President Trump predicted that New York will "only get worse" after two socialist candidates backed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani won Democratic congressional primaries in the Big Apple Tuesday night.
Darializa Avila Chevalier won the Democratic primary election for New York City’s 13th Congressional District on Tuesday night, defeating Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-NY). Chevalier, a self-described socialist whom New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani endorsed, defeated the five-term congressman by a margin of 49.4% of the vote to Espaillat’s 45.9%, good for a lead of […]
The ongoing saga of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has become a "hilarious reminder" of President Donald Trump's incompetence, according to a columnist who argues that the debacle underlines his MAGA base's powerful attachment to his failings.The pool, recently repainted under Trump's direction, has turned murky and algae-covered, with the paint visibly peeling, and rather than acknowledge a botched renovation, the president has pushed a theory that vandals attacked the pool with a box cutter – a claim that directly contradicts his own earlier boasts and strains credulity, argued Salon's Amanda Marcotte."Although such an act would require blade skills beyond even the greatest of samurai, federal authorities have arrested five people," she wrote.The episode reveals something deeper about the MAGA psyche, according to Marcotte, who said the outside saboteurs conspiracy theory is "painfully stupid," but it has nonetheless spread among Republican lawmakers and conservative media."Do these people believe this silly lie?" she wondered. "With MAGA, it’s always hard to distinguish the line between self-serving tales and genuine delusion. Ultimately, it’s irrelevant: What matters more is why right-wingers are burrowing so deeply into this nonsense. Like Trump, they want an excuse to arrest people for laughing at them. It really isn’t deeper than that.""Just as Trump is too egotistical to admit he screwed up the iconic Reflecting Pool, his followers cannot stomach admitting liberals were right all along about how stupid it was to vote for him," Marcotte added.Admitting the pool renovation's failure was self-inflicted would force MAGA voters to confront something uncomfortable about themselves, Marcotte wrote, so embracing his vandalism narrative lets his followers avoid that reckoning altogether."There’s a lot of power in that fantasy for his base, so much so that there is no way they can ever admit that Trump did a bad job on the Reflecting Pool because it’s such a stark symbol of how he really can’t do anything right," Marcotte wrote. "The pool isn’t the only hilarious reminder this week that Trump’s incompetence is only equaled by his narcissism."The Reflecting Pool debacle echoes the legal dispute involving the Kennedy Center, where Trump's name was removed by court order and the building was subsequently covered with a tarp — another instance of obscuring an embarrassment rather than addressing it directly, Marcotte wrote."Trump’s motivations aren’t mysterious. He’s slapping his name on other people’s accomplishments and trying to claim credit," she wrote. "Being solely focused on getting attention, he cannot distinguish between those remembered fondly and those, like Hitler, who murdered millions. All that matters is trying to obscure that the only thing he’ll be remembered for is his corruption, criminality and utter inability to accomplish much of anything of note."The 80-year-old president has suggested the pool, which was completed in 1922, was somehow his own accomplishment, and Marcotte said the botched renovation and ongoing efforts to shield Trump from accountability were a microcosm of the entire MAGA project."Most people would be embarrassed to be associated with such a silly fraud, but the MAGA base keeps eating this up," Marcotte wrote. "Trump is the president for every C student who blames 'affirmative action' for not getting into a better school. He’s the champion for fifth-place swimmers who point the finger at trans athletes when they didn’t do better themselves. For failed sons who whine about Black and female officers because they didn’t rise higher in the military ranks.""Of course they will delude themselves into believing 'vandals' broke the pool Trump obviously messed up," she concluded. "The alternative is to look at their own reflections — and they wouldn’t like what they would see."
Today is Election Day in New York, with a number of primary challengers hoping to unseat Democratic establishment politicians. The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) have a packed slate of 10 candidates across congressional, state Assembly and state Senate races. “People are really looking for something else other than these corporate Democrats,” says Liza Featherstone, author and columnist for Jacobin. Describing the DSA as a key part of the “grassroots base” of the left wing of the Democratic Party, Featherstone says DSA members want elected leaders who have come out of movements themselves, not just lifelong politicians who only turn to movements for endorsements every four years. Palestine is a key issue in many of the races, with DSA challengers taking a strong stand against genocide, while some incumbents have received large donations from AIPAC-linked super PACs. “People are absolutely disgusted with the U.S. relationship with Israel, absolutely appalled by the killing that we’ve seen,” says Featherstone. Today’s primary results will show to what extent the DSA is seen as a genuine alternative to the establishment wing of the Democratic Party.
Trump visits Senate GOP to push the SAVE America Act as Republicans struggle with unity ahead of the midterm elections.
President Donald Trump claimed Iran pledged that it will not pursue any tolls or charges of any kind through the Strait of Hormuz, and that negotiations would end if it did. “Iran has informed the U.S. that, despite troublemaking Fake News reporting to the contrary, there are ‘NO TOLLS, NO INSURANCE COSTS, & NO OTHER […]
Analysts were left stunned Wednesday morning after a trio of progressive congressional candidates backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani swept Tuesday’s Democratic primary elections in New York, many of whom drew comparisons to the late 2000s Tea Party movement that reshaped the Republican Party.“CLEAN SWEEP FOR ZOHRAN!!!” wrote progressive political commentator and former congressional candidate Krystal Ball in a social media post on X to her more than 625,000 followers. “It's a new day in the Dem party.”Democratic congressional candidates Claire Valdez, Brad Lander and Darializa Avila Chevalier all won their respective primary elections Tuesday, with two of them ousting their establishment Democratic opponents, and by significant margins. Their victory comes in spite of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) having “campaigned aggressively against Mamdani’s candidates.”“The Democratic Tea Party is here,” wrote Zachary Donnini, the head of data science at the news outlet VoteHub. “Tonight is shaping up to be one of the more consequential nights in recent Democratic politics, with Mamdani- and DSA-endorsed candidates reforming the party.”The Tea Party movement began in the late 2000s but fundamentally transformed the Republican Party during the 2010 midterms when a wave of far-right fiscal conservatives transformed the party and ousted multiple incumbents. Progressive Democrats have long hoped for their own party to undergo a similar transformation, and according to several journalists, that moment may have arrived on Tuesday.“The primary season is not over yet. And already, the number of Democratic socialists in Congress is set to double,” wrote Prem Thakker, a journalist with Zeteo. “Claire Valdez, Darializa Avila Chevalier, and Chris Rabb will join Bernie Sanders, Rashida Tlaib, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. And there may yet be more to come.”And MS NOW columnist Eric Michael Garcia, using a tongue-in-cheek reference to the “Star Wars” character “Yoda,” made the following quip: “Begun the Democratic Tea Party has.”The Democratic Tea Party is here. Tonight is shaping up to be one of the more consequential nights in recent Democratic politics, with Mamdani- and DSA-endorsed candidates reforming the party.— Zachary Donnini (@ZacharyDonnini) June 24, 2026
A trio of progressive Democratic congressional candidates swept their respective races in Tuesday’s New York primary elections, and a number of right-wing figures – including Fox News’ own Sean Hannity – were said by critics to be experiencing a full-on “freakout.”“Incumbent congressman Dan Goldman (D-NY), who was just banned from a New York City coffee shop because of his support for Israel, has now lost his primary to a radical socialist backed by [New York City Mayor Zohran] Mamdani,” Hannity said Tuesday night on Fox News, his voice cracking. “It appears that a pretty scary transformation is now fully underway in the Democratic Party.”AJ Faleski, a hip-hop artist and news analyst, quipped that Hannity appeared as though he was “literally about to cry” in a social media post on X to his more than 325,000 followers, with several other notable critics making near-identical observations, including writer and activist Maria Figuereo and progressive political commentator Jordan Uhl of The Young Turks fame.Three Mamdani-backed progressive congressional candidates – Claire Valdez, Brad Lander and Darializa Avila Chevalier – won their respective primary elections Tuesday night, two of them ousting Democratic incumbents who House Speaker Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) “campaigned aggressively” for, but fell short.Michael A. Cohen, a centrist liberal writer who is of no relation to President Donald Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen, proclaimed after the election that it was a "genuinely scary night for New York City Jews,” a remark presumably referencing Mamdani and his allies’ fierce criticism of Israel.His comment was scrutinized, however, given the demographics in the districts the progressive candidates achieved overwhelming electoral victories. New York’s 10th Congressional District, for instance, is 24.4% Jewish, giving it the second-largest Jewish population of any congressional district in the country. Lander, who has called Israel an "apartheid" state, won NY-10 by 66% over his pro-Israel opponent Goldman.“The freakout tonight over the NY primaries reminds me of the meltdown when Mamdani won his primary,” wrote the prominent influencer and writer who uses the pseudonym “GenXGril” in a social media post on X to their more than 102,000 followers.Sean Hannity is literally about to cry https://t.co/ckRv6wGVU7— An0maly (@LegendaryEnergy) June 24, 2026
President Trump pushed back against “Communists” after several candidates backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani secured major wins in House primary races on Tuesday. “America the Beautiful will NEVER be a Communist Country!!!” Trump posted on Truth Social early Wednesday, after several Mamdani-backed candidates came out on top. These candidates include Democratic socialists…