Bill Maher on Friday evening put former GOP lawmaker Kevin McCarthy on the spot on HBO's Real Time.
McCarthy, who was ousted from his position as the Republican Speaker of the House before being replaced by Mike Johnson, aired his grievances to Maher about representatives who lie about why they vote for or against certain bills. It's because they want a raise, but they won't tell that to the American people, McCarthy said.
"Those are the people I like to challenge," he added.
Then, McCarthy appears to step in a trap when he starts ranting against high inflation and "wide-open borders" that he said didn't exist when Trump was the president.
Maher hit him with a stinging clapback: "Inflation comes and goes. Democracy should be here to stay."
McCarthy said President Joe Biden is the true threat to democracy, citing Hunter Biden's laptop.
"Oh, for f---'s sake," Maher sighed.
"You can't say that!" McCarthy replied.
"I just did," Maher told him.
McCarthy said a poll found people thought Biden was a threat to democracy, and Maher said, "That doesn't make it right."
Then, McCarthy falsely claimed that Trump's Justice Department never prosecuted the ex-president's enemies. In fact, Trump prosecuted his former fixer and lawyer, Michael Cohen.
"He himself was indicted!" Maher shouted. "That's the point."
On social media, some complained about Maher hosting McCarthy, while others praised the interview.
@RRWORK1 wrote, "We need to have Bill Maher interview more Republicans like Kevin McCarthy. Good job!"
The more Americans learn about the Heritage Foundation's authoritarian Project 2025 initiative, the more they dislike it. That may be why both former President Donald Trump and groups allied with him are now trying to keep it at arm's length.
According to ABC News, America First Legal — which is led by Trump's top immigration adviser, Stephen Miller — has reached out to Project 2025 and asked to be removed from its list of advisory board members. The network reported that the group was listed among the other groups collaborating with Heritage on Project 2025 as recently as Thursday.
"I have zero involvement with Project 2025. Zero. None. I made an advice video a long while back for students. I have no involvement with the project whatsoever," Miller told ABC.
Miller's gesture may prove fruitless, given that his fingerprints have long been on Project 2025 well before it got its official name. Axios reported in 2022 that several Trump administration veterans like Miller were closely involved with efforts to craft a blueprint for a second Trump administration to radically transform the federal civil service into an army of political loyalists — a key plank of Project 2025.
In addition to Miller, former Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought, former Presidential Personnel Office Director John McEntee, former acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell and former National Security Council official Kash Patel, among others, were named as accomplices in the report describing the plan. CNN reported this week that these Trump White House veterans, along with roughly 140 other ex-Trump advisors and staffers, are involved with Project 2025.
That plan to pack federal agencies with Trump loyalists relies on an executive order known as "Schedule F," which Trump issued just before he left office and which President Joe Biden promptly rescinded not long after taking office. That executive order removes long-standing employment protections for career federal employees, thus allowing a president's direct appointees to drastically go up from roughly 5,000 to more than 54,000.
These appointees, thousands of whom have already been pre-vetted by Heritage, would then be placed in key positions of influence throughout federal agencies, effectively allowing a president to implement draconian policies largely free from congressional interference. Project 2025's criteria for screening potential Trump administration employees aren't based on applicants' knowledge of federal policy, but whether they're dutifully loyal to the MAGA movement.
Miller's move to distance himself from Project 2025 comes after Trump's second post claiming he had no knowledge of the initiative or of who was behind it. On Thursday, Trump posted to his Truth Social account that any effort trying to tie him to the controversial plan was "pure disinformation."
However, Trump claiming ignorance of Heritage's blueprint and its architects falls apart upon closer scrutiny, given that he was recorded speaking to Heritage in 2022 and shaking hands with Heritage president and Project 2025 leader Kevin Roberts.
"This is a great group, and they’re going to lay the groundwork and detail plans for exactly what our movement will do," Trump said two years ago.
Former federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner raked Rudy Giuliani over the coals on his latest "Justice Matters" episode after a judge dismissed Giuliani's bankruptcy proceedings, proclaiming that he "can't even do bankruptcy right."
The move puts Giuliani back on the hook for paying a nearly $150 million civil judgment to a pair of Atlanta election workers, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, that he was found liable for defaming with election conspiracy theories following former President Donald Trump's loss in 2020. It follows a number of other legal problems facing the former New York City mayor and close Trump ally, including a RICO indictment in Georgia, disbarment in New York, and a lawsuit from his own lawyer for nonpayment of fees.
Giuliani, said Kirschner, is "nothing if not consistent" in "lying, cheating, stealing, breaking the law." He's in this situation because he "wouldn't even be truthful with the bankruptcy court judge."
The judge in the case, Sean H. Lane, cited Giuliani's failure to adhere to basic financial transparency standards, not answering questions about his assets, and missing key filing deadlines — and said he failed to do anything to correct these problems when the court alerted him to them.
With Giuliani denied bankruptcy protection, creditors will have free reign to pursue other legal avenues of collecting the money he owes, which according to reports is considerable, and may be able to seize his apartment. As a small consolation, it also allows him to appeal the civil judgment against him.
It's a fitting end for a saga that began with Giuliani attacking the poll workers with racial dog whistles, noted Kirschner, saying "look at them, they look like drug dealers passing vials of heroin or cocaine back and forth."
In a statement to Raw Story, Giuliani's attorney Ted Goodman said, "This whole bankruptcy case was burdened with many of the same voluminous and overly broad discovery requests and other actions — including regular leaks of information — intended to harm the mayor and destroy his businesses. It is yet another example of the effort to punish Mayor Rudy Giuliani as the person most responsible for exposing Hunter Biden's laptop and to deter anyone else from asking questions or getting to the truth."
Heritage Foundation chief Kevin Roberts, the man overseeing the far-right Project 2025 plan to transform the entire federal government into a loyalist army for the Republican Party, is "projecting" his own authoritarian impulses when he attacks the Democratic Party, said former Republican National Committee chair Michael Steele on MSNBC Friday evening.
Roberts, who also recently called for a "second American Revolution" that will be "bloodless" as long as the left doesn't resist, proclaimed at the National Conservatism Conference, "The left's new America will have no written Constitution and no rule of law, no independent judiciary, no democratic accountability or national sovereignty. It will be a global theocracy with Marxist fundamentalists sitting in its thrones, menacing its enemies."
"He's full of crap," said Steele. "He's projecting exactly what they want to do. Just swap up Marxist and put in fascist. And just flip the script."
"Look, they're now backtracking on Project 2025," Steele continued. "I've been hearing there may have been some reporting on this that a lot of folks in the inner, inner circle are pissed as hell right now because they're getting tagged on this project. This was supposed to be the secret platform thing they had rolled up even though Donald Trump was talking about it in 2022 and has been praising Heritage, who's going to put together the plan, the foundation of my second administration. And now he expects us to be the stupid ones when he says, oh, Project 2025? I don't know anything about Project — what is Project 20 — I've never heard of it. What is that? Who, me?"
"Yeah, stop it," said Steele. "Donald, you're the stupid one, not us, if you think that we're believing this crap. So, now they're trying to distance themselves. No, baby, we're wrapping all 900 pages around you because you own it. You know this is your foundation. You know this is what you want to do to the country. So, we had the president of Heritage on the weekend, and he started, again, laying that stuff out there. So, now they're trying to backtrack and act like we didn't hear what we heard or we're reading what we're reading. But own it."
"It is the foundation on which they will launch the deconstruction of America," he added. "I mean, Donald Trump, he said, let's terminate the Constitution. Quote. His words ... and you're worried about Joe Biden? Have you ever heard Joe Biden say, I want to terminate the Constitution?"
President Joe Biden came out swinging at his campaign rally in Detroit, Michigan, on Friday, armed with a volley of zingers against former President Donald Trump, self-deprecating jokes about his own age, a laundry list of his policy accomplishments and plans for a second term, and unabashed defiance against the punditry and members of his own party who have spent weeks raising doubts about his ability to stay in the race.
It was exactly the performance many commenters on social media, including some who had been wavering since his shaky debate with Trump in Atlanta, had been hoping for — and many came out to praise him.
“That was by far, I think, the best performance he’s given since the State of the Union," said MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes. "That’s the Joe Biden that has been a very successful politician and won in 2020.”
"Biden has a really good crowd in Detroit," wrote independent liberal reporter Aaron Rupar.
"I wonder if, in a weird way, the internecine battle among Democrats could actually end up helping Biden," wrote Never Trump conservative attorney George Conway. "His problem at the debate was, ultimately, he looked weak. But standing up to the calls for him to stand down makes him look kinda … ornery. That’s not necessarily a bad thing."
"He’s definitely bringing some Dark Brandon energy to this rally," wrote former Naval War College professor Tom Nichols — a reference to a long-simmering internet meme about Biden having a "dark" alter ego, that Biden himself has happily incorporated into his campaign merchandise.
"Maybe Biden did just have a bad night at the debate," wrote MSNBC columnist Michael A. Cohen.
"This is the best rally President Biden has had in a long time," wrote attorney and Democratic activist Aaron Parnas. "I’m so fired up and ready to vote for him in November. He is OUR nominee!"
"Joe Biden is knocking it out of the park at his Michigan rally," wrote Democratic strategist Zac Petkanis. "He's energetic & on message with sharp hits on Trump. He's showing us how we're going to win this election, team."
"After @POTUS Biden's campaign rally tonight in Detroit, will the cut-and-run Democrats walk it back?" wrote Trump biographer David Cay Johnston. "Or will those Dems continue helping Trump? All decent people must unite to defeat Donald, the convicted criminal – rapist – insurrectionist - racist - lying - megalomaniac."
Billionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk found himself under fire on his own app, X, after reports surfaced Friday that he donated to a super Pac working to elect former President Donald Trump — a candidate who just this week asked MAGA supporters, "Who wants to drive an electric car for the rest of your life?"
Musk, the world's wealthiest man worth an estimated $263.6 billion, donated to America PAC, anonymous sources familiar with the matter told Bloomberg. It wasn't immediately known how much he donated, but it was described as a sizable amount.
The PAC must disclose its list of donors Monday.
Republicans quietly formed the super PAC in May as the party prepared to put resources toward convincing Trump supporters to vote early or by absentee ballot, according to The New York Times. In late June, the group spent nearly $7 million on behalf of Trump.
"She’s 100 percent for the Green New Scam," Trump said of Vice President Kamala Harris. "Supports banning the sale of gas-powered cars. Who wants to drive an electric car for the rest of your life? Does anybody? You don’t want to drive for 45 minutes and then stop for three hours, is that what you're saying?"
Trump added: "And Once the American energy industry totally shut down, starting with Pennsylvania fracking and Texas drilling, no drilling in Texas, no fracking in Pennsylvania."
News of Musk's reported donation earned a mountain of criticism on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter that he bought over free speech concerns.
"Trump hates EV so not sure what Musk counts on," wrote @cyprianpl.
"Trump doesn't believe in EVs. Musk is really trying hard," said @SheliaD59.
"Looks like Trump has kompromat on Musk," wrote @BorisTrump6. "Supporting an EV hating candidate makes no sense otherwise."
"If anything, Elon Musk is one of the few wealthy Americans who will actually be harmed by Trump tax policy relative to Biden," said @cowabungatime. "The first thing Republicans are going to get rid of are the electric car tax credits that were expanded under ARP and IRA."
It was just four months ago Musk said he wouldn't donate to Trump or Biden — a fact not lost amongst X users.
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is considered one of former President Donald Trump's top frontrunners to be chosen as his 2024 running mate. But he could face a serious distraction at next week's Republican National Convention, where Trump's selection will be revealed: the appearance of an old friend of his charged with ties to a communist regime.
According to the Miami Herald, a federal judge has allowed former Rep. David Rivera (R-FL) to attend the convention in Milwaukee.
Rubio and Rivera were close friends in the past, at one point jointly owning a home in Tallahassee, serving in the Florida legislature together, and both being elected to federal office at the same time, Rubio the Senate and Rivera the House. Rivera, however, lost re-election after a single term — and he is now charged with acting as an unregistered foreign agent for the far-left government of dictator Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela.
Florida is home to a large community of Venezuelan-Americans descended from refugees of the Maduro regime and the Hugo Chávez regime before it. The nation is currently reeling under what international experts consider to be devastating economic mismanagement, that has led to widespread shortages and devastating hunger.
Former Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-FL), who represented the Miami area, told the Herald regarding Rivera's presence, “It’s a distraction and it could create an awkward situation. That’s been the case for a long time” — but he doesn't think it would matter much in the grand scheme of things.
Besides Rubio, who presents legal challenges as a vice presidential nominee due to Constitutional restrictions on having two people from the same state on one ticket, Trump appears to have narrowed down his choice to two other potential running mates: Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), and Gov. Doug Burgum (R-ND).
For the time being, observers have suggested that Vance could be the likeliest of the picks.
In the debate over how President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are aging, two experts agree: "It's a tale of two brains."
Dr. Harry Segal and Dr. John Gartner, both longtime psychology experts, came to the conclusion Friday on their podcast "Shrinking Trump."
Contrary to what MAGA world would have many believe following Biden's disastrous debate performance in Atlanta, Segal started the show off by throwing a curveball: It's Trump who has shown early signs of dementia, Segal said, citing Trump's language, tangential thinking, and physical gait.
Furthermore — and perhaps even more alarmingly — "Trump suffers from what we can observe as a severe personality disorder often called malignant narcissism," Segal said.
It's this disorder that leads to Trump's "chronic pathological lying," "immoral behavior," and criminal misconduct. Trump was indicted on election-related charges in several states and convicted in New York earlier this year for falsifying business records in a hush-money scheme.
Gartner has argued that Biden had a normally-aging brain, while Trump had a "dementing brain." That came into question, however, following Biden's debate struggles in which he appeared to freeze, fumble, and otherwise fail to make his points.
"It left me wondering and others, 'How is Biden really doing?'" asked Segal.
Initially following the debate, he thought it could be linked to "trauma."
"But when we looked carefully at that debate, Biden's responses were better than they sounded when you read them — and Trump's responses were much worse than they sounded when you read them."
Segal offered a model that he believes may explain Biden.
"Biden has been an extremely active president. Two wars in the world. Negotiating incredible victories in Congress, handling any number of things. And I think over the past year or so, he's been assuming that of course he'll beat Donald Trump because he's a good president," Segal said.
But perhaps, he was a tad overconfident.
"This happens to a lot of incumbents before their first debate after at the end of their first term," Segal noted. "This is not unusual. "That's why they often fail their first debate. So I believe what happened was Biden really wasn't campaigning yet — he was being president. And he showed up at the debate being president."
Furthermore, Segal said it's entirely possible that the 81-year-old Biden was simply telling the truth when he told ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos about his debate performance: "I was exhausted. I didn't listen to my instincts in terms of preparing and -- and a bad night."
Segal said that Biden is extremely experienced and has shown he's in control of setting policy for three years, but that as he's aging, "he is starting to have periods where he is exhausted."
"When he begins to get tired, he mangles his words," said Segal. "He can't organize his thoughts. At the end of the day he tells staff that's it for today, let's do it tomorrow."
Even still, he believes Americans are still getting a high-functioning Biden 80 percent to 90 percent of the time.
Gartner agreed with Segal, calling the debate a "shock" and that information from those close to Biden reinforced that it might not simply be a bad night — it could be that he really does have trouble at night articulating his words, and that sometimes, "it's time for him to rest."
"That's what happens when you get old. It does not mean you are not competent."
Gartner said they had a scientist come on the show and provide ample evidence in charts and data that Trump is showing "demented speech on a regular basis."
Biden, however, is not.
"Biden is showing more signs of aging. The quiet voice, the raspy voice. The coughing. That was part of what disconcerted people during the debate."
President Joe Biden delivered a fiery rally in Detroit on Friday, laying out both his policy accomplishments and his contrast with former President Donald Trump — when he was confronted by a heckler who attacked him for the U.S. support for Israel in the war in Gaza.
The crowd tried to drown out the protester with chants of "Four More Years!" but after several moments of chaos and chanting, Biden moved to quiet the audience down and respond to the criticism.
"Folks. Look. Give me one second," said Biden. "Folks, look. I understand her passion. I understand her passion. That's why I put together a detailed plan that the United Nations accepted, that the Israelis accepted, that the Palestinians accepted, to end this war."
"This war must end," Biden proclaimed to the crowd of his supporters, as they erupted in cheers. "It must end."
The Israel-Hamas war, which flared up after a brutal attack by Hamas terrorists in October of last year that marked the largest individual murder of Jews since the Holocaust, has inflamed political tensions all over the world as cities in Gaza have been leveled and civilians caught in the crossfire, and has led to protest in particular by Muslim-American voters, some of whom have threatened to withhold support from President Biden for not acting quickly enough to rebuke alleged Israeli war crimes and secure a ceasefire.
Biden, for his part, has been working behind the scenes for months to try to broker a permanent peace deal, which was repeatedly set back by both Israeli far-right hardliners refusing to accept movement toward a two-state solution and Hamas leaders walking away from U.S.-mediated Israeli offers.
Earlier today, Biden announced that Israel and Hamas have agreed to a framework for a ceasefire, although many more steps remain for a true end to the war to materialize.
Elections lawyer Marc Elias of Democracy Docket desperately wants America to "wake up" and pay attention to the people working each day trying to circumvent the 2024 election.
In a shocking Thursday report, the Heritage Foundation claimed that President Joe Biden wouldn't turn over power. Further, they claimed to have walked around and asked people if they were citizens and if they were voting in the 2024 election. The information they gathered is used to justify a series of conspiracies the group is pushing. For example, Biden is using undocumented immigrants to win the election illegally and Hamas has kidnapped Barbra Streisand.
Elias told MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace that Donald Trump's so-called "Big Lie" isn't about selling hats. It "has become the central plank of the Republican Party."
"The fact is, since 2020, there have been efforts to refuse to certify the accurate election results in this country in five states," warned Elias. "In Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada, and Pennsylvania."
He said that he represented Biden in fighting and winning 60 elections cases. At one point in 2022, he said that they had to sue an Arizona county because they were refusing to certify the election results. In that same state, Kari Lake is running again, fresh off of her 2022 loss where she claimed she actually won.
"We had to sue Pennsylvania for refusing to -- I'm sorry, two counties in Pennsylvania for refusing to certify election results in 2022," Elias explained. "As we speak in Georgia, there is a rule to allow election deniers to certify accurate elections this November. And in Nevada, the Washoe County Commission has refused to certify the election results in local elections, and they are being sued in the Nevada Supreme Court."
He explained that almost every week, he tells Wallace that people have to wake up to the theft of their votes.
"Week after week, for more than a year now, you and I have a back and forth in which we say, when will people wake up to — not the theory of what may happen — but what is actually happening," Elias cautioned. "I am here to sound the alarm one more time, that everyone needs to understand, that in a few months, we'll have an election, and Republicans are looking to undermine it through voter suppression, but also through election subversion and refusing to certify Democrats the win."
The heated discussion unfolded on "The Situation Room" with host Wolf Blitzer, who hosted former Hillary Clinton spokeswoman Karen Finney and David Urban, former senior advisor to Donald Trump.
Blitzer first asked the panel why Black voters strongly support President Joe Biden in the race, "more than a lot of other groups."
Finney responded first by saying Black voters are "pragmatic."
"People tend to think, 'Oh, well, a Black voter is going to vote for a Black person,'" she said. "No. We're going to vote for the person who we think can deliver."
She said Biden has worked hard to deliver on his promises, but that there's also a "very real fear" in America about a possible second term for Trump.
"We've seen what's happening in states around voting rights, around criminal justice reform, around a lot of the issues that Black Americans care about. And despite what the former president touts, the feat is palpable among Black and brown voters."
Blitzer pivoted to Urban, who pushed back on Finney, saying Trump worked with Van Jones on criminal justice reform. He then criticized Biden for repeating that he got in the race because Trump went to Charlottesville and said after violence erupted at the rally that there were "good people on both sides."
"He's using a debunked talking point, still!" an angered Urban said.
Finney can then be heard in the background pushing back on Urban: "It's not debunked."
"Yes it is!" Urban shoots back. "No, no, no, no, Karen. Look at Snopes. Watch the tape, Karen. I challenge you to watch the tape, Karen, from start to finish. And if you can come back on here and say, 'the way this has been categorized is truthful,' then I think that's mistaken."
Urban cut Finney off again as she tries to interject. "Watch the — watch the tape."
Snopes called the claim "false" that on Aug. 15, 2017, Trump called neo-Nazis and white supremacists who attended the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, "very fine people."
The fact-checking service found that Trump said there were "very fine people on both sides," referring to the protesters and the counter-protesters, but that he said in the same statement he was not talking about neo-Nazis and white nationalists, who he said should be "condemned totally."
Snopes later defended objections to its fact-check, insisting that it only aimed to confirm what Trump actually said, not whether what he said was true or false.
"For the record, virtually every source that covered the Unite the Right debacle concluded that it was conceived of, led by and attended by white supremacists, and that therefore Trump's characterization was wrong," the site noted.
Rupert Murdoch has some ideas for former President Donald Trump ahead of next week's Republican National Convention, and not the least of which is, according to a report, pick anyone except Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance for veep.
Murdoch reportedly tried to sabotage Vance — going so far as to send New York Post workers to Mar-a-Lago to trash the Ohio senator and stump for Burgum.
In fact, Murdoch's initial campaign was for "anyone but J.D.," NOTUS reported.
While the billionaire is open to Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, in recent weeks he's leaned into Burgum, according to the report.
However, Murdoch and Trump reportedly aren't the coziest of friends.
“Rupert has always viewed Trump as subservient to him,” a Fox communications consultant told the news outlet. “And it bothers him. He’s not looking forward to another four years where he’ll have to kiss Trump’s a--. They don’t want Trump on Fox, so they get Burgum on there and groom him for the next four years and make him president. That’s his way of ending Trumpism.”
During the 2016 presidential race, the "Hillbilly Elegy" author Vance was a scathing critic of Donald Trump and argued that he would be terrible for the Republican Party if he won the election. He has since taken an ultra-MAGA turn and become a strident Trump supporter.
But Vance has taken a few shots this week. Mark Caputo, national political reporter for The Bulwark, reported that he may have cost himself the job because he has a healthy beard. Caputo, trying to hold back a laugh, told CNN that Trump prefers a clean-shaven look.
"Of all things that Donald Trump doesn't really like, it's facial hair," said Caputo. "If you notice, guys around him are clean-shaven."
And a biting op-ed published by The Guardian attacked Vance as a "faux populist" who favors style over substance.
Former President Donald Trump wants to take presidential immunity even further now — and use it to wipe out the civil judgments against him in the E. Jean Carroll case.
The Supreme Court's controversial decision this month found that presidents have a presumption of immunity for "official" acts but not "unofficial" ones, punting for now to lower courts to figure out which is which, while eliminating or sharply limiting the ability of prosecutors to use motive or certain types of executive branch evidence to determine whether an act is official. It doomed any chances of special counsel Jack Smith's federal election conspiracy case going to trial before the November election, and breathed fresh life into Trump's attempts to get his Manhattan criminal conviction and the election racketeering cases in Georgia eliminated.
But that's not far enough for Trump. In a footnote of his filing to try to get the Manhattan conviction dismissed, he hinted he also wants to use the Supreme Court's decision to wipe out the more than $80 million he owes in judgments in the civil cases brought by writer E. Jean Carroll.
"Prior to the Supreme Court’s ruling in Trump, Judge Kaplan rejected President Trump’s Presidential immunity defense to allegedly defamatory Tweets," said the footnote. Trump abrogates the reasoning in Carroll for several reasons, including that (1) Judge Kaplan did not define the 'outer perimeter' of Presidential power as that which is 'palpably beyond his authority' ... (2) Judge Kaplan did not apply the 'presumption of immunity' to outer-perimeter acts, as required by Trump ... and (3) Judge Kaplan impermissibly took into account the plaintiff’s allegations of President Trump’s motive in making posting the challenged Tweets — an exercise forbidden by Trump."
Carroll alleged that Trump raped her in a New York City department store in the 1990s. When Trump repeatedly denied this and asserted Carroll was lying to advance her career, Carroll sued him for defamation over the harassment and reputational harm Trump's accusations caused her.
The case is already under appeal by Trump's legal team for separate reasons.
