Trump’s liking. He also threatened to cut off federal funding to New York City, should Democrat Zohran Mamdani win the mayoral race and enact laws or policies Trump opposes.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

The so-called Department of Government Efficiency has moved to relocate federal agencies and repurpose their office buildings (including the US Institute of Peace and the National Science Foundation) to make life uncomfortable for employees and officials. Watch out, Speaker Mike Johnson. 

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

Trump has not yet tried to dissolve any local governments. But Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem did state that the purpose of sending Marines and National Guard troops to Los Angeles was to “liberate” the city from its elected representatives.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

Trump has not attempted to cancel elections. Yet.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

Trump has revealed a plan to denaturalize certain American citizens. He has imposed a new ban on migration from many nations and undone the immigration status of hundreds of thousands of people legally living in the United States. Basically, he has been attempting to keep out people out—especially from nations he calls “shithole countries.” His administration has also taken steps to block foreign students from attending American colleges and universities.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

For his final report, special counsel Robert Mueller produced a 187-page volume detailing Trump’s efforts to obstruct justice during the Russia investigation. More recently, the Trump administration has faced contempt proceedings for not abiding by court orders. 

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

Those who serve Trump’s will are more likely to be nominated to the federal bench. See Emil Bove. 

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

See DOGE. See the new turbo-powered Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. But there are no reports yet of masked and unidentified ICE agents who “eat out” the people’s “substance.”

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

Trump ordered Marines and National Guard troops into Los Angeles, when there was no war or insurrection, without the consent of the state legislature and over the objection of the governor and local officials.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

Trump has not yet removed the military from civilian and congressional oversight. But he recently floated invoking the Insurrection Act, which would give him the power to deploy troops within the United States for the purpose of law enforcement.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

“He who saves his Country does not violate any Law,” Trump recently wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, suggesting he believes his authority supersedes the Constitution and federal laws. Trump also deported people to a gulag in El Salvador and then claimed they were under the jurisdiction of El Salvador and the United States had no ability to effectuate their return. (One of the deportees, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, was eventually returned.)

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

Don’t give him any ideas. National Guard troops sent to LA were housed in a federal building. Clearly, they needed better accommodations.

ttps://x.com/GavinNewsom/status/1932157825117208729. 

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth recently would not rule out ordering troops to shoot protesters. It was not an idle hypothetical. During the 2020 Black Lives Matter demonstrations, Trump raised the possibility of having soldiers shoot activists in the leg. His aides turned him down. Of course, he did pardon hundreds of violent January 6 rioters, though none were convicted of murder.

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

Trump proposed draconian global tariffs that in many cases would bring trade to a halt, claiming trade deficits with countries such as Lesotho were a national “emergency.”

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

Tariffs are taxes. Under the Constitution, Congress has the power to impose tariffs. There was no vote in Congress to approve these tariffs. 

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

The Trump administration has rounded up Venezuelan migrants and sent them to an infamous Salvadoran prison without affording them due process or court hearings. 

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

See above. Trump has transported people to other nations without due process—where they don’t receive trials for either real or pretended offenses. Deportees sent to the notorious CECOT prison in El Salvador were locked up without trials.

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

This was a reference to the Quebec Act of 1774, which extended Quebec’s border southward into territory claimed by American colonies and established an appointed council (instead of an elected body) to govern Quebec—which freaked out colonists, who saw this as a prelude to King George III imposing a similar form of government on the colonies. Trump has done something of the reverse. He told Canada he doesn’t recognize the US–Canada border and has said he might use “economic force” to annex Canada, threatening the United States’ second largest trading partner and most loyal ally.

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

Trump has eviscerated or tried to eviscerate the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Affordable Care Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act. He has undermined the independence of the Justice Department. He has attacked the judiciary. With the complicity of one political party, he has neutered the legislative branch. 

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has yet to suspend Congress. He hasn’t needed to. 

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has abdicated his responsibility to protect Americans by denying disaster relief to states, including Arkansas (tornadoes), North Carolina (a hurricane), West Virginia (flooding), and Washington (a windstorm).

As for “waging war,” Noem (see above) has threatened to use federal troops to take over Los Angeles. ICE agents have terrorized communities coast to coast, injuring residents. Detainees have died in ICE jails. 

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

It might not be what Thomas Jefferson had in mind, but Trump’s reversals on climate change and environmental laws and regulations will lead to rising of the seas, despoliation and erosion of our coasts, and more wildfires. All of this will threaten the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He’s clear on this one…so far. But Trump has indicated he’s open to the idea of using private military forces for his mass-deportation crusade.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He’s also clear on this.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

The second part of this grievance sounds like a comment Trump might post on Truth Social, but the first part is something he actually did—on January 6, 2021.

Dear Joe Rogan, Kash Patel Played You

Dear Joe Rogan,

I don’t know you. We’ve never met, and I am not a regular listener of your podcast. But I have the impression you are a man who does not like to be played. I regret to inform you that Kash Patel played you.

When the FBI director was on your show last month, he made multiple statements that were false or misleading. Given that you’re a proponent of truth-telling, I expect you will be troubled to learn this.

Let me start with Patel’s remarks about what he derisively calls “Russiagate.” A good chunk of your two-hour-long conversation was devoted to this topic, a personal obsession of Patel. As he has done for years, Patel presented to you and your audience a highly skewed and false narrative. “All roads lead to Russiagate,” he declared. “That’s where it all started.” He meant that his entire critique of the so-called Deep State and the supposedly corrupt Joe Biden gang stems from the Trump-Russia scandal. So it can be rather instructive to look at his claims about this foundational matter.

During the podcast, Patel gave you the “90-seconds” version of this controversy:

Can you imagine a time in the United Staes of America in the 21st century, where a political party would go overseas and acquire fake foreign intelligence from a foreign intelligence officer funded by donations to that political party in the United States of America, then take that material, package it, walk it to the FBI, literally, and say, ‘Hey, we need you to surveil the opponent of our political party who happens to be running for the president of the United States”? Then convince the FBI to go to a secret federal FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] court that I used to use to manhunt terrorists and say, ‘Hey I need you to wiretap essentially all the comms in and around Trump camp because of the material we gave you.’ And then have that FBI lie to the federal court and the judge in that warrant application, which is a felony, and intentionally remove information of innocence from that application just to get it above the threshold so the judge would sign it. That’s Russiagate.

Much in this description was inaccurate. The political party Patel was referring to—the Democrats—did not hand that opposition research to the FBI and request surveillance of Donald Trump, and the FBI did not seek to wiretap “essentially all the comms” of the Trump camp. It requested a wiretap on one former Trump campaign adviser.

But more to the point, Joe, what Patel was referring to was merely one slice of the much larger Trump-Russia affair. And this is Patel’s magic trick. It’s a diversion. He wants you and others to fixate on the issue of a search warrant and not pay attention to the bigger story: Russia attacked the 2016 election to help Trump, and Trump aided and abetted Moscow by denying this assault, thus providing cover to Vladimir Putin.

For years, Patel and other Trump allies have deflected from these basic facts by focusing solely on what’s become known as the Steele dossier and how it was used by the FBI to obtain that surveillance warrant for Carter Page, a little-known foreign policy adviser for Trump’s 2016 campaign.

As you know, the dossier was a collection of memos that Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence official and Russia counterintelligence specialist, wrote during the 2016 election on possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. Steele, who had previously worked with the FBI, was commissioned to do so by Fusion GPS, an opposition research firm that was being paid by a lawyer for the Clinton campaign to dig up material on Trump. Starting in June that year, Steele sent periodic reports to Fusion GPS that contained unconfirmed information, much of it gossip and speculation from unidentified sources about internal Russian politics and juicy but unsubstantiated tidbits on Trump and his campaign. Weeks later, Steele began sharing these documents with his FBI contact.

And this is Patel’s magic trick. It’s a diversion. He wants you and others to fixate on the issue of a search warrant and not pay attention to the bigger story: Russia attacked the 2016 election to help Trump, and Trump aided and abetted Moscow by denying this assault.

The first of these research memos alleged that Russia had been “cultivating, supporting, and assisting TRUMP for at least five years.” It noted that Trump and his inner circle had accepted “intelligence from the Kremlin” on his Democratic rivals. It claimed that Russian intelligence had compromising information on Trump that could be used to blackmail him (including what would come to be known as the “pee tape,” which supposedly showed Trump instructing prostitutes to perform a “golden showers” show in his hotel room). The report stated that the Kremlin’s cultivation of Trump included offering him real estate deals in Russia. Another of Steele’s memos cited a source saying there was a “well-developed conspiracy of co-operation” between the Trump campaign and Russia, and that Paul Manafort, the campaign chair (who had a history of working for a Russian oligarch and Moscow-friendly Ukrainian politicians) was overseeing this arrangement.

Steele’s memos remained a secret until I revealed their existence in a story I reported in Mother Jones on October 31. One of the owners of Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson, had shown me a copy of the documents and set up an interview for me with Steele, with the provision that I could not cite Steele by name. My article disclosed that a former senior intelligence officer for a Western country who specialized in Russian counterintelligence had provided the FBI with memos contending the Russian government had for years attempted to co-opt and assist Trump and that the FBI was looking into these allegations. (I did not report the details of the unsubstantiated lurid claims about Trump’s personal behavior believing that would not be fair to him.)

My story on the Steele memos received some attention, but it did not have much impact on the overall coverage of the race in the final week. (By the way, because of my reporting on the Steele documents, I’ve been pulled into some right-wing conspiracy theories about all this. If you’re interested, you can read about that here.)

Let’s back up a bit: Unknown to the public during the 2016 campaign was that in late July the FBI had opened up an investigation—dubbed Crossfire Hurricane—to determine whether Russia was trying to covertly intervene in the election and whether there had been contacts between the Trump campaign and Russians related to this. (The bureau had already been investigating the hacking of Democratic Party computers—an operation attributed to Moscow.) As part of this investigation, the FBI applied to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act federal court for a warrant to spy on Page, the Trump campaign adviser, who had had curious interactions with Russian officials during a trip to Moscow.

For those who don’t know, this was S.O.P. It’s generally tough to get a warrant for surveillance on an American citizen—as it should be. The bureau has to file an extensive application with this court to win such permission. In its application for the Page warrant, the FBI cited the Steele memos. This was an egregious mistake. The documents contained unconfirmed scuttlebutt about Page from a foreign source. And as Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz later noted in a 2019 report, the application was loaded with other errors. Nevertheless, in late October 2016, the FISA court approved the secret warrant—and would in subsequent months approve re-authorizations of this warrant.

This was FBI wrongdoing. Patel is correct about that. An FBI lawyer even pleaded guilty to doctoring an email that the bureau used to win FISA court approval to eavesdrop on Page after the 2016 campaign was over. Much of FBI misconduct regarding the application for the surveillance of Page was laid out in that 478-page report issued by Horowitz. (For those in your audience who want to do their own research, the report can be found here.) By the way, the Horowitz report noted that the Steele dossier was only used in the surveillance application regarding Page. There were no other FISA warrants sought by the FBI in this investigation.

Discussing his effort as a congressional investigator to uncover FBI malfeasance related to the Page surveillance, Patel told you, “What I had unearthed was the biggest political criminal scheme ever perpetuated by portions of the FBI leadership and other people in the intelligence community in coordination [with the media].”

Sounds like hype to me. But you be the judge.

Patel, Trump, and others have beat the drum about the FBI’s misuse of the Steele dossier to draw attention from Putin’s assault on the 2016 election and Trump’s complicity. They claim that there is nothing to the Russia “witch hunt” or “hoax”—and that the entire fuss was kicked off by the Steele dossier, which was a Democratic dirty trick. That is, the Dems orchestrated the entire “Russia, Russia, Russia” business with the Steele documents.

That’s not true. Who says so? Many sources. We can start with Horowitz. His report concluded, “We found that Crossfire Hurricane was opened for an authorized investigative purpose and with sufficient factual predication.” It also found no “documentary or testimonial evidence that political bias or improper motivation influenced…[the] decision to open Crossfire Hurricane.” In fact, his report noted that the Steele dossier had nothing to do with the FBI’s launch of the Russia investigation. That inquiry began after the FBI learned that another Trump campaign foreign policy adviser named George Papadopoulos had told an Australian diplomat that the Trump team had been informed that Moscow could assist it by anonymously releasing information damaging for Clinton.

So it wasn’t a political witch hunt engineered by the Dems. You know who else says this? Special counsel John Durham, who was appointed in 2019 by then-Attorney General Bill Barr to investigate the Russian investigation.

Durham found flaws in the probe, but he concluded that the FBI inquiry “could have been opened more appropriately as an assessment or preliminary investigation” and not a “full investigation,” as it had been. In other words, the bureau did not improperly launch this investigation but assigned it the wrong level of seriousness. Durham, too, did not report uncovering any “political bias” regarding the FBI’s investigation, though he did assail the bureau for “confirmation bias.”

Now let’s look not at the investigation but the thing itself: what happened in 2016. Several government investigations have concluded that Russia mounted a covert operation to hack and leak Democratic emails and other materials to hurt Hillary Clinton and help Trump.

Trump and Patel, though, deny this. In a recent documentary, Patel said that the the FBI and the rest of the US intelligence community that investigated Russian interference in the 2016 election “knew it didn’t exist.” For his participation in this documentary, Patel was paid $25,000 by a Ukrainian-American-Russian filmmaker who has worked on a Russian propaganda project financed by Putin’s presidential office. Joe, I wish you had asked Patel about that payment. Maybe you can next time he’s on. Here are the details.

It’s rather odd that Patel would deny Russia clandestinely intervened in the 2016 election. When he was investigating what he calls “Russiagate,” he was a Republican staffer on the GOP-run House intelligence committee, which in March 2018 released a report on the Russian attack that opened with this line: “In 2015, Russia began engaging in a covert influence campaign aimed at the U.S. presidential election. The Russian government, at the direction of President Vladimir Putin, sought to sow discord in American society and undermine our faith In the democratic process.” Yet Patel won’t acknowledge even the existence of this Russian operation. Joe, why is that? Why isn’t he—or you—pissed off that Russia messed with our election? Why is the FBI director covering for Putin?

I know you like to get to the bottom of things. In this case, that would mean spending time with the 966-page report released by the Senate intelligence committee in 2020. This is the most comprehensive account of what Russia did in 2016—and it’s bipartisan. In fact, Republican Marco Rubio, now Trump’s secretary of state, was chair of the committee when the report was released. He and other Republicans on the panel endorsed its findings. So it ain’t Democratic spin or a phony narrative cooked up by the liberal press and Deep State that hates Trump.

There’s a lot of mind-blowing stuff in this report. But here are the basics:

The Committee found that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian effort to hack computer networks and accounts affiliated with the Democratic Party and leak information damaging to Hillary Clinton and her campaign for president. Moscow’s intent was to harm the Clinton Campaign, tarnish an expected Clinton presidential administration, help the Trump Campaign after Trump became the presumptive Republican nominee, and undermine the U.S. democratic process…

While [Russian military intelligence] and WikiLeaks were releasing hacked documents, the Trump Campaign sought to maximize the impact of those leaks to aid Trump’s electoral prospects. Staff on the Trump Campaign sought advance notice about WikiLeaks releases, created messaging strategies to promote and share the materials in anticipation of and following their release, and encouraged further leaks. The Trump Campaign publicly undermined the attribution of the hack-and-leak campaign to Russia and was indifferent to whether it and WikiLeaks were furthering a Russian election interference effort.

You and your listeners ought to give those passages a good read. The committee—including such Republicans as Rubio, Tom Cotton, and John Cornyn—was saying the Russian assault was real and that Trump assisted Putin by echoing Moscow’s denial. What’s more, these Republicans were confirming that Trump had been indifferent to an attack on the United States by a foreign adversary and had even sought to exploit it.

Oh boy. I ask you, Joe: What’s worse—the FBI screwing up one FISA application or Trump helping Russia subvert an election for his own benefit? Is it a close call?

I’m guessing that about now you are thinking, “Well, what about all that talk of collusion?” Democrats and some in the media did spend a lot of time claiming that Trump colluded with Russia in this attack. Special counsel Robert Mueller, reported that he found no evidence of a criminal conspiracy between Trump’s campaign and Russia. But his report did detail extensive contacts between the campaign and Russian operatives who tried to influence the election. As Mueller testified to Congress, “We did not address ‘collusion,’ which is not a legal term.” Trump and his loyalists seized on the absence of criminal charges to claim full exoneration. That was spin.

On the issue of collusion, Joe, I would, once more, direct you to that lengthy GOP-backed bipartisan Senate intelligence committee report. Its many revelations include the disclosure that Manafort, when he was chair of Trump’s 2016 campaign, covertly met with a former business associate named Konstantin Kilimnik whom the committee characterized as a “Russian intelligence officer,” and he handed over inside campaign information.

Check out this line from the report: “Kilimnik likely served as a channel to Manafort for Russian intelligence services.” Trump’s top campaign aide hobnobbing with Russian intelligence. Isn’t that scandalous? Why does that not interest Patel?

The committee noted it had “obtained some information suggesting Kilimnik may have been connected to the [Russian intelligence’s] hack and leak operation targeting the 2016 U.S. election.” That’s big: Trump’s campaign chief was in close contact with a Russian intelligence officer who might have been tied to Putin’s covert attack on the 2016 campaign to help elect Trump. Moreover, the report reveals that the committee found “two pieces of information” that “raise the possibility” that Manafort himself was connected “to the hack-and-leak operations.” Might one call this collusion?

This was not the only possible collusion. Several government investigations, include the Senate intelligence committee’s, confirmed that in June 2016, top officials of the Trump campaign—Manafort, Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner—met in Trump Tower with a Russian intermediary after being informed she was bringing them dirt on Clinton as part of a secret Russian government effort to help Trump. The information she handed over was apparently not useful. But by agreeing to this meeting, the Trump campaign signaled to Moscow it was just fine with Russia mucking about in the election. Collusion? I dunno. But it’s certainly getting cozy with an enemy.

And consider this: After that Trump Tower meeting, when the news broke that Russians had hacked into Democratic Party computers and 20,000 pages of the pilfered material was leaked right before the party’s convention to hurt the Clinton campaign, Trump Jr. and Manafort publicly insisted that Russia had nothing to do with it. They had been informed Moscow was scheming to covertly boost Trump. Yet here they were backing up Putin’s assertion that Russia had nothing to do with the the hack-and-leak operation. They were lying to protect Russia. Collusion? If not, perhaps complicity?

Joe, if you’ve gotten this far, you’re probably tiring from all these details. I know this whole affair can seem convoluted. But for my money, it remains damn important. It’s the original sin of the Trump presidencies. And I wonder why the current FBI director, whose brief includes countering Russian covert actions targeting the United States, doesn’t seem to care that Putin screwed with an American election.

Patel calls Russiagate “the disinformation seed that started it all.” In a way, I agree. Trump’s betrayal in 2016 helped him reach the White House. Remember when WikiLeaks released John Podesta’s emails, which were hacked by Russian ops, to draw attention from Trump’s “grab ’em’ by the pussy” video? During the final weeks of the campaign, the dissemination of those swiped emails generated a ton of negative news stories for Clinton, which certainly contributed to her ultimate defeat.

Over the past nine years Trump and loyalists like Patel have done their mightiest to cover up Trump’s foul deed—his aiding of the Russian attack—pushing a competing narrative that lets Putin and Russia off scot-free.

During the podcast with Patel, you appeared to accept his version of all this at face value and expressed outrage at the FBI’s misuse of the Steele dossier: “It’s so crazy,” you said, “that someone could do something like that and a whole enormous group of people could do something like that with no repercussions….You were part of something that was one of the biggest scandals in political history. But because it was targeted toward Trump people look the other way.”

And you blasted the left:

The disturbing thing to me is how people on the left are willing to look the other way….If the federal government is doing this, and they’re doing this to someone you consider an enemy, what’s to stop them from doing this against your candidate. This is unprecedented behavior that is tolerated and coordinated with the media. That’s dangerous for the country. But people are so ideologically captured. They’re so locked into their party. By any means necessary. We gotta get Trump out. And they push that narrative so hard that they’re willing to do a very un-American thing.

I wonder if you can take a critical look at your embrace of Patel’s self-serving narrative and at the Trump gang’s unrelenting effort to hide Trump’s involvement in Russia’s assault on the United States. I know that might be tough to do. But I would love to see you have Patel back on the show after you read through those reports I cited above. He sure can sound convincing—unless you know the facts.

While I have you: Two other small things regarding your chat with Patel. At one point, he said, “We are on track to have the lowest…murder rate ever…We’re already down 20 percent from last year.” You asked him how he achieved this, and Patel explained that he was following the policy “let good cops be cops,” suggesting the Biden administration had not focused on stopping crime. I contacted the FBI and asked for statistics to back up Patel’s claim of a 20-percent decline. It responded, “The 2024 and 2025 statistics on the murder rate have not been publicly released yet.” The most recent numbers cover 2023, and those show a 11.6 drop in the murder rate. In fact, the murder rate peaked in 2020, during Covid, when Trump was president, and it has been decreasing since then. Any decline in murders is good news, but Patel made it seem as if the Trump administration had scored an unprecedented achievement, when this drop (assuming Patel’s stat is accurate) may well be part of a historical trend.

Also during the podcast, Patel brought up a claim he has many times made: that Trump “preemptively authorized” the deployment of 10,000 to 20,000 National Guard troops before January 6—and these troops were rejected by then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Washington, DC, Mayor Muriel Bowser. You seized on this to suggest these Democrats were somehow behind the riot: “So they wanted it to be chaos?” (Patel did not dispel that notion and replied, “I will leave it to you on that.”) But does it make sense that Pelosi or any other Democrat would want to cause a riot that might interfere with the certification of Biden’s electoral victory? What would be the point? In any event, the acting defense secretary at that time, Chris Miller—a Trump appointee—has testified there was no Trump order to ready military personal ahead of January 6: “I was never given any direction or order or knew of any plans of that nature,” Miller told Congress.

There were other assertions that Patel made during his time with you that could be similarly challenged or debunked. But by now you get my drift. He didn’t deserve the free ride you provided him. I realize it’s popular to blast the Deep State and portray the Biden crowd as nothing but evil and corrupt—and to depict “the media” as craven accomplices in assorted schemes to undermine Trump. This is Patel’s hymnal. But if you critically scrutinize many of his claims, you will find they don’t hold up or are not the full story. Patel deserves factchecking as much as any government official. Perhaps more so, given he’s been running a con for years, insisting the Russia scandal was not real.

You’re an influencer with a massive audience. So I hope you’ll take the time to read up on the Trump-Russia affair. You know, do your own research. There’s a ton of material. Being informed these days can take a huge amount of effort, especially when Patel and others are out there pushing disinformation. But I assume you’ll agree that whatever our differences we all believe that an accurate flow of information is what’s best for our country and necessary to ensure a sound future for American democracy.

If you want to discuss any of this, Joe, I’d be delighted. My DMs are open.

All best,

David

If you appreciate kick-ass journalism and analysis, sign up for a free trial subscription to Our Land, David Corn’s twice-a-week newsletter at davidcorn.com.

In Trump’s Wartime Reality Show, Truth Is a Casualty

Donald Trump often does not tell the truth. The intelligence community produces classified reports that are unavailable for outside evaluation. Thus, the public cannot trust what Trump and his crew say about the intelligence.

This is a fundamental problem. We cannot accept as fact what Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard or other senior administration colleagues tell us about the US military strike on Iran. It certainly caused immense damage. But what was the impact? Did it end Iran’s nuclear program or merely set it back? If the latter, is that for months, a few years, or longer? This a key question. Yet whatever Trump says about this will be suspect—as is true for most topics. His administration cannot be considered a reliable source for anything, especially military matters, for which the truth can be hazy in the best of times.

In the run-up to the bombing raid, Trump and his gang demonstrated that they were willing to play politics with intelligence. In March, Gabbard testified to Congress that Iran was not pursuing a nuclear weapons program—a finding that was included in the intelligence community’s annual worldwide threat assessment. Yet last week Trump declared that Iran was close to a nuclear weapon and that he didn’t care what Gabbard (and, by extension, the entire intelligence community) had concluded.

Gabbard quickly showed that her allegiance is to Dear Leader, not her own team, by asserting that she and Trump were on the same page. Amid Washington speculation that Trump was not happy with Gabbard, she placated him rather than represent the truth as the intelligence agencies saw it. This sent a message: The intelligence system is rigged.

Throughout this episode, Trump has conveyed—yet again—that he doesn’t care about facts.

When Hegseth, following the raid, was asked whether new intelligence had come in since Gabbard’s March testimony, he ducked the question. That seemed to mean no. On Meet the Press, Vice President JD Vance said he and Trump had faith in the intelligence assessments: “Of course we trust our intelligence community, but we also trust our instincts.”

That is, we will trash assessments that undermine our policy desires.

And as we’ve seen for a decade now, Trump is an inveterate liar, highly erratic. He indicated last Friday that he was seeking a negotiated settlement, and then he launched the attack on Saturday. On June 17, he told reporters on Air Force One, “We’re not looking for a ceasefire [in the Israel-Iran war]. I didn’t say I was looking for a ceasefire…We’re looking for a real end, not a ceasefire. Something that would be permanent, giving up entirely.” But when an uneasy ceasefire came, he hailed the development and claimed credit for it.

At one point, he urged the evacuation of Tehran, as if the United States would be bombing the city. After Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio insisted regime change was not on the agenda, Trump, in a social media post, hinted it might be. Trump also proclaimed the bombing raid resulted in the total “obliteration” of the Iranian nuclear program; Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reported the morning after only that there had been “extremely severe damage.” (On Thursday, Rafael Grossi, the head of the United Nation’s International Atomic Energy Agency said the strikes rendered the centrifuges at the Fordow site “no longer operational” but noted it would be “too much” to assert that the nuclear program was “wiped out.”)

The culture of lying that imbues Trumpworld has dangerous ramifications. The US public cannot believe statements from him and his top officials on vital national security matters, and members of Congress ought not trust the briefings they receive from this administration. (A military briefing for senators and representatives was scheduled for Thursday, but news reports noted the White House would be limiting the classified information it intended to share.) And given how the Trump crew operates, intelligence analysts ought to fear producing intelligence that contradicts Trump’s pronouncements and policies—a career killer. (During his first presidency, Trump complained mightily about intelligence reports that said Russia had continued interfering in US elections after attacking the 2016 election to help him win.)

Trump’s ever-shifting stances and false statements are a national security threat. They render him less effective as a negotiator with other nations. Allies and foes cannot rely upon his word. He often makes hollow threats. (He told Putin he had two weeks to demonstrate he was serious about ending his war against Ukraine. Putin did nothing; Trump said nothing.) And if Trump pledges to negotiate, well, maybe he won’t. Initially skeptical of attacking Iran, he reportedly changed his mind after watching Fox News segments celebrating Israel’s strikes on Tehran and encouraging US involvement.

Intelligence is often a political matter. So is war. And the Trump administration is hitting new heights in this regard. At a Pentagon press briefing Thursday morning, Hegseth started off with a long diatribe against the media, complaining it was more interested in tearing down Trump than accurately reporting the glories of the Iran assault.

Hegseth singled out reporters—including one from Fox, where he used to be a commentator—and accused them of seeking to undermine the nation. He was behaving more like a minister of propaganda than the civilian head of the military. Asked about whether Iran had removed highly enriched uranium from the Fordow facility before the bombing, he sidestepped the matter.

There’s plenty of precedent for abuse of intelligence. President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney manipulated and politicized the intelligence in the run-up to their misguided 2003 invasion of Iraq. (I co-wrote a whole book on that.) But Trump and his aides have gone much further.

The Bush-Cheney administration toiled hard to present a case for war. They cherry-picked intel, ignoring inconvenient findings. They spent months manufacturing arguments full of purported facts and conclusions from the intelligence community about Saddam Hussein’s supposed weapons of mass destruction and ties to al Qaeda. It was all bunk. But it was important to them to convince he public that they were acting rationally and responsibly on the basis of solid intelligence.

Trump felt no such obligation. He dismissed the intelligence assessments and then shifted his stance back and forth without tying it to any new intelligence. He prematurely declared the total annihilation of Iran’s nuclear program. Throughout this episode, he has conveyed—yet again—that he doesn’t care about facts. War is just another chapter in his reality-TV presidency, in which reality takes a backseat to the demands of the Trump Show.

Trump Expands His War on Truth to Iran

The below article first appeared in David Corn’s newsletter, Our Land. The newsletter comes out twice a week (most of the time) and provides behind-the-scenes stories and articles about politics, media, and culture. Subscribing costs just $5 a month—but you can sign up for a free 30-day trial.

It was hard for me to ponder Donald Trump’s attack on Iran without thinking of this:

In the immediate aftermath of the US bombing raid on Iranian nuclear facilities, a careful evaluation of the mission and its purported success was impossible because Trump and his team lie.

We can surely state—as have Democratic and Republican critics of the strike—that the assault violated both the Constitution, which hands Congress, not the president, the authority to declare war, and the War Powers Resolution of 1973, which compels the president to obtain specific authorization from Congress before launching a military strike (unless the United States is attacked) and which, unfortunately, has often been breached by Republican and Democratic presidents.

We can also acknowledge there’s no way to judge the full results of a military action so quickly. Even if the US knocked out these nuclear sites, we can’t know what the consequences will be. “Cry ‘havoc!’ and let slip the dogs of war,” Shakespeare wrote. The 2003 invasion of Iraq looked like a success until it didn’t—and years of chaos and civil war ensued that consumed the lives of about 4,500 American troops and an estimated 200,000 Iraqi civilians. The 2001 invasion of Afghanistan routed the Taliban and dismantled the support system for al-Qaeda. But then came 20 years of fighting—and the loss of about 2,500 American soldiers and the spending of $2.3 trillion. For what? Throwing a strong first punch doesn’t always end the matter in war. There’s an old military saying: The enemy gets a vote.

As of now, the bombing raid has not yielded a larger war. But the dust has yet to settle. Iran has many avenues of retaliation available. Its counter may come soon, or in a while, or never at all. On Monday, it lobbed missiles at a US military base in Qatar and caused no reported injuries, in what was considered a just-for-show response. A few hours later, Trump issued a social media post announcing that Israel and Iran had agreed to a ceasefire. But the New York Times reported that a spokesperson for the Israeli military declined to confirm—or even comment on—Trump’s statement. The newspaper noted, “this is all a fluid and unclear situation.” (On Tuesday, Trump criticized both Israel and Iran for actions that were inconsistent with the ceasefire, as the fragile truce appeared to be holding.)

However this shakes out, one reasonable expectation is that the raid will convince Iran that now more than ever it needs a nuclear weapon. Or perhaps a large cache of biological and chemical weapons—and an armada of advanced drones to deliver them. Or that it should answer with asymmetrical warfare—that is, acts of terrorism. There likely will be uncertainty on this front for some time. Don’t break out the champagne yet. (For a good preliminary and skeptical look at the US attack, check out this day-after thread posted by Jeffrey Lewis, an arms control expert.)

Moreover, we can’t believe anything Trump and his crew say about the strike. In announcing the attack, Trump declared Iran’s nuclear program had been “completely and fully obliterated.” But the next morning, Gen. Dan Caine, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the nuclear facilities had sustained “extremely severe damage and destruction.” That’s not annihilation. And other senior administration officials that day conceded that they did not yet have a read on what was left or even the whereabouts of Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium. It was possible that Iran had moved enriched uranium and crucial equipment prior to the bombing raid. (Iran reportedly had no bomb-grade uranium but possessed uranium enriched far more than necessary for civilian use.)

The Trump gang even pulled out an old, discredited playbook: misrepresenting or ignoring intelligence. The intelligence community had been clear on Iran’s nuclear program. In March, it released its annual threat assessment, which stated: “We continue to assess Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and that Khamenei has not reauthorized the nuclear weapons program he suspended in 2003, though pressure has probably built on him to do so.” Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, during congressional testimony that month, said the same.

But that conclusion did not matter. Trump, who has often boasted that with his big brain he’s smarter than the generals and the analysts, didn’t feel compelled to even bother to claim that there was new intelligence that supported the case for attacking Iran. He just disregarded this assessment and pulled the trigger.

The morning after the attack, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was asked what fresh intelligence had been acquired since the March report that showed Iran was now developing nuclear weapons and, thus, posed a pressing threat. He responded, “The president has made it very clear that he’s looked at all the intelligence and come to the conclusion that the Iranian nuclear program is a threat.” In other words, there was no new intelligence. The president had tossed aside the intelligence community’s finding, and the administration didn’t care how this looked.

On Meet the Press, Vice President JD Vance was pushed on this point, as well. Asked if he and Trump trusted the intelligence community and its assessments, he replied, “Of course, we trust our intelligence community, but we also trust our instincts.” He was saying that Trump went to war on a hunch.

Maybe Vance realized this sounded ridiculous, for he added that the administration had gathered intelligence that the Iranians were “stonewalling” the ongoing negotiations. He did not elaborate. Yet on Friday, the day before the attack, the White House said it supported the ongoing European talks with Tehran, and earlier in the week Trump indicated he would give negotiations two weeks. It’s hard to believe that intel came in that indicated Iran was suddenly slow-walking the talks and, therefore, a strike had to be launched right away.

There was even double-talk about regime change—the bugaboo of the MAGA right with its association with so-called “forever wars.” Following the raid, Secretary of State Marco Rubio proclaimed, “This wasn’t a regime change move.” And Vance said, “Our view has been very clear that we don’t want a regime change.” But then Trump shot out a social media post:

It’s not politically correct to use the term, “Regime Change,” but if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change??? MIGA!!

So who knows? Trump Sycophant No. 1 Lindsey Graham quickly jumped on this with a post that said, “President Trump is spot on with his desire to make Iran great again by changing the regime.” With this coy reference to regime change, Trump was undermining his top officials and suggesting to Iran (and the world) that these assurances meant nothing.

After the attack, House Speaker Mike Johnson released a statement saying, “The military operations in Iran should serve as a clear reminder to our adversaries and allies that President Trump means what he says.” It actually was a clear reminder of the opposite. Trump had indicated he was willing to give diplomacy a chance. Then he didn’t. He said the targets were completely destroyed. Maybe not. His team insisted the attack was not part of a war of regime change. He signaled it might be. How should other nations in the future—friends or foes—regard his statements? How should we? If Iran were now willing to engage in diplomacy, how could it cut a deal with a man whose word (or social media posts) means nothing? A major victim of this attack is American credibility.

“In war,” Aeschylus said, “truth is the first casualty.” Trump long ago killed the truth. Lies and disinformation are his most treasured weapons. Consequently, he paved the path to this war with erratic statements, disingenuousness, and dishonesty. Whatever the impact of the attacks on Iran’s nuclear program—we can’t believe what Trump will say about this—his deployment of such a toxic mix is unlikely to make the world a safer place.

Will Trump’s Disinformation Presidency Lead to Civil War?

The below article first appeared in David Corn’s newsletter, Our Land. The newsletter comes out twice a week (most of the time) and provides behind-the-scenes stories and articles about politics, media, and culture. Subscribing costs just $5 a month—but you can sign up for a free 30-day trial.

Ten years ago this week, Donald Trump rode down an elevator, surrounded by make-believe supporters who had been paid to cheer him, and delivered a rambling speech declaring his candidacy for president. It was dark. The United States, he bellowed, had “become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problems.” The nation was “getting weaker.” It was no longer great. Its leaders were “stupid,” “losers,” “morally corrupt,” and “selling this country down the drain.” Mexico was sending “rapists” across the border to the United States. Unemployment was 21 percent. (Actually, it was 5.3 percent.) The US nuclear arsenal “doesn’t work.” (It did.) He laid it on thick: “We’ve got nothing…We’re dying…We’re becoming a third-world country…Sadly, the American dream is dead.”

Ever since then, Trump has been running a disinformation campaign of doom and gloom, depicting the United States as a disastrous hellscape—that is, whenever it serves his perverted political purposes. In his first inaugural address, he characterized the nation as being racked with “American carnage.” During the 2020 contest, he accused Joe Biden of plotting with radicals, antifa, and communists to literally destroy America.

His 2024 presidential endeavor was more a propaganda operation than a political campaign. He claimed Haitian immigrants were eating cats and dogs, Venezuelan criminal migrants had taken control of towns across the Midwest, schools were performing gender transition operations on children without informing parents, and Biden and Vice President Harris were purposefully importing millions of undocumented people (and using a phone app that told cartel heads where to drop off these migrants). He spewed outrageous and outlandish lies to support an unfounded narrative: America was apocalyptic.

Trump is not facing an election now, but he is continuing to use scare tactics to skew reality.

This was both madness and method. The goal of disinformation is to shape perceptions. If Trump could convince voters that they were imperiled by mobs of barbarous pet-eating brown people and that Biden and Harris were in cahoots with savages and marauders, then they’d have little choice but to vote for him. He was selling a fictitious script to incite fear and loathing, believing that would win him support.

Trump is not facing an election now, but he is continuing to use scare tactics to skew reality. Since he returned to the White House, he has cited phony emergencies to abuse presidential power, falsely claiming that the entry of undocumented people into the United States amounts to an invasion waged by a foreign power and that trade deficits threaten the survival of the nation. And in response to the protests in Los Angeles against his cruel mass deportation effort, he has turned his disinformation campaign up to 11.

Trump says these demonstrations—which have been mostly peaceful, with some yielding limited violent actions—are an insurrection. He and his aides have maintained that Los Angeles is under siege by a vast horde of criminal migrants. In front of troops at Fort Bragg, Trump declared that California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass are “incompetent” and that “they paid troublemakers, agitators, and insurrectionists” to “aid the occupation of the city by criminal invaders.” He has also said the protests have caused “a lot of death.” And that LA would have been “obliterated,” had he not sent in National Guard troops. His top aides have chimed in. Attorney General Pam Bondi exclaimed, “California is burning.” Stephen Miller, Trump’s minister of malice, tweeted, “Los Angeles is occupied territory.”

In Trump’s telling, he’s the strongman rescuing a great American metropolis from annihilation. In reality, he is exacerbating conflict triggered by his own destructive policy.  

None of this is remotely true. The inciter-in-chief was lying to the troops. Yet Trump cult propagandists at Fox and other right-wing media outlets have strived to bolster Trump’s deceit with hysterical coverage of the few violent acts that have occurred in a 1-square-mile area of downtown Los Angeles. (The city encompasses 502 square miles.) Yet again, Trump is cynically concocting a bogus and dangerous tale that demonizes Americans for political advantage. In his telling, he’s the strongman rescuing a great American metropolis from annihilation. In reality, he is exacerbating conflict triggered by his own destructive policy.  

Countering disinformation is difficult, especially in a time of media fragmentation. Trump’s supporters and Fox viewers tend to believe whatever he says. One photograph of three burning driverless taxis goes a long way with his devotees. Fact-checking and reporting by other media outlets mean little to them. And it is tough to fight disinformation one falsehood at a time. Litigating phony assertions can draw them more attention. By the time you’ve challenged one piece of disinformation, another—or many more—emerges.

A more effective response to disinformation is to characterize specific sources of bad information as untrustworthy and not to be believed. But the media lost this fight with Trump years ago, in the early stages of his political career, when it was largely reluctant to brand him a perpetual liar. Since then, it has been playing catch-up with his never-ending stream of falsehoods and hokum, as the stakes get higher. And into this present crisis, when he is spreading lies to justify using military forces against domestic political opposition.

As Trump turned his last political campaign into a disinformation op, he has done the same with his second presidency. He seeks to convince Americans that both an invasion and an insurrection are underway and that the existence of the nation is at risk—and that he must respond with militaristic and autocratic tactics. (On Thursday, a federal judge in California ruled Trump did not have the legal authority to assume control of California National Guard troops and order them to Los Angeles. Hours later, an appeals court stayed the judge’s order and set a hearing on the matter for June 17.)

Here was a brazen attack on the constitutional order. It was practically a declaration of civil war against the people of LA and California.

This is a perilous moment. It was disturbing to see federal agents on Thursday forcibly remove and assault Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) when he tried to interrupt Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, while she was conducting a press conference in Los Angeles. More troubling was what she said moments before that episode:

We are not going away. We are staying here to liberate the city from the socialists and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country and what they have tried to insert into the city.

Liberate the city? Engaging in classic red-baiting, Noem was proclaiming that Trump intended to use federalized National Guard troops and Marines to overthrow the elected leaders of Los Angeles and California because he objected to their policies and political stances. The federal government does not have the authority to do this. Here was a brazen attack on the constitutional order. It was practically a declaration of civil war against the people of LA and California. Call it authoritarianism. Call it fascism. It is not American democracy. Ultimately, Trump’s disinformation operation is aimed at undermining, if not crushing, our diverse and messy democracy. He seeks to burn the village so he can seize power to supposedly save it. And the most potent ammunition for his war on America is lies.

Who’s the Businessman Who Set Up the New Private Trump Club in DC?

A new, ultra-private, super-exclusive club for the Trump oligarchy has opened in Washington, DC. Dubbed the Executive Branch and offering memberships that cost up to $500,000, the club, located in a spot beneath a Georgetown mall, aims to be a safe space for the Trump clan as well as hangers-on, who are likely to include big shots with interests before the federal government and desires to sway the administration. The initial media coverage of the club has noted the president may become a regular visitor.

Founding members reportedly include David Sacks, the tech tycoon who is now Trump’s crypto and AI czar and the chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology; the Winklevoss twins, whose crypto firm was sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission; Chamath Palihapitiya, a venture capitalist and podcaster; and Jeff Miller, a prominent Trump fundraiser and mega-lobbyist. On the list of owners are Donald Trump Jr.; Zach and Alex Witkoff, the sons of the president’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff; Omeed Malik, a venture capitalist and business associate of Trump Jr.; and Chris Buskirk, a close ally of Vice President JD Vance and cofounder of an influential conservative donor group.

It’s a line-up of Trump royalty. But at the top of the corporate structure of the club, as its president, is a much less well-known figure who previously has not been publicly identified with the high echelons of Trumpworld: a San Francisco real estate businessman named Glenn Gilmore. For years, he has been a close business associate of Sacks, and his role in the endeavor adds to possible ethics questions related to Sacks’ involvement in this operation, according to government ethics experts.

“On current facts, it is not clear whether there are any violations of laws or rules based on the role of David Sacks or others, or based on the possibility of lobbyists obtaining memberships,” Noah Bookbinder, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, says, “However, it is deeply problematic to have an expensive social club that is premised on the idea of wealthy people and interests paying significant sums of money for access to high-level administration officials. It contributes to a sense among Americans that the government is set up to cater to the wealthy and powerful, not regular people.”

Mother Jones sent a long list of questions to each Gilmore and Sacks regarding the club. Reached on the phone, Gilmore declined to discuss the venture and said all queries had to be addressed to the club’s press office. Sacks did not respond to the questions. Instead, a representative of the Executive Branch provided a limited reply to both sets of queries. “The Executive Branch club,” he says, “is a private, luxurious space for colleagues to connect without media interference. It is not about access to the Trump administration. Any claim otherwise is false and potentially defamatory.”

Gilmore is not a big macher in Trump circles. He’s not a Trump donor or fundraiser. Gilmore, though, does have extensive business links with Sacks, who has been a prominent champion of the club, who hosted its launch party, and who has called himself “member No. 1.”

“The real problem,” says John Pelissero, the director of government ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University, “is that no official in a presidential administration should be promoting a business, including that club. It provides an opportunity for business partners and friends of members of the administration to do business out of the public eye.”

During an episode last month of the All-In podcast, Sacks described the club this way:

We wanted a place to hang out, and the clubs that exist in Washington today have been around for decades. They’re kind of old and stuffy. To the extent there are Republican clubs, they tend to be more Bush-era Republicans, as opposed to Trump-era Republicans. So we wanted to create something new, hipper, and Trump-aligned… We want a place to go where you don’t have to worry that the next person over at the bar is some fake news reporter or even a lobbyist or something like that who we don’t know and we don’t trust… You want to go somewhere that’s highly curated.

He also said, “Since I’m in the government I can’t be an owner [of the club].”

For years, Sacks has had financial ties with Gilmore, the fellow who, according to corporate filings, is running the show. That means Sacks, Trump’s influential crypto and AI guy, is promoting a clubby venture that could be lucrative for a business associate.

Gilmore is president of Brick & Timber Collective, a commercial real estate firm that specializes in developing spaces for VC and tech firms. The company’s portfolio includes at least 13 properties in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Miami, and its tenants have included tech mogul Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund and Atomic Labs, a VC incubator whose investors include Thiel and Sacks.

In April, Bloomberg, citing loan documents and people familiar with the matter, reported that Sacks is “a limited partner in projects” of Gilmore’s Brick & Timber Collective.

According to the Executive Branch representative, when the club was being formed, Malik, one of the owners, asked if Sacks knew a real estate developer who could help with the project, and Sacks recommended Gilmore. “David Sacks and Gilmore are not business partners but have collaborated on past deals,” he says. This representative adds, “Sacks has no financial interest in the Executive Branch club, directly or indirectly. His involvement has been reviewed and approved by government ethics attorneys.” He would not say whether Gilmore is being compensated by the club or holds an ownership interest in it.

The official corporate paperwork for the club identifies Gilmore variously as president, managing member, or director. In March, he incorporated a company called Executive Branch LLC located at the address for the club. He was listed on that registration as a director or officer. That month, a company with the same name and operating address was incorporated in Wyoming. A subsequent trademark application described the enterprise as a “private members dining club” and listed Gilmore as its managing memo. A later form filed with Wyoming designated Gilmore as the president of the company.

Addresses that appear on the various corporate records for Executive Branch LLC are associated with different Sacks’ businesses. Its initial filing in Wyoming noted its mailing address was 855 Front Street, San Francisco. That building is owned by 855 Front Street LLC, a Delaware firm registered in California by Gilmore in 2016 and that had the same address as Sacks Ventures, one of Sacks’ companies. According to California corporate records, Sacks Realty LLC, another Sacks enterprise, is listed as an officer of 855 Front Street LLC. The 855 Front Street property is also an address for Sacks’ Craft Ventures VC firm.

In April, the mailing address for Executive Branch LLC in the Wyoming corporate records was changed to 55 Green Street, San Francisco. This is a property near 855 Front Street and owned by Brick & Timber Collective. According to SEC records, Sacks Realty and Gilmore were both guarantors of a $36 million mortgage for this Green Street property.

There are other business ties between Gilmore and Sacks. The same day Gilmore incorporated Brick & Timber Collective in California, Sacks registered a company with the same name as doing business in San Francisco. In its articles of incorporation, Brick & Timber Collective listed as its address a San Francisco building owned by Sacks. And according to corporate records, an entity called DS PPI LLC—for which Sacks served as a director—was once an officer of Gilmore’s Brick & Timber Collective; it no longer is.

The Executive Branch representative says, “Neither David Sacks nor any of his entities own any interest in Brick & Timber Collective.”

The corporate records for the Executive Branch club filed in Wyoming and Washington, DC, list no other directors or officers other than Gilmore. He appears to have no preexisting public connections to any of the owners and initial members other than Sacks. He has not been been a major political funder. According to Federal Election Commission records, the only donation he has made to a federal candidate in the past 10 years was a $2,000 contribution to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in June 2023.

In light of Sacks’ White House job overseeing both artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency policy, his business and financial interests have been a matter of controversy, with critics claiming his appointment presents a conflict of interest due to his extensive holdings and personal involvement in crypto and tech. In March, the White House issued Sacks a conflict of interest waiver and maintained he had taken “significant steps to minimize potential conflicts of interest” by divesting “hundreds of millions of dollars in digital assets.”

But in a letter to the Office of Government Ethics last month, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) contended that Sacks had not sufficiently divested his digital assets, and she asked if that office had been consulted regarding the waiver. She noted that because Sacks’ personal financial disclosure form has not been released, “the public cannot verify the waiver’s factual claims.” She also questioned whether his continuing association with Craft Ventures, which is heavily tech-focused, raises a conflict with his role as AI czar. Her office says she never received a response from OGE.

Government employees are entitled to social lives. But the arrangement with this new club seems rather comfy: The president’s crypto and AI adviser is promoting a plutocratic club that stands to earn millions of dollars in revenue for its owners (which includes a son of the president)—with some of that money presumably coming from the checkbooks or crypto wallets of lobbyists, donors, and others who might want favorable policies and decisions from the Trump administration. And a business associate of his is a key part of the action and perhaps in a position to benefit financially.

“No government official should be assisting a business associate in their financial interest,” Peliserro says. “It is unfair and there is a lack of transparency when people are interacting with Trump administration officials in an expensive private club that other people cannot access.” Bookbinder adds, “That some of those profiting from this enterprise have close connections to the administration makes it problematic.”

Trump once proclaimed he would drain the swamp in Washington. Instead, it looks as if his kin and crew are developing it.

Musk Gets Out—and Gets Off Easy

The below article first appeared in David Corn’s newsletter, Our Land. The newsletter comes out twice a week (most of the time) and provides behind-the-scenes stories and articles about politics, media, and culture. Subscribing costs just $5 a month—but you can sign up for a free 30-day trial.

Elon Musk packed his bags and skedaddled out of Washington, DC, last week, proclaiming that his run as a “special government employee” was done. It’s a good bet that he’ll continue to meddle in administration business, especially when he has a financial interest at stake, and will keep in contact with DOGErs and their ongoing crusade to dismantle crucial government programs. But his very public departure from Trump Town prompted reporters to pen farewells that did not do justice to the profound damage this erratic and dishonest gazillionaire has caused.

Writing up an interview he conducted with Musk, the Washington Post’s Christian Davenport opened with a “reflective” Musk musing, “The federal bureaucracy situation is much worse than I realized. I thought there were problems, but it sure is an uphill battle trying to improve things in DC, to say the least.” Davenport observed that Musk’s “attempts to reshape the federal bureaucracy ran into fierce institutional resistance.” He allowed Musk to praise himself as a hard-driving visionary—“If we’re not ultra-hardcore, how are we going to get to Mars?”—and to define his mission in Washington as “reducing waste and fraud.”

Waste and fraud was just a cover story. Too many in the news media have enabled this con and even promoted it.

All of this bolsters the phony narrative pitched by Trump and Musk that DOGE was (and is) a project to ferret out the supposed rampant fraud and waste that infect the federal government. That has not been the case. Musk’s venture has been an assault on government services, not inefficient government expenditures. He and his DOGE minions slashed programs and decimated agencies without evaluating them. Waste and fraud was just a cover story. Too many in the news media have enabled this con and even promoted it.

Davenport did note that Musk’s “claims about finding massive savings and slashing waste in government have been shown to be exaggerated” and that he “did not achieve as much as he wanted.” But even this poke at the billionaire accepts Musk’s noble-sounding premise. His endeavor has not been to merely “reshape the federal bureaucracy,” as Davenport put it, but to eviscerate services and protections for millions and allow powerful interests to escape scrutiny, regulation, and oversight.

At the New York Times, a multi-bylined article—Tyler Pager, Maggie Haberman, Theodore Schleifer, Jonathan Swann, and Ryan Mac—reported that Musk was “disillusioned with Washington and frustrated with the obstacles he encountered as he upended the federal bureaucracy.” Upended the bureaucracy is another all-too neutral way to characterize how he and his henchpeople demolished agencies. The piece noted that Musk had thanked Trump for “the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending” and called his effort “an initiative to drastically cut spending.”

Like the Washington Post, the Times wrote, “Musk’s DOGE team has repeatedly inflated its cost-saving efforts, at times posting erroneous claims about ending federal contracts that they later deleted.” And it noted that the “cuts he wanted to enact were far more difficult than he expected.” Again, the story presented was that of Musk seeking to counter wasteful spending and failing to achieve as much as he desired.

It wasn’t a war on waste and fraud in government. It was a war on government.

Neither piece mentioned how Musk and his libertarian shock troops killed the US Agency for International Development and ended lifesaving assistance for recipients throughout the world. Nor did they cover other dishonorable DOGE accomplishments. Musk and his posse blew up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which prevents vulturous financial firms from ripping off billions of dollars from Americans. They undermined or closed programs key to food safety, workplace safety, environmental safety, and aviation safety. DOGE cuts at the National Institutes of Health, NASA, and other agencies have devastated a generation of science and research. They forced mass firings at the State Department and the CIA that will weaken these organizations and imperil national security. They ripped up programs to track and address climate change. Firefighters, park rangers, weather forecasters, IRS tax collectors, Social Security clerks, Census Bureau workers, employees at Veterans Affairs who help our wounded warriors—all booted out of important jobs.

None of this was related to waste and fraud. And let’s stick with Musk’s attack on USAID. In February, he called this agency that has helped millions of people around the world avoid malaria, Ebola, and AIDS, obtain clean water, and gain access to food and health care “a criminal organization.” Yes, the richest man in the world said that. The following month, not surprisingly, he belittled the idea of empathy. He also claimed, “No one has died as a result of a brief pause to do a sanity check on foreign aid funding. No one.” Not true. Brooke Nichols, an infectious-disease mathematical modeler and health economist at Boston University, has created a tracker that estimates the number of deaths overseas caused by the Musk-driven suspension of foreign aid. As of this weekend, the number of adult deaths reached 100,000, and deaths for children topped 208,000. This is obscene.

Yet the big idea for these media outlets is that Musk was frustrated he didn’t make more progress in his battle against waste and fraud. But it wasn’t a war on waste and fraud in government. It was a war on government.

Much of the media failed to accurately characterize what this alt-right, conspiracy-pushing, oddball, drug-addled (?), anti-empathy tech billionaire was really doing.

Both the New York Times and the Washington Post have done wonderful investigations of Musk and DOGE. Last week, the Times exposed his intense use of drugs, including ketamine, and reported on how DOGE-driven reversals of regulations will cost Americans billions in higher bank fees, electric and water bills, and health insurance payments. New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof has penned moving pieces about the lethal consequences of Musk’s annihilation of USAID.

But throughout the Musk Terror, much of the media failed to accurately characterize what this alt-right, conspiracy-pushing, oddball, drug-addled (?), anti-empathy tech billionaire was really doing. (Then there’s the whole DOGE effort to get its grubby mitts on government data for who-knows-what reasons.) Musk waged a vicious assault. He did not seek to evaluate programs and agencies to root out inefficiencies or activities that were no longer vital. He aimed to destroy. Hundreds of thousands of people will die because of him. Millions of Americans will suffer. Who cares if he is frustrated or disillusioned? The story is not what happened to Musk; it’s what he has done to all of us.