by Steve Benen | Jun 9, 2026 | 2026 election, elections, Maddowblog, News, Politics
Donald Trump has earned a reputation as the nation’s most prominent and powerful election conspiracy theorist, but to the extent that there’s a competition for the silver medal in this ignominious category, House Speaker Mike Johnson is a clear contender.
Indeed, after Trump’s defeat in the 2020 race, it was the Louisiana Republican who took the lead on Capitol Hill, effectively becoming the White House’s congressional point man, doing his best to overturn the results and hand the outgoing president illegitimate power. Johnson even echoed a discredited conspiracy theory involving Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez and Dominion Voting Systems — nonsense that even many Trump acolytes didn’t feel comfortable repeating.
With this in mind, it wasn’t too surprising to see Congress’ top GOP lawmaker echo his party’s baseless conspiracy theories regarding California’s latest elections, though one word in his pitch was of particular interest.
RAJU: But what evidence is there to prove the California election is rigged?MIKE JOHNSON: Look, some of these efforts are so diabolical and so far upstream it’s impossible to prove. But I think everybody knows instinctively that something is wrong here. — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-06-08T19:56:22.798Z
Apparently comfortable speaking on behalf of the nation, Johnson told reporters on Monday afternoon that “everybody knows” that the process of counting votes in California “stinks to high heaven.”
Asked the obvious question about conspiracy theorists’ lack of evidence, the House speaker added, “Some of these efforts are so diabolical and so far upstream that it’s impossible to prove, but I think everybody knows instinctively, something is wrong here.”
It was an implicit acknowledgment of an inconvenient truth: Johnson and his cohorts simply don’t have any evidence. The
by Steve Benen | Jun 8, 2026 | Maddowblog, News, Politics
All Donald Trump had to do was nothing. A group of lawmakers, hoping to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, crafted a bipartisan solution that appeared likely to advance ahead of Friday’s deadline. If the president simply let the process play out, the White House’s position was on track to succeed.
But Trump wasn’t content to do nothing. Instead, with time running out, he announced last week that Bill Pulte, his highly controversial director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, would serve as the acting director of national intelligence, sending shockwaves through political and intelligence circles.
Pulte has literally no background in intelligence or national security, failing to meet the statutory qualifications for the office, and he’s earned a reputation as a hyperpartisan hatchet man who has routinely abused his office to target the White House’s perceived political foes. Complicating matters, MS NOW reported last fall that a federal grand jury investigated whether Pulte illegally shared sensitive information with unauthorized people.
Democrats let Republicans know the president’s move imperiled the FISA extension, at which point Trump made matters worse, telling reporters he expected his unqualified loyalist to “find out some things about the rigged elections.”
On Friday, the president went even further still. The Wall Street Journal reported:
President Trump said he wants Bill Pulte, his incoming acting director of national intelligence, to begin firing a large number of employees as part of a shake-up of the U.S. intelligence community. […]
Trump, in the interview, argued that Pulte’s acting status is an asset. “You’re less shackled,” he said. “It sort of gives you more power, you know, for a somewhat limited period
by Steve Benen | Jun 8, 2026 | 2024 Election, Maddowblog, News, Politics
Before Donald Trump abruptly ended his latest “Meet the Press” interview, NBC News’ Kristen Welker asked the president to reconcile his pre-election assurances about not starting new wars with his decision to start a war with Iran. The host started to ask, “Did you break that promise to the American…” when the Republican interrupted to say, “No.”
Welker pressed forward, adding, “So you’re saying you didn’t break your promise. And yet, Mr. President, in your first term, you held to that promise and it was so fundamental to who you were as a candidate, to a first-term president. What changed, because you insisted ‘no new wars’?”
Trump replied, “First of all, I didn’t guarantee no war. Why would I have built the strongest military in the world?” (As the exchange continued, the president tried to defend his position by referencing the stock market and then pivoted to attacking Welker’s professional integrity.)
Let’s not brush past the rhetorical question the president posed. Indeed, the Republican seemed to suggest he had increased defense spending precisely because he intended to go to war, which is quite an admission. It also reflects the mindset of someone desperate to rebrand the Department of Defense as the “Department of War.”
But the underlying point is just as important, if not more so, since Trump’s record is unambiguous.
Trump: “I didn’t guarantee no war.”Trump guaranteeing no more wars:— The Bulwark (@thebulwark.com) 2026-06-07T16:26:26.795Z
Throughout the 2024 election cycle, Trump and his team went to bizarre lengths to present the Republican as the “peace” candidate who would “expel the warmongers” from the federal government and lead as a “peacemaker,” while rascally Democrats prepared to lead
by Steve Benen | Jun 8, 2026 | Maddowblog, News, Politics
Every year, there’s an event in France to honor the anniversary of the D-Day invasion of Normandy, and every year, a prominent U.S. official speaks at the commemoration ceremony to honor those who helped save the world.
The ceremonies are never controversial. This year, however, was an exception.
Unfortunately, the Trump administration decided to dispatch Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to speak at this year’s event, and there was pushback before he even arrived in France: A local group in Normandy issued a statement criticizing the Pentagon chief’s role at the event, arguing, “This individual carries values contrary to democracy, human rights and peace.”
Soon after, the former Fox News host delivered his comments, at which point things went from bad to worse. NBC News reported:
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth used a speech marking the anniversary of D-Day in France on Saturday, commemorating 82 years since the 1944 push to liberate Nazi-occupied Europe, to lambast what he described as another “invasion” of Europe’s shores.
“Sadly, today, different European beaches are stormed by different dangerous ideologies,” Hegseth said in a speech at the Normandy American Cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer. “Beaches in Spain, in Italy, in Greece and Bulgaria, boats and men arrive. When will European capitals do something about that invasion, or is it too late? I pray not, and I believe not.”
On D-Day, the lesson was supposed to be alliance, sacrifice, and the defense of democracy. Hegseth turns that memory into an anti-migrant “invasion” riff.— The Steady State (@thesteadystate.org) 2026-06-06T23:00:03.785Z
That Hegseth has an anti-immigrant vision is unsurprising, but context is everything: This wasn’t CPAC or a conservative media interview, these were prewritten remarks at a D-Day commemoration
by Fla. Sen. Shevrin Jones | Jun 6, 2026 | Opinion, Politics
The Florida Legislature convened for a special session this week and passed Gov. Ron DeSantis proposal to put a gradual elimination of homestead property taxes on November’s ballot. As a legislator who represents a vibrant, diverse community in South Florida, I could not in good conscience support this measure. I voted “no” because the math does not add up and Floridians deserve honesty, not political theater.
The resolution would raise the homestead exemption from $50,000 to $150,000 in 2027 and to $250,000 in 2028, with a stated path toward full elimination of homestead property taxes. Florida is already one of nine states in the United States without an income tax.
Florida is already one of nine states in the United States without an income tax.
On the surface, getting rid of such property taxes might appeal to Floridians across the political spectrum. We all deserve affordability and the ability to make ends meet without taking on crushing debt or working multiple jobs just to stay afloat. Like Americans across the country, the people in Florida face an affordability crisis as the cost of groceries, housing, healthcare, gas and other everyday expenses continues to skyrocket.Every single person in the communities I serve is feeling the pressure of rising costs, and I take that seriously. But this resolution does not solve that problem — it shifts it. It takes the financial burden off property owners and quietly drops it on the backs of renters and the most vulnerable communities we serve.
Republicans across the country, including many here in Florida, have talked for so long about lowering taxes or eliminating taxes that they seem to have forgotten that
by Steve Benen | Jun 5, 2026 | Maddowblog, News, Politics
During Donald Trump’s recent trip to China, Republican Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas appeared on Newsmax and toed a sycophantic line in a rather specific way.
“We trust in Trump that he’s over there making a great deal for us,” the senator said. “No one’s done more for American agriculture and rural America than President Trump, [Agriculture] Secretary [Brooke] Rollins and a Republican-only Congress.”
The president did not, in fact, make a “great deal” for anyone during his China trip, but Marshall nevertheless appeared at a press conference days later and again argued that the Trump administration “has done more for rural America than any administration has ever done.”
The Kansas senator didn’t point to any specific examples of the Republican administration actually delivering worthwhile results for rural America, and there was no great mystery as to why. As MS NOW host Catherine Rampell, pointing to tariffs, deportations and food aid cuts, explained soon after, “I think few people in American history have done more to screw over farmers than Donald Trump has in a very compressed period of time.”
With this in mind, the president is scheduled to wrap up his week at a roundtable on American agriculture in Wisconsin, though I don’t envy his speechwriters. Marc Short explained in a Washington Post op-ed this week that Trump’s policies “have punched farmers in the mouth.” From the piece:
Last year, America’s crop farmers lost $34.6 billion, and farm bankruptcies surged to numbers not seen since 2020, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation. This year, 70 percent of farmers surveyed claim they cannot afford all the fertilizers they need. Fuel costs continue to rise
