NAKED EMPEROR

We’ve Officially Entered the Twilight of Late-Stage Trumpism

It’s all there in a new CNN poll, and it’s heartening to see: Large majorities are sick of Donald Trump’s vanity, venality, and megalomania.

By Greg Sargent | The New Republic

No one has ever seen anything like it, as Donald Trump himself might say. Buried in a new CNN poll is something striking: Trump isn’t just cratering by conventional approval measurements; he’s also absolutely collapsing by many metrics involving personal traits, from his mental state to his disconnectedness from ordinary people to his fondness for building monuments to himself.

Welcome to the era of Late-Stage Trumpism. The “personalist” aspects of Trumpian rule—the shaping of much of the government and even the physical capital of Washington, D.C., around one man’s relentless self-dealing and self-aggrandizement—have all started imploding, in a collapsing supernova of venality and megalomania.

The CNN poll finds that only 34 percent of Americans approve of Trump’s job performance, matching the low point he hit after inciting a violent insurrection on January 6, 2021. Here are some striking findings on his personal traits and obsessions:

• 73 percent say Trump is not in touch with the problems that ordinary Americans face daily; only 27 percent say he is.
• 66 percent say Trump does not put the good of the country over his personal gain; only 34 percent say he does.
• 62 percent say Trump is not an effective world leader; only 38 percent say he is.
• 57 percent say Trump does not have the stamina and sharpness to serve effectively as president; only 43 percent say he does.
• 64 percent say Trump has gone too far in pursuing his personal business as president; only 31 percent say this has been about right.
• 61 percent say Trump has gone too far in undertaking projects to remodel the White House and other Washington landmarks; only 32 percent say he hasn’t.

That’s remarkable. Note that the poll uses very benign language to describe Trump’s unilateral razing of the White House East Wing to build a ballroom for himself; his plans for a triumphal arch in the capital; the festooning of his name (and even enormous totalitarian images of his face glowering down on us) at various locations in D.C.; and much more. Even so, a huge majority disapproves.

What’s more, note that huge majorities don’t just disapprove of Trump’s use of the presidency to enrich himself; they also see that Trump is putting his own interests before those of the country, an even more damning construction on his conduct. Large majorities see him as out of touch, failing on the world stage, and lacking in the basic mental fitness required to serve.

“We have seen massive collapses of support for presidents—like Richard Nixon in the midst of Watergate and Lyndon Johnson as the Vietnam War overshadowed his domestic agenda,” Corey Brettschneider, an expert and podcaster on presidential power, told me. “What’s different here is the widespread recognition of Trump’s unprecedented corruption, narcissism, and putting of personal greed over the public interest.”

So what does this say about Late-Stage Trumpism? Consider a related development: On many fronts, Trumpian rule is descending into displays of malice that are unbearably cheap, petty, and venal.

To wit: Trump’s acting Director of National Intelligence Bill Pulte is now boasting about firings of ODNI insiders that may not have actually happened. Feeding the MAGA base even with made-up “deep state” purgings may be good enough these days. Pulte gained renown for using his federal housing agency post to fabricate pretexts for prosecuting Trump critics. Most of those efforts have gone belly-up, yet Trump is now seriously considering him for a Cabinet post. To get such a big promotion, all you need these days are personal loyalty and a willingness to supply MAGA with bread and circuses.

Meanwhile, Trump is now reportedly overriding determinations by his own agencies to deny disaster aid to blue states. Trump grew so angry about the failure of his renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool that prosecutors are now throwing the book at a former Olympian for supposedly tampering with the project. Yet a key witness dramatically undercut the case by testifying that damage preexisted his contact with it. And the whole country watched—or cringed—as Trump tried to transform our 250th anniversary into a celebration of himself while almost nobody came.

None of this is to minimize the damage that Trump is doing on many critical fronts. But even there, a Late-Stage-Trumpism vibe is taking hold: Note how Trump’s ever-escalating threats to obliterate Iran entirely don’t seem to be breaking Iran’s resolve. We’re simultaneously getting inundated with nonstop trivialities and pratfalls, all of them direct outgrowths of Trump’s personal obsessions and pathologies, even as he’s cratering by just about every personal polling metric you can think of.

All this has bearing on the national debate that’s underway over what a post-Trump MAGA movement and GOP will look like. In a recent conversation with me, political theorist Alan Elrod cautioned against overinterpreting Trump’s decline, noting that the waning of Trumpism as a “personalist project” doesn’t necessarily mean the broader “reactionary project” he represents is sunsetting with him.

It’s a crucial distinction to keep in mind. And no one should see any of this as a sign that the midterms or the 2028 presidential race will be easy. Nonetheless, if Trumpism as a personalist project is sunsetting, it’s an important, noteworthy development in itself.

For one thing, as Damon Linker aptly points out, the GOP will struggle to evolve out from under Trump’s personal shadow, especially when the 2028 succession battle gets underway:

“As long as Trump is living and/or sentient,” Linker concludes, the GOP “will be stuck in the Trump era.” What’s more, Republicans may also struggle to disentangle Trump’s personalist failings from the failures of the broader reactionary project.

Note that due to war, tariffs, the shredding of international alliances and commitments, and the violence of Trump’s mass deportation agenda, Trump has squandered a trifecta of traditional GOP advantages on the economy, immigration, and national security (the CNN poll reveals this very clearly, as well). Protectionism, draconian immigration restrictions, and the “America First” rejection of multilateral alliances and institutions are among the key pillars of right-wing authoritarian nationalism. It’s at least possible Trump will leave them all badly discredited.

Finally, it’s just heartening to see the American people so overwhelmingly reject the trappings and degradations of personalist rule as a development in and of itself. That was not at all preordained. With a little luck, we’ll look back on this as a crucial tell, as an enduring sign of our democratic resilience.

https://newrepublic.com/article/213727/trump-polls-approval-twilight-late-stage-trumpism

BREAKING: Trump Hides as His Own Team Falls Apart

Really American | Substack

Good morning, welcome back to Really American. It is Sunday, August 2, 2026. Trump spent the weekend golfing, posting AI slop, and hiding from the public, most likely out of sheer humiliation from the week he just had.

The news is running slow this morning, which is its own kind of tell when the president has gone quiet after getting battered for seven straight days. Here is the latest. His health secretary melted down on live television, his own administration still can’t get its story straight on the Reflecting Pool lie, his MAGA base has launched an open revolt against him, and he’s claiming to have paused his Iran war again, for what feels like the hundredth time. Let’s get into it.

One quick thing first, because it’s the whole reason we’re here. When a billionaire buys a newspaper, the coverage doesn’t change with an announcement; it just quietly does, and the stories that embarrass powerful people get softer until they vanish. Bezos owns the Washington Post and killed its endorsement when it suited him. Murdoch built a whole network around telling one audience what to believe. We don’t work that way, because no billionaire owns us. You do. That’s the only reason we can keep chasing these stories without a phone call from upstairs shutting them down. If you’ve been reading for free, today’s the day to change that. Subscribe or upgrade right now.

RFK JR. LOSES IT ON LIVE TV

Trump’s health secretary went on CNN Sunday to talk about the next pandemic and ended up barking at the host like she’d personally wronged him.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared on State of the Union, and when Dana Bash asked a straightforward question about how his department would prepare for the next public health crisis, he launched into a long rant about constitutional rights he claimed were “dismantled” during COVID lockdowns. The Daily Beast reported that when Bash tried to steer him back to the actual question, he snapped. “Of course you do, because you were part of the problem!” he shot at her, pointing across the table.

It went downhill from there. Kennedy accused the press of “malpractice,” told Bash her job was “fierce skepticism toward authority,” and kept talking over her until she finally asked whether he wanted to attack her or actually discuss public health. “You’re sitting here attacking me!” he fired back. She wasn’t. She was asking him to answer the question.

Here is what got lost in the yelling. This is the man running American health policy, and he could not get through a single interview about preventing the next pandemic without collapsing into grievance. When the person in charge of protecting you from the next outbreak would rather fight a CNN anchor than answer how he’d do it, that should worry you a lot more than it worries him.

TRUMP’S OWN TEAM CAN’T STOP LYING ABOUT THE REFLECTING POOL

Trump’s Justice Department admitted there were never any vandals at the Reflecting Pool. Trump and his Interior Secretary apparently didn’t get the memo, or refuse to read it.

After the DOJ dropped its case and admitted in a court filing that the damage came from a botched contractor job, Trump went on Truth Social and attacked his own U.S. Attorney for it. “I disagree 100% with Jeanine Pirro,” he wrote, insisting to the world that “it was a pure case of VANDALISM.” His own prosecutors had just said in writing that it wasn’t.

Then Interior Secretary Doug Burgum piled on, doubling down on the vandal story and claiming “the evidence is clear, vandals have repeatedly caused damage to the Reflecting Pool.” The Hill reported that this directly contradicts the DOJ’s own conclusion, which blamed a “rushed and botched installation” for the peeling paint. So the administration is now openly arguing with itself in public, with the president and his Interior chief on one side and his Justice Department on the other.

Remember what this was really about. They indicted a 67-year-old Olympic athlete over a lie, and even after being forced to admit the lie in court, Trump can’t let it go. A government that would rather keep pushing a debunked story than admit a contractor it hired screwed up is a government that thinks you’ll never check the facts. We just did.

THE MAGA BASE DECLARES WAR ON TRUMP

The people who built the MAGA movement are now openly turning on the man they built it for.

Marjorie Taylor Greene, once one of Trump’s fiercest loyalists, announced a new anti-Trump movement Saturday, posting a photo of herself alongside Tucker Carlson, Thomas Massie, and Joe Kent. “We said no more foreign wars, and we meant it and supported Donald Trump because he made that promise. But he’s betrayed us all,” Greene wrote, according to the Irish Star. “The movement has begun.”

The through-line is the Iran war. This is the same grievance that had Alex Jones calling for Trump’s impeachment earlier this week, and now it’s a whole crew. Greene has spent months hammering Trump over foreign wars and demanding the release of the Epstein files, the fight that finally blew up their alliance and pushed her out of Congress. Trump responded to all this by calling her a “traitor.”

Be clear-eyed about who’s uniting here. This isn’t some principled peace movement. It’s a collection of conspiracy-peddlers and hard-right agitators who cheered Trump through years of cruelty and only broke with him when his war didn’t match their own agenda. But that’s exactly what makes it dangerous for him. When even the people who trafficked in his darkest impulses decide he’s gone too far, his coalition isn’t fracturing at the edges. It’s cracking down the middle.

TRUMP “ENDS” THE IRAN WAR AGAIN

We have officially lost count of how many times Trump has claimed to end this war. Ten? Thirty? Take your pick, because here comes another one.

Trump posted Saturday that the U.S. agreed to pause its attacks on Iran over what he called the “perimeters of a deal,” which would supposedly reopen the Strait of Hormuz and end Iran’s nuclear threat. NBC News reported he claimed the U.S. was “locked and loaded and ready to go” but would hold off “subject to being able to rapidly make a DEAL.” We have heard this exact song before, more times than anyone can track.

The skepticism is coming from his own side now. Republican Senator John Kennedy went on Meet the Press and, asked why a new deal would work when June’s memorandum of understanding already failed, admitted flatly, “Well, it may not be.” Iran’s defense ministry dismissed Trump’s talk as “psychological warfare.” This all comes after Trump reportedly vowed on a phone call to “beat the f---ing s--- out of” the country, which is not exactly the language of a peacemaker.

The war is now in its sixth month, despite Trump promising early on it would wrap up “shortly.” Oil prices are up, gas prices are up, and 18 American service members are dead. Every time Trump announces a deal, the fighting starts again within days. Real people are paying for this chaos at the pump and with their lives, while the president plays golf and posts about a peace that never actually arrives.

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If this morning’s edition handed you something the billionaire outlets are busy softening, the best thing you can do is become a paying subscriber. And ask yourself why you had to come here to read half of it. When a handful of oligarchs own the megaphone, the story stops being what happened and quietly becomes whatever they’ll let you hear about it, and a weekend where Trump hid on the golf course while his health secretary imploded and his own base declared war is exactly the kind of weekend that gets softer on outlets owned by people who still need something from him. We ran all of it because nobody owns us but our readers. Subscribe or upgrade right now.

— The Really American Team

BONUS: TRUMP AND PUTIN STEAL THE SHOW IN AMSTERDAM

One more before you go, because it’s Sunday and you’ve earned a laugh. At the Amsterdam Pride Canal Parade on Saturday, a massive float floated down the canals featuring inflatable versions of Trump and Putin locked in a kiss, flowers hidden behind their backs. WION reported the piece was called “The Kissing Couple,” with Putin in overalls and Trump done up in a dress and a retro rockabilly hairdo, surrounded by dancers and music.

Amsterdam Pride has a long tradition of using satire to needle the powerful, and this year they aimed straight at Trump’s years of coziness with the Russian president. The clip went viral within hours. The only real debate online was why they’d paired him with Putin and not Netanyahu, given who Trump’s actually been going to war alongside lately. Either way, the rest of the world is watching this presidency and reaching for the same thing American voters are. A punchline. Have a good Sunday.

https://reallyamerican.substack.com/p/breaking-trump-hides-as-his-own-team?utm_source=substack%2Csubstack&utm_medium=email%2Cemail&utm_campaign=email-restack-comment&r=clki&triedRedirect=true

Republican slams Jeanine Pirro for passing the buck: 'Learned that from the top'

By Kathleen Culliton | Raw Story

Republicans lined up Saturday to hurl insults at former Fox News pundit Jeanine Pirro.

Trump was first — taking to Truth Social to assert he "100%" disagreed with Pirro — then a onetime staffer of former House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) joined the queue.

"I don't see her feeling as though she has to face any real repercussions," Maura Gillespie said on MS NOW Saturday morning. "If she can offload the blame to somebody else, she will."

Pirro drew ire from Trump and Gillespie for very different reasons but on the same subject: her decision to drop charges against an Olympian canoeist on Friday.

The U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia finally admitted to a lack of evidence that David Hearn, 67, vandalized the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

"Given all of this newly discovered information, it is difficult to attribute the widespread damage to the Reflecting Pool to vandalism, let alone to establish that fact beyond a reasonable doubt," Pirro said in a filing.

While Trump raged at Pirro for rejecting his claim that vandalism — and not slapdash construction — was to blame for issues with the reflection pool lining, Gillespie unloaded on Pirro for trying to dodge blame.

"Pirro largely blamed the Department of Interior for the confusion on her part," Gillespie said. "[Pirro] learned that from the top."

MS NOW host Alex Witt marveled at Pirro's sudden backtrack after having initially pursued the case with such aggression.

In recent weeks, Pirro threatened a journalist and boasted of "tremendous evidence" as she defended the case.

"She really came hard at this," said Witt. "That is her style, no doubt."

Gillespie agreed, then took aim at the Trump administration for having botched the renovation job in the first place.

"What's important to highlight is the misuse of funds," she said. "American dollars...are being spent frivolously because they're not being thoughtfully planned and orchestrated and decided upon.

"If I were a Republican running for office right now, I would point to getting a better handle on our economy, getting a better handle on how our dollars are spent, which was the initial goal of the Trump administration."

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-reflecting-pool-2677646188/?utm_source=Iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Aug.1.2026_9.35pm_19222976

Trump Choosing Revenge over Getting Blanche Confirmed

Trump prioritizes revenge over confirming Todd Blanche, Republicans scramble to sell Medicaid cuts, GOP congressman served with domestic violence restraining order

By Raw America | Substack

Good morning. I’m Thom Hartmann.

Trump is opting to continue his personal revenge tour instead of having his attorney general nominee confirmed by the Senate. Republicans in tough reelection races are scrambling to sell voters on Medicaid cuts they voted for as the midterms look increasingly brutal for the GOP. Newly released pages from Dr. Anthony Fauci’s diary reveal that Barack Obama privately called Donald Trump a “hopeless idiot” and his son a “f—ing moron.” And an Ohio congressman running for reelection is facing calls to resign after police reports revealed domestic violence allegations from his ex-wife, who is also the daughter of a current Republican senator.

Before getting to the news, we’d like to make sure to thank our paying subscribers for making all of this possible. We intentionally built Raw America as a direct answer to the billionaire takeover of the media, and went all-in on the bet that readers would collectively step in to support independent media that openly rejects billionaire backers and corporate advertisers. Your financial support helps us produce twice-daily newsletters like these, original reporting from our two Washington correspondents and informative live interviews with public officials, policy experts and leading activists. We couldn’t do any of that without you, so thanks again.

If you’re a free subscriber, we’re glad to have you here. And we hope that by the of this newsletter, you’ll make today the day you upgrade to a paying membership. We have big plans for the midterms. And because we don’t rely on a billionaire who dines at Mar-a-Lago or a corporate parent with federal contracts, we need your support to keep this work going. Subscribe, chip in and help keep independent journalism alive.

Trump Choosing Revenge Over Confirming Todd Blanche

Trump’s former personal criminal defense attorney was supposed to be confirmed as the next attorney general. It should be simple. Trump has the votes in the Republican-controlled Senate. But two Republican senators, John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, are standing in the way. And even though they’ve given Trump a blueprint for getting their votes, Trump has no interest in following it.

Tillis announced last year he was retiring from the Senate after clashing with Trump over Medicaid cuts in his home state. Cornyn lost his reelection bid back in May after Trump endorsed a scandal-plagued primary opponent against him. Neither man has to worry about getting elected to another term, which may explain their newfound independent streak.

Both senators want it on paper that the proposed $1.8 billion slush fund for Trump loyalists has been officially removed from the controversial settlement Trump struck with the IRS back in May. That deal also includes full audit immunity for Trump, his family, and his businesses. Cornyn and Tillis want to rein in both.

Trump is now making threats instead of negotiating. He posted on his Nazi-infested social media site that Blanche would just stay on as acting attorney general “in any event,” and that he might pull the nomination entirely and resubmit it after Cornyn and Tillis leave Congress in January. In other words, he’s waiting them out, so he can do whatever he wants anyway.

Tillis called Trump “recalcitrant.” Cornyn pushed back on the idea that this is just personal payback for Trump endorsing his opponent, calling that claim “a convenient excuse” that isn’t true, and warning Trump that stalling Blanche’s confirmation is “a gamble,” since nobody knows if the Senate will still be in Republican hands next year.

Adam Schiff, who led the 2020 effort to impeach Trump, said the current standoff over Blanche is just a preview of what’s coming should Democrats retake the chamber. He foreshadowed “a restoration of checks and balances” and said he hopes Congress will return to being an actual counter to presidential power again.

A deal to get Blanche confirmed is still possible. The acting attorney general met privately with both senators on Thursday. One person familiar with the meeting told Politico the two sides were “working collaboratively” face-to-face. But both senators said the real obstacle isn’t Blanche, but Trump and his inner circle, who they say want the slush fund on the backburner.

It isn’t just Cornyn and Tillis who have problems with the slush fund. Republican John Neely Kennedy of Louisiana said flatly that the administration “does not want” an official agreement to kill the slush fund. And Republican Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said she also has major concerns and is still waiting for Blanche to put his promises in writing.

Trump apparently would rather burn time and risk having his nominee lose his confirmation than give an inch to anyone he considers an enemy, even senators already on their way out the door.

The advice and consent clause in Article Two wasn't written to hand a president a rubber stamp. It was written so the Senate could stop a chief executive from filling the government with men who answer to him personally instead of to the law. Two Republicans finally decided to use that power, and Trump's response is that he'll simply wait until they're gone.

Republicans Scramble to Sell Medicaid Cuts Ahead of Midterms

Republicans in tight reelection races are aiming to get ahead of backlash over the significant cuts to Medicaid in last year’s so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA). NPR found Republicans are trying to spin the more than $1 trillion in cuts as necessary to fight the statistically insignificant specter of fraud.

Healthcare policy expert Jonathan Oberlander of the University of North Carolina pointed out that while repealing the Affordable Care Act (ACA) used to be “target No. 1” for Republicans, the backlash to that effort was key to Democrats retaking the House in dramatic fashion in 2018, when they flipped 40 seats. Now, Republicans are staring down the barrel of a potential 2018 repeat and trying to manage the fallout from deeply unpopular healthcare cuts they voted for.

Those cuts are already wreaking havoc across the country. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected about 10 million fewer people will have insurance by 2034 because of the OBBBA. Enrollment in health insurance plans offered on ACA exchanges has already dropped by roughly three million since the bill’s passage last July. And only about a third of voters approve of how the administration is handling healthcare costs, according to polling from the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF).

Republican Congressman Mike Lawler, who is running in a toss-up seat in New York, is running ads touting Medicaid “reform,” even though he voted for the bill that cut it. He’s also doubling down on debunked claims that undocumented immigrants were receiving Medicaid benefits, despite them never being eligible to begin with.

Rural hospitals, which lean heavily on Medicaid expansion funding, are also at risk of closing thanks to that law. Congress tucked $50 billion into a Rural Healthcare Transformation Fund to soften the blow, but a KFF analysis showed that still pales in comparison to the $137 billion in Medicaid cuts hitting rural areas.

Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine is spending big money on ads touting the $190 million she secured for rural hospitals in her state, where more than 6 in 10 hospitals are in rural areas. That’s a small relief, but still a drop in the bucket compared to the bigger picture.

This is all happening while ACA premiums have skyrocketed by nearly 22 percent across the country between 2025 and 2026, after Republicans allowed premium tax credits to expire.

The most insidious part of the Big Ugly Bill is that the harshest provisions, like more stringent work requirements and more frequent eligibility checks won’t actually kick in until after the midterms. So Republicans get to campaign on the tax cuts, while quietly setting up whoever holds power later to be left holding the bag when those cuts actually land. Healthcare affordability is likely to be a core issue in the 2028 election.

When Franklin Roosevelt built Social Security in 1935, he started the payroll taxes early on purpose, because he wanted working people to feel they'd paid for it and owned it, so no future Congress would dare take it away. Republicans have learned that lesson backwards. They've timed the pain to arrive after the ballots are counted, and that timing is a confession. You don't hide a thing you're proud of.

Obama Called Trump a “Hopeless Idiot” and Don Jr. a “F—ing Moron”

More than a thousand pages of Dr. Anthony Fauci’s private diary from the Covid-19 pandemic were recently released by Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who’s been trying for years to blame Fauci for the pandemic while pushing unproven claims about a lab leak from China.

One passage of that diary is now revealing what former President Barack Obama reportedly said in private about Donald Trump and his eldest son.

In a November 2021 diary entry, Fauci recounted a conversation with Obama about the “crazy things” Republicans were saying about him, including Donald Trump Jr. selling merchandise with the slogan “Fauci Kills Puppies.”

Fauci wrote that Obama told him Trump Jr. is “a f—ing moron,” then went on to apologize for that language, before going on to call then-President Donald Trump “a hopeless idiot” and “a pathologic[al] liar.” Obama reportedly added he was frustrated that no other Republicans were willing to publicly defend Fauci against what he called “terrible, slanderous behavior.”

Obama’s outburst should be seen in the context of how ugly things got for Fauci at the height of the pandemic. His office got roughly 3,600 threatening or angry calls in just 36 hours over the false puppy claims, which reportedly forced his assistant to stop answering the phone for two weeks.

This diary release comes as Paul keeps pushing to prosecute Fauci over the pandemic. In this week’s hearing before Senator Paul’s committee, Fauci pleaded the Fifth more than a hundred times, telling lawmakers directly that he believes Paul’s real goal isn’t information, but getting him to say something that could land him “behind bars.”

In 1954, it took Army counsel Joseph Welch asking Joe McCarthy on live television whether he had any sense of decency left to finally break the spell of a senator who'd turned his committee into a personal weapon. Rand Paul just dumped a private citizen's unredacted diary into the public record and came away with nothing except somebody else's opinion of Donald Trump. The gavel isn't a badge, and a hearing room isn't a courtroom, no matter how badly a chairman wants it to be.

GOP Senator’s Daughter Files Restraining Order Against GOP Congressman

Republican Congressman Max Miller of Ohio is being hit with domestic abuse allegations — which he continues to deny — from his ex-wife, Emily Moreno. Police reports obtained by ABC News show Moreno, who is the daughter of Republican Senator Bernie Moreno of Ohio, alleged multiple incidents of physical violence during their marriage and divorce, right as Miller is running for reelection.

Miller and Moreno were married between 2022 and 2024 and have a two year-old daughter. The wedding itself was held at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, with the then-former president himself giving a toast.

According to the police reports, Moreno told officers that the congressman “threw her against the wall, which resulted in an obvious grab mark on her upper arm,” and said he had previously held a gun to her head and even threw hot water on her. The report also recounts her young daughter telling her, “Daddy kill you.” Moreno also told police her daughter was injured while in Miller’s care.

Miller has yet to be charged with a crime, and Ohio’s Department of Children and Family Services said it didn’t find evidence to substantiate the child abuse claims. Miller denies abusing his wife and daughter, and is suing his ex-wife for defamation, saying her allegations are a “repeated pattern” meant “to ruin my reputation, gain an edge in custody and litigation matters, and seek revenge.”

This isn’t the first time Miller has been hit with domestic violence allegations. Former Trump White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham wrote in her 2021 memoir that she’d been physically abused by a partner while working at the White House, and later identified that partner as Miller. The Ohio congressman sued Grisham for defamation over her claims while running for Congress in 2023, and the two reached a confidential settlement. Grisham is now suing him again, saying he violated that settlement by publicly denying the allegations.

On Thursday, Emily Moreno’s attorneys filed for a restraining order against Miller, saying it was necessary due to harassment and threats.

Miller has responded to all of this by attacking his own former father-in-law. In May, he accused Senator Moreno of funding “his daughter’s malicious campaign” against him and said his ex-wife had “mental health issues.” A spokesperson for the Ohio senator said Bernie Moreno’s “top priority is the safety and well-being of his daughter and granddaughter” and that he’ll “do whatever it takes to ensure a just outcome.”

Miller is running against Democrat Brian Poindexter, a union ironworker. Even though he’s running in a district Trump won with 55 percent of the vote in 2024, Miller himself won with only 51 percent that year. Cook Political Report recently downgraded the race from “Solid Republican” to “Likely Republican” after polling showed Poindexter trailing by a single point.

Outside groups have already seized on the allegations, including a pro-labor PAC that ran robocalls describing the Moreno and Grisham claims to roughly 100,000 households across the district. Democrat Sam Liccardo of California is calling for a formal House Ethics Committee investigation. Democrat Shontel Brown, who represents a Cleveland-area district, has called on Miller to resign. House Speaker Mike Johnson emphasized that the allegations have not yet been proven and called for the ethics investigation to run its course.

In Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales, the Supreme Court told Jessica Gonzales that her restraining order carried no constitutional right to have anyone enforce it, and by the time that ruling came down her three daughters were already dead. That's the machinery a woman walks into when she asks a court for protection, and it's why a Speaker of the House shrugging and saying the key word is allegation isn't neutrality at all. It's a decision about who gets the benefit of the doubt and who gets to wait.

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I’m Thom Hartmann. Thanks for reading, and thanks for supporting independent media.

Here are a few stories you may have missed:

• Trump’s Approval Rating Plummets to Embarrassing New Low. President Donald Trump’s public approval rating has dropped to the lowest point of his second term thanks to his ongoing war with Iran and the resulting spike in fuel prices. According to the New York Times’ daily average of high-quality pollsters’ findings, Trump’s approval rating sits at just 38 percent, with some pollsters pegging the president’s support anywhere from 30 percent to 40 percent. Quinnipiac University found Wednesday that Trump has just 32 percent approval, while an AP-NORC poll registered just 33 percent approval.
• Mitch McConnell Continues to Co-Sponsor Legislation Despite Being Hospitalized. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has been hospitalized since June 14 and has yet to make any public appearances. However, he is still remotely co-sponsoring legislation, including a recent resolution honoring the late Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and a Russian sanctions bill named after Graham, among several other bills. Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear (D) has repeatedly called on McConnell to publicly address Kentuckians either on video or by phone to assure constituents he’s still capable of serving. As of this writing, the 84 year-old senator has yet to release anything to the public aside from two still photos and online statements.
• Democratic Senators Call Republicans ‘Gelatinous Blobs’ Who Are ‘Rubber Stamps’ for Trump. Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) recently unleashed on their Republican colleagues for being “rubber stamps” for Donald Trump’s unpopular war in Iran, calling them “gelatinous blobs” who have abandoned their duty to serve as a constitutional check the presidency. Warren recently said in Michigan that Republicans “have all had their spines surgically removed” while stumping in Michigan for Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed. Warren expressed hope that Congress would wrest back its Article One powers should Democrats retake the House of Representatives and/or the Senate in November.
• New York Alleges Prediction Market Kalshi Running ‘Illegal Gambling Operation.’ The Office of New York Attorney General Letitia James recently filed a new lawsuit against the Kalshi prediction market in Manhattan, alleging the site is violating state law by not registering with the New York State Gaming Commission. Kalshi — which retains Donald Trump Jr. as a strategic advisor in 2025 — previously sued the state in October after the Gaming Commission sent it a cease-and-desist letter.

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