Welcome back, Deadline: Legal newsletter readers. The Supreme Court wrapped up its first two-week hearing session of the term, while adding a DOGE-related case to the docket, handing the GOP another emergency win ahead of the midterms, and giving John Eastman a spark of hope for his law license.

The DOGE grant appeared on Tuesday’s order list announcing the latest action on pending petitions. Among the new cases the justices agreed to decide this term was the Trump administration’s plea for help against a watchdog group that has been fighting for information about the Elon Musk-backed Department of Government Efficiency.

In a previous round of DOGE litigation, the high court’s Republican-appointed majority ordered the lower courts to narrow discovery into the purported efficiency initiative. The administration is hoping to prevail again in its latest fight for secrecy.

The order list also produced a notable pairing in Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Neil Gorsuch. The two have joined forces before to call out what they’ve seen as government abuses, even when their colleagues have stayed silent. That happened again Tuesday, when the Obama appointee issued a statement lamenting the “constitutional absurdity” of Jesus Herrera-Salazar’s double prosecution.

He had served time for being “found in” the U.S. after his removal and was told to stay in Oklahoma while on supervised release. But abiding by that instruction led to him being charged again for the same crime of being “found in” the country he was told to stay in. Joined by the Trump appointee, who has shown a libertarian streak in some cases, Sotomayor said that courts faced with this situation in the future should “avoid the constitutional absurdity that occurred here and give the Double Jeopardy Clause its full weight and meaning.”

Sotomayor and Gorsuch split in another case that gave the GOP its latest win on political advertising rates ahead of the midterms. Following a Republican win on the subject last month, over the lone dissent of Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, Sotomayor and Jackson both noted their objections to Wednesday’s ruling in favor of the Federal Communications Commission. A lower court had ordered the agency to rule on Democrats’ challenge to the FCC’s GOP-friendly interpretation of the law on advertising rates.

But the Supreme Court majority put that lower court ruling on hold, effectively blessing what Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., and his fellow Democratic candidates called the Trump-backed agency’s “blatant procedural trench warfare to stave off judicial review of an unlawful agency directive until it is too late to matter.”

Meanwhile, John Eastman got some good news in his fight to keep his law license, after California authorities stripped it for misconduct while representing President Donald Trump and his 2020 campaign. Backed by an array of conservative groups, the former clerk to Justice Clarence Thomas said the court should take his case to “remove the threat” that the loss of his license “poses not just to the First Amendment but to the ability of attorneys fiercely to advocate for their clients without fear of politicized disbarment.”

Eastman’s good news came Thursday, when the court asked the state bar to respond to his petition. It only takes one justice to request a response, so we don’t know whether he will attract the required four justices to grant review (or how a majority of the court would rule on his case if it did grant review). Relatedly, we don’t know if Thomas, who previously recused himself from an Eastman-related case without explaining why, is participating in this one. If he’s not, that could hurt the petitioner’s chances. We should find out later this year whether Eastman’s bar fight will join the DOGE discovery dispute and other appeals this term.

The justices are off the bench until they return for their November hearing session. But the court will keep making news in the meantime, with the latest order list due Monday morning, plus whatever unscheduled emergency actions the court takes. Among the pending disputes the court can resolve anytime are the administration’s bid to enforce its ban on gender-affirming medical care for federal prisoners, as well as an urgent application from a high school wrestler and her mother seeking an injunction that would prevent her from wrestling transgender girls this upcoming season.

Subscribe to the Deadline: Legal newsletter for expert analysis on the top legal stories of the week, including updates from the Supreme Court and developments in the Trump administration’s legal cases.

The post SCOTUS Week in Review: Justices give another win to the GOP and hope to DOGE and Eastman appeared first on MS NOW.

MS NOW legal analyst Andrew Weissmann said President Donald Trump’s disregard for court orders has turned the nation’s justice system into a laughingstock.

“The Trump administration is making the courts look like fools,” he said.

With the midterm elections quickly approaching, Weissmann warned it is time for America’s judges to work “faster and smarter” before it’s too late.

“The administration, over and over again, is doing things unilaterally without permission and, at times, in violation of court orders,” the former Justice Department official explained.

According to an analysis from The Associated Press earlier this year, district court judges have found the second Trump administration violated or failed to follow federal court orders in at least 31 lawsuits and in more than 250 individual immigration cases.

When the court does intervene, sometimes it’s already too late, Weissmann said, pointing to the administration’s use of taxpayer dollars to run ads for the president. When a federal judge blocked that effort, it was only after nearly $22 million had already been spent.

“Tens of millions of people saw those ads, paid for by you and me,” he said.

Weissmann argued that Trump’s DOJ has effectively taken a “do now and ask questions later” approach to the law.

“The court only belatedly says, ‘Hey, don’t do that.’ But the damage is already done, and you can’t put the genie back in the bottle,” he said.

The former federal prosecutor said it was time for courts to be “faster and smarter” in responding to Trump’s blatantly illegal moves, and he cautioned against setting “a permission structure for this administration,” especially as the election approaches.

“What I am worried about is: The midterms are coming up, and is this going to be a government that goes ahead and seizes ballots with the idea that we can break the chain of custody, we can make it impossible to count votes? And maybe later a court will say, ‘You shouldn’t have done that,’ but the damage will have been done,” he explained.

“There has to be a deterrent,” Weissmann warned. “And courts have to be faster and smarter to not get outplayed.”

View this post on Instagram

You can watch Weissmann’s full comments in the clip above.

The post ‘Faster and smarter’: Legal analyst warns courts they can’t let Trump outplay them appeared first on MS NOW.

Donald Trump and the MAGA movement’s grip on white voters appears to be slipping, and in an effort to reverse that trend, it seems Vice President JD Vance has designated himself the pied piper of racist rage.

Numerous polls this year have spotlighted Trump’s declining support among white voters — particularly, white working-class voters who’ve been key to his and his party’s political success. Amid this trend, Vance — in speech after speech — has resorted to rhetoric seemingly designed to groom the white American psyche so that white voters turn their ire on nonwhite people rather than on Trump and the Republican Party.

The latest example came during a rally Vance hosted in Michigan on Thursday, in which he suggested Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is resentful of certain people and places because they’re “too white, too proud or too American.” He called El-Sayed a “weasel who should shut his mouth and show a little gratitude to the country that gave him everything.”

.@VP JD Vance says he feels bad for U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed (D-MI): "I don't know why he resents the things that he does. Perhaps it's because he sees them as too white, or too proud, or too American." pic.twitter.com/6zTXQG3okK

— CSPAN (@cspan) October 15, 2026

Vance has returned to this well numerous times over the past year as Trump’s corrupt business dealings, economically destructive tariffs and his deadly war with Iran have turned off some in the MAGA base. You can see plenty of other examples of Vance launching similar appeals to white bigots — including here, here and in the following clip from last December, when Vance told an audience of right-wing Turning Point USA affiliates that they no longer had to “apologize for being white.”

Vance: In the United States of America, you don't have to apologize for being white anymore. pic.twitter.com/QikIDkXNy5

— Acyn (@Acyn) December 21, 2025

Back in August, the vice president gave an interview to Fox News suggesting that white people who support El-Sayed hate themselves. And keep in mind that all of this is coming from the No. 2 leader of a Republican Party that has spent years frothing at the mouth about liberals supposedly weaponizing “identity politics.” The question is whether white voters choose to indulge in what I’ve previously described on-air as the “racist slop” being offered up by the MAGA movement.

And here, history can be informative. White supremacist movements and organizations in years past — including the Ku Klux Klan — have all sought to unify white Americans around a single racial identity. This trend is explored in films like the documentary “White with Fear,” which shines light on the history of right-wing, racist fearmongering in the United States. White supremacist groups have historically managed to convince some white people to fall in line behind them, but they’ve also faced white backlash as some of the same people have been awakened to these groups’ corrupt ways and self-serving bigotry.

And despite Vance’s efforts, a similar outcome seems to be in play for the white supremacy-boosting MAGA movement as well.

The post Vance desperately targets white voters as Trump’s grip slips appeared first on MS NOW.

A teacher tackled the teenager who opened fire at an Oregon elementary school Thursday, allowing an armed parent to fatally shoot the gunman, authorities said Friday, revealing new details of the attack that killed three children and one adult.

Speaking at a news conference, Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz said the teenager — a former student at the school — entered the school campus by climbing over a fence, throwing his gun over first. The driver of a red truck on a street near the school saw the teenager and confronted him from his vehicle. The teen fired on the truck, striking it at least three times.

A 36-year-old parent of children at the school saw the gunman fire at the truck while driving nearby. In response, the parent drove into the campus parking lot and followed the teenager into the building.

According to Krantz, the assailant forced entry into the school through external double doors, firing multiple rounds into the glass panes, then went into a special education classroom, where he fired as many as 15 rounds.

A teacher confronted the gunman, threw her cellphone at him and wrestled him for his firearm. The teacher was not injured in the confrontation, Krantz said. “She almost certainly helped prevent more bloodshed.”

The parent had a legally secured .40-caliber pistol in his vehicle, which he brought with him as he followed the gunman into the school and saw the teacher confronting him.

Krantz said the teacher’s intervention allowed the parent to kill the gunman.

Officers who arrived at the scene found a Maverick 88 pump-action 12-gauge shotgun and a backpack near the shooter. Investigators found about 44 remaining rounds of 12-gauge ammunition on the shooter or in his backpack.

Authorities on Friday identified two people killed in the shooting as Rhoam Summer, a 5-year-old student, and Meghan Lambert, a 25-year-old teacher in her first year at Silver Rail Elementary School.

The families of the other two victims, who were ages 8 and 11, declined to share their names and asked for privacy.

Krantz said a 7-year-old girl injured in the shooting who received lifesaving care in the classroom is in serious but stable condition. A 54-year-old female teacher also suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries and is receiving treatment at St. Charles Bend hospital.

The parent who killed the shooter has been identified as Kaylub Giamanco, NBC News and The New York Times reported Friday.

Giamanco, 36, is the father of two girls who attend the school.

Giamanco’s mother, Kenda Freeman, said in a statement Friday that her son is not “seeking recognition but instead wishes to express his gratitude to the first responders, school personnel and community for the outpouring of love and support.”

Police have identified the the gunman as Griffin J. John II, 16, who previously attended Silver Rail Elementary School and was a special education student. He was no longer enrolled in the Bend-La Pine school district at the time of the shooting, Krantz said.

“I don’t think we can underestimate or underappreciate that courage,” Krantz said of the teacher’s and the bystander’s actions.

“When someone is willing to risk their own life for others, we recognize that. The quick thinking to observe, to then park and follow someone into the school is incredible and undoubtedly saved people,” Krantz said. “If it came natural as a protective father, that’s terrific.”

“The teacher who’s willing to stand and fight for her children — incredible,” the chief added. “We all recognize that is true heroism. We don’t see that a lot in society.”

President Donald Trump on Friday praised Giamanco for confronting the attacker, calling him a “great hero.”

“There was a great hero,” Trump told reporters. “He took care of business, and thank God we had him,” Trump said. “Otherwise, it would have been much worse. It’s a terrible thing, but thank goodness for a man that had a gun and knew how to use it.”

The family of the teacher killed in the shooting said Lambert had a goal to be an “educator and teach in the school district she loved growing up in.”

“She always fought for the underdog and those with special needs,” the family statement read. “She was an incredible sister, daughter, niece, and granddaughter. Her friends became her family. She was funny and opinionated, and she lit up the room.”

“Meghan loved those children and so we will show you love for her.”

The post Teacher tackled Oregon school shooter before parent fatally shot him, police say appeared first on MS NOW.

At almost every turn, Sen. Marsha Blackburn, the Tennessee Republican running for governor of her state, has voted against Black people’s interests. In 2021 she joined two other Republican senators and introduced a measure to rid classrooms of critical race theory, because she claimed it promotes “division by seeking to dismantle American society.” She voted against the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the George Floyd Act. And in April, after the Supreme Court’s disastrous ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, the gubernatorial candidate, referring to the state’s largest Black city, wrote on X: “I urge our state legislature to reconvene to redistrict another Republican seat in Memphis. It’s essential to cement @realDonaldTrump’s agenda and the Golden Age of America.”

Despite all her documented hostility toward the Black voters of her state and their interests, on Tuesday, Blackburn posted an artificial intelligence video of herself in the place of the Black hip-hop artist Kendrick Lamar performing his hit “Not Like Us” during the 2025 Super Bowl halftime show in New Orleans.

It would be impossible to name everyone who falls under the Compton rapper’s “they,” but we know it includes MAGA Republicans like Blackburn.

Blackburn’s hypocrisy is galling. Kendrick Lamar’s catalog is mostly made of songs about Black people being locked outside of mainstream America. “Not Like Us,” a diss track aimed at Drake, has the mantra “They not like us, they not like us,” and it’s a line in the sand about who Black people should accept and support. It would be impossible to name everyone who falls under the Compton, California, rapper’s “they,” but we know it includes MAGA Republicans like Blackburn.

Even so, her X account released the short AI-generated video showing her mimicking Lamar’s halftime show moves. The other AI-generated people with her are backup dancers: Rep. Tim Burchett, Sen. Bill Hagerty and state Sen. Brent Taylor, along with WWE wrestler Kane, whose real name is Glenn Thomas Jacobs, former mayor of Knox County, Tennessee. Blackburn captioned the post “Tomorrow. Ready to roll.”

“You’ve taken my Blues and gone,” Langston Hughes writes in the first line of his 1940 poem “Notes on Commercial Theater.” The poem accuses white entertainment moguls of taking Black art forms, changing them “So they don’t sound like me” and making them more palatable for and marketable to white audiences. Using an AI program 86 years later, Blackburn does the same thing to hip-hop, which is currently the most dominant form of Black musical expression.

Tomorrow. Ready to roll. pic.twitter.com/YiWREmkjyx

— Marsha Blackburn (@VoteMarsha) October 13, 2026

According to PEN America, the Trump administration has banned almost 600 books written by Black authors or authors representing minority groups, or books dealing with slavery, from Defense Department schools. Black studies programs at colleges and universities have been disbanded. And companies have rolled back their diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. In 2017, Lamar was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for his album “DAMN.,” which the award committee praised as “a virtuosic song collection unified by its vernacular authenticity and rhythmic dynamism that offers affecting vignettes capturing the complexity of modern African-American life.”

Nothing about that description suggests Blackburn would be a fan. It seems more likely that she would find a way to signal her disapproval. But still, she released a video putting herself in Lamar’s place.

Blackburn’s video isn’t blackface in the technical sense, but it’s blackface in the figurative sense. She’s mocking a culture she has no respect or appreciation for. I take Black music seriously, and in response to Blackburn’s hypocrisy, I find myself, like the title of a Hughes short-story collection, “Laughing to Keep from Crying.”

The brilliant thinkers Hanif Abdurraqib and Lauren Michele Jackson suggest that not every example of cultural appropriation is problematic. Cultural appropriation happens every day, and at times, they point out, the people doing it are not aware that they’re doing it. But that’s clearly not the case here. Blackburn made a campaign video using a catchy Black song and an iconic Black cultural moment to promote her candidacy — even as she favors weakening Black political strength and silencing voices who rightly condemn systematic racism.

No matter what AI-generated slop she puts out, “She not like us.”

The post The irony of Marsha Blackburn’s problematic campaign ad seems to have gone over her head appeared first on MS NOW.

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent has been placed on leave after striking a man with his vehicle in Houston on Saturday, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson confirmed to MS NOW.

The unnamed agent struck 48-year-old Miguel Parra, an undocumented immigrant, shortly after 7 a.m. local time on Saturday, according to the Harris County Sheriff’s Office. Parra was hospitalized with injuries following the incident, Maj. Anthony McConnell, who leads the Special Investigations Bureau at the sheriff’s office, said at a Saturday press conference.

The DHS spokesperson told MS NOW on Friday that it is “standard practice” for an agent to be placed on leave while an internal investigation is pending, adding that it is “not any indication of wrongdoing.” The spokesperson did not immediately respond to follow-up questions.

The development was first reported by NBC News on Thursday.

In a statement provided to the outlet over the weekend, an ICE spokesperson said immigration agents were not targeting Parra, but that he fled on foot after a traffic stop. Surveillance footage obtained by NBC affiliate KPRC of Houston appears to show Parra and another passenger get out of a vehicle and run before a vehicle strikes Parra. The second person who fled remains unaccounted for, according to the sheriff’s office.

The agent’s placement on leave is the latest controversy to roil ICE as the agency faces scrutiny over seceral recent incidents and high-profile killings. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani demanded ICE end its operations in the city after an agent shot and wounded a Dominican man while attempting to arrest him earlier this month, while his 5-year-old child was in the backseat. On Thursday, California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a lawsuit alleging ICE agents were unconstitutionally taking people into custody near state courthouses.

Speaking about the incident in Houston, Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare told NBC News that he believes the ICE agent intentionally struck and ran over Parra, an allegation that, if substantiated, could lead to aggravated assault charges. But the DHS spokesperson rejected the allegation that the agent intentionally struck Parra, calling it “RECKLESS and FALSE” in a statement to MS NOW.

Teare, a Democrat, also told NBC News that the federal government was not cooperating with an independent investigation being conducted by his office and the Harris County Sheriff’s Office. A spokesperson for the Harris County DA’s Office referred MS NOW to Teare’s public statements.

McConnell, from the Harris County Sheriff’s Office, initially said Parra’s leg was broken in the incident. But Cesar Espinosa, the co-founder of FIEL, a local immigration advocacy organization, said at a Wednesday press conference that Parra’s leg was not broken. Espinosa said, however, that Parra had sustained “multiple fractures” and was “very, very injured.”

As of Wednesday, Parra was still hospitalized, according to Espinosa.

Parra’s lawyer did not respond to questions from MS NOW on Friday.

This story has been updated with additional information provided by the sheriff’s office.

The post ICE agent placed on leave after striking immigrant in Houston, DHS confirms appeared first on MS NOW.

MS NOW’s Michael Steele said the American people “turned the hand” of Donald Trump after the president announced the government would not livestream the execution of the Fort Hood shooter. “I think we need to sometimes put a check on ourselves, and in this instance, we did,” he said.

Last week, Pentagon officials said the execution of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who was convicted of killing 13 people at a military medical building in 2009, would be livestreamed. But on Thursday, Trump reversed course in a Truth Social post, writing, “He will die, as scheduled, by firing squad, but this event will not be streamed.”

Although the livestream has been called off, Steele said the fact that officials considered broadcasting the execution raises profound questions about the country’s leadership. “What does it say that our country would even consider doing something like this?” he asked.

“This level of barbarism, it doesn’t matter where you are on the death penalty and all of that; this is about who we are as a nation and whether or not we want to participate in this type of voyeurism, this type of dehumanizing behavior,” he continued.

As “The Weeknight” co-host pointed out, even some victims’ families expressed reservations about the plan. “It is painful for the families,” he said. “It is enough to have to live through the loss of their loved ones, but then to have this type of reality TV approach to something so serious, a matter so serious.”

Steele said the controversy underscored why those in power must be held accountable by the public. In this case, he said, Americans had to question whether the government’s plan reflected the country’s values. “I think we need to sometimes put a check on ourselves, and in this instance, we did,” he said, crediting public backlash for Trump’s reversal.

“I think the response of the American people is what turned the hand of the president on this,” he continued, adding that he was “grateful” the public chose to stand up for decency and sent Trump a clear message: “No, we’re not going to watch that.”

“We decided. You responded. That’s how this works,” Steele said.

View this post on Instagram

You can watch Steele’s full comments in the clip above.

The post Michael Steele says Americans ‘turned the hand’ of Trump on execution livestream appeared first on MS NOW.

On Tuesday afternoon, after Katie Zacharia’s disastrous first briefing as White House press secretary, a White House official told MS NOW, “She needs to get much better, fast, otherwise she’ll break Scaramucci’s record,” set, of course, by Anthony Scaramucci, who served as Donald Trump’s communications director for 11 days in 2017.

Three days later, she did what few thought possible by breaking that record. As a truly brutal first week neared its end, MS NOW reported:

After a turbulent five days in the role, Katie Zacharia is out as White House press secretary, two White House officials familiar with her departure told MS NOW on Friday.

The details — whether Zacharia voluntarily left her role or was directly fired — are still unclear. On Friday, President Donald Trump told reporters that he asked Zacharia to “reconsider” her role.

After Richard Nixon resigned in 1974, thus elevating Gerald Ford to the presidency, the Michigan Republican needed a new White House team. Ford tapped Jerald terHorst, a veteran journalist, to be the press secretary, and he seemed like a perfectly sensible choice.

The arrangement, however, did not last. A month into Ford’s tenure, the new president issued a controversial pardon to Nixon, and terHorst, unwilling to defend the decision, resigned. His tenure — just 31 days — was the shortest of any White House press secretary ever.

A half-century later, Zacharia’s time in the office lasted roughly one-sixth the length of terHorst’s tenure.

During a brief Q&A with reporters just outside the White House on Friday afternoon, the president made it sound as if he were doing his newly minted press secretary a favor.

“It’s not an easy job, and I think she was really treated very unfairly,” Trump said, adding, “I told her, ‘I think you’re better off being happy, and I’m not sure you can ever be happy in this job.’”

Asked whether Zacharia would continue to serve in his administration, the Republican said, “Yeah. In some form — but maybe a more pleasant form.”

Q: "Will Katie [Zacharia] continue to be in the administration?"Trump: "Yeah. In some form. But maybe a more pleasant form…I just think the press has been very tough on Katie and I said, 'There's no reason for you to have to do this.'…We'll make a determination."

— The Bulwark (@thebulwark.com) 2026-10-16T17:25:17.043Z

The development marks a stunning turn of events, including the exposure of Zacharia’s extensive record of peddling unhinged conspiratorial nonsense via social media, her misleading claims about her legal credentials, her work at a business that she described as “sort of a pyramid scheme” and her concession that she tried and failed to pass the California Bar Exam.

The president is already trying to blame this remarkable fiasco on the news organizations that reported accurate information, but as the dust settles, Trump and his team should at least try to consider a few lessons.

First, meritocracies are good, and hiring random people because the president saw them on television is bad.

Second, some routine vetting of prominent White House officials is a standard and responsible move.

And third, picking an unqualified press secretary three weeks before nationwide elections, having her move across the country and then throwing her into a difficult role without any meaningful preparation is a recipe for inevitable failure.

Put another way, there’s a fair amount of blame to go around for this humiliating debacle, which has managed to make the entire White House appear even more incompetent.

The post As Katie Zacharia’s tenure ends after just 5 days, here are some lessons for Team Trump appeared first on MS NOW.

Settlers in the occupied West Bank attacked Palestinian villagers, set fire to the olive trees they were harvesting and beat an American journalist Friday in the latest instance of rising settler violence in the region.

Heidi Levine, a veteran photojournalist for The Washington Post, said she was wearing a vest that clearly read “PRESS” on the front and back when a group of settlers, dressed in black with their faces covered, pushed her to the ground and kicked her at least 50 times as she tried to document what witnesses described as a “coordinated attack.”

Levine was taken to a hospital in the Ramallah region, where she is in stable condition.

“I was attacked, pushed to the ground,” Levine told reporters from her hospital bed Friday. “Luckily I had my flak jacket and helmet. Otherwise I probably wouldn’t even be here because they just kept kicking me and kicking me.”

Witnesses who spoke to The Associated Press and Reuters said the attack began when a group of 80 or more settlers descended from a hill above an olive grove in which Palestinian villagers from Abu Falah had gathered to harvest, an annual tradition that has long been a cornerstone of Palestinian culture.

The settlers set the groves on fire and hurled rocks at the Palestinian villagers, according to the witness accounts. Levine was part of a group of journalists who were about 80 yards away when settlers chased them down and overtook them.

She was beaten with sticks and kicked until a group of Palestinians pushed the settlers back enough for American journalist Jasper Nathaniel to reach Levine and help her to safety, according to The Washington Post.

“To be clear, the only reason I was able to reach Heidi was because young Palestinians provided cover with rocks against machine-gun- and tear-gas-wielding settlers and soldiers,” Nathaniel said in a post on X, which included video footage of a group rushing to help Levine. “It’s those kids, not the settler terrorists, who the IDF was hunting after the attack.”

In a subsequent post, Nathaniel shared a photo of a bandaged Levine lying in a hospital bed.

“Heidi is going to be okay, but her injuries are significantly worse than initially thought,” Nathaniel wrote in the post. “It appears that she may have been stabbed. She’s getting ready for surgery.”

The Washington Post did not immediately respond to MS NOW’s request for comment on Friday. Executive Editor Matt Murray in a statement shared with the Post condemned the incident as an unwarranted attack on a member of the free press.

“This morning, a Washington Post photographer, Heidi Levine, was attacked by Israeli settlers while reporting in the West Bank,” Murray said. “She was wearing visible markings clearly identifying her as a journalist. While we are relieved that Heidi has received medical care and is safe, we are outraged by this unwarranted attack on a journalist doing her job and urge a thorough investigation and follow-through from authorities.”

Witnesses said that when soldiers with the Israeli military arrived at the scene, they fired tear gas at Palestinians who had dodged the jeeps that the soldiers had driven through the attack.

The Israeli military said in a statement Friday that “the forces acted to disperse the confrontation using riot dispersal means.”

“IDF soldiers initially fired warning shots into the air and then fired toward a suspect who ran toward them, carrying a sharp object and posed a threat to them,” the statement said, adding the incident is under investigation.

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose far-right government has facilitated a significant expansion of Israeli settlements and outposts across the West Bank, said the circumstances of Levine’s attack “remain unclear and are under investigation.”

Israel “unequivocally condemns violence against anyone,” the statement said. “But serious questions remain.”

It added: “Reports indicate some 200 Arabs and far-left activists confronted approximately 40 Israeli youths. Footage shows masked individuals on both sides hurling objects, amid reports of fireworks fired at Jewish youths. Other footage appears to show Levine knocked down and immediately helped to her feet by the same unidentified individual.”

The post American photojournalist attacked by Israeli settlers in West Bank appeared first on MS NOW.

After a turbulent five days in the role, Katie Zacharia is out as White House press secretary, two White House officials familiar with her departure told MS NOW on Friday. The sources were granted anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

It was not immediately clear whether Zacharia resigned or was fired. On Friday, President Donald Trump told reporters that he told Zacharia to “reconsider” her role.

Zacharia delivered her first and only press briefing on Tuesday, which lasted just over 14 minutes. She took just three questions — all from conservative media outlets — and failed to answer the first policy question she was asked. She defended her performance in an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity on Thursday, telling him she had “very little prep time.”

In the days after her appointment, questions swirled about her past experience, including her past references to being a lawyer. Though she obtained a law degree from Pepperdine University in 2011, she said this week that she did not pass the bar exam. She said she did not intend to mislead about her legal credentials, telling Real America’s Voice that it was a “miscommunication.”

Responding to a reporter on Friday who asked if he wanted Zacharia to “stick around ultimately,” Trump said he planned to talk to her when he returned to the White House from Georgia.

“I just said, ‘I think you should reconsider because I think the press is really being very unfair,'” he said.

Trump announced Zacharia as his new press secretary on Oct. 9, filling a vacancy left by Karoline Leavitt, who departed in August to spend more time with her two young children.

Former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci, who was fired after just 11 days in the role during Trump’s first administration, posted on X following the news of Zacharia’s departure: “Records are made to be broken. But I take no pleasure in other people’s pain.”

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

The post Katie Zacharia is out as White House press secretary after just 5 days appeared first on MS NOW.

Polling suggests that concerns about corruption and healthcare costs are top of mind for most voters as Election Day approaches. A Fox News poll released this week showed large majorities of voters listed both in the top five issues they were “extremely” or “very” concerned about. A new report about President Donald Trump’s self-enrichment by way of the pharmaceutical industry underscores the uniquely awful political predicament Republicans have created for themselves by wedding their party to one of the most corrupt administrations in American history.

Democrats on the Joint Economic Committee previously spotlighted the ways that Trump’s stock investments in the oil and gas industries have benefited from his destructive geopolitical agenda, including his deadly war with Iran. Now, the committee is out with a new report on the ways Trump’s stock investments in the pharmaceutical industry have benefited from provisions of the (ridiculously) so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act that Republicans forced through last year.

According to the new report:

As Americans face sky-high health care costs, President Trump and Congressional Republicans passed into law last year a new giveaway to Big Pharma that enables many pharmaceutical companies to keep charging seniors exorbitant prices for cancer treatments and other medications. This measure — which blocks the Medicare program from negotiating lower prices for several high-cost drugs — will add around $9 billion to the deficit.

The report cites financial disclosure forms that show that in 2025, “Trump held as much as $39.1 million in stock in the same Big Pharma companies that directly benefited from the giveaway that he and Congressional Republicans devised.” And that “these companies reported at least $54 billion in U.S. sales of drugs that benefitted from the carveout in 2025, a 13 percent increase from the year before.”

Trump has made more stock trades since returning to office than everyone in Congress combined. The White House has routinely said that these trades are handled by third parties over which Trump has no influence, denying allegations of corruption or conflicts of interest.

But it seems the majority of Americans aren’t convinced that the self-described “freaking genius” president has truly extricated his personal business dealings from industries that benefit from his policies: A recent AP-NORC poll found that 60% of adults think Trump has either illegally or unethically profited from the presidency.

The post The ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ opened the door to benefit Big Pharma — and Trump appeared first on MS NOW.

MS NOW’s Joe Scarborough criticized President Donald Trump for condemning Ukraine’s renewed strikes on Russian oil sites while saying little about Moscow’s continued violations of his energy ceasefire.

“These events are shocking — even by Trumpian standards,” Scarborough said.

In an interview with Newsmax on Thursday, Trump called Ukraine’s decision to resume drone strikes on Russian oil refineries “a disgrace” and said the attacks would drive up global oil prices. (Trump has repeatedly blamed the Russia-Ukraine war for surging energy costs, though experts say the U.S. war with Iran has had a greater impact.)

“I’m not a big fan of Zelensky,” Trump said of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, adding that he found him “more difficult to deal with” than Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Reacting to Trump’s comments, Scarborough said Friday on “Morning Joe” that he “just can’t get Ukraine off my mind and the absolute betrayal of Ukraine.”

The MS NOW host cast Trump’s criticism of Ukraine as the latest in a series of moves that he argued favor Moscow. Last week, Trump announced the United States would lift sanctions on Russian diesel exports. Scarborough said the agreement would help “pump billions of dollars into Vladimir Putin’s killing machines.”

He also cited Reuters’ report that an order to limit Ukraine’s access to SpaceX’s Starshield satellite service came from inside the White House. The temporary restriction disrupted Ukrainian drone operations, according to the report. A White House official denied that Trump ordered the Pentagon to limit the service.

“That’s all in Donald Trump’s hands,” Scarborough continued. “He’s the one in charge of this.” He said he believed Trump was “doing everything he can to help” Putin “win this war.”

According to the “Morning Joe” co-host, Trump has “been telling us who he is since 2015” when it comes to his feelings toward Putin.

“He’s always been with Russia,” he said. “Long before this war in 2015, while he was running for president, he was talking about his great admiration for Vladimir Putin.”

Scarborough also recalled what he called Trump’s “shameful, pathetic, weak performance” at his 2018 meeting with Putin in Helsinki, during which Trump publicly cast doubt on U.S. intelligence agency findings on Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

Since Trump returned to the White House, Scarborough said, “we’ve heard more of the same.” He said Trump’s advisers would share responsibility for the consequences of the administration’s approach to Ukraine.

“Everybody around him that has anything to do with this policy, this betrayal of the West, this betrayal of Western freedom, this betrayal of Ukraine, this will be marked upon their legacies for as long as they live,” he said.

You can watch Scarborough’s full comments in the clip at the top of the page.

The post Joe Scarborough slams Trump’s ‘betrayal’ of Ukraine: ‘He’s always been with Russia’ appeared first on MS NOW.

Congressional Democrats on the House Armed Services and Intelligence committees are demanding President Donald Trump explain why Ukrainian forces’ access to SpaceX Starshield services was restricted earlier this week.

In a letter first reported by MS NOW, Rep. Jason Crow, D-Co., ranking member of the Armed Services Committee; Adam Smith, D-Wash., ranking member of the Select Committee on Intelligence; Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn.; and Rep. George Whitesides, D-Calif., lambasted the Trump administration for refusing to respond to congressional inquiries on who directed changes to Ukraine’s access to Starshield, the military-grade version of Starlink services.

The lawmakers were not satisfied with either the possibility that Elon Musk’s company SpaceX independently made the decision — which Musk has denied — or the U.S. government made the call.

“Starshield systems are owned and controlled by the US government,” Musk wrote Oct. 14 on X. “Any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS.”

The Democratic lawmakers want the Trump administration to explain exactly who controls the crucial satellite connections Ukraine uses to defend itself.

“If a private company can unilaterally restrict a critical operational service governed by a signed contract with the Department of Defense during an active conflict, it raises serious concerns about public accountability and the outsized influence of private actors over U.S. national security matters,” the lawmakers wrote.

“If, on the other hand, the direction was given by your Administration, it raises serious questions about U.S. defense policy regarding Russia and Ukraine,” they added. “Either way, the American people, our allies, and Ukraine deserve to know why this decision with life-threatening consequences was made.”

A U.S. official, granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive situation, told MS NOW that “no such request was ever made by the President.” The White House ignored repeated questions on whether another administration official or agency directed the change.

“As his popularity plummets at home, he’s shamefully abandoning our allies and once again cozying up to dictators,” Crow said in a statement, referring to Trump. “We need to stand with the people of Ukraine as Russia continues its war of aggression, not fund Putin’s war machine that is killing civilians.”

The Democrats noted the disruption to Ukraine’s military operations and defense capabilities put civilians at risk. The satellite signal disruptions also came amid Trump’s diesel deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin and pressure on Ukraine to stop attacking Russian energy sites, despite its adversary failing to abide by the so-called energy ceasefire announced by Trump.

They asked for a response by Oct. 30.

Their letter, which did not include any Republican signatories, follows a bipartisan Senate effort calling for the Department of Defense Inspector General to investigate the Starlink disruptions in Ukraine.

On Thursday, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., led a bipartisan letter seeking an investigation into whether the restricted Starshield service put U.S. diplomatic, military, and security personnel inside Ukraine in danger and who approved the disruptions.

Starshield speeds began to improve on Thursday, according to Ukrainian chargé d’affaires in Washington Denys Sienik.

“We hope all will be resumed to the previous level,” Sienik said in a statement. “Speed ​​is critical for logistics, and for intercepting the jet-powered Shahed drones especially when Russia constantly uses them to attack our cities and commit war crimes and when Foreign Minister Lavrov openly states that Russia opposes a ceasefire.”

A source familiar with the matter told MS NOW the Ukrainian government has yet to receive any response from SpaceX or the Pentagon.

Wednesday “saw one of the most massive Shahed attacks, occurring precisely when our defense system’s speed was being throttled, and the circumstances behind this are deeply concerning,” said the source, who was granted anonymity to discuss sensitive military operations.

The post Democrats demand Trump explain Ukraine satellite cutoffs appeared first on MS NOW.

Alaska Republican incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan failed an attempt at a “gotcha” moment against former Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola as they clashed Thursday in their final debate ahead of November’s midterm elections.

The pair, who are competing in a key U.S. Senate race that could determine which party controls the upper chamber, traded quips over the impact of President Donald Trump’s policies on Alaska’s economy and their plans to deliver for the state if elected.

In one testy exchange, Sullivan, a close ally of Trump who is running for a third term with the president’s endorsement, made a blunder when he accused Peltola of having received the questions in advance of the debate.

“Can I ask the moderator a question?” Sullivan said shortly after Peltola said Alaskans are suffering higher gas prices due to the ongoing closure of the Strait of Hormuz. “We weren’t supposed to get these questions beforehand, were we?”

“Neither one of you got questions beforehand,” said Lori Townsend, the chief editor at Alaska Public Media, who moderated the debate. “Absolutely not.”

“Okay, I’m just watching my opponent read from questions that seem to be answered,” Sullivan said.

“I’m prepared,” Peltola responded.

Sullivan was apparently accusing Peltola of violating the debate rules by receiving questions from the panel beforehand. But the exchange instead appeared to be a failed attempt at a “gotcha” moment by the Republican, which highlighted Peltola’s calm demeanor as she delivered her answers.

The incident recalls Sen. Eric Schmitt’s similarly embarrassing misfire in Jack Smith’s hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee last month. The Missouri Republican accused the former special counsel of perjuring himself about an NBA basketball game in Atlanta that he did not attend. Smith was at the University of Maryland in College Park that night, watching Maryland play the University of Iowa.

Overall, Peltola and Sullivan have spent more than $56 million on ads in the race, which have dominated Alaska’s limited airwaves for months. The general election contest is also likely to shatter spending records.

The post ‘I’m prepared’: Peltola humbles rival Sullivan in Alaska Senate debate appeared first on MS NOW.

A couple of months ago, Donald Trump appeared on a conservative radio show and said that “a lot of people” wanted to see the president pardon himself in his first term.

“I had the absolute right to do it,” he said. “Instead, I fought it through the courts and won.”

While that wasn’t an entirely accurate summary of recent history — Trump, who was convicted of several felonies in New York, only “won” when the federal criminal cases against him ended upon his return to the White House, not because they were adjudicated in his favor — the president’s rhetoric about his “absolute right” to pardon himself stood out.

This week, he returned to the issue during an interview with Newsmax’s Rob Finnerty.

Trump suggests he is going to pardon everyone, including himself: "I'm allowed to do a self-pardon … I don't want to see people that work for me go through years of nonsense"

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-10-16T00:20:10.130Z

Asked specifically whether he’s “seriously considering a self-pardon” before he leaves office, the president initially hedged, saying he’s done “nothing wrong,” before adding, “I’m allowed to do a self-pardon. I’m allowed to pardon. … The pardon is very powerful. I know that. They say it’s the most powerful thing a president has, the power of pardon.”

As my MS NOW colleague Jordan Rubin explained in detail just last week, whether presidents can actually pardon themselves is a matter of some controversy. Ahead of Richard Nixon’s resignation in 1974, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel prepared a memo concluding that presidents can’t pardon themselves, though OLC opinions are not binding on the courts, and the matter has never been tested — at least not yet.

But also of interest was the other point Trump made as part of the same exchange.

On the topic of pardons, the Republican went on to say, “I can tell you this, I don’t want to see my people go through — because these people are lunatics on the, on the left — I don’t want to see people that work for me go through years of nonsense, hire lawyers and everything else, all for nothing.”

This came a few weeks after Trump also told Time magazine that he’s prepared to issue pardons to members of his administration.

Time will tell whether he follows through, and just as notably, just how many members of his team are considered for presidential clemency. But that Trump keeps making comments like these might very have a real impact in the White House and throughout the executive branch: The president is effectively letting a small army of political appointees know that, no matter what they do as part of their duties, he’s inclined to hand them a pardon, whether or not they deserve one.

Systemic government corruption is already a problem in the Trump era. The signal he’s sending to his team is likely to make matters worse.

The post ‘I’m allowed to do a self-pardon’: Trump opens the door to pardons for staff and himself appeared first on MS NOW.

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.

* According to the latest third-quarter fundraising reports to the Federal Elections Commission, Democratic Senate hopeful James Talarico raised $64 million between July and September, which is the best quarter any Senate candidate has ever had in American history. His Texas rival, Republican Ken Paxton, raised $10.2 million over the same period.

That said, the scandal-plagued state attorney general is receiving some extraordinary backup from billionaire GOP megadonor Elon Musk, who is almost single-handedly financing Paxton’s candidacy at this point.

As MS NOW reported, Musk donated $158 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, the super PAC aligned with the Senate Republican leadership, and one day after Musk opened his wallet, the Senate Leadership Fund “transferred the exact same amount of money to a pro-Ken Paxton super PAC called Texas PAC.”

Whether Texans have any concerns about a billionaire trying to flood the race with cash for Paxton remains to be seen.

* Speaking of fundraising, Punchbowl News took a closer look at third-quarter Federal Election Commission reports and found that in the six states that are likely to determine the Senate majority — Texas, Alaska, Ohio, Maine, Michigan and Iowa — the Democratic nominees “raised between three and six times more than their Republican opponents.”

* In Colorado’s gubernatorial race, Democratic state Attorney General Phil Weiser this week picked up endorsements from several prominent current and former Republicans. As The Denver Post noted, the list included former Rep. Ken Buck, who went so far as to cut a video for Weiser in which he acknowledges it may be “unusual” for a congressman from the longtime GOP stronghold to back a Democrat. In the video, Buck says a shared belief in “integrity in politics” unites the two.

* On a related note, in New Hampshire’s closely watched U.S. Senate race, Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas also picked up some Republican support this week, including an unexpected endorsement from Don Bolduc, the Trump-endorsed Republican Senate nominee from the 2022 election cycle.

* In Kansas’ closely watched U.S. Senate race, incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall didn’t need another controversy, but he managed to get one anyway. The Associated Press reported that the GOP senator worked on a water rights dispute, failing to mention that his solution would benefit a bordering property that he owns.

* And in Michigan’s U.S. Senate race, Donald Trump, on a nearly daily basis, has decided to deliberately call Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed by the wrong name, “Mohammed El-Sayed.” Asked why, the president said, “I don’t know. I feel like it.”

The post Friday’s Campaign Round-Up, 10.16.26: Elon Musk spends massively for Ken Paxton appeared first on MS NOW.

“I know the President has the power to pardon, but can Congress pass a law that says a person must be convicted before they can be pardoned? Or a law that says they must apply for a pardon stating what criminal activity they engaged in before the President can use the pardon power, so everyone knows what crime(s) they committed?” — Bec J

Hi Bec,

I think the answer to both questions is “no.”

The pardon power is a vast constitutional authority belonging to the president.

To be sure, the power has limits. It applies to federal, not state, crimes. It applies to those offenses only after they occur; pardons aren’t permission slips to commit crimes in the future. Presidents also can’t pardon impeachments, so that is one area that the Constitution has carved out for Congress.

Beyond that, the Supreme Court has called the power “unlimited,” writing in an 1866 case that it “extends to every offence known to the law, and may be exercised at any time after its commission, either before legal proceedings are taken, or during their pendency, or after conviction and judgment.”

Highlighting the limits of congressional authority in this area (outside of impeachment), the court said in that same case, “This power of the President is not subject to legislative control. Congress can neither limit the effect of his pardon, nor exclude from its exercise any class of offenders. The benign prerogative of mercy reposed in him cannot be fettered by any legislative restrictions.”

Against that backdrop, we can see why Congress is severely limited here.

Of course, it can impeach and remove the president for corruptly using his power. Even if a president could pardon themselves generally (a topic we explored last week), the impeachment exception to the pardon power means they wouldn’t be able to exempt themselves from those political proceedings.

With that background in mind, I think the courts would say that Congress can’t pass either of the two laws you suggest. I also think there are considerations to keep in mind that might caution against passing such laws even if Congress could, including the consideration of protecting the innocent from unjust prosecutions.

Start with whether Congress can pass a law that says “a person must be convicted before they can be pardoned.” That would run up against the court’s observation that the pardon power “may be exercised at any time after its commission” — even “before legal proceedings are taken.” That observation is supported by the plain constitutional text of the pardon power, which contains no conviction requirement.

There would be a similar problem with a law that says clemency hopefuls “must apply for a pardon stating what criminal activity they engaged in before the President can use the pardon power, so everyone knows what crime(s) they committed.”

Nothing in the Constitution says a person must apply for a pardon at all, much less that they need to describe their criminal activity in doing so. Such a law would therefore seem to interfere unduly with the president’s power. While presidents besides Donald Trump have relied on a standardized application process, whether they do so is up to them, not Congress.

Tying in the innocence point I flagged above, consider the following in thinking about both of these hypothetical laws: What if a president wants to right a wrong by pardoning someone who was unjustly prosecuted? We would not want such a person to have to confess to a crime they didn’t commit.

Or, what if there were an innocent person who hadn’t been charged with any crime, and an outgoing president was concerned that their successor was intent on railroading this innocent person? From Joe Biden’s perspective, that was the situation he faced when he preemptively pardoned Anthony Fauci and others he feared would be targeted by Trump’s second-term retribution campaign. Had those laws been in place at the time, Biden could not have issued that protective clemency.

Whatever one thinks of Biden’s or Trump’s pardons, if Congress is serious about reforming this massive presidential power, then it would need to advance a constitutional amendment to alter that power, which is firmly in the executive’s control until the Constitution says otherwise.

Ultimately, any of this would require a Congress that is willing to act. In the meantime, this discussion reinforces a point that I landed on when answering a prior question about pardons: “the best way — maybe the only real way — to combat the corrupt exercise of the pardon power is to not elect corrupt presidents.”

Please submit “Ask Jordan” questions through this form for a chance to have your question featured in a future edition of the Deadline: Legal newsletter.

The post Ask Jordan: What power does Congress have over pardons? appeared first on MS NOW.

For more than a year, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has acted as one of the nation’s top diplomats, exercising significant authority on behalf of the U.S. government on conflicts involving foreign hostilities, without undergoing the Senate confirmation process or filing a single financial disclosure. If you’re asking how that’s legal, it’s not.

Kushner is a figure of great influence on our national security and foreign policy apparatus. He has been tasked with meeting directly with heads of state, negotiating peace deals and representing the United States in efforts to end the president’s war in Iran, which has put our troops in harm’s way and exacerbated the affordability crisis here at home. My organization, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, just filed a lawsuit asking the court to block Kushner from continuing to perform his outsized role without Senate confirmation and compel him to file his required financial disclosures.

A White House spokesperson said in a statement that “[Kushner’s] personal business activities have nothing to do with his diplomatic engagements, which he conducts on a volunteer basis at the President’s request and while paying his own expenses,” while an attorney representing Kushner dismissed CREW’s lawsuit as “without merit.”

These laws exist to ensure that people granted substantial authority and power in our government are deserving of that power and maintain their ethical obligations to put Americans’ interests first. Kushner and the Trump administration have decided to sidestep this process.

The American public, through its elected senators and government officials, has the right to evaluate whether individuals are qualified and meet the ethical standards to hold powerful positions in our government. Kushner and the Trump administration have denied us that right, and that is both unacceptable and illegal.

The Constitution’s Appointments Clause requires that individuals who hold continuing government positions and are afforded substantial levels of authority be vetted and approved by the Senate before they take office. In my prior role as a senior counsel to the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, I helped conduct this vetting. It involved poring over a nominee’s background and experience, reviewing their past conduct, soliciting opinions on the nominee from outside experts, reviewing their financial records and interviewing them with other committee staff.

Nominees often also meet with senators to answer questions in private, are vetted by the FBI and sit for a public hearing in front of senators and the public before the committee of jurisdiction. Then the full chamber votes to approve or reject their appointment. In addition to that rigorous and multifaceted process, the Ethics in Government Act requires that individuals nominated to such positions file public financial disclosures so that the public and Congress can assess and monitor potential conflicts of interest prior to confirmation and while they serve in the role.

These laws exist to ensure that people granted substantial authority and power in our government are deserving of that power and maintain their ethical obligations to put Americans’ interests first. Kushner and the Trump administration have decided to sidestep this process.

Many officials with less power undergo more scrutiny than Kushner. For example, ambassadors who represent the U.S. in just one country — like the recently ousted Kimberly Guilfoyle — are required to be confirmed by the Senate and file public financial disclosures. Without any such vetting, Kushner has met with the presidents of Russia and Ukraine, as well as leaders from Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, and has been involved in peace negotiations surrounding Gaza, Iran and Ukraine. Meanwhile, Trump has not appointed ambassadors to Russia or Ukraine, as well as Qatar, or the UAE. Those positions remain vacant while Kushner exercises at least some of the powers and duties traditionally assigned to those positions, functionally dodging the Appointments Clause and the required vetting for confirmation.

Kushner is also an atypical diplomat. In addition to being Trump’s son-in-law, the seeming overlap between his government portfolio and business ventures has led to widespread questions. As senior adviser to the president in the first Trump administration, Kushner was required to file financial disclosures, which showed that he and his wife, Ivanka Trump, made between $172 million and $640 million in outside income while working in the White House. Soon after the first Trump administration ended, Kushner secured billions of dollars for his investment firm from the very governments, including Saudi Arabia, he had worked closely with in his official capacity. He continues to run that firm while he engages with foreign leaders who have invested with his company.

While Kushner has occasionally addressed these concerns publicly, he has not done so in Senate testimony under oath, nor provided appropriate documentation of his finances. As is the case with any nominee, his word alone is not good enough. Kushner’s lawyer claims that government ethics officials confirmed that this arrangement complies with applicable ethics requirements, but the Trump administration has routinely blessed ethically dubious conduct by the president and his family. In the first Trump administration, Kushner was granted a security clearance against the reported recommendation of career security specialists who raised concerns about his foreign entanglements.

Kushner is making decisions that affect everything from our safety and position on the world stage to the price of gas and groceries at home. This power, whether or not he has a formal title or receives a government salary, makes him subject to the Appointments Clause and the Ethics in Government Act. The very least we deserve is for Kushner to abide by the law — to be publicly vetted and transparent about his financial entanglements. He has thus far refused to do that, and we refuse to stand idly by.

The post Jared Kushner has no right to be playing diplomat appeared first on MS NOW.

MARQUETTE, Mich. — Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic U.S. Senate nominee in Michigan, signaled Thursday that he would question Israel’s status as an ally of the United States no matter who wins Israel’s elections later this month.

Asked during an interview with MS NOW whether his objections were to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government or to the state of Israel itself, El-Sayed suggested his opposition went further than current leadership.

“I mean, I think we’ve got to get serious, right?” he responded. “Netanyahu is one part of it, but the Israeli military has done heinous things, like heinous things, full war crimes, genocide. So I think we got to just get serious about whether or not we as a country should be subsidizing that government.”

He said he supports “equal rights to peace, dignity, and self-determination” for both “Jewish Israelis and Palestinians,” before pointing to Israel’s lobbying of the U.S. to join the war with Iran.

“But right now, that government has done terrible things with our money in their name, they pulled us into a war we had no business fighting,” he added. “So, to me, an ally is somebody who cares about you and you care about them. I don’t think they care about us. That’s what I’ve seen.”

When pressed on the matter — whether the ouster of Netanyahu would change his views — El-Sayed deferred to after the Israelis selected their next leader.

“Let’s see who the next prime minister is,” he said in an interview with MS NOW, before arguing that “structurally, there are a lot of issues with that ostensible allyship.”

Netanyahu’s main challenger, Gadi Eisenkot, a former chief of the Israeli military, leads a centrist party called Yashar, which translates to “Straight” in English. He has indicated a greater willingness than Netanyahu to more fully engage with the Trump administration on its various regional diplomatic initiatives in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria. Like most other Israeli opposition leaders, Eisenkot has said he would continue an aggressive military posture against militant groups all across the Middle East.

He has positioned his party as a home for voters who are concerned about the direction Netanyahu and his far right and religious coalition is leading Israel. His platform attacks issues where Netanyahu is vulnerable, such as calling for an official investigation into the Oct. 7 attacks, which Netanyahu has resisted. Eisenkot has rejected a Palestinian state in the near term but has pledged to curb settler violence and restrain some settlement expansion in the West Bank.

The International Court of Justice is currently hearing a case brought by South Africa that accuses Israeli forces of genocide. Israel vehemently has rejected the accusation, saying it is based on “biased and false claims.” Israel has said it does what it can to protect civilians and has accused Hamas of using civilians as human shields.

El-Sayed made the remarks after the third stop of his “It shouldn’t be this hard” bus tour — during which he was joined by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. — with less than three weeks until Election Day in one of the nation’s most competitive Senate races. He faces former Republican Rep. Mike Rogers for the seat being vacated by retiring Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, and the outcome could help determine which party controls the Senate for the final two years of President Donald Trump’s term.

El-Sayed’s views on Israel have become a flashpoint in the race, and he has struggled to win over some Jewish Democrats who are wary of his positions and rhetoric. El-Sayed has said he doesn’t support additional U.S. aid to Israel and doesn’t believe Israel should exist as a Jewish state. During last week’s debate, he wouldn’t say whether Israel or Iran posed the larger threat to the U.S., calling it a “ridiculous question.”

Asked by MS NOW on Thursday whether he would consider Israel to be a U.S. ally and whether the ousting of Netanyahu would change his position on the U.S.-Israel relationship, El-Sayed questioned how much of a friend Israel is, citing the impacts of the Iran war.

“They use us to go and fight a war we have no business fighting,” he said. “We’re paying more in gas. We’re paying more in groceries so that they could help to clear the air to try and annex southern Lebanon. How is that helping? What kind of allies? I’m just saying, like, what kind of ally is that?”

During another part of the interview, El-Sayed said Israeli leadership “just use” the U.S.

“Allies are supposed to care about you implicitly, not just use you. The government of Israel has done nothing but use us,” he said. “They use us for our tax dollars. They use us to run cover at the United Nations. They use us to run cover at the [International Criminal Court] and [International Court of Justice] for their war crimes.”

The Oct. 27 vote will be Israel’s first national election since the Hamas-led attacks of Oct. 7. Netanyahu, who has served as prime minister for more than 18 years across three stints, is seeking another term.

El-Sayed said he would wait to see who wins, but he sounded skeptical.

“I’m not hearing any commitment to Palestinian self-determination from anybody. I’m not hearing any commitment to ending the, like, the policy when it comes to settlements. I’m not hearing any remorse for the utter, like, annihilation of Gaza. So let’s see, right? Let’s see,” he said.

“I think right now, structurally, there are a lot of issues with that ostensible allyship. And I think the American public needs to have a conversation about it,” he added. “Like — and here’s the problem, right — too often the American public thinks one thing, right? You look at poll and poll, poll after poll after poll after poll. You all have reported on it, and then American politicians say something else. Why? And I think we should be asking, like, why?”

He continued, “Why is it that American politicians aren’t having the same conversation as the American public? I’m trying to have the conversation with the American public.”

Asked what his message is to Jewish Democrats who are on the fence about supporting him, El-Sayed turned the question back on the Rogers campaign.

“If you are committed to religious pluralism, take a look at the race that they’re running, and ask yourself if that helps anybody who is a religious minority in this country,” he said.

“If you’re committed to reproductive rights, if you’re committed to democracy itself, there is one candidate on the ballot who’s committed to those things,” he added. “Now, we may have differences when it comes to Israel, but the things that you notice are a lot bigger. I’m committed to the safety and security of the Jewish community like I’m committed to the safety and security of all of our communities.”

If elected, El-Sayed would be the first Muslim senator in American history. He said he is “committed to making sure that no matter how you pray, you’ve got a place here in America.”

“Nobody can tell you what you can or can’t do because of your faith. I know what it’s like to be discriminated against for how I pray, just turn on the TV,” he added. “And so I think the things that unite us are so much bigger than the things that divide us. But when it comes to a conversation about foreign policy, we might disagree. But I hope that the things that bring us  together are bigger than the things that divide us.”

Rogers has tried to capitalize on the hesitancy of some Jewish Democrats who are wary of El-Sayed.

“What the polls aren’t picking up is our effort in the Democrat Jewish community,” Rogers said last week at a campaign stop in Sterling Heights, a Detroit suburb. “There’s about 100,000. Those numbers are swelling up. It’s huge for us. The numbers are growing every day, even after last night, lots of calls, they want to get in and be a part of it. You’re never going to see that in a poll.”

Felicia Schwartz contributed to this report.

The post El-Sayed says a Netanyahu loss may not change his view of Israel appeared first on MS NOW.

As part of a tough re-election campaign in Maine, incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins has emphasized on countless occasions that she’s willing to defy President Donald Trump and other GOP leaders. But while there’s some truth to that, the senator’s critics have long emphasized the asterisk that comes with that record.

The New York Times took a closer look at her voting record, which shows that Collins has broken with her party more than any other Republican senator. That said, the same record “reveals that her defections … have rarely thwarted the president during his second term.”

In other words, the longtime GOP senator has demonstrated a willingness to break ranks, except when her vote might actually affect the outcome. Or, as the Times’ report put it, “one of the most dominant and long-running lines of attack against her” is that Collins “only defies the president when it doesn’t matter.”

On Thursday night, in her fourth and final debate against Democratic nominee Troy Jackson, the Maine Republican was presented with a clear opportunity to prove her critics wrong. It did not go well.

YIKES#mesen #mepolitics

— danny (@dabbs346.bsky.social) 2026-10-15T23:18:56.838Z

A moderator asked Collins, “Can you name a time when you voted against your party and President Trump where it actually changed the outcome significantly?”

The senator began by saying there were “several examples,” though she specifically pointed to one: Early last year, Collins said, she helped organize an effort to defeat Pete Hegseth’s defense secretary nomination, though her effort ultimately didn’t work and the unqualified former Fox News host was confirmed.

“So that didn’t change the outcome,” the moderator replied.

Remember, Collins has faced one specific criticism throughout her re-election bid, and it was highlighted by The New York Times in a front-page article published this week. The senator and her team had plenty of time to come up with examples (any example!) to prove her critics wrong.

But she couldn’t. Then, presented with the opportunity and platform, Collins flubbed it, effectively proving the underlying point.

Whether Jackson and his party turn the debate exchange into a new campaign ad remains to be seen.

The post Pressed on her work with Trump, Maine’s Collins trips over key part of her record appeared first on MS NOW.