A MAGA lawmaker sparked outrage after he made a wild claim about the devastating earthquakes in Venezuela during an interview on CNN. Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R-FL), who is known as one of Trump's close allies in Congress, told CNN's Boris Sanchez on Tuesday that the Trump administration bears no responsibility to account for the more than 150 people recently deported to Venezuela who are now missing because the hotel they were staying in collapsed. The deportation flight landed in Venezuela about 24 hours before the earthquakes began, according to reports. "It's just an act of God," Gimenez said. That comment didn't sit well with many political analysts and observers, who shared their reactions on social media."Quite the excuse," Martina Navratilova, a former professional tennis champion, posted on X. John Jackson, a military veteran and political critic, posted on X that Gimenez had "betrayed the American and Venezuelan people, always blindly following Trump into corrupt foreign policy disasters." "The conservative Christian position here is that God wanted the people Republicans kicked out of our country—for no good reason—to die," Hemant Mehta, a former "Jeopardy!" champion, posted on X. "Carlos should be concerned about that last name of his that he's toting around in Trump's America," Russ DiBello, an actor and political critic, posted on Bluesky. CNN: Hours before the earthquake in Venezuela, close to 150 people on a deportation flight were at the epicenter and the hotel they were in collapsed. Many remain missing. Do you think DHS has responsibility to account for those missing?REP. CARLOS GIMENEZ: No I don't. It's just an act of God. [image or embed]— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) June 30, 2026 at 12:46 PM
President Donald Trump announced on Truth Social that the Republican Party will host its first-ever midterm convention in Dallas, Texas, Sept. 9-10.
A Republican-controlled House panel on Monday refused to allow a floor vote on a bipartisan amendment to prevent closer integration of the American and Israeli militaries, which human rights organizations say would deepen US complicity in Israeli war crimes.“This is unconscionable,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who led the proposed amendment alongside Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), said in a video posted to social media on Tuesday. “They’re not even giving us a vote on the amendment.”Khanna vowed that “Thomas and I will continue to fight to make sure we don’t compromise American sovereignty.”Watch:Congress has blocked the amendment @RepThomasMassie and I introduced to stop the integration of our military with Israel’s. It is unconscionable to not even have a vote. We will be continuing on and will not be intimidated by the pro-Israel lobby. pic.twitter.com/6ai93L0rAY— Ro Khanna (@RoKhanna) June 30, 2026 The Khanna-Massie amendment would have removed the US-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative from annual military policy legislation currently moving through Congress. The initiative, laid out in Section 219 of the House’s National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), instructs the Pentagon to “designate an executive agent... responsible for synchronizing cooperative efforts between the United States and Israel, to expand and accelerate bilateral defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, integration, and industrial cooperation.”On Monday, the House Rules Committee unveiled a list of NDAA amendments that it decided would get a full House vote, and the Khanna-Massie proposal was absent. Ben Freeman noted at Responsible Statecraft that the rules panel made its decision “after no debate” on the amendment.“By rejecting the Khanna and Massie amendment, the Rules Committee on Monday ensured the American public would not even get to see how their representatives would vote on this pivotal issue,” Freeman wrote. “This is despite unprecedented levels of public distrust in the Israeli government and widespread public outrage directed at these proposals.”The fight to block the US-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative—which is enthusiastically backed by the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC—is not necessarily over.Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said earlier this month that lawmakers “must” strip the initiative from the NDAA, signaling a possible fight over the provision in the upper chamber. A summary of the Senate version of the NDAA states that the legislation would establish “the United States-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative to expand and accelerate bilateral defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, coordination, and industrial cooperation between the US andIsrael.”Leading human rights organizations, including Amnesty International USA and Human Rights Watch (HRW), have urged lawmakers to reject the cooperation initiative, with the latter group warning that the proposal would “deepen US military cooperation with Israel while walling that cooperation off from further congressional oversight.”“Israeli forces’ widespread war crimes, crimes against humanity, and its ongoing acts of genocide in Gaza should give the United States pause about closer military association,” said Akshaya Kumar, HRW’s director of crisis advocacy. “Instead, Section 219 proposes to deepen entanglement, in a way that makes the risks of complicity ongoing. Legislators still have a chance to strip this damaging proposal out.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) lashed out at far-right rebels in his caucus as their plan to force passage of the SAVE America Act crumbled around them on Tuesday, CNN reported.The SAVE America Act, pushed aggressively by President Donald Trump for months, would add draconian new requirements to voter registration and verification, billed as proof-of-citizenship requirements, that would make it vastly more difficult for millions of people to vote. It doesn't have the votes to pass in the Senate.The plan, spearheaded by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) and backed by figures like Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN), was to pass a rule attaching the legislation to the must-pass defense spending bill, and play chicken with the Senate to force them to adopt it or let Pentagon funding lapse. However, 14 House Republicans crossed the aisle to oppose the rule, blowing up the plan and leaving the House floor paralyzed.According to the report, while Johnson watched the votes come in against him, "the speaker walked up to two of the lawmakers voting against him with a stark warning," telling Luna and Burchett "that they were wrong, they don’t get it and that their votes would lead to embarrassment, according to three sources familiar with the remarks."The Republicans didn't shift their votes, and Luna remained defiant in conversation with reporters, saying, “The fact that I’m being singled out because I know procedure — I’m not stupid. I’m going to fight on behalf of the American people. They’re saying they won’t, so now that you saw what happened on the floor.”All of this comes as the Trump administration, under pressure by a court order, quietly scraps a major proof-of-citizenship database controlled by the Department of Homeland Security, blowing up a major provision of the SAVE America Act that would have required states to use it.
MAGA followers were livid after first lady Melania Trump issued a rare statement voicing her support for the LGBTQ+ community on Tuesday.Trump shared her comments in a post on X following the Supreme Court's decision to uphold laws in West Virginia and Idaho that bar transgender girls from female school sports. The ruling was considered a setback for the transgender community, according to The Associated Press.In her statement, Trump cited an excerpt from her own self-titled book "Melania" — and the page number."The U.S. Supreme Court has now legally confirmed this opinion: 'Under Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, may schools maintain women’s and girls’ sports for biological females? ... The answer is yes.' America, we can support the rights of the LGBTQIA+ community and also protect opportunities for female athletes. Respect everyone and keep girls' sports fair. Both ideals are essential," Trump wrote.Loyal MAGA fans expressed their outrage in response to the first lady's comments."What is ideal about men claiming they can become women? What in that do you actually support?" User Debbie, who self-describes as "MAGA," wrote on X."I support the trans community getting the mental health treatment they need to recognize they are not members of the opposite sex," Matt Van Swol, a MAGA commentator and former nuclear scientist for the U.S. Department of Energy with more than 527,000 followers, wrote on X."Wrong," the account The Waitress, which frequently posts MAGA-related content, wrote on X."Respectfully, I don’t want my FLOTUS to support a community of people with a severe mental illness. They need God, and mental help," user JJ, who self-describes as "MAGA" and "America First," wrote on X."I’m thoroughly disappointed with this post. LGTBQ+ (sic) (alphabet soup) is an Anti-God movement. Sorry to say, but I’ve lost respect," user Lori Smith, who self-identifies as a "small business owner" and often shares Trump-related content, wrote on X.
"If we want real, lasting change, it has to come through the amendment process," Sen. Rand Paul said.
Does NPR's Nina Totenberg have advanced knowledge that Justice Samuel Alito is about to retire? The post NPR’s Nina Totenberg Reveals Why She Posted a Story Claiming Alito Was Retiring – Then Quickly Retracted appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The decision struck down a Trump executive order seeking to prevent the children of temporarily or illegally present people from attaining citizenship.
President Donald Trump is simmering after the Supreme Court rejected his claim that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution does not confer citizenship upon anyone born in the United States — and now the conservative movement is splitting in two over the matter.“When you hate immigrants so much that you want government run sterilization,” 2024 Libertarian Party presidential nominee Chase Oliver posted on X on Tuesday. “These kind of weirdos want to completely undo the country because a long standing precedent and interpretation of the 14th Amendment was once again confirmed by the highest Court in the nation.”He concluded, “They don't want a Republic, they want fascism.”Oliver was replying to a post by Sean Davis, the CEO and co-founder of the right-wing media outlet The Federalist, which advocated illegal defiance of the Supreme Court’s decision. First, Davis called out the two Republican judges (Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett) who joined the three Democratic judges in ruling against Trump’s position. Then he advocated a series of measures to defy the will of America’s most powerful bench.“Nullification,” Davis wrote. “States issue birth certificates, and they can just stop issuing them to non-citizens. Roberts/Barrett can deal with the fallout and litigate each birth individually.”He also suggested, “Pack the court. If Robert wants to be a politician who writes laws instead of a judge, then he can fight with 10 more unelected legislators in robes.”Additionally, Davis recommended that Trump “deny entry to all pregnant foreigners,” “deny entry to all female foreigners,” “require sterilization of all foreign visitors prior to entry,”and “dissolution of the Union. A nation which can’t even restrict who gets to be a citizen isn’t a nation.”Davis also sarcastically said that Republicans could “amend the Constitution. This is pointless, because once a judge decides he can rewrite the Constitution at will (as Roberts and Barrett did today), the actual text is meaningless. But this is what most GOP politicians gravitate towards because they are useless.”He concluded, “If you think all these options are not great, understand that that is what happens when unelected judges decide that they are in charge of the country and get to write its laws.”In contrast to Davis, liberal commentator and former Secretary of Labor for President Bill Clinton Robert Reich expressed disappointment that the Supreme Court’s decision in favor of the 14th Amendment was only a 5-to-4 ruling.“In another era, this would have been a no-brainer,” Reich wrote. “No constitutional lawyer I know thought the Court would decide otherwise. The lower federal courts had consistently and unanimously ruled against Trump.”He added, “Had Trump won, it would have probably caused panic among recent immigrants and their families. Although Trump has insisted his policy would apply only to future births, it was far from clear that the logic of any win for Trump wouldn’t apply retrospectively if a future president (JD Vance? perish the thought) wanted to go there. What I find troubling is that the decision was 5 to 4 rather than unanimous or nearly so, as it should have been.”Trump has openly considered defying the Supreme Court’s decision, as well as the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, perhaps in part because — as Georgetown University School of Law Professor Steve Vladeck recently pointed out — his loss with this decision deals a body blow to his agenda on immigration policy.