“It is unusual for a top congressional aide to write a tell-all book, and much of Mr. Leganski’s is filled with the kind of wonky detail that only a political junkie would crave. But his real-time account of the arm-twisting sessions that Mr. Trump has employed for years to keep Republican lawmakers in line provides fresh insight into a familiar phenomenon that is seldom recounted on the record by someone who witnessed it firsthand.”

“That question is already dividing some Republicans and foreign policy hawks. The memorandum ends the fighting, reopens the Strait of Hormuz and gives Trump a chance to claim he prevented a broader economic crisis.”

“But many of its core terms appear to return the U.S. and Iran to roughly where they were before the conflict: with Iran’s government still in power and its long-term nuclear commitments still unresolved.”

“The Associated Press has yet to call the race, but Ms. Lewis George currently has around 53 percent of the vote, enough to give her an outright victory without tabulating the ranked choices in the election. In an overwhelmingly Democratic city, she would almost certainly win the general election in November.”

Said Greene: “So I sent him directly the death messages I was receiving on my son, and I said, no matter political disagreements, our children should never be threatened. That’s absolutely unacceptable. And I told him his words were causing that to happen. And his reply back to me was, ‘It’s your fault and you deserve it.’ And that’s what he texted me back. And I have those text messages.”

“Ukraine has taken particular aim at Crimea, the peninsula that Russia illegally annexed in 2014, with a range of strikes aimed at cutting off the region’s supply lines. The Russian economy has also begun suffering from the costs of the war in a way that the Kremlin had managed to avoid for years.”

“The justices ruled that the law was overbroad, sweeping together recreational drug users with people addicted to drugs who posed a danger to public safety.”

“New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is backing a trio of insurgent candidates in House races, including two who are challenging Democratic incumbents, while staying out of contentious state legislative primaries. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is supporting several Democratic Socialists of America candidates in competitive New York state legislative races, while so far staying out of contentious congressional primaries.”

“Outside organizations reimbursed Cook for those expenses, the filing shows.”

“The Supreme Court is expected to rule imminently on whether Trump has the power to fire Cook for the reasons he cited.”

“The event was garish, lurid, and crass—perfectly calibrated to appeal to the president. A massive military flyover. The use of honor guards to usher UFC fighters into the cage. ‘Octagon Girls’ in sequined red-white-and-blue costumes parading around the cage between rounds… The main event, a lightweight championship bout between Justin Gaethje and Ilia Topuria, left Topuria bloodied and battered, his face mangled, his vision so impaired that he was hospitalized after the fight…”

“It was Trump’s version of the Roman imperial games—state-sponsored brutality as public entertainment, staged to please the emperor and his courtiers, desecrating a public space. He clearly relished every second of it. But the MAGA movement—and the 80-year-old man who leads it—is breaking apart.”

A new Public Opinion Strategies poll shows Kurt Alme (R) with a commanding lead in Montana’s U.S. Senate race, taking 44% of the vote.

That’s not a majority. But in a three-way race, it may be more than enough.

“But that optimism does not extend to what Americans see as a broad gulf between the wealthy and those who are not wealthy.”

“But this deal is the least bad way for Trump to extricate himself from a crisis he ought never to have ignited.”

“The oil industry has said throughout the conflict that its top priority is to restore shipping flows through the Hormuz to the way they were prior to the war, when the waterway carried 20 percent of the world’s oil and was fully open to vessels without any tolls or fees. The Trump administration said it shared that goal, but analysts said the agreement appears to throw that into question.”

“His absence has drawn notice across foreign policy circles — not only because Rubio has served as chief architect of the administration’s global strategy thus far, but also because he has become one of the president’s most effective communicators, both at home and abroad.”

“The star-studded event that will feature an address from Obama and performances by Stevie Wonder, Bruce Springsteen and Jennifer Hudson is also expected to be the biggest gathering of donors, fundraisers and business leaders aligned with the Democratic Party ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.”