by Julio Ricardo Varela | Jul 28, 2026 | Civil Rights, Opinion, Supreme Court, World
At the end of June, President Donald Trump and his MAGA allies lost — for now — the Supreme Court fight over birthright citizenship. Vice President JD Vance said MAGA needed to keep fighting birthright citizenship after the ruling in Trump v. Barbara, but it’s set its sights on a different nativist victory, this time relying on a set of racist laws the high court approved back at the start of the 20th century.
Just two weeks after the ruling on June 30 didn’t go MAGA’s way, Rep. Morgan Griffith, R-Va., introduced H.R. 9724, the End Birthright Citizenship for Territories Act. The bill would deny children born on or after Jan. 1, 2027, in Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Northern Mariana Islands automatic citizenship unless at least one parent is already a U.S. citizen or a legal permanent resident. Griffith calls it a crackdown on “birth tourism,” and the bill doesn’t hide where its legal authority comes from.“The application under the Barbara case of birthright citizenship in the U.S. territories differs from what is established in the 50 U.S. States according to Supreme Court cases,” Griffith noted in a July 16 e-newsletter about the bill. “The birthright discrepancy between the territories and the States dates to legal cases beginning in the early 20th century known as the Insular Cases.”
Those Insular Cases are generally considered so racist that even Trump-appointed Justice Neil Gorsuch called them “shameful” back in 2022.
No matter how many times this country calls me a U.S. citizen, Washington still isn’t sure what to do with the place where I was born.
For those unfamiliar with the
by Steve Benen | Jul 27, 2026 | Iran, Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics, World
After months of reporting about Russia taking deliberate steps to assist Iran during the U.S. war, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told senators during a congressional hearing last week that Russia is, in fact, “enabling some of the things Iran is doing.”
Evidently, Donald Trump isn’t sure whether to believe his own Pentagon chief or not.
Six weeks ago, as the Group of Seven summit in France was wrapping up, the American president offered some curious praise to his friend in Moscow. “I want to thank Vladimir Putin, he was very neutral,” the Republican said, referring to the Russian president’s role in the war with Iran. Even at the time, the comment was bizarre, given the overwhelming evidence that Putin hasn’t been neutral at all.
Late last week, on the heels of Hegseth’s testimony, Trump reiterated his belief that Russia, in his “opinion,” is “not participating” in the war. In a statement published to his social media platform, he added that his beliefs were based on private assurances he said he received from Putin.
Hours later, asked about the contradiction between Hegseth’s line and the Kremlin’s, the American president again said he “trusts” what he’s been told by the Russian leader.
One day later, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced new plans to share intelligence about Russia’s latest assistance to Iran — the latest in a series of such declarations. Zelenskyy previously said his country’s government had “irrefutable” evidence Russia had provided intelligence to the Iranian regime during the war, but he simply couldn’t get the White House to take an interest in it.
So when Trump fielded questions from reporters aboard Air Force One on Monday afternoon,
by Steve Benen | Jul 27, 2026 | Iran, Maddowblog, World
During his latest appearance on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana acknowledged the fact that the Iran war is broadly unpopular with the American mainstream. It led the senator to offer the Trump administration some unsolicited advice.
Sen. John Kennedy: “I support the president in Iran. We all have to do a better job messaging.”— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-07-26T15:13:32.583Z
“I support the president in Iran,” Kennedy said. “We all need to do a better job messaging. I may end up with a sombrero on my head by saying this, but we all know the president. He exists loudly. He grows anxious when he has an unexpressed thought. He’s not always disciplined in his messaging. I’m not saying he should stop talking. He’s the president, and I’m not.
“But I would put [Secretary of State Marco] Rubio and [Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Dan] Caine and [CIA Director John] Ratcliffe and [Defense Secretary Pete] Hegseth out there, either in a speech or in a long press conference, to explain what’s going on in Iran. Why we went in, why we’re still there.”
It’s a pitch rooted in a simple idea: The unpopular war would enjoy greater public support if the White House had better “messaging” and spokespeople who could simply “explain what’s going on.”
If this sounds at all familiar, it’s because it has become a go-to stance for Republicans in response to all kinds of challenges. Vice President JD Vance, for example, said earlier this month that the administration should have done a better job on “the communications” of the Epstein scandal.
Earlier this year, the president acknowledged his weak public
by Erum Salam | Jul 26, 2026 | Congress, News, White House, World
President Donald Trump is giving fragile U.S.-Iran diplomacy “some space” before deciding whether to resume strikes, United Nations Ambassador Mike Waltz said Sunday.
Hours later, however, Trump posted images to social media depicting the U.S. attacking Iran.
Waltz also dismissed concerns over the United States’ diminished munitions stockpiles, even as he conceded that “a lot” of weapons have been depleted, which he said was because of the Russia-Ukraine war and fighting with the Houthis.
“I want to be crystal clear: The U.S. military — and I’ve verified this every which way — has everything that it needs to conduct this campaign as effectively as it needs to be,” Waltz told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Waltz’s comments came on the second consecutive day of paused fighting between the United Sates and Iran amid reports of a dwindled U.S. stockpile of Patriot antimissile interceptors, among other munitions.
The New York Times reported Sunday that the depletion of interceptor stockpiles is among the reasons why the administration is wary of resuming major combat operations in a war launched without congressional authorization and which has grown exceedingly unpopular.
But Waltz underscored that the pause in fighting is to allow for an opportunity for peace — not because of an insufficient weapons supply, and warned that those leaking information to the press about the U.S. not having sufficient weaponry “deserve to be in jail.”
“What the president is doing right now, as we’ve seen all along, is giving some talks some space. Talks are ongoing,” Waltz told NBC. “They’re happening at every level, from the more technical aspect of it all the way to the highest levels, of course, within
by Joseph Cirincione | Jul 25, 2026 | Opinion, Science, White House, World
President Donald Trump says he believes nuclear technology is a grave threat in the hands of Iran’s ruling regime, arguing that the country would inevitably use it to create a weapon of mass destruction. And yet, in a new agreement signed Wednesday, Trump agreed to let Saudi Arabia enrich uranium and reprocess plutonium, the two ingredients used in nuclear bombs.
The Saudis promise this will be used only for peaceful purposes, but Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said as far back as 2018 that “without a doubt if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible.”
Trump’s generosity to Saudi Arabia — which has numerous lucrative deals in place with members of his family — could unleash a flood of new nuclear programs. If the Saudis get this technology, others will demand it too.
Nuclear is the most expensive way to produce electricity, and Saudi Arabia sits on an ocean of oil and is ideally suited for much cheaper solar and wind energy production.
Since the dawn of the Nuclear Age, U.S. policy has denied the ability to enrich uranium and reprocess plutonium to other nations because it is a shortcut to nuclear weapons. The huge and expensive facilities can be developed openly and legally until a government takes the quick jump from making fuel rods to making the cores of bombs. With this deal, Trump has effectively just green-lit a Saudi nuclear bomb program.
How did we get here?
In 2013, the Saudis unveiled a plan to build as many as 16 civilian nuclear reactors. Nuclear reactor companies salivated at the prospect of contracts worth hundreds of billions
by Zeeshan Aleem | Jul 24, 2026 | Business, Opinion, White House, World
The Strait of Hormuz remains at a virtual standstill because of President Donald Trump’s foolish war, and now, in what represents a new global energy price nightmare, Houthi militants in Yemen have begun to block a separate corridor that is critical for global oil shipping. On Thursday, oil surged past $100 a barrel for the first time since May in response to the news that the war with Iran is on the brink of expanding to a new front. And Trump’s promise to bomb the Houthis should they continue is unlikely to improve the situation.
Those Houthi militants, who are allied with and supported by Iran, announced Monday that they would were enacting a blockade in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait against Saudi Arabia. The Houthis said their blockade is retaliation for airstrikes against a Yemeni airport intended to prevent an Iranian aircraft from landing. (Yemen’s Saudi-backed government claimed credit for the attack.) On Thursday, the Houthis said they had attacked two Saudi oil tankers and successfully warned 10 more to turn back. (Saudi Arabia’s official news agency confirmed at least one tanker was hit.)
Should the Houthis continue to attack ships, Trump ought to be concerned; his record fighting the scrappy militia is not impressive.
The Houthis’ blockade is a huge deal. Before the Iran war, about a fifth of the world’s oil passed through the Strait of Hormuz. Now it’s effectively closed. Saudi Arabia, which had transported the bulk of its oil through the Strait of Hormuz, started moving oil west through a pipeline. From there, Saudi Arabia was sending its oil out through the Red Sea and the Bab al-Mandab Strait, which connects the Red Sea
