VIncent van Gogh Quay with Men Unloading Sand Barges 1888
We have rediscovered at great cost what America’s first @USTreasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton taught us: the nation that depends on its adversaries for critical inputs is neither truly sovereign nor truly prosperous.
— Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent (@SecScottBessent) June 24, 2026
As we approach 250 years of American independence, we would… pic.twitter.com/KVlebPnSJQ
Tucker Carlson dismisses the West's leaders as interchangeable "employees" with no real power of their own.
— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) June 24, 2026
When Alex Jones asks him about Keir Starmer being forced out, Carlson's answer is that it doesn't matter who holds the job.
JONES: "What do you make of Keir Starmer,… pic.twitter.com/Ot9Ee2FTtH
🚨 FETTERMAN SAYS DEMS HAVE BEEN HIJACKED BY THE DIRT BAG, PRO-HAMAS, ANTI-ISRAEL RADICALS!
— Gunther Eagleman™ (@GuntherEagleman) June 24, 2026
Senator Fetterman says the old Democratic Party is DEAD. Replaced by outrageously radical candidates who want to abolish ICE, defund police, open borders, grieve dead Hamas snipers, and… pic.twitter.com/5leCoLlqmV
Donald Trump says he’s spoken to Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and other top officials about potentially officially pulling out of NATO
— Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) June 24, 2026
Trump says there’s no point in paying for NATO if when we ask them to assist in a war, all the countries just say no
We are spending $950… pic.twitter.com/2eO4nZp10b
What, no war accounts to open with?
I think what used to be moderate Democrat voters, the party’s base, have vanished.
If there were a third option, they would dissolve.
To survive, they move left more and more.
• It’s Official: The Democrat Party Is a Socialist Skinsuit (Stephen Green)
Just about the last thing you should expect from some lefty political insider is a forthright admission of what they’re actually up to, but that’s exactly what happened when Democratic Socialist of America (DSA) New York City cochair Gustavo Gordillo spoke with NY1’s Spectrum News earlier this week. It seems like only yesterday [It was only yesterday, Steve —Editor] that PJ Media’s own Matt Margolis pronounced the Democrat Party “dead” after three far-left candidates “endorsed by socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani swept their targeted congressional primaries” against their traditional Democrat opponents.Read more …
Gordillo is here to tell you that not only is the Democrat Party dead, but he and his DSA comrades wear its skinsuit. “We’re using the Democratic Party as a ballot-access vehicle, not because we share its goals,” Gordillo boldly stated. “We build our own organization, get elected under the Democratic label, caucus with Democrats when it’s useful, and push our own agenda from the inside.” Here’s the kicker — the line that should have House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries losing sleep at night and/or wetting himself: “We see the Democratic establishment as an obstacle, not a home.” Of course, I have the clip for you, on the off chance you feel masochistic enough to watch the whole thing.
This is the DSA co-chair. Let me summarize what he says in this video:
— The Undercurrent (@NotTheirScript) June 24, 2026
We’re using the Democratic Party as a ballot-access vehicle, not because we share its goals. We build our own organization, get elected under the Democratic label, caucus with Democrats when it’s useful,… pic.twitter.com/zYwsv4J8Bt“It’s more feasible to think about a statewide democratic socialist race, maybe then a democratic socialist in [14-term Rep. Gregory] Meeks’ seat, which I think is maybe a different kind of challenge,” Gordillo also told Spectrum News, signaling that DSA is far from finished with toppling the New York Democratic establishment. “Some are hoping Rep. Hakeem Jeffries is next,” Spectrum reported, and “one leader wouldn’t rule it out.” “Our congressional districts are going to look very different in 2028 if the measure to redraw the lines ends up being successful,” Gordillo added, hinting that Jeffries is on the menu. “So, I don’t think we can make any concrete predictions until that is further along.”
Sleep tight, Hakeem — but you aren’t the only Democrat establishment figure the DSA has its long knives out for. According to a New York Post report out on Thursday, Gordillo “warned Gov. Kathy Hochul that the emboldened far-left group will take aim at her over her reluctance to ‘tax the rich.'” Gordillo added, “I think we have to show New York what it means to have three Democratic socialists in the congressional delegation.” What it means is, should the Dems take hold of the House in November, come January, we’ll have fricken socialists helping pen legislation that could affect the entire country.
The NYT described Mamdani as “an undeniable power broker” in New York City politics, but he’s just getting started — and his DSA lieutenant Gustavo Gordillo made it clear that their ambitions extend far beyond the city. And they’ll happily wear the DNC as a skinsuit to achieve them.
Remember, this is JFK’s party. But not his voters.
Who are the Dems going to appeal to now?
In federal elections, you can’t go anywhere with Mamdani. Try him in flyover country.
• The Democratic Socialists are Ascendant in New York (JTN)
In a shock to the Democratic Party establishment, several socialist candidates in the mold of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani ousted incumbents and cemented their influence in the nation’s largest city, long considered the financial capital of the world. The candidates centered their campaigns on radical changes that have become the calling card of a new brand of socialist Democrats. Their platform includes abolishing ICE, ending deportations, opposing the state of Israel, implementing Medicare for all, and creating federal job guarantees.Read more …
Mamdani’s endorsements put the mayor on a collision course with establishment Democratic leadership, and he came out victorious. The socialist victories were specifically a defeat for Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who backed the old-school incumbents and doubted Mamdani’s potential for long-term influence over the party. The results have prompted more moderate Democrats to raise the alarm about the growing strength and influence of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) within their own ranks.“People who do not support the DSA wring their hands at cocktail parties, while the DSA is organizing,” Rep. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., told Axios. “It was a tough night,” Gregory Meeks, another Democrat from New York, told the outlet. New York Attorney General Letitia James said Mamdani’s endorsements threaten to “blow up” the Democratic Party.
NY AG Letitia James: “Disappointed” in Mandami
“Some of the candidates that he has supported are individuals who do not understand the politics of New York City, the cultural differences from district to district, who have not been part of the history and the struggle of some of these districts, and are relatively new to the body politic,” James told CNN. “All of us are a little frustrated with the Democratic Party. But you don’t blow it up. That’s what MAGA has done,” she added. Mamdani’s decision to endorse candidates challenging establishment-backed figures and bucking party leadership is part of an attempt to “radically” reorient the Democratic Party towards his vision, those close to the mayor have said.“He’s seeing that opportunity – that we can radically change the Democratic Party,” said Faiz Shakir, an advisor to Senator Bernie Sanders and described as a friend of Mamdani’s. “Like Bernie, he’s not saying I’m doing this out of spite against you, dear leadership. He’s saying, I am supporting these candidates who have a better vision, and I am prepared to lose if it has to be the case.”
Platforms and policies defined
In perhaps one of the most shocking races of the night, DSA-endorsed Darializa Avila Chevalier knocked off five-term incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat, who helmed the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Espaillat has represented the Upper Manhattan district for nearly a decade and was backed by Jeffries. Chevalier, on the other hand, has been a community organizer who graduated from Columbia in 2016. Before running for office, she worked with the Neighborhood Defender Services of Harlem, a public defenders office.Chevalier’s worldview was heavily influenced by an internship with Tomorrow’s Youth Organization, teaching English to Palestinian children in Nablus, West Bank. The 2014 Israel-Gaza war, which lasted about 50 days, started just after she returned to the United States. “That was a really formative period for me, because I was essentially living in the heart of the occupation and seeing the way that Palestinians had to navigate all these systems, the impact that it had on children as young as the ones that I was working with,” Avila Chevalier told City & State New York. “I came back, and I couldn’t unsee all those things. And I started seeing them in our own systems, right? Our systems of policing, of deportation, of the controlling of our movement.”
Her identity as a pro-Palestine, and anti-Israel, activist was at the center of her long-shot campaign. Before launching her bid for Congress, Chevalier had spent years organizing and participating in protests against the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas. The war was sparked when Hamas, a Palestinian terrorist group that controlled the Gaza Strip, conducted a deadly attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
The following day, Chevalier was out on the streets of New York, participating in a protest organized by leftist groups. Rallygoers held signs reading “Resistance is Justified when People are Occupied” and faced criticism for appearing to support the attacks that left more than one thousand Israelis dead. Some of the rally organizers were later sued for allegedly acting as “collaborators and propagandists” for Hamas in the United States.
Claims to be a “human rights advocate” for Palestinians
During the campaign, Chevalier defended attending the rally, suggesting Israel’s response to the Hamas attack had the potential to become “a really outsized reaction.” “I can only say I have been advocating for the human rights of Palestinians for my adult life. And as someone who has seen a pattern, whenever anything happens on the ground (in Israel), there’s always a really outsized reaction that costs thousands of people their lives,” Avila Chevalier told City & State earlier this month.Chevalier’s activism ultimately encouraged her to convert to Islam because of the “grace and love and passion” that her Muslim friends had for “social justice,” she said in a speech at a New York Mosque. In addition to pro-Palestine activism, Chevalier has taken an extreme position on immigration law and deportations. Like many of her DSA colleagues, Chevalier calls for ICE to be abolished, but has gone even further to suggest that all deportations are wrong. “I still believe that all deportations are wrong,” Chevalier said in an interview with Vox earlier this month. When asked if that would include those who had committed criminal offenses in the United States after entering illegally, she doubled down.
Chevalier has also faced scrutiny for a series of deleted posts to social media expressing support for abolishing police, prisons and borders, seizing private property, and nationalizing industries. “A world without borders—just like a world without prisons or police—is possible, necessary, and the only moral way forward,” Chevalier posted to Twitter in September 2021. During that same month, she also posted: “Yes, literally, abolish the border” and “all deportation is wrong.” In a handful of posts, Chevalier appeared to express support for key tenets of Marxism and abolishing the police.
“Seize the means of production,” she wrote in one post. “No. It means ending policing full stop. Period. No more police at all ever,” she wrote in another. Chevalier tried to distance herself from her old tweets during the campaign. “I have grown considerably in the years since these tweets, and I am focused on our community and our community’s future,” Chevalier told CNN when the outlet asked about the posts.
A bit of motion there too. But Republicans have it easy compared to Democrats.
• The Republican Party’s Dissidents Show Themselves the Door (Ben Shapiro)
Tucker Carlson says he can no longer support the Republican Party. In that regard, he finds himself in familiar company. A growing faction on the populist right — including figures such as Candace Owens, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Nick Fuentes — has increasingly positioned itself in opposition to core Republican foreign policy principles. Rather than seeking to persuade the party, many now appear ready to abandon it altogether. That may not be a crisis for Republicans. It may simply be a clarification. Political movements require ideological boundaries. Parties are more than coalitions of convenience; they are associations built around shared principles and priorities.Read more …
When those principles cease to align, separation is often healthier than endless internal conflict. Vice President JD Vance recently made that case during an appearance on Megyn Kelly’s show. Defending the administration’s approach to Iran, Vance argued that Republicans who disagree with specific policies should nevertheless recognize the alternative: empowering Democrats. Whether one agrees with his defense of the administration or not, the broader point is difficult to dispute. Political parties function by advancing a common agenda, not by endlessly renegotiating their foundational commitments.Yet a segment of the so-called “horseshoe Right” appears interested in something else entirely. Rather than influencing the Republican Party from within, its leaders increasingly seem determined to pressure the party into abandoning longstanding principles in favor of a worldview markedly more sympathetic to adversarial regimes abroad. Carlson’s latest comments are a case in point. Speaking on the Can’t Be Censored podcast, Carlson announced that he no longer supports the Republican Party because, in his view, it has become immoral. He argued that Republicans have placed the interests of foreign countries above those of Americans and therefore no longer deserve his support.
“I voted Republican my entire life,” Carlson said. “I’ve been a consistent defender for 35 years of the Republican Party. … But there’s no defending this because it’s immoral.” That claim raises questions of its own. Carlson was registered as a Democrat from 2006 to 2020, explaining at various times that he did so in order to participate in Democratic primaries. Regardless, the larger issue is not his voter registration history but his definition of Republican principles. Carlson has become one of the most prominent voices arguing against support for Ukraine while expressing remarkable sympathy for Russia’s perspective in the conflict.
He has repeatedly criticized efforts to counter Iranian influence in the Middle East and has frequently attacked traditional Republican arguments centered on deterrence and strength.At some point, disagreement becomes philosophical divergence. If a political movement believes in peace through strength, maintaining American alliances and confronting hostile regimes, then those who reject those principles are under no obligation to remain within that movement. Nor is the movement obligated to redefine itself around their objections.Greene recently echoed Carlson’s frustration, declaring that she would no longer support what she called an “America Last Republican Party.”
Similar sentiments have emerged from other prominent commentators who argue that the GOP has betrayed its voters by refusing to embrace a more isolationist foreign policy. But dissatisfaction alone does not confer ownership. Being unhappy with a party’s direction does not mean the party must reorganize itself around every dissatisfied faction. Kelly, to her credit, recently suggested that disagreement with Republican leadership is not itself grounds for abandoning the party. That observation highlights a broader truth: Political coalitions inevitably contain disagreements. The question is whether those disagreements exist within a shared framework of principles or whether they reflect fundamentally different visions of America’s role in the world.
The current divide increasingly appears to be the latter. The Republican Party is free to debate tactics, priorities and individual policies. What it cannot do is function without a coherent identity. If peace through strength, support for American interests abroad, and opposition to hostile foreign powers remain central to that identity, then those who reject those principles may decide they no longer belong in the coalition. If so, there is nothing wrong with leaving. What would be a mistake is allowing those departures to become the blueprint for a new Republican Party. Sometimes political movements benefit not from expansion but from clarity. And sometimes the clearest statement is made by those who choose to walk away.
The motions. Going thru,
• Mark Rutte Gives “Remain in NATO” Pitch to President Trump in White House (CTH)
Against the backdrop of President Trump, Secretary Rubio and Secretary Hegseth pointedly telling NATO of the U.S. intention to draw-down U.S. military operations from Europe, NATO General Secretary Mark Rutte flies to Washington DC to make the pro-NATO sales pitch directly to President Trump.In one of the most transparent appearances in oval office history, a passionate, self-interested and professionally demure Mark Rutte pours on the praise for President Trump and puts on a massive sales pitch.Read more …
You can tell from President Trump’s demeanor, tone and general ambivalence, he too can see how over the top the praise and back-slapping is. Secretary Rutte was intensely and diplomatically focused on not allowing any accurate criticism or statement of disappointment from President Trump be left unchallenged to frame the tone and context of the meeting by the media. This is quite a desperate spectacle to witness when you understand the stakes for Europe which were carried by Rutte.
CTH readers can see through the professionally demure motivations of the NATO secretary, and it was obvious from President Trump’s response that Rutte was transparently playing to the U.S. audience and DC stakeholders. That said, you’ve got to give Rutte credit for tap-dancing that fine line. It was a great sales pitch, and President Trump was very courteous and respectful of the showmanship, but I doubt President Trump was moved much. The G7 assembly in Turkey will be very interesting.For the G7 (+13) in France, Zelenskyy went all-in with the Ukraine false flag and attack on Moscow. It will be interesting to watch what the “coalition of the willing” have planned for the next assembly.
“..29 million exchanges with Claude using thousands of fraudulent accounts..” Couldn’t Anthropic have seen this coming? You know, instead of whining to Pocahontas?
• Anthropic Accuses Alibaba Of Illicitly Extracting Ai Capabilities (BBC)
US artificial intelligence (AI) giant Anthropic has accused Chinese e-commerce and technology firm Alibaba of “brazenly” and “illicitly” extracting its Claude AI model’s capabilities. In a letter sent to two members of the US Congress, the San Francisco-based company said operators linked to Alibaba carried out almost 29 million exchanges with Claude using thousands of fraudulent accounts in what it called the largest extraction campaign of its kind. Anthropic urged Congress to penalise the companies behind attacks like this and to ramp up measures to prevent US tech from being stolen.Read more …
[..] Anthropic’s letter, dated 10 June and addressed to US Senators Tim Scott and Elizabeth Warren, accused New York Stock Exchange-listed Alibaba of carrying out “the largest campaign to illicitly extract Claude’s capabilities”. According to Anthropic, the campaign was carried out through what are known as “distillation attacks”, which extracted answers from a stronger AI model to train a weaker one. Alibaba-linked operators targeted Claude’s most valuable capabilities, including its ability to tackle longer and more complex tasks and its approach to decision-making, Anthropic said.These type of attacks are carried out on an “industrial scale” to enable Chinese companies to harvest and repackage US AI capabilities as their own, the company said. The letter also cited other alleged attacks, which Anthropic said posed a threat to the US military. “Distillation attacks turn hundreds of billions of dollars in American investment and [research and development] into a massive subsidy for our geopolitical competitors,” said Anthropic. It cited the US Department of Defense’s claims that Alibaba and several major firms like car maker BYD and tech company Baidu are tied to the Chinese military.
The companies have denied any such allegations, while Alibaba this week sued the US government in a bid to get its name removed from the Pentagon blacklist. US developers have previously accused Chinese competitors of using distillation attacks to train their models to rival American AI technology at a fraction of the cost. OpenAI has also previously accused Chinese groups of employing the same practice. Anthropic is a leading AI developer and, alongside ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, is gearing up for a blockbuster stock market debut that could make it one of the most vaulable companies in the world. But some of Anthropic’s more advanced models, such as Mythos, have raised cybersecurity concerns over their ability to target weaknesses in computer systems.
“The NSA has reportedly lost access to Anthropic’s advanced Mythos model amid a dispute between the tech company and Washington..”
Maybe the NSA can pretend they’re Alibaba.
• US National Security Agency (NSA) Loses Access To Key AI Tool (RT)
The US National Security Agency (NSA) has lost access to Anthropic’s advanced Mythos 5 AI model while using it to find software weaknesses, the New York Times has reported. The development comes amid Washington’s months-long dispute with the Silicon Valley firm. The cutoff came after the Trump administration imposed export restrictions on Anthropic earlier this month, citing national security concerns, according to the NYT. The loss “deprived” the intelligence agency of a “tool that has impressed and alarmed its analysts with how good it is at finding software weaknesses,” the outlet added.Read more …
During the tests, the model identified vulnerabilities in highly secure government networks “within hours,” the AP reported on Wednesday, citing an anonymous US official. Anthropic’s AI technology has been increasingly deployed on classified government networks and integrated into US national-security work, with its models used for intelligence analysis, operational planning, and cyber operations.However, in February, the Department of War designated Anthropic a “supply chain risk” after the company refused to remove restrictions on some of its AI systems’ military applications. The firm said it opposed mass domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons. US President Donald Trump subsequently ordered federal agencies to phase out Anthropic technology within a six-month window.
Anthropic sued the government, arguing that the measures were unlawful retaliation for its refusal to relax safeguards on AI’s military uses. Despite the phase-out order and ongoing legal battle, multiple media reports later claimed that parts of the US government continue to use Anthropic systems. The developments come amid warnings from researchers, technology leaders, and security officials that AI systems are being integrated into military and intelligence operations faster than governments and institutions can adapt to their increasing capabilities.
Experts have cautioned that the same tools that are used to strengthen cyber defenses could also automate attacks and lower barriers for malicious actors. On Monday, cybersecurity experts from the Five Eyes intelligence alliance – the US, UK, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand – warned that rapidly advancing AI models could soon enable hackers to disrupt governments, businesses, and critical infrastructure on a global scale.
Brexit at Tiffany’s?!
“The UK wants back into the EU, but not on the EU’s terms”.
Galina Dudina, is a columnist at Kommersant daily newspaper in Moscow..
• Brexit at 10: The Divorce Britain Now Regrets (Galina Dudina)
Ten years ago, I was on a business trip in Brussels on the day of the Brexit referendum. Voting was already underway across the Channel, but in the European Quarter, the mood was almost serene. Journalists kept asking EU officials about Brexit, and the officials waved the questions away with jokes, as though the whole thing was a theatrical inconvenience rather than a potential political earthquake. In private conversations, I asked people the same question: if you had to place a bet, what would you choose? Everyone said ‘Remain’. In Britain itself, almost 13 million voters didn’t turn out at all, apparently unable to imagine the scale of what was coming.Read more …
We were all naive. Trump hadn’t yet been elected in the United States, the Covid disaster hadn’t yet rolled across the world, and the year 2022 hadn’t arrived yet. On the morning of June 24, 2016, the news that 51.9% of British voters had chosen to leave the European Union was read not only online, but on the faces of people in Brussels. Outside cafés and around the offices where EU officials gathered for lunch, people spoke into their phones in a state of disbelief. Today, around 57% of Britons say Brexit was a mistake, and despite the reverence traditionally attached in Britain to the “will of the people,” politicians are increasingly prepared to discuss whether the decision should one day be revisited.Philip Rycroft, the senior civil servant who oversaw preparations for Brexit inside the British state, recently argued that “Brexit isn’t over” and “will never be over.” In his view, the British political class should now have an honest discussion not only about closer relations with Brussels, but also about a possible return to the Union. At first glance, this sounds reasonable because, ten years on, Brexit hasn’t produced the promised economic boom. Sterling hasn’t soared, and the Office for Budget Responsibility estimates that, in the long term, the British economy will be around 4% smaller than it would have been inside the EU. Some economists put the loss in GDP per capita at 6–8%.
Nor has Britain escaped dependence on the rest of Europe. The EU remains its largest trading partner, accounting for around 41% of British exports and almost half of imports, while for British companies, Brexit has brought more paperwork, friction, and uncertainty. And yet the new talk of reunion isn’t quite the sober strategic rethink it pretends to be. It also belongs to a wider nostalgia that swept social media at the start of this year, when users in many countries began posting old photographs and memories under the slogan “bring back my 2016.”
Those now dreaming of a return to 2016, and to the EU, should remember what Britain’s membership actually looked like. Since joining the European Economic Community in 1973, Britain spent decades carving out a special status for itself, and while it was in the club, it was never quite like the others. It kept the pound, stayed outside Schengen, secured a rebate on its budget contributions, and negotiated opt-outs in sensitive areas.
There is little reason to think Brussels would now offer London the same package again. A returning Britain would have to accept a far less comfortable relationship, with economic dependence on the continent, migration pressures, tighter alignment with EU rules, and rising defense obligations. This is where public opinion becomes more complicated because, while many Britons may favor closer ties, or even rejoining in theory, only 36% support returning without the old exemptions. In other words, they want the lost stability of EU membership, but not necessarily the obligations that would now come with it.
Britain might also find that its place in the European queue has changed, and a new application would risk landing behind Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ukraine, and Moldova. The former imperial power that once negotiated rebates and exceptions could return as just another applicant. Both Brexit and the current regret over Brexit are therefore more emotional than rational. It’s no accident that the most common metaphor for it is divorce, and many people know from experience that missing a former partner does not always mean reconciliation is possible, or wise.
It’s an absurd story. Nobody in the whole world can figure out why.
• Federal Judge Blocks Trump’s EO Requiring Proof of Citizenship to Vote (AmG)
A federal judge on Wednesday permanently blocked key portions of President Donald Trump’s executive order overhauling federal election procedures, ruling that the president exceeded his constitutional authority by attempting to impose new voting requirements without congressional approval. U.S. District Judge Denise Casper, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, concluded that the Constitution gives primary authority over elections to the states and Congress, not the executive branch.Read more …
The ruling makes permanent a preliminary injunction Casper issued last year in a lawsuit filed by Democratic attorneys general from 19 states. “While the Constitution vests the President with ‘executive Power’ and commands him to ‘take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed,’ it does not grant the President any specific powers over elections,” Casper wrote. “As a result, the President ‘plays no direct role in the process of appointing electors,’ nor does he have authority to control the state officials who do,” she added.Trump’s executive order sought to require documentary proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote, prohibit states from counting mail ballots received after Election Day even if postmarked on time, and withhold certain federal funds from states that declined to comply. Casper ruled that the administration lacked the authority to impose those changes through executive action. In her 59-page opinion, the judge also rejected the administration’s justification for the order, writing that the Justice Department failed to establish the widespread election problems it cited in defending the policy.
“There is no evidence in this record of widespread ‘illegal voting, discrimination, fraud, and other forms of malfeasance and error’ within American elections, which the Executive Order purports to safeguard against,” Casper wrote. The judge also concluded that the order would have disenfranchised thousands of voters.The decision is another legal setback for the administration’s efforts to repair federal election procedures. Courts have repeatedly blocked or limited several election-related initiatives advanced during Trump’s second term.
Additional lawsuits are challenging a separate executive order aimed at creating a nationwide voter database and tightening mail voting requirements. Earlier this week, another federal judge blocked the administration’s attempt to use an immigration database to verify voter rolls, while courts have also rejected Justice Department efforts to obtain state voter registration records. Despite the court rulings, Trump has continued urging Congress to enact proof-of-citizenship requirements through legislation.
The Republican-backed SAVE America Act passed the House but remains stalled in the Senate. Trump renewed that effort Wednesday, saying he would withhold his signature from a bipartisan housing bill until Congress approves voter citizenship verification requirements.
“Bessent noted that a born-again Venezuela is shifting back towards USD invoicing, and that post-deal Iran is likely to do so as well.”
• A River in Egypt (Molly Schwartz)
Scott Bessent took to CNBC’s Squawk Box yesterday to opine on the situation with Iran. Bessent echoed Trump’s comments that any released Iranian assets are to remain under US Treasury oversight and are restricted to use for food and medicine. However, money is fungible, and any released cash that is used to help civilians may mean more cash from other places that can be used to support the IRGC’s interestsRead more …
Bessent’s comments also called attention to another philosophical outlook on the war and the Administration’s initially stated— though seemingly not truly intended—goal of regime change. This is where the waters gets murky, and where we can climb into our Felucca and begin our journey along a river in Egypt, drifting, perhaps, into a bit of strategic “denial” about what regime change actually means. If, hypothetically of course, Operation Epic Fury succeeded in asserting regime change in Iran, where does the US go from here? If the new Ayatollah says he is willing to table plans of further enriching uranium and wants to align itself with US interests, should the US just keep firing missiles? Do you keep Iranian assets under lock and key, even if the regime has shown you that it has changed?Bessent said himself, “we didn’t have a regime change, but we have changed the regime.” If that is the genuine perspective of the Trump Administration, then the deal may not be as bad for the US as many perceive it to be. As our Global Strategist, Michael Every, has noted on multiple occasions, show of strength means everything in the arena of Middle Eastern geopolitics. There is a possibility that the current hardliners in the IRGC aren’t actually so hardline anymore, but are only presenting as such. Note that this is not a new base case for our outlook by any means (you can read more about our Hormuz outlook here), but food for thought.
If the regime truly has changed, this also could have big implications for USD dominance. Bessent noted that a born-again Venezuela is shifting back towards USD invoicing, and that post-deal Iran is likely to do so as well.
Brent crude oil fell below $75/bbl for the first time since the war in Iran began, sending US Treasury markets into a tailspin. US 2-year yields dropped almost 6bp to 4.21, while the 10-year sunk almost 10bp—the largest one-day downward move since October 2025. With “peace in the Middle East,” the case for hikes is losing water by the day, with the market now pricing in 27bp worth of hikes by October, and only 40bp worth of hikes at the peak—a significant downgrade from Monday, when two full hikes had been priced in by the April 2027 FOMC decision.
Such a dramatic move in rates would normally suggest a weaker dollar, but USD was actually the best-performing G10 currency on a one-day view and the best month-to-date. The DXY index continued its climb from last week’s FOMC meeting to 101.6—the highest level since May 2025. Meanwhile, EUR/USD broke below crucial support at 1.14, fueling additional EUR selling, with the pair trading at 1.1356 at the time of writing. While the following appears to be more of an instance of correlation rather than causation, it is also important to note that yesterday’s move coincided with comments from Bessent—perhaps another slow turn of the Felucca—that USD can remain strong even when interest rates are being cut.
While USD is soaring, JPY is plummeting. USD/JPY spent the day yesterday approaching the July 3, 2024 high of 162, with the 14D RSI at 71.83 suggesting that USD/JPY is overbought. According to Bloomberg, Bessent and Japanese Finance Minister Katayama spoke over the phone, with Katayama telling reporters that “she and Bessent agreed to take ‘bold’ steps on currencies if needed,” and said the nations are increasingly “aligned” on foreign-exchange policy.
The Bank of Canada released its Summary of Deliberations from the June 10 decision, written on papyrus. Recent Canadian economic data suggest that the Canadian economy has slipped into a technical recession, with two consecutive quarters of negative quarterly growth. The Governing Council piled into a felucca of their own, racing up de Nile, justifying that higher-frequency data suggest a “resumption of growth in the second quarter,” and that while the Canadian economy is weak, it is “not clearly in a recession.”
“It’s so hot that the schoolchildren are passing out in class and nobody is allowed to do anything about it.”
• Suffer the Little Children, France Insists (Stephen Green)
If Johnny Carson were still around and hosting The Tonight Show, he might launch a bit during tonight’s monologue with “Boy, it’s really hot out there in Nîmes today…” and then the audience would burst in, sounding almost rehearsed and shouting, “HOW HOT IS IT?” “It’s so hot that the schoolchildren are passing out in class and nobody is allowed to do anything about it.” Wait, that isn’t funny. But it is the situation in Nîmes, a city of about 148,000 in a lovely part of the south of France. Actually, I’ve been in the south of France, and all the parts are lovely (except Marseille, of course), but I digress.Read more …
The region is suffering a record-breaking, early-summer heat wave with temperatures soaring as high as 40–44°C, the way the French reckon it, or 104–111°F in actual degrees. This is when Americans would set the thermostat to 68° (actual degrees) or maybe go see a movie at a theater where they keep it that temp all the time.mBut at the École Primaire La Planette school in Nîmes, they have no air conditioning — naturellement — and according to Miss Jo on X and other sources, a child there “recently fainted because of the heat,” even while “classes were being taught in corridors to get out of the heat.”Parents of the students there did what parents in America would almost certainly do in a similar situation, and they raised money to buy five portable air conditioning units for the school. The community got so involved that the parents needed just three days to raise the required €2,000. So far, so good. But Mayor Vincent Bouget is an actual member of the Parti communiste français (PCF), and if there’s one thing Communists can’t stand, it’s the community doing stuff. Bouget ordered the school to remove the A/C because “it sets a precedent,” and “in some neighborhoods, parents don’t have the means to act.”
I mean, I guess those parents could hold a fundraiser like the other parents did. The community seemed pretty excited to jump in and help. But no. What was Winston Churchill just saying about socialism? Ah, yes — here’s the quote: “Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy.” That line actually dates back to a speech Churchill gave in Scotland in 1948. But it’s so timeless that it still has that fresh quote smell. Unlike the schools in Nîmes, which likely smell like sweat and desperation. Honestly, I’d enjoy nothing more than to write about something, anything other than how vicious Europe is to its own people, but it just won’t stop being so vicious to its own people.
If I were a particularly coldhearted eugenicist, this is where I’d argue that it’s one thing to force young children to put up with potentially deadly heat, but it just makes good sense to deny A/C to old people who are nothing but burdens to the State. Which is exactly what happens even during normal summers, when tens of thousands of Europeans — typically older — die unnecessarily due to the heat. But that would be gross. And also wrong. This is America, and we have A/C for pretty much everybody who needs it. The way God and Willis Carrier intended.
~Weird.
• Kremlin To Contact Apple Before Responding To Removal of Apps (TASS)
Relevant Russian agencies will contact Apple before deciding how to respond to the removal of Russian apps, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “Naturally, before drawing any conclusions, it is necessary to establish contact with this service, and our relevant agency will do so. Of course, clarifications will be required from the corporation,” he said when asked a respective question. VK announced earlier that Apple had removed its apps from the store without explanation. The company clarified that apps already installed would continue to function on Apple devices, though users would not receive push notifications. VK also emphasized that it had never been subject to sanctions, a fact confirmed by numerous legal opinions from international and US lawyers.Read more …
I need a new MacBook. Mine is 8 years old. They just added $400+. Great. Volunteers?
• Apple Price Shock: Macs And iPads Jump $200 Or More, Memory Crisis Worsens (ZH)
Readers were warned as early as late January to front-run the coming memory shortage by purchasing their favorite electronics, whether PCs, laptops, TVs, smartphones, or anything else dependent on high-end memory chips, as unprecedented data-center demand was already beginning to emerge. Fast forward nearly five months, and just two weeks after Apple CEO Tim Cook warned that “price increases are unavoidable” for laptops and other devices, a Wall Street Journal report has confirmed that those hikes have now been passed along, potentially delivering sticker shock to customers.Read more …
Here’s what happened earlier: The Apple Online Store briefly went down, and when it came back online, prices for Mac computers jumped 15% to 20%, while iPad prices increased 15% to 25%. The company briefly took down its Apple Online Store early this morning as it typically does when announcing new products. When it came back online, the price tags for Mac computers rose roughly 15% to 20% and iPad prices rose 15% to 25%. Among the price increases, the base MacBook Air rose $200 to $1,299; the base MacBook Pro increased $300 to $1,999; the entry-level MacBook Neo increased $100 to $699. The iPad Air increased $150 to $749 and the iPad Pro increased $200 to $1,199. -WSJ
*APPLE RAISES VISION PRO HEADSET PRICE TO $3,699 FROM $3,499
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) June 25, 2026
*APPLE HOMEPOD NOW $349, HOMEPOD MINI IS $129, APPLE TV TO $199However, iPhone prices remained unchanged, but the company told the outlet in a statement that additional price hikes could be on the way. “We have now reached a point where we need to begin raising prices,” Apple said in the statement. “We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly.” An Apple spokesperson placed the blame on the “rapid expansion of AI data centers, which has created an extraordinary surge in demand for memory and storage,” and this is why component prices surged.
Earlier this month, Cook told WSJ that price increases had become “unavoidable” because of higher component costs, adding, “There’s less supply at a time when consumers want devices, and the memory guys are passing along huge price increases.”Apple has historically revealed price hikes with new launches of iPhones, iPads, and other devices, making this overnight price hike extraordinarily rare. The high-end chip market is dominated by US-based Micron and South Korea’s SK Hynix and Samsung, which have all seen massive demand for high-bandwidth memory from AI “hyperscalers” such as Google, Meta, and Amazon.
Apple’s price hikes come hours after Micron delivered blowout quarterly earnings, touting gross profit margins that topped 80%. Shares soared nearly 18% in premarket trading. Micron executives told investors that “tight conditions” will persist beyond 2027 and that only suggests further price hikes are coming not just for Apple but also for other major big tech firms that sell devices. Micron Chief Business Officer Sumit Sadana said in a WSJ interview last night that “a couple of the customers who were being very aggressive with pricing at that time were not constructive,” without naming Apple…
Sadana noted, “A lot of the industry investments got shut down in 2023 because of really poor pricing and really poor margins.” A recent Morgan Stanley note found that memory prices have climbed sixfold over the past year, with new manufacturing capacity likely to take years to build and ramp up. The iPhone price hike may be unavoidable: JPMorgan analysts estimate DRAM and NAND could jump from roughly 10% to 15% of an iPhone’s total component cost today to more than 45% by 2027. Memory price spikes are already showing up in the Producer Price Index for semiconductor and other electronic component manufacturing.
At what point does Trump start raging at soaring memory prices
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) June 11, 2026
PPI Electronic Components is pulling entire core index higher pic.twitter.com/v9ufHmx0gG… and at what point does President Trump start raging at memory prices, just as his administration has successfully sent oil prices crashing by entering a diplomatic phase with Tehran to secure a permanent peace deal?
Every politician everywhere is involved. Forget figuring it out.
• Fauci, The CIA, And The Unanswered Questions of COVID (RealClearWire)
Did Anthony Fauci manipulate the intelligence community (IC) investigation of the origin of COVID as outgoing Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard claims?Gabbard recently released previously unseen documents and communications during the COVID pandemic between the IC and the key member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, Dr. Anthony Fauci. She claims they show that Fauci and the IC coordinated the investigation of the origin of the COVID to suggest it was a natural occurrence rather than a laboratory leak. She further charges that the documents reveal Fauci’s direct role in influencing and manipulating IC assessments in an attempt to discourage the lab-leak hypothesis.Read more …
It is not clear that the released information shows this, and a careful reading suggests a more complicated scenario. But what the messages do show is that an undue emphasis on Fauci’s actions risks missing a more important point – the hidden connection between public health officials and the IC during the pandemic.The two theories on where COVID originated are that the virus evolved naturally from bats to man via an intermediate animal host; or that the virus leaked from a laboratory in Wuhan, China. The first was more widely accepted by scientists and most of the international press early in the pandemic, but the intermediate host has never been discovered so the theory remains speculative. The second theory, which has gained significant traction since initially being disparaged as conspiracy, is only circumstantial since no definitive proof exists. The answer as to how COVID originated remains unknown.
Where does Dr. Fauci, the government’s point man in the pandemic, fit in? He acknowledges the possibility of a lab leak, but initially came down firmly on the side of natural origin – aggressively so. He and his colleagues, notably his boss NIH director Francis Collins, attempted to publicly silence proponents of the lab leak theory. The rub is that Fauci was tangentially involved in “gain of function” viral manipulation research done in Wuhan and clearly misled Congress about this involvement.
Because gain-of-function research could have been responsible for the development of the virus in the Wuhan lab, this means Fauci has a conflict of interest on the COVID source: He could bear some responsibility for the entire affair if this was indeed a lab leak. So he has reason other than scientific inquiry to support the animal host theory. He is aware of that and has written in the past about the necessity and the attendant danger of doing gain-of-function research. He now strenuously denies it had anything to do with COVID.
Enter the IC and Gabbard’s document release.
There is uncertainty over whether Fauci frequented CIA offices early in the pandemic, something he was less than forthright about in his 2024 congressional testimony. It is unclear whether or how many times he was there, in part because a whistleblower claims the requirement to sign in was waived for Dr. Fauci. What is not in doubt are his contacts with the CIA after President Biden charged the IC with investigating the origin of COVID.
The CIA asked Fauci to provide recommendations for experts to consult in their investigation of the COVID origin; the extent of his influence on the agency’s investigation is unclear. At the time, some officials, aware of the potential conflict of interest, questioned in the documents whether relying on recommendations from someone deeply involved in coronavirus research could create the perception of improper influence regarding their findings. Nevertheless, the IC employed the experts Fauci recommended, who were never publicly identified. Their names have been redacted in communications and the information they provided has never been released.
The lack of transparency by the public health community and the CIA caused Republicans, led by Dr. Rand Paul, to suspect Fauci selected his CIA consultants based on their opposition to the lab-leak theory. Further, Paul proposed there was a self-justifying loop of information in which the medical experts put their thumbs on the scale of the IC report supporting natural origin. Public health officials (and some politicians who saw the lab-leak theory as a potential scandal) then turned around and used the “doctored” IC report to support the conclusions they provided to the public.
Neither of these accusations is supported or refuted by the released communications.
USAID money funded coronavirus research in China that killed millions of people https://t.co/AJJM70wDXq
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 23, 2026
🚨 HUGE NEWS: The US Postmaster General has just told Congress that the Post Office WILL NOT deliver mail-in ballots in the 2026 midterms to states who refuse to comply with President Trump's election integrity executive order
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) June 24, 2026
This order makes sure mail-in recipients are… pic.twitter.com/TC0ezihX3e
Javier Milei: I thought being on the left was a mental problem… But what I discovered is that being on the left is a disease of the soul.. Since they have no way or arguments, they go for physical violence.
— Defiant L’s (@DefiantLs) June 24, 2026
pic.twitter.com/Jq15KKiHhR
I covered this a few years ago, sunscreen actually causes cancer, sounds crazy, but the biggest studies shows that.
— Jimmy Dore (@jimmy_dore) June 25, 2026
The kind of cancer you get from the sun is Basal Cell carcinoma, which is not deadly, the survival rate from basal cell after five years is 100%
Lack of sun is… https://t.co/yy8OnVQJpA
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