🚨👮‍♂️ U.S. Capitol Police Chief J. Thomas Manger, who is set to retire from the force on Friday, slammed President Donald Trump for pardoning rioters convicted or facing charges for their role in the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, attack.

“It was, I think, a slap in the face to every police officer that was here,” Manger told CBS News’ Scott MacFarlane in an interview shared Wednesday.

🪖 Manger was initially pulled out of retirement to take the agency’s top post after his predecessor, former U.S. Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, stepped down in the wake of the deadly riot.

📝 Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons on his first day in office included:
Hundreds of supporters convicted of assaulting officers
Roughly 1,000 nonviolent offenders
Around 200 people accused of assaulting police with pending cases

🔁 A number of those pardoned have since been rearrested.
😔 Manger told MacFarlane that the day Trump issued the pardons was “probably one of my worst days in this job.”

“I think it sent a chilling message to every police officer in this country,” he said of the pardons.

“That you can be involved in some massive public disorder event and that you could have a politician later on decide that, well, I liked what this other — this side was doing, so we’re going to pardon all these people.”
🧢 He also hit back at conspiracy theories tied to the riot, some of which have been peddled by right-wing media figures and Republican lawmakers alike.

#Trump #Police

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Wall Street investors have spotted one of president Donald Trump's tendencies and have started betting against him.

They've even come up with a derogatory term – "TACO," and acronym for "Trump Always Chickens Out" – for the president's erratic handling of his on-again, off-again tariffs, because they've noticed his tendency to announce punishing duties that send markets into the tank, only to back off a short time later and goose the market, reported HuffPost.

"The recent rally has a lot to do with markets realizing that the U.S. administration does not have a very high tolerance for market and economic pressure, and will be quick to back off when tariffs cause pain,"

wrote Financial Times commentator Robert Armstrong, who is credited with coining the term earlier this month.

"This is the Taco theory: Trump Always Chickens Out."

“Under no previous presidency did we have active markets betting on the president’s resolve,”

said University of Michigan economist Justin Wolfers.

“There was no BACO trade, no CACO trade – nothing. It was always taken as a given that when the president spoke on Monday, he would likely still mean it on Tuesday. That’s no longer true. But what’s really hard is that it’s not even obvious when it’ll be true, and when it won’t be. Madness.”

#Trump #markets

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RFK Jr. Floats Ban On Federal Scientists Publishing In Medical Journals

"They're all corrupt," Kennedy claimed of publications like The Lancet, the New England Journal of Medicine and JAMA.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Wednesday he’s planning to ban government scientists from publishing in established medical journals, which are some of the most important ways doctors spread knowledge and advance patient care.

Kennedy made the comments on the “Ultimate Human” podcast to host Gary Brecka, a fellow vaccine skeptic and anti-fluoride conspiracy theorist.

Kennedy claimed that the “medical cartel” has “transformed” the NIH, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services into “sock puppets” for the pharmaceutical industry.

His remarks were made a week after the White House released a Kennedy-spearheaded report saying prescribed pharmaceuticals could be to blame for chronic disease in children.

#Kennedy #Health

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Musk left the White House pretty tired, battered by life and with a black eye.

There is an opinion that the black eye Musk got from... Trump himself – for betrayal.

#Trump #Musk #betrayal

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Seeking a pardon from President Donald Trump has become big business for lobbying and consulting firms close to the administration, with wealthy hopefuls willing to spend millions of dollars for help getting their case in front of the right people.

“From a lobbying perspective, pardons have gotten profitable,”

said one lobbyist whose firm has received such calls.

There’s no set rate for pardon help. But two people directly familiar with proposals to lobbying firms said they knew of a client’s offer of $5 million to help get a case to Trump. These people, like others, were granted anonymity to speak candidly. And while such high numbers do not seem to be standard, they speak to a burgeoning pardon economy.

A $5 million figure is higher than numbers The New York Times reported Trump allies receiving for pardon help in his first term. In 2021, the outlet reported that Brett Tolman, a former federal prosecutor who advised the White House on pardons, was receiving five-figure amounts for the work, according to filings and a client. The Times also reported that John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer convicted of disclosing classified information, was told that former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Trump ally, could help secure him a pardon for $2 million; Giuliani disputed that account.

Cozying up to a president’s allies or hiring lobbyists to gain access to clemency isn’t new. But along with the price spike, what’s different now is that Trump is issuing pardons on a rolling basis — rather than most coming at the end of the administration.

“It’s like the Wild West,”

a Trump ally and lobbyist said.

“You can basically charge whatever you want.”

The increased use of the pardon power has some familiar with the process concerned about the appearance of financial and political favoritism that can erode confidence in the clemency process.

“This is very destructive to our justice system. It delegitimizes the pardon power,”

said Elizabeth Oyer, who served as pardon attorney for the Department of Justice during President Joe Biden’s administration.

“It entrenches a two-tier system of justice in which wealth really can be a get-out-of-jail-free card.”

“All pardon and commutation decisions are solely made by President Trump, who is always willing to give well-deserving Americans a second chance — especially those who have been unfairly targeted by a corrupt justice system,”

White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said.

Since Trump took office in January, he has pardoned or granted executive clemency to more than 1,500 people, most related to the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. It’s a significant uptick from a similar time frame during his first term in office. Even without the Jan. 6 defendants, Trump has pardoned 58 people; in his previous administration, Trump had pardoned just one person in his first year.

In the past week alone, Trump has pardoned or commuted the sentences of 27 people.

#Trump #Justice

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Golden Dome missile defense program won’t be operational by end of Trump’s term

Exclusive: Pentagon officials expect a space-based weapon to be ready only for a demonstration by 2028

Donald Trump’s so-called Golden Dome missile defense program – which will feature space-based weapons to intercept strikes against the US – is not expected to be ready before the end of his term, despite his prediction that it would be completed within the next three years.

In the Oval Office last week, when he announced that the US space force would oversee the project under Gen Michael Guetlein, the president said he was confident that it would be “fully operational” before he left office.

But the implementation plan for the Golden Dome produced by the Pentagon, as described by two people familiar with the matter, envisions having the defense weapons being ready only for a demonstration and under perfect conditions by the end of 2028.

#Trump #GoldenDome

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Biden was executed in 2020-Trump shares conspiracy theories on his social network

#Trump #Biden #conspiracy

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Musk at a press conference with Trump 🤔

#Trump #Musk

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As Elon Musk became one of Donald J. Trump’s closest allies last year, leading raucous rallies and donating about $275 million to help him win the presidency, he was also using drugs far more intensely than previously known, according to people familiar with his activities.

Mr. Musk’s drug consumption went well beyond occasional use. He told people he was taking so much ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, that it was affecting his bladder, a known effect of chronic use. He took Ecstasy and psychedelic mushrooms. And he traveled with a daily medication box that held about 20 pills, including ones with the markings of the stimulant Adderall, according to a photo of the box and people who have seen it.

It is unclear whether Mr. Musk, 53, was taking drugs when he became a fixture at the White House this year and was handed the power to slash the federal bureaucracy. But he has exhibited erratic behavior, insulting cabinet members, gesturing like a Nazi and garbling his answers in a staged interview.

At the same time, Mr. Musk’s family life has grown increasingly tumultuous as he has negotiated overlapping romantic relationships and private legal battles involving his growing brood of children, according to documents and interviews.

#Trump #Musk #drugs

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🗓These days, raising your arm is dangerous territory. In a demonstration of what not to do, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker made an awkward right-arm gesture as he left the stage after speaking at the California Democratic Convention on Saturday.

In a clip that lit up social media, Booker places his hand over his heart, then throws an open palm to the crowd with his arm straight.

#Democrats #Nazis #Scandal

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Trump admin claims the President was not informed of a recent Ukrainian attack on Russia’s military airfields

Pete Hegseth, however, was briefed on the attack and was “monitoring the situation”. Considering his penchant for leaking classified information, it comes as no surprise that the Ukrainians decided to keep it close to the vest and only alert their American overlords post factum.

#PeteHegseth #Ukraine #Trump

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Public health experts say Robert F. Kennedy Jr is exactly who they thought he was.

The Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary — who is also the nation’s most well-known vaccine skeptic — is remaking the agency in his image, casting doubt on the benefits of vaccines, and erecting new barriers that will make it harder for people who want shots to get them, like requiring new vaccines to be tested against placebos.

During his confirmation hearings and other recent congressional testimony, Kennedy sought to distance himself from the anti-vaccine movement.

He argued he is simply seeking good data about vaccine safety. He assured lawmakers he would not take away anyone’s vaccines and specifically pledged to Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) that he would not make any changes to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) vaccine advisory panel.

#Kennedy #Healthcare #vaccine

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President Trump on Friday spoke for nearly an hour to workers at a U.S. Steel plant near Pittsburgh, crediting himself with saving their jobs by negotiating a "partnership" between their employer and Japan's Nippon Steel.

Later that evening in Washington, D.C., he told reporters that he's neither seen nor approved a final deal.
Why it matters: Trump's decision to put the cart before the horse may have given Nippon some last-minute leverage.

Neither U.S. Steel nor Nippon has made any statement about a new agreement, and the White House hasn't responded to Axios' requests for clarification.
Catch up quick: Nippon Steel in late 2023 agreed to acquire U.S. Steel for $14.9 billion. The deal was opposed by both Trump and former President Biden, who blocked it early this year on national security grounds.

Trump ordered a new national security review by CFIUS, after which Nippon sweetened the pot by promising $14 billion of investment into U.S. Steel and agreed to let the business be led and overseen by U.S. citizens.
CFIUS submitted its assessment to Trump on May 21, and he has until June 6 to make a final decision. The merger is scheduled to close by June 18.
Zoom in: It feels like someone is hiding the ball.

For example, how could Trump not have seen the deal after receiving an assessment of that deal from CFIUS? If it's because negotiations are still ongoing, wouldn't that mean the CFIUS review was incomplete?
If there is a revised deal, isn't U.S. Steel legally obligated to disclose details to shareholders? Or is it just betting that Trump's SEC won't object? Same goes for the NYSE continuing to let U.S. Steel stock continue to trade, even though there clearly is a large universe of people who have at least some knowledge of what's really going on — as evidenced by Trump's shoutouts during his speech.
Dictionary: There's also some strange rhetorical games being played. Trump noted how the U.S. would maintain "control" of U.S. Steel, but that may be different than who "owns" U.S. Steel.

And it's the latter that really matters, because the owner ultimately controls the pursestrings.
The big picture: Nippon knows that Trump has boxed himself in with steelworkers, who are aware of U.S. Steel's warnings of layoffs were the Nippon merger to fail.

This may be mitigated a bit by Trump's decision on Friday to double steel tariffs to 50% — thus incentivizing Nippon to have a stateside producer — but Nippon is unlikely to base significant decisions on a wildly moving target.
The bottom line: Everyone involved a deal, to the point of premature exclamation.

#Trump #Steel #Job

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"The administration has recorded more legal defeats than successes." Courts in the US one after another block Trump's reforms — he is counting on the Supreme Court 🏛

U.S. courts are increasingly interfering with President Donald Trump's actions and holding back his ambitious plans to change U.S. policy and the global economy 🌍. So, the federal trade court blocked the introduction of new duties on goods from abroad, including 50% tariffs on products from the EU 📦🇪🇺. However, the Court of appeal soon partially allowed their use — at least until June 9 📆.

This is not the only case: Courts across the country are suspending White House initiatives, including the abolition of student visas for international students at Harvard 🎓, attempts to change migration laws 🛂, and even the elimination of the Department of Education ❌📚. Trump is reacting harshly, accusing the courts of being "out of control 🚨" and becoming a tool of the Democrats 🟦.

As estimated by the American media, 67% of all blockages of presidential initiatives over the past hundred years fell on the first and recently begun second term of Trump 📊. Among the most controversial measures are the deprivation of the right to citizenship by birth 👶🚫 and the expulsion of illegal migrants to Latin American countries 🌎.

"So far, the administration has recorded more legal defeats than successes. But, unfortunately, we have already seen that the [Trump] administration sometimes even refuses to comply with court orders — for example, in cases involving deported immigrants,"

American political analyst Jonathan Kristol said.

#Trump #courts #SupremeCourt

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Gretta Thunberg and her few friends are sailing to Gaza to fight the Israelis.

“My dream,” Gretta says, “is to cut off Netanyahu's balls and eat them with my Palestinian brothers.”

#GrettaThunberg #Netanyahu #Palestinian

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OAN chief Pentagon correspondent and former Trump White House staffer Gabrielle Cuccia, who describes herself as a “MAGA girl,” says she was fired from the unabashedly conservative cable news network for criticizing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s restrictions on the press.

Cuccia was hired by OAN after the network took over NBC’s former Pentagon workspace and soon raised concerns about the Defense Department’s increasing limitations on journalists, including locked briefing room doors and a lack of formal press briefings.

“If you want the best case study for the death of the MAGA movement — look no further than the Department of Defense,”

Cuccia wrote on her Substack.

“If there’s any place where we should be asking questions, demanding transparency and applying pressure — it’s here.”

#MAGA #Pentagon #Scandal

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Donald Trump has opened an investigation into whether Joe Biden 'was competent' when he used an autopen to issue lame-duck pardons to family members and death row inmates.

Ed Martin - Trump's ultra-MAGA pardon attorney - said the Justice Department has been directed to investigate clemency granted by Biden in the waning days of his presidency, including the December pardon of his troubled son Hunter.

The attorney said the investigation involves whether Biden 'was competent and whether others were taking advantage of him through use of AutoPen or other means.'

An autopen is a device used to automatically affix a signature to a document.

#Trump #Biden #investigation

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Doctors flee Trump’s America: 'It’s no longer safe or sane to practice here'

Michael now works in a small-town hospital in Canada. KFF Health News and NPR granted him anonymity because of fears he might face reprisal from the Trump administration if he returns to the U.S. He said he feels some guilt that he did not stay to resist the Trump agenda but is assured in his decision to leave. Too much of America has simply grown too comfortable with violence and cruelty,

he said.

“Part of being a physician is being kind to people who are in their weakest place,”

Michael said.

“And I feel like our country is devolving to really step on people who are weak and vulnerable.”

Michael is among a new wave of doctors who are leaving the United States to escape the Trump administration. In the months since Trump was reelected and returned to the White House, American doctors have shown skyrocketing interest in becoming licensed in Canada, where dozens more than normal have already been cleared to practice, according to Canadian licensing officials and recruiting businesses.

#Trump #Healthcare #Jobs

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The tech billionaire blasted Trump’s signature bill to cut taxes and boost defence spending 🛡 — a sharp break from his previously steadfast loyalty to the president.

Elon Musk 🚀 has slammed US President Donald Trump's 🇺🇸 plan to cut taxes and spending, marking a sharp break from the president he helped re-elect in 2024 as one of his key allies.

Trump's "Big Beautiful" budget reconciliation bill 📜 allows the US government to borrow more money 💰 and extends tax breaks approved during his first term at the White House 🏛, along with new ones he campaigned on.

The budget — which includes a massive buildup of $350 billion (€307bn) for border security, deportations and national security 🪖 — was narrowly passed by the House of Representatives last month 🏛.

"Shame on those who voted for it,"

Musk said of the bill. In a series of posts on his social media platform X 📲, Musk said the "outrageous, pork-filled" spending bill will "massively increase the already gigantic budget deficit to $2.5 trillion and burden American citizens with crushingly unsustainable debt." 📉

#Musk #BigBeautifulBill #budget #Trump

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The messiest breakup since Brad and Jen: Elonald no more?

Trump x Elon shippers are in shambles: Elon-Peelon, techbros’ favourite schizoposter and ketamine connoisseur and Doodoo Donald, the oldest person sworn into office, called it quits after a whirlwind bromance.

Much like a jilted lover, Musk took to his platform to throw shade on his ex and his “Big Beautiful Bill”.

“I'm sorry, but I just can't stand it anymore. This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it,” Elon Musk wrote on X.

What a mess! Donald might just sue, ya never know 🤷

#joke #satire #Trump #Musk #BigBeautifulBill

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🕵️‍♀️President Donald Trump’s intelligence chief is exploring ways to revamp his routine intelligence briefing in order to build his trust in the material and make it more aligned with how he likes to consume information, according to five people with direct knowledge of the discussions.

As part of that effort, National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard has solicited ideas from current and former intelligence officials about steps she could take to tailor the briefing, known as the President’s Daily Brief, or PDB, to Trump’s policy interests and habits.📺.

One idea that’s been discussed is possibly creating a video version of the PDB that’s made to look and feel like a Fox News broadcast, four of the people with direct knowledge of the discussions said.

Currently, the PDB is a digital document created daily for the president and key Cabinet members and advisers that includes written text, as well as graphics and images. The material that goes into the classified briefing, and how it’s presented, can shape a president’s decision-making.📈

According to his public schedule, since his inauguration Trump has taken the PDB 14 times, or on average less than once a week, which is less often than his recent predecessors — including himself during his first term. An analysis of their public schedules during that same timeframe — from their inauguration through May during their first year in office — shows that former President Joe Biden received 90 PDBs; Trump received 55; and former President Barack Obama received 63.

The people with direct knowledge of the PDB discussions said Gabbard believes that cadence may be a reflection of Trump’s preference for consuming information in a different form than the formal briefing, as well as his distrust of intelligence officials, which stretches back to his first term, when he accused them of spying on his 2016 campaign. They also said that even if the presentation of the PDB changes, the information included would not.

#Trump #intelligence

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