death penalty for the mentally diabled

Corruption allegations are already peeking out from the White House, even with a complicit Republican Congress unwilling to hold the nation’s executive branch to the grindstone. This means when the Congress truly becomes an investigative arm of government after November, Americans may have to face much more than just the tip of the ugly iceberg.

Gerard Baker, columnist at The Times and editor at large at The Wall Street Journal, warned on Friday that Americans will not at all like what they’re going to see.

“One or two Democrats are already planning to lead these investigations, and I think some of the stuff that they will investigate will actually look really, really bad,” Baker told Washington editor and The Times columnist Katy Balls, in Friday.

Baker said the nation is already aware of allegations members of President Donald Trump's family using their connections to enrich themselves. Former Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle was recently forced to resign after a Trump donor shared texts alleging Guilfoyle was begging $100k from him in exchange for White House influence. And People familiar with contract services of former Trump attorney Alina Habba claim she was granted a plush private job specifically to help a billionaire get a pardon. Prominent Venezuelan Julio Herrera Velutini sought clemency from President Donald Trump, and he got it not long after his daughter gave Habba her lucrative job. As well as bigger allegations about Trump family members and Steve Witkoff’s family members and deals that they've managed to achieve miraculously wile serving in international diplomatic capacities.

“All of that came out, thankfully, due to journalistic efforts,” said Baker. “It's mostly been reporting by journalists with no assist from Congress, which has power to do so much more if Democrats take control. And they will have all the powers Congress has, complete with all of the staff and all of the legal authorities that they'll have. And I think there's a lot more to come out, I suspect.”

Baker referred to the “iceberg theory of scandals,” which is the stuff that you know the public sees initially is only a fraction of what there is. He warned there will be some extent of eyes “glazing over” at the sheer amount of it as people are already familiar with Trump-style corruption.

But the corruption that could truly stagger the nation are the national security implications that start to come out when a Democratic Congress begins to dig.

“If there's some evidence of some of the stuff that's come out around Kimberly Guilfoyle, if there's evidence that people got favors from the administration, that foreigners got favors from the administration in exchange for money or other things that those people wanted we could start to see some really ugly stuff about what exactly the administration has been doing for the last two years, wittingly or unwittingly in terms of America's foreign policy and National interest,” said Baker.

“I think that's the real danger here, not just for Republicans and for Trump but actually for the country,” Baker warned, as the U.S. public lost all faith in government because of Trump’s corruption.

Balls pointed out that with Trump’s kids and family associations getting their weddings funded by Russian oligarchs, U.S. integrity could be shaken to the ground.

Legendary Republican strategist and GOP pollster Frank Luntz complains that President Donald Trump and the White House have flubbed their economic message in the final days leading into the midterms, and now there’s no hope of a course correction before disaster.

Luntz was particularly distraught over the warring opinions between Trump and Vice President JD Vance on the Trump economy’s impact on young Americans, with Vance saying recently that “most Republicans … don't pay enough attention to the affordability problems that are affecting young people.

But Trump appears to be is doubling down on his own rosy assessment of the economy with a Friday Truth Social post claiming “inflation is way down under “Trump.” Income for people and companies way up. The Golden Age of America is upon us.”

Luntz waved off inquiries by CNN anchor Boris Sanchez on Friday if he thought Vance's message of empathy was a good tactic.

“The message should have been delivered months ago, and that it's basically too late now,” said Luntz. “At this point, you're trying to turn out your voters and you're not trying to antagonize or excite the opposition.”

Luntz said Democrats now have a 2 percent advantage in turnout, meaning that races that are would have been decided by 1 percent or less will automatically go into the Democratic camp.

“And that matters in some of these Senate races that are absolutely so close to call that you can't distinguish them. And it could have an impact on three or four House races as well,” said Luntz. “The Democratic party has a strong, engaged, active core that are absolutely showing up to the polls. The Republican core still supports Donald Trump, but not with the same intensity. And we see that not just with younger voters, but all voters.”

Luntz said he was watching the Election Day behavior of “paycheck to paycheck” voters, who have “very little or no savings at the end of the month, people who are most affected by affordability.”

“These are individuals who voted for Donald Trump in record numbers. Not that he won them by a huge amount, but that Republicans normally did not attract that vote. But they came to him in 2024. And I'm watching to see how many of them leave him or look for a Democratic alternative in 2026,” said Luntz. “That will matter in Nebraska. That will matter in Kansas. It will matter, particularly in some of these midwestern states that are up for grabs right now.”

Luntz was equally troubled about the two thirds of white voters without a college degree that Trump won in all three presidential campaigns. A new Marist College poll now finds that 44 percent of these likely voters disapprove of Trump’s job performance. And Luntz fretted whether this was a temporary realignment or a plague on his party for years to come.

“These are people who have been loyal Democrats who shifted in 2024, and maybe that was the more significant election, because they seem to be heading back to the Democrats in 2026. I'm going to be following them, trying to understand why you would vote for president trump in 2024 and choose a Democratic candidate, either for governor or senator in 2026, because that's going to tell us about the election in 2028,” Luntz said.

- YouTube youtu.be

As unhappy as Americans are over the economy, the last two years of President Donald Trump’s second term with its unnecessary tariffs and its gas-busting war in Iran was just the first bite, sources tell Politico. After the mid-terms, Trump has zero motivation to even try to keep the economy level, so it’s gloves off from here.

“The possibility is that it could actually get worse, be more tumultuous, more unpredictable and higher tariffs,” said one industry lobbyist speaking anonymously.

Republican and industry officials don’t believe the president is going to slow his agenda because of a poor showing by his party in the midterms. If anything, he may ramp it up, they say.

“Trump still wants to bring tariffs close to where they stood before the Supreme Court struck down a broad swath of them in February, according to nine current and former officials, congressional aides and industry representatives,” reports Politico. “He has teed up trade measures that could lead to new duties in the weeks after the election. The Pentagon, meanwhile, has been sending more forces to the Middle East, and Trump has been hinting that more action is coming in Iran.”

Analysts speaking with Politico say as much damage as Trump has done to consumer prices with his tariffs and his unilateral wars, the president was actually trying to put on a good face before the mid-terms to protect his Republican majorities in Congress.

“GOP candidates in competitive midterm races in border states have already sought to distance themselves from Trump’s renewed trade war with Canada that flared up in August, after trade talks between Washington and Ottawa broke down,” according to Politico.

“The tariffs are hammering us,” said one Republican in Michigan, where GOP Senate candidate Mike Rogers and gubernatorial candidate John James are fighting fiercely for open seats. Meanwhile, Trump’s self-created hike in gas prices since the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on Iran is already weighing down GOP candidates in rural areas and suburbs alike.

But with midterms out of the way and voter beatings heartily delivered to the GOP in November, nothing stops Trump from sallying forth with an even more extreme agenda, sources say.

“Trump’s new actions could not only trigger Main Street angst, but could also sink stock markets and drive oil prices even higher, with impacts that are likely to reverberate not just in the next Congress but in the 2028 contest for president,” reports Politico. “An additional round of levies after the election would be exactly the wrong lesson, one House Republican said, noting that if any Midwest Republicans eke out wins at this point, it will be ‘in spite’ of Trump’s tariffs.”

A White House official refused to guarantee that Trump planned no new tariffs after the mid-terms, merely saying that “any tariff announcements will come directly from the Administration,” and that “any discussion or reporting about tariffs and tariff rates should be regarded as baseless speculation.”

But Politico reports The White House did not respond to separate questions on its post-midterm plans for Iran.

The cardinal sin of MAGA world appears to be grifting without giving President Donald Trump either a cut of it or permission from him to do it, said The Bulwark's Jonathan V. Last and Catherine Rampell on the Friday episode of "Receipts."

The two began by discussing Alina Habba Mildon, who allegedly signed a contract with a Venezuelan family for $50 million while also working for the Justice Department, the New York Times reported. The contract was for a year working as general counsel for a the company started by the daughter of Julio Herrera Velutini. Herrera was seeking a pardon from Trump at the time of the contract.

Last joked that Herrera appears to have been pardoned for bribery with bribery.

"It's funny to me that the people in Trump's orbit don't understand that they need to be making him whole," Last said.

Rampell quibbled with the idea of "whole," saying that it "implies there's a deficit there. He is not rich enough. That he has not siphoned off enough public dollars or private dollars in the process of being president."

The Times report revealed that Trump was furious about the deal and its size. He ultimately said that the family shouldn't pay out the rest of the contract after they'd given her $10 million. The message got back to them.

Last talked about former Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and her aide Corey Lewandowski, who were caught in a number of pay-to-play scandals and accusations. A friend's company handled a $220 million ad campaign. The commentators explained that, at one point, Lewandowski wanted to send a threatening letter, but realized it likely wouldn't be smart to put threats in writing, so he wrote down what he wanted a staffer to say and then sent the staffer. Last remarked that the whole situation was like "a mob movie."

Rampell said it was more like a satire of a mob movie. "This is bumbling people trying to emulate the mafia and the mob and failing and then pointing the finger at each other and sometimes making a lot of money but ultimately clowning themselves."

Last explained it like a drug deal where someone who works under a "boss" says they have a $15 million deal on something and would give the "boss" something to bless the deal. What Last said that Habba Mildon didn't do is give Trump a cut.

"None of these people seem to do that! Go to Eric. Go to Barron! Say, I'll throw $10 million into your stupid Trump coin so I can do this. Make sure the boss is ok," said Last. "And none of them do that!"

Others on the list include Kimberly Guilfoyle, who was recently fired after text messages revealed that she begged a Trump donor to pay her $100,000 American Express bill before her confirmation hearing for the Ambassador post.

Two others who recently surfaced were James Blair and Chris LaCivita. Both men were working for a pro-Russian government in a Balkan election, Bloomberg reported. The men traveled to Republika Srpska, a self-governing part of Bosnia and Herzegovina. There they "consulted" on voting issues ahead of Sunday's election for the nationalist party.

Rampell noted that she believes the reports said that gave much of the money to the Trump Presidential Library after the president got mad.

Brad Parscale, the former Trump campaign manager, had a falling out with the president when an ad from The Lincoln Project revealed how much money Parscale was making off of the campaign.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

Lawyers, legal reporters and good government advocates celebrated on Friday after Judge Ana Reyes said that she'd be appointing a special master to investigate whether the Department of Justice and the Department of the Interior lied to her at any point over the past several months of a case.

At issue is a golf course renovation. President Donald Trump wanted to take over one of the three public golf courses in Washington D.C. and turn it into a PGA-style course where competitions could be held. The process didn't go through the necessary approval process, and existing contracts to renovate and repair the whole manmade island were broken with the National Links Trust.

More recently, in October, 400 cherry blossom and other trees that had been on the island for over 100 years were chopped down. The cherry blossoms were a gift to the U.S. from Japan in 1912, and while there were hundreds of the trees on the island, there is evidence that a few of them were from that original gift, the National Park Service said.

A group of concerned citizens in the D.C. Preservation League and two frequent golfers are suing over the Trump takeover.

When it first went to court, the judge said that she trusted the administration would inform the court if any major changes were being made. Typical maintenance was fine. Cutting down over 400 trees, she explained, did not qualify as maintenance. The administration told the court about the project at 4:55 p.m. on the Friday ahead of a holiday, and the following day the trees were gone.

The judge has been incensed as she navigates the case and multiple instances in which the Justice Department may not have been as forthcoming as attorneys are required to be.

On Friday, after another hearing, Judge Reyes announced that she'd be appointing a special master to investigate whether she was, in fact, lied to.

What started out as a case about a golf course has instead become a debate over the separation of powers in the U.S. Constitution, one man remarked.

"Judge Reyes is questioning how a simple case that would have been difficult for the plaintiffs to win has suddenly become a test of the separation of powers. A constitutional crisis over a golf course, of all things," wrote one observer on BlueSky while following the reporting on the case by legal reporter Chris Geidner.

"Hey, it was a wrong turn in Sarajevo that set off The Great War. A third-rate burglary toppled Nixon. Fitting if the absurd Trump is felled by a golf course," one person replied.

"From our golf course hearing just now. Court opens investigation into possible misrepresentations by Trump admin lawyers about Trump’s plans for E. PotomacPark. This case is not just about preserving this historic public property, cocounsell DF, DDF, L&A are exposing Trump admin corruption," said Norm Eisen, whose firm, the Washington Litigation Group, is handling the plaintiffs side of the case against the government.

"This is a very smart move by Judge Reyes. It insulates the Court by providing a neutral third party. A special master can have broad powers to investigate misconduct. It ensures that the other issues in the case can move forward independently. A very sound move and very ominous for the DOJ here," said one Minneapolis attorney.

"It will go from the District Court to the D.C. Bar once the investigation is completed," said litigator Sean Satori.

"It can be a few things," began law partner Sean Marotta. "1. Reyes can sanction her herself under her inherent authority or Rule 11 or Section 1927. 2. Reyes can refer them to the D.D.C Grievance Committee for action against their D.D.C. bar admissions. 3. Reyes can refer them to the D.C. Bar."

"Also she's already made an explicit bad faith finding, so that really kicks things up," another attorney responded. Our federal courts just weren't used to/prepared for so much lying from the Department of Justice. But they appear to be learning. Good," commented department director and professor Deborah Pearlstein at Princeton University.

Fox News hosts appeared taken aback after President Donald Trump launched a vicious verbal assault on a reporter by describing him as "out of shape" and "disgusting."

The Fox show America’s Newsroom, hosted by Bill Hemmer with Martha MacCallum, showed footage from the previous day in which Reuters White House correspondent Jacob Bogage asked the president whether he was calling off a rally in Kansas over the weekend because he was "sick of traveling." The president had previously acknowledged the strain of his heavy campaign schedule.

When the reporter asked whether he was tired of traveling, the president was not amused, and he referred to the reporter as "sick" and criticized his appearance.

Trump told Bogage that he felt perfectly well before turning to personal insults.

"You are disgusting. Put yourself in shape. You look like hell," Trump said.

“Whoa,” Hemmer said, reacting to the clip with surprise, according to Mediaite.

“Mmmmmm,” MacCallum replied, appearing alarmed yet amused, followed by an awkward silence.

“I guess that settles that,” Hemmer said, laughing.

Both anchors argued that the clip, together with the intensive campaign effort, demonstrated that Trump was "leaving it all on the field" during the final days before the midterm elections.

Hemmer said Trump was clearly putting everything into the campaign and that Tuesday night, when the results start coming in for the Senate and House races, would show whether his efforts had made a difference.

If the polls are correct and the margins are just two or three points, he suggested, adding that the get-out-the-vote campaign could have a significant impact.

MacCallum agreed, saying that most of those races were still anybody's game. She pointed out that polling had been unreliable in recent years and argued that those inaccuracies had to be taken into account to get a clearer picture. Whatever the outcome, she said, no one could claim the president had failed to put in his full effort.

The rallies in Kansas and Iowa were initially canceled but have now been brought back. Trump said he was skipping Kansas because Sen. Roger Marshall was performing so well, a point Marshall also made even though recent polls showed him trailing his Democratic opponent, Adam Hamilton.

A White House official confirmed on Friday that President Trump had reinstated the campaign rallies previously canceled in Iowa and Kansas.

The official said the president was planning back-to-back rallies in Kansas and Iowa on Sunday, alongside nearly 20 tele-rallies. The official explained that the events had been rearranged to accommodate the tele-rallies recently added to Trump's schedule.

On Friday, Trump was also scheduled to campaign in Florida in the hope of energizing his supporters in a state he won comfortably in 2024. Democrats have shown relatively strong participation in early voting, although registered Republicans were slightly ahead in ballots cast as of Thursday.

It will be his latest visit to a state Republicans generally expect to win, following campaign events earlier this week in Mississippi and South Carolina.