A federal judge temporarily blocked the latest round of firings from President Donald Trump, finding it was "illegal," an "excess of authority," and was "arbitrary and capricious."
Trump and his Office of Management and Budget director, Russ Vought, announced that during the government shutdown, they would fire thousands of people across the government.
The American Federation of Government Employees and other federal labor unions requested a temporary restraining order while the case about the legality moves through the courts.
U.S. District Judge Susan Illston made it clear that she agreed and approved the temporary restraining order, The Associated Press reported. She noted in court that she was "inclined" to agree to the restraining order because, despite the government shutdown, laws must still be followed, GovEx's Eric Katz said on X.
The Trump administration has "taken advantage of the lapse in government spending, in government functioning, to assume that that all bets are off, that the laws don't apply to them anymore," she said.
Vice President JD Vance made clear on Wednesday that he isn't as angry about the bombshell scandal exposing members of the Young Republicans group posting racist and neo-Nazi rhetoric among themselves in text messages, as he is about reporters going public with the thing, calling them "scumbags."
"Grow up! Focus on the real issues. Don't focus on what kids say in group chats ... The reality is that kids do stupid things, especially young boys — they tell edgy, offensive jokes. That's what kids do," said Vance, following the report that a number of GOP operatives, some in their 30s and who hold elected office, professed love for Hitler in these chats.
This did not go over well with commenters on social media, with many pointing out that the people implicated in these chats aren't actually kids.
"Not even a month ago," wrote former President Barack Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau, linking to a clip of Vance saying, "When you see someone celebrating Charlie's murder, call them out — and, hell, call their employer."
"These 'young boys' are professional-class Republicans in their 30s," wrote The Bulwark's Andrew Egger.
"Question for @JDVance: How hard is it to simply say 'loving Hitler is not good'?" wrote former White House staffer Jeremy Edwards.
"They're not 'young boys,' they're grown ass adults, many of whom are employed by Republican elected officials," wrote Run For Something director Amanda Litman.
"They’ve already been fired. Their own org has denounced them strongly, as have other GOP. Why keep doing this?" wrote former college football coach E.B. Beaumont.
"To be clear, the Young Republican National Federation is for people between the ages of 18 and 40 not 'young boys,'" wrote political columnist Matthew Yglesias.
"I don't believe he would grant such leeway to the younger 'boys' group chatting about Palestine and Israel on college campuses," wrote MSNBC's Sam Stein.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced Wednesday that his agency is working to secure an additional $20 billion to add to the previously announced $20 billion bailout of Argentina, an announcement that sparked outrage from the administration’s critics.
“So that would be a total of $40 billion for Argentina,” Bessent said, speaking with members of the press at the Treasury building, CNN reported.
The Trump administration finalized its $20 billion bailout for Argentina last week, paid for with American tax dollars. The additional $20 billion Bessent announced on Wednesday, he said, would be paid for through a partnership with sources from the private sector and other entities, though the new price tag ignited rage from critics who argued the Trump administration had abandoned its mantra of “America first.”
“Trump is DOUBLING his bailout for Argentina. Meanwhile your health care premiums are about to DOUBLE,” wrote Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) in a social media post on X on Wednesday. “$40 BILLION to help Trump’s elite friends. $0 to lower costs for American families.”
“So much for ‘America first,’” noted the popular X account “Republicans against Trump” with its close to 1 million followers.
Argentina’s president, Javier Milei, has had a strong relationship with President Donald Trump, calling him “not only an ally” but “also a dear friend.” Trump, in turn, has praised Milei as being “MAGA all the way,” and championed his libertarian ideals that have drastically cut government agencies and regulations, ideals that critics say have destabilized the country and increased income inequality dramatically.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT) also joined in on slamming the Trump administration over the news of the bailout’s new price tag, highlighting the fact that Republican lawmakers’ ongoing opposition to extending Affordable Care Act subsidies would see health care premiums double for as many as 22 million Americans.
“If you're the Qatari royal family worth $335 billion, Trump gives you an Air Force facility in Idaho,” Sanders wrote Wednesday in a social media post on X.
“If you're the President of Argentina, Trump gives you a $20 billion bailout. If you're an American whose health care premiums are about to double? Tough luck.”
🚨Trump is DOUBLING his bailout for Argentina. Meanwhile your health care premiums are about to DOUBLE.
$40 BILLION to help Trump’s elite friends. $0 to lower costs for American families. https://t.co/Q6rLeWV6gz — Ruben Gallego (@RubenGallego) October 15, 2025
A U.S. military plane carrying Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was forced to declare an emergency, a Pentagon official said.
According to Assistant to the Secretary of Public Affairs Sean Parnell, the incident occurred as Hegseth was returning from NATO's Defense Ministers meeting on Wednesday.
"Secretary of War Hegseth’s plane made an unscheduled landing in the United Kingdom due to a crack in the aircraft windshield," Parnell confirmed on X. "The plane landed based on standard procedures and everyone onboard, including Secretary Hegseth, is safe."
A large 'Democracy' ice sculpture placed on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday gave a chilling warning.
It weighs about 3,000 pounds and is "in direct view of the U.S. Capitol as a vanishing reminder, its creators said, of rapidly eroding rights and an existential threat to the freedom on which America was founded," The Washington Post reports.
Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben & Jerry's, told The Post that democracy is in jeopardy under the Trump administration. The activist's Up in Arms campaign, which calls for reduced military and Pentagon spending and more healthcare and education spending, said the organization is behind the 5-foot-high and 17-foot-wide sculpture.
“Showing in real life that democracy is melting away before our very eyes, I think it’s a powerful symbol that helps express the feelings and the sadness and the horror of Americans,” Cohen told The Post.
“Attacks on freedom of speech. Masked, unidentified secret police snatching people off the streets and arresting and deporting them. These are horrible things that we used to talk about as happening in other countries,” Cohen said. “People being prosecuted and punished and sentenced without due process. Using the military against the population of the United States is undemocratic, right?”
Artists Nora Ligorano and Marshall Reese created the piece and have made other similar works to call attention to important social causes, including “Truth” at the same location in D.C. in 2018 and “The Future” at the People’s Climate March in New York City in 2014.
“We do this work to spark thought and provoke awareness and encourage people to engage in discussion about the issues and hopefully take some action,” Ligorano told The Post. “To witness it melting in front of the nation’s Capitol just adds theatrically, it sets the stage for what’s really going on.”
Sen. Jim Justice (R-WV) did not let the ongoing government shutdown prevent him from holding a birthday party for his dog in a Senate office building.
Correspondent Daniella Diaz confirmed that the party for Babydog Justice took place in the Hart Senate Office Building on Wednesday.
An invitation to the event promised cake and "belly rub diplomacy." The 6-year-old English Bulldog has been a fixture on Capitol Hill since Justice took office. The dog also appeared on stage at the Republican National Convention in 2024.
A long line of people was seen at the Hart Office Building waiting to get into the party.
The outrage over the NFL selecting reggaeton superstar Bad Bunny as the next Super Bowl halftime musical artist led Turning Point USA higher-ups to jump into the fray and propose an alternative “All American Halftime Show.”
And it's not going well, reports Salon columnist Amada Marcotte, who suggested that fans of the late Charlie Kirk’s TPUSA appear to be out of touch with not only current music, but also are in a state of “complete cluelessness” about what people will watch.
As she wrote on Wednesday, TPUSA decided to let supporters provide input on the acts and style of music to be presented, and it has not gone well, and there is not the groundswell of enthusiasm they likely expected.
According to Marcotte, there is a divide between those who want a Christian-based halftime show and those who lean hard into older rock units in the twilight of their careers.”
“When TPUSA posted about their halftime show, there was a flurry of hyperbolic responses from MAGA followers, hoping that hate alone would somehow produce an entertaining alternative to one of the most popular artists in the world,” she wrote and added, “The results haven’t been announced yet, so we can’t know if 'Classic Rock' will beat out 'worship' music. But on X, there were plenty of eager Trump fans offering suggestions about the kind of artists they think will top Bad Bunny, who has been streamed nearly 100 billion times on Spotify.”
Pointing out a proposed lineup of “a murderers’ row of has-beens like Papa Roach, Nickelback, Staind and, yep, Creed,” the columnist quipped, “... basically, the same array of CDs you’d find in the floorboards of the least dateable guy you knew in the 1990s.”
With that in mind, she added, “Some people wanted music that’s even more unpopular. Multiple users demanded worship music, which is basically a blandly written verse and chorus about Jesus performed in an adult contemporary style that no one listens to outside of white evangelical circles," before pointing out, “Many people, without having a clue who will perform, declared they would watch this instead of the real halftime show. Some of them seemed confused, thinking TPUSA had somehow canceled and replaced Bad Bunny with [fill in acceptably white person] at the Super Bowl.”
“All of this reflects what is a small ray of hope in our bleak political moment. MAGA’s relationship with pop culture only has two forms: Complete cluelessness and/or resentment that most people think their taste stinks,” she suggested, and noted that the right-wing donors behind the rise of TPUSA would be throwing their money away.
Writing that, “MAGA couldn’t be better designed to repel the creative urge. The whole movement is based on a notion that difference is scary, change is bad and everything that’s happened since you were 11 years old is a travesty,” she added, “Fearfulness and intellectual laziness are kryptonite to the imagination. How can you think of something new when your ideological position is that everything new is bad?”
Vice President JD Vance faulted "scumbag" reporters for leaking text messages from leaders of Young Republican groups that praised Adolf Hitler, used the N-word, joked about putting political opponents in gas chambers, and praised rape.
While appearing on the Charlie Kirk Show on Wednesday, Vance was asked about a report on thousands of text messages obtained by Politico. Prominent leaders of various Young Republican groups across the country sent the messages. Vance, however, called them "a bunch of kids."
"The stupid things that I did when I was a teenager and a young adult, they're not on the internet," the vice president explained. "Like, I'm going to tell my kids, especially my boys, don't put things on the internet. Like, be careful with what you post."
"If you put something in a group chat, assume that some scumbag is going to leak it in an effort to try to cause you harm or cause your family harm," he continued. "But the reality is that kids do stupid things, especially young boys. They tell edgy, offensive jokes."
"We're not going to allow the worst moment in a 21-year-old group chat to ruin a kid's life for the rest of time. That's just not okay."
Vance accused Politico's report of "canceling kids."
"We're all going to have to say, you know what? No, no, no. We're not doing this," he remarked. "And if I have to be the person who carries that message forward, I'm fine with it."
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson clashed with a Louisiana lawyer during oral arguments on Wednesday when the court heard Louisiana v. Callais, a case on whether a majority-minority district in Louisiana discriminated against white people.
Those advocating against the district frequently argued that the plaintiffs in the case demanded a second majority-minority district, but Jackson explained that this is not the case's focus and does not constitute a retrial.
"Where in section two [of the Voting Rights Act] does it mandate another minority district?" asked Jackson. "My understanding, as I explored with Ms. Nelson, is that sectiontwo is the mechanism by which we determine equal electoral opportunity is not being provided for a certain minority group. And we've interpreted in Gingles, we've given some flesh to how one goes about identifying that set of circumstances. But I thought that's the end of it in terms of the court's announcement under section two. And then the court turns to the state and says, 'How do you want to remedy this?'"
She explained that sometimes that means adding another majority minority district, and sometimes it does not.
"Your answer to Justice Barrett was, well, everybody just knows that's the automatic remedy. So, can you help me figure out that disconnect?" Jackson asked Benjamin Aguiñaga, Louisiana solicitor general.
"Justice Jackson, I think there's a reason why this court's voting precedents, going all the way back to Shaw 1, are so tied up with race, it is because the remedy as parties and the courts have understood section two to operate is almost always going to be race," said Aguiñaga.
"They're so tied up with race because that's the initial problem, right? That is the beginning," said Jackson, explaining how the cases were brought. "The beginning is the claim that a person makes under section two, because of their race, they are not being afforded equal electoral opportunity. It is a separate question as to how we go about remedying that..."
Aguiñaga agreed and attempted to continue going on with his statement, but was stopped in his tracks.
"Wait, why is that not a compelling interest to identify areas [where] the problem is occurring?" she asked.
Aguiñaga cited a case that allowed states to remedy the problem, but Jackson paused him again, noting that it isn't the question.
"I'm not talking about the remedy. I'm talking about identify — alright? So, if I'm right, that section two is about identifying the problem and then requiring some remedy," said Jackson. "I don't understand why your answer to Justice Kagan's question about, 'is this a compelling state interest' is 'no.' The answer is obviously yes. That you have an interest in remedying the ills of all discrimination that we identify using this tool, when you go too far in your remedy, is another issue, right?"
That's when things took a more confrontational tone.
Aguiñaga claimed that "step zero" was that the plaintiffs came in and said that they wanted another majority-minority district.
"I thought they came in and said we're not receiving equal electoral opportunity because our votes are being diluted," Jackson shot back.
Aguiñaga claimed it's saying the same thing as saying "we deserve" another district.
"It's not," Jackson shot back. "Trust me on this. Because the second district is a remedy that one could offer for a problem that we have identified. And the whole Robinson litigation was about identifying the problem. Is it really happening?"
In most cases, she said, the court says "you're fine" and "go away. In this case, the court said, I see. I'm looking at the factors. I appreciate what you're saying. You've proven that we have this problem. And so, the next question is how do we go about remedying it?"
Aguiñaga again brought up "intentional discrimination," but Jackson questioned why it even needed to be discussed, as it was not the question before them.
Madiba K. Dennie, who writes for "Balls and Strikes" called the exchange "striking."
"To me, Louisiana was basically like 'here come these Black people always asking for more' and Justice Jackson was like, 'that's not what the f--- they're asking for, they're saying: stop discriminating against us,'" Dennie wrote on Bluesky.
Virginia Roberts Giuffre was 16 years old when she first got a job at Mar-a-Lago, and within days she was introduced to its owner, Donald Trump.
The teenager caught a ride to her first day on the job with her father, who was responsible for the resort’s in-room air-conditioning units and its red-clay tennis courts, and she describes in a posthumously published memoir her first meeting with the future president and the direction he pointed her young life in excerpts published by Vanity Fair.
"It couldn’t have been more than a few days before my dad said he wanted to introduce me to Donald Trump himself," Giuffre wrote. "They weren’t friends, exactly. But Dad worked hard, and Trump liked that— I’d seen photos of them posing together, shaking hands. So one day my father took me to Trump’s office. 'This is my daughter,' Dad said, and his voice sounded proud."
"Trump couldn’t have been friendlier, telling me it was fantastic that I was there," she added. 'Do you like kids?' he asked. 'Do you babysit at all?'"
Giuffre completed work on the manuscript for “Nobody’s Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice” in October 2024, six months before taking her own life, and she chronicled the sexual and physical abuse that tainted her life from early childhood through her experience with the sex predators Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, whom she met through her work at Mar-a-Lago.
"[Trump] explained that he owned several houses next to the resort that he lent to friends, many of whom had children who needed tending," Giuffre wrote. "I said yes, I’d babysat before, omitting the fact that the last time I’d done so, I’d been reprimanded; in an attempt to entertain the kids in my care, I’d ignited a huge cache of fireworks I’d found hidden in the house. Clearly I was right to leave that out, because soon I was making extra money a few nights a week, minding the children of the elite."
Conservative commentator and media personality Benny Johnson got into a heated exchange with Rep. Ro Khanna Wednesday after being called out on his false claim that the “vast majority” of recent political violence was perpetrated by “the left.”
Khanna was appearing on Johnson’s show Wednesday when the topic of political violence was brought up, something Johnson blamed almost entirely on “the left,” a claim he also said last week where he blamed recent political violence almost entirely on the Democratic Party.
“Come on, we both have functional brain stems and eyeballs, you can see that the vast majority of the modern political violence is on the left, and that's what all available data shows,” Johnson said.
Khanna pushed back, citing reporting from the Anti-Defamation League that noted “all extremist-related murders in 2024 were committed by right-wing extremists,” the third year in a row in which right-wing extremists had been “connected to all identified extremist-related killings.”
Having been directly rebuked, Johnson fired off at the ADL as being unreliable, and questioned the accuracy of its data.
“You can't use the ADL! The ADL uses prison violence and ascribes right-wing – uh – white nationalist prison violence as right-wing hate,” Johnson said. “We disavow that entirely, that's not part of our movement, you can't bundle that data together. I refuse to acknowledge that data on this program!”
Despite Johnson’s assertions, the ADL’s report is supported by a number of other studies, including a study published last month by the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute. That study found that terrorist attacks propagated by “right-wingers” accounted for 11% of politically motivated murders since 1975, whereas “left-wing terrorists” were responsible for 2% during that same time period.
The ADL does track prison-based white supremacist gangs as Johnson asserted, though its inclusion does not undermine the underlying claim, nor does it account for studies on right-wing violence from other research organizations.
A political strategist says that the leaked GOP chat filled with racist jokes and rape fantasies reveals a "fetish for hierarchy" and "loyalty oath."
Rick Wilson outlines how the Telegram chats ripped off the mask on MAGA in a new Substack essay Wednesday titled "Meet the Master Race."
"If you’ve followed the Trump movement, you’ve seen this movie a hundred times," Wilson writes. "He didn’t invent authoritarian fandom and racial conspiracy culture; he licensed it, scaled it, made it hot. He made it glamorous to be cruel. He turned the taboo into a loyalty oath. The core lesson to aspiring strivers was simple: say the thing decent people won’t say, then win because what you said shocked and horrified the normies. The cruelty signals membership; the shamelessness proves it."
MAGA — the movement and people infatuated by it — fell for this language and promise, he explains.
"The MAGA operating system rewards cruelty, honors shamelessness, and elevates performative transgression as a test of in-group loyalty," he writes. "If you want to show you’re 'real,' you say the unsayable, and then, crucially, refuse to be shamed when normal people recoil. The goal isn’t persuasion; it’s domination, ritualized through humiliation."
Wilson describes the "private chat populated by state and national elite Young Republican leaders, men and women in their 20s and 30s already working in politics, already drawing government paychecks, already courting donors and staffing offices, casually swapping 'I love Hitler' riffs, Holocaust gags, rape 'jokes,' and racist slurs like they’re passing canapé trays at a fundraiser."
He also dives into why this culture is "marinating in bile."
"Because the party’s incentive structure pays out to the worst actors. The last decade taught ambitious young Republicans that if they shock the normies and RINOs, punch down, and never apologize, there’s a future in it," Wilson writes.
And, "the chat wasn’t an aberration. It was a window," he explains, adding that "it’s an endless parade of soft, doughy tough guys who cosplay as master race conquerors while wheezing after a walk to the break room. The spirit may be willing, but the core is… under construction."
That's the reality, he adds.
"That gap is a perfect bridge between the MAGA fantasy of power and the MAGA reality of mediocrity, and it’s precisely why the rhetoric turns so venomous. When you can’t command respect, you learn to demand submission. When haven’t seen your own junk in a decade past the jiggling wall of FUPA…well, you get more Hitlery," the analyst wrote. When you can’t carry yourself like a leader, you rehearse cruelty as a shortcut to authority. The adoration of Hitler isn’t an intellectual position; it’s a fetish for hierarchy that flatters their egos, a dream that even the obese Hermann Göring could have a flattering uniform. And given that none of these men has ever once either taken or delivered a punch, you know it’s their dream that someone else’s boot will do the stomping while they collect the lanyards and job titles."
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) have agreed to a joint appearance on C-SPAN.
The network announced on Wednesday that both leaders had said they would appear together on C-SPAN's Ceasefire program. No formal date was set for the joint appearance.
While speaking to C-SPAN earlier this month, Johnson said he was willing to "sit down with Hakeem Jeffries, my counterpart."
Jeffries later accepted the challenge.
"I look forward to that," the Democratic leader said Tuesday, according to The Hill. "We’re going to try to get it scheduled, absolutely."
Johnson has previously refused to debate Jeffries.
"We don't need to waste time on that nonsense, those debates have been had," Johnson said following the government shutdown. "I respect him, but we all know what he's trying to do there."
