Hello, friends!

I know, I know. What fresh hell are we diving into today?

Stay for the good stuff: a little hope, a special birthday, and a song that perfectly sums up this week.

No foam. No filter. Let’s go.☕️

1. Signed, Sealed, Rejected

Imagine casting your ballot, mailing it in, and discovering it won’t count because you forgot to seal an envelope, or because the Postal Service didn’t process it in time.

Welcome to the 2026 midterms.

In North Carolina, new Republican-backed absentee voting rules require voters to seal their ballots inside an inner envelope before placing them in the mailing envelope.

According to , roughly 3% of mail ballots are being rejected across 27 counties reviewed–twice the statewide rejection rate in 2022. In some counties, rejection rates have reached 7–8%. Thousands more ballots could be rejected if those trends continue.

Meanwhile, a separate investigation uncovered another problem: Postal Service cost-cutting measures have slowed mail processing in rural communities, delaying postmarks and leaving otherwise valid ballots arriving too late.

Across five states examined, late-ballot rejection rates doubled or tripled in counties affected by postal service cuts.

The irony? The hardest-hit areas disproportionately voted for Trump in 2024.

Postal Service officials say special procedures for handling election mail should help prevent similar problems in November, but many of us who work on election security and protecting democracy remain concerned.

🗳️ The Envelope That Could Cost Your Vote (Democracy Docket)

2. Even Trump’s DOJ Is Looking at This One

Remember those luxury planes and the $220 million advertising campaign featuring former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem? I wrote about that taxpayer-funded spending spree earlier this month.

Well, a familiar name has resurfaced.

The Justice Department is investigating Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s former campaign manager and Noem’s top adviser, over allegations that he personally profited from his government role. The probe began with a referral from DHS’s own inspector general, whose investigation has been underway for months. Lewandowski was technically a temporary government employee, yet reportedly wielded enormous influence over DHS contracts. He apparently even signed some contracts despite questions about his legal authority. Meanwhile, disaster relief funding was reportedly held up, at his direction.

Lewandowski denies wrongdoing and hasn’t been charged.

Trump’s Justice Department investigating a Trump loyalist? Somebody check the thermostat in hell. Either the evidence was too big to bury, or Lewandowski just became the most expendable man in MAGA world. With congressional Democrats already investigating DHS spending and the midterms approaching, the question is how far this goes.

I spent years working inside DHS. Government contracts leave paper trails. Those trails don’t necessarily end with the person who signed the paperwork.

💸 Lewandowski’s DHS Role Under Criminal Investigation (The Guardian)

3. Hegseth Wanted the World, His Staff Broke It

You really can’t make this stuff up.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wanted a historic globe associated with Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower during World War II moved into his Pentagon office. One problem: The experts who normally handle priceless military artifacts were furloughed during the government shutdown.

So Hegseth’s staff reportedly decided to move it themselves.

They dropped it.

The 1930s-era globe crashed onto its base, leaving a several-inch gash near Antarctica. The Army confirmed the damage, while the Pentagon responded: "Accidents happen."

Yes, they do. That’s generally why you wait for the professionals instead of having your staff play furniture movers with a priceless piece of history.

I can’t say I’m shocked by the apparent disregard for expert advice. Given this administration’s approach to military decisions involving, oh, let’s say, Iran, the episode raises a familiar question: who gets listened to before consequential decisions are made?

On a personal note, I had the honor of seeing that globe while it was still intact. I’m grateful I did.

🌎 Hegseth’s Pentagon Globe Mishap (WaPo)

4. FEMA’s New Disaster Plan: States, You’re on Your Own

Hurricane? Wildfire? Catastrophic flooding? Better hope your state has a healthy savings account.

The Trump administration is preparing to shift more disaster recovery costs and responsibilities onto states, with changes potentially beginning in as little as six months. FEMA Administrator Cameron Hamilton told state officials they need bigger financial reserves and stronger capabilities to handle disasters without relying as heavily on Washington.

To be clear, states and local governments have always led initial disaster responses. FEMA steps in when disasters overwhelm their capabilities. What’s changing is how much financial responsibility Washington expects states to shoulder.

The catch? FEMA’s own report found state disaster agencies are often understaffed, underfunded, and heavily dependent on federal assistance.

I worked on federal disaster response, including Hurricane Katrina. I saw firsthand how quickly even prepared states can be overwhelmed. That’s exactly when Washington needs to show up.

Disasters don’t respect state lines. Neither should our willingness to help Americans recover.

🌪️ FEMA’s Plan to Shift Disaster Costs to States (Politico)

5. Bird Flu Is Spreading: Officials Aren’t Testing the Workers

Remember when we learned the hard way what happens when people ignore public health warnings? Well, this headline nearly made me spit out my coffee.

A ProPublica investigation uncovered a bird flu outbreak that has been spreading for more than two months at a Utah mink farm housing thousands of animals.

Why mink? Their respiratory systems share characteristics with humans, making them potential hosts for dangerous viral mutations. Scientists worry the virus could eventually adapt to spread more easily among people.

And the reasoning? State health officials said active monitoring frustrated farmers and made cooperation harder. Interesting…

Officials also declined to order the infected mink culled, citing concerns about the farm’s livelihood. Utah officials say they haven’t identified spread beyond the farm. But if you’re not monitoring workers or testing for infections, how would you know?

I worked on pandemic response inside the White House. I’ve seen what happens when public health warnings collide with political and economic considerations. The CDC still rates the public risk as low, and there’s no evidence of sustained human-to-human transmission. But waiting until that changes to take precautions? That’s exactly the danger experts are warning about.

We don’t need another pandemic to learn the same lessons all over again.

🦠 Bird Flu, Mink Farms, and the Next Pandemic (ProPublica)

🕊️ One Thing for Your Soul: Standing Together

Across nine states, more than 1,200 volunteers are preparing to stand outside polling places on Election Day. They’re called poll chaplains and peacekeepers, and their mission isn’t to campaign. It’s to offer reassurance, help defuse tensions, and make sure people don’t feel afraid.

Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Quakers, and people of no particular faith. Different beliefs, one shared commitment to treating their neighbors with dignity.

The story that stayed with me: In 2020, when a mob stormed a Detroit vote-counting center, the Rev. Steve Bland and other faith leaders put their bodies between the crowd and the building. Now he’s back as a poll chaplain. During a past election, he reassured an elderly woman who felt too intimidated to vote. She came back with her two grandsons. As Bland put it, "Without that intervention, three people wouldn’t have voted that day."

After intimidation flyers appeared in my own neighborhood, this story hit especially close to home.

🗳️ Faith Leaders Unite to Counter Voter Intimidation (AP)

Keep showing up at the polls. Keep standing by one another. Vote early! And to my readers around the world who are standing with us through all of this: Thank you. Your support means more than you know.❤️

🐾 A little birthday joy before you go! Our sweet Stevie turned 7 this week, with Ringo on hand to supervise the celebration (aka steak). Happy Birthday, Stevie! Seven years of love, laughter, and a whole lot of personality. We love you to the moon and back!

And for those days when the headlines are so wild you can’t decide whether to laugh, cry, or spike your coffee, here’s a new release for your playlist. Sometimes you need a song that gets it.

🎧 “We’re F*cked” by Chuck Lorre and Barenaked Ladies

Finally, I’m off to El Paso, the city that raised me!🌵 I’ll be at the Clear Eyes, Full Hearts, Can’t Lose rally with James Talarico this Monday, October 26. If you’ll be there, come say hello. I’d love to meet my fellow El Pasoans. Rooting for you, Texas!

-Olivia

Last Monday, at my home in Northern Virginia, I woke up, looked outside, and saw paper tucked under the windshield wipers of every car on my block. And the next block. And the one after that.

They were flyers. “Sanctuary City Information Notice.” A Department of Homeland Security seal in the corner. A list of federal laws about “illegal aliens” voting. A hotline for neighbors to report anyone they suspected. It was the actual ICE tip line.

My security cameras caught the person who did it. Middle of the night. Masked up. Fully covered, walking car to car with a stack of these things like he was delivering pizza menus. I’ve lived in this area on and off for twenty years, between career assignments and deployments. I’ve never seen anything like it.

My mom was here that morning. Before I could stop her, she walked outside and read the flyer in my hand. She’s a Mexican immigrant and a U.S. citizen, and she was scared. That’s the part I can’t shake. Not the paper. The fact that a woman who has done everything right in this country, who raised a daughter who spent more than twenty years protecting it, read that flyer and felt hunted.

That was the point.

I contacted the mayor, gave my security footage to Alexandria police, and made sure local media knew what happened.

Authority borrowed, real fear

DHS says it had nothing to do with the flyers. Okay. So someone put a federal agency’s seal on a piece of propaganda and distributed it through neighborhoods weeks before an election, with early voting already underway in Virginia.

And there wasn’t just one version. In Del Ray, the flyers said: “Arlington Community Watch” (wrong county, but whatever). Another version read “Volunteer Community Watch.” Same design. Same federal seal. Same ICE hotline. Different labels.

That’s not a typo. Someone went to the trouble of making different versions of the same warning.

Who made them? And how many more are out there?

The flyers call us a sanctuary city. Neither Alexandria nor Arlington officially uses that designation. But facts were never the point.

Here’s the trick: the flyers mostly recite actual law. Non-citizens cannot vote in federal elections. True!

So, who’s the audience?

Naturalized citizens have every right to vote. Green card holders cannot vote in federal elections. But neither should have to fear being reported to DHS because of their accent, last name, or skin color. And the flyer isn’t really talking to them. It’s talking to the guy next door, handing him a hotline and a permission slip to turn suspicion into a call to DHS.

That’s not a community watch. That’s a snitch line with a federal seal slapped on it.

Police say they’re still investigating. Nobody knows who distributed these flyers. And I want to know who did.

It’s not just my street

I started looking for identical flyers elsewhere. I haven’t found them. Yet.

Instead, I found a troubling pattern: different tactics, different states, and recurring messages about who belongs at the ballot box.

Miami: Earlier this month, a man allegedly impersonated an ICE agent at a Miami Dade College voting site where Brazilians were casting ballots in their country’s election. Wearing an ICE jacket, hat, and mask, he reportedly frightened voters who feared deportation. He told investigators he wanted to “see people’s reactions.” He’s charged with voter intimidation.

He didn’t need a U.S. election to frighten people. Just the costume.

North Carolina: About 1,400 registered voters received letters questioning their citizenship and asking them to prove eligibility or remove themselves from the rolls. They were flagged by the federal SAVE database, which can misidentify recently naturalized citizens. Eligible voters were not automatically removed from the rolls.

But imagine opening a letter questioning whether you’re American.

Syracuse, New York: ICE agents entered an active polling place in June to confront a poll worker about an Instagram post. Even the county’s Republican election commissioner criticized the signal it sent.

And this isn’t new.

North Carolina, 2024: A group placed nearly 1,000 Spanish-language warning signs near early voting sites. The signs accurately stated that noncitizens couldn’t vote, and election officials allowed them to remain. Here’s the rub: the group’s president was recorded describing voters with “Hispanic-sounding last names” as suspicious…

These incidents don’t prove a single coordinated operation, but they do show how different tactics can produce the same result: fear around voting.

NOTE: If you’ve seen flyers like the ones in my neighborhood, send me a photo, the city, date, and location. You’re my national search party. And please, let your local law enforcement and authorities know.

Follow the numbers

Now look at what the federal government is telling Americans.

In July, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin claimed the department had identified more than 250,000 potential noncitizens registered to vote in four states. A staggering number. Except FactCheck.org’s July 17 analysis found that DHS hadn’t disclosed its methodology. Election experts warned that comparing voter rolls with commercial databases can produce false matches.

Your name appears in two databases, and suddenly you’re being counted as a suspected noncitizen. What?!

In Nevada, DHS initially flagged nearly 16,000 records. After further review, that fell to 185. Nevada officials later reported that all 185 were U.S. citizens. By the time the numbers were corrected, the scary headline had already traveled.

I warned about all of this on September 1 in my article ICE Is Coming for the Voter Rolls, when Homeland Security Investigations–an agency that investigates terrorism, cartels, and serious transnational crimes–was being directed toward voter rolls in nine states.

Prosecute actual violations. Absolutely. But let’s not confuse allegations, questionable records, and proven illegal votes. They aren’t interchangeable.

Then came Monday’s arrests in California.

DOJ announced 28 arrests under "Operation Protect the Vote." Those arrested were lawful permanent residents—green card holders—not undocumented immigrants. One was a 72-year-old Belize-born man taken from his home in pajamas by heavily armed agents.

If proven, the alleged violations warrant appropriate consequences. But fifteen days before Election Day, images of armed agents arresting immigrants send a message far beyond those charged.

Meanwhile, FBI Director Kash Patel celebrated Monday’s California arrests involving alleged voter fraud.

Twenty-eight arrests. A national announcement. Another headline about voter fraud. Reminder that arrests aren’t convictions, and individual allegations don’t prove widespread illegal voting.

When government becomes the messenger

Since September 2025, DOJ has sued 30 states and Washington, D.C., demanding unredacted voter rolls containing sensitive information about millions of Americans. Utah’s Republican Lieutenant Governor Deidre Henderson refused to surrender protected information. Other states have pushed back, too.

Here’s what happened in court.

Federal judges dismissed all 26 cases that had received final district-court rulings. Twelve judges were Republican appointees, including eight appointed by Trump. A George W. Bush-appointed judge in West Virginia called DOJ’s demand "devoid of any factual basis." Other judges found that the laws DOJ cited didn’t authorize its demands.

The administration has appealed most rulings. Yet the nationwide push for voter data continues. California offers a glimpse of what that pressure looks like on the ground. DOJ gave officials 48 hours to review a list of 20,000 supposed noncitizens, then sued.

Federal officials also warned that election workers counting unlawful ballots could face criminal liability. Trump went further, posting that people involved "will all go to jail for a long period of time!!!"

Imagine being a county election worker reading that.

On 60 Minutes, Lesley Stahl asked DOJ civil rights chief Harmeet Dhillon whether these efforts were intended to sow distrust in elections.

Her answer: No. "The distrust is there."

Asked about the election process, Dhillon also said she expected normal counting and certification, "absent some shocking contingency."

But distrust doesn’t appear out of nowhere.

I’ve spent more than twenty years working in national security. I’ve sat through briefings on foreign influence operations designed to undermine trust in American institutions. Official-looking material. Anonymous distribution. A targeted audience. A frightening narrative that doesn’t need to be true to do damage.

I’ve also worked inside the Trump White House alongside Trump and Stephen Miller, with Kash Patel in that orbit. I watched political fear become a messaging strategy. In the lead-up to the 2020 election, it was “law and order.” I remember a meeting where they described the audience they wanted to reach and scare as “suburban housewives.”

Immigration was part of that messaging, too. By the 2024 election, it had become an even more prominent campaign issue.

Now it’s noncitizen voting. Different crisis. Different target. Familiar tactics.

And that’s what I recognized when I saw those flyers on my neighbors’ windshields. I cannot tell you who printed them. I won’t pretend they’re connected to anyone in government. However, when national leaders repeatedly warn of an invasion of illegal voters, someone distributing anonymous warnings in a neighborhood doesn’t have to invent the narrative. It’s already out there.

What happens after Election Day?

Trump has called for Republicans to “nationalize the voting” in roughly fifteen places. At last month’s Republican Midterm Convention, he led supporters in a pledge to vote, even if they weren’t registered, and to "cheat like hell."

On Monday, ProPublica reported that DHS political appointees asked CISA—the agency responsible for helping protect election infrastructure—to secretly obtain and hack a voting machine, report findings to the White House, and conceal vulnerabilities from the manufacturer. Career officials refused. The plan reportedly never happened.

If you discover an election-system vulnerability, the responsible thing is to fix it, but why keep it secret? One former official suggested the information could be used to cast doubt on election results.

Before Election Day, fear can discourage eligible citizens from voting. After Election Day, fraud allegations can become ammunition to challenge results.

Two different consequences. One common casualty: public trust in elections.

So what do we do?

Fear is what they’re counting on. Don’t give it the final word.

1. Found a flyer, sign, or strange letter? Don’t toss it. Photograph it where you found it and note the time and place. Report suspected voter intimidation to election officials or law enforcement. You can also call 866-OUR-VOTE (866-687-8683) or 888-VE-Y-VOTA for assistance in Spanish.

2. Call your people. Especially naturalized citizens and mixed-status families. Eligible, registered citizens have every right to vote. Period.

3. Show up. Sign up to serve as a poll worker or learn how to become an authorized election observer.

4. Don’t spread panic. Verify alarming claims about polling places with election officials before sharing them. Rumors can do the intimidators’ work for them.

5. Vote. Early, if you can. Know your rights, make a plan, and don’t let intimidation make that decision for you.

They left their message on my car. Here’s mine back: my neighbors, my mom, and millions of people like her aren’t going anywhere. We’re voting.

Until next time,

–Olivia

Washington’s cutting services, Trump’s talking about shooting leakers, and Fox News is apparently at war with journalism. Just another perfectly normal week in America. The coffee’s strong. The absurdity is stronger.

No foam, no filter. Let’s go.

1. Trump Says Leakers Should Be Shot

This barely made a blip in the news cycle, but it should have. At a Wednesday rally in Arizona, Trump declared: “In my opinion, leakers should be shot.” The crowd applauded.

He was referring to someone allegedly revealing military plans. Which raises an interesting question: Remember when Pete Hegseth shared operational details of impending strikes in Yemen in a Signal chat that accidentally included a journalist? The Pentagon’s own inspector general found that Hegseth violated department policy and created risks for American troops. Funny how Trump’s outrage over exposing military plans doesn’t seem to extend to his own Defense Secretary.

I’ve heard this rhetoric before.

In 2019, Trump compared people who provided information to a whistleblower to spies and invoked how treason was punished “in the old days.” I was serving in his administration then. Later, when people like Miles Taylor and I publicly spoke out about what we’d witnessed, we became targets of his attacks.

I also witnessed when he suggested shooting protesters in the legs during the 2020 demonstrations. It was one of the reasons I walked away from my intelligence career, resigned, and went public to warn Americans about the danger of his leadership.

There’s a difference between prosecuting unlawful disclosures of classified information and threatening people who expose wrongdoing. Consider the message this sends to the next government employee who witnesses misconduct, or to the journalist whose sources are already afraid to talk. Maybe that’s precisely the point.

🚨 Trump’s Call to Shoot Leakers (TIME)

2. HUD Was Gutted, Renters Are Paying the Price

Remember when we were told that slashing the federal workforce would make the government more efficient? Well, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) just checked the receipts.

Turns out, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) lost 29% of its workforce in 2025. HUD lost 29% of its workforce in 2025. More than half of those who left had abundant experience having served at least a decade, and Americans are feeling the consequences.

According to the GAO report, which was just publicly released, housing organizations described delayed safety inspections, slower discrimination investigations, and disruptions to rental assistance. One housing agency lost access to its federal funding system for three months, forcing it to tap reserves. Property managers delayed maintenance because rental assistance payments arrived late.

Here’s a particularly troubling example: One fair housing organization opened just 25 discrimination cases during a ten-month funding gap, compared with 82 during the previous ten months. Interesting…

So who’s getting the more efficient government? Certainly not the renters waiting for inspections, families seeking assistance, or people trying to fight housing discrimination.

HUD says it’s modernizing operations. But when GAO asked for information to evaluate those efforts, the agency didn’t provide it. Apparently, accountability isn’t part of the efficiency plan.

🏠 HUD Cuts, Real Consequences (GAO)

3. Costa Rica Gets Its Own CECOT

The Central American country famous for rainforests, pura vida, and having no standing army since 1948 is now taking a page from El Salvador’s prison playbook.

This week, Costa Rica’s right-wing populist President Laura Fernández inaugurated a $35 million mega-prison designed to hold 5,100 inmates. It’s modeled after El Salvador’s notorious CECOT facility, where human rights organizations have documented serious abuses.

So how did Costa Rica get here?

Cartel violence has surged, with homicides reaching a record high in 2023. Fernández promised a crackdown.

Enter El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, whose sweeping anti-gang campaign dramatically reduced murders, but also resulted in more than 91,000 arrests under emergency measures and widespread allegations of arbitrary detention and abuse. And now, his prison model is becoming an export. Ecuador has already adopted a similar approach, while other Latin American governments are looking to Bukele for inspiration.

Costa Rica has a real cartel problem. Nobody’s disputing that. But when your solution comes straight from a government accused of mass arbitrary detentions and torture, we should probably be asking a few more questions. Fighting organized crime shouldn’t mean abandoning the rule of law.

If you haven’t listened to The Daily’s 2024 episode on Bukele, I highly recommend it. It’s an excellent look at how Bukele built his tough-on-crime model, and why Costa Rica’s decision deserves a closer look.

🇨🇷 Costa Rica’s CECOT Copycat (AP)

4. Fox News Attacks the Media Every 15 Minutes

Ever wonder how millions of Americans end up convinced that practically every news outlet except the one they’re watching is lying to them? Well, researchers at Duke University just put some numbers behind that question.

After analyzing 15 years of cable news transcripts, they found that Fox News disparages other news organizations or journalism itself roughly every 14.5 minutes. For comparison, MSNBC did so every 61 minutes. CNN? Every 140 minutes.

That’s roughly 10 times as often as CNN and four times as often as MSNBC.

Fox’s most frequent target wasn’t CNN, MSNBC, or The New York Times. It was “the media” itself. A news network repeatedly telling its own viewers that journalism can’t be trusted.

Meanwhile, a September 2026 Gallup poll found that just 22% of Republicans trust the news media, compared with 50% of Democrats. Overall, only one in three Americans trusts the media to report the news accurately and fairly.

The researchers haven’t established that Fox’s attacks are causing that distrust—but when millions of viewers repeatedly hear that other journalists are dishonest or deliberately misleading them, how willing are they to consider information from anywhere else? And what happens to a country when we can’t even agree on which sources of information to trust?

📺 Fox’s War on the Media (Nieman Lab)

5. Americans Are Rethinking Medicare for All

Three weeks before the midterms, Americans have a message about health care.

A new Axios–Ipsos poll finds that 43% support Medicare for All, compared with 24% opposed. Another 32% aren’t sure. And here’s another insight: Two-thirds of Americans, including half of Republicans, want the federal government to spend more to lower health care costs.

Meanwhile, Washington has been moving in the opposite direction…

Last year, Trump signed a Republican-backed law cutting projected federal health care spending by roughly $1.1 trillion over ten years, largely through changes to Medicaid. The Congressional Budget Office estimates its coverage provisions will leave 10 million additional Americans uninsured by 2034. On top of that, enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits expired at the end of 2025 after Congress failed to extend them, leaving many families facing higher insurance premiums.

Here’s the irony: Americans want more help from Washington but barely trust its leaders.

The same poll found that just 20% trust Trump for health-related information, while only 25% trust Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. To be clear, wanting lower medical bills isn’t the same as supporting Medicare for All. Only 21% of Republicans support that specific proposal.

If that’s not a disconnect between what Americans need and what Washington is delivering, I don’t know what is.

🏥 Medicare for All Gains Ground (Axios)

📍See What’s Happening in Your State

Federal funding cuts and freezes aren’t just numbers in Washington. They have real consequences for communities nationwide. States United and Grant Witness have created an incredibly valuable resource called Lost Funds that lets you explore federal funding disruptions in your own state, from health care and education to food assistance and infrastructure.

Ahead of the midterms, this tool helps connect national policy decisions to what’s happening in your community. Take a look at what’s happening in your state. The numbers may surprise you. Please share this resource so others can see for themselves.

Lost Funds: $170 BILLION GONE

🍋 One Thing For Your Soul

When Payton Obert was just 18 months old, a teddy bear donated to her during a hospital stay comforted her. Years later, at age eight, she decided to return that kindness by opening a lemonade stand to raise money for toys for hospitalized children. Her first stand raised $768 in 2018.

Eight years later, Payton’s Lemonade Stand has grown into a remarkable effort that has helped deliver $5 million in gifts and necessities to children and families facing hardship. In 2026 alone, young volunteers raised $170,000, with lemonade stands reaching communities well beyond Payton’s hometown of Cincinnati.

What began with one little girl remembering how much a teddy bear meant to her has become a movement of kids helping kids. Sometimes, changing the world starts with a glass of lemonade.

🧸 Payton’s Lemonade Stand (Good News Network)

I’m heading out to No Kings later today! If you’re in the DC area, come say hello. I’ll be at the Vote Early to Stop the Arch March.

Wherever you’re rallying, stay safe! I’d love to see your photos, so send them, share them, and tag me. Let’s see those crowds!

—Olivia

I grew up in a truck-driving family. I know what it costs to keep a rig on the road, and I know diesel prices don’t stay at the pump. They ride into every grocery aisle, every delivery, every farm in this country. When fuel gets expensive, working people feel it first and longest.

That’s exactly why I’m not buying what got sold on October 9.

Trump announced Putin would release 300,000 tons of diesel onto U.S. and global markets this month, with more to come. Washington quietly eased sanctions on Russian diesel to make it happen. Meanwhile, U.S. officials have been leaning on Ukraine to stop hitting Russian refineries.

Cheaper fuel is the pitch. Nobody’s told you the price.

Hell, even Mike Pence, not exactly a card-carrying member of the resistance, urged Trump to rescind the deal. So did some U.S. senators, four of them Republicans.

And who rushed to answer him? Mike Flynn. Yes, Trump’s disgraced former national security adviser, the one Trump pardoned after he pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his Russian contacts. That Mike Flynn.

You can’t make this stuff up.

Read more

Every Saturday, I bring you stories that deserve your attention. This week, one story is too important to wait until Tuesday’s Deep Dive. So pour yourself some covfefe (or morning tea), and buckle up. ☕️

This week, broke the story of a leaked Pentagon memo. In it, the Department of Defense (War 🙄) agreed to loan its Active Denial System, better known as the “heat ray,” to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which is part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

According to the memo:

• July 22: DHS asked for the weapon.

• September 23: The Pentagon said yes. That was less than three weeks ago.

• How long: About seven months.

• Who operates it: CBP personnel, not the military, under CBP’s own law enforcement authorities.

Read that last line again. The Pentagon may own the machine, but CBP would have its hands on the controls.

Working inside the government teaches you to read announcements differently. And then there are internal memos that stop you cold. This is definitely one of them.

Watch my conversation with Jim about the memo on YouTube:

Why I’m paying attention

My years at the Pentagon during the Iraq War were spent working on counterterrorism, insurgency, and detention issues. Later I worked extensively on homeland and border security. I understand why troops and law enforcement need options that can prevent violence and save lives. I also know that the rules governing those options, and who enforces them, matter as much as the tools themselves. That’s why this memo is so alarming: the weapon’s history, the way it has been discussed for use at home, and the authority now being handed to CBP all point to serious concerns.

Who can authorize its use, and against whom? What stops it from being used far beyond the southern border, including against Americans exercising their First Amendment rights? This administration needs to answer those questions before anyone turns this weapon on another human being.

What is a “heat ray,” in plain English?

Think of it as a giant invisible beam. The Active Denial System fires millimeter-wave energy, a cousin of microwaves, that heats the outer layer of your skin within seconds. There’s no bullet, no rubber round, and no tear gas. You can’t see the beam, but you will absolutely feel it. People who have been hit describe feeling like their skin is on fire. The pain stops when you get out of the beam.

That’s the whole idea. It’s a weapon designed to change human behavior through pain. When I discussed this with a friend, their immediate reaction was, this sounds like torture…well, in my opinion, it’s because it is. The military spent decades developing it as a less-lethal option for crowds, checkpoints, and protecting troops. Supporters say it gives personnel a choice before resorting to deadly force. That’s a fair argument, and worth taking seriously.

But this weapon’s history should give all of us pause.

Built for war. Then the military hesitated to use it.

The Marines wanted it to control crowds without killing anyone. Officials also considered it for controlling detainee violence at the Camp Bucca detention facility in Iraq. According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Pentagon policy officials concluded that using it on detainees was politically untenable. Other deployment plans ran into problems with the system’s size and complexity. By December 2008, efforts to deploy it overseas had been terminated.

In 2010, the military finally shipped one to Afghanistan. It came home without ever being used.

Here’s the part most people don’t know. Even while the military struggled to use it abroad, the Pentagon was exploring uses here at home, possibly including the southern border. A 2009 GAO report documented that, and warned that the policy for using this kind of weapon was incomplete.

Then they looked closer to home. Twice.

In 2018, days before the midterm elections, CBP officials suggested using the heat ray on migrants at the southern border. Then-DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen vetoed it. DHS later denied the idea was ever seriously considered. I was serving in the Trump White House at the time, and I remember hearing about those discussions. Given what I knew about this technology from my Pentagon years, I was relieved when DHS leadership shut it down.

Notice that the agency that floated the heat ray in 2018 is the same agency that now may be getting one.

Then came June 1, 2020. Protests filled Washington after George Floyd’s killing. The Defense Department’s top military police official for the capital region emailed the D.C. National Guard to ask whether it had two crowd-control devices: a Long Range Acoustic Device, often called a “sound cannon,” and the Active Denial System. National Guard Maj. Adam DeMarco later disclosed that email to Congress. It was sent the same day law enforcement forcibly cleared protesters from Lafayette Square.

I was there that day. I had just walked the grounds outside the White House, and I remember the sequence of events like it was yesterday. I have friends who were in that crowd, and I don’t take what happened to them lightly.

To be clear, the heat ray was not used at Lafayette Square. The Guard didn’t have one, and the Pentagon later described the inquiry as planning and said no further action was taken. But the question was asked.

Now look at how this has progressed:

• 2018: CBP suggested it. The DHS Secretary said no.

• 2020: Federal officials asked whether it was available. It wasn’t.

• 2026: The Pentagon has reportedly approved lending it to CBP, operated under CBP’s own authority.

That progression sends a chill down my spine.

Imagine it at a protest

We’ve already seen protests outside federal buildings and tense confrontations between demonstrators and federal agents. Now picture CBP bringing the heat ray to one of those protests, perhaps to back up another DHS agency. A crowd gathers. Most people are peaceful, but a few aren’t. Someone throws a bottle and a barrier gets pushed. Officers order everyone to disperse, and some people don’t leave. That crowd includes peaceful protesters, journalists, medics, and maybe a handful of people breaking the law.

Who decides whether a weapon built to inflict pain gets turned on all of them?

I’m not saying CBP has been authorized to use this on protesters. I’m asking whether the rules clearly prohibit it. A tool introduced for border security should not quietly become a tool for controlling protests on American streets.

The Pentagon has already told us how it sees this weapon

In July 2025, the Pentagon’s Joint Intermediate Force Capabilities Office published an article titled “Directed Energy Weapons: A Safer, Smarter Tool for Border Security.” It named Active Denial Technology specifically. The article described using directed energy to deter unauthorized crossings, secure ports of entry, and control crowds during large migration surges. It discussed people who approach restricted areas aggressively or “non-compliantly,” and described the heat ray’s effect as a way to get compliance.

Compliance. Sit with that word.

Stopping someone who is about to hurt you is very different from using pain to make someone follow orders.

Shootings involving federal immigration agents are no longer hypothetical. Remember Alex Pretti, the ICU nurse shot and killed by CBP officers during a Minneapolis protest in January? Is the goal to prevent deadly encounters? Or is it to widen the situations where agents can use force on people who aren’t an immediate threat?

CBP’s own Use of Force Policy already lists directed-energy devices among the tools that can cause pain or discomfort to change behavior. That doesn’t mean the policy specifically authorizes the heat ray. It does mean we need clear, public rules on exactly when it can and can’t be used.

Now picture the border

A large crowd approaches a port of entry. Agents fear the barriers will be overrun, and they want to avoid using their guns. The beam comes on, people feel intense heat, and they move. In that moment, a less-lethal weapon might genuinely reduce danger. Now change the facts. What if the crowd isn’t violent? What if the people refusing to move are asylum seekers? What if a few people are damaging a fence while hundreds of others, including children, are doing nothing wrong?

Then there are the questions nobody has answered:

• Detention centers: Could this end up inside ICE facilities? The Pentagon already decided that using it on detainees in Iraq was politically untenable. What stops it here?

• Mexico: Could CBP aim it at someone standing on Mexican soil, and who would approve that? That’s not just a use-of-force question. It’s an international sovereignty question, and I guarantee Mexico’s president will be asking it.

“Nonlethal” doesn’t mean harmless

The military says the heat ray’s effects are generally temporary and reversible. But testing hasn’t been entirely injury-free, and safety depends on how long someone is exposed and under what conditions. The whole system depends on one assumption: that you can get out of the way.

What about someone pinned against a fence, a person in a wheelchair, or an elderly woman? What about a child trapped in a crowd, or someone who trips and falls?

One violent person in a crowd doesn’t make everyone around them a legitimate target.

Why now? And why seven months?

We are just over three weeks from the November 3 midterm elections.

In 2018, CBP floated the heat ray days before the midterms. In 2020, officials asked about it during protests in Washington. Now, weeks before another election, the Pentagon has signed off on a seven-month loan.

I’m not alleging these events are connected. I am asking why this weapon is being made available now, what operational need justifies it, and why the arrangement runs seven months.

DHS and the Pentagon should be able to answer that.

The questions we should all be asking

Before this weapon is used on anyone, the public deserves answers:

1. Where is it going, and why?

2. Who authorizes each use, and against whom?

3. Can it be used on protesters, nonviolent crowds, or detainees?

4. Can it be moved away from the southern border, or aimed into Mexico?

5. What medical safeguards apply? Will every activation be documented and reviewed?

6. Why seven months, what happens afterward, and what oversight will Congress have?

If you do one thing today, send these questions to your senators and representatives. Ask them to demand CBP’s rules for this weapon, in writing.

The real question is authority

Once a weapon like this is in the hands of domestic federal law enforcement, everything depends on who decides when, where, and against whom it’s used. Policies don’t enforce themselves. Safeguards only work when leadership insists on following them.

I lived this firsthand in Trump 1.0. We shouldn’t have to count on the personal restraint of whoever holds a certain cabinet level job to decide whether a weapon built to cause pain gets turned on civilians. Maybe CBP has strict rules. Maybe every use requires senior sign-off. I hope so. But hope is not an oversight mechanism.

Those rules should exist in writing, Congress should examine them, and the public deserves to know the limits.

We already know this weapon can make someone move. The question is who gets to decide when the government is allowed to make someone move by hurting them, and what happens when that person refuses.

We need that answer before anyone turns this system on.

❤️ One Thing for Your Soul

I know that was a lot. Covfefe isn’t just about what should worry us. It’s also about what should give us hope. So here’s a story that restored a little of my faith in humanity.

When Michael Jensen began volunteering at a Washington state food bank, he worried he’d have to turn people away. Instead, he found himself encouraging people to take enough food. Even people struggling to feed themselves were worried about leaving enough for others. His story inspired thousands of dollars in donations.

Sometimes the people who have the least are the ones thinking most about others. It’s a beautiful reminder that there’s still so much goodness in this world.

🥫 The Kindness of Strangers (WaPo)

Hug someone you love. And breathe.

-Olivia

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said it urgently needed planes for deportations. So urgently that it bypassed competition.

The New York Times reports that DHS approved buying five aircraft from Daedalus Aviation Corporation on Kristi Noem’s last morning as secretary: a $108 million luxury Boeing 737, two Gulfstreams totaling $106 million and two older passenger jets at $45 million each.

But according to the Times, DHS lacked crews to fly the aircraft purchased for deportations. Most remained largely idle. DHS now says four passenger airliners will carry government leaders and members of Congress overseas instead…

What then, exactly, was so urgent?

I’ve worked on both sides of federal contracting: drafting proposals, coordinating bid teams, building competitive pricing structures, and reviewing contracts from the government side. I understand why some situations require speed, and why review matters.

What I want explained is what justified the shortcut here.

Daedalus chairman William Walters contributed $10,000 to American Resolve, a PAC supporting Noem. He says he did not know of that association. Apparently, the website’s giant “Kristi Noem” heading was too subtle.

Noem disputes the donor characterization and says the purchase was finalized under her successor, Markwayne Mullin. The Times distinguishes Noem’s March approval from Mullin’s April transfer of ownership. Daedalus defends its prices by citing limited aircraft availability and tight deadlines.

How the process is supposed to work…

The government defines its requirements. Companies submit proposals describing their approach, qualifications, and price. Reviewers compare them against the stated criteria to determine best value, not always the lowest price. Capability and reliability matter, too. Competition gives the government options: better prices, faster delivery, different approaches. Lawful exceptions allow restricted competition when delay would cause serious harm or only one supplier can meet the need.

Even under the urgency exception, agencies must seek offers from as many potential suppliers as practicable. For a sole-source award, the government loses the comparison between bids. However, the agency must still justify its choice and determine that the price is fair and reasonable.

For this contract, published data identify a noncompetitive award, one offer, and an urgency exception. DHS said it urgently needed deportation aircraft. Inside a government agency, “urgent” is a powerful word. Ordinary questions can start sounding like obstacles to the mission. But that is precisely when officials should ask: Why this company? Why this price? What harm would considering alternatives cause?

Claiming urgency does not establish that skipping competition was justified.

What was so urgent?

For award 70QS0326C00005002, an independent reproduction of USA spending data shows obligations growing from about $139.9 million to $463.6 million, including a $303.2 million addition on March 24. These are commitments, not necessarily cash already paid. Did the original urgency rationale cover that expansion? Who approved it, and on what evidence?

Delay alone does not prove misconduct. A fleet needs crews, maintenance, and approvals. But what operational plan supported skipping competition? When could the planes perform the mission used to justify purchasing them? And what review supported assigning four of the passenger aircraft to a different purpose? These are exactly the questions I would have asked when reviewing these purchases from the government side.

And the bedroom?

In February, it was reported that ICE was seeking approval to purchase the luxury 737 for $70 million. DHS said it would serve two missions: deportation flights and Cabinet-level travel. It also said at least one bedroom was being converted into seating to prepare the plane for deportations.

Noem repeated the dual-mission explanation to senators in March and said she thought they were removing a bedroom. Executive travel was part of the public explanation before the purchase. But according to the Times, DHS ultimately agreed to pay $108 million. Daedalus says the government paid to replace one bedroom with a conference room. The other bedroom, bar, and luxury fittings remained.

A conference room. What happened to the deportation seating?

What explains the jump from the $70 million request to the $108 million agreement? Different terms or services may explain it. Show us the records.

Who approved that configuration? What did conversion cost? Did the written justification cover both missions, and what made them urgent enough to bypass competition? Who reviewed this?

Competitive negotiated procurements use expert evaluation teams; advisory panels are optional. Sole-source awards still require documented justification, certification, and approval. For an urgency justification at this dollar level, standard Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) rules require written approval by the agency’s senior procurement executive.

Who defined the need, evaluated the aircraft, and determined the price was reasonable? Who approved the March expansion? How were legal and ethics concerns resolved?

Publish the review chain: names, roles, dates, findings, and signatures.

A secretary’s policy approval does not replace required procurement approvals. Did those reviews happen–or did someone treat Noem’s sign-off as sufficient? Because that would be interesting, too.

I have seen what happens when those safeguards fail. I served as a witness in an inspector general investigation involving a federal contractor and an agency’s chief procurement officer. That investigation resulted in someone going to prison.

That does not establish a crime occurred here. It explains why I take these questions seriously and want an independent investigation.

The price deserves an explanation.

The Times reports that Daedalus bought the Gulfstreams for about $83 million combined and sold them to DHS for $106 million. The luxury 737’s previously advertised asking price was below $90 million. Its actual sale price to Daedalus was not disclosed. Six aviation experts consulted by the Times put typical values for the older passenger planes at $15 million to $30 million each. DHS paid $45 million each. Daedalus did not explain those individual prices.

And where was Corey Lewandowski in all of this?

Remember him?

Noem brought him into DHS as an unpaid special government employee. Yet reporting described him directing personnel and contracting. My sources at DHS say he was the gatekeeper: meetings with Noem and sign-offs went through him. Her approval policy for spending above $100,000 concentrated decisions in the same office where, those sources say, he controlled access.

By March, an inspector general inquiry into his contractor dealings was reportedly underway. The watchdog declined to confirm or deny it. His office denied directing companies to hire anyone; his lawyer denied demanding contractor payments.

Unpaid does not mean uninfluential. What did Lewandowski review, recommend, or influence—and under what authority? Who made the final decisions, and where are the records?

Current DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin has apparently since reversed Noem’s approval policy.

And what about the other contracts?

For an operation supposedly rooting out waste and fraud, an awful lot of spending needs explaining. Where are the DOGE bros on this one? Suddenly allergic to a spreadsheet?

Start with the $220 million advertising campaign. Senate oversight materials identify two no-bid awards. There’s that shortcut again. $143 million to Safe America Media and $77 million to People Who Think. Safe America Media was incorporated just seven days before its award. Seven days. Man, why didn’t I think of this? A subcontract went to the Strategy Group, which had worked on Noem’s gubernatorial campaign and whose CEO is married to her then-DHS spokesperson. Interesting…

DHS said it did not select subcontractors. But it invoked the “border emergency” Trump lingo to bypass competition for the ads. Apparently, even the advertising needed an emergency exception. What harm would competitive bidding have caused?

Even Republican Senator Thom Tillis is calling her out. On 60 Minutes, he recently singled out the $200 million-plus ad campaign featuring Noem on horseback.

Noem’s response? "Thom Tillis attacks me because I was effective."

Effective at what, exactly?

She claimed $40 billion saved through voluntary departures and $15 billion from cutting contracts. Those numbers deserve receipts, too.

Then there is Salus Worldwide Solutions, a Walters-owned company with a contract worth up to $915 million supporting voluntary departures. That award involved limited competition. Government court filings described concerns that Salus helped shape the requirements and received information unavailable to competitors. Officials approved a conflict waiver after citing mitigation measures, urgency, and national security.

Senators also sought records on allegations that a Salus representative conditioned subcontracting work on hiring Lewandowski as a consultant. He denies soliciting or receiving company compensation during his DHS tenure. The allegations remain unproven.

And Naples? After months of delays securing FEMA assistance for its hurricane damaged pier, the mayor enlisted Sinan Gursoy, a donor of at least $25,000 to Noem’s gubernatorial campaign. Records obtained by ProPublica show that after he contacted Noem, more than $11 million in assistance moved onto an expedited track. DHS denied political favoritism.

This was disaster assistance, a different mechanism from contracting. But why should a community need a donor’s phone number to get things moving?

There’s also the spending just below Noem’s $100,000 personal review threshold. In November 2025, POGO reported eleven awards since August between $99,999 and $99,999.99, compared with seven over the preceding decade. Apparently, those last few cents were doing some heavy lifting.

DHS called them routine operational purchases. The amounts alone do not prove wrongdoing. Were awards structured to avoid her sign-off?

And those savings claims?

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently found DHS’s separate $10.5 billion cost-avoidance claim to be overstated. It counted maximum potential contract spending, while DHS continued buying needed services elsewhere. Canceling permission to spend money is not the same as saving it. If taxpayers saved billions, show us how.

Kristi, show us the records.

If Noem and the Trump administration want to answer the criticism, release the records.

DHS under Mullin can publish the contract, amendments, no-bid justification, price analysis, operational plan, and approval history. They can explain lawful redactions, account for payments, deliveries, and aircraft still awaiting use.

Furthermore, federal rules generally require require posting an urgency justification within 30 days of award, subject to applicable disclosure protections. DHS still has not released the aircraft contract and refused to release the justification, citing "national security" and "other security risks."

I’ve traveled on the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s aircraft and other government planes. Some have small sleeping compartments for officials working through long flights. I understand the practical need for a place to rest. Nothing I traveled on came close to this level of luxury.

Two bedrooms, marble showers, a bar, and a manta ray skin table? Come on.

I also understand protecting sensitive information. Explain what requires protection and release what can lawfully be disclosed. "National security" does not answer why taxpayers paid this price for these planes. Congress and inspectors general should follow the money and determine whether the exceptions were justified, the reviews were adequate, and anyone improperly benefited.

You can’t make rooting out waste and fraud your sales pitch, then act offended when people examine your own spending.

Kristi Noem wants a retraction. Taxpayers should want the receipts.

Until next time,

—Olivia

October 3, 2026

Happy Saturday, friends. ☕️
It’s been another perfectly normal week in America, by which I mean…absolutely not.

Coffee up. We have things to discuss.

1. There’s a Revolt Brewing in Farm Country

You know an endorsement has struck a nerve when a former leader publicly comes off the sidelines to rebuke it.

Last month, the Texas Farm Bureau endorsed Ken Paxton for U.S. Senate. Then Bob Stallman, a Texas cattle and rice farmer who led the Texas Farm Bureau for six years and the American Farm Bureau Federation for another 16, weighed in.

His assessment was not subtle:

But don’t let the lizard line distract you from the bigger story.

Stallman argues Paxton has remained silent while Trump administration policies hurt the ranchers whose support he is courting. Exhibit A: Trump’s decision to allow an additional 300,000 metric tons of foreign beef into the U.S. tariff-free. Here’s the twist: the American Farm Bureau itself is fighting the policy, saying the imports have done little to lower grocery-store beef prices while cattle prices have fallen.

And that’s the rift worth watching: Texas Farm Bureau backs Paxton. One of its most prominent former leaders is publicly rebuking that decision. Meanwhile, the national organization is fighting a Trump policy affecting the very ranchers at the center of this debate.

This isn’t really about one endorsement, or one spectacular lizard insult. It’s a crack inside one of rural America’s most influential institutions over what happens when political loyalty collides with the economics of keeping a ranch alive. Eventually, what happens on the ranch shows up at your kitchen table.

🚜 Farm Bureau Leader Blasts Paxton Endorsement (Houston Chronicle)

2. Your Mail Carrier Almost Had a Say in Your Vote

For a brief moment this year, the Postal Service was on track to have a very different role in American elections. Under an executive order Trump signed in March, USPS developed new requirements for mail ballots: unique barcodes, new envelope standards and state-provided voter information. Ballot mail that didn’t comply could be rejected and returned to election officials.

Think about that shift.

USPS wouldn’t simply deliver election mail. It would become a federal checkpoint verifying whether state and local election officials had met new federal requirements before ballots entered the mail stream. The Trump administration wanted it operational for this November’s midterms. States sued. Federal judges blocked the rule, and the administration asked the Supreme Court to let it take effect. The Court said no. So nothing changes for voters this November.

But this is why I’m putting it in Covfefe: the larger question isn’t settled. The Supreme Court’s order stopped these requirements for the midterms; it didn’t decide whether they could be imposed after November. That’s the part worth remembering.

We almost changed the Postal Service’s role in elections from simply moving ballots to enforcing new federal conditions on whether states’ ballot mail could move at all. This one was stopped. The idea behind it wasn’t necessarily buried with it.

📬 Inside Trump’s Mail-Voting Plan (ProPublica)

3. The Kennedy Center Wasn’t Broke, Then Came the Takeover

The Kennedy Center is closed. Its finances are in distress. And now Donald Trump won’t rule out demolishing it. How did we get here?

Trump has spent months saying the Kennedy Center is in terrible shape and needs a two-year, $250 million renovation. After a federal judge ordered his name removed from the building, Trump tied moving forward with renovations to the fight over putting it back. Asked this week what ultimately happens to the building, Trump said, "I’m not committing to anything." He added: "I’d be willing to save it...Only I can save it."

Here’s the problem with that premise: the Kennedy Center was financially stable when Trump took it over.

The Washington Post examined 15 years of financial records and found the previous leadership handed over an institution in better financial condition than during most pre-pandemic years. Then came Trump’s takeover—and Richard Grenell’s tenure running the place.

In 19 months, audiences and donors pulled back. The development staff shrank from 94 people to 16. Ticket income fell 15 percent last fiscal year and is projected to fall by more than two-thirds this year. The center maxed out an expanded $21 million credit line, drained reserves and wrote off $48 million, mostly from donor pledges it no longer expects to collect. Quite the financial turnaround. Just not the one Grenell promised.

Now the finances have deteriorated. The center is closed. Renovations are entangled with the fight over Trump’s name, and Trump won’t rule out tearing the whole thing down.

🎭 How the Kennedy Center Collapsed (WaPo)

4. Meanwhile, Morocco just made history

With everything happening here at home this week, you may have missed something remarkable across the Atlantic: for the first time in Morocco’s history, a woman will lead its government.

King Mohammed VI appointed Fatima Ezzahra El Mansouri, a 50-year-old lawyer, housing minister and mayor of Marrakesh, as prime minister after her party won the most seats in last week’s parliamentary elections. El Mansouri already knows something about breaking ceilings. In 2009, she became the first woman elected mayor of Marrakesh. Now she’s the first to reach Morocco’s highest government post.

"This isn’t just pride for me but pride for all women," she said.

The symbolism matters, and so does the reality. Women have made significant legal and political gains during King Mohammed VI’s reign. At the same time, Morocco remains a country where the palace holds substantial power, and equality for women throughout society has lagged behind their advancement at the top. So no, one woman becoming prime minister doesn’t suddenly transform life for every woman in Morocco. Yet, firsts still matter. Somewhere, a Moroccan girl just watched a woman walk through a door no woman in her country had ever walked through before.

There was plenty happening in the halls of power this week to make your blood boil. This one deserved a moment.

👩🏻‍⚖️ Morocco Makes History (NY Times)

5. Inside the FBI, agents are worried about Election Day

What surfaced yesterday is exactly why I’ve been watching the FBI as the midterms approach. More than 40 current and former officials and FBI employees described growing anxiety inside the Bureau over election-related investigations.

Sources said many requests came directly from the White House, sometimes with word that an issue was important to the president. And yes, Stephen Miller’s name comes up here too: officials described Patel citing directions from Trump, Miller and other White House staff. The White House did not deny that Miller gives direction to the FBI. When investigators failed to uncover new findings, three people recounted Patel telling staff to "look harder" or "look again."

Then there’s Election Day.

One agent contemplating election-related directives told The Atlantic: "I’m either gonna be sick that day or they are going to have to fire me."

(And a note to that agent: If you’re told to carry out an unlawful order—or get fired for refusing one—reach out. I’ll help you find the support you need.)

Last month, when asked whether deploying FBI agents to polling places would violate federal law, Patel responded: "I don’t know that we can’t legally do it." The FBI disputes that its election work is improper. However, here’s the layer I don’t want you to miss: the FBI’s credibility is itself part of election security.

I worked alongside Kash Patel in the Trump administration and have publicly raised concerns about his qualifications and whether his loyalty to Trump could come before the independence this job demands. Career agents need to trust that they’re following evidence, not politics. Election officials need to trust their federal partners. Voters need to trust both.

That trust isn’t incidental to election security. It’s part of what makes election security work.

🚨 Inside the FBI’s Midterm Push (The Atlantic)

💛 One Thing for Your Soul

Happy Socktober, everyone!

Fifteen years ago, a group of kids in Tennessee wanted to help people in their community. They learned that socks were among the things local shelters needed most, and received least. So they started collecting them.

They called it Socktober.

That little idea has since spread to communities in all 50 states and around the world. The premise remains wonderfully simple: find out what a shelter near you actually needs, and help. No massive organization required. No elaborate plan. Just people doing one small thing for somebody else.

As creator puts it: "Little acts of big love change things."

Seems like a pretty good way to start October.

🧦 The Story Behind Socktober (The Enthusiast on Substack)

More soon,

Last Tuesday, before the speeches really got underway at the United Nations, I gave you my list. Would anyone from the United States talk to the Iranians? What would happen when Trump left New York and sat down with Xi Jinping? And what would the United States do at the UN’s meeting on preparing for the next pandemic?

By the end of the week, we had answers. Sort of.

• American envoys spent three hours meeting with Iranian mediators,

• The United States opposed the pandemic declaration,

• And Trump hosted Xi for a state visit filled with military honors, a state dinner, Marine One, tea, and a tour of the National Archives.

After all of it, the question I’m left with isn’t whether Trump had meetings. It’s this: What did America get from them?

Iran: threats outside, talks inside

Iran was the headline. Trump told the General Assembly that he believed a deal could happen after the midterms because Tehran was “waiting to see how I do in the midterm election.” Then came the alternative. Annihilation.

Trump talked about the choice between making a deal with Iran and destroying the Islamic Republic. I would say this is completely out of place, but the entire room has come to expect this talk from the current leader of the United States. Yet, while Trump was publicly threatening Iran, something very different was happening behind the scenes.

Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner (as expected, he made an appearance…) spent three hours meeting with Iranian mediators on the sidelines of UNGA. Trump called the meeting "very good" and "very productive" and said another would be scheduled in the “very near future.” Iranian state media went further, reporting that Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi conveyed Iran’s conditions for reopening the Strait of Hormuz: lift the U.S. naval blockade, unfreeze Iranian assets, and end the war on all fronts.

Those aren’t pleasantries. They’re negotiating positions. I’m glad they were talking. Again. But that reference to the midterms jumped out at me. I spent years reading threat briefings. Adversaries listen for timelines. They look for pressure points. They pay very close attention when an American president tells them publicly what he thinks changes after an election.

This morning, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard delivered a message directly to the American public ahead of the midterms, urging Americans to take to the streets against Trump’s policies and arguing that his war in the Middle East has failed. Remember what Trump said at the UN: Iran is "waiting to see how I do in the midterm election." Well, Iran certainly appears to be paying attention.

So my question isn’t whether diplomacy happened. It did. My question is what happens now. Because days later, Trump was sitting across from the leader of Iran’s largest trading partner, and one of the countries with the most economic leverage over Tehran—Xi Jinping.

So what did Xi bring to Washington?

There were actual outcomes from the Xi visit, and they shouldn’t be ignored. The United States and China extended their broader trade truce for two months. Over the weekend, the two governments released reciprocal lists covering roughly $30 billion in trade in each direction that they are recommending for reduced tariff treatment. The two sides also announced progress on fentanyl precursors and military crisis communications.

Those things matter. But given what had just happened at the UN, I was watching for something else. Iran.

Trump had just threatened Iran with annihilation. His envoys had spent three hours meeting with Iranian mediators, and now he was sitting across from the leader of Iran’s largest trading partner. China urged Washington and Tehran to return to negotiations. But despite Beijing’s enormous economic leverage over Tehran, there was no major public Chinese commitment to pressure Iran. So what did Trump ask Xi to do? Did he press China over its purchases of Iranian oil? Did Beijing make any commitment to increase pressure on Tehran? Was there a concrete ask? We heard the tough talk at the UNGA podium. I’d like to know how much of it made it into the room with Xi.

Iran wasn’t the only unresolved question.

There’s Taiwan

The Trump administration is currently withholding a roughly $14 billion weapons package for Taiwan—one that State Department officials put together and congressional leaders approved earlier this year. Trump has actually described holding back arms sales to Taiwan as a “very good negotiating chip” with China. According to the U.S. Ambassador to China David Perdue, Taiwan arms sales come up whenever Trump and Xi meet. On Fox News Sunday, Perdue was asked about concerns over the withheld Taiwan package. He defended Trump’s record on Taiwan and said there were continuing discussions about additional sales.

Then he revealed something extraordinary. Perdue said Trump had asked Xi whether China would like to buy American weapons too. Yes. China.

By Monday, the State Department was saying that U.S. law prohibits arms sales to China and that there was “no offer or plan to sell arms to China.” Trump denied the conversation happened. There was his go-to phrase—the verbal equivalent of “I don’t know him.” “I never heard of that one,” Trump said. “We didn’t discuss it.”

Except this wasn’t some random person he was being asked about. It was his own ambassador to China describing what he says Trump said to Xi Jinping. But as always, he can’t help himself and says the quiet part out loud. When asked whether he would consider selling weapons to China, Trump added: “Maybe it’s a good idea.” Meanwhile, Taiwan says U.S. arms sales to the island remain unchanged, but that roughly $14 billion package is still on hold.

And this is where the whole thing becomes a national security question for me. The United States spends billions preparing for the possibility of conflict with China. Sensitive technologies are restricted from reaching Beijing. American alliances across the Indo-Pacific are built in large part around deterring Chinese aggression, and U.S. law commits us to helping Taiwan maintain a sufficient self-defense capability. So when the U.S. ambassador to China says the President of the United States asked Xi Jinping whether China wanted to buy American weapons, and Trump responds that maybe selling them weapons is “a good idea,” we should all have questions.

I don’t care where you land politically. What exactly is our national security strategy toward China? Because you can’t spend years warning Americans about the military challenge posed by Beijing while treating American weapons as just another potential deal on the table. At some point, national security has to be more than a talking point. It has to govern the decisions you make.

Which brings me to the F-35 fiasco. As I wrote in my last Covfefe article, the Pentagon is investigating how F-35 components ended up in Hong Kong. Days later, how they got there remains unexplained. With Xi in Washington, it seems like something worth bringing up over tea…

And then there was the pandemic meeting

On Friday, the United Nations held a high-level meeting on pandemic preparedness. Six years after COVID killed millions of people around the world, shut down schools and businesses, overwhelmed hospitals, disrupted supply chains, and upended basically every part of our lives, the countries of the world gathered to talk about how not to do that again. The UN itself described the meeting as an effort to address the weaknesses exposed by COVID and strengthen surveillance, laboratories, health systems, and access to medical products.

The United States opposed the proposed political declaration. This wasn’t a treaty handing control of American public health to the UN. It was a political declaration focused on preparing countries for future pandemics. Now, to be fair, other countries had concerns with the text too. But some of the objections the United States raised stopped me in my tracks.

The Trump administration objected to what it characterized as "divisive ideologies" in the document, and raised objections involving the international framework for pathogen sharing. Reporting also indicated that the administration was unhappy with references to equity and universal access to sexual and reproductive health services. Read that again. We are talking about preparing for pandemics, people!

I sat on the White House COVID Task Force. I remember early 2020. We needed the sample, the sequence, and reliable data. And we needed them yesterday. We were making enormous decisions while staring through a fog, trying to understand what was spreading, how it was spreading, who was most vulnerable, and what we weren’t being told. Every single day mattered.

So debate the details. Demand accountability. Negotiate better language if the language isn’t right. But after everything this country lived through during COVID, the idea that arguments over "divisive ideologies" and reproductive-health language are part of a dispute over how the world prepares for the next pandemic is difficult for me to comprehend. Viruses don’t care about our culture wars. They don’t care which administration is in office. They don’t care how we voted. And they certainly don’t wait for us to finish arguing before they spread. We learned that already.

So, what did we get?

There were real diplomatic outcomes last week. American envoys spent three hours with Iranian mediators. The United States and China made progress on trade. Those things matter, and I’m not going to pretend they didn’t happen because it would make for a cleaner argument. But after all the speeches, meetings, and ceremony, some of the biggest questions are still unanswered.

Last week I told you that I care less about what happens at the podium than what happens around it. I’ve been on the inside of these foreign policy weeks. I know how much work goes into every meeting and every ask. Now we have the readout. Some of it was substantive, and a lot of it was spectacle. But foreign policy isn’t the speech. It isn’t the motorcade. And it definitely isn’t tea. It’s what you got when the meeting was over.

On some of the biggest national security questions of the week, we’re still waiting for that answer.

Or maybe that’s the answer right there.

–Olivia

September 26, 2026

It’s officially fall, y’all. 🍂

The coffee is hot, the leaves are turning, and somehow parts of an F-35 ended up in Hong Kong. So much for easing into sweater weather.

No foam, no filter, let’s go.

1. ICE Is Making Detainees Disappear From Its Public Locator

No, that headline is not hyperbole.

Since September 15, ICE has stopped showing immigrants with final deportation orders in its Online Detainee Locator System, the database families and attorneys use to find people in federal immigration custody. The change came without a public announcement.

This database exists for a reason. The Obama administration created it in 2010 after investigations into horrific detention conditions. Before that, people could effectively vanish into the system. Families and lawyers sometimes had to call ICE offices one by one looking for them. Some were deported before anyone found them.

And now we’re going backward.

Immigration officers are also reportedly being told not to give attorneys or relatives detainees’ locations over the phone. One legal-services organization says at least 17 clients disappeared from the locator. Eight ACLU clients held at Guantánamo Bay vanished from it as well.

A final removal order doesn’t necessarily mean the legal process is over. Someone may still be appealing, trying to reopen a case or seeking humanitarian protection. Their lawyer needs to know where they are. The government knows where these people are. Their families may not.

We built this system to stop people from disappearing into immigration detention. Now we’re dismantling it.

🔎 Detainees Vanish From ICE’s Locator (WaPo)

2. So, How Did Parts of an F-35 End Up in Hong Kong?

Yes, you read that correctly.

The Pentagon is investigating how components from the F-35, America’s most advanced fighter jet, somehow ended up in Hong Kong. A cockpit canopy and weapons-bay door were being shipped from Australia back to the United States for inspection, repair, or disposal when the shipment was unexpectedly diverted to Hong Kong. The Pentagon is now trying to retrieve them.

How did they get there? Well, that’s apparently the multimillion-dollar fighter-jet question.

Australia’s defense minister says the components aren’t sensitive, and there’s currently no public evidence that China obtained classified F-35 technology from this incident. But that doesn’t make this harmless. Even non-classified military hardware can potentially provide intelligence about materials, manufacturing, engineering, or maintenance. These particular components were coated with radar-absorbing material used to enhance the F-35’s stealth capabilities. The Chinese government reportedly took possession of them.

China has targeted F-35 information before: a 2013 Defense Science Board report said Chinese cyberattacks accessed data from numerous Pentagon weapons programs, including the Joint Strike Fighter.

Congress and the Pentagon are investigating, but officials still haven’t publicly explained how the shipment was diverted, or whether it was intentional or a mistake.

And the timing? Chinese President Xi Jinping was just in Washington for a three-day state visit with President Trump. They talked trade, Taiwan, Iran, and Artificial Intelligence (AI)—and even agreed to start calling AI "super intelligence."

Thus far, there’s no public indication that the F-35 parts came up at all. Interesting. Maybe "super intelligence" could help us figure out how F-35 parts ended up in Hong Kong.

✈️ How Did F-35 Parts End Up in Hong Kong? (AP)

3. The Susan Collins Story Is Getting Messier

Quick refresher, because this story has a few layers. Earlier this week, ProPublica revealed that the FBI had been investigating allegations involving U.S. Senator Susan Collins, members of her staff, a pro-Collins super PAC and defense contractor Navatek. At the center was Navatek’s former CEO, Martin Kao, who pleaded guilty to campaign-finance and loan fraud. Kao told investigators he had exchanged political contributions for government contracts. Collins and her office vigorously deny allegations of bribery or pay-to-play, and no one in her orbit has been charged.

Now look at the timeline.

Collins responded to ProPublica by saying the FBI and the Biden Justice Department examined the matter and cleared her in 2021.

But Kao gave investigators new allegations between 2022 and 2024. In September 2024, he sat for a two-day FBI interview and provided a 50-page account. FBI records show agents were still examining his claims in early 2025, and that documents and emails corroborated portions of what he told them. Trump returned to office shortly afterward. The FBI anti-corruption unit handling the work was dismantled amid personnel changes, and the inquiry ended without a conclusion.

An unfinished investigation isn’t proof of guilt…but a 2021 clearance can’t settle allegations investigators didn’t receive until years later.

📂 The Susan Collins Files (ProPublica)

4. Forty Days Before the Midterms, CISA Has an Election Security Plan

Better late than never?

On Thursday, 40 days before the midterms, the federal government’s cybersecurity agency unveiled its first public election-security initiative since the Trump administration dramatically scaled back that work last year. The new 13-page plan offers state and local officials free cybersecurity assistance, including vulnerability scanning, penetration testing, and physical-security assessments. Those are important services.

CISA used to do much of this already. The administration largely froze its election-security work in 2025, reduced staffing and put some of these services on hold. Now CISA’s own assessment says election offices frequently struggle with basic cybersecurity and that voter-registration databases remain attractive targets for foreign adversaries.

I spent years in national security. Finding vulnerabilities before an election is exactly what CISA should be doing. Doing it 40 days out after spending a year scaling back the work? That’s where I start asking questions.

We’re 40 days out, amid federal investigations into alleged voter fraud and continued claims about election interference. Cyber vulnerabilities are not voter fraud. They are not evidence that an election is rigged. And they sure as hell shouldn’t become a predicate to suggest otherwise. I don’t have evidence that’s what’s happening here. But the fact that I’m even asking the question bothers me.

CISA’s plan says election security requires “year-round diligence.”

So why are we rebuilding that trust 40 days before people vote?

⏰ Election Security, 40 Days Out (Politico)

5. Meet the Woman Quietly Rewriting America’s Fertility Rules

You probably don’t know Emma Waters’ name. You might want to.

The 28-year-old Heritage Foundation policy analyst has spent the past few years building a conservative policy agenda around IVF, surrogacy, embryo screening, and reproductive technology. According to a new WIRED profile, those ideas aren’t staying inside Heritage. They’re making their way into legislation and government policy.

Waters’ vision goes well beyond regulating a fertility industry that has faced some ethical and oversight problems. Under the system she favors, IVF could remain, but without destroying, indefinitely freezing, or ranking embryos. Surrogacy would be limited to altruistic arrangements for heterosexual married couples with documented infertility.

Republican Senator Rick Scott has introduced legislation restricting commercial surrogacy involving citizens of foreign-adversary countries. Florida has already enacted a similar restriction. The Texas GOP now calls IVF and commercial surrogacy "destructive practices." Trump has taken action on birth tourism and foreign surrogacy, all areas where Waters has advocated federal restrictions.

This one made me angry. IVF, surrogacy, and whether and how you build a family? It doesn’t get much more personal than that. Yet the ideas developed inside Heritage are increasingly finding their way into the government policies that could determine what choices people have.

Waters isn’t an elected official. Most Americans have probably never heard of her. Apparently, that hasn’t stopped Washington from taking notes.

🍼 The Woman Rewriting America’s Fertility Rules (Wired)

🌮 One Thing For Your Soul

Twelve-year-old Eduin walks from school each day to help his mom run their family taco stand in Montebello, California, where he helps cook the meat, translates for her, and serves customers.

Local firefighter Marco Miranda noticed something else: Eduin was making the trip on an old, rusty bike without a light or helmet. So Miranda quietly bought him a new bicycle, helmet, and light with his own money.

Eduin’s reaction got me: “It’s really cool because no one gave me something like that before.” A firefighter saw a kid working hard to help his mom and decided to make his road home a little easier.

There are good people everywhere. Don’t forget to look for them.

🚲 A New Bike for Eduin (KTLA)

And on that note, you know I love our farmers—so don’t forget to tune in to Farm Aid Saturday night! 🚜🎶

–Olivia

Every September, world leaders descend on New York for the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). Presidents. Prime ministers. Kings. Staffers with big egos and enough motorcades to make anyone trying to cross Manhattan lose their mind.

Most people know UNGA as the speeches from that famous green marble podium, the staged handshakes and the awkward moments caught on camera. That’s the public version.

For two years, I was Vice President Mike Pence’s lead for UNGA, and I can tell you a lot of the real diplomacy happens around those speeches, not during them. Schedules changed right up until a meeting started. It was absolutely exhausting, at times incredibly frustrating, and I loved it.

Today, the General Debate opens with roughly 130 heads of state and government expected in New York. The United States is at war with Iran, and Iran’s president is coming anyway.

So, yeah. There’s a lot going on.

Before you decide none of this has much to do with your life, it does. What happens this week can eventually show up in the price you pay for gas, how prepared we are when the next pandemic hits, and the rules being written around Artificial Intelligence (AI) before most of us have figured out what the hell it’s going to do to our jobs.

Most people aren’t sitting around watching hours of U.N. speeches. I don’t blame you. I care more about what happens after they leave the podium.

The bilat is the whole game

A bilateral, or “bilat,” is a meeting between two countries’ leaders or senior officials. And here’s a number that tells you what UNGA really is: member states have put in roughly 1,000 requests for bilateral meetings this week. The U.N. even has booths delegations can book in half-hour slots. That’s the part of UNGA I know well. We spent weeks, sometimes months, building them.

Then came the people who just wanted to be in the room. Folks at the White House with zero connection to an issue suddenly developed a deep interest in sitting across from a king. When exactly did you become a foreign policy expert? No, you’re not riding in the motorcade either. It’s long enough.

One year I spent months getting Pence a seat at a leaders’ meeting on eliminating terrorist and violent extremist content online, alongside heads of state including King Abdullah II of Jordan and then-New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern. Pence was the vice president, not a head of state. Getting him that seat was unusual. I was proud of securing that one for the U.S. delegation. Then Pence dropped out at the last minute. His chief of staff was focused domestically and didn’t understand what it took to get that seat, or why having the American vice president there mattered.

So we sent Kash Patel.

Yes, that Kash Patel. The one now running the FBI who spent part of a congressional hearing last week explaining why bestiality is no longer, in certain circumstances, an automatic disqualifier for an FBI applicant.

I really wish I were making that sentence up.

Kash texted me in a panic. He knew it was a mistake. The message was basically: Get Pence here. And I remember thinking: Oh no, my friends. YOU all screwed this up. I had made every argument for why Pence needed to be there. They overrode me. Now they wanted me to fix it. There was nothing I could do. King Abdullah called Pence, confused. He was gracious. I was furious. Months of work, gone.

A seat at one of these meetings can look insignificant from the outside. It isn’t. Somebody negotiated for it, and somebody on the other side agreed to it. People notice who shows up, and who doesn’t.

Washington doesn’t stay home

September 2019: we pulled up to UNGA with Trump and Pence, cameras everywhere, and my phone started blowing up as we walked down the corridors. Friends were texting that I was on TV. As an intel officer, my whole job had been staying out of the shot, so my reaction was basically: Why is my face on TV? Yikes. Speaker Nancy Pelosi had announced the formal impeachment inquiry over his actions on Ukraine. There we were, walking into UNGA with the impeachment chyron basically following us through the halls.

You know, a totally normal week.

And in 2018, I sat in the General Assembly hall when Trump told the room his administration had accomplished more than almost any administration in American history. People laughed.

Actual laughter.

Trump stopped. "Didn’t expect that reaction, but that’s okay." Sitting in that room, you’re hearing an American president through everyone else’s ears.

Last year, Trump returned to that podium and asked another memorable question: What is the purpose of the United Nations? He returns today with that question hanging over a very different world. The U.S. and Israel have been at war with Iran for months. Gaza remains a humanitarian catastrophe. Russia’s war in Ukraine is heading toward another winter.

The General Debate opens this morning with Brazil’s President Lula da Silva, followed by Trump, the traditional order. But like I said, I’m less interested in what happens at the podium than what happens around it.

In fact, that started before the speeches did. Trump spent about an hour at Gracie Mansion Monday with New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, talking about housing, affordability and the massive Sunnyside Yard project, which would require substantial federal support. Not everything that matters during UNGA happens at the U.N.

Trump has meetings with major allies and partners. One of the most consequential may be with Gulf leaders, who are expected to press him against another escalation with Iran. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman have all felt the effects of the war, from attacks and shipping disruptions to the economic fallout.

Zelenskyy is also expected to meet with Trump today, and there’s a lot riding on that conversation. Just two days earlier, Trump pressed him to stop Ukraine’s strikes on Russian oil refineries, citing concerns about the global diesel shortage and rising prices. Zelenskyy is arriving with his own proposal: a mutual pause in attacks on energy infrastructure and targets in the Black Sea. Ukraine says it would stop hitting Russian energy facilities if Moscow stops targeting Ukraine’s energy sector, critical infrastructure and food exports. And the timing isn’t theoretical. Russia and Ukraine traded another round of deadly strikes as Zelenskyy arrived in New York.

Meanwhile, Putin isn’t coming, but his foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, is.

Venezuela’s acting president, Delcy Rodríguez, will make her U.N. debut, and Trump is expected to have a pull-aside with her—their first face-to-face meeting since the U.S. operation that removed Nicolás Maduro. That’s exactly the kind of encounter that can get buried beneath the speeches.

Then on Wednesday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian speaks. The United States and Iran are at war, and the presidents of both countries will be in the same city during the same High-Level Week. Does anybody from the United States meet with the Iranians? Maybe. Maybe not. Has anyone seen Jared Kushner? Either way, don’t assume silence means nobody is talking. UNGA has plenty of ways for messages to make their way across town.

Trump won’t be there Wednesday to hear Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. He’ll be back in Washington because Xi Jinping is coming. That’s one hell of a split screen.

It also tells you something about UNGA. Nearly every government in the world is gathered in New York, but one of the most consequential meetings of the week may happen 200 miles away. Trump goes from UNGA to hosting China’s leader at the White House for Xi’s first visit there in more than a decade. Iran, trade, and artificial intelligence all hang over that meeting. China buys Iranian oil, dominates much of the global rare-earth supply and is America’s principal competitor in AI.

And then there’s Friday.

Who’s in the American chair?

The U.N. is holding a high-level meeting Friday on pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response. This one matters to me personally.

I spent a significant part of the COVID pandemic inside the Trump White House response. I know how brutal the lessons were: testing, early warning, supply chains, vaccines and public communication. This week, the U.N. is asking what the world learned and how to prepare for the next pandemic.

Which brings me back to Xi. Does pandemic preparedness come up between Trump and Xi? What does the United States say at the U.N.? Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spent part of last week speaking to Children’s Health Defense, the organization he once chaired, while years of congressional scrutiny have focused on COVID’s origins, Wuhan and Dr. Fauci. I’m curious who America sends Friday to talk about preventing the next pandemic.

The empty camera

No network television pool camera will travel with Trump to New York. CNN was scheduled for pool duty, but after the White House barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico, the other networks declined to replace it and suspended pool coverage. American journalists are still covering UNGA. What’s missing is the independent network camera that normally travels with the president. I’ve been in those motorcades. Plans change. Reporters shout questions. Unexpected things happen. Sometimes that’s what you want to see–not the carefully worded readout afterward.

What I’m looking for

So yes, I’ll listen to Trump’s speech. But I’ll be watching what happens around it.

Does anything come out of the meeting with Gulf leaders? What does Zelenskyy walk away with? Does anyone talk to Iran? What happens when Trump leaves New York and sits down with Xi?

And that question Trump asked from the podium last year: “What is the purpose of the United Nations?”

Fair question. By Friday, we may have a better answer.

More soon,

Olivia

September 19, 2026

A quick update before we begin: MS NOW confirmed this morning that its journalists were denied entry to the White House, one day after Trump announced bans on MS NOW, CNN and Politico.

And a political plot twist: Karl Rove says he will vote for Democrat Jon Rosenthal—only the second Democrat he has ever voted for—after Republican Bo French posted racist comments about South Asian students at the University of Texas. Yes, that Karl Rove.

"The GOP’s stables need a cleaning," Rove wrote. "This is a good place to start." Well said.

Pour your coffee. No foam, no filter, this one’s a doozy! Let’s go. ☕️

1. Uncle Sam Wants You, ICE Wants Your Family

Army Specialist Jasmine Hernandez enlisted partly to protect the life her immigrant parents built here, a calling familiar to me. But while she was stationed away, ICE detained her father at an Arizona gas station in front of her younger brothers. His application for Military Parole in Place was still pending.

This week, two 17-year-old U.S. citizens said they were delivering paperwork to a Marine recruiter when they stopped to record an ICE operation in Texas. Video shows agents pulling one from a car and using pepper spray. Both were detained for eight hours; one is now reconsidering enlisting. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) says they obstructed officers and resisted arrest. The video does not show everything preceding the confrontation, but the teenagers have filed a police report.

More than 50 military parents and spouses have reportedly been detained during Trump’s second term; at least six were deported. The Army warns that immigration uncertainty can interfere with mission-essential duties, even as the Pentagon increasingly relies on immigrant communities. Nearly 11,000 green-card holders enlisted last year, up 62 percent since 2021.

Quite the way to build morale…and fill the ranks. Serve this country. Defend this country. Just don’t assume your service will protect your family.

🪖 ICE Targets Military Families (ABC)

2. Congress Saw the Hegseth Vote and Went Home

For the first time, a member of a president’s own party has introduced articles of impeachment against the president’s Pentagon chief.

Republican Rep. Thomas Massie filed eight articles against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, accusing him of waging an unauthorized war in Iran, disregarding congressional war-powers resolutions, ignoring laws intended to protect civilians and retaliating against political critics. Massie’s fourth article centers on the U.S. strike on an Iranian elementary school. When it happened, I was sickened and called it what I believed it was: a war crime. Having worked alongside the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR) in conflict zones, I do not use those words lightly.

This week, a UNHCR fact-finding mission found reasonable grounds to believe U.S. strikes on that school and a sports complex may constitute war crimes. The administration rejects the findings. But here we are.

Massie introduced it as a privileged resolution, which was expected to force House members to vote on it this week.

So what happened?

Speaker Mike Johnson recessed the House one day early and sent lawmakers home to campaign.

🚪 Congress Skips the Hegseth Vote (CNN)

3. Apparently, Power Plants No Longer Affect the Climate

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has decided that greenhouse-gas emissions from American power plants have "no material impact on global climate change." Well, that’s convenient. Fossil-fuel power plants produce roughly one-quarter of America’s carbon emissions. The EPA repealed most 2024 carbon limits on coal and natural-gas plants and proposed eliminating the rest, arguing that the Clean Air Act does not authorize climate-based regulation. If upheld in court, that could make restoring the protections far harder.

The administration says the rollback will lower costs and improve grid reliability. The EPA projects that coal production for electricity could increase more than tenfold, and that the changes will produce an additional 123 million metric tons of carbon pollution over the next decade. The discarded standards were also expected to reduce soot and other pollutants, preventing as many as 1,200 premature deaths and 360,000 asthma attacks in 2035. Environmental and public-health organizations filed suit Thursday, arguing that the Clean Air Act still requires the EPA to regulate the pollution.

During Trump’s first term, I witnessed discussions about sidelining scientists and overruling agency leaders when their findings conflicted with the preferred political message. Today, the agency charged with protecting the environment arguing that one of America’s largest sources of climate pollution is somebody else’s problem. "Environmental protection" may be right there in the name, but apparently we’re treating that as a legacy branding decision.

🏭 EPA Erases Power-Plant Climate Rules (EPA)

4. Meet Trump’s Arctic Adviser. Russia Already Has…

Trump appointed Texas venture capitalist Thomas Dans to chair the U.S. Arctic Research Commission, which advises the president and Congress on Arctic science, security and policy. Dans has advocated closer relations with Russia, shared material reflecting pro-Kremlin views and supported Trump’s push for U.S. control of Greenland. He also promoted Dutch shipbuilder Damen while his consulting firm helped the company pursue a U.S. icebreaker contract. Dans reportedly would have been paid if Damen won. Because commissioners are not legally federal employees, he faces fewer disclosure requirements despite having access to government information. The White House says his outside work did not constitute a conflict; Damen says it complied with sanctions.

I know firsthand from my national security work that this is not an obscure science-board appointment. Melting ice is opening shipping routes and access to critical minerals, making the Arctic a growing arena of competition with Russia and China. That competition moved again Friday, when the U.S., Denmark and Greenland announced an agreement that would expand America’s military presence and reportedly bar Russian and Chinese bases. Greenland remains part of the Kingdom of Denmark, and parliamentary approval is still required.

Dans was not the week’s only Russia-linked story involving Trump’s circle. Russian oligarch and Putin associate Umar Kremlev reportedly spent hundreds of thousands of dollars hosting two nights of Donald Trump Jr.’s wedding festivities. The couple confirmed the gift from their “dear friend.” President Trump says he does not know Kremlev and was told his son repaid him, but provided no details. House Oversight requested records.

Two stories. Two Russia-linked relationships. Both now facing questions about disclosure and oversight.

🧊 Trump’s Russia-Linked Arctic Adviser (ProPublica)

5. Canada Sees Europe, Trump Sees Tariffs

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has proposed making Canada the EU’s first "associate member," and Prime Minister Mark Carney embraced the idea. Canada is not joining the EU; the new status must still be negotiated. But Canada and Europe are already deepening cooperation on defense, energy, critical minerals, AI and digital trade. Canada is also the only non-European participant in the EU’s €150 billion defense-procurement program. Carney framed it as an alliance of “middle powers” able to resist economic coercion.

America was not in the room, but its policies shaped the conversation. Trump called the proposal "laughable," suggested it could be a "hostile act," and threatened Europe with more tariffs.

To my Canadian readers: I see you. After months of tariffs, threats, and talk of making Canada our 51st state, I understand why this moment may feel like an exhale. Canada is asserting its sovereignty and diversifying the relationships that protect its future.

Alliances are not diplomatic decorations. Canada and Europe sustain American jobs and supply chains, share intelligence and strengthen our security. If partners build a future around Washington, America loses influence, business opportunities and intelligence cooperation. Foreign policy eventually finds its way home to factory floors, energy bills, family budgets and national security.

🇨🇦 Europe’s Historic Offer to Canada (NY Times)

✨ One Thing For Your Soul

Across historically Black colleges and universities (HBCU) in the South, students are registering voters, explaining election laws and showing classmates how the ballot reaches into their everyday lives. At Tuskegee, they are taking voter registration to rodeos and trail rides. Sometimes democracy looks less like a panel discussion and more like a clipboard and a good pair of boots! They are confronting apathy, confusion, and barriers to participation while carrying forward the legacy of HBCU students who helped lead the Civil Rights Movement.

Discouragement is easy. Showing up is the harder choice, and these students keep making it. Democracy survives because every generation decides to carry it forward. Given the moment we’re in, I’m really grateful they are.

🗳️ The Students Carrying Democracy Forward (SPLC)

And thank you to everyone in the D.C. area who showed up at the Kennedy Center last night!

Until next time,

Olivia

Two weeks ago, I wrote a piece called “ICE Is Coming for the Voter Rolls.” At the time, we knew that Homeland Security Investigations, the investigative arm of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), was launching a coordinated "voter fraud surge initiative" across nine states ahead of the midterms. What bothered me then when I wrote that article was something pretty basic. In national security, you are supposed to start with the threat. What is it? How serious is it? What does the evidence show? And, what government response is actually justified by that evidence? You don’t start with the response and then go hunting for the threat.

That was September 1.

Now we’re getting an extraordinary look inside the broader DHS effort to hunt for alleged unlawful voters, and what a whistleblower says was happening behind the scenes raises even more questions. According to a federal whistleblower whose disclosure was provided to Senators Chuck Schumer and Alex Padilla, federal personnel working what DHS called the "Unlawful Voter Initiative" were expected to review at least 40 people during each eight-hour workday.

Do the math. That’s about 12 minutes per person. Twelve minutes to examine someone’s citizenship information and voting history and determine whether that person should be identified as a potentially unlawful voter in federal records. Even more concerning is that according to the whistleblower, the underlying data itself may have been unreliable. Remember what we’re talking about here. Not terrorists. Not cartel members. Not suspected human traffickers.

Voters.

This is where the new reporting connects to what I wrote about two weeks ago. This summer, DHS began publicly touting large numbers of potential noncitizens appearing on state voter rolls. Nevada was one of the most revealing examples. DHS initially touted nearly 16,000 potential matches there. That did not mean DHS had found 16,000 people illegally voting. Those records required additional review. DHS subsequently provided Nevada with 185 voter IDs it said it had greater confidence about. That’s why I wrote then that a database match isn’t a conviction. Now we’re learning more about the broader effort behind the government’s search for alleged noncitizen voters.

The whistleblower’s disclosure states that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) personnel were given DHS-provided lists of individuals and instructed to run them through state voter-registration systems. The underlying information reportedly drew from multiple government sources. The whistleblower alleges employees found problems with the data they were being asked to use. Another key issue raised involves naturalized Americans. People who interact with the immigration system can be assigned an alien registration number, commonly called an A-number. The identifier can remain in federal immigration records after someone becomes a naturalized American citizen, which means the existence of an immigration identifier does not, by itself, tell you whether someone is currently a noncitizen. That’s not some tiny technical distinction. It’s the difference between a noncitizen and an American citizen. The whistleblower alleges that unreliable data could wrongly implicate eligible U.S. citizens in federal law-enforcement records as potentially unlawful voters. This is precisely why massive government databases require enormous care.

Perhaps the most disturbing part of the disclosure is that USCIS personnel were apparently directed to use personal information to access individual records through state voter-lookup websites. These websites aren’t simply open databases. They’re designed for individual voters to look up their own information. In my home state of Virginia, for example, the state explicitly limits use of its voter lookup system to people attesting that they are searching their own records. California requires personally identifying information, such as a driver’s license number or partial Social Security number, to access an individual record.

According to the whistleblower, personnel were effectively being instructed to pose as individual voters to access those records. The employees reportedly raised concerns about whether doing so violated state law. Agency leadership told employees to continue conducting the searches after legal concerns were raised, and government attorneys reportedly took the position that the searches were permissible when performed as part of official investigative duties.

I am not declaring that federal employees broke state law. We’ll have to see how the investigation develops. But here’s what I can’t get past: The federal employees being instructed to conduct the searches were reportedly asking whether they should be doing them. That matters.

I’ve spent enough time inside government to know the difference between criticism coming from outside an agency and career personnel raising concerns from within. I know because I’ve been that career person. At other moments in my career, especially during the first Trump administration, I found myself asking some of the same fundamental questions: Is this right? Should we be doing this? And eventually, asking those questions out loud. That experience had nothing to do with this voter initiative, but it taught me to pay attention when the people actually carrying out a government mission begin questioning the information they’re being given, the methods they’re being instructed to use, or whether those methods are lawful.

The concerns weren’t limited to the data or how voter records were being accessed. According to the whistleblower, USCIS personnel were pulled from their regular duties in late August and given less than two hours of training before being assigned to the initiative. That raises an obvious question: What was DHS taking them away from, and why was this suddenly important enough to take priority?

To be clear, this is not the same HSI operation I wrote about on September 1. That was a separate Homeland Security Investigations voter-fraud surge across nine states. These are distinct efforts but, taken together, they show the extent to which DHS is expanding its involvement in voter records and alleged noncitizen voting as the midterms approach. Add to that the Justice Department’s separate push to obtain detailed voter-registration information from states, and the picture becomes harder to ignore. Different agencies. Different authorities. Different initiatives. Same direction of signal and intent…

Which brings me to the question I care about most now: What happens to the people who were flagged in these voter rolls?

If someone was swept into this initiative because of outdated immigration information, a bad database match, or some other error, was that information corrected? Was it deleted? Or does a federal record now identify an eligible American voter as potentially unlawful? That’s not an abstract concern. According to the whistleblower, employees worried that inaccurate information could become part of government records. Those records can have consequences, including potentially prompting further investigation. A federal record can follow someone for years.

The whistleblower’s allegations need to be investigated. DHS should explain where its data came from, what safeguards were in place, how many people were flagged, how many were ultimately cleared, and what happened to the records of anyone identified incorrectly.

Finding an error isn’t enough. We need to know what the government did with it.

P.S. We are less than two months out from the midterm elections. Take a minute today to double-check your voter registration status. And, vote.

–Olivia

September 12, 2026

A quick thank you before we get started.

This week, I shared something I had carried with me for 25 years: how September 11th changed the course of my life. At the end, I asked you to share your own memories. So many of you did. You told me where you were, who you called, who you lost, what you remember, and how that day changed the direction of your lives. Thank you for trusting me with those stories. And thank you for the incredibly kind notes about mine.

Pour the coffee. ☕️ Here are five things worth knowing before the next outrage buries them.

1. America Has a Trust Problem

Start with this number: only 34% of Americans have a great deal or quite a bit of trust in the government’s certification of election results. That’s down from 40% in 2024. With the midterms approaching, nearly half worry the federal government could discredit or tamper with election results, or pressure state officials over certification. Quick refresher: certification is the official sign-off on the vote count, a process that has traditionally been routine. Since 2020, that process has become increasingly politicized.

But elections aren’t the only place trust is eroding. About 6 in 10 Americans have little or no trust in federal information on issues including foreign affairs, the environment, elections and politics, abortion and immigration. It gets worse. Only about 1 in 10 Americans say either party’s campaign messages are always or often factual. Even among partisans, only about a quarter say that about their own party.

We aren’t just arguing over what the facts mean. We’re increasingly questioning whether we can trust the facts at all.

📉 America’s Government Trust Problem (AP)

2. Wait, Who’s Watching Whom?

Police departments around the country have a new surveillance concern: your glasses.

Internal law-enforcement documents obtained by The Guardian show agencies from Maine to California warning about Meta’s camera-equipped Ray-Bans and other smart glasses. They look remarkably ordinary, but can record video and audio. Police worry they could be used to secretly film officers, detention facilities, camera locations and security routines.

This isn’t hypothetical. A man wearing Meta glasses secretly recorded a South Carolina detention center, including holding cells, showers and other detainees who apparently didn't know they were being filmed. There’s a national-security angle, too. The FBI says the attacker who killed 14 people in New Orleans on New Year’s Day 2025 wore smart glasses while biking through the French Quarter before the attack, activity authorities characterized as pre-attack reconnaissance.

Law enforcement agencies are increasingly using cameras, facial recognition, and other surveillance technology, while also warning about what happens when increasingly invisible cameras are pointed back at them. As government surveillance capabilities expand and the cameras available to ordinary people get smaller and harder to see, so do the questions about privacy, civil liberties and who gets to watch whom.

Welcome to the surveillance era, where apparently everyone is watching everyone.

👓 Police Have a New Surveillance Worry: Smart Glasses (The Guardian)

3. Meanwhile, in Dallas…

In a week filled with reflection on 9/11, Dallas offered a very different soundtrack.

Republicans held their first-ever national midterm convention, and President Trump had a message for November: "Pretend that I am running." The surprise? If Republicans keep control of both chambers of Congress, Trump said every adult citizen would get a $5,000 "Trump dividend." Price tag? More than $1 trillion. Details on how it would actually happen? Not many. Trump said the money would have to be spent in the United States.

Vice President JD Vance took the stage the following day. When a protester unfurled Mexican and Palestinian flags, Vance zeroed in on the Mexican one: "If you love Mexico so much, get your ass over there. I’ll buy you the plane ticket."

And while all that was happening in Dallas, the money was moving. Trump’s political operation has begun deploying its enormous midterm cash reserves, including tens of millions in advertising through the newly created No Going Back PAC and another $10 million from MAGA Inc. in the Texas Senate race.

November was ostensibly the point, but 2028 wasn't exactly hiding in the wings. The crowd chanted "JD, JD," some shouted for Vance to be the next Republican nominee, and Vance smiled and told them: "We gotta take care of business this November, then we’ll worry about what comes next."

Right…

🇺🇸 Inside the GOP’s First Midterm Convention (NYT)

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4. Who Counts in the Census Could Change

The Trump administration is proposing a major overhaul of the 2030 Census that could exclude millions of noncitizens from the population count used to divide seats in Congress among the states. That includes undocumented immigrants, asylum seekers, and others without permanent status. However, this isn’t just about immigration. Who gets counted can change political representation.

The Census determines how the 435 House seats are divided among the states, and, in turn, each state’s Electoral College votes. Consider what that could mean: a 2020 Pew analysis found that excluding unauthorized immigrants from that year’s apportionment count would have cost California, Florida, and Texas one House seat each. That doesn’t necessarily predict what would happen in 2030, but it shows how changing the count can change representation.

It would remove questions about race and ethnicity from the decennial Census questionnaire. Race has been part of the Census in some form since 1790. The Census Bureau itself says those data are used not only for redistricting, but also for civil-rights policy and measuring disparities in health and environmental risks.

📋 Trump’s Census Plan Could Reshape Voting Maps (Axios)

5. An AI Insider Sounds the Alarm

Jacob Coxon has worked inside both OpenAI and Anthropic, two companies racing to build increasingly powerful artificial intelligence (AI). On Tuesday, he quit Anthropic with an extraordinary public warning: the AI race, he says, is moving faster than our ability to keep it under human control.

At the center of his concern is something called recursive self-improvement. Put simply: imagine an AI system capable of helping build a better AI system, which can then help build an even better one. Researchers haven’t reached the runaway version of that scenario, but companies are actively working on systems that automate more of AI research itself.

Yes, I know this is starting to sound like the part where someone mentions Skynet. Stay with me…

Even if one company wants to slow down and test carefully, what happens if its competitors don’t? Coxon says that’s the trap. He argues that competitive pressure could keep pushing companies forward even when people inside them are deeply worried about where the technology is headed. Anthropic itself says current models present low risk from recursive self-improvement, while acknowledging that capabilities are advancing.

His warning has now reached more than 100 million people online, and the debate isn’t staying inside Silicon Valley. Lawmakers from both parties are raising questions about AI safety following recent security incidents involving advanced systems.

Technology moves fast, but the guardrails rarely do. I watched government struggle to catch up with social media after the fact. With AI, we may not have that luxury.

🤖 Why an Anthropic Researcher Quit Over AI (Washington Sun)

✨ One Thing for Your Soul

For 25 years, retired New York City firefighter Rocco Fertoli rarely talked with his daughter about what he experienced on 9/11. He had been off duty that morning. After the second plane hit, he rushed to his firehouse and headed toward Manhattan. He watched the North Tower collapse from a bus carrying first responders, then spent weeks at Ground Zero searching through the wreckage. He lost more than 30 friends and colleagues.

This year, his daughter, NPR reporter Annmarie Fertoli, finally asked him to tell her what happened. He said yes, in part because he regretted never asking his own father enough about his service in World War II. Twenty-five years later, they retraced his path together.

Some stories take years to find their way home.

👨‍🚒 The 9/11 Story He Never Told (NPR)

Take care of each other this weekend.

-Olivia

Saturday Covfefe is independent and reader-supported. If you value these five things each week—and the deeper reporting and analysis in between—consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support is what keeps this work going.

Prefer to watch? My full video reflection is below.

For the past several days, I’ve been trying to understand how I feel about the 25th anniversary of September 11.

Grief, certainly. Gratitude. Anger. Pride. Regret. Fear.

But more than anything, I keep thinking about choices.

The choices taken from us that morning. The choices our country made afterward. And the deeply personal choices so many of us made because of what we saw, what we lost, and what we believed the moment required of us.

September 11 changed the course of history. It also changed the course of millions of individual lives.

Mine was one of them.

The Life I Thought I Might Live

I was raised in a deeply patriotic family, the daughter of a truck driver and a Mexican immigrant. Born in Nevada to a family connected to farming and the casino world, I later moved to El Paso, Texas, the border town that molded me into the person I am today. Life there was shaped by culture, faith, family, and a certain kind of working-class toughness. Mom taught me to be bold and unafraid. Dad was bullish, fiercely protective, and deeply no-nonsense, especially when it came to his only daughter.

After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania, I moved to Washington. But politics and public service were not the only interests pulling at me. For years, I felt torn between two worlds: the desire to serve and a love for the arts. At one point, I left Washington for Austin, Texas, where I worked at a law firm connected to Lady Bird Johnson’s family. I had always been passionate about First Amendment law, but outside the office, I danced with a company and pursued theater and acting. I still did not know which direction my life would take. Then politics pulled me back to Washington.

In the summer of 2001, I returned to work at the Republican National Committee (RNC). I was conservative, shaped by my Catholic upbringing and working-class Texas family. But I was also the artsy staffer who wore black, showed up in platform shoes, and did not exactly blend into the building. People at the RNC would jokingly remind me that the Democratic National Committee was down the street. And back then, it really was a joke. I had friends who worked there. We did not see politics the same way, but we could still laugh together.

On September 11, 2001, none of those labels mattered.

I was at the Capitol that morning, delivering a package and was making my way back, when Capitol Police officers began yelling at people to clear the building. At first, I thought someone might have a gun. I didn’t understand what was happening. No one around me seemed to understand. There was only confusion and the increasingly urgent order to get out. So I ran. As I exited, I heard an officer say there was another plane in the air and no one knew where it was headed. Another plane? I looked up at the sky. I had no idea what he meant. I ran back to the RNC. When I walked into the building, everyone looked pale. People were staring at the televisions in disbelief as the horror unfolded in New York City. My phone was ringing. It was my boss, calling from Alaska. He had been awakened by the news and wanted to know whether I was safe and what was happening in Washington. He sounded scared. I was scared. We were all scared.

Then came the sound of a distant boom.

Soon, the reports began coming in: the Pentagon had been hit. Then came the news from Pennsylvania. Our building was evacuated.

My parents knew their only child was somewhere in the nation’s capital, but they had no idea where. The phone lines were jammed. I couldn’t reach them or my roommate. There was no way to tell anyone I was alive. I thought about my college boyfriend, who worked on Wall Street, and my classmates from Penn. So many had gone to New York. How many were in those buildings? How many families were calling phones that would never be answered?

With nowhere else to go, I walked with a friend to her apartment in downtown Washington. The streets were gridlocked. Police were everywhere. People were crying. No one knew whether another attack was coming. Only later would I learn that the passengers and crew aboard Flight 93 fought back, preventing the plane from reaching Washington. The Capitol, the building I had just fled, is believed to have been its target.

Eventually, I began walking home.

I lived near Ballston in Arlington, Virginia. Anyone who knows the Washington area knows that walking from downtown to Ballston is no casual stroll. That day, it felt even longer. I had plenty of time to get lost in my thoughts while the world around me seemed to be burning and no one knew what would happen next.

Then I passed the Pentagon.

Smoke filled the sky. Emergency crews were everywhere. On a grassy hill, I saw people gathering and staring at the hole in the side of the building. Some were waiting to learn whether their loved ones were alive. I felt nauseated. I had grown up in a city with one of the largest military installations in the country. Now I was watching the center of the American defense establishment burn. I knew, even then, that the United States would respond. I did not know what that response would look like, where it would take us, or how many lives it would claim. I only knew that the images in front of me would remain seared into my mind forever.

When I finally reached my apartment, my roommate opened the door sobbing. "Oh, my God. You’re alive."

I have never forgotten that moment. By the time I made it home, my feet were covered in blisters.

The Choice I Made

Two months before September 11, I had been considering a completely different life: moving to California to pursue dance, theater, and perhaps acting.

Two months after 9/11, my father died unexpectedly while driving his 18-wheeler across the country. In the days after the attacks, he had begged me to leave Washington and come home. He worried about me being so far from my mother in Texas, especially because his work kept him on the road. I sometimes wonder what he would have thought about the decision I made next.

I returned to my desk at the RNC after the attacks, but campaign politics felt increasingly difficult to care about. The country had just experienced an unimaginable act of terrorism, and spending my life focused on party strategy and political advantage no longer felt meaningful. I wanted to serve—not as a Republican or a Democrat, but on behalf of the American people. All of them. I wanted to help keep families safe, regardless of their politics, religion, race, or community.

So I asked to go to the Pentagon.

That decision shaped the next 25 years of my life.

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On my first day inside the Pentagon, the dust was still there. Near the corridor where the plane had struck, there was an overwhelming heaviness, something you could feel before anyone said a word. I thought about those killed inside the Pentagon and aboard Flight 77, and the families they left behind. A year later, on September 11, 2002, I was there when the Pentagon Memorial Chapel opened near the site of the attack. I began attending Mass there regularly while working first for the Army’s Office of General Counsel and later in policy. There was something deeply personal about sitting in that chapel. I had once walked past the Pentagon as it burned. Now I was working inside of it, trying to honor those we had lost through the life of service I had chosen.

My earliest national security education came from some of the most experienced military and civilian leaders in the world. That education soon moved beyond offices and briefing rooms. I deployed overseas and served as an aide to Ambassador L. Paul Bremer in Iraq. There, I became friends with Sérgio Vieira de Mello, the United Nations Special Representative for Iraq, and was among the last people to speak with him before the bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad killed him and 21 others. That night, from the palace, I answered calls from Condoleezza Rice, Henry Kissinger, Donald Rumsfeld, the FBI, and others trying to understand what had happened.

Over the next decade, my work in the counterterrorism community took me across multiple departments and administrations, and to Afghanistan, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, other parts of the Middle East, and Africa. Along the way, I witnessed terrorist attacks and watched dedicated public servants disrupt plots most Americans would never hear about.

My mother, still grieving my father, carried the worry of my service for years, and over time, it took a toll on her health.

What Service Taught Me

I entered national security determined to help prevent another September 11. But the years that followed taught me that protecting a country requires more than military force, and that patriotism demands more than unquestioning support for every decision made in America’s name. Across the Middle East, the people I met bore little resemblance to the images Americans saw on television. Learning their cultures and sharing meals with their families allowed me to know them beyond the distant narratives of conflict.

I saw war up close.

Its consequences were visible in the children living with decisions made thousands of miles away and in the extraordinary courage and sacrifice demanded of American service members. I also learned how intelligence can be misunderstood, selectively interpreted, or bent to support decisions already made. Over the course of my career, I worked for some of the most senior officials in the United States government and witnessed consequential national security decisions up close. Those experiences did not make me anti-military, anti-government, or anti-public service. They made me deeply wary of war, especially long, open-ended conflicts without a clearly defined purpose or an honest measure of success.

Supporting the people who serve does not require us to stop questioning those who send them into harm’s way. In fact, I believe the opposite. If we value their lives, we have a responsibility to ask the hardest questions before committing them to war. That, too, is patriotism.

On anniversaries like this one, we often talk about how united America felt after September 11. There is truth in that memory. Strangers helped one another, first responders ran toward unimaginable danger, and Americans searched for ways to serve something larger than themselves. But memory can soften the edges of history. That period also brought fear, suspicion, and cruelty. Muslim, Arab, Sikh, and South Asian Americans were harassed and attacked. Entire communities were treated as suspect because of their faith, their clothing, or the color of their skin. If we are going to remember the unity, we must also remember who was excluded from it. Love of country should never require us to abandon the principles that make the country worth loving.

That lesson feels especially urgent now.

Twenty-five years after September 11, Americans are again being encouraged to see one another as enemies. Political disagreement has become a test of personal loyalty. Public institutions have been weakened by distrust. Service is too often dismissed as weakness, and cruelty is marketed as strength.

I watched those divisions deepen from inside the government. I entered the first Trump administration hoping, as I had with every administration I served, that the president would succeed for the sake of the country. What I ultimately witnessed forced me to make another choice: to speak publicly about what I believed was wrong. The choice was different, but the instinct behind it was the same one I felt on that long walk home.

The country must come before party. Truth must come before personal comfort. And public service must serve the public—not an individual, a faction, or a political movement.

What the Next Generation Must Carry

Many of the intelligence officers, military personnel, and public servants serving today do not remember September 11. Some were children. Many had not yet been born. I hope they never experience that particular kind of day. I hope they never have to call home and discover that the phone lines have gone silent, walk alone through a city under attack, or stand beneath a smoke-filled sky wondering what will happen next. But I do hope they understand what genuine public service demands: expertise, discipline, judgment, courage, and, above all, a moral compass.

Intelligence is not a political product. The military is not a personal instrument. Government power must never be turned against people because of their politics, religion, ethnicity, or dissent. Public service is a promise to people you may never meet and who may never know your name. It is a promise to protect the Constitution, tell the truth, and put the country before yourself.

On this 25th anniversary, I am thinking about the people who never made it home.

I am thinking about the firefighters, police officers, paramedics, and ordinary people who entered burning buildings to help strangers escape—and those who breathed the toxic air at Ground Zero and spent years fighting the illnesses that followed.

I’m also thinking about the service members, intelligence officers, diplomats, aid workers, journalists, and families who carried the weight of everything that came next. And about the civilians overseas whose lives were forever altered by America’s response.

How many lives took a different path because of that one day? Mine certainly did.

This anniversary does not belong to a president, a political party, or any one version of America. It belongs to the people we lost, the people who carried us through, and the generations now responsible for deciding where we go from here. Twenty-five years later, I do not believe America can, or should, return to exactly what it was before September 11. We know too much now about the costs of fear, the consequences of endless war, and the fragility of institutions we once assumed would always hold.

But I still believe in what America can become. Not because I have blind faith in our political system. Trust me, I don’t. I believe because I have seen the American people at their best: running toward danger, opening their doors, serving without recognition, and choosing courage when fear would have been easier. What made America a beacon was never a building, a president, or a political party. It was the promise that people from every background could belong here. That power would be constrained by principle. That truth mattered. That no person stood above the law, and that, in the moments that tested us most, we would recognize one another as Americans before anything else.

We have drifted far from that promise, and we may not find our way back soon. But perhaps "back" is not where we should be trying to go. Perhaps our responsibility is to move forward. To build a country that is more honest about its mistakes, more careful with its power, more protective of democracy, and more determined to see the humanity in people both within and beyond our borders.

I began walking toward that country on September 11, 2001. I did not know it at the time. I was simply trying to get home.

Twenty-five years later, I am still walking. And I still believe we can find our way there together.

–Olivia

If September 11 changed the course of your life, I would like to hear how. What did you choose because of that day? What have you carried with you ever since? Please share your story in the comments. Twenty-five years later, those stories are also part of our national memory.

If this piece meant something to you, consider sharing it with someone who remembers that day, or with someone too young to remember it at all.

Good morning.☕️

The headlines were loud this week. Some of the most important stories weren’t.

Pour the coffee. Let’s get into it.

1. Welcome to Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon

Here’s a story that gets more interesting when you put a few pieces together.

The Pentagon quietly brought conservative military influencers with hundreds of thousands of followers into government jobs. Some continued praising Pete Hegseth, attacking his critics and weighing in on Pentagon policy, without telling their audiences they were also working for the Pentagon. Meanwhile, three Stars and Stripes employees are being fired after two publicly defended the newspaper’s editorial independence and the third refused to fire them. On Friday, a federal judge declined to block their terminations while their lawsuit proceeds.

So friendly influencers get quietly brought inside. Journalists defending their independence get shown the door. Got it.

And here’s one more wrinkle: NBC reported last week that Hegseth and his wife have privately discussed a possible 2028 presidential run. Hegseth says that’s "100% false." Maybe he never runs. However, a Defense secretary with possible political ambitions overseeing a Pentagon that’s quietly employing sympathetic influencers while exerting greater control over an independent military newspaper?

That’s worth paying attention to.

🥸 Pentagon Secretly Hires Military Influencers (WaPo)

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2. The CDC Director Is Caving, Again

I’ve seen this movie before…from inside the White House.

In 2020, I watched Trump and his team pressure the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) when its science or public-health guidance became politically inconvenient. It was dangerous then. Watching it happen again is even more alarming.

Which brings me to what’s happening at the CDC right now.

CDC Director Dr. Erica Schwartz ordered the agency not to include two measles-associated deaths reported by Pennsylvania in its national tally while it conducts another review. Pennsylvania says it provided the required information, and former CDC officials say second-guessing a state’s determination this way is highly unusual.

And as of Friday night, nothing has changed. The CDC updated its national measles tracker Friday and again left out Pennsylvania's two reported deaths, putting an asterisk where the state's death count would otherwise appear.

Remember the concerns about Schwartz during her confirmation? Senators from both parties pressed her on whether she would stand up to RFK Jr. and Trump if politics collided with science. She promised she would "never compromise on the science." Well, here’s her first major test…

When politics starts influencing how the CDC counts deaths or communicates risk, we lose something essential: trust in the information meant to keep us safe. I watched what happens when politics bullies science into submission. We should not have to learn that lesson twice.

🦠 CDC Delays Counting Measles Deaths (CNN)

3. DHS Goes Fishing

Apparently investigating your social media posts wasn’t enough.

The Trump administration is using an obscure government tool to obtain private information about journalists, nonprofits and unions, without first getting a judge’s approval. Minneapolis journalist Georgia Fort learned the government had obtained six months of her phone records without notifying her.

It turns out your shopping history isn’t off limits either. In a separate anti-ICE investigation, DHS Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) subpoenaed REI for information on anyone in the Minneapolis–St. Paul area who bought a particular dark-green beanie over roughly two years. WIRED reports investigators issued 92 subpoenas to companies ranging from telecoms and social-media platforms to airlines.

Yes. The federal government wanted to know who bought a green beanie at REI.

I’ve worked at DHS. Investigators sometimes need access to records when pursuing actual threats, but that’s why we have rules, oversight, and courts. A few weeks ago, I told you about DHS building dossiers on protesters.

This week, it’s journalists’ phone records and REI shopping histories.

See the pattern yet?

📱 DHS Is Using an Obscure Law to Secretly Snoop (The Guardian)

4. About Those Forever Chemicals in Your Water...

You know those “forever chemicals” we keep discovering in our water, soil, and food? We seem to be taking the “forever” part a little too literally.

The EPA developed a first-of-its-kind national survey to figure out which industries are sending Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) into wastewater treatment plants, information that could help regulators trace the biggest sources and eventually limit the pollution. It was sent to the White House Office of Management and Budget for approval in October 2024. It’s still sitting there. Nearly two years later! (For context, a former OMB official told the Associated Press that these reviews typically take about 60 days.)

PFAS have been linked to certain cancers, developmental problems in children, reduced vaccine response, and other health problems. Wastewater plants generally aren’t equipped to remove them, meaning the chemicals can wind up back in rivers and in treated sewage sludge spread on farm fields as fertilizer.

Here’s where this gets particularly absurd: the Trump administration criticized an EPA assessment of PFAS-contaminated farm sludge in part because there wasn’t enough national data. The survey designed to collect that data? That’s the one sitting at the White House awaiting approval.

The administration says it’s committed to protecting Americans from PFAS and has kept some Biden-era drinking-water limits. But if you actually want to stop these chemicals from getting into our water and food, knowing who is dumping them in the first place is a good place to start.

Call me crazy.

☣️ PFAS Study Stalled at White House (AP)

5. Maybe Check That Barcode

Here’s something I want you to know.

While diarrhea jokes have gotten some laughs lately, here’s the less funny part: our food-safety system has some serious holes.

There were 320 food recalls last year, up from 296 in 2024. But the number that caught my attention was this: regulators investigated 28 foodborne illness outbreaks, and 17 never resulted in an announced recall for a specific brand. In 13 cases, investigators didn’t even identify what type of food caused the outbreak.

All of this is happening as the federal food-safety infrastructure is being weakened. ProPublica found that inspections of foreign food facilities fell to their lowest level in more than a decade, excluding the pandemic, following Trump administration staffing cuts.

So some journalists and data experts decided to build another set of eyes.

Recall411 is a new independent tool that monitors food and product-safety information from more than 100 sources, including federal and state agencies, retailers, manufacturers, and international regulators. You can even scan a barcode and see reported complaints and injuries before you buy.

We shouldn’t need a backup watchtower for the agencies charged with keeping us safe. But right now, I’m really glad someone built one. I personally tested it out and found it incredibly helpful.

🥫Check Your Food & Products on Recall411

❤️ One Thing For Your Soul

The stories coming out of the family detention center in Dilley, Texas, have been heartbreaking. Parents have reported children getting sick, struggling to eat, and going without basic necessities.

And in the middle of all that, there is Casey Revkin.

Through her nonprofit, Each Step Home, Casey is sending more than $10,000 a week to detained families so parents can buy food their children will actually eat, bottled water, medicine, and even candy bars for birthdays. She regularly helps nearly 80 children.

If there are angels on Earth, Casey is certainly one of them. I hope she inspires all of us to keep making a difference in our own way. No matter how big. No matter how small. It matters.

🪥 The Woman Feeding Kids in ICE Detention (WaPo)

Before I leave you this week, I want to take a moment to remember a woman who spent a lifetime showing us what it means to speak up. After the 2024 election, concerned about what the future would hold, I had the privilege of spending time with Gloria Steinem when she opened her home to an extraordinary group of women. We regrouped. We leaned on each other. I sat in that room listening as Gloria shared her wisdom with women I deeply admire. She spent a lifetime showing generations of women what it looks like to speak up, push forward, and refuse to accept that the world has to remain as it is.

Thank you for everything, Gloria. Your courage lives on in all of us.

Have a wonderful Labor Day weekend,

-Olivia

Federal agents are launching a voter-fraud surge across nine states, starting today, that will continue as Americans begin casting ballots in the midterm elections. I spent years inside the Department of Homeland Security and counterterrorism communities. The dates caught my attention, but the agency they chose got my full attention. According to internal federal guidance obtained by CNN, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) is kicking off a "coordinated criminal voter fraud surge initiative." Field interviews, investigative leads, and potential prosecutions will take place from now through mid-October.

If this is your first introduction to HSI, don’t feel bad. ICE eats all the headlines, and FEMA soaks up whatever’s left, but I know this agency. HSI is not the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) with badges. It’s ICE’s principal investigative arm, built to go after things like terrorism financing, human trafficking, cyber intrusions, weapons smuggling, and the money behind cartels. Its agents sit on Joint Terrorism Task Forces with the FBI. This is serious machinery, built for serious threats. Which is exactly why it’s strange to watch it get pointed at your county’s voter rolls.

This isn’t the first stretch, either. HSI’s mission has already been bent during this Presidential term. ICE has two lanes: Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) handles immigration arrests and deportations, HSI handles criminal investigations. Almost immediately after Trump returned to office, Border czar Tom Homan folded HSI into a “whole of government” immigration surge alongside ERO, the FBI, DEA, ATF and the Marshals. It has been all hands on deck for arrest numbers. Specialized investigators trained for terrorism, cybercrime and transnational crime got reassigned to immigration enforcement. Now they’re being redeployed again. This time toward American voters in Washington, Wisconsin, Missouri, Georgia, California, Pennsylvania, Nevada, New York and Connecticut (Anyone else notice some critical election swing states in there?)

To be clear, if someone knowingly votes while ineligible, that’s a crime, and crimes should be investigated. I’m not arguing otherwise. The question is narrower and much less comfortable: why does an agency built for cartels and terror cells suddenly have the bandwidth, and the mandate, to go door-knocking on election integrity, three months out from a national election? And does the evidence actually justify the size of the response? In national security, you don’t start with the response you want and reverse-engineer a threat to justify it. You start with the threat. What is it, how big is it, what does the evidence actually show, and what response is proportionate? I spent years in rooms where that sequence determined which agencies got involved and where resources went. So let’s run the numbers HSI is supposedly acting on.

The 250,000 number that isn’t

This summer, the White House and DHS announced it had found more than 250,000 registered noncitizens across California, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Nevada. That’s a big, scary, headline-ready number. Then you look at Nevada, one of the four states in that count. DHS told Nevada it had found nearly 16,000 noncitizens on the voter rolls. Somewhat alarming, until DHS clarified that 16,000 was just a raw list that still needed to be manually checked, person by person.

So how many did DHS say it was actually confident about?

185.

Another 6,200 were "higher confidence, needs more vetting." Over 14,000 needed further review before anyone could say anything about them. Nevada asked DHS for the underlying data to verify even the 185. DHS said no.

Nevada’s deputy secretary of state for elections put it plainly: "We are unable to conduct an analysis without real verifiable information."

Maybe some of those 185 turn out to be real. Investigate them. That’s the whole point. Investigate what you can substantiate; don’t build the scary number first and go looking for the crime after. That’s not how you run a national security operation, and it’s certainly not how you should run an operation aimed at American voters.

A database match is not a conviction

HSI’s real strength is connecting data across systems, which is useful when you’re tracking a cartel’s money. It’s considerably less reassuring when the dataset is your neighbors. Names overlap. Addresses go stale. Records lag. A match doesn’t mean you found a crime; sometimes it doesn’t even mean you found the right person.

Nevada officials said the quiet part out loud: they were worried about accusing an actual U.S. citizen of being a noncitizen and leaving them scared, harassed, or unable to vote. That’s not a clerical error, it’s a person’s ballot. Keep that in mind, because the disinformation machine around the midterms is already running hot, and a headline number is a lot easier to spread than a correction.

And DHS wants to take this national

Last week I flagged that ICE is exploring hiring a private contractor to collect voter-registration and voting-history files nationwide, all 50 states, D.C., the territories, feeding it to HSI for "fraud detection and data segmentation." Right now it’s only a request for information, not an awarded contract, and the draft says jurisdictions shouldn’t be picked based on politics. Sure…

Now put the pieces on the table together: HSI agents already stretched thin on immigration enforcement, redeployed onto a voter-fraud surge, built on numbers that dissolve under scrutiny, layered on top of a proposal to vacuum up voter data nationwide, all landing in the same eight-week window before Americans vote.

Each piece has an explanation if you squint. Stacked together, that’s not a coincidence, that’s a pattern.

Protecting elections is not the same as policing them

DHS absolutely belongs in election security: foreign hacking, physical threats to election workers, infrastructure attacks. That’s real, and it’s necessary; however, protecting the system is different from investigating the people inside it.

American elections are deliberately decentralized; your county clerk runs your polling place, not the federal government. The Department of Justice’s (DOJ) own guidance warns that overt investigations near an election can chill legitimate voting and drag the investigation itself into the political fight. DHS isn’t bound by that DOJ policy, and this new guidance doesn’t even mention the concern.

Sit with that.

Then there’s the military

This week, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Dan Caine had to put something remarkable in writing, in an official letter to a sitting senator: the military has no plans to send federal troops or federalized National Guard members to polling places, and no plans to seize ballots or voting machines.

Good. That’s exactly the answer we should want. But I can’t shake the fact that in 2026, in the United States of America, someone had to ask. And I’ll say this plainly: I have been deeply concerned about Trump deploying troops as we get closer to the midterms. I still am.

Caine’s letter doesn’t erase that concern. Because troops don’t have to be stationed at polling places to affect what’s happening around an election. Having served in the White House during Trump 1.0, I know what the President does when he lashes out. As Trump grows increasingly angry about the possibility of Republicans losing Congress—and the investigations, subpoenas and accountability hearings that could come with it—I’m watching what happens in American cities very closely.

The justification for deploying forces doesn’t have to be the election. It can be immigration. An “invasion.” Crime. Riots. Disorder. Protecting federal personnel or property. Pick your emergency.

We’ve already watched this administration deploy federal forces into American cities over the objections of state and local leaders. In 2024 I publicly warned that this would happen should he return to office, and it did. That’s why I’m not only watching whether troops appear at polling places. I’m watching whether they’re deployed to the streets around them in the weeks leading up to Election Day.

Trump often says the quiet part out loud. Stephen Miller’s role has been different: turning the president’s impulses into executable policy that also benefits his conniving agenda.

So no, I don’t expect anyone to stand at a podium and announce, We’re deploying troops because of the election. I’m watching what they do, and what justification they use to do it because you don’t have to put a soldier inside a polling place to change the atmosphere outside of one.

Tonight, in one of those nine states, a local election official—Republican, Democrat, or neither—it doesn’t matter, is testing equipment and answering angry emails, bracing for the next round of harassment over a job most people don’t even know exists. Before you share the next viral fraud claim about them, ask the questions I learned to ask for a living: What’s the threat? What’s the evidence? Does the response actually match it?

And let me be clear about something else: none of this should scare anyone away from participating. Stay vigilant. Ask questions. Pay attention. But no matter what happens between now and Election Day, get out and vote.

Our elections don’t belong to ICE, DHS, the military, or any president.

They belong to us.

Until next time,

Olivia

Saturday, August 29, 2026

Happy Pumpkin Spice Latte season to all who celebrate. 🎃☕️ (It’s too early in my opinion, but I digress.)

Grab your coffee. No foam, no filter—let’s go.

1. ICE Wants Your Voting History. Seriously.

If you had ICE collecting voter data from all 50 states on your 2026 bingo card, congratulations.

This week, ICE sought a contractor capable of acquiring voter-registration and voter-history files from every state, D.C., and U.S. territory for what it calls "fraud detection and data segmentation." To be clear: voting history doesn’t tell the government who you voted for, but it can show whether you voted and include other information contained in voter files.

But here’s where this gets even more concerning.

In Wyoming, two Department of Justice (DOJ) officials showed up during the Republican primary to monitor polling places. According to Laramie County Clerk Debra Lee, they wanted to interview voters, questioned officials about poll-worker training, requested training materials, and asked to examine election tabulators. She refused some of their requests. Republican Gov. Mark Gordon called their behavior "aggressive" and "irregular" and has asked the state attorney general to investigate. DOJ says they were there to ensure compliance with federal voting-rights laws.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration is fighting in court to impose new federal requirements on mail voting just weeks before ballots go out. A federal judge temporarily blocked the rules Thursday, and the administration is already appealing.

I’ve worked at DHS. ICE collecting nationwide voter data while DOJ officials are showing up at polling places asking about voting machines is not something I shrug off. Neither should you. This isn’t normal, and we shouldn’t get used to it.

🗳️ ICE Seeks Nationwide Voter Data (Courthouse News Service)

Speaking of technology knowing a little too much about us…

I stumbled across What We Tell AI, a project asking strangers what they actually tell AI about work, relationships, decisions, and the things they might not tell another person.

The most 2026 project imaginable: humans telling humans what they tell the robots. 🤖 Take a look

2. We’re Running Out of the Missiles NATO Needs

While Washington ricochets from one outrage to another, here’s something that should be setting off alarm bells: U.S. Patriot missile interceptor stocks in Europe have reportedly fallen to “beyond critical” levels. The six-month war with Iran has consumed an estimated 65% of the U.S. Patriot inventory. The Pentagon disputes that there’s a critical shortage, but our adversaries are watching.

Fresh U.S. intelligence reportedly indicates that Putin sees America as weakened by the Iran war and may see an opportunity to escalate against U.S. interests and allies in Europe. Russia has already been threatening NATO countries while intensifying missile and drone attacks against Ukraine. Then came an extraordinary development: CIA Director John Ratcliffe quietly flew to Moscow this week to apparently warn Russian officials not to escalate against NATO allies, particularly Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and pressed Moscow to reduce its military and economic support for Iran. Trump, meanwhile, downplayed the concern, saying Putin isn’t going to attack NATO territory.

I spent years working on national-security crises. Readiness means planning for the threat in front of you and the one that comes next. We’re burning through critical air-defense weapons in one war while Russia is reportedly assessing whether America is too depleted and distracted to respond somewhere else.

Putin is watching, and apparently, he’s doing the math.

🚀 U.S. Patriot Stocks Fall to “Beyond Critical” Levels (AP)

3. RFK Jr. Said It Wasn’t About Vaccines, His Letter Says Otherwise

During his confirmation hearings last year, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was repeatedly questioned about a 2019 trip he made to Samoa, months before a devastating measles outbreak killed 83 people, most of them young children.

Kennedy was emphatic that his trip had "nothing to do with vaccines," he told senators. He said it again the next day: "My purpose in going down there had nothing to do with vaccines."

There’s just one problem: a letter Kennedy himself sent before the trip.

New documents obtained by the Associated Press and The Guardian show Kennedy wrote Samoa’s prime minister proposing that his team conduct a "detailed health informatics assessment" of what happened with the country’s MMR vaccines. In that letter, he used the words vaccine or vaccination eight times.

Kennedy ultimately got confirmed after reassuring skeptical senators about his vaccine positions. Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy, a physician, has since said Kennedy violated commitments he made to secure that support.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) insists the Samoa trip was unrelated to vaccines and calls allegations that Kennedy lied to Congress false and defamatory. Kennedy was not under oath during the hearings, although knowingly making materially false statements to Congress can still be a crime.

This isn’t ancient history. This is the man currently running America’s health department.

💉 RFK Jr.’s Samoa Story Unravels (AP)

4. Fired Over Climate Science

Dr. Adam Kalkstein spent 17 years teaching at West Point. He was the academy’s only climate scientist. Now he’s out of a job, and suing.

Kalkstein says West Point ordered him to remove information about the human causes of climate change from his curriculum. He refused, saying doing so would force him to “defy science.” Six months later, the tenured professor was told his contract would not be renewed.

And here’s a detail worth knowing: Kalkstein is a conservative Republican. His argument wasn’t about politics or “social justice.” He told Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that understanding climate change is a national-security issue, from competing with Russia in a melting Arctic to preparing future officers for the world they’ll actually have to operate in.

This also comes as Hegseth pushes to remake America’s service academies. A draft Pentagon memo reportedly criticized “civilian academic norms,” proposed scaling back civilian professors, and called for reviewing courses for their “operational relevance.”

Think about the irony. If you’re serious about military lethality, wouldn’t you want future commanders to understand why the physical environment they’re going to fight in is changing? The enemy doesn’t care about our culture wars. Neither does melting sea ice.

🌡️ West Point’s Climate Science Fight (NY Times)

5. Your Tax Dollars at Work…on the Ranch

Remember all that talk about government waste? Apparently there may be an exception when the government official owns 480 acres nearby.

Senators are seeking an investigation into Michael Boren, a senior Trump administration official overseeing the U.S. Forest Service, after current and former officials raised questions about the firefighting response to a July blaze near his Idaho ranch. The fire reportedly burned only about seven acres, but officials described an unusually robust deployment of federal firefighting resources. Boren reportedly contacted Forest Service officials repeatedly as the fire approached the area surrounding his property. The Agriculture Department says his communications were appropriate for his position, and it has made no finding of wrongdoing. However, the allegations are serious enough that senators now want answers about who got those federal firefighting resources and why.

Government efficiency gets complicated when the smoke is visible from your own backyard.

🔥 Firefight at the Ranch (The Guardian)

🐾 One Thing For Your Soul

Milo Bear, a golden retriever, disappeared into the snowy mountains near Lake Tahoe on Christmas Day. For 72 days, his family searched. They put up thousands of flyers, followed sightings and snowshoed through drifts as deep as 20 feet. They never stopped looking.

Then came the call every dog owner dreams about: Milo had been found alive. A shelter scanned his microchip and reunited him with his family. He’d lost a lot of weight, but remarkably, had no major injuries.

Now Milo has been named the winner of Nationwide’s 2026 Hambone Award for the year’s most unusual pet insurance claim.

For 72 days, his family refused to give up on him and Milo wasn’t giving up on finding his way back to them either.

Good boy, Milo!

🐶 Milo’s 72-Day Journey Home

And before I go, I can’t end this week without saying goodbye to Dolly Parton. I was raised on Dolly. Her music was part of the soundtrack of my childhood and a reminder that you can go out into the world, become larger than life, and never forget where you came from.

Rest easy, Dolly. We will always love you.❤️

More soon,

Olivia

Saturday, August 22, 2026

$40 trillion.

That’s where the national debt landed this week. If you think that’s just a Washington Beltway number, it isn’t. The consequences can reach your mortgage, your car loan, your credit cards, etc.

And, as the national debt crossed a record $40 trillion, the President was showing off construction on his White House ballroom and helipad.

So there’s your cheerful Saturday morning financial update. Now on to the other things keeping me caffeinated.

1. He Spied For America, Now ICE Wants Him Gone

Blerim Skoro says he infiltrated al Qaeda for the CIA, provided intelligence to the FBI, and helped put terrorists behind bars. He was shot after his cover was blown and a federal judge later determined that sending him back to Kosovo could put him at risk of torture or death. So naturally, ICE arrested him while he was showing up to an immigration office to renew his paperwork.

Skoro’s story is complicated. He came to the U.S. from Kosovo, served prison time for drug trafficking, was deported, and later returned illegally. There’s a national security problem buried inside this immigration story: What happens the next time America asks someone to risk their life for us?

Intelligence work depends on people willing to enter rooms Americans cannot, build relationships we cannot, and take risks most of us will never know about. You can argue about Skoro’s immigration status. You can’t pretend the message being sent to future informants and assets overseas doesn’t matter.

Neither, presumably, did the people we’ll need to recruit tomorrow.

🕵️‍♂️ He spied for the U.S. Now ICE wants to deport him. (CBS News)

2. What Does Anti-Terrorism Money Have to Do With Your Ballot?

Last month we found out that the Trump administration is withholding federal anti-terrorism money unless states and local governments agree to changes in how they run elections. The money comes from FEMA’s Homeland Security Grant Program, created by Congress after 9/11 to help communities prevent and respond to terrorism.

That is quite a journey from al Qaeda to ballot audits.

New requirements cover voting equipment, how ballots are cast and audited, and citizenship checks of voters and election workers using a federal database that has faced questions about accuracy. Jurisdictions that don’t comply can lose 20%, or potentially all, of their grant funding. Now Harris and El Paso counties in Texas, Nashville, and Columbus are suing. FEMA says election security is national security and calls the requirements “critical, common-sense steps” to protect election integrity.

I spent years at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Protecting elections from cyberattacks, terrorism, and foreign interference absolutely belongs in the homeland-security mission. Using anti-terrorism funding as leverage to dictate how states and localities administer elections is something very different—especially months before the midterms. Whatever you think, ask yourself this: What happens to public safety when terrorism-prevention money becomes leverage in a fight over elections?

🗳️ Anti-Terrorism Funds Tied to Election Rules (USA Today)

3. When the Watchdogs Become Political Weapons

I’ve warned about this for years.

When I spoke out in 2020, I didn’t use the internal whistleblower process. I had spent my career inside the government and was already worried about what happens when the systems designed to expose wrongdoing are controlled by the people you’re reporting on.

Trump began his second term by firing or demoting at least 20 inspectors general. Some replacements are now openly praising Trump, attacking his political opponents and directing scrutiny outside the agencies they’re supposed to oversee.

Then came a DOJ whistleblower. Career Civil Rights Division attorney Haley Van Erem alleges the administration’s antisemitism investigations into Brown, Columbia and Harvard universities had outcomes "predetermined without regard to the evidence." At Brown, she says investigators found insufficient evidence of systemic violations; yet more than $500 million in federal funding had already been frozen.

Antisemitism is real and Jewish students deserve protection, but that’s exactly why investigations must follow the evidence, not a political directive. Put the stories together: fire the watchdogs, weaken their offices, install political allies, and then pressure career investigators when the facts don’t produce the desired result…

And you arrive at the question I worried about in 2020: Who do you report wrongdoing to when the watchdogs themselves have been compromised?

🚨 Trump’s IGs Become Political Weapons (NY Times); DOJ Whistleblower Sounds the Alarm (WaPo)

Someone I Want You to Know

I want to pause here for someone I know personally.

My friend and former colleague Julia Curlee told her story in The Atlantic this week. Julia and I spent years serving in the intelligence community, and we later served together on Vice President Mike Pence’s staff. During my tenure as his Homeland Security Advisor, she was his Presidential Daily Briefer. I knew Julia for what she was: an extraordinarily dedicated intelligence officer and public servant. I also watched Vice President Pence treat her with the professionalism and respect she had earned.

Julia is transgender. In her piece, she writes publicly about her career, her service, and what happened after the Trump administration returned to power.

She ends with a line that stayed with me:

She once wrote under a pseudonym so she could keep serving. Now she writes in her own name for the same reason.

🕵️‍♀️ Julia Curlee: The Wrong Kind of American (The Atlantic- Gift article)

4. ICE Had a Quiet Deportation Channel With Iran

And then there’s the one that almost made me spit out my coffee.

Newly released emails show ICE officials working with Iranian officials to arrange three flights that deported more than 100 Iranians in 2025 and early 2026. Coordinating with another government to obtain travel documents isn’t unusual. However, what happened next is. The emails show Iranian officials requesting changes to who would be sent back, and ICE apparently accommodating some of them.

"Per request from the Iran Embassy I added a few cases," one ICE official wrote. Another wrote: “Iran has requested that I amend the previous manifest and expedite the removal process.”

At least one Iranian was even put on a flight despite not appearing on the final manifest sent to Qatar. One U.S. official responded: “I have no idea how the case/person got through on the plane.” DHS disputes that anyone was mistakenly deported.

Days after Trump warned “Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran!” during the U.S.-Israel conflict with Iran, ICE leadership was calling Iranian deportations a priority. An internal email urged officials to “identify a solution for this White House priority,” even as Iranians themselves were fleeing the country.

Previous reporting found asylum seekers among those deported. And eleven Iranian detainees have separately alleged they were forced to meet with Iranian government officials who knew details about their asylum claims. DHS vehemently denies sharing asylum records and says deportees received due process.

For decades, America offered refuge to Iranians fleeing that regime. Now we’re learning the regime may have had a say in who America sent back.

🇮🇷 ICE’s Quiet Channel With Iran (AP)

5. Dump Flock, but the Cameras Aren’t Going Away

Remember all that controversy over Flock Safety, the company with more than 120,000 AI-powered license-plate cameras across America? People fought back and at least 56 municipalities have deactivated, canceled, or rejected Flock contracts this year. Victory! Well, not exactly. New reporting finds that some cities dumping Flock are simply replacing it with another surveillance company: Axon. The $48 billion police-tech giant behind Tasers and body cameras has moved in to replace Flock in at least seven municipalities across five states.

And this is where the story turns into a bigger Flockin’ deal. See what I did there?

These cameras automatically scan license plates billions of times every month, creating searchable records of where vehicles have been. Police say they’re invaluable for finding missing people, stolen cars and solving crimes. We’ve also seen police use this technology to track a woman suspected of self-administering an abortion across state lines. Officers have allegedly used it to stalk romantic partners. Data has found its way to federal immigration enforcement. Now add artificial intelligence (AI)…Axon markets a platform that combines license-plate readers with city and privately owned cameras to, in the company’s words, "connect the dots across your entire data ecosystem."

This isn’t really a story about Flock anymore. It’s about building a surveillance infrastructure faster than we’re building the rules governing what can be done with it.

You can take down the Flock cameras. That doesn’t mean anyone stopped watching.

👁️ Cities Dump Flock. Surveillance Remains (The Guardian)

Meanwhile, Deep in the Heart of Texas…🤠

Okay, I’m originally from Texas, so indulge me. Cook Political Report just moved the Texas Senate race from Lean Republican to Toss-Up, as rural Republicans increasingly revolt over data centers, transmission lines, water, power and local control. Texas hasn’t elected a Democrat statewide in more than 30 years. So no, I’m not calling Texas blue. But I am saying: Watch Texas. I will certainly do my best to support James Talarico because I love my home state. Texans and the country deserve better than the corrupt Ken Paxton.

🐴 One Thing for Your Soul

Meet Yupia, a rescue horse who apparently looked at the music industry and thought: I can do that!

Singer-songwriter Mikayla Khramov discovered Yupia liked making music when he started strumming her guitar with his nose. He has since expanded his repertoire to guitar, harp and accordion, sometimes plucking strings with his teeth. Naturally, he’s now a featured artist on her upcoming album.

So after a week of $40 trillion debt, deportations, surveillance and government watchdogs…

Here’s a horse dropping an album. And frankly, I’m ready for his tour dates.

🎸 Meet Yupia, the Musical Horse (USA Today)

And on that note, I’m off to play my guitar. Thanks for the inspiration, Yupia.

–Olivia

Saturday, August 15, 2026

If there were ever any doubt that Trump does not understand the sacrifices military service demands, just remember the USS Abraham Lincoln.

Bring them home.

And apparently Trump now thinks he can declare parts of the world American territory. He says the Strait of Hormuz is next. Because international sovereignty works on dibs now. SMDH. (Translation for those of us raised on complete sentences: shaking my damn head.)

Now, let’s get into it.

1. The National Security Cloak Is Coming for the Midterms

I have long warned that “national security” is this administration’s favorite cloak, the phrase it reaches for when it wants extraordinary power with minimal scrutiny. Now Trump’s allies are saying the quiet part out loud.

During a Newsmax interview, MAGA personality Wayne Allyn Root suggested Trump declare a national security emergency to impose new voting restrictions before the midterms. Trump could have rejected the idea. Instead, he replied: "Stranger things have happened, okay? I’ll leave it at that."

A classic Trump threat, left hanging in the air. The president does not control federal elections. The Constitution gives states primary responsibility for administering them and Congress the power to regulate them. An emergency declaration cannot erase that, and any attempted takeover would face immediate legal challenges, but legality is only part of the danger.

This is how the national security cloak works: manufacture an emergency, call it "security" and dare anyone to intervene. Protesters become "domestic terrorists." Migration becomes an "invasion." A trade deficit becomes a "national emergency." Falling crime in Washington justifies troops in the streets. Now they are testing that language on our elections.

Trump just told us what he may do. This time, let’s not pretend we weren’t warned.

🗳️ Trump Is Hinting at an Election Emergency (The New Republic)

2. Bombing Fishing Boats Near the Galápagos…

This story reads like a spy thriller. Unfortunately, the people and the explosions are real.

Three Ecuadorian fishing boats were attacked near the Galápagos Islands this year. The Fiorella disappeared in January with eight crew members still missing. Two others were struck by explosive drones in March. Survivors say armed men then hooded and handcuffed them, transported them to El Salvador and eventually sent them home without charges or explanation.

The Washington Post reports that the attacks were part of a covert CIA program authorized by President Trump. Flight data shows a surveillance-equipped American jet repeatedly flying from El Salvador toward the boats before the strikes. It operated from Ilopango, the same airport used for covert U.S.-backed operations in Central America during the 1980s. This is separate from the Pentagon’s campaign of bombing suspected drug boats, which has killed 221 people without meaningfully slowing the cocaine trade, as I recently wrote. No evidence has been publicly released tying these Ecuadorian crews to trafficking. The survivors say they were fishing. If this was a legitimate counternarcotics operation, where is the evidence? If it wasn’t, what exactly did our government do?

🛥️ Now the CIA Is Reportedly Bombing Fishing Boats, Too (WaPo)

3. Federal Agents Killed Him, DHS Investigated the Protesters

Four days after federal agents fatally shot Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old VA nurse who was filming Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) opened an investigation. The target of that DHS inquiry was not the conduct of the agents who killed him. It was labor unions, climate activists, socialist groups and ordinary residents protesting the crackdown. Newly released documents reveal that DHS launched a sprawling surveillance effort called Operation Puppet Master. Undercover agents infiltrated Signal chats and attended meetings in churches, libraries and parks. They recorded names, political opinions and license plates. Investigators obtained three years of financial records from the Sunrise Movement and the Communications Workers of America. They scrutinized wire transfers from the nation’s largest health care workers union as possible "domestic terrorist financing."

Prosecutors later showed a grand jury a slide claiming that 18 organizations, including the AFL-CIO, teachers’ unions, the Democratic Socialists of America and even a Minneapolis bicycle shop, were connected to a conspiracy to obstruct immigration officers. Fifteen individuals were eventually charged with interfering with federal agents, and the indictment describes some allegedly violent or obstructive acts. None of the organizations swept into the investigation has been charged with a crime. A significant portion of the documented activity involved constitutionally protected speech discussing protests, monitoring ICE vehicles, and criticizing the administration. This wasn’t investigators following evidence. It was the government choosing political opponents, then working backward to find a crime. This is incredibly alarming.

They called it Operation Puppet Master. For once, the name tells you everything.

🕵️ DHS Put Political Dissent Under Surveillance (NY Times)

4. The Name That Won’t Stay Gone

Remember when we stayed up late watching Donald Trump’s name finally come off the Kennedy Center? Well, someone kept the ladder.

This week, the Trump-aligned Kennedy Center board voted, again, to put his name on the building. This time, the proposed inscription reads: "The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, Restored and Renovated by President Donald J. Trump."

Subtle.

A federal judge blocked the board’s previous attempt to rename the center and ordered Trump’s name removed in June. So rather than accept the ruling, the board has apparently returned with a thesaurus and a workaround. It also voted to close the main building for two years for renovations, shifting some performances elsewhere. However, some have said the shutdown is less about construction and more about concealing declining ticket sales after Trump took the place over. The judge who blocked the earlier closure plan would still need to approve this one. Apparently we’re doing this ridiculous performance again, only this time the show is happening outside of the theater.

🎭 Trump’s Name Is Going Back on the Kennedy Center, Again (Politico)

5. The Teenagers Did Their Homework and the Adults Panicked

Given what is happening to journalism and the First Amendment across this country, I want you to read this story. What happens to the next generation of journalists matters just as much as what is happening in today’s newsrooms.

Ben Mueller, a California high school senior, was assigned to tell a news story through an Instagram slideshow for his journalism class. He chose the Epstein files. Mueller spent five hours searching the Justice Department’s database for references to his Marin County community. He found thousands, including a 2013 email associated with a woman connected to a French modeling agency. He accurately summarized the public document in a post for his school newspaper, The Redwood Bark. After the post went viral, the woman threatened to sue the school district for defamation. Worried about legal costs, the superintendent demanded that the students remove her name or delete the slide. So the teenagers spent lunch consulting lawyers and then showed administrators the document and cited California law protecting student journalists from censorship. The post went back up and no lawsuit followed.

The Student Press Law Center says requests for legal help from school newspapers have risen 42 percent in two years as students report on immigration, Gaza, campus protests and the Epstein files. This is how censorship often works: not with a government order, but with enough pressure to make people silence themselves. These teenagers refused.

📰 A Teen Reporter, the Epstein Files and a Legal Threat (Wired)

🌠 ONE THING FOR YOUR SOUL

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope may have discovered an entirely new cosmic object: a “black hole star.” Seen as it existed 660 million years after the Big Bang, it is the size of our solar system and produces 100 billion times more energy than any known star. Except, it’s not a star! It may actually be a black hole wrapped in gas so dense that the whole structure glows. Scientists believe objects like this could have helped shape galaxies, stars, planets, and eventually, life.

There is something comforting in knowing the universe can still surprise us. A light we never knew existed has traveled billions of years to reach us, and we are finally able to see it.

If Earth felt especially heavy this week, here’s your reminder to look up. Even something as dark as a black hole can surprise us with light. Take that with you.

🌌 Meet the Black Hole Star (The Guardian)

And on that bright note, see you next time,

Olivia

Some of this week’s biggest stories barely made a ripple. They should have set off alarms, but at this point, the fire alarm would never stop ringing. Pour the coffee. Here are five things worth knowing before the next outrage buries them.

1. The Tired_Thumb Surveillance of Dissent

Say something mean about U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) online and there’s a decent chance that a federal contractor is already building a dossier about you. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has spent $258 million (a tiny 57% bump from the Biden years) on an army of analysts, including Amivero, a small Virginia firm that scored an $8 million contract, who then subcontracted to Guidehouse. Their teams scrape Instagram, Facebook, X, Reddit, Discord, even Snapchat (your snaps aren’t private either), hunting for "threats." What counts as a threat? Using the phrase ACAB "all cops are bastards," or pretty much any hint of a side eye could make you a target. Definitely don’t post after ICE shoots someone in cold blood.

Welcome to the Trump police state era.

Take Tired_Thumb, the Reddit user who mentioned an ICE agent’s home state after news outlets already reported it. Six months, two subpoenas, and a grand jury later, the feds still don’t know who he is and haven’t filed a single charge, but they’re still trying! Or Paigelynne Gonyea, a poll worker cornered at her voting site by agents waving a folder with her birthdate, address, and an airport surveillance photo, over an Instagram post she can’t even find anymore.

Putting my former DHS hat on: THIS. ISN’T. NORMAL.

DHS blames an "8,000% increase" in death threats. Sure, some of that’s real. But civil-rights lawyers keep asking: if these are real crimes, where are the charges? Mostly what’s getting flagged is people being annoyed online, who are still protected by that pesky First Amendment. Nothing chills speech like a home visit and a letter saying your post “may” be illegal, no court required.

🕵️ The Surveillance State Wants Your Reddit Comments (WSJ)

2. Big Law’s Surrender Tour

Remember when President Trump began targeting law firms with executive orders?

Some refused to back down. Perkins Coie, WilmerHale, and Jenner & Block fought the administration in court and won early injunctions. Veteran attorney Abbe Lowell, who has represented clients across the political spectrum, including Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump, and Hunter Biden, left Winston & Strawn to launch Lowell & Associates, a boutique firm representing individuals and institutions facing what the firm describes as politicized investigations and government actions.

Others made a different calculation.

Take Paul Weiss, once the firm of the Scottsboro Boys and Brown v. Board, the firm that reunited migrant families during Trump’s first term and put chairman Brad Karp on magazine covers for "standing up to the White House." This time, Karp didn’t fight. He rushed to the Oval Office and folded within days, agreeing to $40 million in free legal work for Trump-approved causes. Trump then rewrote the deal on Truth Social anyway, tacking on a "no DEI" pledge Karp never agreed to and a fabricated quote claiming Karp admitted "wrongdoing." Karp’s own email to partners: "He changed the agreement... and came up with a completely false quote...My god."

The fallout was brutal. Over 100 firm alumni called it "a craven surrender." Partners quit in waves, including litigator Karen Dunn, who wanted to sue in protest and got overruled. Then in January, the Epstein files revealed Karp hadn’t just represented Leon Black, he’d personally advised Epstein on discrediting his own accusers. His own partners pushed him out months later.

Moral of the story: fold for Trump, and you don’t just lose your spine. You lose your firm too.

⚖️ How Paul Weiss Folded (NY Times)

3. US Gov Advice on Hackers Breaching Water Systems: Try a Password

Hackers have hit water utilities in at least 12 states, and two weeks in, the government still can’t get facilities to set a password. Acting Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) director Nick Andersen told reporters at the Black Hat cyber conference this week that his agency is still finding programmable logic controllers, the tiny computers running pumps and valves, sitting wide open on the public internet with no password or the factory default. "We’re not making ourselves hardened targets," he said, which is putting it mildly given some utilities lost remote control entirely and had to run pumps by hand.

Minnesota alone had 30-plus systems targeted; Georgia’s Clayton County Water Authority, serving 300,000 people near Atlanta, had a pressure drop and boil-water advisory. Drinking water has stayed safe throughout, small mercy.

CISA’s own memo flagged tactics matching a known Iran-affiliated hacking campaign. Trump’s response, when asked directly: he doesn’t "think there was an Iranian cyberattack." Andersen, notably, says CISA isn’t touching attribution at all right now, just cleanup. No formal blame, no consequences, nothing. (Welcome to payback for an endless unnecessary war that Trump started…)

And Andersen’s fix for chronically underfunded utilities running on decades-old equipment? "A degree of personal responsibility." Cool, very reassuring for the water treatment plant with a skeleton crew and a 1990s server. The only actual backstop that exists right now is DEF CON Franklin, a volunteer program pairing hacker conference attendees with small rural utilities that has all of 21 utilities enrolled nationwide, out of roughly 50,000 community water systems in the country. Volunteers with laptops, doing the job the federal government won’t fund.

Tip of the white hat to them!

🔓 Your Water Utility’s Password Is Still “admin123” (NextGov)

4. The DNC Is Getting Ghosted

Some of the Democratic Party’s biggest donors are still writing enormous checks. They’re just no longer writing them to the Democratic National Committee (DNC).

The Soros family and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman have reportedly given the DNC nothing this cycle. Meanwhile, the DNC is carrying roughly $18.5 million in debt, with about $16 million on hand, while the Republican National Committee has amassed more than $128 million without debt.

No, the donors haven’t become Republicans. They’re bypassing the party establishment and putting money directly behind candidates they believe in, including Texas Senate candidate James Talarico and Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff. Having seen some prominent political consultants, and former DNC alumni, in action firsthand, I can’t say I blame them. There’s apparently even a new joke circulating among Democratic donors: DNC now stands for "Do Not Contribute." Ouch.

🫏 DNC: "Do Not Contribute" (WSJ)

5. It’s the Economy, Stupid!

A new Reuters/Ipsos poll has Democrats beating Republicans on the economy for the first time in nearly a decade, 37% to 36%, according to a survey of 4,505 adults with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 points. It’s razor thin, but Republicans have owned this question through Trump’s first term, all of Biden’s, and most of Trump’s second, so "tied" is basically a five-alarm fire for the GOP.

Here’s the data behind it: gas prices are up more than 25% since the US-Israeli strikes on Iran, over a dollar more per gallon, and Americans are noticing. Trump’s approval on cost of living sits at 23%, with 70% disapproving. On inflation: 22% approve, 70% disapprove. His overall approval dropped to 35%, down from 37% the month before and just a point off his term low.

It gets worse for the GOP on the generic congressional ballot: Democrats lead 42% to 37%, with independents breaking for Democrats by 12 points. Republicans are defending narrow majorities in both chambers with roughly three dozen competitive House races and eight Senate contests heading into November.

Trump’s response, posted to Truth Social before the poll even dropped: "My REAL Polling Numbers, not those made up by the Fake News Media, are the best they have ever been." Sure, Don.👌

📉 Dems Beat GOP on Economy (The Independent)

One Thing For Your Soul

Dave Bell usually spends Christmas playing Santa across Central Virginia. This July, he gave a stranger the gift of a lifetime: one of his kidneys.

Bell lost roughly 40 pounds to qualify as a living donor, then anonymously donated through the National Kidney Registry. His recovery, he reports, went "slicker than reindeer snot on a glass doorknob." But beneath the Santa jokes is something genuinely beautiful. Bell had two kidneys, decided he could live with one and the other should give a stranger another chance at life. "If we all made the world a better place," he asked, "what kind of place would this be?"

Apparently, the kind where Santa shows up for Christmas in July, and I’m here for it!

🎅 Santa Gave the Gift No Sleigh Could Carry (WRIC)

Have a wonderful weekend,

Olivia