Author: Brett Samuels

President Trump is testing pressure points within the GOP with a series of particularly bold moves that have shown just where some Republicans are willing to draw a line on certain issues. Farm state Republicans have expressed concern about Trump’s idea to import beef from Argentina as U.S. cattle ranchers face economic headwinds.  Meanwhile, New York Republicans pushed back on the decision to pardon disgraced former Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.), who was serving time in prison on fraud charges. And others in the president’s party have expressed unease with Trump’s talk of a massive settlement with his own Justice Department…

President Trump said Thursday he was cutting off trade negotiations with Canada, citing an ad campaign that used former President Ronald Reagan’s warnings about the long-term risks of tariffs amid the trade dispute between the U.S. and Canada. Trump in a post on Truth Social accused Canada of using the ad to “interfere” with a pending Supreme Court case to determine Trump’s authority to impose sweeping tariffs on other countries.  “Tariffs are very important to the national security, and economy, of the U.S.A. Based on their egregious behavior, ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED,” Trump posted. Ontario Premier Doug Ford,…

President Trump on Tuesday awarded the nation’s top civilian honor posthumously to conservative activist Charlie Kirk, describing him as a “martyr for truth and for freedom.” Trump was joined in the Rose Garden by dozens of administration officials to posthumously give the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Kirk, who was killed last month during an event at Utah Valley University. In lengthy remarks, Trump praised Kirk as a political visionary, while calling his killing a “demonic” act and accusing those on the far-left of having “the devil’s ideology.” “Today, we’re here to honor and remember a fearless warrior for liberty,…

The White House said Tuesday it will use money from tariff revenue to fund a supplemental nutrition program facing a funding shortage amid the ongoing government shutdown. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt posted on X that President Trump and the White House had identified the “creative solution” to shift tariff funds to the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, commonly known as WIC, which was set to run out of money in the coming days. “The Trump White House will not allow impoverished mothers and their babies to go hungry because of the Democrats’ political games,”…

The Trump administration announced Friday it was freezing $2.1 billion in funding for infrastructure projects in Chicago, marking the latest instance in recent days of the White House withholding money for projects in blue states. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought wrote in a post on social platform X that the money being put on hold was designated for an extension of the city’s Red Line and the Red and Purple Modernization Project He added that the decision was made to “ensure funding is not flowing via race-based contracting.” The Department of Transportation echoed that sentiment, saying…

The White House is embracing the fight over the first government shutdown since 2019, viewing it as a political loser for Democrats and an opening to unilaterally advance its own policy interests. President Trump and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russell Vought have signaled they plan to use the shutdown to further slash the federal workforce and potentially pare back government programs and benefits. While some polling has shown many Americans will hold Republicans — who control both chambers of Congress and the White House — responsible for the shutdown, administration officials and their allies have spent weeks framing Democratic…

Russell Vought, the head of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), issued a memo on Tuesday evening directing government agencies to begin executing their plans “for an orderly shutdown.” Vought wrote to agency leaders with just hours to go until government funding lapses at midnight. The OMB director blamed the impending shutdown on “Democrats’ insane policy demands, which include $1 trillion in new spending.” “As such, affected agencies should now execute their plans for an orderly shutdown,” Vought wrote. Many government agencies have released contingency plans in the event of a shutdown, which will lead to thousands of federal…

Former President Obama criticized President Trump’s claims linking the use of Tylenol to autism as “violence against the truth,” warning it could harm pregnant women and families with children who are autistic. “We have the spectacle of my successor in the Oval Office making broad claims around certain drugs and autism that have been continuously disproved,” Obama said Wednesday during a stop on his speaking tour in London. “And the degree to which that undermines public health, the degree to which that can do harm to women who are pregnant, the degree to which that creates anxiety for parents who…