May 15, 2026 at 5:03 AM EDT
This is what elite detachment looks like

Bill Maher and Sen. John Fetterman sat around joking about Donald Trump's new White House ballroom like a couple of wealthy guys at a country club joking over cocktails as the republic burns outside the window. Maher dismissed the outrage by calling the cost "couch money." Fetterman rolled his eyes and reduced the backlash to "Trump Derangement Syndrome." They practically patted each other on the back for being the last two supposedly reasonable men in American politics.

May 15, 2026 at 4:42 AM EDT
Americans should call Trump's government what it really is

Words matter. When describing a government, they inevitably carry moral weight. Over the last 16 months, Trump and his appointees have so profoundly undermined the United States government that we should use different words to describe these people than we've used to describe all previous administrations.

May 15, 2026 at 4:09 AM EDT
'Sorry for misleading people': Inside the GOP's biggest problem

In recent months, some prominent conservatives and erstwhile allies of President Donald Trump - former U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and journalist Megyn Kelly, for example - have voiced their displeasure with him on several issues. They range from Trump's handling of the Iran war and the economy to the release of information concerning his relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Most notably, political commentator Tucker Carlson, once one of Trump's most stalwart loyalists, expressed remorse for his previous support for the president, declaring in April 2026, "It's not enough to say, well, I changed my mind - or like, oh, this is bad, I'm out." Carlson said he will be "tormented" by his support for Trump "for a long time" and that he is "sorry for misleading people."

May 14, 2026 at 10:15 PM EDT
Hard luck lands J-6er before tough Trump judge

President Donald Trump desperately wants to protect one of the people who helped him try to overturn the 2020 election -- but the January 6er in question was just assigned a judge who has already shown little patience for Trump. "On Thursday, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia took up the case stylized as U.S.A. v. Fox, named for the D.C. Bar's lead disciplinary counsel, Hamilton P. Fox," Law and Crime reported on Thursday. "In the lawsuit, the Trump administration seeks to void and enjoin any and all disciplinary actions taken against former U.S. Department of Justice lawyer Jeffrey Clark who was recently disbarred in Washington, D.C., over his role in efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election to favor President Donald Trump."

May 14, 2026 at 9:46 PM EDT
Critics rage as Trump builds $1.7B taxpayer shush fund for cronies

President Donald Trump is reportedly planning to force the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to pay him $1.7 billion for a slush fund for his cronies. Trump is angling to obtain this money as a settlement with the Justice Department he controls in a $10 billion lawsuit he filed by claiming that the agency is responsible for his tax returns being leaked. Now Trump says he will redirect $1.7 billion to a compensation fund for supporters like the nearly 1,600 individuals charged with the Jan. 6 insurrection and agencies connected to Trump himself.

May 14, 2026 at 9:32 PM EDT
Trump's latest unlucky appointment is already 'cooked': analysis

Bulwark Economics Editor Catherine Rampell says the ally that President Donald Trump worked so hard to place over the federal Reserve is already hanging off a tailspin -- and he hasn't even taken a seat. "In economics, there's a concept called the 'winner's curse.' It means that the person who ends up winning an auction has often overpaid for the prize. It's a good way of characterizing the fate of the newly confirmed Federal Reserve chair, Kevin Warsh," said Rampell.

May 14, 2026 at 8:27 PM EDT
Regret continues to mount among Trump supporters as nation careens into midterms: report

Surveys conducted by The Conversation found that 84 percent of 2024 Trump voters say they would vote for Trump if given the chance to vote again in the 2024 election. That's down 2 percentage points since analysts previously asked this question last July. "But some groups of Trump voters are having second thoughts," the Conversation reports.

May 14, 2026 at 8:26 PM EDT
Conservative slams Trump's 'impotent' House puppet

President Donald Trump has so thoroughly intimidated House Speaker Mike Johnson, he practically comes across as lazy, at least if one conservative commentator is to be believed. "Each House speakership ends up having its own unique character""forged through a combination of successes and failures," wrote The Bulwark's Joe Perticone on Thursday. After reviewing the problems that afflicted past House Speakers like Nancy Pelosi, Paul Ryan and Kevin McCarthy, he described Johnson as unique in his lack of productivity.

May 14, 2026 at 5:26 PM EDT
DOJ should look 'very carefully' at Blanche's role in Trump cases: Comey

Former FBI head James Comey says he has never imaged a scenario when a president's acting attorney general must consider removing himself from DOJ cases involving the president because of his former role as the president's defense attorney. "I never imagined a circumstance where a president would have a criminal defense lawyer who was the acting attorney general," said Comey, discussing a CNN report that a high-ranking lawyer warned acting AG Todd Blanche to recuse himself from certain cases or risk ruining them.

May 14, 2026 at 5:20 PM EDT
Law enforcement celebrates departure of embattled Trump official: 'It's like Christmas'

For several months, Border Patrol Chief Mike Banks has been fending off allegations of unethical behavior in office. Then on Thursday morning, he abruptly announced his retirement. According to Washington Examiner reporter Anna Giaritelli, law enforcement agents who worked under him are celebrating. "A Border Patrol sector chief called me this afternoon," posted Giaritelli. "He choked up talking about how horrible his experience was working under Mike Banks. (To have a senior federal law enforcement agent this upset about a boss goes to show just how bad it was.) 'Every field chief, I'm texting probably 10 this morning, it's like Christmas for everybody,' the official said."

May 14, 2026 at 5:08 PM EDT
This Republican is a 'dying breed' falling victim to Trump's 'personality cult'

Over the course of President Donald Trump's second term, there may be no member of his own party who has drawn more of his ire than Senator Thomas Massie (R-KY). Now, with polls showing that a Trump-backed primary challenger may end up kicking Massie out of Congress, Reason magazine editor in chief Katherine Mangu-Ward argues that America would be worse off without the leadership of this "dying breed" Republican. As Mangu-Ward explains, while Trump has called Massie "a complete and total disaster," "Their falling-out wasn't a foregone conclusion. Mr. Massie votes with his party 91 percent of the time. He shares MAGA's distrust of the administrative state and MAHA's suspicion that federal health and agriculture bureaucracies are too cozy with the industries they regulate. He was drinking raw milk before Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made it cool."

May 14, 2026 at 4:47 PM EDT
Christian nationalists cling to Trump because they 'know they're in decline'

President Donald Trump and his administration have openly preached for Christianity to shape national policy since he began his second term -- yet the vast majority of Americans do not share this agenda. "The religious right has been ascendant during the second presidency of Donald Trump, and they've harnessed his disdain for rules and norms to blur the lines between church and state," reported Vox's Christian Paz on Thursday. "Inside the White House, the secretary of defense has framed the war in Iran and American military action abroad as sanctioned and guided by God. Outside the government, this alliance between church and state often skirts near the edge of outright idolatry. Conservative pastors are erecting golden statues of Trump (but insisting it does not mirror the infamous golden calf of the Old Testament). They're extending their hands over the president in prayer after comparing him to Jesus and standing by him, with some mild criticism, after he cast himself as an AI-slop Messiah."