Political Glance
Obama’s office took the unusual step of issuing an emphatic refutation after Trump told reporters that his predecessor had “[tried] to lead a coup” against him and was guilty of “treason” over intelligence assessments suggesting that Russia had intervened to help Trump defeat Hillary Clinton in the campaign.
“Out of respect for the office of the presidency, our office does not normally dignify the constant nonsense and misinformation flowing out of this White House with a response,” the statement said. “But these claims are outrageous enough to merit one. These bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction.”
The statement went on to criticize claims made in an 11-page document released last week by Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, who said she was passing evidence of what she claimed was a “treasonous conspiracy” among Obama national security officials to the justice department, recommending their prosecution.
“Nothing in the document issued last week undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes,” it said.
“These findings were affirmed in a 2020 report by the bipartisan senate Intelligence Committee, led by then-Chairman Marco Rubio.”
Obama breaks silence on Trump’s ‘outrageous’ call to prosecute him
Alina Habba not retained by federal judges as US attorney for New Jersey
Judges on the U.S. District Court of New Jersey have declined to retain President Trump’s pick for the state’s top federal prosecutor, Alina Habba, as the clock on her interim status runs out.
In a terse standing order, the court tapped attorney Desiree Leigh Grace to lead the office hours before the expiration of Habba’s 120-day temporary term. The appointment is effective as of Tuesday, according to the order signed by U.S. District Judge Renée Marie Bumb, the district’s chief judge.
Habba, who served as a personal lawyer for Trump, assumed the role in March. Her profile as a staunch defender of the president in the courtroom and the press was raised while representing him in his business fraud case and the defamation and sexual assault lawsuits brought by advice columnist E. Jean Carroll.
Early in her interim term, her leadership came under scrutiny following the arrests and charges against Newark, N.J., Mayor Ras Baraka (D) and Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.) stemming from an incident at a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility.
Although a trespass counresisting, impeding and interfering with federal officers.t against Baraka was dropped, McIver is still fighting her criminal charges in court. She has pleaded not guilty to three counts of assaulting, resisting, impeding and interfering with federal officers.
Lawyers for Harvard and Trump square off in court in Boston
In an escalation of the back-and-forth between Harvard University and the Trump administration, the school has filed a lawsuit against the federal government. In it, Harvard argues the government's actions, including freezing more than $2.2 billion in federal funding, violate the First Amendment and don't follow legal procedures.
"The consequences of the government's overreach will be severe and long-lasting," reads a letter by Alan M. Garber, Harvard's president, announcing the lawsuit. He goes on to detail the type of research the government has "put in jeopardy," including efforts studying child cancer survivors, predicting the spread of infectious disease outbreaks and easing the pain of wounded soldiers.
"Defendants' actions threaten Harvard's academic independence and place at risk critical lifesaving and pathbreaking research that occurs on its campus," the lawsuit reads.
The Trump administration accuses Harvard of failing to protect Jewish students. After Harvard refused to comply with a list of demands from the administration, the Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism announced it was freezing funds.
Native Americans rail against Trump's call to change Commanders' name back.
Native American groups fought for years to get this city's National Football League team to change its name.
Now, President Donald Trump wants to change it back to a moniker many Native Americans consider offensive and disrespectful.
“No Native American child should have to sit through a pep rally or in a stadium where their culture is being mocked,” said Jacqueline De León, senior staff attorney for the Native American Rights Fund.
Trump threatened over the weekend to block a deal to build a stadium in Washington, D.C., if the Washington Commanders team refuses to revert to the name it had from 1937 when the team moved from Boston until 2020.
'Whatever’s' should IMMEDIATELY change their name back to the Washington Redskins Football Team," Trump posted on his Truth Social site. “I may put a restriction on them [that] if they don’t change the name back to the original 'Washington Redskins,' and get rid of the ridiculous moniker, 'Washington Commanders.'”
Trump denies another Journal report, this time on Powell, Bessent
President Trump responded angrily on Sunday to a Wall Street Journal story that Treasury Department Secretary Scott Bessent had personally sought to talk him out of trying to fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.
Trump, who is currently suing the Journal over its reporting on his relationship with the late Jeffrey Epstein, has been aggressively trying to fire Powell over his handling of interest rates. Legal scholars do not believe Trump has the authority to oust the Fed chair unilaterally, and reports that he might try to do so have shaken Wall Street in recent days.
“The Wall Street Journal ran a typically untruthful story today by saying that Secretary of the Treasury, Scott Bessent, explained to me that firing Jerome ‘Too Late’ Powell, the Worst Federal Reserve Chairman in History, would be bad for the Market,” Trump said in a Sunday post on Truth Social.
Here’s where Democrats stand in polls at Trump’s 6-month mark
Recent polling is painting a mixed picture for Democrats as they look to chart a path forward in the wake of their loss to President Trump in November.
Trump’s approval rating remains comfortably underwater as he reaches the six-month mark back in office on Sunday. But while Democrats have scored some notable victories in high-profile elections since then, they’ve been unable to pull away from the GOP as the party hopes to regroup for the midterms next year.
Data experts said Democrats’ position has improved since Trump started his second term, but they still have a lot of work to do to win back trust from the American people and be poised to take back control of the House.
“You can’t just be on the attack. You can’t beat something with nothing,” said Democratic pollster Celinda Lake. “We have to show and tell what we would do, but I think that we’re on the precipice of a big opportunity, and I hope we take advantage of it.”
The Trump Admin Quietly Made Attending College Even More Expensive
Twenty-five years ago, students across the country were encouraged to take out student loans in order to attend college, the cost of which had increased dramatically since the 1970s. It was played as an investment: You could safely borrow tens, even hundreds of thousands of dollars because a college degree was a path to a good-paying job, so you’d have no trouble paying back the loans you took out for education.
But even college graduates with salaried jobs struggled to pay back loans. Wages stayed depressed and the cost of housing, food, and child care increased, forcing many college graduates with loans to stretch their budgets further than previous generations. Student debt, however, ballooned. At the end 2024, more than 43 million borrowers owed a combined $1.6 trillion.
There have been many suggestions on how to handle the student debt crisis — and it appears the Trump administration has settled on making it even harder to go at all.
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