Trump's turns to empty threats as he runs out of real ammo in his five-month war on Iran.The latest from Raw Story's Nick Anderson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist.
The Trump administration has adopted a new and unusual tactic in its ongoing push to investigate voter fraud – obtaining the IP addresses of people who registered to vote online.The FBI recently requested and received the IP address tied to an online voter registration in South Carolina with assistance from state and local officials, according to documents first shared with Axios."It's unclear how often the FBI plans to take the extraordinary step of seeking IP addresses," Axios reported, "but its push in South Carolina has broad implications nationwide: 43 states allow some form of online voter registration."Alan Helms, a veteran election official in York County, South Carolina, said it was the first time in his tenure that law enforcement had approached his office this way. A former senior Justice Department official was more blunt, describing the request as an inappropriate "fishing expedition" into private voter data.While an IP address doesn't reveal a person's identity, it can indicate general location and internet service provider — including whether a registrant was located outside the state or the country.This South Carolina case is part of a broader, multi-agency federal effort tied to President Donald Trump's persistent, unsubstantiated claims of fraud in the 2020 election. ICE has separately requested voter data in Texas and North Carolina, while the Justice Department is suing 30 states and Washington, D.C., seeking access to voter rolls from jurisdictions that have declined to share registration information voluntarily.Critics argue the campaign is rooted in unproven allegations rather than evidence of systemic fraud. Robert Weiner, a former senior DOJ civil rights counsel, said the administration has pursued "every possible avenue to undermine the confidence in the integrity of the federal election process."The administration has pointed to New Jersey as an example of election vulnerabilities, after a software error led to roughly 6,600 noncitizens registering to vote.New Jersey has since removed about 4,500 people from its rolls but is resisting federal demands for full access to its voter data. State officials note that some individuals initially flagged as ineligible may in fact be eligible voters.
President Donald Trump's claims about falling prices were subjected to a thorough fact check from CNN's Daniel Dale.The 80-year-old president boasted at a Michigan rally that eggs – along with "everything else" – had gotten significantly cheaper since his return to office, but Dale told "CNN News Central" that Trump was completely wrong."The president's claim that 'everything else' is down is absolutely, unequivocally false," Dale said.Consumer Price Index data covering 332 products and product categories found egg prices did fall dramatically — down 32.7 percent between January 2025 and June 2026 — but they stand as a striking outlier rather than a representative trend. Overall consumer prices actually rose 4.3 percent during the same period.The data shows widespread increases across major spending categories. Food prices rose 4.2 percent, shelter costs climbed 4.6 percent and energy prices jumped 13.1 percent, driven by an 8.3 percent rise in electricity and a 15.2 percent increase in gasoline. Medical care services rose 4.9 percent, apparel increased 4.5 percent, and tuition, school fees and childcare rose 3.8 percent. New cars ticked up slightly, though used cars and trucks saw a decline.Notably, no other item on the Consumer Price Index list came close to matching the size of the egg price decline — not even at half the magnitude. Only about one-sixth of tracked items fell in price at all. Even within grocery categories, eggs stood apart: Overall grocery prices rose 3.4 percent, with five of six major grocery categories increasing, including meats, poultry, fish and eggs as a combined category, which rose 3.6 percent. Only dairy products saw a slight decline, down just 0.1 percent.The report attributes the unusual trajectory of egg prices to a bird flu outbreak that caused prices to spike in late 2024 and early 2025, under both the Biden and Trump administrations, before beginning to normalize in April 2025."Eggs skyrocketed and then plummeted back to mostly normal levels," Dale said. "Meanwhile, pretty much everything else just kept rising. So the president, again, not telling the truth about prices, inflation and the cost of living." - YouTube youtu.be
Dear Democrats, Since too many people are complaining about you without providing any suggestions on what you could be doing better (other than “DO BETTER FFS!”), I’m here to help. We’re all tired of watching Democrats tweet without really doing anything, or getting into dumb flame wars with MAGA Republicans. Let’s fight smarter! Before we dive in, I know nobody likes being criticized or hearing the phrase, “You know what you should do?” When someone tries that with me, my immediate instinct is never to do whatever it is, because I’m a stubborn Taurus woman who hates being told what to do, like most women. But in this case, I must insist on telling you what to do, because it’s what you should do. Not to humblebrag (and yet also to brag like a man with a track record like mine would be allowed to brag about), but I have a long, long history of offering my ideas to people (men) in positions of power who laughed at me, but then made a lot of money from my ideas — but never kicked down any scratch or gave me credit. Non-political examples from my real life include:*Telling my first (male) radio boss in 1994 that Radiohead and Beck weren’t one-hit wonders *Telling my last (male) radio boss in 2006 that creating social media accounts for our station and streaming our signal online were essential for us to stay relevant [I also helped to create and named the station’s annual holiday concert series, which continues to be its biggest annual moneymaker]*Telling Dave Grohl in 2002 that if he wouldn’t cover my favorite song (“Heroes” by David Bowie) with Foo Fighters at Coachella ahead of their impending rumored breakup, then he needed to write me a song just as good. Dave then wrote “Times Like These,” which is just a rewrite of “Heroes,” and while he didn’t laugh at me, the Foo Fighters also never broke up, and I’m pretty sure I’ll never get any credit for it.Then there’s my entire Twitter political history, getting blocked by Trump and so much of MAGA, and all of the things I’ve written about how Democrats need to fight the Trumpublicans better. It led one of my followers to dub me Dublin “NosTARAdamus,” even though I’m more of a Cassandra when it comes to the political side of my predictions.Most importantly, I was a guest of then-DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison at our 2024 convention in Chicago, and I got myself there with all of two days’ notice, because I’m a magical human with amazing connections. I even met Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta and his husband, and Rep. Kenyatta told me he read my tweets. I’m tired of giving away my ideas for free, but I’m equally tired of not getting anywhere when it comes to getting Democrats to listen to me. Short of running for office (never happening, I’d be a nightmare of a candidate), I can either keep screaming my ideas into the abyss, or I can try to get the DNC to at least put me somewhere on the payroll as a consultant. The number one thing I’ve been screaming about (besides never understanding why no one challenged the 2024 election results, but we’ll circle back in a sec) since January 2025 is how much the party needs our own press secretary.A Democratic Press Secretary could easily set themselves up at the Capitol and hold a daily briefing to fact-check whatever KKKaroline Lie-vitt had just lied about. An immediate Democratic response every day, similar to the State of the Union response, would have an impact. Every member of the press would cover it, including the right-wing media, because they’d try to make content with gotcha questions. It would be the party’s best opportunity to get the truth out before the lies can take hold.And it would be a chance to show the American people what Democrats are actually doing to combat the barrage of awful from the Trump regime. Instead of tuning out the way Trump wants us to, more people would tune in because they’re starving for the truth, along with something to hope for.We need to see more Democrats bringing back some dignity to their offices, and we have the perfect model with Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), a new contender for the 2028 ticket. I’m also very proud of my Oregon Democratic delegation, who’ve collectively fought for all of the right things, yet fly under the radar despite their consistently strong performances. We also have an out and proud lesbian Governor, Tina Kotek, who could really use more support from the party right now, as could the record number of women (51!) currently running for Governor in their own states. Here’s the free advice I’m offering right now, but I’m not kidding when I say you need to reward those of us out here trying to keep/put as many Democrats in Congress in November, even as the GOP is doing everything to cheat. Every Democratic candidate needs to frame their Trumpy opponents (Trumpponents? Is that a thing we could make stick?) as willing co-conspirators in the Epstein Files cover-up. Make it as much about Epstein as possible.
ABC accused the Federal Communications Commission Thursday of “attempted censorship” and a clear “retaliation” effort meant to send a message to every other media company in the country.“The Administration has openly and repeatedly called for the revocation of ABC’s licenses, because it dislikes the content and viewpoints expressed on ABC network programs,” ABC wrote in a fiery 119-page regulatory filing to the agency.The filing is the latest in a legal battle between the television network and the FCC, which abruptly moved to review the licenses of eight ABC-owned television stations in April. The agency initially claimed that the review was related to ABC’s diversity and inclusion hiring policies, though it came shortly after Jimmy Kimmel made a joke about President Trump that Trump didn’t like. The federal government had never before demanded such a vast review of a major television network’s licenses.ABC’s latest filing called out FCC Chair Brendan Carr by name and made clear that this fight isn’t just about the Disney-owned network: “The retaliation against ABC is a signal to every media company in the country: accommodate the Administration’s view of what news coverage should look like or pay the price.”“Across the government, regulatory and contracting carrots and sticks have been trained on other disfavored speakers,” the filing continued. “The tools vary; the objective does not: a media industry too fearful of official reprisal to report the news freely.”Carr has rejected accusations of censorship, despite the sledgehammer he’s taken to the free press since the start of Trump’s second term.“Look at the results so far,” Carr bragged at the Conservative Political Action Conference in March. “PBS, defunded. NPR, defunded. Joy Reid, gone from MSNBC. Sleepy-eyes Chuck Todd, gone. Jim Acosta, gone. John Dickerson, gone. Stephen Colbert is leaving. CBS is under new ownership, and soon enough, CNN is going to have new ownership, as well.”Still, despite it all, Carr claims he doesn’t view the FCC as “the speech police.”Luckily, as ABC outlined in its filing, the network has received a massive outpouring of support from viewers, current and former FCC officials, advocacy groups, and political leaders on both sides of the aisle—including warnings from conservative Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch and Senator Ted Cruz. The FCC’s website has been buried in public comments supporting ABC and offering passionate defenses of the First Amendment and local television.This latest filing may not change Carr’s approach, but it could rally the rest of the industry—and the public—before the FCC makes its next move.
Donald Trump and his dutiful Federal Communications Commission chair, Brendan Carr, have been targeting ABC’s broadcast licenses, and ABC just challenged this hard in a new filing. In an interesting move, ABC cited Trump’s own social media postings and remarks at speeches to show that he is corruptly trying to censor the network as punishment for its content and viewpoints, in violation of the First Amendment. Amusingly, in those examples, Trump blurted right out in public that he does in fact want the FCC to punish ABC precisely because of its speech. Now this has become a weapon against Trump. We talked to law professor Leah Litman, author of a good book about the Supreme Court. She explains why Trump’s public bullying should undermine his case, walks us through the legal ins-and-outs here, details why ABC might prevail, and discusses how open, explicit corruption is intrinsic to his political project. Listen to this episode here. A transcript is here.
President Trump says a deal has been reached for Hamas to completely disarm and Israeli forces to withdraw from Gaza. And, the U.S. economy slowed some, but Americans continued to spend.
The following is a lightly edited transcript of the July 31 episode of the Daily Blast podcast. Listen to it here.Greg Sargent: This is The Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR Network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.It’s been a while since we checked in on Donald Trump’s use of government power to silence networks that displease him, and there’s a new development. ABC just put out their challenge to the Federal Communications Commission’s vile efforts to punish it by going after its broadcasting licenses. And something funny happened. Trump’s own tweets and declarations have become evidence of his corrupt intent to use the FCC as a weapon of censorship. And this captures something really essential about Trump’s open corruption and whether our institutions are capable of constraining it.So we’re talking about all of it with one of our go-to people on these things, University of Michigan law professor Leah Litman. Hey, Leah, always good to have you on.Leah Litman: Glad to be back.Sargent: So at the center of this sordid story is FCC Chair Brendan Carr, who’s one of Trump’s most slavishly devoted accomplices. Whenever Trump gets upset about networks telling the truth about him, Carr is right there in the background. In the spring, Carr launched an early review of broadcast licenses at eight TV stations owned by ABC, which is a network Trump hates because of Jimmy Kimmel and other things. Leah, can you just bring us up to date on this, and what Carr is really all about?Litman: Yeah, so Carr has been basically attempting to use the Federal Communications Commission’s power over these media companies in order to get them to ensure there is favorable coverage for the president, and coverage that the president likes. And sometimes he does this by threatening to review licenses that allow these companies to distribute their programming onto other channels. Other times he uses the FCC power by threatening investigations into the companies that might impose regulatory sanctions on them. And so this is not the first time this has happened. You know, we saw, for example, the FCC kind of try to coerce Disney to cancel Kimmel. We saw them trying to strong-arm CBS to cancel Colbert. And they do this, again, by threatening the agency’s regulatory authority to award benefits or impose punishments on companies that are subject to their control.Sargent: And these agencies, particularly FCC, have huge power, right? If they don’t grant licenses, that’s the end of the company. They don’t have business anymore. Yeah. And we should note here that the FCC claimed that its review of the broadcast licenses of these stations was about looking at their DEI policies. And I think we know that’s bullshit, right?Litman: Yeah, I mean, I don’t know what this administration thinks DEI stands for. You know, on our podcast, we’ve joked that it’s “dicks, ex-husbands, imbeciles.” In light of the diarrhea—it’s “diarrhea for everyone, because of incompetence,” right? Like, I don’t know. But they kind of use that word as their go-to for saying, we don’t like something that you’re doing, and so we are just going to target you.Sargent: Yeah. There’s almost like a Soviet quality to it. It’s like they really just say it, and they’re visibly full of shit, and they know it. And that’s part of the exercise of power.Litman: Yes, indeed. We can just toss this label out and use that to go after anyone we want. Sargent: And there’s nothing you can do about it. So ABC put out its formal response to the FCC’s review, and it’s scathing stuff. I’m going to read one line. ABC says, “The retaliation against ABC is a signal to every media company in the country: Accommodate the administration’s view of what news coverage should look like, or pay the price.” Leah, that’s the plain truth, isn’t it?Litman: No, absolutely. And I think the president has taken this approach to many different regulatory initiatives or prosecutions. You know, he’s tried to indict, for example, former FBI director Jim Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James. And it’s clear that those prosecutions also serve as a warning, right? Like, do our bidding, or stand down, or you will face the penalty. And so this attempt to bully ABC is just another example of that. And here, in the context of media coverage—and I think another manifestation of this are the president’s litigation against different media companies. You know, he sues them for running a story that he doesn’t like. And here he’s leveraging the immense power of the federal government to serve the same purpose.Sargent: Now, here’s the really good part. In order to show that the FCC is trying to punish ABC for its content and its viewpoints, punish it for its reporting and its speech, ABC cites one of Trump’s own tweets, in which Trump says this directly.
