Trump News

Congresswomen Ilhan Omar and Delia Ramirez on Thursday strongly condemned the Trump administration's deadly attack on a boat allegedly trafficking cocaine off the coast of Venezuela as "lawless and reckless," while urging the White House to respect lawmakers' "clear constitutional authority on matters of war and peace."

"Congress has not declared war on Venezuela, or Tren de Aragua, and the mere designation of a group as a terrorist organization does not give any president carte blanche," said Omar (D-Minn.), referring to President Donald Trump's day-one executive order designating drug cartels, including the Venezuela-based group, as foreign terrorist organizations.

President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that he intends to sign an executive order to change the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War, a move that was roundly criticized by legal and military analysts.

The rebrand speaks to the "warrior ethos" that Trump has asked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to restore in the military, according to reports. Trump has also previously expressed interest in the name change.

Lawyers and legal analysts mocked Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh this week after Bloomberg Law published comments he made about trying to "rebrand" the court's secretive process for releasing controversial decisions.

Kavanaugh, who was appointed by President Donald Trump in 2018, told Bloomberg Law that he prefers the term "interim docket" to "shadow docket" when describing instances when the Supreme Court deviates from its traditional procedures to decide a case. Data from SCOTUSBlog shows the court issued 113 decisions during the 2024-25 term through the so-called "shadow docket."

President Donald Trump will follow through on his plan to revert the Department of Defense back to its former name, Department of War.

Trump plans to sign an executive order on Friday to rebrand the Department of Defense, a senior administration official told Politico. Trump has said he wants a more neutral name, arguing that "defense" in the name doesn't account for "offense."

A military analyst on Thursday slammed President Donald Trump's decision to bomb an alleged drug boat off the coast of Venezuela.

Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, who led Army troops in Afghanistan in 2007 and 2008, joined The Bulwark's Tim Miller on a new episode of the outlet's podcast, "Bulwark Super Feed," to discuss the strike. Hertling argued that the Trump administration may have broken the law by striking the boat, even if it was being used to run drugs, as the administration has claimed.

Former speechwriter to President George W. Bush, David Frum, said that if the U.S. Supreme Court hands power to President Donald Trump to wage his trade war, then they're effectively killing the Constitution.

Speaking to MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace on Thursday, Frum called Trump's tariff actions "the most extreme thing that he's ever done in this way."

CNN anchor Kasie Hunt snapped at Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) on her show "The Arena" on Thursday over his comments about vaccines.

Mullin argued that vaccines are ineffective because Americans suffer from higher rates of chronic illnesses today than they did in the 1950s. He also suggested that the prevalence of autism can be linked to the increased number of vaccines children are asked to take to attend public school.

Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) got an earful from CNN anchor Kasie Hunt on Thursday over his claims linking vaccines to the prevalence of autism.

Mullin joined Hunt on CNN's "The Arena" to discuss Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Senate hearing on Thursday, where he made multiple false statements about the efficacy of vaccines. For instance, Kennedy said he was unsure whether the COVID-19 vaccine saved millions of lives. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that it did.

President Donald Trump has shown no signs thus far of seriously considering the removal of Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., despite months of controversy and despite his increasing attacks on doctors, vaccines, and public health consensus — but veteran analyst Chuck Todd thinks it's just a matter of time before he's gone.

Todd made the bold prediction in a panel on CNN's "The Arena" Thursday afternoon, following a scorched-earth hearing on Capitol Hill where senators in both parties piled on Kennedy, much to the outrage of some figures in Trumpworld.

The New Republic reports that President Donald Trump’s administration keeps changing its story to justify an unprecedented military strike on an alleged Venezuelan cartel boat transporting drugs.

Department of Defense officials privately expressed concerns that the government had changed details of its story about the strike that killed 11 people, according to a Thursday report by the New York Times.

The Department of Homeland Security claimed a "huge victory" Thursday after an appeals court paused the shutdown of one of its most infamous detention centers.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit issued a temporary injunction against a lower court's ruling that required DHS to shut down "Alligator Alcatraz," a 5,000-bed detention facility in the Florida Everglades, within 60 days. The lower court ruled that the Trump administration had ignored environmental regulations, which allowed them to build the facility in eight days.

President Donald Trump's administration is scrambling to get the Supreme Court to reverse the decisions of multiple lower courts that held his tariff scheme illegal and invalid — but in the rush to provide a defense, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent may have just blown a hole through one of Trump's biggest fabrications about his trade policy.

That's because, according to national security journalist Marcy "emptywheel" Wheeler, Bessent's statements to the court give a completely different number than Trump's repeated boasts that he's secured $15 trillion in foreign investment into the United States as part of his nebulous "trade deals" with other countries to reduce his tariffs.