Bank

A plan to import Russian diesel would route American money to Moscow that might wind up helping Iran in its fight against U.S. forces, argued Daily Beast columnist and security expert David Rothkopf in an analysis published Monday.

Rothkopf said the purchase, which he wrote was already moving with a first cargo of about 300,000 metric tons, won’t make a dent in prices at the pump. That shipment, he calculated, covers about half a day of the country’s diesel use. He added that the U.S. is likely paying more than it would to proven suppliers like Canada, that Russia’s own diesel supply is under strain, and that the arrangement relaxes sanctions on Russia.

His main concern is where the money ends up. In his telling, the cash would help sustain a Russian economy under pressure and bankroll its war in Ukraine. He then cited reports that Russia is rebuilding Iran’s missile stocks and passing along intelligence Iran could use to target U.S. and allied forces. The column doesn’t specify the sources for those reports....

A federal judge ended a hearing Monday regretting that she could not yet punish President Donald Trump’s officials, saying the government “can’t be trusted” after it cut hundreds of trees despite ongoing court proceedings.

U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes spoke as she closed an emergency hearing on the National Park Service’s weekend removal of trees at East Potomac Golf Course in Washington, Washington Sun reporter Reese Gorman reported.

Preservationists and golfers asked Reyes to halt the cutting, which they argue clears the way for Trump’s planned overhaul of the course, court records show....

Katie Miller, the podcaster married to White House adviser Stephen Miller, deleted a post celebrating Monday’s federal search of Rep. Ilhan Omar’s home, but not before social media captured it and suggested it could come back to haunt her.

“Promise made, promise kept,” Miller wrote on X in reply to a New York Post article about the search, echoing the Trump administration’s longtime slogan for touting its accomplishments, The Daily Beast reported.

National security writer Marcy Wheeler, who posts as emptywheel, screenshotted the post before it vanished and wrote that Miller “is not going to do very well in a deposition.”...

President Donald Trump's deal to buy Russian diesel fuel ahead of the midterms is more bluster than it is substantive, according to one expert.

Last week, Trump announced that the U.S. would buy more than 300,000 tons of diesel this month as an attempt to lower gas prices ahead of the midterm elections. The move was announced at a time when the national average price for a gallon of diesel fuel was above $6.20, according to figures from AAA. The deal has also sparked significant pushback from Republican lawmakers in Congress.

Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, said on CNN that the deal, while lucrative for Russia, likely won't have the significant and sustained impact on U.S. fuel prices that Trump hopes. ...

Supporters of the White House barely showed up in replies to its latest post about election fraud, as critics claimed its “bots” vanished after drones hit a Russian data center.

“Under President Trump, criminals who disrupt the integrity of America’s elections will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” the White House wrote on X Monday.

The post shared a Justice Department announcement of charges against 16 people accused of illegal voting, fraudulent voter registration and related election crimes....

A GOP-affiliated super PAC dropped tens of thousands of dollars on ads attacking Maine Democratic Senate nominee Troy Jackson, but appeared to have made an “embarrassing” mix-up when picking its audience, The Intercept reported Monday.

“The only problem with the ad in question: The group paid for the video ad to show more than 1 million times in the wrong Portland,” The Intercept’s Noah Hurowitz wrote.

The Defending Main Street super PAC, which describes itself as “supporting the governing wing of the Republican Party,” spent between $20,000 and $25,000 on a 30-second ad attacking Jackson “and all his taxes.” But according to Google’s ad records, the ad ran in Portland, Oregon, nearly 3,000 miles from its likely target of Portland, Maine. An X user, waprog, first posted screenshots of the targeting data....

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) suggested over the weekend that a Trump administration official may have quietly contacted a federal appeals judge to stall a contempt inquiry, and the legal analyst interviewing him declared that if so, “people are going to jail.”

In a clip flagged by political video aggregator Acyn Torabi from the Legal AF podcast, Whitehouse laid out a hypothetical involving D.C. Circuit Judge Neomi Rao, a Trump appointee.

“If some MAGA official communicated to Judge Rao or her chambers and that resulted in the administrative stay that held the door open and kept the facts from the Senate Judiciary Committee for his confirmation and stalled investigation into misconduct by the DOJ,” Whitehouse began, “ask any judge how big a deal that is.”...

President Donald Trump cut off reporters and walked away after they repeatedly demanded evidence for his claim of widespread mail-in voting fraud in California.

Trump spoke to reporters outside the White House on Monday as he prepared to board Marine One for campaign events.

The midterm elections are less than a month away, on Nov. 3....

Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) bragged about a road salt win at a Maine Senate debate, and her challenger's comeback had observers cheering.

On Tuesday, Collins faced Democratic challenger Troy Jackson in a debate weeks before the midterms. Asked what she would do about President Donald Trump's tariffs on Canada, Collins pointed to a specific victory.

"I was successful at getting road salt removed from the tariff list," Collins said. Jackson responded by pouncing on the answer....