A Nobel Prize-winning psychiatrist who previously called for Donald Trump to be removed from office says the president’s mental condition has deteriorated to a level never seen before, warning that Trump’s behavior poses a serious danger due to the extraordinary powers he holds as president.

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With the midterm elections right around the corner and Republicans struggling to keep their congressional majorities, Donald Trump is sitting on an enormous pile of money that his party desperately needs, and they’re growing increasingly worried that he’s going to keep it for himself.

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Trump’s MAGA Inc. super PAC had more than $400 million in cash at the end of July, a huge advantage that the GOP has been counting on to help vulnerable candidates battling for survival. But with early voting approaching in competitive races, most of that money hasn’t seen the light of day, and Republicans are beginning to worry that Trump has other plans.

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According to The Washington Post, some people around Trump believe he has no interest in spreading around his super PAC’s money to help out with the midterms. Trump himself must approve how the money is spent, and his inner circle refuses to say what he intends to do with the money

Republicans now have to confront the uncomfortable possibility that after turning their party’s political identity over to Trump, he now may decide that advancing his own political agenda is more important than saving their seats.

Among the possibilities being discussed is Trump using the money to influence the 2028 presidential race, transferring it to his preferred successor, or using funds for legal expenses, post-presidential travel, events and personal political projects. That could include Trump’s planned presidential library in Miami, which is projected to cost at least $1 billion.

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The anxiety has already had a cooling effect on new donations after donors began noticing the previous funds they’ve sent aren’t being spent. Meanwhile, Republican are privately complaining that MAGA Inc. has squandered valuable time by losing opportunities to attack Democratic candidates since no money is being spent on campaign ads. While Republicans want to voice those concerns, publicly criticizing Trump comes with a whole new set of problems.

If Trump thinks his brand alone is enough to carry struggling GOP candidates over the finish line, he’s sorely mistaken. Public and private polling has Trump’s approval rating stuck at near historic lows for a president heading into the midterms, yet some ads that have been released attempt to promote his record, even as Republicans argue that the money would be better used attacking Democrats.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune didn’t hold back when asked about the predicament Republicans find themselves in.

“I worry about that, for sure,” Thune told The Post when asked about the possibility of Republicans losing their Senate majority. “I’m a realist, and I don’t ever try and sugarcoat things. I think it’s a competitive environment right now.”

Republicans suspicious of Trump’s intentions have reason to worry. Trump has always been reluctant to use money raised by his political operation to help other candidates. So far this year, MAGA Inc. has spent less than $900,000 supporting Sen. Darline Graham in her South Carolina primary and less than $20,000 on text messages supporting Rep. Clay Fuller of Georgia.

But Trump wants to people to think he intends to help.

“I’m not affected by the election,” he told reporters Wednesday. “I’m not running. But my party is running, and I’m going to help my party.”

Later, speaking to congressional Republicans at the White House, Trump said he’s “going to be helping you, and I’ll be going around and doing a lot of speeches.

Notably, he said nothing about releasing the hundreds of millions of dollars sitting in his super PAC.

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Republicans have spent the better part of a decade accepting that their political fortunes are tied almost completely to Trump’s. Now, with congressional control hanging in the balance, some of them are discovering the downside to that deal.

Trump controls an enormous financial arsenal capable of helping rescue vulnerable Republicans, but the decision about whether to use it belongs largely to a president who has spent his political career making clear that his first priority is Donald Trump.

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President Donald Trump has decided on the man he wants permanently running the United States Navy, and along with a lengthy résumé of military service, he has some bizarre beliefs about witches taking over a city in California.

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Trump announced Tuesday that he is nominating Hung Cao, the retired Navy captain and former Republican congressional candidate who has served as acting Navy secretary since April, to take the job permanently. Cao took on the acting role after former Navy Secretary John Phelan abruptly resigned after clashing with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

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Cao graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1996, served as an explosive ordnance disposal and diving officer and retired as a captain after a 25-year Navy career that included service alongside special operations forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. He subsequently entered Republican politics, unsuccessfully running for the House in Virginia in 2022 and the Senate in 2024.

But Cao also brings something less conventional to the Navy secretary’s office: a documented history of comments about witchcraft, Wiccans and the supposed spiritual deterioration of a California seaside community, all inspired by his extremist evangelical Christian ideology.

During a 2023 interview with right-wing Christian activist Sean Feucht, Cao pointed to Lovers Point on California’s Monterey Peninsula as an example of what he believed could happen when Christianity is removed from public life.

“Monterey is a really dark place now. A lot of witchcraft and the Wiccan community has really taken over there,” Cao claimed.

“We just need to mobilize Christians across the nation…we can’t let it turn like this,” he added.

Cao’s fear of non-existent witches doesn’t seem to have bothered Trump, who described him as a “true WARRIOR” while announcing his nomination on Truth Social.

“I can think of no one better than him to make sure our Great Navy and Marine Corps remain the FIERCEST and BEST Force the World has ever seen,” Trump wrote.

Trump has been enthusiastic about Cao for years, although his praise has occasionally ventured into focusing on some of Cao’s less substantive qualifications.

“This is a great gentleman. I love his name: Hung Cao. I love that name. And that name alone can get you elected,” Trump said while campaigning in 2024, despite the fact that it did not get Cao elected. Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine comfortably defeated him in Virginia’s 2024 Senate race.

Nevertheless Cao found himself occupying a high-level government role. The Senate confirmed him as Navy undersecretary last October by a narrow 52-48 vote. Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski joined Democrats in opposing him, citing “concerns about his past statements and conduct.”

His promotion now comes at a scandalous moment for the service he could permanently oversee.

The USS Abraham Lincoln has just completed an extraordinary 286 days at sea, carrying nearly 5,000 sailors and Marines before finally reaching Thailand for a five-day port visit. The carrier played a major role in U.S. military operations against Iran, and its greulingly long deployment sparked reports of exhaustion, disrupted communications with families, mental-health problems and shortages of fresh food. But Cao made sure to defend the Navy’s handling of the deployment.

“There is no question our young men and women have been pushed to their limits, but they have never broken,” Cao said in statement. “They are rightly tired, but have never been out of the fight.”

Cao acknowledged that a “small number of mental health cases” had been treated and that meal plans had been altered when fresh food was unavailable, but accused the media of portraying service members as victims.

The Pentagon in general is also dealing with a period of instability, thanks to the fact that Hegseth has repeatedly clashed with senior military officials, and Army Secretary Dan Driscoll resigned this week following months of tensions with the defense secretary.

Cao is known to be more aligned with Hegseth’s ideological approach to the military, including the administration’s fixation on purging DEI initiatives and reversing what conservatives describe as “woke” military culture.

His own rhetoric has provided a hint as to how aligned he is with Hegseth. During a 2024 Virginia Senate debate, Cao attacked the Navy’s previous use of a drag performer in a recruitment campaign and offered his own bigoted description of the type of personnel the military should be seeking.

“When you’re using a drag queen to recruit for the Navy – that’s not the people we want,” Cao said. “What we need is alpha males and alpha females who are gonna rip out their own guts, eat them, and then ask for seconds.”

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His comments go hand-in-hand within Hegseth’s effort to turn the debate over military readiness into a battle over gender, diversity and cultural politics.

The job Cao is seeking is one of the most consequential civilian positions in the Pentagon, and his nomination comes at a time when the Navy is dealing with an active conflict, exhausted crews, enormous shipbuilding challenges and leadership turmoil.

Nothing a little witchcraft can’t fix.

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Editor’s note: a previous version of this article contained a typo in the headline. It has since been corrected.

JD Vance traveled to Las Vegas this week hoping to reassure one of the Republican Party’s most influential constituencies that he can be trusted to inherit Donald Trump’s throne inside the White House. Instead, he accidentally highlighted a problem that could haunt him all the way to the 2028 Republican presidential campaign: Tucker Carlson.

Then, an infamous neo-Nazi made the problem a whole lot worse.

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Rep. Thomas Massie is making good on a promise he made in regards to the Epstein files, while accusing the federal government of continuing to withhold millions of records. This Monday, he publicly named 14 people he says should be investigated over their alleged connections to the now-deceased convicted sex trafficker.

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Speaking on the House floor, the Kentucky Republican pointed out that it has been a year since President Donald Trump signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act, legislation Massie spearheaded with Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna to force the Justice Department to release the Epstein files. According to Massie, millions of documents are still being hidden from the public.

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“The government continues to withhold over three million files,” Massie said. “That’s why we’ve introduced the Epstein Files Transparency Act II, to bring the fight to the state courts, accountability to the Department of Justice and closure for survivors. We want perpetrators of these crimes to be investigated and prosecuted.”

Massie then named 14 people he described as Epstein “co-conspirators,” reading a list of bankers, billionaires, entertainers, businessmen, modeling figures, a former royal and one of Epstein’s longtime employees whose connections to Epstein have been well documented.

Below are the names Massie cited, along with their histories:

Jes Staley, the former JPMorgan banking executive, has claimed his relationship with Epstein was professional and he was unaware of Epstein’s crimes. Documents released earlier this year showed prosecutors had reviewed rape allegations against him, but never pursued them.

Staley acknowledged in a U.K. court hearing last year that he had sex with a member of Epstein’s staff but claimed the encounter was consensual. During congressional questioning in July, he also admitted sharing confidential and market-sensitive banking information with Epstein and acknowledged that he had once been named a trustee of Epstein’s estate. Staley said in 2020 that he “deeply regrets” his association with Epstein. Britain’s financial regulator later concluded that Staley lied about the nature of his relationship with Epstein and barred him from holding any senior financial roles in the U.K.

Leon Black, the billionaire co-founder and former CEO of Apollo Global Management, resigned from his role in 2021 amid scrutiny surrounding his dealings with Epstein. Black appears repeatedly in the Epstein files and was also appeared in a collection of birthday messages sent to Epstein.

Black told lawmakers in closed-door testimony this year that he did not know about Epstein’s “nefarious activity” until 2019 and claimed he “never abused any woman,” “never engaged in any sex trafficking,” and “never paid Jeffrey Epstein for sex, access to women, or any illegal activity.”

Les Wexner, the billionaire retail mogul who was once one of Epstein’s most close associates, was singled out by Virginia Giuffre as being one of the men who Epstein trafficked her to. Wexner denied the accusation and told lawmakers in February that he knew nothing about Epstein’s crimes and did not participate in his abuse of girls or young women.

David Copperfield is mentioned repeatedly in released Epstein material, including photographs showing the magician on Epstein’s private island. According to a 2019 internal FBI document later released by the Justice Department, Copperfield was investigated in connection with the rape of a young girl. The document said the case was closed because prosecutors were “intimidated by the financial resources of Copperfield.”

Lapo Elkann, an Italian businessman and heir to the Fiat fortune, appears in Epstein files, but has not been accused of wrongdoing or charged with any Epstein-related crimes.

Tom Pritzker, the hotel magnate and cousin of Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, stepped down as executive chairman of Hyatt Hotels earlier this year after his association with Epstein was revealed. Records showed that Pritzker continued interacting with Epstein after Epstein pleaded guilty in 2008 to soliciting prostitution from an underage girl.

Glenn Dubin, the billionaire hedge fund manager, was named by Giuffre in a lawsuit as one of the men who Epstein trafficked her to. Dubin has denied wrongdoing and called the allegations “demonstrably false and defamatory.”

Frédéric Fekkai, the French celebrity hairstylist and entrepreneur, was accused by one of Epstein’s former aides of sexually assaulted her in the early 2000s. Fekkai has denied wrongdoing and has not been criminally charged.

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Eduardo Teodorani, an Italian businessman, was named by Massie because of his appearance in Epstein-related files, but has not been accused of or charged with any Epstein-related crimes.

Jean-Luc Brunel, the French modeling agent long accused of helping Epstein traffick girls, died in a French jail in 2022 while awaiting trial on charges of rape and sex trafficking of minors. Giuffre had accused Epstein of trafficking her to Brunel “on numerous occasions” and said Brunel offered modeling jobs to underage girls before bringing them to the United States to be “farmed out” to Epstein and his associates.

Daniel Siad, another modeling figure, appeared more than 2,000 times in the Epstein files. He was found dead in France in July while under investigation for rape and accusations that he helped Epstein traffic and abuse women. One victim described him to the BBC as “essentially a professional trafficker.” Siad denied the accusations and told CNN that he “trusted” Epstein and considered him a “professional person.”

Ramsey Elkholy, founder of the band Monotronic who also worked as a modeling agent, allegedly introduced women as young as 18 to Epstein. Records say that Elkholy communicated with Epstein from at least 2009 until shortly before Epstein’s death in 2019, with much of the discussion involving their access to female models. Elkholy told the BBC in March that he did not know Epstein was abusing women and said he regretted the language he used in some of the correspondences.

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly Prince Andrew, was perhaps the most famous person Massie named. Massie said the former royal should face investigation in the United States over his alleged sex crimes. Mountbatten-Windsor has not been charged with an Epstein-related crimes and has repeatedly denied wrongdoing.

He was arrested and questioned in February in connection with allegations of misconduct in public office, with police “assessing” reports that he sent trade reports to Epstein in 2010 while serving as Britain’s special envoy for international trade. King Charles stripped his brother of his royal titles last year amid the continuing Epstein fallout.

Giuffre also accused Mountbatten-Windsor in a 2022 lawsuit of rape, alleging that Epstein trafficked her to London, New York and the U.S. Virgin Islands for sexual encounters with him. Mountbatten-Windsor denied those allegations and settled the case for an undisclosed amount without admitting guilt.

Lesley Groff, Epstein’s longtime executive assistant, who Massie explicitly said is “not a victim” and alleged that she “conspired with Epstein to traffic other woman.” Groff has denied wrongdoing and has never been criminally charged.

Groff previously attracted scrutiny because she was one of four women identified as possible “co-conspirators” who received immunity from prosecution under Epstein’s controversial 2007 federal plea agreement in Florida.

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Massie is collecting the 218 signatures required for a discharge petition that could force the House to vote on the Epstein Files Transparency Act II. He says the legislation would give state attorneys general “access to Epstein files required to prosecute perpetrators under state law, and makes it easier for survivors to sue to get their files.”

After years of officials promising transparency on Epstein, Massie is essentially arguing that the public still hasn’t been shown anything close to the complete record. And judging by the list he just read into the congressional record, he’s most likely correct.

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If you haven’t upgraded yet, I totally understand. Everyone on this platform is fighting for your attention and your money. But don’t forget that story you just read is only possible because I have a group of loyal readers who’ve stepped up and supported my work.

When the executives of major news networks are sitting at private dinners with the MAGA politicians they’re supposed to hold accountable, the line between journalism and power its supposed to hold accountable starts to disappear, and that’s happening before out eyes.

UnPresidented has no parent company or corporate pressure, and there’s no one behind the scenes deciding what I can and can’t publish. This is simply an independent news outlet fighting to survive in a media landscape that’s getting more compromised by the day.

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Something “very unusual” is reportedly happening inside the Pentagon, and officials in Donald Trump’s administration are becoming increasingly freaked out. The panic centers on the extraordinary influence of someone very close to Pete Hegseth, and questions about who is really helping shape decisions at the highest levels of America’s military establishment are permeating throughout the White House. What officials are now saying anonymously makes an already controversial tenure much more disturbing.

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With just two months to go before the midterm elections, Republicans are confronting an alarming reality: Donald Trump may be turning the coalition he built into a liability for the very party that sacrificed its credibility to get him elected.

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New polling shows Republicans trailing Democrats across a wide group of Senate battleground races, while GOP strategists are openly fearing the possibility of losses reminiscent of those in 2006, when Democrats won both the House and the Senate.

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Now, it’s not just Democrats predicting the coming bloodbath. Republicans see it coming as well, and they’re openly admitting it.

“It points out the obvious that Republicans are in pretty bad shape going into the midterms and that they’re looking at historic losses,” Republican strategist Terry Holt told the Daily Beast. “The question is whether some of these races can be saved with some miraculous turnout that apparently is going to be very expensive or whether or not the mood in this country can be changed fundamentally.”

According to the latest RealClearPolitics poll, Republicans are behind in eight major Senate battlegrounds: Alaska by 2 points, Georgia by 7.5, Maine by 2.3, Michigan by 1.8, Ohio by 2.6, New Hampshire by 2, North Carolina by 8 and Texas by 1.9. Republicans lead in Iowa, but only by 1.4 points.

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Another crisis for the GOP involves the fact that Trump’s support is deteriorating among certain crucial demographics. Politico politics bureau chief Jonathan Martin says one particularly serious problem is emerging in farm country, where Trump’s policies are alienating voters who have been central to GOP wins in the past.

“He’s in serious trouble in farm country,” Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer of North Dakota told Martin. “He being Trump, and Trump is us. I’m not very optimistic.”

Cramer’s comments reveal a serious problem: Trump is the Republican Party.

Voters in agricultural states have plenty to complain about. Trump’s trade wars, rising diesel and fertilizer costs connected to the war with Iran, and his decision to import foreign beef in an attempt to lower grocery prices have all contributed to growing anger in states such as Ohio and Iowa.

“The beef thing, are you kidding me?” Cramer said. “The one [agricultural] producer making money for a change and you shrink his revenue.”

Meanwhile, some vulnerable Republicans are reduced to publicly reminding Trump of basic geopolitical and economic realities.

“I would remind [Trump] that Canada is our friend, our closest ally and our biggest trading partner,” Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine told Martin. “And that our economies are so linked that if you try to hurt one, you end up hurting Maine and other border states.”

Trump, however, appears considerably more interested in pursuing his own ambitions. The recent UFC event at the White House, the IndyCar race in D.C., and his continuing feud with Canada, which has included his push to rename Lake Ontario “Lake America,” have all created distractions and press rumblings that continue to eat away at the broader GOP agenda.

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Even some people inside Trump’s orbit apparently recognize the developing crisis. Republicans are planning a “midterm convention” in Dallas, but one Trump adviser offered a blunt assessment to the Daily Beast, saying the convention’s messaging will depend on “whatever crazy stuff the president says.”

For Republicans who relied on Trump’s unpredictability as an asset, November may give them an inconvenient opportunity to test that theory.

A special message to my readers:

If you haven’t upgraded yet, I totally understand. Everyone on this platform is fighting for your attention and your money. But the story you just read is only possible because I have a group of loyal readers who’ve stepped up and supported my work.

When the executives of major news networks are sitting at private dinners with the MAGA politicians they’re supposed to hold accountable, the line between journalism and power its supposed to hold accountable starts to disappear, and that’s happening before out eyes.

UnPresidented only exists because readers fund it. There’s no parent company or corporate pressure, and there’s no one behind the scenes deciding what I can and can’t publish. This is simply an independent news outlet fighting to survive in a media landscape that’s getting more compromised by the day.

If even a small percentage of readers step up and upgrade to a paid subscription, it changes everything — more reporting, more voices, more reach.

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Donald Trump’s health is getting a fresh dose of scrutiny from a medical professional who saw video footage of his recent appearance at NASA’s Johnson Space Center and described what he saw as a disturbing sign of physical and mental decline.

During Trump’s appearance Friday in Houston, the moment caught the attention of a clinical and forensic psychologist, who said what he saw was “the most concerning footage” of the president he has ever examined.

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Donald Trump has spent more than two years trying to find a legal route out of the criminal conviction that made him the first person elected to the presidency after being convicted of a felony. On Friday, another one of those routes was closed off, and the federal judge responsible completely dismissed the argument Trump’s lawyers brought before him.

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Pete Hegseth was supposed to bring a more lethal, war-ready edge to America’s military. Instead, less than a year into his tenure, President Donald Trump is reportedly confronting an increasingly disturbing reality: the U.S. is running dangerously low on critical weapons, hindering its ability to sustain a prolonged bombing campaign. As a result, Hegseth is losing Trump’s trust.

Before we continue, I want to take a moment to remind you that independent journalism will only survive if the readers who consume it also choose to support it.

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According to a new report from the Daily Mail, the latest sign of trouble between the two came at Camp David earlier this month, when Trump gathered advisers as his war with Iran entered into its sixth month. Insiders tell the Daily Mail that Trump became visibly angry after learning just how depleted American munitions had become — a problem he thought “had been fixed.”

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Everyone knows that war depletes military hardware, but the more disturbing question is how Trump could apparently believe a critical readiness problem had already been resolved, only to discover from his defense secretary that it hadn’t.

One source familiar with the situation said that Hegseth, along with others around the president, “tells Trump what he wants to hear.” A Republican member of the House Armed Services Committee was even more blunt.

“Hegseth is afraid of Trump and won’t be as honest as he should about the war for fear of losing his job,” the lawmaker said.

Dwindling American stocks of air-defense missiles and other munitions have coincided with a dramatic change in the administration’s Iran strategy. After months of military action, the Trump administration has increasingly shifted toward the strategy of economic pressure under the guidance of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

One Trump insider said that “the environment changed,” adding that officials are realizing they simply “can’t bludgeon [Iran] anymore.”

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Given those revelations, it’s not surprising that the campaign against Iran has stalled. The last publicly confirmed U.S. attack against the regime occurred on July 29, when U.S. Central Command announced a “heavy wave of strikes” against dozens of Iranian targets. As of today, there have been no strikes since then, making it the longest pause since the conflict began on February 28.

Bessent is reportedly gaining a wider leadership role in the Iran conflict, despite the fact that a Treasury secretary would ordinarily not be the first Cabinet official one imagines overtaking the defense secretary during an active war. Bessent has become increasingly prominent during Situation Room briefings, where Trump receives assessments from Hegseth, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other senior officials.

“He’s very trusted,” a source close to Trump said of Bessent. “It’s not just on Iran, his stock is increasing. He’s just more and more involved in things.”

The report raises serious questions that extend well beyond Iran. A defense secretary’s job is to oversee an enormous institution tasked with ensuring the U.S. can fight at moment’s notice and sustain enough strength to confront an additional threat without discovering halfway through that U.S. firepower has been depleted.

The Camp David confrontation suggests that’s exactly what happened.

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Trump selected a Fox News personality with limited senior management experience to oversee one of the largest and most complicated institutions on Earth. Hegseth sold himself as the man who would restore lethality, readiness and a “warrior ethos” to the military.

Now, according to the report, Trump is wondering why the U.S. is short on the weapons it needs, and is increasingly turning toward his Treasury secretary for a strategy to get him out of a war.

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Donald Trump has a habit of publicly berating journalists who report something he doesn’t like. But he probably didn’t expect to get corrected on live television by one of the most prominent anchors at Fox News.

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An active-duty Air Force major is sitting in jail for declaring President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance unfit to stay in office. According to reports, Maj. Jason P. Watson is being hit with charges that can end his career and put him in jail for years.

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Watson, a 17-year logistics readiness officer and Air Force Academy graduate, has publicly demanded impeachment of Trump and Vance several times since the Iran war began. Prosecutors are also accusing him of speaking with contempt toward the president.

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“For the past 18 months, we the people have allowed the highest levels of the executive branch of the federal government to violate our constitution and their oath to it with impunity,” Watson said during a Washington press conference in early July. “For this, the president and vice president must be impeached, convicted, and removed.”

He was first arrested after the Capitol Hill demonstration, carrying a sign reading “Impeach, convict, remove.” He called for Trump and Vance’s impeachment again earlier this month during a CNN interview, and previously during a July interview with an anti-Trump activist outlet, and, prosecutors say, in a blog post that was published in June.

Watson’s arrest on July 1.

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Military prosecutors charged him with contempt toward officials, failure to obey orders or regulations, and conduct unbecoming an officer. If convicted he faces penalties ranging from a dishonorable discharge to years in prison and is being held in custody until his trial begins.

His lawyer says the motive was to speak out on his personal beliefs, not to influence others to speak out as well.

“Major Watson is someone who took his oath to defend the Constitution very seriously,” Christopher J. Mutimer, of the Washington-based Monument Legal law firm, told USA Today. “He has a deep respect for the military and Constitution and it is my belief that he is not encouraging anyone to follow in his footsteps or create discord in the military.”

Watson felt he had “to stand up to say that the violation of the Constitution by this administration with the war in Iran needs to stop,” Mutimer added.

Watson has said he expected some sort of consequence for his actions. He knew speaking out in uniform was frowned upon, but he put it on anyway, stood on the Capitol grounds, and continued his vocal protest even after he was first arrested.

Watson is not the first person to face retaliation from the Trump administration for daring to criticize military policy. In November of last year, Trump accused six Democratic members of Congress of “seditious behavior, punishable by death” after they urged American troops to “refuse illegal orders” amid Trump’s efforts to deploy soldiers to cities. One of them was Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona, a former Navy pilot. After the Pentagon opened an investigation, legal experts said the Desert Storm veteran did nothing unlawful. The Justice Department pursued potential criminal charges, but a grand jury in Washington declined to indict him.

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Mutimer says his client is among the first officers of his rank charged under Article 88 in modern memory. The Air Force has confirmed the charges and said Watson will remain in pretrial confinement. It has not so far offered a detailed explanation of why he needs to remain in jail until his trial.

The stories you’re reading here at UnPresidented are powered by paid subscribers. I know a lot of people are asking for your money, but supporting independent journalism is a noble act that ensures that the far-right and MAGA will be held accountable as they continue to devour the mainstream media. The link is below, and it takes just a minute.

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It doesn’t matter which platform we’re talking about — Facebook, Twitter, or anywhere else. The cycle is familiar. You build a readership. You connect directly with people who want your reporting. And then, without much explanation, the platform starts turning down the volume, making it harder for those same readers to see the work they signed up for.

Lately, I’ve begun to notice that same pattern emerging on Substack.

To be clear, Substack has given me something the other platforms never did: a direct line to readers through email. That’s invaluable. But even here, visibility is still shaped by an algorithm that decides which posts travel and which ones stall. When that dial gets turned down, growth slows, not because the quality of the journalism changes, but because distribution does.

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Right now, the stakes for independent journalism feel especially high. As Donald Trump pushes further toward authoritarian policies and escalates tensions abroad, there’s a growing need for reporting that challenges power and documents what’s happening without fear or corporate pressure. That’s the purpose of this project. But it can only keep going if it has a dependable foundation.

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Scott C. Galenti

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sat through a Make America Healthy Again roundtable at Tampa Bay Boulevard Elementary School on Wednesday with Sen. Ashley Moody. The subject of the discussion was about children’s health, but the event was cut short when a journalist asked about a controversial and potentially unsafe kratom drink sold in gas stations, a dropped Justice Department case, and a $1 million check to the Make America Healthy Again PAC, which is run by a close Kennedy ally.

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House Democrats have opened an investigation into Donald Trump Jr. and 1789 Capital, the venture firm he joined as a partner after his father won the 2024 election, alleging possible fraud and insider trading.

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Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, laid out the case in a letter first shared with MS NOW and asked the firm to turn over its communications with federal and elected officials, along with a list of portfolio companies, and other relevant records.

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Raskin writes that since Don Jr. took the role, 1789 Capital has shown “almost clairvoyant accuracy” in its timing.

From Raskin’s letter:

“With Don Jr.’s new leadership role, 1789 Capital has developed an uncanny ability to identify companies that are about to receive massive influxes of cash from the Trump Administration or to benefit from significant changes in federal policies and regulations. They say there is no such thing as a sure thing in investing, but this is about as close as you can get.”

Raskin went on to write that it’s “impossible to believe that your firm’s astonishing growth and success are due to anything other than insider political influence and thoroughgoing corruption.”

The growth of the firm is not in dispute. The firm managed a few hundred million dollars in 2024 just after Don Jr. joined, according to a New York Times report, and now manages $3 billion.

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Raskin’s letter points out that in 2025 the firm invested in Vulcan Elements, a rare-earths magnet startup, and in the months that followed, Vulcan announced a $620 million Pentagon loan and a $50 million grant under the CHIPS and Science Act, the 2022 law signed by President Joe Biden.

“This was an amazing turn of events when the Trump Administration decided to pump over half a billion dollars into an unproven start-up company,” Raskin wrote.

Don Jr. told the Times he did not have “inside information,” but only a “reasonable assumption” that Vulcan would pay off.

“It’s not like it takes a genius to figure this out,” Don Jr. said.

The letter also points to investments in Juul, the prediction market Polymarket, and defense firm Anduril Industries. On Juul, Raskin cites a March 2025 stake reported by Reuters, followed later that year by an FDA reversal of a ban on certain e-cigarette products.

Don Jr. has been in the sights of Democrats for a while now. In March, members of a House natural resources subcommittee tried to subpoena him over the Vulcan investment, but Republicans stepped in and protected him. Thursday’s letter is a preview of what Democrats will do if they take the House in November and gain subpoena power. Raskin has already announced a separate inquiry into Jared Kushner, citing a “glaring and incurable conflict of interest” between Kushner’s role as a White House peace envoy and his work as a private investor.

The White House did not address the allegations, and spokesperson Davis Ingle said President Trump’s “stock and bond portfolio is independently managed by third-party financial institutions.”

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“Neither President Trump nor any member of his family has any ability to direct, influence, or provide input regarding how the portfolio is invested or when investments are bought or sold,” Ingle said.

That statement does nothing to address the contents of Raskin’s letter. The letter is about a private venture firm that added the president’s son as a partner, then watched its assets swell while a cluster of those bets coincided with administration cash and regulatory relief.

The stories you’re reading here at UnPresidented are powered by paid subscribers. I know a lot of people are asking for your money, but supporting independent journalism is a noble act that ensures that the far-right and MAGA will be held accountable as they continue to devour the mainstream media. The link is below, and it takes just a minute.

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The White House has been repeating the same line about high prices and who is responsible for them for months. But this week, a fundraising appeal went out under Vice President JD Vance’s name that sounded as if it had been written for a different audience entirely.

It arrived as living costs sit at the top of voters’ midterm concerns and as President Donald Trump continues to describe the affordability crisis as a political scam invented by the Democrats. The contrast raises a simple question the campaign would rather not answer in public — which version of the economy the administration expects voters to believe.

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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has spent the past year remaking the Pentagon in his image — fewer four-star generals, more “warrior ethos,” and a rebranded “Department of War” that prizes “maximum lethality” over what he has dismissed as “tepid legality.” The results, according to current and former officials and the organizations now flooded with discharge requests and a growing number of troops who no longer want any part of the mission.

Before we continue, I want to take a moment to remind you that independent journalism only survives if the readers who depend on it choose to support it.

UnPresidented runs entirely on reader support and stays editorially independent only if enough of you choose to fund it. A paid subscription works out to roughly 20 cents a day, and that small commitment is what guarantees this newsletter keeps arriving in your inbox. If you’re able, sign up as a paid subscriber today.

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The Army has operated without a chief of staff since Hegseth fired Gen. Randy George in April. Officials told The New York Times he also pushed out at least three officers considered possible successors.

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In total, Hegseth has forced the departure of at least half a dozen senior officers. Among them: Gen. James Mingus, the former Army vice chief of staff; Gen. David Hodne, hired and then dismissed eight months later; Maj. Gen. William Green; Gen. Christopher Donahue; and Air Force Vice Chief Gen. James Slife. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. CQ Brown Jr. was removed in the opening weeks of President Trump’s second term, Gen. David Allvin retired early last fall, and Army Secretary Daniel P. Driscoll is widely expected to follow.

When Hegseth was confirmed, the Army had ten four-star generals on active duty. It now has five, making it the lowest number in years. Rep. Pat Ryan, a New York Democrat and former Army intelligence officer, slammed the cost of Hegseth’s leadership.

“Hollowing out the most battle-tested and most lethal, proven leaders in a time of war means troops are less safe and we’re less likely to win,” he said, adding that the pattern inflicts “generational damage to the sense that the military is an apolitical trusted organization that swears an oath to the Constitution, not to a president.”

That leadership gap coincides with the current military campaign against Iran, launched as Operation Epic Fury on Feb. 28. Iranian drones have struck U.S. bases in the Middle East since late February and at least 18 American service members have been killed and more than 750 wounded. The same period has seen U.S. strikes destroy civilian infrastructure in Iran while the administration has also conducted 67 strikes on small vessels in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, killing 223 people it labeled narco-terrorists without publicly presenting evidence.

The reaction inside the ranks has not been the surge of troop enthusiasm Hegseth predicted. Applications for conscientious objector status have risen to six times the normal rate since the Iran operation began, reaching a 25-year high, according to Mike Prysner, executive director of the Center on Conscience and War. The group is currently assisting 140 applicants, many of whom have more than a decade of service. The Quaker House GI Hotline recorded 429 inquiries in March and 440 in April. Before the war, the organization typically handled five to ten cases at a time; it now has about 30.

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Prysner said most callers are not primarily afraid of dying. They are “scared of the moral and ethical implications of participating” in a war they describe as lacking a clear rationale or endgame, and of “killing for something that they don’t believe in and don’t believe is right.”

The formal process, which can take to a year, requires a written application, supporting letters, and interviews with the chain of command, a chaplain, and a mental health evaluator.

Hegseth has been explicit about the culture he wants. In September 2025 he declared the Pentagon would go “on offense,” employ “maximum lethality, not tepid legality,” and pursue “violent effect, not politically correct” tactics. He gutted the Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response program after labeling it “woke.” Senior officers had already warned that rolling back those functions would raise the risk of target misidentification and reduce battlefield awareness.

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Hegseth’s failure is now visible in the data: a secretary who talks constantly about warriors is presiding over both a depleted senior officer corps and a record number of experienced troops trying to leave on grounds of conscience. The Army’s remaining four-stars are fewer, its top civilian leader appears headed for the exit, and the force that must execute the current campaign is asking, in growing numbers, to be excused from it.

The stories you’re reading here at UnPresidented are powered by paid subscribers. I know a lot of people are asking for your money, but supporting independent journalism is a noble act that ensures that the far-right and MAGA will be held accountable as they continue to devour the mainstream media. The link is below, and it takes just a minute.

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She built a devoted following by casting herself as the ultimate outsider, an independent voice relentlessly exposing the Deep State’s hidden influence inside the government.

For years the warnings came daily: shadowy forces, traps, institutional betrayal. Then, in the middle of a very public confrontation, the government itself confirmed the truth no one was supposed to know.

The collision between the carefully crafted image and the actual reality is more revealing than anything she ever posted. Here’s the full account of how the mask came off, and what it exposes about the MAGA loyalists who claim to fight the system from the outside.

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The farmers who delivered for Trump in the 2024 election are now telling him that their livelihoods are being destroyed.

Before we continue, I want to take a moment to remind you that independent journalism only survives if the readers who depend on it choose to support it.

UnPresidented runs entirely on reader support and stays editorially independent only if enough of you choose to fund it. A paid subscription works out to roughly 20 cents a day, and that small commitment is what guarantees this newsletter keeps arriving in your inbox. If you’re able, sign up as a paid subscriber today.

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Rural voters backed him at 69 percent in 2024 and farming-dependent counties across the Corn Belt backed him at 78 percent. Those same communities are now describing the worst financial crisis in agriculture since the 1980s, and they are pointing directly at Trump’s trade war and the Iran conflict as the culprits.

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Gasoline has jumped from around $3 a gallon before the launch of the Iran war to more than $4. That alone raises the cost of running tractors and equipment and buying fertilizer.

“Inputs are way out of whack,” Matt Bailey, a Nebraska corn and soybean grower, told the The Financial Times. “Where do you start with that? How do you budget for that?”

Also speaking out was Brad Lubben, an agricultural economist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

“If you look at all the components of the production budget, most of them have gone up substantially over the past few years,” he said.

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Interest payments, labor, and machinery have all climbed. Pam Johnson, a northern Iowa farmer and former president of the National Corn Growers Association, said the Iran war has made things more uncertain.

“The [Iran] war has made so much uncertainty for us as farmers,” she said. “It’s projected that farmers aren’t going to make any money for the next two years.”

John Dittrich, farming in Nebraska for 44 years, called the situation unprecedented.

“Our costs of production are very high and then the instability and the unknowns of every variable that affects both our production and the prices we receive for our commodities are just unprecedented,” he said.

John Hansen, president of the Nebraska Farmers Union, was equally blunt.

“This is the worst financial downturn in the sector since the 1980s.”

Iowa farmer Aaron Lehman also summed up the mood.

“The trade and the war stuff ... it’s extremely chaotic. No one knows what’s going on. And we are right at the front end of the damage.”

Trump’s tariffs have also added to the damage, contributing to an almost $15 billion drop in U.S. agricultural exports to China. The political fallout is already apparent, with Fox News polling showed Trump’s rural approval at 70 percent when he took office in January 2025. By June it had fallen to 51 percent, and last month it sat at 44 percent.

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Republican Sen. Thom Tillis acknowledged the problem on Monday.

“We’ve got 71 days [until the midterm elections] and right now we don’t have a positive message to sell farm country, and we haven’t since ‘liberation day’ last year,” he said.

As the White House continues to stay silent on the crisis, the voters who once formed the backbone of Trump’s rural coalition are now calculating whether they can survive the policies they helped elect.

The stories you’re reading here at UnPresidented are powered by paid subscribers. I know a lot of people are asking for your money, but supporting independent journalism is a noble act that ensures that the far-right and MAGA will be held accountable as they continue to devour the mainstream media. The link is below, and it takes just a minute.

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Before she became one of President Trump’s closest White House aides, Natalie Harp unleashed a long and unfiltered digital trail on one of most disgraceful days in American history.

The posts captured a level of public devotion that went far beyond ordinary political support. They were posted in real time, intense and unrestrained, only to be scrubbed from view years later. An analysis of the now-deleted posts raise disturbing questions about the woman just a foot away from Trump’s every move and the origins of her cultish loyalty.

Here’s the full account of what she wrote that day, how it later disappeared, and what it reveals about the depth of her allegiance.

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