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MS NOW's Jen Psaki kicked off Thursday night's edition of "The Briefing" by ruthlessly mocking the House GOP's latest rebranding attempt to try to stave off defeat in November.

"It seems like little Mike Johnson has finally, finally settled on his pitch for the midterms," said Psaki. "He has managed to boil it all down to one simple message."

A legal expert shredded Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito's "acrobatics" from his latest opinion in a major voting rights case during a new interview with Slate.

Janai Nelson, who argued on behalf of Louisiana voters in Louisiana v. Callais, told Slate staff writer Dahlia Lithwick in an interview that the Supreme Court's decision in the case was "catastrophic." The court decided that Louisiana's election map, which had been challenged by a group that described itself as "non-African Americans," constituted a racial gerrymander and paved the way for the court to shrink Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits racial discrimination in voting.

A system implemented by the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency program accidentally leaked the Social Security numbers of health care providers, The Washington Post reported on Thursday.

"The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) last year created a directory to help seniors look up which doctors and medical providers accept which insurance plans, framing it as an overdue improvement and part of the Trump administration’s initiative to modernize health care technology," said the report. However, "a publicly accessible database used to populate the directory contains some of the providers’ Social Security numbers, linked to their names and other identifying information."

President Donald Trump's sliding polls on inflation and cost of living stunned MS NOW's Chris Hayes — who presented the latest data in a striking graph that could barely even fit how far his numbers had plummeted.

"The lesson is that people really care about gas prices," said Hayes. "Oil and natural gas, gasoline are the most important commodities in the world. They are what modern civilization runs on. I think that's about to change because of how cheap and incredibly clean energy has gotten. But right now, you quite simply cannot run your society without fossil fuels. There's no other option. When the prices go up, people get pretty upset about it."

A group of Republicans sounded off to the Wall Street Journal on Thursday after a Trump administration official hinted that they are considering avoiding Congress on yet another issue.

Under the War Powers Act, the president must notify Congress of a military action within 48 hours and withdraw the troops within 60 days. However, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said during a recent hearing that the Trump administration believes the clock for both of those countdowns stopped on the day that the administration agreed to a ceasefire with the Iranian regime, the Journal reported.

Fans of President Donald Trump's MAGA movement freaked out on Thursday after a high-profile progressive influencer posted a rage-bait photo on social media.

Hasan Piker, a podcaster who has hosted multiple Democrats on recent episodes, posted two photos on X of him riding a train while reading "What is to be Done?" by Russian communist leader Vladimir Lenin. While the book was enough to send some MAGA fans into a tailspin, some noticed another detail that really set off the firestorm — Piker was wearing an expensive piece from Cartier.

With the sudden exit of Gov. Janet Mills from the Democratic Senate primary in Maine, criticism has begun to pile up around Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who played an essential role in coaxing Mills into the race to begin with.

But Schumer's allies are laying the blame squarely at the feet of Mills herself, for running a lackluster campaign, reported Stephen Neukam of NOTUS, who shared what he called the "spicy fallout."

Fox News host Jesse Watters on Thursday revealed the "questionable quip" that got him pulled away from Queen Camilla during the recent state visit, according to a new report.

Watters, who co-hosts "The Five," said during Thursday's broadcast that he chatted up the Queen about her visit to Washington, D.C., and made a joke that the royal staff found distasteful enough to pull him away from the Queen, HuffPost reported. Watters is known for making outlandish statements, but the "questionable quip" that he uttered in front of the Queen also seemed to embarrass him, according to the report.

Reporters Without Borders warned Thursday that the United States is facing a “press freedom crisis” as President Donald Trump and his subordinates wage an aggressive assault on the media that has included threats of treason charges and imprisonment against journalists.

The Trump administration’s active disdain for press freedom has pushed the US to its lowest-ever rank on Reporters Without Borders’ (RSF) World Press Freedom Index, which ranks countries based on numerous indicators including legal protections for journalists, reporter safety, and overall political hostility toward the press. The US landed at 64th out of 180 countries on the latest version of the index, falling seven spots compared to last year.