Travis Gettys

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, has buried a small central Texas pediatric practice in document demands as part of his investigation into what he calls a conspiracy to push parents into vaccinating their children.

The New York Times reported that Paxton's Consumer Protection Division sent her a letter in December demanding 10 years of vaccine purchase records and her practice's vaccine policy, and the letter added that citing the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's recommended childhood schedule would not be enough – and warned her to stay quiet.

"You are requested NOT to inform other entities of this request, as this request relates to an ongoing confidential investigation that would be jeopardized and impeded by disclosure," the letter stated.

The 28-item demand sought every "reward, financial benefit, bonus, discount, return, rebate or other consideration" she had received from vaccine makers.

Her answers went as far as a $40 batch of cookies a drug rep once brought to her office, but she said her most significant discounts were small price cuts for paying bills on time. Paxton's office replied with follow-up demands, calling some of her responses frivolous or improper.

The doctor, who asked to be identified only by her middle name, Rachel, has treated children in her community for 20 years, but she has spent nearly $15,000 on legal fees so far, digging up receipts for $18 vaccines from a decade ago. Now she is reconsidering whether to keep practicing.

"I took it very personally," she told the Times. "It felt like it was such a slap in the face and an insult."

Paxton announced the investigation in January, vowing to stop "Big Pharma and Big Insurance" from bribing providers "to pressure parents to jab their kids with vaccines they feel aren't safe or necessary." He said he was working "alongside President Trump" and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. He billed the probe as targeting the state's "largest medical providers," and it's unclear why a tiny practice was swept up.

Paxton has since expanded the probe to the American Academy of Pediatrics, which has sued the Trump administration and won.

"This is another attempt at intimidation," said Dr. Kathryn Edwards, a Vanderbilt University pediatrics professor. She added that pediatricians are "not being intimidated because their moral core is about the well-being of children."

Paxton's announcement came 10 days after a federal judge ruled that Kennedy's health department had illegally retaliated against the academy by cutting $12 million in grants. The same day, Children's Health Defense, the anti-vaccine group Kennedy founded, sued the academy.

Rekha Lakshmanan of the Immunization Partnership warned that the investigation could have a "chilling effect" on pediatricians. Measles and polio vaccination rates among Texas kindergartners have already fallen from nearly 97 percent in 2019 to about 93 percent.

Paxton's office did not respond to the Times' request for comment. He trails Democrat James Talarico 51 percent to 45 percent in a recent New York Times/Siena poll.

President Donald Trump is opening the final weeks of the midterm campaign on defense.

The 80-year-old president is rallying in deep-red states where Republican Senate candidates are suddenly struggling, and the strategy has some in his own party scratching their heads, reported MS NOW.

"I don't get it," said Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), pointing to Trump's recent stops in Oklahoma and Alabama, where no Senate races appear to be in play.

"I don't think the answer to our political challenges right now is another rally," said Cornyn, a former chair of the Senate GOP's campaign arm. "The president seems to think that's the antidote to all political problems."

Cornyn called Monday's stop in Grand Island, Nebraska, an exception. Trump is rallying there with Sen. Pete Ricketts, who is locked in a tight race with independent Dan Osborn. Recent polls show the two separated by only a few points, but Nebraska hasn't elected a Democrat to the Senate since 2006.

Diesel prices are above $6 a gallon in Nebraska, and Trump's decision to temporarily suspend tariffs on beef imports has rattled the state's ranchers. Ricketts has pushed back on the beef decision but will appear with Trump at the rally.

Trump's swing through GOP territory reflects grim polling. New York Times/Siena surveys show Republicans trailing or statistically tied in five states where they are defending Senate seats:

• Texas: Democrat James Talarico leads Ken Paxton 51 percent to 45 percent.
• Alaska: Former Rep. Mary Peltola leads Sen. Dan Sullivan 50 percent to 43 percent.
• Ohio: Former Sen. Sherrod Brown leads Sen. Jon Husted 49 percent to 46 percent.
• Kansas: Sen. Roger Marshall and Democrat Adam Hamilton are tied at 45 percent.
• Iowa: GOP Rep. Ashley Hinson leads Democrat Josh Turek by a single point.

Sen. Jim Justice (R-WV) blamed the party's own messaging.

"We are so horrible at marketing ourselves, it's unbelievable," Justice said, "and now we're having that 'Oh you know what' moment, where all of a sudden, all across this country, everybody's awakening to, 'Oh my, look what the polls are now.'"

He added that voters who can't pay their bills will hold Republicans responsible because "we're in control."

A former Trump political official defended the president's blitz, saying the White House is trying "to kind of take them off the board early" before moving on to swing states like Michigan.

Trump said, for his part, the trips are about loyalty.

"Sometimes even though you don't have to come here, you got to pay respect to the people that have loved you right from the beginning," he said.

CBS News set off a firestorm of criticism over its announcement on social media that disgraced former House speaker Dennis Hastert has died at 84.

The longest-serving Republican House speaker was sentenced to 15 months in prison, making him the highest-ranking elected U.S. official to serve a prison sentence, after pleading guilty to illegally structuring bank withdrawals to conceal hush-money payments to a former student he had sexually abused as a high school wrestling coach.

But the network's post on X, along with the lead sentence of its online report, left out the abuse entirely, and critics blamed CBS News editor-in-chief, Bari Weiss.

"Former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, who represented Illinois for two decades in Congress and was later jailed for violating banking laws, has died," CBS News reported.

The report's next sentence does address the abuse, explaining that the hush-money payments were meant to cover up his sexual abuse of teenage boys. The post on X, however, stopped at the banking violations.

It drew a community note pointing out that the "banking violations revealed accusations he had sexually abused teenagers while coaching wrestling at a suburban Chicago high school," and other social media users shamed the network's coverage.

"This is what is known as burying the lede," observed The Nation's Jeet Heer.

"Did he violate anything else," wondered writer Brandy Jensen.

"That's what Dennis Hastert went to jail for! Banking laws!" shouted writer and comedian John Fugelsang. "This is what they've done to CBS, folks."

"You mean pedophilia, right, @bariweiss?" prompted The Lincoln Project's Reed Galen.

"@bariweiss - you left something out," added popular X user Rita Powell.

"Why was he violating banking laws, I wonder," pondered pundit Matthew Yglesias.

"Former Chicago businessman Alphonse Capone, who rose to the top of the beverage distribution industry and was later jailed for violating tax laws, has died," joked newsman Jacob Rubashkin.

"So the guy who spent 20 years in Congress including 8 years as Speaker, meaning he was 2d in line for the Oval Office after VPOTUS, was also a prolific boy-diddler," pointed out writer John Schindler. "Maybe worth mentioning in his obit? Seems kinda important."

"'Violating banking laws' is one way of putting it," sighed author Mike Rothschild.

The Palm Beach County Republican Party isn't distancing itself from suspended Clerk of Courts Mike Caruso, even though the state GOP has said it won't support him after he was charged in August with molesting a young relative.

Caruso won't drop out and insists he still intends to win in November, and county GOP Chairman Carl Cascio told the Miami Herald that the party committee "has the power and duty" under state law and local party rules "to conduct campaigns for party nominees."

The state Republican Party "publicly stated it would not support Mr. Caruso's reelection if he remained in the race," according to a letter Cascio posted on the county party's website. The local party has made no such statement, and instead the letter notes that Caruso is "currently Palm Beach County's only Republican constitutional officer" and is fighting "to clear his name."

Cascio wrote that the state party directed him to pick a replacement candidate after the arrest, and that he stayed in close contact with Gov. Ron DeSantis' office. The county elections supervisor even delayed printing ballots to give Republicans time, but Caruso refused to withdraw.

"I maintain my innocence and remain a candidate for Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller," Caruso, 68, said in a statement through his spokesperson. "My name is on the November ballot, and I intend to win this election."

DeSantis appointed Caruso, a former Republican state legislator and longtime ally, exactly one year before his Aug. 18 arrest by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The governor suspended him right away.

Caruso has pleaded not guilty to charges including lewd or lascivious molestation, kidnapping, child abuse and luring or enticing a child. The case centers on allegations by a male relative who was under 5 at the time. At an Aug. 28 hearing, prosecutors disclosed that a second person, a woman, alleges Caruso molested her when she was 4.

An Orange County judge released Caruso on $160,000 bail, saying the state's case had weaknesses and might not be proven, but prosecutors objected.

Caruso's campaign website is down, and he has refunded two contributors and a data vendor. Campaign records show he has kept paying his oldest son for "outreach" and held two campaign meetings in mid-September at restaurants in Lake Park, where he lives.

Palm Beach County leans Democratic, and Caruso faces Democrat Yvette Drucker, a Boca Raton city council member. If Caruso wins, DeSantis could suspend him again.

CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss will not take on an expanded role – at least for now – as Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount combine into one of the world's largest media companies.

CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter broke down the new leadership lineup set to take effect Tuesday, and the combined company will be called Skydance, with CNN CEO Mark Thompson remaining as chairman and editor-in-chief of the network. Weiss will remain in charge of CBS News, and the two news divisions will not be combined for now.

"Many insiders had wondered if Weiss would be given a role at CNN as well," Stelter said, "and that's not happening for the time being."

The announcement ends months of uncertainty that began when Paramount won the bidding war for Warner Bros. Discovery in February. Questions about CNN's future have hung over the deal because of the Ellison family's ties to the Trump administration.

Stelter pointed to "Paramount's close, cozy ties with the Trump administration," and he noted that patriarch Larry Ellison has a "close relationship as a donor to the president" and that CEO David Ellison has made efforts "to cozy up to the Trump administration to win these merger deals."

In a memo to staff, Thompson sought to reassure the newsroom.

"I have real confidence that they both understand and will fully support the principle and the practice of the kind of independent news that CNN has always stood for," Thompson wrote.

Thompson also said Skydance leadership, "from CEO David Ellison on down," sees news as "a top strategic opportunity" for the new company.

Stelter said the moves show the new owners are "valuing stability over any possible shakeup." HBO chief Casey Bloys is also staying in his role.

The new company will carry a heavy debt load and face "severe pressure to cut costs," Stelter said. It will also rely on cash from profitable channels like CNN to pay that debt down.

"The company has good reason to avoid disrupting the network," he said.

- YouTube youtu.be

President Donald Trump's public posting of a Republican senator's personal cell phone number shows he still doesn't get how politics work, according to an analyst.

The 80-year-old president shared Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton's phone number on social media to pressure him in a fight over daylight saving time, and MS NOW's Steve Benen noted that Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy unloaded on Trump, saying he "can go from zero to a-hole in about three seconds."

"I don't think he should have given out Tom's cell phone number," Kennedy told NBC’s “Meet the Press." "I don't think that's going to help convince Tom."

Trump posted the number on Truth Social on Saturday morning, apparently angry that the Arkansas Republican has blocked efforts to fast-track the Sunshine Protection Act, which would make daylight saving time permanent and end the twice-yearly clock change. The bill passed the House in July but has stalled in the Senate.

Hours later, Trump posted again, accusing Cotton of letting his "ego" get in the way of putting "Arkansas first."

When reporters at the White House asked why he had shared the senator's number, Trump argued for the bill instead.

"We want to get away from this ridiculous way and custom of, twice a year, turning your clocks back, turning your clocks forward, being late for dinner, being late for very important meetings. It's ridiculous," Trump said. "Tom Cotton is holding it. He shouldn't be holding it. It's an issue that people want."

Cotton has argued that past attempts to lock in daylight saving time failed and were quickly reversed.

It's not the first time Trump has used this tactic. During his first presidential campaign in 2015, he read out the cellphone number of Lindsey Graham, then a GOP primary rival and one of his harshest critics. In 2020, he went after a Michigan Republican lawmaker who resisted efforts to overturn the election. He posted the wrong number, and a private citizen was flooded with thousands of angry calls and messages.

Benen argued that the episode shows Trump, more than a decade into his political career, "still has no idea how to work with Congress."

"It's not as if a sitting senator with a firm policy position is going to say, 'Well, I was opposed to a bill, but now that Trump doxxed me, I guess I have no choice but to change direction,'" Benen wrote.

"What we’re left with, in other words, is the president picking a pointless fight with an intraparty ally one month before Cotton faces voters on Election Day, which is every bit as foolish as it sounds," he concluded.

Republican unease with President Donald Trump has spread beyond swing-district lawmakers fighting for their political lives.

Senators from some of the country's most reliably red states are now openly challenging him on the economy, the Iran war and more, according to a new report from The Washington Sun.

Trump's approval rating keeps sliding, and now the 80-year-old president is preparing to hold rallies in solidly Republican Oklahoma and Alabama in the coming weeks, possibly a sign the White House may be nervous about his own turf.

Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), whose state Trump carried by 22 points in 2024, said he won't spin voters about rising prices.

"I'm not going to tell the voters, 'Oh, it's President Biden's fault, and it's not that bad, you shouldn't believe your checkbooks,'" Kennedy told reporters. He later told the Sun that "the main reason for the resurgence in inflation is the Iran war."

Sen. Jim Justice (R-WV) represents a state Trump won by more than 40 points and isn't up for re-election until 2031, and he pointed to soaring fuel and grocery costs and said Republicans have fumbled their message on the war.

"We knew that there was a real chance that it would drive gasoline and diesel and fertilizer and all that kind of stuff," Justice said. "We knew that and everything, but we never really dreamed we'd be there this long."

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) objected to a series of Trump ads that appear to have been funded by taxpayers, while fellow South Dakotan Sen. Mike Rounds also criticized the TV spots, and he went on to criticize a clawback of nearly $1 billion in congressionally approved funds and Trump's order temporarily expanding foreign beef imports.

Sen. John Curtis (R-UT) asked the Senate Judiciary Committee to look into a Russian oligarch's payment for part of Donald Trump Jr.'s wedding festivities.

"To me, it just stinks. It's corruption. I don't like it," Curtis said in a video.

The GOP and its allies are also spending heavily to hold Senate seats in Alaska, Ohio and Texas – all states Trump won by double digits.

"The trend downwards is very clear," University of Maryland government professor David Karol told the Sun. He said Trump's weakening position makes Republicans "feel more free to separate themselves" from his least popular moves.

Retiring Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) cautioned that most Republicans still vote with Trump, but he welcomed the independent streak. He told the Sun that "having that image of independence going into this election is critically important to getting Republicans reelected."

President Donald Trump's administration started looking for a way out of its bombing campaign against Yemen's Houthi militants just weeks after it began, and officials say that a hasty truce allowed the group to rebuild and come back stronger than ever.

Weeks before Operation Rough Rider began, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. suggested getting new assessments of what strikes might achieve, but the Washington Post reported that Gen. Michael "Erik" Kurilla, then head of U.S. Central Command, cut him off, saying "the time for assessments is over," and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sided with him.

Trump launched the operation on March 15, 2025, vowing the Houthis "will be completely annihilated!" The 51-day campaign cost an estimated $1 billion-plus and struck more than 1,000 targets, but the Houthis kept firing at U.S. warships and shot down at least seven MQ-9 Reaper drones. The U.S. also lost two F/A-18 fighter jets in mishaps at sea.

The "Signalgate" scandal dogged the operation almost from the start.

Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance and other senior officials discussed the strikes in a Signal group chat that accidentally included Atlantic journalist Jeffrey Goldberg. Hegseth shared specific details of the bombing before it began, and a Pentagon inspector general review later found his actions "created a risk to operational security."

The administration began hunting for an exit just a couple of weeks into the bombing, said April Longley Alley of the Washington Institute. Trump had no clear exit strategy, so when Oman said the Houthis wanted a truce, he took it.

"It almost seemed that Trump had buyer's remorse," a person familiar with Pentagon deliberations told the Post.

Yemen's Saudi-backed government had supported the campaign and was caught off guard when it ended.

"The Trump administration did not read the situation strategically," a Yemeni official said. "They just wanted a quick win."

Before long, the official said, the Houthis "rebuilt everything."

Trump declared victory in May 2025, saying the Houthis "don't want to fight anymore." The administration then all but walked away from Yemen. It never filled a special envoy post and slashed aid, and some in U.S. Central Command were "apoplectic," a former official said.

"You ignore Yemen at your own peril," that official warned colleagues at the time.

The warning has proved prescient. In recent weeks, the Houthis have seized the strategically vital Bab al-Mandeb Strait, reignited Yemen's civil war and attacked oil infrastructure and military bases in Saudi Arabia. With Iran's other proxies weakened, the group is now the most powerful piece of Tehran's "Axis of Resistance."

"The Houthis have learned how to use negotiations, ceasefires and truces as a tactic to preserve their power, rebuild their capabilities and prepare for the next round of conflict," Yemeni analyst Nadwa Al-Dawsari said.

Pentagon spokesperson Kingsley Wilson disputed the reporting, saying Rough Rider "achieved decisive success against Houthi forces" and "helped create conditions for a ceasefire that strengthened freedom of navigation."

The president has stayed upbeat, saying last month that the Houthis "don't want to fight us" and "everything will work out very well."

"Trump may be done with the Houthis," Alley said, "but the Houthis are not done with Trump."

A longtime friend of Donald Trump who has long claimed he introduced the president to Melania Trump is accused in a new lawsuit of drugging and sexually assaulting a woman at his Manhattan townhouse.

Paolo Zampolli, 56, who has served as Trump's special envoy for global partnerships since March 2025, is named in a civil complaint filed by tech entrepreneur Victoria Drake, 33, according to The Daily Beast's investigative unit PunchUp.

Drake alleges that Zampolli approached her on Oct. 5, 2023, at the Zero Bond private members' club in Manhattan and said he recognized her from Mar-a-Lago, where she had previously attended events with a former boyfriend. The two exchanged numbers and later met at Zampolli's Gramercy Park home, where she says he gave her a drink and she lost consciousness.

Drake claims she briefly came to and found herself naked in a bed as Zampolli sexually assaulted her with his hands around her neck. She says she "did not and could not consent," and that she woke the next morning with bruises on her hips and legs and couldn't find her clothes.

According to the complaint, Drake reported the incident to the New York Police Department the next day, and she was then taken by ambulance to Lenox Health Greenwich Hospital, where she underwent sexual-assault and drug-facilitated-assault exams.

There is no evidence Zampolli was arrested, and he says police closed the complaint. The NYPD did not respond to questions about why the case wasn't pursued.

The allegations have not been adjudicated. Zampolli, an Italian citizen, says the claims are an attempt to extort or damage him. In April, he filed a criminal complaint against Drake in Rome accusing her of making false and defamatory accusations and said he plans to countersue her for $100 million, calling her "out of her mind."

Zampolli said he has not discussed the lawsuit with the White House.

"We are slightly busier than engaging with personal attacks on people who serve the president or are close to the president," he told PunchUp.

The Trump associate's name appears several times in the Jeffrey Epstein files. An FBI memo records a former Epstein assistant telling investigators Zampolli had tried to buy the Elite Model Management agency with the late sex offender. None of the released files establish wrongdoing by Zampolli in connection with Epstein.

The modeling agent reportedly arranged a visa for then-Melania Knauss to come work in the U.S.

Zampolli is also in a bitter custody fight with his former partner, Brazilian former model Amanda Ungaro, who has accused him of using his connections to get her detained by ICE before she was deported. Zampolli denies involvement, and DHS says political influence played no role.

The White House and State Department did not respond to PunchUp's requests for comment.

President Donald Trump has promised to preemptively pardon anyone who has come "within 200 feet" of the Oval Office before he leaves office, but that pledge could set up a clash with Democrats who are weighing whether to prosecute administration officials for misusing their authority.

Democrats are already drafting legislation aimed at reining in the powers Trump has stretched as they look to regain control of Congress after next month's elections, and some have argued that the way Justice Department officials have targeted Trump's political enemies is illegal and could expose those officials to criminal charges, reported The Washington Post.

"We have a massive reconstruction task ahead of us," said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD). "We will have to go department by department, subject by subject, and public purpose by public purpose to determine what we salvage and what we re-create."

Raskin said undoing Trump's changes would take decades, and he has already drafted bills that would bar a president from accepting payments from foreign governments without congressional consent, require public review of White House renovations, and block a president from reaching monetary settlements with his own government.

The last measure follows a federal judge's rebuke this summer of Trump and the Justice Department. The judge said they tried to "use" and "manipulate" the court to approve a deal that would have shielded Trump from IRS scrutiny and created a nearly $1.8 billion fund for alleged victims of politicized prosecutions.

Other Democrats are going after emergency powers. Trump has declared roughly a dozen emergencies to justify tariffs, faster deportations and National Guard deployments. Reps. Suzan DelBene (D-WA) and Don Beyer (D-VA) have introduced a bill barring a president from imposing tariffs under a national emergency without Congress' approval.

"Once we get through this nightmare, the rest of our careers will have to be devoted to reviving American progress and building institutions that endure and succeed," Raskin said.

The Brennan Center's Michael Waldman warned Democrats against turning Trump's tactics on him.

"It will be very tempting for Democrats to say, 'Oh, you think we are going to limit our abuse of the Justice Department? We don't want to be suckers,'" Waldman said. "But I think that would be a big mistake."

Tiffany Justice, executive vice president of the conservative Heritage Action, argued that Trump has done nothing out of the ordinary and predicted Democratic plans to reign in the executive branch would go nowhere.

“They are full of baloney — I don’t think Democrats would ever limit the power of a Democratic president,” Justice said. “The idea of Democrats saving democracy, it’s nonsense.”

White House spokesman Steven Cheung argued that Trump has followed established procedures at every step but also claimed he had changed the country forever.

“His successes on behalf of the American people will be imprinted upon the fabric of America and will be felt by every other White House that comes after him,” Cheung said.

A beloved freebie at Mexican and Tex-Mex restaurants could soon disappear as President Donald Trump's tariffs on Mexican tomatoes push costs higher.

The Trump administration imposed a 17 percent tariff on tomatoes from Mexico in July 2025, saying it would protect American farmers and boost domestic production, but those duties and recent bad weather sent prices soaring – and Texas Public Radio reported that could force restaurants to charge customers for chips and salsa.

Mexico has supplied roughly 90 percent of the tomatoes the U.S. has imported since 2015, a market worth more than $3 billion, according to a Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service study.

At first, grocers and restaurants absorbed the added costs, but bad weather in Mexico and Florida cut supplies and raised prices to their highest level in two decades.

"We saw the fresh tomato market jumped to about $80 a box," said Dante Galeazzi, president of the Texas International Produce Association.

Prices got so high that some grocery stores stopped carrying tomatoes altogether for much of May, Galeazzi said.

Restaurants have held on longer, largely because diners expect complimentary chips and salsa. But overall food costs have jumped roughly 35 percent over the past two years, partly because of the tariffs.

"You have restaurants that are simply saying, 'Look, I can't afford to put salsa on the tables anymore,'" Galeazzi said. "What are consumers going to do? Where are consumers going to find this relief?"

The San Antonio Business Journal has reported that some restaurants in the city spend tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars a year on salsa ingredients.

Kelsey Erickson Streufert, chief public affairs officer for the Texas Restaurant Association, said tomatoes are only part of the problem.

"Right now we're living in a time of very high costs on food — which is most restaurants' biggest line item — but also labor, utilities, credit card swipe fees, insurance," she said. "Almost everything that it takes to run a restaurant these days is significantly more expensive than it was a year or two ago."

She added that Texas restaurants "operate on very narrow profit margins" even in good times.

FBI Director Kash Patel offered an enigmatic response when a reporter sent him detailed questions about the bureau's election investigations.

The Atlantic's Sarah Fitzpatrick sent Patel a three-page memo with 17 questions about the FBI's push to investigate President Donald Trump's false claims about the 2020 election, but Patel didn't answer any of them and instead responded with an inscrutable quip.

"I'm still looking for my gold-plated jet ski in the English Channel; you all know where it is. Free ride if you help me find it," Patel wrote.

"I did not understand this response," Fitzpatrick reported, noting she had never written about or asked Patel about "anything having to do with Jet Skis or the English Channel."

A Google search showed the quip appears to trace back to a July story by MS NOW, a different outlet, about Patel's political troubles, Fitzpatrick determined. That story included a graphic showing a white jet ski, golf clubs and a private jet, and Patel responded on X at the time: "Nah, my jet ski is gold plated… dumba--."

"Put simply, Patel responded to The Atlantic's questions about the FBI's election investigations by referring to a graphic that appeared on an unrelated news story on another media company's website," Fitzpatrick wrote.

Patel has filed a $250 million defamation lawsuit against Fitzpatrick and her employer over her earlier reporting on colleagues' concerns about episodes of Patel's alleged excessive drinking and unexplained absences.

The bureau's press office sent statements to Fitzpatrick from five named officials, who called the reporting "false" and insisted the FBI was "united." The FBI also posted the questions and its answers on X before the story ran.

The new report, based on interviews with more than 40 sources, describes Patel pushing staff to "look harder" for evidence of 2020 election fraud that has not materialized.

President Donald Trump is trying to rewrite his own predictions about how long the war with Iran would last, but CNN's Daniel Dale subjected his revised public claims to a fact check.

Seven months after launching the war on the last day of February, the 80-year-old president claimed Thursday that his much-repeated "four to six weeks" estimate referred only to eliminating Iran's nuclear threat, not to the entire conflict.

"I stated, numerous times, that it would take 4-6 weeks to get rid of THE IRAN NUCLEAR THREAT, and I did it in one night! The rest of the time is just to make sure it stays that way," Trump wrote on Truth Social.

In an interview with TIME Magazine published the same day, a reporter told Trump that "most people heard you say four to six weeks." Trump blamed the media: "No, I think the press fed it to them."

But CNN's review found that Trump and his former press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, repeatedly described the weeks-long timeline as applying to the war as a whole.

On March 2, less than three days into the fighting, Trump told CNN's Jake Tapper, "I always thought it would be four weeks. And we're a little ahead of schedule." Later that day, he said in a speech, "We projected four to five weeks."

At a March 10 briefing, Leavitt said the "initial timeline was about four to six weeks to achieve the full objectives" of the operation. She listed goals that went well beyond nuclear weapons, including destroying Iran's missiles and navy and weakening its proxy groups.

Trump repeated the estimate twice at a March 26 Cabinet meeting. "We estimated it would take approximately four to six weeks to achieve our mission, and we're way ahead of schedule," he said.

On March 31, Trump went further. He told reporters the U.S. could be done "within two weeks, maybe; two weeks, maybe three." Asked to clarify, he added: "We'll leave."

As recently as April 8, Leavitt said Trump "stated this would be a four-to-six-week military operation to dismantle the military threat" posed by Iran.

CNN asked the White House for any example of Trump limiting his timeline to the nuclear threat. The White House offered none and instead sent back a statement insisting Trump was "right" without addressing the request.

Many experts also dispute Trump's separate claim that he eliminated Iran's nuclear threat in a single night.

Trump has been distancing himself from the estimates for months. In April, he accused Democrats of claiming he "promised 6 weeks to defeat Iran."

"He can quibble about whether he made a promise or offered an estimate," Dale concluded. "But the record shows the “six weeks” figure came from his own mouth."

Two Illinois residents who were detained outside a Chicago-area immigration detention center last year have sued right-wing podcaster Benny Johnson for defamation, accusing him of falsely telling millions of viewers that they were violent extremists who attacked federal agents.

Kyle Frankovich, a data scientist at Harvard University, and Maureen Foody, a contract court reporter, filed the suit Friday in federal court in the Northern District of Illinois, reported MS NOW.

The pair say they were protesting peacefully outside the Broadview ICE facility when they were detained, and that Johnson knowingly portrayed them as criminals.

The case appears to be the first defamation suit tied to the Trump administration's immigration crackdown to target one of the pro-Donald Trump influencers who have been given special access to cover federal operations.

Karianne Jones, an attorney for the plaintiffs, told MS NOW the lawsuit aims to hold accountable people who "serve as a mouthpiece for the government." The complaint calls Johnson's content "political combat dressed up as news."

Johnson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

On Oct. 3, 2025, Johnson joined then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and former Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino at Broadview. The site had become a flashpoint, with viral videos showing agents shoving demonstrators and firing tear gas and pepper balls.

According to the complaint, Frankovich and Foody were standing in a designated "free speech" zone when agents, without provocation, shoved, struck and detained several protesters.

In videos Johnson posted across several platforms, he appears to taunt the crowd. "These are exactly the kind of people that we want to be pissing off," Johnson says in one clip. "It's your tears that keep us going."

Another scene shows about 10 detained protesters, including the plaintiffs, lined up with their hands zip-tied. Johnson calls them "left-wing terrorists arrested for attacking police officers and ICE officers."

"All of this was false, which Mr. Johnson knew," the complaint states.

One of Johnson's posts, which claimed that "every activist here attacked ICE agents," drew 1.7 million views. Hundreds of commenters called for the protesters to be prosecuted or deported, and some called for them to be tortured or killed, according to the suit.

Neither plaintiff was charged with a crime, and the complaint states they were held for about eight hours and then released a half-mile from the facility.

Frankovich told MS NOW he was shaken by the online reaction, and he said Johnson's followers labeled him an antifa leader and were "trying to find me and stop me."

Johnson, who was fired from BuzzFeed for plagiarism in 2014, has become one of the administration's go-to "new media" figures and has been given a seat in the White House briefing room and ride-alongs with immigration agents.

He was among several prominent right-wing commentators whose content creation for the Tennessee-based startup Tenet Media was secretly funded by Russian state media employees, according to a 2024 federal indictment, although Johnson was not charged with any crimes and claims he was not aware of the foreign funding.