Transcript:President Donald Trump, like the previous Republican president George W. Bush, incorrectly claimed that the Middle Eastern country he wished to invade possessed a nuclear weapon. Unlike Bush, however, Trump never even attempted to create a convincing argument as to the nuke’s existence.“Trump hasn’t presented a scintilla of evidence that Iran represents an imminent nuclear or missile threat to America,” wrote Joseph Cirincione, national security analyst and anti-nuclear activist, wrote on his Substack on Sunday. “He has skipped the laborious process of manipulating the intelligence, presenting false reports and assessments, of trying to convince the American people, the Congress, our allies and the United Nations that there was an urgent necessity to go to war.”Instead of creating a large body of supposed evidence that could be presented to the public, Cirincione said that Trump relies “on friendly and compliant media to amplify his lies over and over” and a “slavish Republican majority in the House and Senate who parrot his lies and refuse to hold any open hearings on the war or debate an authorization resolution.” The president has even tried to curtail the First Amendment right of the press to critique their activity.“As part of his effort to consolidate Trump’s authoritarian rule, his Federal Communications Commission Chair Brenden Carr is threatening to revoke the licenses of broadcasters who ‘want us to lose the war’ by reporting stories unfavorable to the administration,” Cirincione wrote. “Trump is also aided by legions of well-funded groups backing the far-right government of Israel who are happy to support a war that they believe will destroy a country they consider the arch-enemy of Israel.”The anti-nuclear activist also commented that Trump is better serving the agenda of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu than he is his own.“I have been in Washington for over 40 years and I cannot remember a time when Netanyahu did not want to invade Iran,” Cirincione wrote. “His persistence paid off. He finally found an American president so stupid that he would do what every Republican and Democratic president since Ronald Reagan refused to do: start a pointless, enormously costly war with an adversary on the other side of the globe that, however odious, posed only secondary threats to America.”Ironically, Trump spent months prior to invading Iran (and, before that, Venezuela) demanding that he be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America,” Trump told Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre earlier in March regarding being snubbed. He later added, “I’m no longer interested in it [the Peace Prize]."In the words of Steve Schmidt, a Republican strategist who advised Bush, characterized Trump’s exchange with Støre as showing Trump has no interest in peace and wishes to wage war.“No man of violence and venom can resist the siren song of modern warfare, which, after all, is just a game,” Schmidt wrote for his Substack, employing the term “game” sarcastically “This is Trump’s team: Hegseth, Rubio, Vance, Cain, Bondi, Noem, Kushner, Witkoff, Musk, Weiss, Ellison, Hannity, Graham, Patel. Never have so many nitwits commanded so much power. They are a terrifying bunch, to say the least.”Schmidt concluded by writing “war is no game. Yet, it is treated as such by a group of vile men and women who are playing with human life as if they were gods. Trump is no god. There is no divinity lurking around Trump. There is only blackness. Only death. Only misery. Only wreckage. Only corruption.”Earlier this month, a former employee for Trump expressed concern that the president will ultimately cause a nuclear war over Iran.“Few Americans realize how close the president took us to the brink of nuclear war in his first term before aides talked him down,” Miles Taylor, the Department of Homeland Security chief of staff during Trump’s first term, wrote regarding the president’s warmongering against North Korea at that time. “What the public didn’t know at the time . and until years later . was that the president’s team was worried he might start a nuclear war.”s

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Transcript:In the two weeks since the US and Israeli strikes on Iran began, Donald Trump’s war aims have fluctuated between crippling Iranian military capabilities and toppling the regime that has ruled there since 1979. But despite the success of the initial strikes, which killed the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, many analysts believe that air power alone will not be sufficient to bring about regime change. They say this objective would be impossible to achieve without combat troops on the ground, a move that most US military and political leaders have long opposed. Instead, one idea that seems to be circulating in Washington is to support an invasion by armed Kurdish groups in Iraq and western Iran to destabilise the Islamic Republic from within. Trump publicly backed away from this idea on March 6, telling reporters: “I don’t want the Kurds to go into Iran … The war is complicated enough as it is.” But, given Trump’s trademark inconsistency and the unpredictable nature of this conflict, an armed Kurdish uprising remains a distinct possibility. Such a scenario could have consequences that extend far beyond Iran. The Kurds are an ethnic group with their own language and culture who have lived in a mountainous area of the Middle East for centuries. Nowadays, they number around 30 million and live in a region that spans parts of Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria. The Kurds are widely considered to be the world’s largest stateless people because they do not have a country of their own. This situation dates to the end of the first world war, when the Ottoman empire collapsed. Kurdish leaders at that time hoped to establish their own state, having lived for 400 years under Ottoman rule. But instead their homeland was divided between several new countries that emerged from the defeated Ottoman state. This left Kurdish communities split across internationalAround 10% of Iran’s population is Kurdish and many live in the country’s north-west near the borders of Iraq and Turkey. The Kurdish region of Iran has long been the least economically developed part of the country and Kurdish political parties are outlawed. Armed Kurdish groups have periodically clashed with the Iranian state, demanding greater autonomy or independence. The Kurdish question is even more sensitive in Turkey, which is home to the largest population of Kurds in the world. Since 1984, the Turkish state has been locked in conflict with the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), an armed group that has fought to establish an independent Kurdish state. This conflict has killed more than 40,000 people in the past four decades. For the Turkish government, the possibility that the US may support Kurdish fighters in neighbouring Iran is therefore not just a foreign policy issue. Turkish leaders worry that strengthening Kurdish armed groups elsewhere in the region could embolden similar movements inside Turkey itself. In the recent past, Turkey has launched military incursions into the Kurdish regions of Iraq and Syria. It has also fought a brutal counterinsurgency against PKK fighters inside its own borders. These actions show how strongly Turkish leaders oppose any notion of Kurdish independence anywhere in the region. American support for Kurdish fighters has caused tension between the US and Turkey in the past. Turkey strongly opposed the partnership between Washington and Syrian Kurdish forces during the fight against the Islamic State militant group in Syria in the late 2010s. It argued that some of these Kurdish groups were linked to the PKK. Turkey’s relations with Israel have also been strained by the Kurdish question. The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has accused the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, of undermining the transitional Syrian government by aiding Kurdish groups there. The Kurdish issue has clearly become a major source of tension between Turkey, a key member of the Nato alliance, and the west. So far, Turkey has largely remained neutral in the Iran war. Despite their regional rivalry, Turkish and Iranian leaders share concerns about Kurdish separatist movements and have sometimes cooperated to contain them. In the past, security forces from both countries have coordinated efforts against Kurdish militant groups operating along their shared border. Turkish and Iranian officials have also exchanged intelligence and carried out military operations against Kurdish fighters moving between the two countries. And both governments strongly opposed the 2017 referendum on independence that was held by the Kurds in northern Iraq. Over 92% of votes were cast in favour of independence. Iranian regime changeFor Turkey, the collapse or fragmentation of the Iranian state would be deeply worrying. It could create exactly the conditions Turkish leaders fear most: armed Kurdish groups operating across a much longer and more unstable border. Another concern is the possibility of a new refugee crisis. Turkey already hosts nearly 4 million Syrians following the civil war that began there in 2011 – the largest refugee population in the world. This has become a major political issue inside Turkey. If conflict or state collapse in Iran – a larger and even more politically complex state than Syria – triggers large-scale displacement, many more refugees could head west towards Turkey. Such a scenario would place considerable political and economic pressure on the government. Washington may see the Kurds as a useful way to confront the Iranian regime without deploying American troops. But such a strategy could create new tensions elsewhere in the region. For Turkey, Kurdish militancy is not simply a foreign policy issue but a core national security concern. If the Iran war ends up empowering Kurdish armed groups or destabilising Turkey’s border, Erdoğan may yet feel compelled to respond. This could open up another front in an already expanding regional conflict. Ben Seymour, PhD Candidate in International Relations, Nottingham Trent University and Eszter Simon, Senior Lecturer Politics and International Relations, Nottingham Trent University This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.s

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Transcript:President Donald Trump directed the Pentagon and other federal agencies to begin releasing government files related to UFOs and unidentified anomalous phenomena – called UAP – in February 2026, following years of pressure from Congress, military whistleblowers and the public. Congress formally mandated UAP investigations through the National Defense Authorization Act in December 2022. The Pentagon’s official UAP investigative body, the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, AARO, now carries a caseload exceeding 2,000 reports dating back to 1945. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed this figure earlier this year. The cases were submitted by military personnel, pilots and government employees describing aerial objects that could not be explained as known aircraft, drones or weather phenomena. Governments in Japan, France, Brazil and Canada also have their own formal UAP investigation programs. Yet modern research universities remain almost entirely absent from this conversation. No major university has established a dedicated UAP research center. No federal science agency offers competitive grants for UAP inquiry. No doctoral programs train researchers in UAP methodology. The gap between what governments openly acknowledge and what universities are willing to study is, at this point, difficult to explain on purely intellectual grounds. I have navigated this gap while conducting my own UAP research. My work developing the temporal aerospace correlation tool, a standardized framework for correlating civilian UAP sighting reports with documented rocket launch activity from Cape Canaveral, is currently under peer review at Limina: The Journal of UAP Studies. Designing that framework meant making methodological decisions without community standards, without institutional funding and without the professional infrastructure many researchers in established fields take for granted. What is missing is not interest or data – it is the shared scaffolding that turns isolated curiosity into cumulative science. Stigma is measurableThe most rigorous evidence for the gap between faculty interest in UAP and faculty willingness to study it UAP comes from peer-reviewed studies by Marissa Yingling, Charlton Yingling and Bethany Bell, published in the scholarly journal Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. Across 14 disciplines at 144 major U. S. research universities, 1,460 faculty responded to their 2023 national survey. Most surveyed believed UAP research was important. Curiosity outweighed skepticism in every discipline that was part of the study. Nearly one-fifth had personally observed something aerial they could not identify. Yet fewer than 1% had ever conducted UAP-related research. The gap was not explained by intellectual dismissal, but it was in part explained by fear. Researchers were not primarily deterred by intellectual skepticism because they doubted the topic’s merits. Instead, they feared they might lose funding, face ridicule from colleagues or find their careers quietly derailed. Faculty reported being told to “be careful.” A 2024 follow-up study found that roughly 28% said they might vote against a colleague’s tenure case for conducting UAP research, even when they personally believed the topic warranted study. Historian and philosopher of science Thomas Kuhn argued that scientific communities suppress anomalous questions not because those questions are unanswerable, but because they fall outside the boundaries the community has collectively decided are worth investigating. Sociologist Thomas Gieryn called this suppression “boundary work,” referring to the active process by which scientists police what counts as legitimate science. For UAP researchers, the data and tools to study the phenomenon exist. What may not exist is social permission to use them without professional consequence. Creating an academic disciplineAcademic disciplines do not emerge spontaneously. They require dedicated journals, agreed-upon methods, graduate programs and professional societies. The history of cognitive neuroscience demonstrates how disciplines emerge. Before the 1980s, researchers at the intersection of neuroscience and cognitive psychology faced resistance from both parent disciplines. These fields achieved mainstream acceptance only after targeted funding from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, new brain-imaging tools and the gradual formation of academic programs that created career pathways for researchers. Researchers at the nexus of these fields did not wait for central questions to be resolved. They built infrastructure, and the infrastructure made progress possible. UAP studies as a discipline is developing some of these elements, but largely outside universities. The Society for UAP Studies, a nonprofit of scholars and researchers, operates Limina as a double-blind, peer-reviewed journal and has convened international symposia drawing researchers from physics, philosophy of science and the social sciences. But a nonprofit scholarly society without tenured faculty does not constitute a discipline. To turn UAP studies into a recognized academic field would require three things. First, funding. The Yingling studies found that competitive research grants would do more to unlock faculty participation than any other single factor. Without grants, researchers cannot hire students to assist them, maintain instruments or sustain the multiyear projects that produce meaningful results. Second, shared methodological standards – these would entail agreed-upon procedures for collecting, recording and evaluating UAP reports – would mean findings from one research group can be compared and built upon by others. Third, institutions could publicly affirm that they will evaluate appropriately rigorous UAP scholarship on its scientific merits during tenure reviews. Several universities have already done this for gun violence research and psychedelic-assisted therapy studies. These are not isolated examples. Research into near-death experiences and adverse childhood experiences followed similar trajectories, moving from being a professional liability to mainstream legitimacy after the removal of institutional barriers. The international comparisonThis gap in UAP scholarship is unique to the United States. France’s GEIPAN, a dedicated investigation unit within its national space agency, has operated since 1977. It has publicly archived approximately 5,300 French UAP cases, of which about 2% to 3% remain unexplained after rigorous analysis. In 2020, Japan formalized UAP reporting protocols for its Self-Defense Forces, the branch of the Japanese military responsible for national defense. By June 2024, more than 80 lawmakers had formed a parliamentary UAP investigation group that by May 2025 had formally proposed a dedicated UAP research office to the defense minister. Canada launched its own multiagency UAP investigation survey in 2023. None of these actions has produced a corresponding response from American research universities. Universities provide independent, peer-reviewed analyses that government programs structurally cannot. The University of Würzburg in Germany became the first Western university to officially recognize UAP as a legitimate object of academic research in 2022, when it formally added UAP investigation to its research canon. Researchers at Stockholm University and the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics in Sweden have been actively publishing peer-reviewed UAP research since 2017, most recently in Scientific Reports in October 2025. Congress has passed legislation, the Pentagon is reporting on its investigations, and the president has directed federal agencies to begin releasing records. So the question no longer is whether governments take UAP seriously – it is whether universities will follow, and which ones will get there first. Darrell Evans, Professor of Environmental Science and Sustainability, Purdue University This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.s

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Transcript:In a flurry of chaos and fiery debate, the House of Delegates passed a version of Raylee’s Law Saturday night at 11:59 p. m., giving the Senate no time to agree on it by the session’s midnight deadline. The bill won’t head to the governor’s desk.“I can’t believe we have so many members of the Legislature who stand up and defend child abusers. It’s disheartening, disturbing and heartbreaking,” Senate Education Chairwoman Amy Grady, R-Mason, who sponsored a version of Raylee’s Law in the Senate, said Saturday night. Raylee’s Law is meant to prevent child abuse by pausing a parent’s request to homeshcool their child if there’s an active abuse and neglect investigation in the home. Del. Shawn Fluharty, D-Ohio, who has championed Raylee’s Law for years, chastised House members in the final minutes of session as the clock ticked away. They’d had the bill all day to consider, he argued.“This is abhorrent behavior. Disgusting government,” Fluharty said. “Why are we here defending child abusers? It’s insane.”The measure is named for Raylee Browning, an eight-year-old girl who died of abuse and neglect in 2018 after her teachers notified CPS of potential abuse, prompting her abusers to move her to homeschooling. Outside the House chamber, while lawmakers debated the bill, a large poster-sized photo of Raylee was on display.“When you reject her tonight, go out there and at least have the guts to look at her,” he told House members. The bill was in the House’s hands when they gaveled in Saturday morning but they didn’t take it up until 11:15 p. m. Del. Elliott Pritt, R-Fayette, a public school teacher, pleaded with House members to bring it to a vote as soon as possible after multiple Republicans put amendments in the system that needed to be vetted by midnight.“We have a moment here to do something to protect children that are in harm’s way, That is a fact. I’m very sorry if that fact is very uncomfortable for some of you to deal with,” he said. “I’m pleading with you to please reject these amendments as quickly as possible.”Raylee’s Law became one of this session’s most high-profile measures due to numerous and, at times, dramatic attempts by both Republicans and Democratic lawmakers to get the bill up for a vote by deadline this year. A bipartisan group of senators, led by Senator Ryan Weld, R-Brooke, amended Raylee’s Law into House Bill 5537 late Friday night after overriding a ruling by Senate President Randy Smith . a very rare move . to set up a vote on it. The measure passed with a vote of 24-7 and three senators absent. Weld said what happened in the House on the final night was “absolutely shameful.”“They had the bill for eight, nine, 10 hours. They got it before 11 o’clock this morning and did nothing,” he said. “With some of the things that I saw and heard in that debate, I’ve never seen a fight to protect child abusers.”Raylee’s Law has faced fierce opposition from homeschooling advocates and parents, who argued it was infringement on parental rights and could potentially force their child to stay in an unsafe public school. During the House floor debate, Del. Adam Burkhammer, R-Lewis, argued that the bill as written wouldn’t solve the problem its supporters were trying to address since it didn’t mandate a CPS investigation. He said the House needed “focus on protecting kids and not making a political stunt out of this (and) not trying to attack homeschoolers.”“I’m really even kind of frustrated how we’ve politicized this thing, but it’s flawed,” Burkhammer said. The House has passed versions of Raylee’s Law in 2024 and 2025. In 2024, a Boone County girl, Kyneddi Miller, died from starvation while being homeschooled, fueling renewed interest in the bill.“You voted on it. You’ve already passed it. And now all these amendments are popping up and we know damn well why it is,” Fluharty said. “We know this bill is good. We know who it was drafted by. We know what it stands for. It’s not about homeschoolers. It’s not attacking homeschoolers. Those who pretend to be and actually abuse are who we’re going after, you should want to do that.”Weld said he plans to bring the measure for consideration in 2027.“After what I saw in here yesterday and over there today, I’m 100% locked in. This is coming back next year, so they better be ready for it,” Weld said.s

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Transcript:Senate Republicans are “anxious about the midterms," and “the mood is shifting” among GOP leaders who once assumed they could coast to victory in November, Politico reports. Politico spoke with 10 Republican senators and aides, many of whom "are now openly predicting a tough battle to hold onto control,” thanks in large part to President Donald Trump’s policies. Their party is struggling “to keep the focus on affordability policies that lawmakers want to make the centerpiece of their midterm campaign,” Politico explains, as Trump wages an unpopular war in the Middle East that comes with rising oil prices and potential downstream impacts to the U. S. economy. “The Senate passed a major housing bill this week but it faces an uncertain future in the House. Trump himself told Republican lawmakers Monday that housing is not a top concern for voters,” the report adds. Trump ally Senator Kevin Cramer , Republican from North Dakota told Politico he’s “glad he’s not on the ballot” as “Republican senators [warn] that the party writ large needs to hammer home cost-of-living measures.”Senator Josh Hawley , Republican from Missouri, another Trump supporter, acknowledged “prices are high,” and told Politico he hopes Republicans will “take some votes to lower the costs.”Trump, meanwhile, has set his sights on passing the SAVE America Act, an effort to overhaul U. S. elections and "institute tough new citizenship and photo ID requirements in order to cast a ballot,” Politico reports. But Senate Majority Leader John Thune is locked in conversations with the White House, and Thune has warned the president his chamber does not have the votes to pass the bill. The president has even demanded Republicans nuke the filibuster to ensure passage of the SAVE America Act . but just last week, Thune had to deliver some “not so good news” to Trump on his demand.“The votes aren't there to nuke the filibuster,” Thune explained. “It's just a reality. … The math doesn't add up.”“Voting on the SAVE America Act is something we will do, but passage is not guaranteed,” he added. “I just wouldn't assume that that's going to happen.”s

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Transcript:In his top post at the Department of Homeland Security, David Harvilicz sets policy on protecting the nation’s elections infrastructure, including voting machines. He’s also the co-founder of a company with James Penrose, who helped hatch debunked conspiracy theories blaming hacked voting machines for Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 presidential election. Penrose assisted in a push to seize voting machines to overturn Trump’s defeat. On social media, Harvilicz has called for doing away with voting machines, saying they are “eminently vulnerable to exploitation.” In a March post, he wrote that “DHS needs to ban voting machines for all federal elections. The time is now.” He also has repeatedly questioned the validity of Democratic electoral victories and pushed for Republicans to overhaul electoral systems to their advantage. Election experts as well as current and former DHS officials say Harvilicz’s central role in overseeing the security of electoral systems and voting machines is especially concerning at a time when the administration is taking unprecedented steps to relitigate Trump’s baseless claims that the 2020 election was stolen. That includes the FBI’s seizure of 2020 voting records from Fulton County, Georgia, and having a team working for Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, take custody of voting machines used in Puerto Rico in 2020.“The security of our election infrastructure depends on leadership that is trusted, impartial and grounded in evidence . not individuals who have promoted conspiracy theories about the very systems they are now responsible for protecting,” said Danielle Lang, vice president for voting rights and the rule of law at the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan pro-democracy organization. “Placing someone with that background in charge of policies affecting election security can undermine public confidence in our elections at a time when trust is already fragile.”DHS didn’t answer detailed questions about Harvilicz or his team, providing a more general statement about the work done by the agency. “DHS and its employees are focused on keeping our elections safe, secure, and free,” it said. “Every single day appointees at the Department of Homeland Security work to implement the President’s policies and keep our Homeland safe.”Harvilicz didn’t respond to questions about his DHS role. Harvilicz’s X account notes his post as DHS’ assistant secretary for cyber, infrastructure, risk and resilience policy but says he’s been detailed to the Defense Department. (Such temporary assignments are typically done in 120-day increments.)Harvilicz was appointed to the DHS job around July, taking on a role that in the past has largely focused on shaping policy to protect the nation’s critical infrastructure, including its election systems. But current and former DHS officials say Harvilicz and his team have transformed their functions to become more hands-on. They’ve been deeply engaged with facilitating multiple administration data-gathering efforts aimed at scouring voter rolls for noncitizens, the officials said. ProPublica has reported on one such effort, which has led to hundreds of citizens being incorrectly flagged as potential noncitizens. Harvilicz’s team includes Heather Honey, the deputy assistant secretary of election integrity. ProPublica has reported that Honey was previously a leader in the Election Integrity Network, a conservative group that has challenged the legitimacy of American election systems. Honey worked closely with Cleta Mitchell, the network’s leader, who played a prominent role in helping Trump try to overturn his 2020 loss. Also reporting directly to Harvilicz is Samantha Anderson, a data specialist who previously worked to elect Trump through the advocacy arm of the America First Policy Institute, a think tank closely associated with the president. Multiple officials and elections experts said they were worried that Harvilicz and Honey would have prominent parts in assessing and describing the cybersecurity of the coming election, both to the public and to administration leaders. They also expressed concern that if Trump again wanted to get control of voting machines after the election, perhaps if Republicans lose seats in the midterms, that Harvilicz is ideally positioned to help them do so.“It would be super easy for them to get the voting machines,” a current DHS official said, adding they can “describe it as they want, if they don’t like the results.”Harvilicz co-founded Tranquility AI, which has developed an artificial intelligence tool for law enforcement, with Penrose, and they are listed on its 2025 patents as developing its systems together. Penrose, a former intelligence officer, played a leading role in the campaign to help Trump in his failed bid to overturn the 2020 election, ProPublica has reported. Penrose also participated in multiple attempts to clandestinely seize voting machines, including in Michigan, where prosecutors accused him of breaking into some of the machines. (Penrose wasn’t charged in the case.) He appeared to be an unindicted co-conspirator in the failed Georgia prosecution in which Trump was accused of conspiring to overturn the election results, according to The Washington Post. Penrose didn’t respond to a request for comment for this article. One of the purported uses of Tranquility AI’s product is for “election integrity,” according to the company’s website. It didn’t provide more details in response to a question from ProPublica. Tranquility AI’s tools, which help law enforcement agents process data and assemble cases, have been employed by New Orleans’ district attorney, and the company says it has partnered with dozens of law enforcement agencies nationwide. In July 2025, a large government IT contractor announced a partnership with Tranquility AI. Harvilicz started his career working at law firms on Wall Street and in tech. Then, in 2004, when he was 29, he launched a losing bid for a Maryland congressional seat. After that, he helped lead a crowdfunding company, a movie marketing business, a film production business that worked with former intelligence officers and several cyber security ventures (including one at which he worked with Penrose). He also did a stint in the first Trump administration, serving as cybersecurity official in the Department of Energy. In advance of Harvilicz getting the DHS position, Tranquility AI made a 100 dollars,000 donation to Trump’s inaugural fund through a newly created nonprofit based at Harvilicz’s home address, according to The Intercept. In response to questions from The Intercept, Harvilicz said the donation was designed to help them meet administration policymakers. The Intercept first reported his ties to Penrose in connection with the donation. Harvilicz has posted prolifically to social media, sharing hundreds of posts of conservative content. After Trump won a second presidential term, he wrote: “We will now dismantle the near communist takeover of America and return her to greatness.”In 2020, Harvilicz purchased a 3.3 million dollars home outside of Los Angeles. After the Palisades Fire destroyed it around the beginning of Trump’s second term, Harvilicz stood on a roadside to greet the president’s tour of the disaster area with his young son on his shoulders. His son held aloft a picture of a bloodied Trump punching the air after surviving an assassin’s bullet. Even then, elections were not far from his mind. He told a reporter for the Los Angeles Times that he supported Trump making disaster aid conditional on the Democratic state implementing voter ID.“I hope he saw us,” Harvilicz told the Times reporter.s

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Transcript:President Donald Trump’s UN Ambassador Mike Waltz is being roasted on social media for asking other nations to help America open the Strait of Hormuz after it was shut down due to America’s invasion of Iran.“The administration's been talking about potential navy escorts for more than a week now, shipping executives tell CNN that all their requests for escorts have as of now been rebuffed,” CNN’s Jake Tapper asked Waltz on Sunday. “President Trump said, ‘Hopefully China, France, Japan, South Korea, the UK and others will send ships to the area.’ Is he hoping that those countries are going to send ships or have they committed to sending ships? And how soon will those naval escorts be ready?”Waltz told Tapper, “I'll leave those conversations to him. The conversations are ongoing. I think there's an important point that's getting kind of missed in the conversation, that 80% of the oil coming out of the Gulf heads to Asia, only about 7%, 8% heads to the Western Hemisphere. And Thank God for President Trump's energy dominance agenda. Everything from opening up the Anwar pipeline in Alaska, incentivizing fracking, what we're going to see come out of Venezuela and Guyana in the coming months and years.”After continuing to praise Trump’s energy and foreign policy agenda, Waltz concluded that “we certainly welcome, encourage, and even demand” help from other countries with the Strait of Hormuz. “Meanwhile the US military will continue to pound the Iranian military, their missile boat and drone forces, to keep the straits open.”Many users of the social media platform X expressed contempt for Waltz’s seemingly entitled attitude.“The gall of the sick b . . ” posted a user called Judy Ellis. “Wasn’t too hard to predict though, was it?” Ellis was not alone. A user called Nancy Levine Stearns similarly called out the president, arguing that “Trump regime can’t demand former allies, which it alienated, to do s . . .”Similarly a user called Maxwell Black criticized Trump’s policy with a pun, saying that “Trump trapped in a Hormuz Strait jacket.” Black was joined by at least one other X user.“Other countries owe nothing to the US for starting a war without consulting them and then asking for their help because he can't handle it alone,” posted a user named hcorvin. “Trump is a coward. TRUMP MAKES AMERICA WEAK. Let's spread the message loud and clear TRUMP = AMERICA LAST”Waltz has previously put egg on the face of the Trump administration. Before serving as UN ambassador Waltz was Trump’s national security adviser, and in that role he aroused indignation when it was revealed he used an insecure platform called Signal to have highly classified and sensitive conversations. Although he was removed from his role in May, Trump reportedly struggled with that decision."For much of this week," The New York Times wrote in March, "President Trump was consumed by a single question: What should he do about his national security adviser, Michael Waltz? 'Should I fire him?' he asked aides and allies as the fallout continued over the stunning leak of a Signal group chat set up by Mister Waltz, who had inadvertently added a journalist to the thread about an upcoming military strike in Yemen. In public, Mister Trump’s default position has been to defend Mister Waltz and attack the media."The Times added, "On Tuesday, (March 25), the day after Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic broke the story about being included in the chat, the president said Mister Waltz was a 'good man' who had nothing to apologize for. But behind the scenes, Mister Trump has been asking people inside and outside the administration what they thought he should do."s

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Transcript:President Donald Trump’s actions in engaging America into a war with Iran are “unpardonable,” according to a Republican strategist who worked for President George W. Bush during his similarly-controversial war against Iraq. Steve Schmidt, co-founder of The Lincoln Project and the Save America Movement, cautioned that a “tidal wave” of epic proportions is coming for the president’s party on The Daily Beast Podcast.“We’re not winning this war,” consultant Steve Schmidt told The Daily Beast Podcast’s Joanna Coles. “And that is unpardonable in the United States.”Noting that Trump has been repeatedly told the Iranian regime shows no signs of being toppled despite the joint US-Israeli attacks on Iran on Feb. 28th, Schmidt expressed disgust at Trump for publicly declaring victory regardless. At the time of this publication, Trump’s war has led to at least 13 American servicemembers dying and another 140 being injured.“Before the war started, the midterms were already a political disaster of immense dimensions, immense dimensions for MAGA, for Trump,” Schmidt told Coles. “They’re going to lose the House majority. They’re likely to lose the Senate majority. They’re going to lose governors’ races. They’re going to lose up and down the ballot all over the country.”Even before the Iran war, Democrats were already gaining momentum by flipping 28 traditionally safe Republican state legislative seats since November 2024, while Republicans have flipped zero. The Iran war is only heightening that trend.“There are a lot of [Democratic] candidates and a lot of places who are going to win, and that’s before the war,” Schmidt said. “You can tell through the collapse of his polling numbers and their further deterioration and the split within the MAGA party on this issue that this is terrible for Trump.”Despite originally being a staunch Republican, Schmidt is now one of Trump’s fiercest conservative detractors. Earlier in March he called out Trump for demanding a Nobel Peace Prize before waging unprovoked wars against Venezuela and Iran.“He wanted the Peace Prize, and when he couldn’t get it, Trump lost his mind,” Schmidt wrote for his Substack on Friday. He then quoted a February letter Trump wrote to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre saying he would wage wars because of his disappointment at not getting the prize.“Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America,” Trump told Støre. On another occasion in March, Schmidt characterized the Iran war as being waged with “no debate, no plan, and no thought given by Donald, his stooges and politicized generals about the second-and third-order effects of their decisions. This is escalating.”In a separate Substack editorial, Schmidt described how Trump has eroded faith in public institutions.“Trust is a rare commodity in our wretched times,” Schmidt argued. “These are the days of corruption, self-dealing, incompetence and faithlessness to the Constitution.”Our Analysis:The Unforgivable War: A Dissection of Power, Decision-Making, and ResponsibilityIn the complex theater of American politics and its military engagements, the war with Iran, as described in the article featuring Steve Schmidt's criticisms of President Donald Trump, presents a fertile ground for examining the allocation of blame, the sources of institutional power, and the responsibility for decisions that have far-reaching consequences. This analysis aims to untangle the web of narrative, power, and accountability surrounding Trump's war with Iran.Institutional Power and Decision-MakingFirstly, it's imperative to identify who holds institutional power in the context of engaging America in a war. The President of the United States, as commander-in-chief, wields substantial power over military decisions. However, this power is not unilateral. The Constitution grants Congress the authority to declare war, thereby setting a system of checks and balances intended to prevent rash or unilateral military action by the executive branch. In the case of the war with Iran, the article implies that Trump bypassed broader institutional oversight, suggesting a significant concentration of decision-making power in his hands.Decision-maker: President Donald Trump is pinpointed as the primary decision-maker, having engaged in military action against Iran. The narrative suggests that Trump's decisions were influenced by personal grievances (notably, not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize) and conducted without the deliberative process that such grave decisions warrant.Misdirected Responsibility?The article frames the responsibility almost exclusively on Trump, attributing to him the entirety of the blame for the war's initiation and its consequences. While it's clear that the President played a pivotal role, the framing potentially overlooks the broader context of American foreign policy, the role of advisors and military officials, and the lack of Congressional intervention. The mention of "politicized generals" hints at a more complex decision-making environment, yet the analysis stops short of exploring these dynamics in depth.False Equivalences and ScapegoatsRejecting false equivalence is crucial. While the article does not make direct comparisons, it implicitly elevates Trump's actions as singularly unprecedented. This is a precarious simplification. Historical context is vital. the U. S. has a long history of military engagements initiated under questionable circumstances. The critique of Trump should be balanced with an understanding that the issues of unilateral military action, bypassing Congress, and engaging in conflicts with dubious justification are not unique to his administration.However, the critique of Trump in this context appears well-founded, given the specific accusations of initiating a war based on personal vendettas and without a clear plan. These criticisms are not scapegoating. they address the heart of the matter. decision-making power and its misuse.Conclusion: The Weight of Decision and PowerThis analysis concludes that President Trump, as the primary actor with institutional power, indeed bears significant responsibility for the decision to engage in war with Iran. The article, while potentially narrowing the focus too tightly on Trump, does not misdirect responsibility toward actors with limited control. However, it could benefit from a broader examination of the systemic issues that allowed such a decision to proceed seemingly unchecked.Steve Schmidt's criticisms, as presented, serve as a poignant reminder of the consequences of centralized decision-making in matters of war and peace. The narrative underscores the need for a more robust system of checks and balances, a diversification of perspectives in foreign policy decision-making, and a reevaluation of the mechanisms that allow for the initiation of military conflict.In dissecting the political narratives surrounding this war, it becomes clear that the unforgivable act is not just the decision to wage war but the failure of the system to prevent such decisions from being made unilaterally and capriciously. Accountability extends beyond the individual to the very structures that enable such power to be misused.s

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Transcript:An expert on law, politics and foreign policy explained in a Sunday editorial that the same logic used by President Trump and his supporters to invade Iran is also being used to justify getting rid of the Senate filibuster.“Senator John Cornyn’s reversal on the Senate filibuster may or may not be sincere, but it is logical,” The Washington Post’s Jason Willick wrote in a Sunday editorial about Trump’s demand that the Senate abandon the 60-out-of-100 vote threshold necessary to call off a filibuster. Trump wishes to nuke the filibuster because Democrats are using that to thwart his attempt to pass the SAVE Act, a mass disenfranchisement law he insists is necessary to help Republicans keep control of Congress in the 2026 midterm elections.“That supermajority threshold for most legislation has historically made it harder for the majority party to steamroll the minority,” Willick wrote. “Cornyn (who has been in the Senate for nearly a quarter-century) argues that this arrangement used to make sense, but today’s Democratic Party can no longer be trusted to respect it.”Because Democrats came two votes away from getting rid of the Senate filibuster in 2022, Willick concluded that Cornyn “has a point” insofar as the filibuster is concerned, then speculated that this same logic is being applied by Trump to justify invading Iran.“Iran has been inveterately hostile to the United States for decades,” Willick wrote. “But the U. S. has long managed to deter the regime from taking the two steps that would be most threatening to American interests: closing the Strait of Hormuz and building a nuclear weapon.” Now that America and Israel have invaded Iran, “there’s a good chance the surviving elements of the Iranian regime will see the U. S.” as having escalated matters past the point of no return.“When deterrence erodes, incapacitation becomes more important,” Willick said. “If the U. S. and Israel want to prevent Iran from closing the strait or lunging for a nuclear weapon, they’ll need to make sure it never rebuilds the capacity to do so after this war. That will be an arduous process, likely requiring further attacks. And there’s no guarantee that a future U. S. president will be up for them.”The bottom line, as Willick put it, is that “the chances of Iran building a bomb are thankfully much lower” than the likelihood of the Senate eventually abolishing the filibuster, “but, I fear, higher than they were before Trump started this war.”Trump’s desire to eliminate the filibuster and thereby pass the SAVE Act is so intense, the president has refused to endorse either Cornyn or Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the ongoing Senate Republican primary as a means of pressuring the Senate to get rid of the filibuster. Yet as Semafor journalist Burgess Everett reported earlier in March, “the Republican Congress is consumed by a daunting, nearly impossible task: Satisfying President Donald Trump’s desire for new federal voter ID legislation.” Many of them share his belief that the law is necessary to avoid losing in the midterms, but also fear that getting rid of the filibuster to pass it will leave them vulnerable to future major policy shifts by the Democrats."The one thing I’ve said all along and I’ve told [Trump] and others . that I can’t guarantee an outcome,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters earlier this month about Trump’s anti-filibuster crusade. “I can’t guarantee a result if the result is only achieved by nuking the legislative filibuster. We don’t have the votes to do that, and so that’s just not a realistic option, and I’ve made that clear to anybody who’s asked."Our Analysis:The Filibuster, Foreign Policy, and the Art of MisdirectionIn the swirling vortex of contemporary political debate, few topics have become as intertwined with the machinations of power and principle as the Senate filibuster and foreign policy decisions, particularly those involving military action. The recent editorial by Jason Willick in The Washington Post attempts to draw parallels between President Trump's efforts to dismantle the Senate filibuster and his administration's military actions in Iran. This analysis seeks to dissect the institutional powers at play, decision-making processes, and the framing of responsibilities within these complex issues.Institutional Power and Decision MakingThe Senate Filibuster: At its core, the filibuster is a procedural tool within the U. S. Senate designed to extend debate and delay or block votes on legislation. The power to change or eliminate the filibuster rests with the Senate itself, making it an issue squarely within the institutional power of Congress. Senator John Cornyn's apparent reversal on the filibuster highlights the evolving political calculus within the Republican Party regarding this procedural mechanism. However, the decision to maintain or abolish the filibuster does not rest with President Trump but with the Senate majority.Military Action in Iran: The decision to engage in military action against Iran is primarily an executive power, directed by the President as Commander-in-Chief, albeit with the expectation that such actions are to be informed by Congressional authorization or, at minimum, consultation, in accordance with the War Powers Resolution. The invasion of Iran, as described, underscores a unilateral exercise of executive power that has far-reaching implications for U. S. foreign policy and global stability.Misdirected Responsibility?The article's framing suggests a causal link between the logic applied to domestic policy maneuvers, like the filibuster debate, and decisions of international consequence, such as military intervention in Iran. This juxtaposition misdirects responsibility by conflating two fundamentally different realms of decision-making and authority. The dynamics and considerations governing domestic legislative processes are distinct from those that propel military actions on the international stage. By suggesting that the same "logic" underlies both, the article risks oversimplifying the nuanced and complex considerations that inform these decisions.The Filibuster Debate: Criticism of the filibuster and its potential elimination focuses on the balance of power within the U. S. legislative process. This is a debate about the internal workings of one of the country's foundational institutions, driven by partisan strategies and considerations about the long-term implications for legislative governance.Military Action in Iran: Decisions to engage in military actions are influenced by a myriad of factors including national security interests, international alliances, and geopolitical strategy. These decisions carry profound implications for international peace and stability and are subject to a different set of checks and balances, including international law and the potential for Congressional oversight.ConclusionWhile it may be tempting to draw parallels between domestic policy battles and international military strategies as manifestations of a single "logic," such comparisons are misleading. The decision-making authority, institutional power, and implications of actions in these domains are fundamentally different. Criticism of the filibuster's potential elimination should be situated within the context of U. S. legislative politics, just as the decision to invade Iran must be examined through the lens of executive power, national security policy, and international relations.The framing of these issues in the discussed article misdirects responsibility by implying a uniformity of logic and decision-making that simply does not exist. In doing so, it obscures the nuanced realities of governance and policy-making. While the desire to find a coherent narrative is understandable, it is essential to resist the allure of oversimplification, particularly when the stakes involve both the foundational principles of democratic governance and the complexities of international peace and security.s

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Transcript:Today I want to talk about who’s getting the most out of Trump’s war. That war is costing the U. S. about 1 billion dollars a day. The Pentagon’s budget is around 1 trillion dollars this year, and Trump wants an additional 500 billion dollars. Because of the war, the cost of oil has topped 100 dollars a barrel, and the price of a gallon of gas at the U. S. pump now averages 3.67 dollars . up from 2.92 dollars before the war. The strain on the federal budget has given Republicans an excuse to demand further cuts in federal assistance to people in need. JD Vance recently kicked off a “war on waste and fraud” by announcing suspension of Medicaid payments to Minnesota, charging that the program is rife with fraud perpetrated by “bad actors in our society … [who] decide to make themselves rich.”But if you want to find real waste and fraud, look no further than Pete Hegseth’s “Department of War.”A new analysis by government watchdog Open the Books found that as the 2025 fiscal year was ending, Hegseth’s Pentagon spent: nearly 100 dollars,000 on a Steinway grand piano to outfit the home of the Air Force chief of staff. 60 dollars,719 on premium office furniture, including at least one luxurious 1 dollars,844 Aeron Chair. 12 dollars,540 for three-tiered fruit basket stands. 2 million dollars on Alaskan king crab, 6.9 million dollars on lobster tail, 15.1 million dollars on ribeye steak, and 1 million dollars on salmon. 124 dollars,000 for ice cream machines. and 26 dollars,000 for sushi preparation tables. The Pentagon has failed every audit since it was legally required to start submitting them in 2018, and reports say it will continue to fail them at least through 2028. The ballooning profits of military contractors are helped by their near monopoly on defense production. Since the 1990s, the number of prime contractors for the Defense Department has shrunk from 55 to five. Keep following the money. These giants have been spending more on enriching their investors than expanding production. Between 2020 and 2025, top military contractors devoted 110 billion dollars to stock buybacks and dividends . more than double what they spent on capital expenditures . which boosted their stock values and the pay packages of their CEOs. And who are their biggest investors and CEOs? Trump loyalists. Larry Ellison’s Oracle provides Hegseth’s war machine with cloud infrastructure and enterprise software. (Reminder: Ellison is the second-richest person in America and a Trump loyalist on the verge of owning a media empire comprised of CBS, CNN, TikTok, Comedy Central, and HBO.)Elon Musk’s SpaceX has secured billions in contracts for launching sensitive satellites and space surveillance. Musk’s xAI has received a Pentagon contract to develop advanced AI tools. (Reminder: Musk is the richest person in the world and spent a quarter of a billion dollars getting Trump reelected in 2024.)Peter Thiel’s Palantir Technologies has landed multibillion-dollar defense contracts, including a 10 billion dollars agreement with the U. S. Army to provide AI-driven data analytics and software to integrate AI, surveillance, and battlefield management systems. (Reminder: Thiel is a billionaire who contributed 1.25 million dollars to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, including 1 million dollars to a pro-Trump super PAC, and then 10 million dollars to getting JD Vance elected to the U. S. Senate in 2022.)Not to forget Big Oil, now enjoying windfall profits as global oil prices soar. (Recall Trump asking oil company executives for 1 billion dollars for his 2024 campaign, in return for undisclosed favors.) Among others benefitting from the turmoil is Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and one of the U. S. government’s chief negotiators in the Middle East, who’s busily raising at least 5 billion dollars or more for his private-equity investment firm from governments in the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund. Finally, there’s Trump’s on-again, off-again ally Vladimir Putin. In just two weeks of war, Russia has reaped an estimated 6.9 billion dollars from the increase in oil prices and the easing of sanctions. What to do? At the very least, Congress should:Prohibit defense contractors from making campaign donations or lobbying Congress. Why should taxpayers subsidize these activities? Tax windfall profits from Trump’s war (or from any war). America has had windfall profits taxes during wartime before. Given the size of current windfalls, we need it again. Cut the defense budget. Start by cutting it 10 percent each year it fails audits. This is particularly important during the Trump-Hegseth era of defense bloat. As long as Trump and his Republicans control Congress and the executive branch, these reforms don’t have a prayer. Still, Democrats should introduce them and push for them. Let Trump and his Republicans go on record voting against them. Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich. substack. com/.Our Analysis:The True Architects of War Economy: A DissectionIn the intricate web of military spending, political patronage, and corporate profiteering, the recent article by Robert Reich draws attention to the multifaceted beneficiaries of what is termed "Trump's war." This analysis aims to dissect the underlying power structures, decision-making processes, and potential misdirections within the narrative to pinpoint where responsibility truly lies.Institutional Power and Decision MakingFirstly, it is crucial to identify who holds institutional power in the context of military spending and war profiteering. The U. S. government, particularly under the Trump administration, alongside Congress, wields the ultimate authority in defense budget allocations, war decisions, and legislative reforms targeting corporate practices.Defense Department: Pete Hegseth's so-called "Department of War" exemplifies the unchecked power and decision-making authority within the Pentagon, highlighted by egregious spending on luxury items. The Pentagon's institutional power is immense, given its control over military operations and budgetary discretion, albeit with Congressional approval.Congress: Republican control of Congress, as highlighted in the narrative, plays a significant role in enabling the war economy, through both the approval of increased defense spending and the resistance to regulatory reforms aimed at curbing corporate influence and profiteering.Framing and MisdirectionReich's article adeptly points out the scapegoating and diversion tactics employed by political figures like JD Vance, who focus on "waste and fraud" in federal assistance programs to divert attention from the colossal waste within the Pentagon. This tactic misdirects responsibility toward actors with limited control over the federal budget and defense spending, framing individuals and programs designed to assist them as the problem rather than addressing systemic issues within defense budget management.The Corporate BeneficiariesThe narrative correctly identifies the military-industrial complex's beneficiaries, from defense contractors to Big Oil, backed by Trump loyalists and investors. The consolidation of defense contractors into a near-monopoly not only stifles competition but also increases their influence over government decisions, supported by substantial campaign donations and lobbying efforts.Military Contractors: Companies like Oracle, SpaceX, and Palantir Technologies, led by Trump-affiliated magnates, secure lucrative contracts, benefiting from the war economy. Their influence is compounded by their financial contributions to political campaigns, ensuring a conducive environment for their continued profitability.Big Oil and Global Politics: The geopolitical ramifications of war, including heightened oil prices, underscore the interconnectedness of war, energy policy, and global politics. Figures like Jared Kushner and entities like Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund are emblematic of the complex interplay between U. S. foreign policy, personal enrichment, and the global energy market.Proposed Reforms and Political RealityReich’s call for reforms, including prohibiting defense contractor donations, taxing windfall profits, and slashing the defense budget for failing audits, confronts the political reality of a Congress and executive branch under the sway of the very interests these reforms aim to curtail. The suggestion that Democrats push for these reforms to force Republicans into a revealing vote is a strategic one, albeit optimistic given the current political landscape.ConclusionThe article under scrutiny sheds light on the beneficiaries of the war economy, driven by institutional decisions made within a framework of political and corporate collusion. While it accurately identifies the actors profiting from the status quo, the emphasis on Trump and his allies risks simplifying a complex system of mutual dependencies that transcend individual administrations. The real story here is not just about who benefits from Trump's war but about the enduring structures that facilitate and perpetuate a war economy, necessitating a broader, systemic approach to reform.s

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