Bondi and Kristi Noem the only two cabinet members to be removed despite string of scandals involving male officialsDonald Trump has been accused of running a “misogynistic administration” after making Pam Bondi the second woman to be fired from a cabinet already dominated by men.The US president dismissed the attorney general on Thursday amid mounting frustration with her performance, especially over the release of files on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Continue reading...
NATO’s secretary general is heading to the White House next week as President Donald Trump lashes out over European allies’ refusal to join the U.S. and Israel’s war with Iran.
NATO is a promise, and now it's broken.The big picture: The alliance was built on the premise that an attack on one member is an attack on all. President Trump has made that conditional: if you won't help me in my war, I might not show up for yours.NATO's mutual defensive framework doesn't actually apply in the case of Iran, a war taking place far from the alliance's territory. But it could be the death knell for the most powerful and consequential alliance of the past eight decades.Driving the news: Trump and his team have fumed at several NATO allies for denying the U.S. logistical help or access to their airspace or military bases to carry out attacks against Iran. He's called them "cowards" for refusing to join the war to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the administration would now "have to reexamine the value of NATO." Trump said he might withdraw altogether.The flip side: For their part, allies have noted that Trump launched the war without their input or any international legal framework — and created the Hormuz crisis he's now demanding they resolve. Flashback: This all comes months after Trump threatened to seize Greenland, a territory of ally Denmark, and impose tariffs on any other allies who stood in his way.That was one of several increasingly existential crises for NATO that have erupted, then died down, over Trump's two terms.Until now, allies have managed to "muddle through," in part by pursuing personal relationships with Trump and via various accommodations, like agreeing to buy U.S. weapons for Ukraine when Trump refused to provide them, notes Thomas Wright of the Brookings Institution.NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte will surely try to patch things up over Iran when he visits D.C. next week.Friction point: Taken together, Greenland and now Iran have forced European leaders to confront the need for a security architecture that could stand without the American pillar.Even if they stick to their newly robust spending commitments, though, it would take several years to be able to "defend and thereby deter Russia," and perhaps a decade to fully replace the U.S., says Ivo Daalder, a former U.S. ambassador to NATO.He says NATO remains operational and stands ready to respond to any urgent threats, such as a drone incursion."The big question is, let's say there is an actual armed attack on NATO. Would there be a political decision [by Trump] to come to the aid of that ally?" wonders Daalder.Trump has given ample reason in the past, and even just this week, to suspect the answer might be no.For the allies who share a border with an expansionist Russia, that's a very worrying prospect.Zoom in: The Iran war is shaping up as a strategic windfall for Moscow, boosting oil revenues and diverting Western attention — all while straining NATO.Russian officials and state media are openly reveling in Trump's attacks on the alliance, casting them as validation of Europe's weakness and self-sabotage.Surging oil prices — coupled with Trump's "temporary" easing of sanctions — are pumping billions into Russia's war chest while highlighting the depths of Europe's energy fragility.A furious Trump reportedly threatened to stop selling weapons to Ukraine via NATO if European allies refused to help open the Strait of Hormuz, according to the Financial Times.What to watch: While Trump is once again dangling a NATO departure, a 2023 law co-sponsored by Rubio states that no president can withdraw without Congress. However, the courts could well side with Trump if he decided to test it, Daalder says.Regardless, without unyielding U.S. commitment to the Article 5 mutual defense clause, NATO has already been significantly undermined.The bottom line: When Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was asked this week if the U.S. still stood by Article 5, he deferred to Trump, but added "you don't have much of an alliance if you have countries that are not willing to stand with you."
Golfer Tiger Woods appears to have called President Trump after his rollover crash in Florida last week, according to body camera footage obtained by multiple outlets Thursday. Footage released by the sheriff’s office in Martin County, Fla., shows a deputy asking Woods, who was standing down the road, to “hang down here with us” following…
President Donald Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi not because she did her job poorly (although she did), but because she was insufficiently corrupt.At least that is the claim made by expert legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, who wrote for The New York Times on Thursday that Trump fired Bondi for a “bad” reason, namely her failure to effectively abuse her office to prosecute his political enemies. In September he blasted her publicly for failing to get convictions against former F.B.I. director James Comey, Senator Adam Schiff and New York Attorney General Letitia James, and The Daily Mail reported that Thursday he was also upset she notified Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), with whom she has a friendly relationship, about an impending investigation into his alleged relationship with an accused Chinese spy.The Daily Mail also reported that Bondi "begged" to keep her job in a "dramatic" scene in the White House.“The fact that Ms. Bondi has failed in these abusive prosecutorial efforts is cause for relief, not dismissal,” Toobin wrote of Trump’s dissatisfaction with Bondi’s efforts in that regard. “It’s the rest of her record that has turned the Justice Department into an oxymoron that will take years, if not decades, to fix.” Toobin pointed out that under Bondi “case loads are down because of her failure to prosecute violent criminals” and she has sent so many transparently political prosecutions to judges that he has destroyed their ability to be presumed to be of good faith before the bar.“With the midterms looming, President Trump may have decided to replace his attorney general while his party still controls the Senate,” Toobin concluded. “But whomever he chooses, the future at the Justice Department looks like more of the same, and probably worse.”According to CNN, the writing was on the wall for Bondi as early as Monday, when the president began making private calls about the wisdom of firing her. While most of his support network said he should do so, experts suspect he will have trouble finding a replacement willing to compromise their credibility on his behalf as Bondi has done. Indeed, Bondi’s performance on the job was so poor that former federal prosecutor and legal analyst Elie Honig called her an “abject failure” while speaking with CNN."I think Pam Bondi's legacy as an attorney general will be as an abject failure. And I think there's broad agreement on that. Start with the Epstein files," Honig said, referring to Bondi’s mismanagement of the release of files pertaining to the late child sex trafficker and Trump friend Jeffrey Epstein."Everyone on both sides of the aisle agrees that she badly mishandled the Epstein files,” Honig said. “As Evan [Pérez] and Jeff [Zeleny] just noted, she was the one who brought this back to the fore by making these grand promises about disclosing the Epstein files that ultimately she could not fulfill.”Honig added, "When Congress passed a law requiring the DOJ to produce the Epstein files, she completely botched it. DOJ acted more than a month late. They over-redacted the names that should not have been taken out. They redacted. They left victim information there. When she testified about this a month or so ago in front of Congress, it was an utter disaster. She embarrassed herself.”
President Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi amid mounting frustration over her handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files and her office's failed bids to prosecute his political opponents -- while publicly praising her as "a Great American Patriot."
Hakeem Jeffries predicts Pete Hegseth could be next as party alarmed by damage done by ‘terrible’ attorney generalTrump fires Pam Bondi, a loyalist and ally, as attorney generalUS politics live – latest updatesWith quips, memes and jabs, Democrats cheered Donald Trump’s firing of attorney general Pam Bondi on Thursday, while the president’s Republican allies praised her relatively brief tenure overseeing the justice department.Trump announced Bondi’s departure on Truth Social, saying: “We love Pam, and she will be transitioning to a much needed and important new job in the private sector, to be announced at a date in the near future.” Her deputy Todd Blanche will take over as acting attorney general. Continue reading...
On the early edition of Balance of Power, Bloomberg Washington Correspondent Joe Mathieu discusses the latest from the Middle East and President Donald Trump's removal of Pam Bondi as US Attorney General. On today's show, Stonecourt Capital Partner Rick Davis, Third Way Executive Vice President Matt Bennett, Lexington Institute Vice President Rebecca Grant, Attorney Robert McWhirter, Groundwork Collaborative Managing Director Liz Pancotti. (Source: Bloomberg)
Attorney general was key part of effort to go after enemies but even she could not satisfy whims of mercurial presidentPam Bondi’s swift dismissal on Thursday underscores a reality that has met Trump loyalists from Jeff Sessions to Kristi Noem – no amount of loyalty is enough to save oneself from being dumped by Donald Trump.Since the president assumed office last year, there have been few people more important to his effort to remake government than Bondi, his longtime friend. Continue reading...
Two more members of Donald Trump’s Cabinet could soon be on their way out.The president is reportedly considering axing Attorney General Pam Bondi and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard.Trump has polled his top advisers about the duo’s fate, asking other Cabinet officials in recent weeks whether he should give them the boot.His gripe with Gabbard relates to her decision to shield a former deputy who disagreed with Trump’s war with Iran, people briefed on the discussions told The Guardian. It’s not clear if Gabbard will actually be fired, or who could possibly replace her.Meanwhile, Bondi’s administrative future is apparently on the fritz due to her handling of the Epstein files. Trump has been “frustrated” with her leadership at the Justice Department, and is considering tapping Lee Zeldin—the current administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency—to replace her.Yet Trump is still opting to publicly display his confidence in Bondi. The duo traveled to the Supreme Court together Wednesday for the court’s birthright citizenship case (something that no sitting president has ever done), and Trump chose to heap praise on Bondi’s performance when asked about the situation by The New York Times.“Attorney General Pam Bondi is a wonderful person and she is doing a good job,” Trump said in a statement to the Times.In comparison to his first administration—which was practically a revolving door for the president’s underlings—Trump has been much more sparing with his staffers over the past year. Still, Bondi and Gabbard would not be the first officials from Trump’s second term to receive a pink slip from the Oval Office.Trump axed Kristi Noem from her position atop the Department of Homeland Security last month, immediately following a string of abysmal appearances before Congress. Her position among the higher echelons of the Trump administration had become increasingly tenuous in recent months due to a series of scandals, though most notably after ICE agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis, marring Trump’s immigration agenda—a chief MAGA priority—in the process.
By Wayne Allyn Root Pam Bondi is out as AG.
The post WAYNE ROOT: Pam Bondi is Gone. Adios. Bravo. Thank You, President Trump. That was Part 1 of Getting MAGA Base Excited for Midterms. Part 2 is Start Indicting & Arresting Democrat & Deep State Criminals- with Barack Obama at Top of the List. appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Congressman Chip Roy, R-Texas, said the next attorney general needs to be “aggressive” and deliver real results, not just “show” and “statements.” President Donald Trump fired Pam Bondi on Thursday, confirming in a Truth Social post that Bondi would move to an undisclosed role in the private sector. “Pam did a tremendous job overseeing a […]
The Supreme Court has been a house of horrors for Colorado over the past decade, with the state facing a trio of major losses over laws it claims it has enacted to protect LGBT people but that the justices found violated constitutional rights. Colorado suffered its latest loss at the Supreme Court on Tuesday when […]
President Trump said Thursday he would "soon sign an order" to pay all Department of Homeland Security employees. Why it matters: The president's announcement marks the second time in a week he's moved to circumvent Congress to pay federal workers amid the record-long DHS shutdown."I will soon sign an order to pay ALL of the incredible employees at the Department of Homeland Security," Trump posted on Truth Social on Thursday. He added: "Help is on the way for our Brave and Patriotic Public Servants who have continued to work hard, and do their part to protect and defend our Country."Trump's announcement comes a day after House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) announced a plan to end the shutdown. Zoom out: Trump's move to bypass Congress and pay all DHS workers by fiat comes a week after he announced he would sign a similar order to restore pay for TSA workers.The administration's attempts to keep parts of the government open without congressional approval could run afoul of the Antideficiency Act.The 150-year-old law bars spending without appropriations and underscores Congress' constitutional control of the purse.State of play: The Senate earlier Thursday sent its plan to fund DHS — excluding ICE and CBP — back to the House for consideration.Even with Johnson now on board, arm-twisting still could be needed to get the measure through the House.Johnson had previously opposed the plan amid opposition from hardliners in his conference, calling it a "joke."The speaker hasn't said whether he will call lawmakers back to Washington from a two-week recess that began Monday.
Strategists say Trump's historic Supreme Court presence and birthright citizenship fight could energize MAGA voters ahead of midterms as Republicans defend fragile House majorities.
The president said Wednesday that the strait "will open up naturally" as its closure sends gas prices soaring at the same time he's urging other countries to "grab it."
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson faced viral conservative backlash over a wallet-stealing-in-Japan analogy during birthright citizenship oral arguments on Wednesday.
President Donald Trump reportedly told Attorney General Pam Bondi she was fired on Wednesday night, according to Fox News correspondent Katelyn Caralle. The dismissal occurred during a meeting before Trump's national address on the Iran war. According to sources cited in the report, Bondi had lost her job and was en route back to Florida by the time the President took the podium for his speech. The abrupt termination marks the end of Bondi's tenure overseeing the Department of Justice during Trump's second term. Trump is reportedly considering EPA Chief Lee Zeldin as Bondi's replacement, according to various reports.Watch the video below. Your browser does not support the video tag.
WATCH: The Constitutional Case Against Birthright Citizenship for Illegal Immigrants In the latest episode of The Patriot Perspective, we examined one of the most consequential constitutional questions currently before the Supreme Court: the scope of birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment. Oral arguments were heard on Wednesday, and while the issue carries clear political implications, the Court’s task is not to evaluate policy outcomes.
The post The Constitutional Case Against Birthright Citizenship for Illegal Immigrants appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Supreme Court justices and lawyers cited a litany of historic cases that reflect the many times Asians turned to the courts, trying to shape immigration law.
The National Capital Planning Commission had previously delayed the vote after thousands of negative public commentsDonald Trump has privately asked cabinet officials in recent weeks whether he should replace his director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, venting frustration that she shielded a former deputy who undercut his rationale for war with Iran, according to two people briefed on the discussions.It is not clear that Trump will actually fire Gabbard over the episode. Currently, there is no standout candidate to take the job, and advisers have cautioned that creating a high-profile vacancy before a successor is ready could cause unhelpful political distractions. Continue reading...
The Supreme Court’s 8–1 decision in Chiles v. Salazar is not the end of the road for the battle over a ban on the discredited practice of “conversion therapy.” As Beth Parlato, senior legal counsel at Independent Women, explained, the justices have now changed how the lower courts must look at Colorado’s counseling law, which […]
While addressing the nation on Wednesday night, President Donald Trump called on the world's countries to “build up some delayed courage" and “just take" the Strait of Hormuz.
The United States and Israel have done significant damage to Iran’s military capabilities. But Iran still fires missiles, has nuclear material and coordinates with militias in the region.
There are another two or three weeks of fighting the war in Iran, President Trump said Wednesday in a nationally televised address. Trump said Iran is “really no longer a threat” after more than a month of combat. Trump also stated that in a short time the U.S. would withdraw from the conflict and leave […]
