**A scandal here! A scandal there! **Team MAGA is sprinting for the midterms, but can’t stop tripping over its own shoelaces. Oh, let us count the stumbles.
Three weeks before the all-important midterms, President Donald Trump’s team is hard at work… on their blooper reel. Polls suggest the GOP’s House and Senate majorities are both in grave peril. But Trumpworld seems hell-bent on generating enough gaffes to fill a sitcom.
Cue the Portlandia soundtrack to accompany the GOP’s latest blunder in Maine, where Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME)
is trailingSenate Democratic candidate Troy Jackson. A Republican super PACspent thousands of dollarson an ad bashing Jackson. The problem? The PAC aired the ad in Portland,Oregon— not Portland,Maine. Oops!
Then there’s the embarrassing Greek debacle, featuring Don Jr.’s ex-fiancée, Kimberly Guilfoyle. The former Fox News host resigned today from her cushy post as U.S. ambassador to Greece, after the world learned that she
had beggeda Trump donor to wire her $100,000 to pay off her credit card bill. (“These allegations are false,” Guilfoyle wrote in her𝕏resignation tweet.)
All
the drama is handing progressive commentators endless fodder to dunk on Republicans. Crooked’s Tommy Vietor, for example, said that he sent Guilfoyle a sarcastic message on X to troll her.
“‘Sup Kimbo slice. Congrats on the epic run of press coverage. Not sure how they roll in Greece, but here in ‘Murica we respect the big baller lifestyle,” Vietor said on
. “Want to come on my show and talk about it?”▶Pod Save America
Some of the GOP’s latest scandals aren’t so trivial.
Politics junkies spent the weekend trying to figure out why Republicans
were falsely accusingTexas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico of being treated at a mental facility in Ohio — when he literally just had a case of the flu. The bizarre conspiracy theory collapsed within hours.
What’s more, the Texas GOP found itself forced to defend Ken Paxton, their
comically corruptcandidate, after an account emerged of the time he reportedlywatched fireworks from a luxury apartmentinside Dubai’s Burj Khalifa last year… alongside two fugitives from U.S. justice.
Speaking of shady business abroad, many Republicans
𝕏are frustratedabout Trump’s recent deal to buy tons of Russian diesel to bring down global oil prices, which spiked due to his war with Iran. But the president doesn’t care. “I made the right choice,” Trump wroteon social media.
And amid all this, the administration is fretting over its own plan for a public execution that would amount to a government-sponsored snuff film. Trump
cast doubton Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s pledge to livestream the death of a terrorist by a firing squad, joining Vice President JD Vance, House Speaker Mike Johnson, and scores of other Republicans. “There are two thoughts: don’t show it, and show it,” he said.Very astute, Mr. President.
**Team MAGA is now scrambling to stave off defeat in states they once took for granted, including Alaska, **Kansas and Nebraska. I guess voters don’t love political scandals?
** The reviews are in: White House Press Secretary Katie Zacharia** led her first press conference today, and… it wasn’t great. She’s not nearly as smooth as Karoline Leavitt. She was visibly nervous, and stopped the briefing after only a few minutes. She took questions from only three reporters, including one from Breitbart. “She got off on the wrong foot. She needs to get much better, fast, otherwise she’ll break Scaramucci’s record,” a White House official
** Most Americans think Donald Trump is **making money from the presidency in illegal or unethical ways, according to a new poll. Only 20 percent of people think Trump isn’t doing anything wrong. “His wealth increases but the people in the country are just barely getting by,” an 87-year-old independent voter in Florida told the Associated Press. Anybody else remember the time former President Jimmy Carter put his peanut farm into a blind trust to avoid any possible conflict of interest?
** On that note, FIFA signed a seven-year, $4 million lease** for an office in Trump Tower in New York City last year, according to the
** Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) slammed federal agents for raiding** her D.C. home on Monday morning. “Make no mistake: this is an attempt to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement,” she tweeted. The Department of Justice said the search is part of an “ongoing criminal investigation,” but didn’t provide more details. Trump also weighed in: “I think she’s a terrible person, but that’s really up to the DOJ,” he told reporters.
** Cornell banned frat parties for the rest of the year** and pledged to add sexual assault investigators to the campus police force, amid nationwide uproar about a female student’s alleged gang rape by seven frat brothers in 2024.
** Country star Kacey Musgraves slammed Kristi Noem **after the former DHS secretary criticized Musgraves for taking a photo with James Talarico. “I don’t think you have a dog in this fight but if you did you
** Users on X trolled Elon Musk after he posted a screenshot **of a Lego order that he placed using his Grok AI chatbot, which included his order number, email address, and last four digits of his credit card. A user plugged that info into the Lego website to cancel the order. Another user, however, reactivated the purchase, ordered 400 Lego sets, and changed the shipping address.
** Conservationists in California are working to revive** the population of sunflower sea stars, a critically endangered critter that can have up to 24 arms. The stars could help bring back dwindling kelp populations by eating sea urchins, which feast on the algae.
** NASA’s Perseverance rover on Mars broke the record** for the farthest any vehicle (not on Earth) has ever driven, traversing 28.1 miles.
** Some astronomers believe in so-called superhabitable planets,** which supposedly revolve around cooler, slower burning, orange-hued stars. These planets theoretically are larger and rounder than Earth, have warmer and more stable climates, and would be home to “a whole world of balmy archipelagos and reefs,” the
