DARK MONEY DISPLACING DEMOCRACY
Attribution: Paul Duginski, CagleCartoons.com
Paul Duginski has spent a half-century in journalism, including 27-1/2 years at the Los Angeles Times, and 13 years at the Sacramento Bee. His cartoons have appeared in the L.A. Times, the New York Times, the Christian Science Monitor, the San Jose Mercury News, the San Francisco Examiner and the McClatchy Bee newspapers in California, among other places. He was an award-winning graphics journalist at the L.A. Times.
NYT How Our Reporters Trace Dark Money in Politics
About $1 billion in anonymous contributions is coursing through midterm races across the country. Figuring out where the funds are coming from is no easy task.
By Mike AbramsWith Theodore Schleifer and Amy Gardner
Mike Abrams is the deputy editor for Trust, working to help readers better understand The Times and its journalistic values.
Sept. 2, 2026
Follow the money. Journalists — not to mention anyone who has seen the movie “All the President’s Men” — know the phrase well. By tracking the money, reporters can better understand and convey the forces shaping society.
That was the approach taken by Shane Goldmacher and Theodore Schleifer of The New York Times, who recently reported that at least $1 billion in dark money — funds from anonymous donors — is flowing into midterm elections.
So how do you find something obscured by design?
To answer that question and others, Schleifer and Amy Gardner, a deputy editor on the Politics desk, took time before the final stretch of midterm races to discuss why dark money matters and how they tracked it. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.
Let’s start with a couple of broad questions: What does money buy in politics? And is there anything it can’t buy?
THEODORE SCHLEIFER: I’ve been writing about money in politics for over a decade now, and I’ve written some stories that have proven to be clunkers. I sometimes cringe reading my pieces from during the 2016 campaign that made it seem like Donald Trump had no chance of competing with Hillary Clinton because she was out-raising him month after month.
So my understanding of how much the money matters has evolved. You’d rather have more money than less, but candidates can win with sometimes substantially less — or make the fact that their opponent has more into something of a political liability, especially if the funding is from a controversial place.
AMY GARDNER: This is such an important question and one we’re not done trying to answer this cycle. I’m very eager to show readers in more detail where voters are getting their information about campaigns, because the answer is evolving rapidly. Influencers, social media, online ads — coupled with younger voters who don’t watch traditional TV — raise all kinds of questions about whether the billions of dollars being spent putting ads on the airwaves are actually buying the same influence that they used to.
On the second question, one thing money cannot buy: a good candidate.
What is dark money, and how has it come to dominate modern campaigns?
THEODORE: I love this question, because the term has been totally warped by partisans over the last few years to signify “scary thing I don’t like.” (No, it does not mean all super PACs, those canonical outside groups that can raise unlimited money.) There is some debate among reasonable people about edge cases, but generally it refers to donations or spending by entities that do not disclose their donors, which are usually nonprofits. The term “dark money” can be read as a bit sinister, but to me it just carries this more technical definition.
There was dark-money spending before the landmark Citizens United decision in 2010 that loosened campaign finance rules, but quite a bit more after. There’s more advertising and spending by these dark-money groups, and some of them are spun into an intricate web with one another. You’ll sometimes see one dark-money group pass millions onto another, which passes it onto another, and another and another, and then finally that dough ends up funding the mailer at your doorstep. Good luck tracing all of it.
When contributions are hidden, how do you even know to look for them?
THEODORE: Nonprofit donors are almost always not public. But nonprofit spending generally is, and that’s how as a reporter you can peek behind the curtain.
When a nonprofit sends that piece of mail, there’s a disclosure saying what group paid for it. When they run an ad on television, the ad and payment can be tracked by media-buying firms who pull public records showing the amount and locations of the buy. And when a nonprofit makes a donation to a super PAC, the contribution is recorded in paperwork with the Federal Election Commission.
That being said, we’re just scratching the surface. I absolutely believe there are major nonprofits creating influential or provocative content in the midterms that have evaded detection. These groups will file a tax return, probably at the end of 2027, at which point the election is well over and I feel like I will be the only person in America who volunteers to read the filing. (OK, I am paid to.)
Dark money has reached “industrial scale,” as you reported. With such a vast investigative target, where do you begin your research?
THEODORE: This story began for Shane and I with a feeling, more or less. We’ve both written about campaign finance for a long time, and yet we felt like it was easier than ever to get away with not disclosing your donors. That was our intangible sense from just living in the world of sources and documents that we do.
That’s not a story, though. We then began a pretty extensive research effort to assess whether that feeling was true. It was. Feelings are really meaningful as reporters, and we try to trust them.
AMY: It can be challenging to show the reader what’s new or noteworthy about a subject that is as complex as campaign finance, and dark money in particular. We don’t know the full universe of how much dark money is being spent, so we can’t say, for instance, it’s more than ever this year. We don’t know that! But we can say what we’re seeing that we haven’t seen before. We’re seeing an enormous total just from the sources that are traceable. And we’re seeing this money infuse far more races, in both primaries and general elections.
One reason we put an explanation of Teddy’s and Shane’s methodology at the bottom of the story was to help readers understand where they got their data, and ideally to impart that we are telling the reader what we were able to find, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t more out there.
How does this kind of fund-raising work? Can and do campaigns coordinate with outside groups behind some of these large contributions?
THEODORE: Candidates mostly can’t coordinate with these outside groups, but there are some exceptions, and ones that operatives in private conversations tell me they are increasingly comfortable testing. For instance, we report that Senator Susan Collins of Maine attended a dinner thrown for her in July by Stronger America, a nonprofit group that is aligned with her. Collins, a Republican, obviously knows who was at the dinner — but the public doesn’t, because Stronger America doesn’t disclose its donors.
How does dark money shape campaigns?
AMY: One area of interest for me is the extent to which such vast sums of money increase the income of political operatives, who in some cases get a cut of ad purchases. That creates an incentive in the industry to continue the money race even as new, cheaper ways to reach voters emerge, such as social media influencing or online ads.
What are you watching for next in this area of politics?
AMY: I’m curious whether changes in the way people learn about candidates will change the way campaigns and outside groups spend their money. That certainly doesn’t appear to be happening yet. As Teddy and Shane noted in their story, Republicans and Democrats alike keep coming up with new ways to raise and hide money.
THEODORE: I expect this trend to go into overdrive in the 2028 presidential cycle. I think it will become the norm for super PACs to be funded just by an alphabet soup of patriotic-sounding nonprofits, all created in disclosure-hostile states like Delaware or Wyoming about five minutes before they make billion-dollar donations to super PACs. I am only kind of kidding.
Mike Abrams is the deputy editor for Trust, working to help readers understand The Times and its journalistic values.
Theodore Schleifer is a Times reporter covering billionaires and their impact on the world.
Amy Gardner is a deputy politics editor for The Times.
Oct 4, 2012
GEOFF TATE – Dark Money (Lyric Video). Taken from the album ‘Kings And Thieves’, Inside Out Music 2012.
Attribution: RJ Matson, Portland, ME
the brightest star in the dark money sky?
Elon Musk unleashes first wave of spending on key races in the midterms
Elon Musk’s super PAC disclosed its first independent expenditures of the 2026 general election in a filing released late Wednesday, detailing roughly $800,000 across key House and Senate races.
Musk’s America PAC targeted several key Senate contests, including races in Texas, Maine, Ohio, New Hampshire, Iowa, Michigan and Alaska.
The largest amount went to Texas — over $247,000 — where Republicans are expected to deploy a wave of party resources to bolster Attorney General Ken Paxton against Democrat James Talarico.
Musk’s super PAC also put nearly $90,000 into eight House races:
Rep. Derrick Van Orden in Wisconsin; Rep. Mike Lawler in New York; Rep. Jen Kiggans in Virginia; Rep. Tom Kean Jr. in New Jersey; Rep. Scott Perry in Pennsylvania; Rep. Rob Bresnahan in Pennsylvania; Rep. Ryan Mackenzie in Pennsylvania; and Scott Singer in Florida.
The independent expenditures — Musk’s first of the general election — were disclosed days after he met with Speaker Mike Johnson in Texas last week.
Republicans already hold a significant fundraising advantage over Democrats, buoyed by President Donald Trump’s roughly $400 million in his MAGA Inc. super PAC. Trump is under growing pressure from Republicans to tap into that money as the midterms near. A major investment from Musk would further widen the GOP’s financial edge heading into November.
Musk has reportedly considered spending at least $100 million for the GOP through America PAC to help Republicans in this year’s midterms, but the full scope of that effort remains unclear.
A spokesperson for America PAC declined to comment.
Musk spent roughly $290 million to support Trump and the GOP during the 2024 cycle, predominantly through his super PAC, making him the largest individual donor to any political committee that cycle, before he took on a major role in the White House’s DOGE effort.
another one from NYT Millions of Dollars in Secret Spending Could Upend the 2026 Midterms
At least $1 billion from anonymous donors is flowing into the midterm elections. Dark money is not new, but it now permeates nearly every major contest.
Nonprofits or super PACs have aired dozens of ads this year in House and Senate races using dark money, which is political spending by groups that hide the names of their donors.
[above NYT article continues]
By Shane Goldmacher and Theodore Schleifer
Aug. 31, 2026
In Michigan and Minnesota, tens of millions of untraceable dollars poured into recent Senate primaries trying to topple progressive Democratic candidates.
In Kansas, the torrent of secret money that boosted an obscure Democratic Senate candidate amounted to 100 times as much as what he had on hand in the final stretch of the primary.
And in Texas, Republicans exploited lax federal disclosure rules to spend secretly and try to nominate a weak Democratic candidate whose own party had denounced her as antisemitic.
All across America, the midterm elections are drowning in dark money.
A New York Times review of advertising data, campaign-finance filings and tax records revealed that about $1 billion in anonymous money is sloshing through the political landscape in 2026, a staggering sum and yet almost certainly a low-end estimate, given how difficult this money is to trace.
Dark money is the term used by the campaign industry to describe political spending by groups that hide the names of their donors. The deluge is upending races from coast to coast, with billionaires, corporations and special interests hiding their agendas and involvement with relative ease.
It is impossible to know the full scale of this spending. The Times’s tally of the $1 billion includes only what is publicly available, primarily television and digital ad purchases and donations to super PACs from nonprofit groups. These groups also fund political activity that is more difficult to track, such as direct mail, hiring influencers to boost favorable content or deploying door-knockers for causes that are not technically campaigns.
Yet the sum is more than “enough money to manipulate a lot of politicians and to put a lot of poison in the blood of the American political system,” said Nick Penniman, the chief executive of Issue One, a group that has sought to reduce the role of money in politics.
Just this month, one Wyoming group with a thin paper trail dating only to this spring, Choose Freedom Inc., sprang into action to reserve about $22 million in ads to boost Republicans in two dozen battleground House and Senate races. The next day, another Republican-linked nonprofit rolled out a $22 million campaign in 41 House districts. On Thursday, a nonprofit called Per Aspera Policy Inc. emerged from obscurity to place a $3.7 million ad buy praising the Republican Senate nominee in Ohio.
All of it involved untraceable cash.
Secret money is not new. But the pervasiveness has reached industrial scale in 2026 — and serves as a preview of its coming prevalence in 2028. Nearly every major primary and battleground race this fall has been or will be shaped by secret funds. The anonymously sourced expenditures are so big that, in some instances, they are outstripping the spending of campaigns themselves, making candidates seem like bystanders of their own elections. The trend is especially true in primaries.
Big money doesn’t always win elections, and in some races, the spending invites significant backlash.
“The power of our many is greater than the power of their money,” Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, the progressive who won the Michigan Democratic Senate primary, declared after his victory. His opponent, Representative Haley Stevens, had benefited from about $62 million in ads from groups funded either entirely or heavily with secret money.
Supporters of undisclosed money argue that allowing anonymity is crucial to free speech.
Each cycle, lawyers look for new loopholes to exploit and old rules to stretch. Democrats and Republicans are locked in something of a partisan arms race, competing for new ways to conceal contributors.
Both are funding more and more types of political activities, such as research and polling, through nonprofit arms. Some are passing tens of millions of dollars through an interwoven network of nonprofits, making the funds even more difficult to track. Others are directly paying for what are called “policy” ads that can be funded with secret donors, even though, for the average voter, they can be virtually indistinguishable from campaign commercials.
“It’s almost like the people inside the Beltway live in a drug den, and this is just the newest drug that’s circulating,” said Mr. Penniman, whose organization formed in the aftermath of the landmark Citizens United decision in 2010, which lifted restrictions on political spending.
The biggest dealers in dark money this cycle are four nonprofit organizations allied with Republicans and Democrats in the House and Senate. Together, they account for more than $460 million from hidden sources being spent shaping this year’s elections, the Times analysis found.
The groups are registered under the federal tax code as social welfare organizations, allowing them to operate as nonprofits. In reality, they each share office space with a sibling super PAC. In all four cases, the nonprofit and PAC are run by the same political strategists, essentially offering donors a one-stop shop to avoid disclosure while spending millions on politics.
The direct spending on ads from these four nonprofits is growing: from $166 million in the 2022 midterms to more than $242 million this cycle so far, according to data from AdImpact, the ad-monitoring service.
”We are on track to have the least transparent midterm at least since Citizens United,” said Dan Weiner, senior director of the Brennan Center’s Elections and Government Program, which advocates for greater transparency rules. “We’re almost at the point where anyone who doesn’t want to be disclosed doesn’t have to be disclosed.”
Maine: A case study
Two elections in Maine illustrate the phenomenon.
In one, Senator Susan Collins, a Republican, is running for re-election in a race that could determine control of the Senate. Voters there are besieged by nearly $75 million in advertising funded by dark money on both sides, according to a Times analysis of donations and data from AdImpact.
That amounts to more than $80 in secret money per registered voter in a state with fewer than 900,000 of them.
It’s not just television ads. Ms. Collins has benefited from at least 10 different mailers from One Nation, a Republican-aligned nonprofit, among them mailers thanking her for working for veterans, firefighters and cancer research, according to Mintt, a mail-tracking firm.
Who secretly gives money matters. Ms. Collins, as an example, serves as the chairwoman of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee, which helps direct federal spending. That puts her in an elite group of lawmakers with whom special interest groups have a particularly keen interest in currying favor. Ms. Collins also attracts plenty of dark money that works against her.
And while the public remains in the dark, the politicians themselves are often told who their benefactors are. One nonprofit group, Stronger America Inc., has spent more than $11 million on ads helping Ms. Collins — the only candidate it has supported. In July, Ms. Collins attended a dinner hosted by that nonprofit, which was held at the townhouse in Washington owned by the tech company Oracle, according to three people briefed on the event.
A spokesperson for Oracle, whose building regularly hosts fund-raising dinners for politicians, did not respond to a request for comment. Ms. Collins’s campaign also did not respond.
Senator Susan Collins has seen more than $74 million spent anonymously in her race. The money has come from both Democrats seeking to defeat her and Republicans trying to re-elect her.
In another race in Maine, the retirement of Representative Jared Golden from the most Republican-leaning House seat held by a Democrat has created a rare opportunity for the G.O.P.
So Republican operatives set out to meddle in the Democratic primary. They spent nearly $500,000 to defeat the Democrat they saw as the strongest candidate, a state senator named Joe Baldacci. Using a new super PAC that did not disclose any donors until after the election and a limited liability company that masked its Republican vendors, the group flooded the airwaves with an ad that labeled Mr. Baldacci “dark money’s choice.”
“It’s the ultimate in deception,” lamented Mr. Baldacci in an interview. His loss by several hundred votes has intensified Democratic concerns about ceding the seat.
In other words, the Republican meddling worked.
Layers upon layers of secrecy
Sixteen years have passed since the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission helped open the floodgates for super PACs, the independent political committees that, unlike candidates, can raise unlimited money and spend unlimited sums on federal elections. At the time, the Supreme Court reasoned that transparency would prove to be a powerful accountability check on such activities.
“Citizens can see whether elected officials are ‘in the pocket’ of so-called moneyed interests,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the majority opinion. “This transparency enables the electorate to make informed decisions and give proper weight to different speakers and messages.”
Today, the opposite has proved true. Secrecy has become so widespread it is essentially systematized.
Three distinct strategies help political groups hide their donors.
The first is simply using nonprofit organizations that do not have to disclose their contributors to run ads. Technically, the commercials are supposed to be about issues, but they often attack or praise sitting House members and senators in caustic terms.
The second is for these nonprofit groups to donate to allied super PACs. The super PACs can run explicitly election-focused ads and are required to disclose their donors — but not their donors’ donors — keeping the true origin of the money hidden. There are virtually no limits to the size of these transfers: Some high-profile super PACs are entirely funded by nonprofits.
The third strategy is an increasingly popular option in the midterms: “pop-up” super PACs, which exploit a gap in federal disclosure laws. The final pre-election deadline to reveal donors is three weeks before a federal election, allowing any last-minute group to pop up and spend freely — and secretly — in the final days of a race. The pop-up super PACs must ultimately disclose their donors, but not until the election has passed — too late for voters to weigh that information.
The biggest spender in the Democratic Senate primary in Minnesota was a super PAC behind Representative Angie Craig. That group was almost entirely funded by a nonprofit started just in December. She lost.
“If you are trying to hide who your donors are, you are probably trying to hide some nasty stuff,” said Representative Chris Deluzio, Democrat of Pennsylvania, who has sponsored legislation to close this loophole.
Defenders of secret political spending offer a different take. Some Democratic donors privately say such funding can offer shelter at a moment when the Trump administration has explicitly targeted Democratic financiers.
Sean Cooksey, a Republican who is the former chairman of the Federal Election Commission and the former counsel to Vice President JD Vance, said that America was built on anonymous speech, dating back to the Federalist Papers.
“There is important political value in allowing people to associate and speak anonymously,” Mr. Cooksey said. “Especially when they have unpopular opinions.”
The Internal Revenue Service, which oversees nonprofits but has rarely policed political spending, is even less equipped to do so after cuts by the Trump administration. The Federal Election Commission, with only two of six seats currently filled, does not even have enough commissioners for a quorum to hold a formal meeting, let alone enforce campaign finance laws.
“The F.E.C. has never been a cop on the beat,” said Mr. Weiner of the Brennan Center. “But at the moment they can’t even enforce routine traffic violations.”
The commission declined to comment, and the I.R.S. did not return a request for comment.
A growing universe of dark money
Some of the $1 billion in secret money can be traced to ideological interest groups, who disclose their agendas but not their core donors. On the right, the anti-tax Koch family network accounts for over $50 million in spending from undisclosed sources, and on the left, a group of three environmental nonprofits have injected close to $50 million in dark money as well, according to the analysis of AdImpact and donation records. And $30 million has come from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which spent heavily against Dr. El-Sayed in Michigan.
Haley Stevens, the defeated U.S. Senate candidate, received $62 million in support from six major groups, all of which were either dark-money nonprofits, super PACs heavily funded by dark-money groups or “pop-up” super PACs.
One of the biggest new forces in this world is an outfit called the American Prosperity Alliance, which has almost perfected the modern dark-money playbook.
Four years ago, Republican operatives and donors grew frustrated watching Democrats intervene in G.O.P. primaries in 2022 to help elect weaker nominees.
And so this cycle, the American Prosperity Alliance has done the same. The group funneled $37 million to a partner super PAC called Conservative Americans PAC that spawned a network of at least five different “pop-up” committees that used limited liability corporations and postal service boxes to further mask its activities.
Some of these pop-ups adopted Democratic-sounding names like Lead Left PAC or Progressive Champions PAC and intervened in a half-dozen Democratic primaries. This was the network that tried and failed to elevate the Texas Democrat who had been denounced as antisemitic. The network also financed the anti-Baldacci ads.
The American Prosperity Alliance has leveraged all three ways that organizations keep their funders secret. The nonprofit group donates to super PACs. It uses the pop-up loophole. And its three projects also have directly aired tens of millions in policy ads this cycle.
The group does not reveal its contributors. But two people briefed on the group’s finances who spoke anonymously to describe confidential strategy said the nonprofit was funded heavily by corporate interests, including the pharmaceutical industry. The nonprofit declined to comment.
Then there’s Mr. Trump’s own allied nonprofit, Securing American Greatness, which is led by his advisers and also does not disclose its donors. The group so far has spent at least $44 million since early last year, sending nearly $25 million to super PACs and airing about $19 million of ads boosting Mr. Trump and Republicans.
Operatives in both parties privately acknowledge that the system allows them to act nearly with impunity until votes are cast. Lawyers tend to advise nonprofit clients not to file comprehensive disclosures of this cycle’s activity with the Internal Revenue Service until mid-November 2027 — more than a year after the midterm elections.
That was stunning reporting by NYT on dark money, but I’d like to see deeper dives into the ads that money produces. Much of it seems wasted. Three months ago the dark money crowd backed a bunch of foolish ads like this one that didn’t move the numbers a bit…
MAGA pollster warns Republicans sleeping as red states slip from their grasp:
🔮 THE 60-DAY MIDTERM PREDICTION METER 🔮
TOMORROW marks 60 days until the midterms—and we’re launching the Trail Mix Prediction Meter. Post yours here today or in Friday’s comment section.
🏛️ HOUSE: Democrats ___ | Republicans ___
⚖️ SENATE: Democrats ___ | Republicans ___
No hedging. No pundit fog. Just your best prediction. (Add independents to the party where you expect them to caucus).
ICE’S CRIMINAL ARREST MYTH
ICE’s own records show just 26% of those arrested had criminal convictions—and 58% had neither a conviction nor a pending charge.
Time for my occasional dive into ICE’s own arrest records to answer a simple question: How many are actually convicted criminals?
Still only 26%.
That’s right. Despite all the spin about ICE going after criminals, its own records show only about one-quarter of the people arrested had previously been convicted of a crime.
And even if we broaden the definition to include people merely charged with crimes, 58% of those arrested had neither a criminal conviction nor a pending criminal charge.
In other words, the majority of those arrested ARE NOT CRIMINALS.
Sources:
Where’s the money coming from? On the right from Musk and other self-interested billionaires. Who specifically and through what funding aggregator may be interesting, but under Citizens United there is no limit or recourse.
So how about focus on broader issues like inflation under Republican controlled national and state governments and Republican criminality? Focus on Dumbass, Musk, Thiel, Paxton, DiSantis and other widely recognized assholes. Throw in some ICE overreach and if that doesn’t GOTV we’re fucked at the state and national levels.
BTW, good start with the ICE stats, Poobah. That kind of shit pisses off thinking people.
Pog, Patd — I keep this in my permanent file about Citizens United:
While upholding unlimited contributions in Citizens United (5-4), the Supreme Court also voted eight to one that mandatory donor disclosure is constitutional. Congress just hasn’t passed it.
From Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion:
Dark money in Texas Senate race spurs Talarico complaint to FEC against Paxton — CBS NEWS
https://www.texastribune.org/2026/09/02/texas-hospitals-medicaid-greg-abbott/
In a rare move, Gov. Greg Abbott defends Medicaid funding for Texas
Abbott is doubling down on the state’s fight to recover nearly $10 billion in Medicaid funding that the Trump administration is withholding from Texas hospitals.
The statement comes two days after The Texas Tribune reported that the governor’s office had stepped into a nearly year-long impasse between the Texas Health and Human Services Commission and Washington over the funding.
Texas, under Abbott’s watch, is one of the few states that has not expanded Medicaid to more low-income Texans. This has contributed to Texas having the highest uninsured rate in the nation.
“Texas is working with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to protect funding that helps hospitals serve Medicaid patients and keeps critical emergency care available,” Abbott’s spokesman Andrew Mahaleris said in a statement.
*So, Abbott’s office is saying it, not Abbott; nothing but crickets for a year, but now midterms are in sight and it’s big looking promising for Republicans who have a track record if not caring about humans with a net worth under a million dollars.
A POLITICO survey of more than 70 GOP candidates and members revealed most either do not plan to go or are undecided on going to the party’s midterm convention next week in Dallas.
As Hill Country waits for FEMA money after July flood, Trump announces $50 million for storm recovery
The announced funding was still only a fraction of Gov. Greg Abbott’s initial estimate of $489.7 million in costs in his first request for federal help.
Texas will receive $50.5 million in disaster recovery assistance “from the severe storms, winds, tornadoes, and flooding that hit them hard,” President Donald Trump announced Tuesday in a post on Truth Social.
It wasn’t clear which storm Trump meant: His 5:42 p.m. post went up just hours after Tropical Storm Edouard made landfall near the Texas-Louisiana border and was pushing inland into southeast Texas. But communities in southwest Texas have been waiting more than six weeks for federal disaster assistance from floods that struck in July.
Before Tuesday’s post, Trump had only approved limited federal emergency assistance so far for those floods, which is typically capped at $5 million.
In its daily operations briefing, FEMA did not show that Trump had approved or denied the major disaster declaration needed to unlock the significant funding that communities were seeking. The FEMA disaster webpage also showed no additional funding approved as of 8:30 a.m. Wednesday morning.
*So, he lied and only those in the affected areas will know?
Urban Institute, has shown that major federal disaster funding decisions are taking roughly three times longer on average under the current administration than under previous administrations since 2000, when the typical wait was about three weeks.
https://www.texastribune.org/2026/08/07/texas-us-senate-james-talarico-ken-paxton-polls/
The latest survey has Talarico and Paxton evenly split. Most polls show Talarico with a slight advantage over Paxton.
Updated September 2, 2026
Poignant Bob Morris piece on Haitians fearing he was ICE…
https://www.newsweek.com/texas-county-has-slowly-shifted-blue-cuts-92-polling-places-12395073
Texas County That Has Slowly Shifted Blue Cuts 92 Polling Places
Tarrant County is a fast-growing area of Texas. It includes Fort Worth and has become increasingly competitive, politically, in recent years, showing a potential shift toward the Democratic Party within a solidly red state.
Earlier this year, Republicans in the state were stunned when Democrat Taylor Rehmet won a special election to fill a state Senate seat in Tarrant County. According to Texas Democrats, Republicans in the state are realizing the risk of this potential political shift in the county.
***
https://www.cbsnews.com/texas/news/tarrant-county-polling-locations-voting-elections/
Commissioners voted 3-2 in favor of fewer polling sites for early voting and Election Day.
Dozens of residents spoke out Tuesday against the proposal to eliminate 92 polling sites for the midterm election in November. Public comments went on for more than two hours, and law enforcement escorted one person out for using profanity.
WAPO via MSN Republicans fear Trump will keep super PAC money and not spend on the midterms
Attribution: REPUBLICANS WISH TRUMP WOULD SHARE HIS MONEY by Paul Duginski
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/sep/03/gloria-steinem-groundbreaking-feminist-campaigner-dies-aged-92
Gloria Steinem, groundbreaking feminist campaigner, dies aged 92
She also credited black feminists including Florynce Kennedy, Evelyn Cunningham, Shirley Chisholm and Fannie Lou Hamer for teaching her the importance of activism. “It was like finding a family,” she said of that time. “As wildly different as we may be, and we certainly were, women share hopes and a certain vision of the world, and a certain shit detector.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/sep/03/el-nino-supersizing-before-our-eyes-united-nations
‘Supersizing before our eyes’: UN warns of record El Niño approaching
The El Niño is likely to be the largest in at least 1,000 years and will pile extra heat into an atmosphere where temperatures are already rising rapidly due to global heating. The combination means 2027 is set to “blow apart” the record and be the hottest year ever recorded.
Gloria Steinem: Quite an extensive bio/obit.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/03/us/politics/gloria-steinem-dead.html?
https://www.texastribune.org/2026/09/03/texas-affordability-costs-inflation-2026-elections/
Texans’ top concern used to be immigration. But amid rising costs and slowing immigration, a plurality of Texans now view inflation and higher prices as the most important issue facing the state, according to an August poll of registered voters by the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin. Higher prices came in as the top issue for Republicans and independents and the second most important issue for Democrats behind political corruption, the poll found.
Gov. Greg Abbott, seeking a fourth term, wants to abolish school property taxes and make it easier to build homes. State Rep. Gina Hinojosa, the Austin Democrat running to unseat him, wants to send $1,500 to every Texas household and stop Wall Street from buying single-family homes.
In the state’s marquee Senate race, Republican Ken Paxton has floated tax breaks for families to help pay for health care and housing costs, and more ideas. [?] Among the proposals from state Rep. James Talarico, his Democratic foe from Austin: abolishing the gas tax to help Texans’ transportation costs and expanding tax benefits for parents with kids.
*Isn’t “parents with kids” redundant? All parents have kids. Did Ai write this article?
Hmmm, “and other ideas.”
Gloria Steinem was such a well-connected force, and lifting women up all along societies’ borders.
Much is being written about her today at her death at age 92. I was reminded about another great woman who smashed other barriers, a woman certainly on the top 10 list of influential women in the history of the United States. Gordon will explain:
Frances Perkins** — and she is less known as a women’s rights leader than as a labor rights leader who happened to break a huge barrier for women.
Here is a brief overview:
## Who she was
Frances Perkins was the first woman ever appointed to a U.S. presidential Cabinet, and the longest-serving Secretary of Labor in American history. She served under Franklin D. Roosevelt from March 4, 1933 to June 30, 1945.
## Early life and training
She was born April 10, 1882, in Boston, Massachusetts. She studied sociology and economics at Mount Holyoke College and continued her education at the University of Chicago, the University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia University, earning a master’s degree in 1913.
Trained as a social worker, she worked in settlement houses in Chicago at Hull House and in Philadelphia.
## What shaped her career
In 1911, Perkins happened to witness the Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire in New York City that killed 146 workers, mostly young women, and she drew inspiration from the tragic incident throughout her lifelong battle for social and economic justice.
She moved into New York State government. She was a member of the New York Industrial Commission (1919-1921), director of the Council on Immigrant Education, and a member of the State Industrial Board, becoming chairman in 1926. Under Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt, she became head of the New York State Department of Labor from 1929 to 1933.
## In Washington
When Roosevelt became President during the Great Depression, he tapped Perkins to become Secretary of Labor, making her the first woman to hold a cabinet post.
Her 12 years covered the entire New Deal and World War II. She was:
– **Principal architect of the Social Security Act** of 1935
– Behind the Fair Labor Standards Act, which set the first federal minimum wage and maximum hours, and banned child labor in many industries
– Behind the Wagner-Peyser Act that revitalized the U.S. Employment Service, and the Wagner Act protecting workers’ right to organize
She was also chair of Roosevelt’s Committee on Economic Security, which designed much of the New Deal safety net.
## Later life
After leaving Labor in 1945, she served as a member of the Federal Civil Service Commission under President Harry S. Truman from 1946 to 1952, then taught at Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations. She published a memoir, *The Roosevelt I Knew*, in 1946.
She died May 14, 1965, in New York City.
So while she is remembered today for opening Cabinet-level government to women, at the time she was famous — and often criticized — for fundamentally reshaping American work: Social Security, unemployment insurance, the 40-hour work week, and workplace safety laws all trace back to her office.
Heard Hillary talking about Gloria on MsNow on the way in this morning. Really good interview, and pointed out that Gloria’s goal was to have everyone be the best they could be, particularly women of course, and that she had a hopeful persona, particularly in her living room meetings, which Hillary described as not bein g heavy, but being light and hopeful. I don’t believe that is the impression many, particularly the misogynists on the right, had of her. I always loved her expression that a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.
https://www.middleeasteye.net/trending/ben-gvir-deletes-ai-video-showing-emaciated-palestinian-prisoners-after-backlash
this is gross
he wears a noose lapel pin, how charming
https://www.thedailybeast.com/elon-musk-named-in-bombshell-election-meddling-claim-in-alex-gibney-documentary/
different kind of gross
I do try to not sound as if I’m not bragging:
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today’s meme…
meme #2….
Today in the Diner
1. Clancy Case Mistrial & Texas Senate Race Panic
2. What A True Crime Mistrial Means For The Clancy Case
3. Beam Me Up: Traficant, Star Trek & The Clancy Case
Clancy case updates, Susan Collins health news, and a Gloria Steinem tribute. We discuss Texas Senate panics, Star Trek, and James Traficant.
We kick things off with a CBS Morning News flashback featuring Hillary Clinton reflecting on the monumental legacy of Gloria Steinem. Then C-SPAN regular Howard Mortman drops by to help us celebrate the 60th anniversary of Star Trek by revisiting the bizarre congressional career of Ohio Congressman James Traficant who famously ended his floor speeches by asking to be beamed up. It is a weird slice of political history that feels strangely relevant today.
On the political front we dig into our 12 state Senate watchlist. We are looking at Kansas Senator Roger Marshall trying to talk to farmers, Susan Collins facing health questions in Maine, and the strange dynamic where Democrats might be taking Roy Cooper for granted in North Carolina. We also jump into the true crime world with an update on the deadlocked jury in the Massachusetts Clancy case, exploring the weird timeline and the realities of postpartum psychosis.
Live Chat: https://trailmix.cc/chat
Website: https://trailmix.cc
Alerts: https://trailmix.cc/alerts
00:00 Intro
04:30 Hillary Clinton on Gloria Steinem
08:05 Howard Mortman and CSPAN
10:20 Doug Wilder Virginia Politics
14:15 James Traficant Star Trek Quote
29:40 Massachusetts Clancy Case Trial
42:15 Kansas Senator Roger Marshall
44:20 Texas Senate and Governor Abbott
46:40 Susan Collins Health News Maine
48:30 Roy Cooper North Carolina Race
56:20 Tim Miller and MAGA Pollster
01:03:00 Nene Americas Got Talent
— Human directed and edited. Machine drafted (Gemini Pro).
trump on US tender is a huge win for the regime
something the ancient despots did
https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/03/politics/trump-rising-prices-republican-ads
Trump falsely claims prices are falling rapidly. Some Republican ads acknowledge reality
Even as consumer prices continue rising, Trump continues to falsely claim that they are falling – and even that they are down since he returned to office, though they are actually up 4.3% over that period. In the past two weeks alone, Trump has claimed that “I’ve largely taken care of inflation,” that “the prices are all coming down,” that “the prices are coming down very rapidly,” and that prices have already fallen “very, very, very substantially.”
Fact-checkers have challenged such claims for months, but you don’t have to take it from us. Some Republican midterm candidates have been running commercials that acknowledge reality – implicitly rejecting the narrative of their party’s chief spokesman on one of the year’s most important issues.
“On our farm here in Belle Plaine, we see it every day: gas, groceries, everything’s expensive. Iowa families are hurting,” Zach Lahn, the Republican candidate for governor of Iowa, says in one recent ad, going on to claim his Democratic opponent is out of touch.
“Housing costs keep rising, and it’s getting harder to afford a place to live,” another Iowa Republican in a competitive race, Rep. Zach Nunn, says in an ad in which he proceeds to pitch a proposal to train more skilled workers and builders.
An ad from Republican Ohio gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy features a testimonial from a woman who touts him as strong on healthcare affordability.
*Based on what?
The ad begins with the same woman delivering a broad complaint about rising costs: “When I was diagnosed with breast cancer, the last thing I needed to worry about was money. But bills are overwhelming, and groceries, rent, and gas are more expensive too.”
*Looking to Republicans who caused this mess is foolish. Voting for an arrogant, out of touch billionaire like Vivek is whatever lies beyond foolish. Remember, he was such a problem that he was kicked out of DOGE.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musk_(film)
Musk is an upcoming documentary…follows the billionaire businessman Elon Musk, and his enormous influence in contemporary politics.
The film will have its world premiere out of competition of the 83rd Venice International Film Festival on September 8, 2026. It is scheduled to be released theatrically in the US…on October 16.
The documentary is reported to be a “definitive and unvarnished examination”…
https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/music/articles/david-byrne-wields-elon-musk-160200391.html
David Byrne…has written and performs “Let Me Sell You a Dream,” an original song…the song’s lyrics are drawn entirely from Musk’s own words…Byrne dug into Musk’s sayings to create what he described as sardonic poetry.
for Alex Gibney’s forthcoming documentary Musk, according to Variety.
damn right…
Extreme Mortman says BEAM ME UP CONGRESS 👉
🍽️From today’s Digital Diner menu
Not paying, in time or attention, to watch MuskRat for almost 4 hours…but a 4-minute song/video with clips from the doc that could let the folks who still think Elon is some kind of genius scientist/inventor know what he really is, that would be fine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Omega_Glory
*Here’s a nice synopsis for Mortman.
During a ceremony to celebrate the Yang victory, Kirk and Spock, discussing the Yang culture, connect the names Yang and Kohm with “Yankee” and “Communist”. Spock then conjectures that the history of Omega IV had closely paralleled that of Earth until the former was devastated by a biological war that Earth had avoided. This hypothesis is confirmed when William produces a very old American flag, along with ancient documents from which he recites the Pledge of Allegiance in a garbled accent. The Yangs are shocked when Kirk chimes in to recite the end of the Pledge.
Near the end of the episode, viewers are reminded again about the power of words in Kirk’s final speech:
“Hear me! Hear this! Among my people, we carry many such words as this from many lands, many worlds. Many are equally good and are as well respected, but wherever we have gone, no words have said this thing of importance in quite this way. Look at these three words written larger than the rest, with a special pride never written before or since. Tall words proudly saying We the People. That which you call Ee’d Plebnista was not written for the chiefs or the kings or the warriors or the rich and powerful, but for all the people! Down the centuries, you have slurred the meaning of the words, ‘We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this constitution.’ These words and the words that follow were not written only for the Yangs, but for the Kohms as well!”
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/military-operation-epic-fury-may-5/
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/military-operation-epic-fury-may-5/
In response to questions from CBS News, the Pentagon said Wednesday that Operation Epic Fury officially ended May 5, the same day Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared to reporters at the White House: “The operation is over. Epic Fury is — the president notified Congress – we’re done with that stage of it. We’re now on to this Project Freedom.” Four days earlier, Mr. Trump told Congress the “hostilities” had “terminated.”
Previously, the Pentagon and U.S. Central Command had declined to disclose the operation’s formal end date for months.
*A turd, by any other name, will still draw flies.
From the Financial Times(link)
There is more to the news than just Trump and the election.
BTW Russia, China and India recently met in a big boys of Asia summit..
Russia is trying to build an oil pipeline to India and so have a steady buyer of their oil that doesn’t depend on sea routes and vulnerability to sanctions.
Some day America is going to wake up and go “what happened?”
Jack
holy cowwwww
scully just played an anti-el sayed attack ad and it is insanely disingenuous
(twisted his clever response to a jesse waters cheap shot into something gross)
here it comes
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj9x2k8n3y1o
The crew have been well-drilled not to talk about conditions on board the USS Abraham Lincoln during its long combat deployment in the operation against Iran, which have been the subject of criticism back in the US.
Some sailors were wary of making any conversation at all. Others referred journalists’ questions to their media teams.
Visible everywhere in Pattaya were the men wearing t-shirts emblazoned with the letters SLG, or Shore Liaison Group. It is their job to maintain discipline on land, to watch out for the crew members, some of whom are very young and inexperienced, and to co-ordinate with the local authorities during port calls.
US Naval Attache Kristopher Robinson did not answer questions from the BBC about activities that soldiers were banned from doing while in Pattaya, saying that “we’re trying to give the sailors as much opportunity for rest as they can”.
US personnel, he added, would “conduct themselves in accordance with US law, US naval regulations, and the laws of Thailand”.
It is also on the ship’s route from the Gulf to California, giving the crew a chance to let off steam, and enjoy a break from the demands of life on board a warship.
If their stop in Thailand does the trick, any frustration they may feel over their unexpectedly long and tough mission may have dissipated by the time they get home.
But bar owner Kanta Saenkla complained many of the sailors appeared to simply be roaming around rather than enjoying the local bars.
“They haven’t really come in for drinks or anything,” she said. “Mostly they just walk around. They’re not spending money like they did in previous years.”
Wednesday night, the city’s most famous promenade, Walking Street, was very much open to them, with a huge, illuminated sign at its entrance welcoming the crew of the US carrier.
They have, however, been reminded the sex industry is off-limits, as prostitution is technically illegal in Thailand.
But alcohol was flowing. By midnight some of the younger sailors were so inebriated they had to prop each other up.
Maria Bartiromo Leaves Fox News
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/03/business/media/fox-news-maria-bartiromo.html?emc=edit_na_20260903&nl=breaking-news&segment_id=225975
JD was actually pretty impressive playing Press Secretary this morning. Wonderfully glib while lying through his teeth and blaming everything on Biden. It’s understandable why he is being pushed for 2028.
RR
That is why “Crone” used to be an honorific for older woman with the wisdom of age instead of some old wrinkled witch.
SO LONG GLORIA STEINEM –>
The humans manage another seamless podcast transition NOT scripted by ChatGPT. We saved gallons.
🍽️From today’s Digital Diner menu
https://stboncc.com/faqs/158-do-catholics-believe-in-the-rapture
*JD is no more a Catholic than that opossum that lives under the back deck of this house.
“Prior to the 19th century, this question (do we believe in The Rapture?) would have puzzled Christians, for the idea of “The Rapture” was non-existent. Historically, you will not find any church father, theologian, pope, saint or ecumenical council mention The Rapture. It became a novelty in the 19th century.
(Note: this should be contrasted with the objection posed to Catholics that, like the Rapture, the Immaculate Conception was only proclaimed in 1854. These are two very different ideas: the Immaculate Conception was believed from the time of the Apostles–and mentioned by church fathers, theologians, saints, popes, etc throughout history, but only formally defined in 1854. The idea of the Rapture was virtually non-existent until the 19th century.)
*Annotation re: which parts of the story to disregard and why.
What are the Catholic beliefs about the Second Coming of Christ?
The Catholic Church teaches that Jesus Christ will return at the end of time to judge the living and the dead, a belief rooted in Scripture and expressed in the Nicene Creed. The Church emphasizes that the exact timing of this event is unknown and warns against attempts to predict it, focusing instead on living a faithful life in anticipation of His return.
*And how does one live a “faithful life”? Not by putting empire before God. Not by hoarding resources while others suffer…and in the case of government, make choices to create systemic suffering. Not by pushing white supremacy under the guise of Christianity.
When JD said he wouldn’t be surprised if the anti-Christ walked among us, was he just projecting because he sees himself in the mirror every day? What if tRUMPism isn’t just the opening salvo; what if tRUMPism ends up being “the good, old days” or something?
https://jacobin.com/2026/09/michigan-el-sayed-rogers-centrists
Centrist Democrats Are Trying to Throw the Michigan Race
…they’d rather hand the seat to a Trump-backed Republican than let the Left gain a foothold in their party.
Attorney General Dana Nessel modeled a way out of the bind with a comically backhanded endorsement. Tasked with trying to convince Jewish Democrats that they should vote for El-Sayed despite the blizzard of smears charging he’s a dangerous antisemite, Attorney General Dana Nessel offered the most unappetizing of unappetizing pitches. Referencing the biblical story of Queen Esther, who chose to put her life on the line to save many others, she implored those in the room to do the
same.
VANCE SAID WHAT?
VP Blames Dems For Gas Prices: Covering the Coverage
The media’s reaction to JD Vance’s White House briefing is a predictable split-screen of partisan gymnastics. Mainstream outlets highlight the absurdist disconnect of blaming the Biden administration for skyrocketing gas prices mid-war, while conservative platforms obediently amplify the spin. Progressive and independent sites focus on the glaring reality gap between the podium’s rhetoric and the pump’s prices, painting a portrait of an administration scrambling to rewrite the rules of economic cause-and-effect.
Here’s my latest Abdul ad, pass it on…
Lindsay Clancy Trial:
Defense Blames Single Juror for Deadlock
The judge refused a defense lawyer’s request to remove a juror who he said was not heeding instructions on reasonable doubt. The jury, deadlocked since at least Tuesday, was sent home for the day. — New York Times (Trail Mix Free Link)
Trail Mix True Crime: Watch Today’s Podcast Chat
Blue
You can have all sorts of fun getting AI to do a run down on all the religious twists and turns involved in Virgin Birth, Immaculate conception, the siblings of Jesus, Mary in the Quran, and Jesus vs Mohamed. It will just keep getting more tangled with every question. lol
Trump Administration Asks Supreme Court to Allow Mail Voting Limits
The justices have been asked to weigh in again on the Trump administration’s efforts to restrict mail voting — this time on whether the plans violate the Constitution.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/03/us/politics/trump-supreme-court-mail-ballots.html?emc=edit_na_20260903&nl=breaking-news&segment_id=225984
Jamie – Thought it was interesting that St. Boniface in Columbus, NE had to warn the adherents off of the rapture, but remind them that Mary was also free from the stain of original sin, despite both being more recent additions to…culture, I guess I’ll call it.
Clancy case to down to one holdout juror who wants conviction…
https://www.theadvertiser.com/story/sports/college/football/2026/09/03/louisiana-ag-says-sec-lawsuit-against-lane-kiffin-lsu-officials-is-garbage/91600297007/
While a judge in Baton Rouge decides whether to stay an injunction against the NCAA, the SEC and commissioner Greg Sankey in their lawsuit against 31 athletes seeking a fifth year of collegiate eligibility, Sankey and the SEC filed a new federal lawsuit against LSU football coach Lane Kiffin and other schools officials in an Alabama court.
But less than an hour into the hearing, news broke that the SEC had named LSU football coach Lane Kiffin, LSU president Wade Rousse and athletics director Verge Ausberry in a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama, alleging, “Defendants waged a deliberate and coordinated campaign to recruit professional athletes to play football for LSU during the 2026-27 season, including players who had signed NFL contracts with the Cleveland Browns, New Orleans Saints, and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.”
Plans Announced to Break Ground on Trump’s Triumphal Arch Before Final Approval
Doug Burgum, the interior secretary, announced plans to start work on the site of the 250-foot-tall triumphal arch. Final approval of the project is still pending.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/03/us/politics/trump-triumphal-arch-plans-approval.html?emc=edit_na_20260903&nl=breaking-news&segment_id=225989
If they try to break ground on that arch the vets will show up in force, and I’ll join them.
looks like i have a pet monarch butterfly
it’s loving the zinnias
Usually, indicating the split in a hung jury is grounds alone for a mistrial.
Anon
Congratulations for providing a migration motel.
Blaming Biden for their own ineptitude is weak sauce.
Bad time to have our refrigerator fail. No parts for repair. Months-long wait-time for new deliveries. Poor Maytag Man. Hope he’s not a Maga but was reluctant to ask.
Our choices are LG or LG. Black or silver?
Meantime: ice bags in the cooler.
The ice house at Monticello has always fascinated me, as did the fact they could make ice cream in summer.
I was a jury member once on a hung jury. It is not a pleasant experience when there is one member who refuses logic or reason.
Do we know where the girlfriend (now his new wife) was at the time? When did they start dating? If a guy wants to start dating right after his kids were killed, red flag. I haven’t paid much attention to this, but hmmmm.
That goes to my question: how did they learn about the split? Defense attorney asking for removal of the juror! Weird stuff…
KINDERGARTEN ECONOMICS:
Stop calling it socialism. Call it sharing. It fixes potholes and actually buys library books.
🍽️We go out with Nene Royal, my pick for AGT!
check this out: the White House is hosting an online game for kids to pretend they’re deporting “the horde”:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/arcade/
Hitler youth rally goes online.
So, this pedo-centric WH created a website for kids. What could go wrong?
Any church pastors affiliated with it?
Don’t take any digital candy kids…and turn off your camera and location.
Wonder if any white hat-techies will put sawdust in their digital gears?
The lone hold-out is always the weird one.
make sure you bring a magnet to the store if you want a fridge that can hold them, not all do because there’s two types of stainless used by the industry, one isn’t magnetic
also, grocery stores usually sell dry ice, you just have to ask
So, MAGAt Mike sent everyone home to prevent the Massie/Khana 2.0 Epstein vote. There would be no need for this if there weren’t so many powerful men who did some very bad things.
can’t imagine that same regime is going to cede power willingly or according to the law
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-white-house-launches-arcade-with-games-to-build-wall-deport-migrants-12403151
@WhiteHouse • X.com
CAN’T STOP WINNING
Build the wall. Deport. Fill a Trump Account.
LIVE – PLAY NOW • ARCADE.GOV
*The graphics on those sociopathic games are terrible. Did Dumbass have his pool guy do that website?
From the previous link:
The new “Arcade” section of the White House website features five low-resolution, retro-style games based on familiar arcade classics and tied to different parts of the administration’s agenda.
*Oh, the crappy graphics were intentional.
Ha! Someone did an Oregon Trail game meme.
even the insider political radio i’m on is suspending disbelief and acting like this isn’t some kind of entrenched authoritarian regime, bonkers
excellent suggestion
*Biblical scholar v MAGAt
https://www.thedailybeast.com/fox-fires-top-executive-patrick-ignozzi-over-its-bonkers-maria-bartiromo-trumpyleaks-scandal/
Maria Bartiromo wasn’t the only one axed by Fox News amid her leaking scandal.
Patrick Ignozzi, the executive producer of Bartiromo’s Mornings with Maria program on Fox Business, has also been fired…
The news coincides with a Status report that revealed Fox fired Bartiromo, 58, for divulging confidential internal guidance regarding coverage of President Donald Trump to the White House.
The incident occurred in July after Trump, 80, gave a primetime address to the nation in which he alleged China was responsible for meddling in the 2020 presidential election.
The outlet reported that Fox executives advised senior staffers to refrain from giving airtime to Trump’s false election claims, doing so via written instructions. The network largely abided, bewildering many—including the White House.
Bartiromo ultimately revealed her network’s internal instructions to the White House—even showing them the text message orders she received from upper management, according to Status.
Soon after the network’s announcement, Bartiromo’s digital presence was scrubbed clean—with Fox Business Network taking down her contributor page entirely.
I expect Ms Bartiromo will soon be at CBS and 60 Minutes. Bari is salivating
NEW THREAD by our fearless leader