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The Justice Department seems to be taking a renewed glance at trafficker Jeffrey Epstein's New Mexico ranch, which was largely ignored when investigations began in 2019.

The Guardian reported Monday that the recent disclosure of documents from the DOJ showed added attention to the so-called Zorro Ranch. The sprawling property is one of the many sites believed to be where Epstein abused underage girls. At no point has the federal government conducted a search.

That isn't to say that New Mexico wasn't on the feds' radar.

Former New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas told The Guardian, “In spring 2019, our office investigated activity in New Mexico that was still viable for prosecution, including contact with multiple victims."

“During that time, the US attorney’s office in New York asked us to pause any further state investigation or prosecution related to Epstein, informing us that they were already conducting an active multijurisdictional prosecution,” Balderas said. “We shared all our reports and interviews to ensure they had all investigative leads and respected their request to refrain from further parallel investigation. We kept the matter open, investigated Epstein’s land leases, and continued offering our legal resources to the DoJ for further prosecution.”

He noted that neither the main DOJ nor the New York office shared anything with them. Instead, New Mexico stepped back from its investigation.

One Dec 2019 email captured a federal prosecutor telling a lawyer for Epstein’s estate co-executors that they had “not searched the New Mexico property."

Balderas told The Guardian that his office asked federal authorities “to use any available asset forfeiture tools to seize the ranch” in 2020.

“We expect to have additional information to share about our investigation as it continues to progress,” a spokesperson for the current state attorney general told The Guardian.

The brother of the victim, Virginia Giuffre, Sky Roberts, gathered a crowd outside the ranch over the weekend to demand more be done to expose those who worked with Epstein to traffic and exploit the girls, reported KOAT.

"It's a little surreal," Roberts said. "It's very important that we show that we're here in unity, and we're not going away. Whether it's on the Capitol steps or we get to come to New Mexico, we're going to do it. These survivors deserve it. This is about so much more than the survivors."

It's unclear whether the interest in Zorro Ranch was prompted by New Mexico's decision to begin its own investigation into the ranch. The New York Times reported on March 1 that in February, state officials formed a "truth coalition" with bipartisan state legislative members eager to probe the history of the ranch.

"We got word that this was happening about two days ago and we knew we had to be here," Amanda Roberts told KOAT during the weekend protest. "We're so proud of New Mexico, the citizens of New Mexico, the legislators that have pushed for this investigation. It sets the tone for the rest of the United States, and we're backing every single survivor who has suffered in silence. We're here for Virginia."

“Not only has it been overshadowed, it’s been completely ignored,” argued Albuquerque radio D.J. Eddy Aragon, who has spent years investigating Epstein.

The Santa Fe New Mexican reported that the new owner, Republican Texas businessman and former state Sen. Don Huffines, was ordered to immediately stop renovations after the ranch was purchased. Huffines is currently running for state comptroller in Texas. Construction has already begun on what he plans to turn into a Christian retreat; however, it appears he hasn't filed for any permits with the state or local governments.

Among the 3 million documents released by the Justice Department in the past months, one individual contacted federal authorities on Nov. 25, 2019, “to report an email he received offering 7 videos of sexual abuse and the location of two foreign girls buried on Zorro Ranch." An FBI report doesn't appear on the tip until Oct. 2021.

Aragon has been talking about the allegations about women buried on the ranch for years, noting that he, too, got an email from a source in 2019 offering the information for money. He said that he forwarded the email to the FBI.

The Guardian spoke with New Mexico defense attorney John Day, who explained that there are some challenges to getting a search warrant for the property seven years after the death of Epstein. However, former Sen. Huffines indicated he was cooperating, so it is doubtful he would block any effort to search all 7,500 acres, which would amount to just under 12 square miles.

Day said that given the length of time that has passed, it might be difficult to find much evidence.

He said that the first steps would be in sifting through "the human side" of the investigation, meaning anyone who could have worked on the ranch. The other key investigation would be to search all the Epstein documents for any mention of "New Mexico" or individuals with zip codes in the state.

New Mexico's Department of Justice emailed the U.S. DOJ asking for another version of the email indicating girls might be buried at the ranch. The state DOJ also spoke with Stephanie Garcia Richard, New Mexico’s state land commissioner, about agricultural leases that Epstein's ranch had for more than 25 years.

Prominent anti-Trump conservatives are speaking out, sensing a weakened president prosecuting an unpopular war as oil prices soar and markets plunge.

“You know, in the end, Trump’s name will be synonymous for the single most evil and destructive person to ever hold the Presidency, and it won’t even be close,” wrote The Lincoln Project’s Rick Wilson.

In a parody of President Trump, Wilson wrote: “I killed 500,000 people by botching COVID, wrecked our economy with a foolish trade war, set loose murderous domestic secret police, ripped off Americans in billion-dollar crypto scams, covered Epstein, sold out our allies, started a second Great Depression and World War III.” He then called it “a hell of a resume.”

Former Trump Homeland Security Chief of Staff Miles Taylor noted, “My former GOP colleagues are still ‘standing by their man’ — the month he starts a war, slaughters civilians, starts a global financial panic, puts Americans in the crosshairs of terrorist attacks, and is accused of raping a 13-year-old girl.”

“Good luck in the midterms,” he added.

Taylor also wrote: “The ‘American experiment’ doesn’t mean what is used to. Now it means testing what happens when you give a senile sociopath nuclear weapons.”

Wilson continued, writing, “At least when we’re paying $8 a gallon for gas, the global economy is in a shambles, World War III is raging, and the living envy the dead, Donald Trump will have a new shiny ballroom.”

Pointing out that the president wore a USA baseball cap when he attended the dignified transfer of American service members killed in Kuwait, Wilson noted, “Trump wearing a ball cap at Dover is repugnant beyond words. He is grotesque. As always, imagine what Fox et al would have done if Biden or Obama did so.”

Predicting a possible Democratic wave in November, The Bulwark’s Bill Kristol noted: “Democrats at +6 on the generic ballot among registered voters. 74% of Dems say they have high interest in the fall’s election, compared to 61% of Rs. So among likely voters probably at something like +7 or 8. On the way to a Dem wave, but not yet there.”

The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols, a retired U.S. Naval War College professor, commented, “It’s almost as if we don’t have a strategy.”

And he warned, “Don’t have a war led by people who are in over their heads.”

And on Saturday, responding to a Trump social media post, Wilson wrote: “Just so we’re quite clear, the President is insane.”

After President Donald Trump fired Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Salon's Amanda Marcotte — in a biting article published on March 6 — argued that she "excelled in debasing herself to please her boss" only to get fired anyway. Noem, Marcotte observed, even altered her physical appearance to please Trump. But in the end, according to Marcotte, Noem's loyalty was rewarded with a firing via social media.

Marcotte revisited the subject of MAGA loyalty to Trump during an appearance on The New Republic's "The Daily Blast" podcast posted on March 9. Host Greg Sargent noted that White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt's "cult-like obsequiousness gets dialed up to 11" whenever the "news gets particularly bad for Donald Trump," and Marcotte explained the "psychology" behind Leavitt and other Trump loyalists.

Marcotte told Sargent, "I think at the end of the day, the most important psychology that keeps these people on board is just that admitting that Trump is bad or wrong or a failure is admitting that all those people who, for a decade, have been telling you that you made a mistake were right. And what's weird is the longer this drags on, the harder it is for them to let go without some kind of offramp. And I will say, if there ever was an offramp, I do kind of think the Iran war might be it — because again, they don't want another [George] Bush."

Marcotte added, "Trump ran pretty explicitly the first time as: I am not another Bush. He made fun of the Bush that was in the race, and here he is, another Bush."

Trump's loyalists, Marcotte emphasized, are so invested in defending him that they refuse to publicly acknowledge all the things that are wrong with his administration — from Iran to the economy.

Marcotte told Sargent, "I agree that (Leavitt's) first and foremost motivation is making her boss feel good so she keeps her job. I would love to like look inside her head and see if she actually thinks it makes a difference to say these obsequious, like laughable things — if she thinks she's actually persuading anybody, or if it's just Trump, her boss, like managing her boss' feelings, because it might just be that…. I think we're seeing a lot of people who are behaving like they don't know what to do. They don't know what's going to happen next."

Marcotte continued, "They're at the whims of a mercurial boss who may not be remembering super well what he said one minute to the next. And I think that there is no plan here. I think that they're just kind of winging it in the most like ridiculous way."

After President Donald Trump fired Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and nominated Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Oklahoma) for the position, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina) called for Trump to fire another person in his second administration: White House adviser Stephen Miller.

Never Trump conservative Rick Wilson and liberal journalist Molly Jong-Fast discussed Tillis' outspokenness on a March 8 video for their YouTube show "Fast Politics." And they attributed Tillis' willingness to criticize Trump officials to the fact that the conservative senator isn't seeking reelection in the 2026 midterms.

Although Tillis plans to serve out the rest of his term, he will be exiting Congress in early January 2027. Tillis, facing an aggressive GOP primary challenge for not being MAGA enough, decided against seeking another term.

Jong-Fast, with amusement in her voice, said of Tillis, "He's had that thing where, when you're a Republican and you decide you're not going to run again, you become suddenly very brave."

Also sounding amused, Wilson — a former GOP strategist who expressed his disdain for President Donald Trump and the far-right MAGA movement by leaving the Republican Party and becoming an independent — told Jong-Fast, "You gain superpowers, in fact…. Incredible superpowers that allow you to have a shred of moral clarity for years of having your lips firmly attached to Trump's backside…. But Tillis has become a born-again hard MOFO, and he has been ripping the living hell out of tiny Santa Monica Goebbels, Stephen Miller, on the Sunday shows. It's been a delight. "

Jong-Fast, commenting on Trump's decision to fire Noem and nominate Mullin, told Wilson, "The real story here is Stephen Miller, who is running the show."

- YouTube www.youtube.com

The belated dismissal of Kristi Noem -- President Donald Trump's woefully unqualified and performatively ridiculous custodian of homeland security --- highlights the perils now faced by all Americans in an increasingly perilous world. Now that the United States is at war with a regime notorious for terror tactics, it is no longer possible to ignore the frightening incompetence of a government that we expect to keep us from harm.

Noem cut an especially clownish figure at the Department of Homeland Security -- with her constant costume changes, soap opera escapades, corrupt expenditures and abuse of Coast Guard aviation and residential facilities -- but her MAGA style of governance is all too visible across our national security agencies.

While it was apparent from the day of her appointment that Noem had no relevant experience or knowledge, she and her "special employee" Corey Lewandowski brought extreme levels of chaos and disrepute to the agencies they oversaw. Like other Trump officials, she imposed senseless waves of cuts, mass firings of veteran officials, useless expenditures and measures such as polygraph tests that destroyed staff morale.

And in her zeal to enforce the administration's absurd deportation schedule, Noem fomented a confrontation with Congress and indeed the entire country that has resulted in the DHS shutdown. With most of its employees forced to work unpaid, all its security functions are now subject to staffing shortages, rising absences and declining resolve.

It's not a good time for that to be going on: The Iranian regime, along with allies in Hezbollah and kindred terror groups, is assuredly seeking means of revenge for the killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the wider war. Given Iran's known capabilities in cyber warfare, the reduced defensive capacity of the DHS-based Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency is troubling.

Yet the president has replaced Noem with another politician whose Fox News appearances he enjoys, rather than a serious figure with military, intelligence or even government experience. Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin may be popular among his peers, but his resume for this position is thinner than paper.

As Kevin Carroll, a former senior DHS official, told CNN on Thursday, "I'm not sure that Sen. Mullin is really qualified. I mean, most of the other secretaries of Homeland Security have had substantial experience in federal law enforcement or the military, or have held senior executive positions. ... He was a successful small businessman. But we're in a severe threat environment right now (with the invasion of Iran). It's probably the highest threat environment since 9/11. ... I really don't think it's time for him to be in his first national security position or his first executive position."

That disturbing vacuum of professional leadership and skill is reflected throughout Trump's government, with potentially ruinous consequences. It is especially glaring at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where the comedy team of Director Kash Patel and former Deputy Director Dan Bongino achieved so much destruction in the span of a few months. Their dismantling of FBI divisions tasked with protecting the country showed a reckless enthusiasm that must have excited our foreign enemies.

Patel has done grave harm to the bureau's national security branch, which encompasses its divisions of counterterrorism, intelligence and counterintelligence, and its special directorate for weapons of mass destruction -- all vital to protecting us at this moment of heightened threats. The FBI cyber division, like CISA at DHS, has likewise suffered from the firings and fear that have destroyed confidence among agents in Washington and in FBI offices around the country and abroad.

The impact of Patel's recurrent displays of idiocy, arrogance and abuse are felt far beyond our borders -- although the damage has become obvious in major highly publicized domestic cases like the Brown University murders and the suspected abduction of Nancy Guthrie.

Early in his tenure, at the request of the head of the United Kingdom's MI5 intelligence agency, Patel agreed to maintain a London FBI station where both countries monitor adversary activities. He violated the pledge almost immediately, earning distrust among the "Five Eyes" intelligence consortium, which includes Australia, Canada and New Zealand as well as the U.S. and UK and is critical to our counterterrorism effort.

The barely disguised contempt for Patel (and Bongino, whose position was crucial to everyday operations) among foreign security officials is a serious hindrance to the bureau's international operations division, which depends on our foreign allies to provide actionable information about threats originating overseas.

So toxic is Patel's presence in the FBI that the bureau may be better off with him spending most of his time far from headquarters, whether at his home in Las Vegas, with his country-singer girlfriend on a government jet, or at the Olympics, car races or other sporting events where he weirdly shows up.

The pattern of dubious political appointees extends into the top levels of every sector, from Tulsi Gabbard -- whom even Trump no longer pretends to respect -- at the Directorate of National Intelligence to Pete Hegseth at the Pentagon, where security breaches and outright lies have become routine.

Will we pay a hideous price for all these loitering MAGA bozos? So far, in Trump's second term, America has escaped the deadly disasters that can arise from stupid, amateurish government -- whether in an intelligence snafu like 9/11 or a botched pandemic response like COVID-19.

By now we should know that our luck won't hold forever.

It bears repeating that Donald Trump’s rationale for war against Iran keeps shifting because Trump himself does not believe his own rationales. The goal of this war has little to do with Iran. It has to do with creating conditions in which an old, depleted and unpopular president looks big, tough and loved on American TV.

But there may be a reason outside the president’s fear of defeat in this year’s congressional elections. While he believes that he benefits from the perception of being a war president, it looks like the decision to become one wasn’t entirely his to make.

Early reporting on the war suggested that Israel was going to attack Iran without or without Trump, and that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was lobbying him to join the effort. USA Today reported yesterday that Netanyahu decided in November of last year to order a long-planned operation to assassinate Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Marco Rubio confirmed that reporting on Monday: "We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action. We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn't preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.”

Just so I have this straight in my mind: Trump did not attack Iran in order to stop it from having nukes; in order to stop it from being a global leader in state-sponsored terrorism; in order to liberate the Iranian people; or in order to manifest world peace.

No, the president launched an illegal and unjustified war with Iran because America’s ally, Israel, put him in a no-win situation in which, as one source told the Post over the weekend, “the only debate that seemed to be remaining was whether the US would launch in concert with Israel or if the US would wait until Iran retaliated on US military targets in the region and then engage.”

Trump could have condemned Netanyahu after the fact, but apparently the appeal of being a war president was too great.

If I were the commander-in-chief of the world’s mightiest military, and if I allowed a foreign head of state to lead me around by the nose, I would also come up with a couple dozen reasons for going to war with Iran, no matter how unconvincing those reasons may be, because I would be highly motivated to draw attention away from the view that I’m not entirely in charge.

I mean, Trump can’t even take credit for Khamenei’s death. Pete Hegseth told reporters the Israeli strikes killed him Saturday. The only “credit” he can claim is having followed Netanyahu’s lead.

That it appears the decision to attack Iran was Netanyahu’s more than it was Trump’s is going to be a problem, most immediately because of the outcry in the Congress. If Trump was not acting in self-defense, and clearly he was not, then this war against Iran is a war of choice, which requires the consent of the Congress. Trump is going to be forced to explain himself, thus risking being held accountable for the spike in goods and oil prices, Tuesday’s sell-off on Wall Street and general chaos in the Middle East.

(According to journalist Steve Herman, the State Department told Americans to “immediately leave 16 countries and territories: Bahrain, Egypt, Gaza, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, UAE, West Bank and Yemen.” NBC News reported that the mandatory orders are coming despite many airports in the region being shuttered. In Qatar, Americans who can’t get out were advised that “should not rely on the US government for assisted departure or evacuation.”)

The White House’s best rationale for war seems to be that the US was forced to attack Iran, because Iran was forced to defend itself against Israel’s attack. Such a rationale is not going to fly with most of the Congress, including many maga Republicans. That’s why Trump lied Tuesday. He said Netanyahu didn’t force my hand. I forced his. According to Kaitlan Collins, he said “it was his opinion that Iran was going to attack first if the US didn't.”

For the lie to work, however, he needs the full faith of maga. He needs the base to trust him enough to play along. To do that, he must affirm his dominance. If supporters believe he’s Netanyahu’s puppet, however, such displays of dominance will seem empty and hollow to his own people, thus creating problems much bigger than abstract debates in the Congress over war powers.

To understand the problem he has created for himself, bear in mind the true nature of America First, which has been largely sanitized by the Washington press corps. It is not rooted in high-minded principles like freedom and national sovereignty. It is rooted in conspiracy theory and antisemitism, which are often provided a veneer of respectability by rightwing intellectuals and gullible reporters. Peel away the noble-sounding language, however, about nation-builders “intervening in complex societies that they did not even understand themselves,” as Trump said last year, and what you find at the center of America First is an unshakeable belief in a global Jewish conspiracy against America.

This belief in a global Jewish conspiracy against America was the foundation beneath the push to release the Epstein files during Trump’s 2024 campaign. The belief took on a slightly different form, but the animus was the same. Trump was supposed to have been the hero sent by God to fulfill a prophecy to save America from a secret cabal of powerful Jews who sex-trafficked young girls to untouchable elites. In maga lore, Jeffrey Epstein came to represent this shadowy, malevolent syndicate. Once reelected, Trump was supposed to bring them all to justice. When he didn’t, he triggered a crisis of faith that can be registered in recent polling that lumps him in with the rest of the “wealthy elites” who act with impunity for the law – the so-called “Epstein class.”

The Times reported Tuesday on the growing uproar within the maga movement over the possibility that Netanyahu said “jump” and Trump asked “how high?” Some of the most invested maga personalities, men like Jack Posobiec, told the Times that divisions can be overcome and lingering doubts will only be relevant to future candidates to lead the maga movement.

If supporters believed Trump betrayed principles, Posobiec might be right, as they don’t really care about principles. Supporters could shift from anti-war to pro-war as seamlessly as Trump does. But what Posobiec is ignoring, because it’s in his interest to ignore it, is that America First is not rooted in high-minded principles. It’s rooted in Jew-hate. Supporters are not going to warm up to the appearance of an American president seeming to take orders from the leader of a Jewish state. Instead, they might see Trump doing to believers in America First what he has done to supporters who demanded the release of the Epstein files.

Again, this is why the president lied Tuesday. In an attempt to assert dominance, he said he was the one to force Netanyahu’s hand, not the other way around. That might have worked – the base might have trusted him enough to play along with the lie – but for his already established betrayal in the Epstein case. With Iran, he has now compounded maga’s crisis of faith. He must contend with the growing suspicion that instead of destroying the global Jewish conspiracy against America, he has joined it.

During his first presidency, Donald Trump was a relentless critic of neoconservatives —arguing that the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 was a total disaster. And his America First views, greatly influenced by paleoconservative Patrick Buchanan, were often described as "isolationist."

But Trump, since returning to the White House, has taken a much more interventionist turn — from the capture of former President Nicolás Maduro to pushing for the U.S. to buy Greenland (an idea that European leaders vehemently oppose) to calling for Canada to become "the 51st state." And Trump escalated his interventionism by going to war with Iran.

In an op-ed published by the conservative Washington Examiner on March 8, journalist Timothy P. Carney lays out some reasons why Republicans should proceed with caution when it comes to war.

"If we take conservatism to be a real habit of mind, grounded in insights and a sound anthropology," Carney writes, "then the full weight of conservatism comes down against regime changes and wars of choice…. Overthrowing the current order, even when that order is rife with problems, typically makes things worse. More broadly: Dramatic changes to complex systems always create unintended and unforeseen consequences, and those consequences are often very bad."

Carney continues, "This isn't merely a foreign policy view. This is something the conservative believes so deeply he may not say it out loud. It's why he's skeptical of grand new plans and revolutions, whether cultural, economic, or otherwise. It's not that we live in the best of all possible worlds, it's that we live in a world more complex than we can imagine. Our power of reason is awesome, but humans trying to rearrange civilization are like amateurs tinkering with a home's electrical system — there's a high risk of disaster."

Carney goes on to describe the "lessons" of the United States' "21st Century regime-change wars."

"In Afghanistan," Carney explains, "we very quickly dethroned the Taliban, and then sunk into a 20-year occupation that ended in a humiliating and deadly retreat in 2021….

We spent more than $9 billion to try and end narcotics trade and production in Afghanistan. This was a total failure. By 2018, Afghanistan was supplying more than 90 percent of the world's opium…. The Iraq War, likewise, was quickly declared a success."

Carney continues, "Our military demolished Iraq's, deposed Saddam Hussein, and soon arrested him. For a moment, we were, as the war's champions predicted, greeted as liberators. Mission Accomplished! But then things spiraled way down. The primary premise for the war, that Saddam was about to use 'weapons of mass destruction,' proved false. The government we stood up collapsed. Our efforts to import Madison democracy failed, and in the vacuum, terrorism blossomed and then spread throughout the region. Many experts argue that the war created ISIS, which then brought hell on the region for many years. Domestically, the war became incredibly unpopular, and led to the Democratic takeover of Congress in 2006 and Barack Obama's election in 2008. Iraq today is one of the worst places on the planet to live."

In a Saturday, March 7 post on his Truth Social platform, U.S. President Donald Trump offered a vigorous defense of his decision to go to war with Iran and claimed that the operation is going extremely well. But Trump's arguments got a strong pushback from Never Trump conservative Tim Miller, who stressed that the president is failing to offer a "coherent" explanation for getting the United States into war.

Trump's escalation with Iran represents a continuation of his longstanding adversarial stance toward the Iranian regime. Since taking office, Trump has pursued an aggressive posture toward Tehran, withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018 and reimposing strict economic sanctions.

The administration has repeatedly accused Iran of destabilizing the Middle East through its support of proxy militias and regional actors. Throughout his first term, Trump authorized military strikes against Iranian military commanders, including the 2020 assassination of General Qasem Soleimani, which significantly raised tensions and prompted retaliatory threats from Iran. These actions set the stage for an increasingly confrontational relationship, one that Trump has continued to fuel with inflammatory rhetoric and hardline policies upon his return to office.

In a video for the conservative website The Bulwark, Miller — a frequent guest on MS NOW and a former GOP strategist — went over Trump's points, one by one, and took them apart.

Trump posted, "Iran, which is being beat to HELL, has apologized and surrendered to its Middle East neighbors, and promised that it will not shoot at them anymore. This promise was only made because of the relentless U.S. and Israeli attacks."

Miller, in a mocking tone, told viewers, "I don't think they've apologized to their Middle East neighbors."

Trump wrote that Iran was "looking to take over and rule the Middle East" — to which Miller responded, "Maybe aspirationally."

Trump called Iran as "the loser of the Middle East," and Miller described that rhetoric as comparable to a "nine-year-old."

- YouTube www.youtube.com

Wednesday was historic.

Not inspiring. Not admirable. Just…historic.

In the most “nothing to see here” political maneuver imaginable, Sen. Steve Daines waited until the final minutes before the filing deadline to drop out of his race for a third term in the U.S. Senate.

Minutes.

Then—almost magically—another candidate appeared.

A chosen one.

Republicans instantly fell in line. Like dominoes. Or perhaps like pre-written press releases waiting in a folder labeled “In Case of Emergency: Install Replacement Senator.”

Who endorsed the mystery candidate?

Let’s see.

Senator Steve Daines. Representative Ryan Zinke. Senator and wrist breaker, Tim Sheehy. Governor Greg Gianforte.

And, naturally, Donald Trump.

The endorsements came fast, very fast.

Almost as if everyone (except the public) already knew what was about to happen.

And the new candidate?

Kurt. Who?

A man who has never run for office, never held elected office and never campaigned statewide.

But suddenly—within minutes of the deadline—he’s the anointed successor to a United States Senator.

Amazing how that works.

Democracy usually involves voters, primaries, debates, competition.

But apparently we’re trying something new now — succession planning.

Apparently the voters of Montana are no longer supposed to choose their Senator. Instead, the sitting Senator (and Trump) simply appoints one.

How efficient.

No messy campaigns. No inconvenient challengers. No pesky voters asking questions. Just a quiet backroom decision.

Then—boom: “Here’s your new Senator. Please clap.”

So let’s ask the obvious questions.

Why did Daines wait until minutes before the deadline to withdraw?

Why did Kurt (who) wait until minutes before the deadline to file?

Why was there no transparency?

Why were other Republicans denied the chance to run?

Why wasn’t the party allowed to choose its own nominee in a primary?

Because make no mistake—this maneuver shut the door on competition.

Locked it, bolted it and then threw away the key.

If Daines had announced months ago he wasn’t running, there would have been a wide-open Republican primary.

Montanans could have heard ideas, evaluated candidates and compared records.

Instead, they got a political ambush — a last-minute switcheroo. A Senate seat was handed off like a family heirloom.

And the speed of those endorsements?

Impressive.

Trump posted his “complete and total endorsement.” Gianforte applauded. Daines praised.

Everyone smiled. All within hours.

Which raises another awkward question: How long was this planned?

Because this doesn’t feel spontaneous. It feels choreographed. Scripted and pre-approved.

Maybe it’s nothing.

Maybe it’s just the strangest coincidence in Montana political history.

Or maybe it’s something else. Maybe it’s a backroom deal. Maybe it’s political stage management.

Maybe it’s exactly what it looks like.

Either way, it stinks.

And voters can smell it.

Now let’s talk about the new heir apparent. Kurt Alme’s central qualification appears to be enthusiastic loyalty to Trump and his agenda.

Fine. That’s a position.

But let’s examine what that agenda actually means.

Cuts to USAID that humanitarian groups say could lead to fourteen million deaths overseas. Cuts to the Veterans Administration—thousands of doctors and nurses gone (more than 14,400). Cuts to Affordable Care Act subsidies—leaving thousands of Montanans without affordable health insurance. Cuts to HIV medication programs that keep people alive. Cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also called “food stamps.” Cuts to medical research for cancer and other diseases. Cuts to education.

Cuts to the Mansfield Center and the Critical Defense Language Institute that trains U.S. military and intelligence officers.

And tariffs. Lots of tariffs. Taxes on fertilizer. Taxes on farm equipment. Taxes on parts. Taxes on American consumers.

Because tariffs aren’t paid by foreign governments.

They’re paid by you, by farmers, by ranchers and by businesses.

Then there are the tax cuts — massive ones. The ones tilted toward millionaires and billionaires. The ones projected to add roughly $4 trillion to the national deficit. That’s a bill our kids and grandkids will pay.

But sure: “Fiscal responsibility.” Let’s go with that.

And what about Daines?

Once upon a time, he presented himself as a man of principle. A man of faith. Now he enthusiastically backs a political movement led by a convicted felon, a habitual liar, and a man found liable for sexual assault.

That’s a choice.

Everyone makes choices.

History keeps score.

So why the sudden exit?

What’s next for Daines?

A cabinet job?

An ambassadorship?

A lucrative lobbying career?

Washington has a funny way of rewarding loyalty.

But here’s what we already know: This isn’t how democracy is supposed to work. We don’t crown successors. We don’t install Senators through backdoor deadline tricks.

We hold elections, real ones; with real competition.

And if Daines truly planned to step aside, the honorable thing would have been simple: Announce it early, let Republicans compete and let voters decide.

Instead we got a last-minute maneuver designed to ensure only one chosen candidate could file.

That’s not leadership. That’s not transparency. That’s not Montana values.

It’s a political stunt.

And Montanans deserve better than political magic tricks performed at 4:52 p.m. on filing day.

Because democracy isn’t supposed to happen behind closed doors.

It’s supposed to happen in the open.

With voters watching.

Right now?

Something clearly happened. And the public deserves to know exactly what it was. Nothing good happens in darkness. What Daines and Trump did here – total darkness.

Montana citizens deserve better. We deserve the truth.

President Donald Trump’s former Homeland Security Secretary, Kristi Noem, made a “startling confession,” according to a conservative writer, and the mainstream media is not focusing on it.

The “confession” in question involved Noem admitting to a Senate investigative committee that “her department had arrested and deported DACA recipients—the ‘Dreamers’ who are shielded from deportation and have had work authorization since 2012—at unacceptable levels,” wrote Adrian Carrasquillo for The Bulwark. He shared the story of a Motel 6 hospitality area manager, Maria, who was wrongly deported to Mexico despite working in America legally under DACA.

“I feel like it was entrapment,” Maria told Carrasquillo. “The moment they told me I was going to be deported, first I felt like they killed me right then and there. But seeing my daughter devastated was one of the hardest moments I had in my life. I was thinking, ‘What am I going to do?’”

He explained that “life has grown hard” as Maria adjusts to her new life in Mexico, and was in the audience when Noem faced the Senate this week.

“To me, it means my whole entire world that I raised a good daughter, a daughter that is not going to let go,” Maria told Carrasquillo. “Standing up for me and fighting, being a voice for those that cannot speak, it means a lot. That I did a good job as a mother and raised a good citizen.”

The Bulwark reporter added that “Maria’s message to the Trump administration is that in their zeal to remove criminals who are bad for the country, they have targeted good people like herself who are ‘assets to the country.’ She also underscored that, in addition to helping those homeless families and other community work, she doesn’t live on government assistance, welfare, or food stamps.”

It does not appear that the cruelty to immigrants like Maria played a major role in Noem’s dismissal. Instead it was reported that congressional leaders persuaded Trump that Noem was no longer viable because of her multitude of scandals. Trump was also furious when Noem said repeatedly the president had personally approved her controversial ad blitz in which she was prominently featured, which Trump denies.

Noem’s tenure was also notoriously marked by infighting and accusations of vindictiveness, with the former secretary’s top aide and alleged lover Corey Lewandowski being often singled out for criticism. After Noem’s firing, a White House official anonymously said they “don’t know who would want him.”

The Bulwark, though skeptical that Noem’s replacement will be better, nevertheless celebrated her departure.

“Trump’s pick to replace her, Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin, is a MAGA meathead of the highest order, but I’d hesitate to predict confidently that he’ll be any worse—at any rate, he’ll have his work cut out for him if he hopes to be,” wrote The Bulwark’s Andrew Egger. “And this isn’t nothing: We hope we won’t have to think about Corey Lewandowski’s sex life ever again.”