Robert Davis

President Donald Trump's late-night Truth Social posting sprees reveal a pattern that mental health professionals might say warrants serious concern, according to one of the president's biographers.

Journalist Michael Wolff, who has written four books about Trump, discussed Trump's social media habits on a new episode of "Inside Trump's Head," a podcast he co-hosted with Hugh Dougherty, the Daily Beast's executive editor, on Thursday. A recent review of Trump's posts by The Daily Beast found that the president has made more than 8,000 posts since returning to office in January. The review found that the president did not post on just five or six nights in April, and he was repeatedly posting during hours when most adults are asleep.

Trump's posts have also contained some concerning content. For instance, he's claimed that former President Barack Obama is guilty of treason and should be imprisoned. He's also posted several times alleging that the 2020 general election was stolen from him, even though his lawyers have failed to prove that point in more than 60 court cases since he lost the election.

"You can look this up and find the President of the United States regularly saying things that are out of control, bizarre, unhinged, irrational — that have in every possible way departed reality," Wolff said. "If this were a family member of literally anybody who stayed up all night and posted sometimes 100 posts of this kind of wingnut stuff, that would be a mental health crisis."

Wolff, who has covered Trump for more than a decade, also said it is concerning how little attention Trump's late-night posting sprees have gotten in the media.

"There are no headlines in the New York Times that say the president of the United States has flipped his lid," he said, "which in any reasonable, fair-minded reading of what he posts on social media, that's the conclusion you would come to."

A heated exchange on CNN's "NewsNight" with host Abby Phillip devolved into a shouting match on Thursday evening when a political analyst lost his composure after a Republican pundit deflected criticism of President Donald Trump's trip to China by invoking former President Joe Biden.

The segment quickly spiraled into a clash between John Avlon, a former Democratic candidate in New York, and Joe Borelli, a former Republican lawmaker in New York, as the panel debated who the "big dog" was in U.S.-China relations.

Borelli claimed that Trump was leading the charge in China because Xi had not told him directly that he would try to take over Taiwan, as he did to Biden. Things began to unravel when Avlon countered by arguing that Borelli was telling pure fiction.

"Joe, you've forgotten that Biden actually was routinely criticized for taking too tough a line on China and Taiwan," Avlon said. "So the exact opposite of what you said."

"What did he do after he was told?" Borelli shot back, suggesting that Biden's response to Xi's threat was weak.

"Oh my god!" Avlon exclaimed. "You're totally missing the point."

Among the crosstalk, Avlon added that Borelli needed to "go to Google" and read about Biden's response. Borelli picked up his phone and claimed he already had.

CNN's Kaitlan Collins made Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) squirm during a segment on "The Source" on Thursday after she threw his words about gas prices back in his face.

Collins reminded Jordan of how critical he was of the Biden administration when the price of gasoline topped $3 per gallon during the COVID-19 pandemic. Jordan, a staunch ally of President Donald Trump, has remained largely silent as gas prices have climbed above $4.50 per gallon amid the Trump administration's war with Iran.

"You were critical when gas was $3.07, when President Biden was in office. If you thought that was bad, what is $4.53?" Collins asked.

Jordan stammered that everyone wants gas prices to go down before launching into a tirade about Iran's nuclear weapons.

"You can't have that regime getting a nuclear weapon," Jordan said. "The president has been clear about that. Secretary of State Rubio has been clear about that. So the president is concerned about the long-term safety of this great country and the citizens who live here. That's what he's focused on."

Collins then played a clip of Jordan's previous comments in which he bashed "elites" in Washington, D.C., who don't care about gas prices. She then reminded him that Trump had promised to get gas prices under $2 a gallon when he took office.

"That's life," Jordan said. "I think the country gets the fundamental fact."

Collins told him that his argument might not sit well with a family that is struggling to afford the increase in gas prices and the associated costs.

"Saying 'that's life' might not make them feel better," she said.

That's when things got heated.

"Those are your words, not mine!" Jordan said.

"No, you said that just now!" Collins shot back.

The internet erupted on Thursday after a new report revealed President Donald Trump's plan to create a billion-dollar fund to pay his allies.

ABC News reported that Trump is considering dropping his $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over the release of his tax returns during his first administration, in exchange for creating a $1.7 billion fund to pay his allies who claim they were wrongfully prosecuted by the Biden administration. The report indicates that Trump himself won't qualify for payments under the initiative, but entities tied to the president can be paid.

Rioters who participated in the Jan. 6 insurrection, as well as groups such as the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, could also qualify for the payments, according to the report.

Political analysts and observers reacted to the report on social media.

"They’re openly pilfering the United States Treasury," Scott Weiner, a Democratic state senator in California, posted on X. "They don’t even bother to hide it. Because they think there won’t be accountability. Except there will be."

"Considering how difficult it is for people with legitimate claims that they were grievously wronged by the government over many years and different administrations to get compensation let alone accountability, this is truly breathtaking if true," Lawrence Hurley, senior Supreme Court reporter for NBC News, posted on X.

"Trump is poised to effectively steal $1.7 BILLION in taxpayer funds to pay off January 6ers and other political allies, without any oversight by Congress and despite the fact that the people who’ll be handed cash straight from our paychecks don’t have viable legal claims," lawyer Aaron Reichlin-Melnick posted on X.

President Donald Trump is expected to drop his massive, $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service, but not for reasons some might expect, according to a new report.

ABC News reported on Thursday that Trump plans to drop the lawsuit in exchange for creating a $1.7 billion fund that he can use to pay allies who claim they were wrongfully targeted by the Biden administration. Those allies include recently pardoned Jan. 6 rioters like the Proud Boys and Oathkeepers, as well as lawmakers who were investigated by Biden's Department of Justice.

"The settlement terms are expected to prohibit Trump from directly receiving payments related to those three legal claims; however, entities associated with Trump are not explicitly barred from filing additional claims," the report reads in part.

Trump initially sued the IRS for $10 billion, claiming the agency should have done more to prevent his tax returns from being released during his first administration. The lawsuit raised conflict-of-interest concerns among some political analysts and observers because the IRS is an executive agency that Trump oversees.

A Trump spokesperson told ABC News that the IRS has "wrongfully" allowed a "rogue" employee to leak Trump's tax returns.

"The arrangement would be an unprecedented use of taxpayer dollars with little oversight," the report reads. "Under the terms of the potential settlement agreement, President Trump would have the authority to remove members of the commission running the fund without cause, and the commission would be under no obligation to disclose its procedures or decision-making process for awarding more than a billion dollars, the sources said."

A former lawmaker from a red state warned that something ominous is hiding behind the latest "five-alarm fire" from the Supreme Court, according to a new report.

G.K. Butterfield Jr., a former Democratic representative from North Carolina, told The Atlantic recently that the Supreme Court's ruling in Louisiana v. Callais is a "five-alarm fire" for voting rights. The ruling allowed states to gerrymander their maps for partisan purposes, even if there is a racially discriminatory effect from the move, which effectively gutted the last remaining section of the Voting Rights Act that protected minority voters.

While the impact on the midterms has been well-covered, and rightfully so, Butterfield warned that there is something ominous lurking behind the Callais ruling. He warned that the ruling could be used to "silence the voices" of Black voters.

One way the ruling could do that is by eliminating local districts for local and county bodies, which would force minority candidates to run against the entire state rather than a single opponent. Butterfield compared that possible outcome to his father's time in local office, which ended in the 1950s after North Carolina lawmakers threw out the ward system and replaced it with at-large districts.

“I was 10 years old, and I quickly realized that the rules can really determine the outcome of an election,” Butterfield Jr. told The Atlantic. “I came back home with the intention to file some type of voting-rights litigation against the city, kind of to avenge what had happened to my father."

Fox News host Jesse Watters sparked outrage on Thursday after he uttered a "trash" claim about the Voting Rights Act during a segment on the show he co-hosts, "The Five."

During the segments, Watters claimed that Black people don't have enough babies to justify their proportionate share of representation in Congress. He made the claim at a time when the Supreme Court ruled in Louisiana v. Callais that states can gerrymander their maps for partisan purposes, even if there is a racially discriminatory effect. Red states like Louisiana, Florida, and Tennessee have all passed new maps since the ruling that eliminated Democratic seats held by Black representatives and cracked majority Black voting districts.

"For 150 years, Blacks have only represented 10% to 15% of the American population," Watters said. "That's not that much. So, if they want to have more seats, they gotta get in between the sheets."

Watters' comments sparked backlash online.

"No one finds people’s rights being trampled on more hilarious than Jesse Watters. A truly vile person," Veterans for Responsible Leadership, a political advocacy group, posted on X.

"Everything about this is disgusting. Is this what passes as professionalism these days, @FoxNews, or have you decided to stop dipping your toes in the gutter and just jump all the way in? This is trash. Pure trash," Jennifer Erin Valent, an award-winning author, posted on X.

"He is truly repulsive," Martina Navratilova, a former professional tennis champion, posted on X.

"Republicans love democracy right up until democracy includes Black Americans," liberal political commentator Alex Cole posted on X.

President Donald Trump's trip to China was billed as a high-stakes diplomatic summit with President Xi Jinping, but with one notable exception: the first lady was nowhere to be found.

Melania Trump, who had attended the 2017 Xi summit and appeared alongside both leaders and their spouses, sat this one out entirely because, according to her office, she was attending the six-month anniversary of an unnamed initiative connected to children and foster care programs. The announcement flabbergasted legal and political commentator Michael Popok, host of the podcast "The Intersection with Michael Popok," who said on a new episode on Thursday that he had no clue what Melania Trump was referring to.

"Where is Melania?" Popok asked. "She had to stay back because they're celebrating the six-month anniversary. Is that even a thing? I defy anybody ... to tell me what she stands for and what she's done to help America, America's families, or children. Name one thing of substance that's concrete."

"And at the moment when Trump needed backup and support, he ended up going with Brett Ratner as his plus one to the state dinners, along with his kids, because Melania refuses to be the first lady," he added.

Popok was even more incredulous that Melania's office appeared caught off guard by details of the trip itself. Her spokespersons said she had no idea Ratner, her own documentarian, had traveled to China with her husband as part of the presidential delegation.

At a moment when a first lady's presence traditionally serves as a stabilizing piece of soft diplomacy, Melania's absence only amplified the sense of disorder surrounding the visit, Popok argued.

"One husband doesn't know what the other wife is doing," he said.

A political analyst warned on Thursday that Democrats have reached a "do or die" moment ahead of the 2026 midterm elections as a red state escalates its efforts to gerrymander its map.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, a Republican, announced on Thursday that he is calling a special session for state lawmakers to redraw their election map ahead of the midterms. The announcement comes after McMaster refused to call a special session earlier this month after the state legislature failed to secure a veto-proof majority supporting the new maps during its regular session.

What makes the move so pernicious, according to Brian Tyler Cohen, a progressive YouTuber, is that South Carolina Republicans only need a simple majority to pass the maps in a special session, lowering the bar for passage.

Cohen said in a new reaction video that McMaster's call for a special session presents a "do or die" scenario for blue states that could help thwart Republican gains through gerrymandering.

"The onus is now on us to apply as much pressure as humanly possible to our blue state officials," Cohen said. "And if they won't do it, like Maryland State Senate President Bill Ferguson, then we need to support Bobby LaPin, his primary opponent, who's running against him. If they won't do it, like Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, then we need to support the gubernatorial candidates in Colorado who will."

The push for South Carolina to adopt a new election map came after the Supreme Court ruled in Louisiana v. Callais that states can gerrymander their maps for partisan purposes. Already, red states like Florida, Louisiana, and Alabama have redrawn their maps to eliminate Democratic congressional seats.

A photographer discovered never-before-seen photographs of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein in his belongings as he was preparing to move to Europe, which he thought had been destroyed after a run-in with Epstein's bodyguard, according to a new report.

Christopher Anderson, the Vanity Fair photographer who took a recent series of eye-popping portraits of officials in President Donald Trump's administration, photographed Epstein in his New York townhome for a story that was eventually spiked. Epstein eventually wrangled the photos from Anderson, but they emerged on an old hard drive that had been tucked away for years, Vanity Fair reported.

They also reminded Anderson of a time when he was threatened over the photos.

“[Epstein] sent his bodyguard/driver, Merwin, a massive guy in a long black overcoat and black, leather gloves, to my studio to intimidate me (it worked)," Anderson wrote in his upcoming book, "Index," according to the report.

Anderson also recalled sensing something was up with Epstein during the photoshoot. Vanity Fair described the photos as "stark, emotionless, quiet, [and] haunting."

“When I was in there and I was photographing, I photographed pictures of this mantleplace, of his mantle and his fireplace, and I made the pictures of Woody Allen and Bill Clinton and whoever else, and I'm sure there were others there, including Trump—but at the time, no one cared about Donald Trump," Anderson wrote.

He also said that he had no idea that the photographs themselves, or the people in them, would become a global story.

“I went and photographed him the same way I would go in any situation like that, which is really trying to be a clear-eyed observer and see what I saw,” he said. “And I think, in the picture, I think I did see something.”

A new lawsuit accused a MAGA culture warrior in Oklahoma of working with Chaya Raichik, founder of the Libs of TikTok social media account, to terrorize a teacher for more than three years, according to a report.

The Advocate reported on Thursday that Regan Killackey, a former Oklahoma public school teacher, filed a lawsuit accusing former state superintendent Ryan Walters of working with the popular social media account to attack Killackey over a photo of the teacher's son attacking the teacher's daughter with a plastic sword while she wore a President Donald Trump mask. The lawsuit says the campaign lasted more than 1,000 days.

It added that Walters only took issue with the photo, which was taken in 2019, after a gunman attempted to assassinate Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, in 2024.

“This resulted in harm to, among other things, [Killackey’s] reputation and employment,” the lawsuit reads in part.

Walters was one of the most embattled state culture warriors in the MAGAverse before he resigned in 2025. Walters oversaw initiatives to force public schools to teach classes about the Bible, sought to ban books from public school libraries that he claimed taught children a "radical woke ideology," and once projected images of a naked woman on the television in his office, although no charges were filed after that incident.

Libs of TikTok has also been at the center of accusations of stochastic terrorism, or rhetoric that inspires people to act violently without an explicit call to action. Raichick has previously said that such accusations made her feel "important," The Advocate reported.

Political analysts and observers mocked a giant Trump-aligned media company on Thursday after it was reported that the company is in talks to acquire a floundering conservative podcast.

Axios reported that Paramount is evaluating a potential distribution deal with Katie Miller, wife of President Donald Trump's Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, and her podcast "The Katie Miller Podcast." The report noted that Paramount is considering the deal as it attempts to bolster its podcast roster. The company has also had discussions with Paragon Collective, which hosts comedians Whitney Cummings and D.L. Hughley, and Jubilee Media, according to the report.

Miller's podcast has just over 57,000 followers on YouTube. No episodes have reached more than 1 million views, even though they have included prominent conservative figures such as Fox News host Sean Hannity, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and SpaceX founder Elon Musk.

"The conversations with Miller suggest Paramount is looking to bring in diverse voices, including conservatives," Axios reported.

The report attracted mockery from political analysts and observers on social media.

"The MAGA movement is DEI for conservative losers," Mike Nellis, a Democratic strategist, posted on X. "Prove me wrong."

"Paramount needs Trump for their merger to go through, so conveniently now the wife of that goblin Stephen Miller gets a sweet deal out of it. The grift is never-ending," The Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump political group, posted on X.

"Odd business decision to go all-in with people who are just on the edge of being toxic and unemployable for the rest of their lives," writer and producer Jonathan Harris posted on Bluesky.

"Her podcast isn’t very popular," Zaid Jilani, a political analyst and writer, posted on X. "This is clearly corruption, a way to pay off the family of a powerful Trump staffer."

"I'm told this is The Return Of Meritocracy," Eric Boehm, a writer for Reason Magazine, posted on X.

An "America First" candidate running for the Senate in North Carolina has been caught selling merchandise made in China, according to a new report.

Michael Whatley has been giving supporters drink koozies that were made in China, according to a Daily Beast report. The koozies appear to be linked to a campaign expense exceeding $1,600 that Whatley's team noted in a recent Federal Elections Commission filing, the report added.

Whatley is also not the only America First candidate caught selling merchandise made in China. President Donald Trump has also sold merchandise made in countries ranging from China to Haiti and Nicaragua, both in his private businesses and his political campaigns.

Voice of America News reported in 2024 that some Trump merchandise, such as his “Make America Great Again” Trump hat or “Childless Cat Lady for Harris” shirts, was made in China.

Whatley has been an outspoken critic of China during his career, according to the Daily Beast. For instance, Whatley sharply criticized China in 2021 for harming American workers by flooding markets with cheaply manufactured goods. He has also supported Trump's tariffs against China during the second Trump administration, according to the report.

Trump himself has also described Whatley as a patriot who will fight to “Promote MADE IN THE U.S.A.," the report noted.

A judge appointed by President Donald Trump just put the president's immigration regime on ice with a major rebuke, according to one lawyer.

Recently, a federal appeals court in New York ruled that the Trump administration's policy of detaining suspected illegal immigrants without bond is illegal. The judge in the case, Joseph F. Bianco, who was appointed to the bench by Trump during his first administration, ruled that the administration's "government’s novel interpretation of the immigration statute defies their plain text" and ordered the administration to provide bond hearings for the detainees.

Shant Karnikian, a lawyer and host of the "Civil Action" podcast on the Legal AF Network, said in a new episode that the ruling is a "major loss" for the administration.

"When your own nominee writes the majority opinion rejecting your policy as the broadest mass deportation without bond mandate in American history, that's not just a legal setback. It's a major, major loss for the Trump administration," Karnikian said.

The Trump administration has faced mounting legal challenges over its immigration detention practices, including holding U.S. citizens and legal residents without due process, deporting individuals to third countries without notice, and circumventing habeas corpus protections.

Federal courts have repeatedly ruled against the administration, which has defied or slow-walked several judicial orders.

The case in New York stemmed from a Trump administration policy that reclassified long-term residents who entered without being screened as being eligible for deportation. In turn, they were detained without a bond hearing.

However, that plan relied on what Karnikian described as "legal fiction" that long-term residents are still "seeking admission" to the country. That ruling could be used to squash future detentions of a similar kind.

"It's a fiction," he said. "I mean, you can't do that. You can't have it like kind of retroactively treat them, look at their history, and go, 'Well, he was seeking admission at one point.'"

The full breadth of President Donald Trump's entourage of American business leaders and dignitaries was unveiled during a welcoming ceremony in China early Thursday morning, which included an appearance of one individual who incensed a political analyst.

Ana Navarro, a CNN commentator, noted that Brett Ratner, who directed Melania Trump's eponymous documentary on Amazon, was among those selected by Trump to travel with his delegation. Ratner's travel to China on the U.S. taxpayers' dime incensed Navarro because of his sordid history in Hollywood and the harm he's caused to some women.

"There is also another person who is in this official delegation, and that was on Air Force One, and that's Brett Ratner, who was the director and producer of the 'Melania' movie," Navarro said on CNN's "NewsNight." "But let us remember, Brett Ratner had been basically banished from Hollywood in 2017 because there were very serious sexual predatory allegations against him."

"His name is all over the Epstein file because of his association with Epstein," she continued. And so, because he volunteered to do that documentary on Melania, that Amazon allegedly paid $40 million for, he is now being brought back and rehabilitated by Donald Trump."

"I find it appalling, appalling, and I urge people to go look up the women," she added. "Some of the biggest names in Hollywood who spoke up against the sexual harassment and sexual acts of Brett Ratner, which included things like masturbating in front of them. And there he is as part of the official U.S. delegation flying on Air Force One on our dime. I find that appalling."