Trump announced a deal for Hamas to disarm. And, the U.S. economy slowed a bit
Source: NPR Topics: News · Bias: Center
Summary
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.
Trump announced a deal for Hamas to disarm. And, the U.S. economy slowed a bit
Center
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.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is taking Friday's Cabinet meeting on the road — to the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland, a rustic backdrop for sessions that have come to be known for being overly long and consumed by administration officials' endless praise for their boss. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said [...]
Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee voted Thursday to block a Democratic amendment that would have prohibited the Internal Revenue Service from giving sweeping tax audit immunity to President Donald Trump, his family, and their businesses.If passed, the amendment would have nullified a central element of the deal that the US Justice Department cut with the IRS in May to settle Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the tax agency. Experts have argued that such broad audit immunity is unlawful, and Democrats have warned the agreement could leave the IRS with no recourse if Trump decided to dodge taxes on the billions of dollars he has pocketed during his second stint in the White House.Democrats on the Finance Committee sought to attach their amendment to bipartisan legislation aimed at streamlining tax administration. The amendment failed in a 13-14 vote along party lines, and the bipartisan bill passed out of committee 26-1—with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) the lone opponent. Warren told Politico that she “cannot support a bill that rubber stamps Donald Trump’s corruption.”“Senate Republicans blocked Democrats’ proposal to end Donald Trump’s IRS sweetheart deal,” Warren wrote on social media following Thursday’s vote. “This deal gives him FULL IMMUNITY from audits on tax returns he’s filed. It’s corruption on steroids.”The vote on the Democratic amendment came as Trump’s attorney general nominee, Todd Blanche, remained stalled in the Senate, in large part due to the Justice Department’s failure to commit to sufficient limitations on the IRS audit immunity deal, which Blanche signed.Blanche, who is currently the acting attorney general, testified during a Senate confirmation hearing earlier this month that the IRS audit immunity deal is “not forward-looking,” but a key Republican said this week that the Justice Department has not yet provided sufficient written commitments to limit the immunity agreement.Blanche reportedly met with the two Senate GOP holdouts—John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina—on Thursday in an effort to hash out a deal to advance his nomination. Trump, who has aggressively avoided taxes throughout his career and broke with political tradition by refusing to voluntarily release his federal income tax returns, threatened on Thursday to pull Blanche’s nomination until Cornyn and Tillis leave the Senate next year, having lost reelection.The New York Times summarized the IRS immunity deal, should it survive legal and political scrutiny:First, the IRS has to drop any inquiries, whether civil audits or criminal investigations, it was pursuing into Mr. Trump, his family members, their companies, or ‘affiliated individuals.’ Second, the IRS can’t start any new investigations into tax returns that this potentially large pool of people and companies has already filed.That means that any tax maneuver the Trumps have already used, whether the IRS was already auditing it or not, is now off limits. The agency typically has three years after someone files a tax return to assess more in taxes. So there are potential audits of Mr. Trump and his family that the IRS could have initiated—claims that ‘could have been asserted,’ in the language of Mr. Blanche’s order—that it is now not supposed to. But the next tax return that Mr. Trump files could, theoretically, still be eligible for an audit.“Trump’s sweetheart audit immunity deal is perhaps the most brazenly corrupt action taken by a president in American history, and Congress must permanently put a stop to the unchecked greed on display,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, said earlier this week. “Elected officials cannot look taxpayers in the eye and ask them to play by a set of rules that the president of the United States is exempt from.”
White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett scrambled Friday after being confronted by Fox Business’ Maria Bartiromo about the “way lower than expected” economic growth that fell far short of his previous predictions.In early May, Hassett told Bartiromo that he “personally would make a bet” with his “friends” that U.S. economic growth would be 4% for the “rest of the year.” He doubled down on that prediction in early July. And yet, on Thursday, the Commerce Department reported “weaker than expected” GDP growth – a broad measure of economic activity – of just 1.5% for the second quarter of 2026, per the Bureau of Economic Analysis.“Yesterday, the GDP was slower than expected; last time we spoke, you told me you were expecting 4% growth in the second half of the year,” Bartiromo said. “We got a growth number yesterday, but it was way lower than people expected – how would you assess the macro story today?”Rather than admit his prediction was widely off, Hassett attempted to reframe his past remarks as referencing a narrower interpretation of economic growth.“Well I think that what we were looking at when you and I talked last was... uh... the really surging domestic demand, and so final sales within the U.S. were about 4% actually, almost exactly the number we talked about, 3.9%,” Hassett said. “The reason why the topline number was 1.5% was that we imported so many capital goods because we're building factories so fast that the number was different than we expected by a little bit.”Despite Hassett’s claim that the United States was “building factories so fast,” federal data paints a different picture. Factory construction spending was actually down 22% when compared with the same time last year, having declined every month this year. Manufacturing employment is also trending downward, with the sector losing 38,000 jobs over the past 12 months while adding 18,000 in the past six months.“The bottom line though is that if you look at that – the huge surge in capital spending – it means that the economy is really running on all cylinders,” Hassett claimed.
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.
