MAHA event sparks mockery as attendees 'nearly puke' in pancake eating contest: reporter

'Did the rapture happen?' Mockery ensues as Fox News broadcasts from empty Trump event

The internet had a hilarious response to the low attendance at President Donald Trump's Great American State Fair on Monday.Reporters broadcast live from the sparsely-attended fair commemorating America’s 250th anniversary, marked by bad weather that canceled rapper Vanilla Ice's performance, power outages melting ice cream, a Confederate flag display that ignited a firestorm and lackluster reviews from attendees. Journalist Aaron Rupar commented on a Fox News reporter's live report from the celebration."Did the rapture happen overnight? Fox & Friends is broadcasting from a completely empty Trump state fair on the National Mall," Rupar wrote on X.Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM) described a similar scene."I went to the Great American State Fair this weekend…and it really was as empty as reported. **And where did the rest of our taxpayer dollars go?" Stansbury wrote on X.Another D.C.-based reporter questioned the turnout, sharing an aerial video view from the Freedom 250 Ferris wheel."The Great American State Fair on Saturday at 2:15pm. What do you make of the crowd?" Jon Michael Raasch, The Daily Mail's White House correspondent, posted on X.Strategist Christopher Webb responded to reporting from MS NOW at the location."The Great American State Fair was really just the remaining MAGA faithful refusing to admit it’s over," Webb wrote on X.Lawyer David Lurie joked about the situation."Confused attendees thought they were supposed to invade the Capitol," Lurie wrote on Bluesky.Did the rapture happen overnight? Fox & Friends is broadcasting from a completely empty Trump state fair on the National Mall pic.twitter.com/fIdDJZG4FA— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 29, 2026

'Disgusting!' Trump blamed after Republican's whites-only rant sparks clash on live TV

A Republican caller's live argument that citizenship should be limited to white people drew an instant rebuttal from a Democratic woman who blamed President Donald Trump for riling up white supremacists.During Monday's Washington Journal program on C-SPAN, Jim, a North Dakota man calling on the Republican line, invoked America's first citizenship law to make his case. Victoria, a Connecticut woman on the Democrats' line, called it "disgusting" — and said it was the president's fault.The 1790 Naturalization Act limited citizenship to "free white persons" — a restriction that lasted more than 160 years."The very first naturalization laws that they put in place in 1790 said you had to be a free white person of good character to become a citizen," Jim argued."They had no intention of flooding this nation with millions of people from the third world," he continued. "They never would have allowed this to happen, open borders. And I think they'd be disappointed when they looked at those inner cities and things right now.""Whoever builds the clubhouse decides who the members are going to be... And in 1790, the census said that we were 99% white Anglo, and we were that way all the way through the 1960s. It's only in the last 40 years of Democrats flooding this country. We see all the mess."Victoria directed her response at Echevarria, a Latino host, asking how he felt hearing Jim's whites-only diatribe about America on its 250th birthday."Pedro. As a person of color, I wonder how you feel with that previous caller and how he defined America 250 years later," she asked but the host didn't answer."It's disgusting!" the caller exclaimed. "I'm disgusted at this country. I can also remember 1976 and how that whole year it seemed like we were in celebration mode. That's not how we are today. And why is that? Because we have a white supremacist in office who is riling up all the other white supremacists like that North Dakota caller you just had."The Supreme Court has since gutted the Voting Rights Act through a series of decisions, most recently in April 2026."Fifty years ago, we were on the heels of civil rights legislation that is now being repealed," Victoria concluded. "There were also African American people in this country in 1790. They were in enslavement."

DC insider calls out JD Vance's 'slick sleight of hand' to avoid mockery from key audience

Bill Maher challenged Vice President JD Vance on President Donald Trump's false claims of election fraud, and a well-connected Washington, D.C., reporter flagged a sneaky maneuver the V.P. used to avoid heckling from the talk show's live audience.The vice president agreed that candidates should not refuse to concede elections but claimed that technology companies had interfered in the 2020 election by censoring political narratives to favor Democratic candidates, but Jonathan Martin, Politico's politics bureau chief and senior political columnist, told MS NOW's "Morning Joe" that Vance had sidestepped Trump's actual claims."I want to go back to that clip you played at the start of this segment," Martin said. "I think it's really important for your viewers to see what Vance was doing, because it's a really slick slight of hand what Vance was doing. He has a studio audience, a studio audience there in Hollywood that skews liberal. He's got a host who definitely skews liberal in Bill Maher.""Vance does not have the courage to sit there and echo Trump saying 2020 was stolen and Democrats literally stole the election because he knows that can't play with that audience and that he's going to be laughed at and mocked if he says it out loud," Martin added, "so he doesn't echo what Trump actually said, he just argues something else entirely."Martin said the game Vance was playing on Maher's show is the same balance that all Republicans are forced to strike with Trump looming over the party."He won't carry Trump's water there because he'll be laughed at it before a studio audience," Martin said. "But he also won't alienate Trump or disagree with Trump, so he argues something else entirely from the question that was posed, which is talking about what social media companies did on speech in the lead up to '20. But that was never Trump's argument. Trump wasn't talking about that, Trump said, 'No, it was literally stolen from me, they literally stole the election from me.' But Vance won't litigate that, so instead he talked about something else and hopes that Trump won't notice, and this is a standard for the entire game for the last decade. What Vance was doing there is what the party does writ large, which is you just try to make this as least humiliating as possible – change the argument: 'Well, I'm talking about the broader case, the broader case, because if you litigate what Trump is actually saying...""It's embarrassing and obviously it doesn't stand up on the facts, either, and what Vance was doing there is that game they play every time – it's a high-brow Trumpism, it's an uptown version of Trumpism," Martin added. "He won't say they stole the election directly, I'll just say say something else that won't piss Trump off. He won't notice that I'm actually walking away from his craziness and I can just live for one more day. Boy, that is the order of the decade for the GOP." - YouTube youtu.be

Trump facing 'bleak' chances of fixing his biggest midterms problem: report

President Donald Trump and the Republican Party are in "a race against time," according to The Hill, as they face "bleak" odds of addressing one of voters' biggest concerns ahead of the midterm races.The cost of living and general economic affordability remain the most pressing issues for voters this year, and numerous polls have indicated that a significant number of them blame Trump directly for the current state of affairs, particularly the problem of runaway inflation. In the face of his mounting unpopularity, the GOP has been staring down increasingly worse midterm odds and seems poised to lose one or both of its congressional majorities to Democrats in November.According to a Monday morning report from The Hill, Trump and his party are desperately "hoping that inflation can be bent downward in time to revive their chances in November’s midterm elections," but their outlook is not strong."New data released late last week on personal consumption expenditures (PCE) showed inflation above 4 percent," the outlet explained. "Even excluding food and gas costs, so-called core inflation was at 3.4 percent for the year ending in May. This, in turn, makes an imminent reduction in interest rates by the Federal Reserve much less likely — despite Trump’s clamoring for it."The report continued: "Gas prices also remain elevated, with the national average cost per gallon at $3.90 on Friday, according to AAA. Although down from its apex, this price is still almost $1 above the level that was seen just before Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attacked Iran in late February."The Hill also noted some signs of hope for the party, specifically the plummeting cost of oil in the wake of Trump's shaky ceasefire deal with Iran. This, however, does not guarantee that the prices consumers see at the pump will be down enough before November.“We have time, but we don’t have that much time,” GOP strategist Matt Mackowiak told The Hill. “There are several reasons for Republicans to believe things are going to get better. The questions are: How much better are they going to get, and how much are voters going to feel it?”"The polling numbers demonstrate just how steep a climb the president and his party are facing," the outlet added. "Inflation is consistently the issue on which Trump performs worst when voters are asked about his performance in office. In the polling averages maintained by RealClearPolitics, Trump’s net rating is almost 40 points underwater on the topic. A Reuters/Ipsos poll released last week found that just 22 percent of adults approved of how Trump was handling their cost of living, while 69 percent disapproved."It continued later: "Most pertinently of all, inflation has remained stubborn. In November 2024, the month of Trump’s reelection, the annualized rate of inflation was 2.7 percent. The reading one year later was exactly the same. The rate ebbed slightly at the start of this year, only to ramp up again as a consequence of the war with Iran."

Supreme court nears the end of its term with cases about Donald Trump’s power to be decided – US politics live

Court expected to hand down decisions on several outstanding cases, wrapping up term that has focussed on Trump’s expansive claims of presidential powerTyler HicksFollowing a brutal Republican primary runoff in which Islamophobia took center stage, anti-Muslim hatred continues spilling into public life in Texas. Continue reading...

Joe, Why Did You Go to This Event?

Trump lashes out at Obama amid widespread State Fair mockery: 'Packed with happy people'

President Donald Trump took to social media Monday to lash out at former presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden amid widespread mockery of his Great American State Fair, an event he insisted was “packed with happy people” and loved by all – despite ample evidence to the contrary.“Do you think people appreciate what a fantastic job we did in building and operating the Great American State Fair at the National Mall, packed with happy people, and everybody loving it?” Trump asked on his social media platform Truth Social. “Ask yourself this simple question, ‘DO YOU THINK THAT OBUMA OR SLEEPY JOE BIDEN COULD HAVE DONE IT?’ THE ANSWER IS NO!”Organized by the Trump-linked group Freedom 250, the fair got off to a rough start last Thursday after most of the artists previously slated to perform at the event backed out after learning of its connections to Trump. The fair has also experienced power failures that melted perishable foods and stalled a Ferris wheel, and has been ridiculed over what appear to be near-empty fields and booths.

Mike Johnson navigates 'minefield' as MAGA lawmaker risks 'paralyzing' House GOP: report

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) will be forced, again, to navigate a “legislative minefield” this week due to President Donald Trump’s controversial agenda, a challenge that risks leaving the entire chamber “paralyzed for a second week in a row” and sparking a GOP "disaster,” Punchbowl News reported Monday.At the heart of the difficulties facing House Republicans is Trump’s controversial voter ID bill known as the SAVE Act, which has passed in the House multiple times but continues to stall in the Senate. House lawmakers are hoping to advance the annual defense spending bill this week before a July 4 recess, but one MAGA lawmaker is threatening to block all floor proceedings unless the SAVE Act is attached to the defense spending bill, an amendment that’s considered a non-starter for Democrats and would almost surely tank the bill.That lawmaker is Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL), who’s already submitted an amendment to the defense spending bill to attach the SAVE Act, which would require voters to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote, something experts have described as a form of voter suppression.“If Luna’s amendment is ruled out of order, the Florida Republican told us she’ll vote against the rule and continue her blockade on floor action, likely rendering the House paralyzed for a second week in a row,” Punchbowl News’ report reads.“Johnson and top House Republicans are hopeful that Luna will drop her insistence on the language after Trump posted on Truth Social last week that the GOP members should stop messing around with rules votes. It’s true that Luna has close ties to the Florida crew in the White House. But Trump has less sway than ever. And his advice on legislating is oftentimes ignored.”