Can Maine’s governor topple Susan Collins?

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Democratic Maine Gov. Janet Mills officially launched her campaign to unseat Republican Sen. Susan Collins on Tuesday, with a video highlighting her opposition to President Donald Trump, who she characterized as a “bully.”

YouTube Video

In the campaign video, Mills highlighted her comment of “see you in court” to Trump at a February meeting in the White House. The statement was in response to Trump attempting to berate Mills for opposing his administration’s attempt to ban transgender children from participating in school sports.

Trump attempted to withhold federal funding from Maine over the issue but in April a federal judge ordered the Department of Agriculture to pay out the money to the state.

Related | ‘See you in court’: Governor refuses to bow to Trump’s bigoted ban

“We stood up to Trump and stopped him from cutting the school lunch program for Maine kids,” Mills says in her ad, before going on to criticize Collins for letting “bullies like Trump have their way.”

Collins has long presented herself as a moderate representing Maine’s mix of Democratic and Republican voters but has often allied herself with the right wing. She declined to vote to remove Trump from office in 2020 despite the House majority agreeing that he had committed high crimes. Collins also voted to confirm Trump’s Supreme Court pick Brett Kavanaugh, whose vote led to the eventual repeal of Roe v. Wade and the loss of abortion rights for millions of Americans.

Mills is not alone in challenging Collins. Oyster farmer Graham Platner is also running for the Democratic Party’s Senate nomination and has attracted the support of Sen. Bernie Sanders.

A Zenith Research poll of Maine voters conducted Oct.7-10 found both Mills and Platner polling ahead of Collins, with Platner ahead by 14 and Mills up 8.

In Morning Consult’s tracking poll of governors around the country, Mills was the most unpopular Democratic governor—but her approval rating of 49% to 46% disapproval is leagues ahead of Collins, who has a 38% approval rating and 54% disapproval.

Maine is traditionally considered a Democratic-leaning state and former Vice President Kamala Harris won it in the 2024 election. Collins has been one of the top targets of the Democratic Party and the party’s Senate campaign arm, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, has been criticizing Collins for siding with her fellow Republicans to shut down the federal government.

“Collins is shutting down the government instead of working to address the health care crisis she helped create, and in 2026 Mainers will hold her accountable at the ballot box,” DSCC spokesperson Maeve Coyle said in a September statement.

Americans don’t buy RFK Jr.’s medical quackery

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Most Americans give a failing grade to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. according to a new poll released on Thursday from nonpartisan health policy group KFF.

The survey was conducted after Kennedy, along with President Donald Trump and Dr. Mehmet Oz, head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, held a press event pushing unscientific medical claims, including the promotion of a false link between autism and Tylenol.

In KFF’s poll, 59% of the public said they either somewhat or strongly disapprove of how Kennedy has been handling his job. The vast majority of his disapproval comes from Democrats and independent voters, but even 25% of Republicans also said they disapproved of him.

“Medical emergency” by Mike Luckovich

Poll respondents also strongly opposed Trump’s allegations about a link between Tylenol and autism. Among those surveyed, 65% said it was probably or definitely false that the link is real. Among parents, 60% also expressed doubt about Trump’s position.

Reflecting the Trump administration’s embrace of unscientific anti-vaccine stances, trust in the Centers for Disease Control is down significantly from the public support the agency had under former President Joe Biden. In KFF’s September 2023 poll, 63% of the public said they trusted the agency on vaccines. That is now down to 50% under Trump.

Following the event with Kennedy, Oz, and Trump, global health leaders soundly rejected their unscientific claims and reaffirmed support for the use of Tylenol-style drugs during pregnancy. For instance, the European Medicines Agency told Reuters, “Available evidence has found no link between the use of paracetamol during pregnancy and autism.”

That position was echoed by the American Academy of Pediatrics, who slammed the White House for “dangerous claims and misleading information that sends a confusing message to parents and expecting parents.”

Medical experts have also said not using pain relievers like Tylenol during a pregnancy when treating a fever can lead to severe medical problems, including miscarriage and other complications that could affect fetal health.

Related | RFK Jr. continues quest to Make America Sick Again, vaccines edition

Kennedy’s tenure has been plagued with a series of ill-informed medical recommendations and actions. He has pushed to limit the availability of vaccines for dangerous conditions like COVID-19 and a measles outbreak claimed lives while the administration pursued cutbacks and sidelined medical experts.

The public distaste for Kennedy’s actions has increased efforts from congressional Democrats like Michigan Rep. Haley Stevens, who has said she intends to introduce articles of impeachment against Kennedy.

“His contempt for science, the constant spreading of conspiracy theories, and his complete disregard for the thousands of research hours spent by America’s top doctors and experts is unprecedented, reckless, and dangerous,” Stevens said in a September statement.

Impeach RFK Jr.? This House Democrat plans to try.

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Democratic Rep. Haley Stevens of Michigan announced Thursday that she plans to introduce articles of impeachment against Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., citing his unscientific medical practices as a threat to public health.

“RFK Jr. is making our country less safe and making healthcare less affordable and accessible for Michiganders. His contempt for science, the constant spreading of conspiracy theories, and his complete disregard for the thousands of research hours spent by America’s top doctors and experts is unprecedented, reckless, and dangerous,” she said in a statement.

Democratic Rep. Haley Stevens of Michigan

Stevens added that she believes that Kennedy has violated his oath of office and that she intends to “lead the charge to remove him.”

Similar to that of the president, articles of impeachment must pass the House, followed by a Senate trial. If convicted in the Senate, an official can then be removed from office.

Stevens has accused Kennedy of dereliction of duty, citing cuts to vital research, promotion of medical falsehoods and conspiracies, lying about his views during his confirmation hearing, and failing to administer the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which are under his control.

The impeachment charge follows President Donald Trump’s widely derided presentation on Monday, where Kennedy appeared alongside Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Administrator Mehmet Oz. Together, they falsely claimed that autism can be linked to vaccines and the use of acetaminophen. 

In response, scientists and doctors from around the world have lashed out at the Trump administration, highlighting the dangers of their unscientific medical claims—particularly among vulnerable children.

But despite the public outcry, the autism quackery embraced by Trump, Kennedy, and Oz has received support from key GOP figures.

A cartoon by Pedro Molina.

“God bless President Trump and RFK Jr. for asking the questions and starting to use their positions, their platform, to give parents informed consent,” Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin said.

The autism debacle is just the latest in a string of failure and embarrassment from health agencies on Kennedy’s watch. His decision to censor CDC reports and muzzle experts contributed to an unprecedented measles outbreak in Texas earlier this year.

Kennedy has repeatedly pushed unscientific fears about COVID-19 vaccines and beefed up the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices with compliant followers who have limited access to vaccines.

In his confirmation hearings, Kennedy said that he would uphold existing vaccine standards, but in office he has done the opposite. He’s also pushing to limit access to abortion pills while trying to pressure international scientists against publishing objective research on the effectiveness of vaccines.

Americans have died as a result of Kennedy’s malpractice, which has been enabled by Trump. If successful, Stevens’ impeachment plan could put a stop to it all.

Trump’s top deportation thug reportedly probed by FBI over bribe

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Tom Homan, the “border czar” who has been the architect of some of the Trump administration’s most harmful and callous immigration actions, was reportedly under FBI investigation for accepting a bribe—but the case was dropped after Donald Trump was sworn in as president in January.

MSNBC reported on Monday that Homan allegedly took $50,000 in cash from undercover FBI agents posing as contractors. According to government documents, Homan was recorded on camera taking the payment at a location in Texas in September 2024.

Homan reportedly took the cash in exchange for the promise of securing government contracts when the Trump administration took over in January of this year. MSNBC reported that FBI and Department of Justice officials believed they had a case against Homan for conspiracy to commit bribery.

Related | Sleazy 'border czar' seems to have one heck of a conflict of interest

In response to the outlet’s reporting, FBI Director Kash Patel argued that the investigation was a partisan operation that began under the Biden administration. Patel didn’t explain why Biden’s team failed to bring charges if partisanship was the motivation.

Even as the Trump team was burying the Homan case, the administration began orchestrating criminal investigations of Trump’s political adversaries. Those machinations recently came to a head after the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia was fired because he wouldn’t charge New York state Attorney General Letitia James with trumped-up crimes.

This isn’t the first time that Homan’s name has come up in connection to corruption.

In May, it was reported that Homan worked as a consultant for the Geo Group, which operates immigration detention centers. Homan was paid a minimum of $5,000, although disclosing the exact amount he made isn’t mandatory—and then pushed mass deportation efforts as border czar, generating new business and lots of federal payments for his former employer.

Homan has been the public and extremely pugilistic face of the administration’s harsh immigration policies. He has made frequent media appearances, including a near-ubiquitous presence on Fox News. The MAGA mouthpiece news network has buried the latest report on his actions, naturally.

The former border patrol agent has a history of racist affiliations and as border czar has embraced racial profiling and using scare tactics against largely Latino migrant communities. He has admitted that ICE has arrested people without cause, and has threatened cities with Democratic leaders who have said they will protect immigrant communities.

Homan has even said he would use the Department of Justice to go after Democratic officials like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for speaking out against deportation actions. Now we know that this same department is apparently uninterested in pursuing justice if the crime may have been committed by Homan himself.

Fox News promotes racist Trump shill who pushed boatloads of BS

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Fox News announced Wednesday that former Trump press secretary Kayleigh McEnany will be hosting her own weekend show, “Saturday In America.” The decision comes after years of McEnany prominently lying about a dizzying array of issues, further cementing Fox’s key role as a source of disinformation and falsehoods.

McEnany has worked at the network since 2021, following her stint in the Trump administration and at the Republican National Committee. Currently, McEnany serves as an on-air pundit for Fox and one of the co-hosts of the panel discussion program “Outnumbered.”

An example of McEnany’s blatant lies is her 2012 tweet saying, “How I Met Your Brother — Never mind, forgot he’s still in that hut in Kenya. #ObamaTVShows”

The comment came at the same time that President Donald Trump was pushing the discredited, racist “birther” conspiracy falsely alleging that President Barack Obama was born in Kenya and not the United States.

Kayleigh McEnany speaks with reporters during her stint as President Donald Trump’s press secretary in 2020. 

And during a 2019 appearance on CNN, McEnany previewed her time in the spotlight by saying of Trump, “I don’t believe the president has lied.” 

At that point in his presidency, Trump already made 16,241 false or misleading claims, as catalogued by the Washington Post. 

“He doesn’t lie. The press lies,” she said in 2020. “We will not see diseases like the coronavirus come here, we will not see terrorism come here, and isn’t it refreshing when contrasting it with the awful presidency of President Obama.”  

Of course, the first COVID-19 cases had already been confirmed a month earlier.

After promising journalists at her first press briefing that she wouldn’t lie, McEnany spent almost her entire time in Trump’s administration spreading misinformation.

McEnany asserted in September 2020 that Trump “never downplayed the virus,” despite his repeated false assertions that COVID-19 had been contained, even bragging to Fox that his administration had “shut it down.” Tens of thousands of deaths followed.

Her claim was so removed from reality that the fact checking site PolitiFact rated her defense of Trump as “pants on fire.” In fact, in 10 fact checks rating her statements, the service only rated three as “mostly true” or “half true.” The remainder were categorized as “mostly false,” “false,” and “pants on fire.”

Another fact checking site, FactCheck.org, noted in May 2020 that McEnany had repeated a Russian talking point when discussing the Mueller investigation, which she claimed was a “complete and total exoneration of President Trump.” 

The report, which specifically said that the investigation “does not exonerate him,” later formed the basis for many of the charges in Trump’s first impeachment.

During the 2020 election season, McEnany carried water for Trump by regurgitating his false attacks on mail-in voting, but it was later revealed that McEnany—like Trump—had voted by mail multiple times since 2010.

As results came in showing that Trump was losing the election to President Joe Biden, McEnany pushed false narratives, prematurely claiming that Trump won Pennsylvania, which he ultimately lost. She also falsely argued that there were “very real claims” of voter fraud being pursued by the Trump campaign and even promoted a bogus analysis alleging that it was improbable that Biden won four of the swing states that he did in fact win.

And McEnany continued her deception at Fox, where she claimed that nobody in Trump’s orbit brought up Vice President Kamala Harris’ race—something that Trump himself did. She also said that Trump didn’t put in place a Muslim ban during his presidency—which he infamously did. She even claimed that “you didn’t see crisis after crisis” during Trump’s presidency.

In May, as part of her pro-Trump advocacy McEnany said that CBS reporter Scott Pelley should have been arrested after criticizing Trump’s authoritarian stances during a commencement speech.

Fox has long positioned itself as a primary source of lies and dishonesty within the conservative movement. With the elevation of a serial liar like McEnany, the network continues to cement its reputation of spreading falsehoods.

Wack job Rudy Giuliani is getting a medal for his service to Trump

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Election conspiracy theorist and disgraced former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani is set to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Donald Trump. 

The award, which is the highest civilian honor bestowed by the U.S. government, rewards Giuliani for his years of loyal service to Trump, marked by the promotion of crackpot theories, the failed legal fight to overturn the 2020 election, and dangerous quack science.

“I am pleased to announce that Rudy Giuliani, the greatest Mayor in the history of New York City, and an equally great American Patriot, will receive THE PRESIDENTIAL MEDAL OF FREEDOM, our Country’s highest civilian honor,” Trump wrote on his social media account on Monday.

Trump’s announcement comes a day after Giuliani announced that he had been hospitalized following a car crash in New Hampshire. 

Giuliani served as mayor of New York from 1994 to 2001, most notably on Sept. 11, 2001. In 2008, Giuliani mounted a disastrous campaign for the Republican presidential nomination and became a part of Trump’s inner circle. For years, Giuliani has lurched from one embarrassing incident to the next in a public spiral with few parallels in American history.

Following Trump’s loss in the 2020 presidential election, Giuliani was part of Trump’s legal team and pushed ridiculous and easily debunked conspiracy theories, trying to spin Trump’s loss to Joe Biden as a win. 

In the days after that election, Giuliani held an ill-fated media availability at Four Seasons Total Landscaping in Pennsylvania to discuss challenges to the state’s ballot counting process. As Giuliani spread falsehoods, it became clear that the Trump campaign had booked the location thinking it was a Four Seasons hotel, and not a landscaping business. 

Trump and Giuliani pose for photographs at the Trump National Golf Club Bedminster clubhouse after the 2016 election.

Giuliani’s conspiracy promotion caught up with him after he was sued by former Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Wandrea Moss, whom he falsely implicated in a scheme to steal votes from Trump. Ultimately, Giuliani was ordered to pay the women nearly $150 million for defaming them. 

He was also disbarred in New York and Washington, D.C., for his disgraceful promotion of election lies.

Giuliani was also part of a pro-Trump operation after the 2016 election, attempting to push Ukraine-related conspiracy theories. The idea was to cast aspersions on the investigation into Russia’s decision to aid Trump in that election against Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

That conspiracy theory formed the foundation of Trump’s first impeachment after he used the office of the presidency to pressure Ukraine and enhance his political power.

Giuliani also promoted conspiracies about the COVID-19 virus at the height of the pandemic, including the promotion of phony medical remedies for the virus on his podcast.

As recently as last Christmas, Giuliani was using his infamy to promote his own personal brand of coffee in a series of cringeworthy internet videos.

Giuliani has demonstrated that, like Trump, he is a die-hard conspiracy theorist. He has invoked those conspiracies to defend Trump, throwing away whatever last vestiges he had of credibility following his time as mayor and a significantly influential figure within the Republican Party.

In receiving the Medal of Freedom, Giuliani joins racist misogynist Rush Limbaugh, who died in 2021, as another Trump sycophant who received an award for their service providing pro-Trump propaganda.

Giuliani has gone from “America’s Mayor” to a disgraced Trump-era punchline, and now he’s getting a prize for it all.

Why conservatives think American cities are hellscapes

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Over the last week, President Donald Trump has tried his best to make a spectacle of sending federal agents and the National Guard into Washington to combat a nonexistent crime surge. The act has been a clear attempt to shift focus away from both his administration’s ongoing cover-up of its files on accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, and the deterioration of the economy because of Trump’s tariff policies.

Violent crime in Washington hit a 30-year low last year, and that trend is continuing this year. However, Trump, a serial liar, has tried to counteract reality with conspiracy theories about crime statistics, and his conservative base is eating it up—but why?

Groundwork for crime narrative

In 2015 and 2016, as he pivoted from pushing the racist “birther” conspiracy theory about then-President Barack Obama and ran for president himself, Trump repeatedly claimed the country was in the middle of a dangerous crime surge, though the violent crime rate remained low. After he won the election, he used his inaugural address to speak about so-called “American carnage,” which he attributed in part to immigration—reinforcing the falsehood that Latino immigrants are mostly criminals.

Former President George W. Bush, right, and President Donald Trump, shown in 2018.

Trump’s demagoguery had deep roots in the Republican Party. Former President Ronald Reagan blamed societal ills on mythological welfare queens, and former President George W. Bush curtailed civil liberties and pushed for the invasion of Iraq based on fears of terrorist attacks from al-Qaida.

The conservative movement loves to connect fear of crime to rhetoric about racial minorities. It preys on deep-seated bigotry and motivates conservative voters to get out and vote, all as a way to stop the “other” from gaining control and allowing the spread of crime.

In more recent times, conservatives have circulated lies about the murder of Black teenager Trayvon Martin, and some right-wing circles have even celebrated his killer, George Zimmerman, as a hero. This resurfaced during Trump’s first term with the murder of George Floyd and the nationwide protests against police brutality that ensued. Instead of taking these organic expressions seriously, the right saw it as an affront to Trump and labeled even the most peaceful protests as riots blessed by top Democrats.

Trump loses to Biden, and the right doubles down on “crime”

After Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, he and the right were thrown off-balance. Reeling from this loss, he pushed for the violent attack on the government on Jan. 6, 2021, and then spent the next few years blaming Biden for a crime surge that began on his watch, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trump, alongside his propaganda allies at Fox News, saw crime begin to decline under Biden but kept pushing the lie that it hadn’t. To do otherwise would have undermined years of attacks against Democrats and would be an acknowledgement that the right’s “tough on crime” approach had not worked.

Then-candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally in Colorado last October.

The right blamed this supposed crime wave on migrants, reinforcing the conservative movement’s nativist, racist message. And they used the narrative to reinforce a long-held conservative bias against cities, which the right has railed against for their successful progressive policies and their racial and cultural diversity.

Much of this doesn’t make logical sense. The facts do not align with putting crime, racial minorities, and liberal policies all in a pile together. It makes even less sense when we remember that Fox News is headquartered in New York City, the metropolis Trump himself is a product of.

But the right loves conspiracies, and it is far easier for them to argue that liberal policies celebrating ethnic unity also promote crime than it is for them to live in reality.

Trump pulls the trigger

Trump understands his core audience more than he understands anything else in the world, and while complex ideas are out of his grasp, he is fluent in the language of bigotry.

Insurrectionists loyal to Donald Trump storm the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

By invoking crime, particularly at a moment of political vulnerability, he understands that he is activating long-simmering conservative resentments. By raising the idea of a crime wave occurring in cities with large Black populations, the tensions raised within the MAGA movement about Epstein can be eased, at least temporarily. 

This is why Trump can open prison cells and release Jan. 6 rioters who were tried and convicted, and also continue to proclaim that he is for “law and order.”

Right-wing lawmakers and media have sold conservative voters on a false narrative for so long that those voters truly believe Trump and his cohorts are fighting crime—even as they continue to cover up for an accused sex trafficker and pedophile.

Democratic leaders can bring tons of facts to conversations about crime, but most of the right is too far gone. They are too steeped in propaganda and paranoia to give reality a chance.

They were always going to believe the lies from Trump and the rest when it comes to crime. It was only a question of when it was going to happen.

Trump’s Fox News addiction is reportedly behind Iran attacks

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Over the weekend, on orders from President Donald Trump, the U.S. attacked three Iranian nuclear sites, inserting itself into Israel’s conflict with that nation.

Leaders like Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York quickly noted that the military action was done without the authorization of Congress, called it a “grave violation of the Constitution,” and said it was grounds for his impeachment. (Trump has already been impeached twice, more than any president in history.)

The incident is the latest in a long line of Republican leaders pushing bombing campaigns on shaky legal and moral ground.

A B-2 bomber arrives at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri on June 22.

Now new reporting indicates that what appears to have pushed Trump into attacking Iran was his most influential adviser: Fox News.

The New York Times reports from sources close to Trump that in the days leading up the action he was glued to Fox. “The president was closely monitoring Fox News, which was airing wall-to-wall praise of Israel’s military operation and featuring guests urging Mr. Trump to get more involved,” the outlet noted.

Since Israel’s latest attacks on Iran, Fox News has gone into pro-war overdrive. For instance, on last Tuesday’s edition of “Fox & Friends,” which is known to be Trump’s favorite show on the network, co-host Lawrence Jones baselessly claimed, “If we ever even got into a conflict with Iran, it would be over within two days, if that.”

Similarly, a delegation of hawkish activists pushing for U.S. military intervention in Iran visited Trump at the White House on June 4. They were led by conspiracy theorist Mark Levin, host of the Fox News weekend show “Life, Liberty & Levin.”

Fox News was one of the major sources of propaganda in favor of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. The network hyped then-President George W. Bush’s administration’s falsehoods about Iraq possessing weapons of mass destruction and links to the 9/11 attacks. In the aftermath, the war killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians and thousands of American military service members. There were no weapons of mass destruction.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, a former Fox News host, shown on June 22.

Trump is obsessed with Fox News and has hired at least 23 former Fox staffers to be in his administration. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who has been out in front on the Iranian bombing campaign, is the most prominent former Fox host in the Trump Cabinet. Other figures, like Attorney General Pam Bondi and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, were also Fox News talking heads.

Fox was also instrumental in Trump becoming a major political figure. When President Barack Obama was in office, Fox frequently hosted Trump to promote the racist “birther” conspiracy theory that falsely claimed Obama was not a native-born American citizen.

The feedback loop between Fox and Trump is consistent. The network even had to pay out a $787 million legal settlement to Dominion Voting Systems after Fox pushed Trump’s lies that he had won the 2020 presidential election, which he lost to former President Joe Biden.

Now Trump has pushed America into military strikes, seemingly based on the skewed coverage and baiting of Fox News, with more death and destruction likely to follow.

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Trump proves that he has no idea what the Constitution is—again

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Attempting to deflect from courts repeatedly ruling against his immigration policy, President Donald Trump lied to reporters on Monday, claiming that the courts fabricated the need for cases to be heard—despite the right to a trial being a constitutional law for more than 234 years.

“The courts have all of a sudden, out of nowhere, they said, ‘maybe you have to have trials.’ Trials, we’re going to have 5 million trials? Doesn’t work, doesn’t work. You wouldn’t have a country left,” he said.

YouTube Video

Trump has been under fire for denying detainees due process. Students like Mahmoud Khalil and Rümeysa Öztürk have been abducted for their pro-Palestinian advocacy, and legal U.S. resident Kilmar Abrego Garcia was wrongly captured and deported to El Salvador.

On April 30, a court ordered the release of Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian immigrant who was held by the Department of Homeland Security while it tried to find a reason for his deportation.

Contrary to Trump’s statement, the U.S. Constitution explicitly lays out the right to a trial in the Sixth Amendment:

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

Similarly, the Seventh Amendment notes:

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

These rights were part of the ten amendments ratified in 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights, and nothing in U.S. law or Trump’s executive orders have nullified them. The Sixth Amendment ensures that accusations leveled by the government against people have to be proven in a court of law and not just by royal fiat, as was done by the British government in the colonial era.

Trump’s unconstitutional remarks come just one day after he told NBC “I don’t know” when asked if the president needs to uphold the Constitution. Like every president before him, Trump took an oath of office, making it clear that this was a core element of his presidential duties.

The presidential oath of office states:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.

The oath is not ambiguous, and defense of the Constitution is not optional.

Trump’s ignorance of U.S. law and history was also on display when he recently argued that the Declaration of Independence was a “declaration of unity and love and respect.” The document famously severed the relationship between colonists and England, leading to the bloody Revolutionary War where hundreds of thousands died.

Of course, Trump is the only president who has been impeached twice. In both instances, he was found to be in violation of the Constitution.

No wonder he thinks the right to a trial came “out of nowhere.”

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Team Trump runs to friendly media to spin damaging war plan leak scandal

Posted on by Oliver Willis

Donald Trump, senior members of his administration, and his congressional Republican allies are struggling to contain the political fallout from the leaked war plan chat scandal. 

In multiple media appearances on friendly right-wing media outlets, they offered multiple excuses to spin what happened and promoted an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory for how Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic was able to get access to the chat.

Appearing on Newsmax Tuesday, Trump inaccurately referred to the text chain as a “call” and professed ignorance as to how the leak occurred.

“What it was, we believe, is somebody that was on the line with permission, somebody that worked with Mike Waltz at a lower level, had Goldberg's number or call through the app, and somehow this guy ended up on the call,” he told host Greg Kelly.

“I can only go by what I’ve been told—I wasn’t involved in it,” Trump added.

Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance tried to dismiss the scandal altogether, claiming on social media it was “very clear Goldberg oversold what he had.”

Fox News devoted the opening segment of all three of its prime-time shows on Tuesday night—“Hannity,” “The Ingraham Angle,” and “Jesse Watters Primetime”—to hosting Republican officials to spin the story.

YouTube Video

Speaking to Laura Ingraham, national security adviser Mike Waltz, who invited The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief to the chat, saw a sinister motive behind Goldberg’s reporting.

“I’m not a conspiracy theorist,” he said, “but of all the people out there, somehow this guy who has lied about the president, who has lied to Gold Star families, lied to their attorneys, and gone to Russia hoax, gone to just all kinds of lengths to lie and smear the president of the United States, and he’s the one that somehow gets on somebody’s contacts and then gets sucked into this group.”

Trump has attacked Goldberg over many years for reporting that Trump called deceased military veterans “suckers” and “losers,” but Trump’s own former chief of staff John Kelly from his first administration verified that story.

Waltz also claimed to Ingraham that he has enlisted multibillionaire Trump financier Elon Musk to investigate the leak.

YouTube Video

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, led on by host Jesse Watters, echoed Waltz’s conspiracy theory that Goldberg had done something "mischievous" to end up in the secret text chain to which he was invited by Waltz. 

She also compared Democratic anger about the leak to the Russia “hoax”—which was not a hoax and led to Trump’s first impeachment.

“The Democrats, there’s nothing that they’re better at than spinning a sensationalist story out of a basic set of facts,” Leavitt said.

YouTube Video

Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin, a Trump ally, led off the opening segment of “Hannity” by praising chat participants for speaking “just like they do to the American people.” Mullin then argued that Democrats were raising the issue to distract from “disastrous decisions that the Democrat (sic) Party is having.”

The Trump administration’s argument—that Goldberg or some other outside actor had done something devious to access the chat—wasn’t far off from pro-Trump conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who argued on his Infowars site that the leak to Goldberg was a “CIA Vault 7 style operation.” Vault 7 was a leak of classified CIA documents to the WikiLeaks site in 2018.

The full-throated defense and attempt to spread disinformation surrounding the story across multiple outlets raises doubts about the administration’s claim that the leak was not a big deal. In fact, the high-level spin raises more questions about the chat and what the administration may be hiding as it refuses to be more forthcoming about what occurred. 

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