October 15, 2025 at 10:20 PM EDT
'Watch out for January': Insider reveals which Trump Cabinet member will be first to go

Washington D.C. correspondent David Gardner on Wednesday revealed which member of Donald Trump's Cabinet will be first to go, telling podcast host Joanna Coles to "watch out for January and Pete Hegeseth." Noting Trump's penchant for rapid turnover during his first term, Gardner explained he was "told early on that Trump did not want a repeat of his first administration, where it was kind of chaos." "He was firing people, hiring people, it was a lot of unrest within the administration," Gardner noted of Trump's first administration. According to Gardner, he was " told [Trump] was going to give most of his leading Cabinet members a year, so there wasn't this kind of constant departure thing." "So my guess is, watch out for January and Pete Hegseth, because I don't think he's going to last much longer than that first year," Gardner said.

October 15, 2025 at 8:39 PM EDT
Conservative justice slammed for 'misguided approach' during major hearing

In an article for MSNBC published Wednesday, legal analyst Jordan Rubin argued that conservative Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, an appointee of President Donald Trump, is driving a dangerous effort to limit voting rights, based on what Rubin calls an "unfounded insistence" that race-based remedies must have an expiration date. Rubin warned that Kavanaugh's position, voiced during oral arguments in a major voting rights case out of Louisiana on Wednesday, could pave the way for the Court to further dismantle the Voting Rights Act.

October 15, 2025 at 7:29 PM EDT
MAGA lambasted for deceptive new spin on Republican shutdown

This Saturday, October 18, roughly 2500 No Kings Day protests will, according to organizers, be held in cities all over the United States. The demonstrations are expressing opposition to President Donald Trump's policies and are a follow-up to the No Kings Day protests held four months ago on Saturday, June 14, when the flagship event in Philadelphia reportedly attracted over 100,000 participants. Allies of Trump, from House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, are going out of their way to demonize the No Kings gatherings. Johnson is claiming that the protests are "Hate America" events consisting of Hamas supporters and Antifa agitators, but in fact, the June 14 gatherings were much different from the way the House speaker characterized them and drew a wide range of participants -- from liberals to centrist Democrats to democratic socialists to right-wing libertarians and Never Trump conservatives.

October 15, 2025 at 7:26 PM EDT
Trump's latest 'mad king presser' was more 'power crazed than usual': analysis

On an episode of The New Republic's "Daily Blast" podcast, host and journalist Greg Sargent speaks with fellow journalist Brian Beutler on how President Donald Trump seems "more crazed and power-mad than usual" in his Tuesday press conference. Referring to Trump's refusal to take a question from an ABC reporter because of an interview with Vice President JD Vance that went badly, the Pentagon requiring media to sign a pledge in exchange for curated coverage, and his threats to cut funds off from New York City if mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani wins, Sargent says, "Trump is clearly emboldened in a new kind of way."

October 15, 2025 at 6:13 PM EDT
Trump ripped for thinly veiled effort to 'intimidate' Supreme Court Justices

President Donald Trump, during a Wednesday afternoon, October 15 press conference, discussed the U.S. Supreme Court's tariffs case with reporters and said he may go to the High Court to watch the case. Trump told reporters, "If we don't have the use of tariffs, we have no national security. This country will have no financial security, will not have national security". But if we are not allowed to use what other people use against us, there's no defense. It'll be a disaster for America. That's why I think I'm going to go to the Supreme Court to watch it. I've not done that". I think it's one of the most important cases every brought, because we will be defenseless against the world."

October 15, 2025 at 5:18 PM EDT
'Conservative Republican' in deep-red Idaho pleads with Trump as 3rd-gen farm flails

A conservative Republican farmer from Idaho is making an unlikely appeal to President Donald Trump: "Do the right thing." His call comes as his family farm struggles to survive amid labor shortages he blames on Trump-era immigration policies. ABC News reported Wednesday that Shay Myers, general manager of Owyhee Produce, a third-generation farm in Parma, Idaho, is speaking out against the aggressive deportation tactics that have intensified under the Trump administration.

October 15, 2025 at 4:37 PM EDT
'What a prosecutor does': Expert blasts CNN analyst's claim Trump prosecutor 'rushed' charges

Although former U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) special counsel Jack Smith kept a low profile during the first eight months of Donald Trump's second presidency, that changed in a big way in October. Smith, during a Wednesday, October 8 panel discussion at University College London in the U.K., argued that it was "absolutely ludicrous" to claim that he prosecuted Trump for political reasons in 2023 and 2024. And he was highly critical of the direction DOJ has been taking under U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi.

October 15, 2025 at 4:09 PM EDT
House speaker waffles after agreeing to debate Jeffries 'anywhere anytime'

Republican Speaker Mike Johnson and Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries have agreed to a joint debate, following Jeffries' proposal nearly two weeks ago to address the federal government shutdown. "I write to challenge you to a debate on the Floor of the House of Representatives any day this week in primetime, broadcast live to the American people," Leader Jeffries wrote in a letter on October 6. "Democrats have been clear and consistent in our position. The country needs immediate, bipartisan negotiations between the White House and congressional leadership in order to reach an enlightened spending agreement that reopens the government, improves the lives of hardworking American taxpayers and addresses the Republican healthcare crisis."

October 15, 2025 at 4:05 PM EDT
Three judge panel rejects red state GOP's push to change voting rules

In a split from earlier rulings, Florida's 1st District Court of Appeals on Wednesday turned down a bid by Republicans to alter how county commissioners are elected in Alachua County -- a move that would have significantly shifted the region's political balance. PBS affiliate WUFT TV reported that the challengers, including former state Senator Keith Perry (R) and three co"'plaintiffs, had asked the court to block the county from electing its five commissioners through a so-called at"'large system, in which every voter in the county votes for all commissioners. The appeal supported maintaining or restoring single"'member districts, where only voters in a given district cast ballots for their respective commissioner.

October 15, 2025 at 11:55 AM EDT
'Political fault lines': 'Soaring' utility bills 'haunt candidates' in competitive races

Inflation in general has been a sore spot with voters, possibly helping Donald Trump get past the finish line in the United States' 2024 presidential election. Trump hammered then-President Joe Biden and then-Vice President Kamala Harris nonstop on inflation, and according to polls, anxiety over rising prices was a key factor in many voters' decisions to vote for Trump -- who didn't win by a "landslide," as he claims, but defeated Harris by roughly 1.5 percent in the national popular vote.

October 15, 2025 at 11:47 AM EDT
'Moral bankruptcy': House Speaker dismisses claim GOP rep beat girlfriend as not 'serious'

When asked for comment on the news that Florida Republican Congressman Cory Mills was ordered by a judge to stay away from his ex-girlfriend who accused Mills of assaulting her, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson's (R-LA) reply set off a firestorm on social media. Meidas Touch senior digital editor Acyn Torabi posted clip on his X account of a press conference at which a reporter asked Johnson, "It's been reported that Cory Mills was accused of beating a girlfriend" accused of stolen valor. Are you concerned?"

October 15, 2025 at 11:03 AM EDT
'Aggressive and unaccountable': Conservative warns Trump's assault on America is 'getting worse'

Conservative writer Bill Kristol writes in his latest piece for The Bulwark that it's "less than a quarter of the way through the second [Donald] Trump administration" and "it's getting worse." "I mean this neither as an expression of hyperbole nor a cry of alarm," Kristol writes, adding that "Trump's authoritarian apparatchiks are tightening their control over the key power ministries of the federal government."