Stories

Browse major news stories and see what officials have said.

Sep 6, 2026

Trump Tells the Fed to Cut Rates or He Will "Stop Trading" With Every Country the U.S. Runs a Deficit With — Ten Days Before a Meeting His Own Fed Chair Is Signaling Will Raise Them

On Friday, September 4, 2026, hours after a jobs report showed employers added 162,000 jobs in August, President Trump posted a Truth Social ultimatum telling the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates or he would cut off trade with every country that runs a surplus with the United States: "LOWER THE RATE OR I'LL STOP TRADING WITH COUNTRIES WITH WHICH WE HAVE A DEFICIT." He told the Fed Board it "must get smart — BE PATRIOTS for a change." The threat capped an unusually broad week-long pressure campaign: Vice President JD Vance told a White House briefing on September 3 that it was "proper and responsible" for the Fed to lower rates; National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett said on September 4 that the administration "respect[s] their independence" but that the case for holding steady was "pretty strong"; and senior economic counselor Peter Navarro, in a Friday interview with Steve Bannon, called members of the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee "clowns" and said a hike would be "careless." The target of the campaign is Trump's own hand-picked Fed chair. Kevin Warsh, confirmed in May 2026 in the closest vote in modern history, used his Jackson Hole speech in late August to say the Fed's focus needed to be squarely on inflation, and markets put the odds of a quarter-point hike at the September 15-16 meeting at roughly 60 percent. The meeting falls eight weeks before midterm elections in which polling shows widespread voter anger over prices — a frustration Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) described on "Meet the Press" on September 6 as inflation "gutting people like a fish," while conceding his own party was unlikely to do anything about it before November.

“Except for inflation, which as I said, sucks, the economy’s solid.”
John Kennedy (R-LA) · Sep 6, 2026

Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer Resigns Amid Misconduct Investigation

On April 20, 2026, Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer resigned from the Trump Cabinet, becoming the third cabinet member to depart during Trump's second term. She stepped down amid an active Labor Department Inspector General investigation into allegations of misconduct. The IG was investigating claims that Chavez-DeRemer was having a sexual relationship with a member of her security detail, using staff for personal errands including liquor pickups, and exploiting official travel for personal purposes. Her husband had also been separately banned from Labor Department headquarters amid sexual assault allegations, though that criminal investigation was later closed. Chavez-DeRemer, a former Oregon congresswoman who had been seen as a bridge between Trump's base and organized labor, denied the allegations and blamed "high-ranked deep-state actors" for coordinating with media to undermine her. Deputy Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling was named acting secretary. Democrats called her departure a disgrace and pressed the IG to publicly release its findings.

“Now that the investigation is complete, we need answers. Members and staff were not briefed on the findings. That is unacceptable and disregards Congress's constitutional oversight role.”
Bill Cassidy (R-LA) · Sep 4, 2026

Aug 20, 2026· Updated

The National Debt Crosses $40 Trillion Months Ahead of Schedule — Driven in Part by the Tariff Revenue the Supreme Court Took Away — and the Treasury Secretary Says "There's Nothing Magic About the $40 Trillion Number"

On August 19, 2026, the Treasury Department reported that total federal debt outstanding had crossed $40 trillion for the first time, finishing the day at $40,047,425,768,420.22 — roughly $32.3 trillion held by the public and $7.8 trillion in intragovernmental holdings. The milestone arrived months earlier than the Congressional Budget Office had projected. The government borrowed $1.8 trillion in the first ten months of fiscal 2026 — more than in all of fiscal 2025 — and the gap widened after the Supreme Court struck down Trump's "Liberation Day" tariffs, costing an estimated $250 billion in revenue and forcing Treasury to refund more than $100 billion in import taxes it had already collected. The debt has doubled in under a decade, having stood at just under $20 trillion at the end of the Obama administration. Republicans who control both chambers reacted with alarm rather than a plan. House Budget Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-Tex.) called the debt "an existential threat" and renewed his call for an Article V constitutional convention. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), whose chamber had just left town for August recess without acting on Trump's demand that it address the debt ceiling, told reporters "$40 trillion in debt — seems to me that should get our attention." Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) posted that voters had "40 trillion reasons 2 reject unaffordable socialist policies," drawing ridicule from critics who noted he had voted for the tax and spending bills that produced it. Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) called it "bad" and demanded a balanced budget. Democrats pointed at the majority. Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), ranking member on the Budget Committee, said Republicans "only care about 'fiscal responsibility' when it's time to cut your health care." House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said "The Republican economy is a disaster. Vote them all out in November." The administration's answer was growth. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC the next morning that "there's nothing magic about the $40 trillion number, and we can grow our way out of that," and said there was a "very good chance" the deficit under Trump had already peaked.

“There’s a very good chance the U.S. budget deficit under President Trump has peaked.”
Scott Bessent (R-SC) · Aug 20, 2026

The Forest Service Files to Rescind the 2001 Roadless Rule "In Its Entirety," Opening Nearly 45 Million Acres — About a Third of the National Forest System — to Roads and Logging

On August 18, 2026, the U.S. Forest Service filed a proposed rule to rescind the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule in its entirety, stripping road-building and timber-harvest prohibitions from roughly 44.7 million acres of national forest — about one-third of the National Forest System. Public comment runs through September 21, 2026. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins framed the repeal as wildfire policy, saying outdated restrictions had kept tens of millions of acres off-limits to treatment and had "tied the hands of local forest managers." Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz said more than 40 percent of inventoried roadless areas — primarily in the West — carry high or very high wildfire hazard potential while only 5 percent have received hazardous fuels reduction treatment since 2014. No state is more affected than Alaska, which holds close to a third of the acreage; Colorado and Idaho have their own state-specific roadless rules and would not be covered by the repeal. Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte welcomed the proposal as an end to Washington's "heavy thumb" on nearly 60 percent of Forest Service land in his state. Rep. Jared Huffman, the ranking Democrat on House Natural Resources, called it "reckless" — noting the administration is proposing thousands of miles of new roads in the middle of one of the worst fire seasons on record after firing thousands of Forest Service employees — and said Democrats would fight it in Congress. Wildland fire scientists signed a letter opposing the rescission, and conservation groups have signaled litigation.

“For too long, outdated restrictions have kept tens of millions of forested acres off-limits to the very treatments that improve forest health and reduce wildfire risk to our communities. Today, we filed a proposal to restore authority to local forest managers who know the land best, removing the barriers that have kept them from doing the work the land demands.”
Brooke Rollins (R-TX) · Aug 18, 2026

ABC and Disney Sue the FCC on First Amendment Grounds, Calling Brendan Carr's Forced Early Review of Eight Broadcast Licenses an "Existential Threat" — and the Commission's Lone Democrat Says She's Glad They Did

On August 18, 2026, ABC, its parent company Disney, and the eight local stations whose licenses are at issue sued the Federal Communications Commission in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, asking the court to halt an early license-renewal proceeding the agency opened in April. None of the eight licenses were due to expire before 2028, and the complaint says the commission had not demanded an early renewal like it in more than fifty years. The suit frames the proceeding as retaliation: "Acting through the Federal Communications Commission, the Administration has waged a retaliatory campaign against ABC for a single reason: it disapproves of what ABC broadcasts." It points to President Trump's public demands that ABC lose its licenses, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr's threats against the network's broadcast licenses, an inquiry into its workplace diversity practices, and agency scrutiny of Democratic Texas Senate candidate James Talarico's appearance on "The View." Carr, in interviews the same day, called the case meritless and said "Disney seems a little jumpy right now." Anna Gomez, the commission's only Democrat, broke with her chairman and publicly welcomed the lawsuit, saying the FCC has spent months waging "a campaign of censorship and control." A dozen Senate Democrats — led by Ed Markey, Maria Cantwell, Chuck Schumer and Ben Ray Luján — had already written to Carr in May calling the early-renewal order "an egregious abuse of power."

“It would seem that Disney has become very concerned and worried, and they now are attempting to go to court to get the court to stop the FCC from moving forward, at least with respect to some of the proceedings that are underway.”
Brendan Carr (R) · Aug 18, 2026

A Career Civil Rights Lawyer Says the Administration's Campus Antisemitism Investigations Were "Predetermined, Without Regard to the Evidence" — and Jamie Raskin Opens an Investigation Calling Them a "Pre-Baked Frame-Up"

On August 18, 2026, lawyers for Haley Van Erem — a career attorney who spent nearly a decade in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division before being detailed to the multi-agency antisemitism task force — filed a 28-page whistleblower disclosure with the inspectors general at DOJ and HHS and with the Office of Special Counsel. The disclosure alleges that the Title VI investigations of Harvard, Brown, Columbia and Cornell were marked by "extraordinary procedural irregularities, predetermined outcomes without factual or legal support," that "the outcomes of the investigations were predetermined, without regard to the evidence," and that the whole exercise was a "politically mandated effort" to extract money through settlement demands and funding freezes. It says hundreds of millions of dollars were suspended before the investigations were finished, that Columbia investigators flagged false statements and constitutionally protected activity being cited as Title VI violations, that a Harvard-assigned attorney warned the proposed settlement demands were unrelated to remedying antisemitism and likely violated the First Amendment, and that the task force also targeted Muslim professors. Van Erem left the department in May 2025, she says, because she was "unwilling to be made vulnerable to further participation in politically motivated investigations unsupported by facts and contrary to law." Columbia agreed to pay $200 million over three years and Brown agreed to spend $50 million on Rhode Island workforce development, both without findings of wrongdoing. The same day the disclosure surfaced, Rep. Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on House Judiciary, wrote to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon demanding documents and a transcribed interview before September 1. A Justice Department spokesperson said Van Erem "did not work on university investigations" and that the department "stands behind the integrity of these investigations."

“Antisemitism at American universities and medical schools is real. It needs to be addressed seriously. But your "investigation" into antisemitism was fake, a pre-baked frame-up operation thoroughly political in nature.”
Jamie Raskin (D-MD) · Aug 18, 2026

Aug 18, 2026· Updated

Jon Ossoff Names Trump's Personal Aide in an Atlanta Campaign Speech — and the White House Answers With Obscenities From Its Communications Director and Press Shop

At a campaign event in Atlanta on August 16, 2026, Sen. Jon Ossoff — on the ballot in November — attacked President Trump's engagement with the job by name-checking Natalie Harp, the executive assistant who travels with him and handles his dictated posts and messages. Ossoff tied it to the Iran war and the USS Abraham Lincoln's record deployment: the president, he said, "sleeps through his meetings, he golfs, and trades stocks," and wants to "build his ballroom and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the emir of Qatar," a reference to the Qatari-donated aircraft. The White House response was unusually personal and profane. Communications Director Steven Cheung and spokesman Davis Ingle each issued statements attacking Ossoff's character rather than rebutting the substance, and Rep. Brandon Gill (R-Texas) defended Harp by invoking her cancer history. Trump, asked about the attack in the Oval Office on August 17, dismissed Ossoff as a "Pee-wee Herman lookalike." The exchange is a marker for the Georgia Senate race and for how the administration handles criticism aimed at the president's personal staff — a subject the White House has otherwise kept off the record.

“Natalie Harp survived bone cancer because President Trump allowed her the "right to try." Now she's an extremely hardworking and trusted assistant. Any other insinuation is vile.”
Brandon Gill (R-TX) · Aug 18, 2026

Vance Says the "Goal No. 1" of the Iran War Is Cheap Gas and Iran's Nuclear Program Is Goal No. 2 — Four Days Later Trump Posts That the Number One Goal "Is, and Always Will Be" the Bomb

Nearly six months into the war with Iran, the administration gave two different answers in four days about why the United States is fighting it. On Thursday, August 13, 2026, in a Fox News interview with Will Cain, Vice President JD Vance ranked the war's objectives: "That's goal No. 1: keep oil and gas cheap for Americans all over our country," adding that "obviously, goal No. 2 is ensure that Iran never gets a nuclear weapon." The framing was a shift — the war had been publicly justified since February on nonproliferation grounds — and it came as Washington threatened an indefinite naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and new economic pressure on Tehran, with gas prices rising at home. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about the ordering aboard Air Force One the next day and said both goals were equally important to the president. Then on Monday, August 17 — the day the 60-day US–Iran memorandum of understanding expired without a deal — Trump posted on Truth Social at 6:18 a.m.: "The number one Goal is, and always will be, that Iran cannot have, in any way, shape, or form, a Nuclear Weapon," publicly reversing his vice president's ranking without naming him. Congress was in August recess when the exchange played out, and no member of Congress went on record about the contradiction in the days that followed.

“The number one Goal is, and always will be, that Iran cannot have, in any way, shape, or form, a Nuclear Weapon. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”
Donald Trump (R-FL) · Aug 17, 2026

After Bulldozers Reach Santa Elena Canyon, CBP Halts Border Barrier Construction Inside Big Bend National Park — With a Republican Senator, a Republican Border Sheriff and the Texas Governor All Against the Project

On August 16, 2026, Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott announced he was pausing all construction activity for the border barrier inside Big Bend National Park while he traveled to West Texas for what he called a personal, on-the-ground evaluation. Video of crews clearing pristine Chihuahuan Desert wilderness near Santa Elena Canyon had circulated for days, and the project was already facing litigation, including a suit by the Lipan Apache and a petition for a temporary restraining order filed by Texas state Sen. Roland Gutierrez. The opposition was not partisan. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) had written to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin on August 7 asking him to halt work until stakeholders were consulted, citing a bipartisan group of Texas border sheriffs, county judges and private landowners, and arguing that Big Bend's 1,000-foot riverbank cliffs and canyon terrain are their own deterrent. Terrell County Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland, a Republican, said he had been urging Scott to visit for months because the original plan was flawed. Gov. Greg Abbott said Mullin had assured him no barrier of any kind would go up in the park at all, and that drones and fiber optics would secure the area instead. Democrats treated the pause as incomplete and, in Abbott's case, belated. Gutierrez called it a good thing but pressed for a full stop, accusing CBP of having characterized the clearing already done as mere surveying. State Rep. Gina Hinojosa said Abbott had known about the project for months and said nothing while the bulldozers worked.

“Good thing, for sure.”
Roland Gutierrez (D-TX) · Aug 17, 2026

The Ninth Circuit — Two Trump Appointees Among Them — Rules the Attorney General Cannot Install Unconfirmed U.S. Attorneys by Naming Them "First Assistant" to a Job That Is Already Vacant

On August 17, 2026, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed a district court order disqualifying Sigal Chattah from running the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Nevada, holding that the Justice Department's workaround for keeping unconfirmed prosecutors in place is unlawful. Writing for the panel, Judge Eric Miller — a Trump appointee, joined by fellow Trump appointee Stanley Blumenfeld and Clinton appointee Sidney Thomas — framed the question directly: "These cases present the question whether the Attorney General can make someone an Acting United States Attorney — bypassing the usual requirement that a U.S. Attorney be confirmed by the Senate — by designating that person as the first assistant to an already-vacant office of U.S. Attorney. We hold that the Attorney General cannot do so." Under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, the panel held, automatic succession runs only to a first assistant who already held that post when the vacancy arose. Chattah was named interim U.S. attorney in 2025 under 28 U.S.C. § 546 after Jason Frierson resigned, and was never confirmed — Nevada's two Democratic senators blocked her, citing her record as an election denier. When her 120-day interim term ran out, the department designated her first assistant so she could serve as acting U.S. attorney indefinitely. The Ninth Circuit is the second appeals court to reject that maneuver, after the Third Circuit ruled against Alina Habba's tenure in New Jersey. A Justice Department spokesperson said the department disagreed with the ruling and would appeal to the Supreme Court.

“Sigal Chattah has always been unfit to serve as Nevada's U.S. Attorney, and I'm glad to see the Ninth Circuit agree her appointment is illegal. It's past time for her to vacate the position and leave the U.S. Attorney's office once and for all.”
Jacky Rosen (D-NV) · Aug 17, 2026

A Federal Judge Blocks the Trump Administration From Scrapping the FBI’s Greenbelt Headquarters and Diverting the Money to a Building Across the Street From the White House

On August 17, 2026, U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang permanently enjoined the FBI and the General Services Administration from moving the Bureau's future headquarters to the Ronald Reagan Building in downtown Washington, ruling that the agencies "exceeded their authority" and acted unlawfully under the Administrative Procedure Act. The dispute goes back to 2023, when GSA — running a competition Congress had structured in 2022 and 2023 appropriations laws — selected Greenbelt, Maryland, over sites in Springfield, Virginia, and Landover, Maryland, for a new FBI headquarters to replace the crumbling J. Edgar Hoover Building. In July 2025 the FBI and GSA announced they were abandoning that selection and would instead move the Bureau into the Reagan Building, blocks from the Hoover site. Maryland and Prince George's County sued, arguing the administration could not override a congressionally structured site selection or redirect the construction money Congress had appropriated for it. Judge Chuang agreed, holding that the statutes required GSA to pick from the three short-listed sites outside Washington. Maryland's Democratic officials — Gov. Wes Moore, Attorney General Anthony Brown, Prince George's County Executive Aisha Braveboy, and all eight Democrats in the state's congressional delegation — cast the ruling as a rebuke of an administration that treated a congressional appropriation as optional. The county has estimated the project at more than 7,500 jobs and roughly $4 billion in added GDP. The FBI pushed back hard in a statement, saying "the court has chosen to impermissibly intervene for political reasons" and that "this is not the first time courts have tried to undermine the administration in its goal to make government more cost-effective."

“This victory is about more than a building. It is about ensuring that when Congress makes a decision, the Federal Government cannot simply ignore it because they do not like the outcome. Congress made a promise. The Trump Administration tried to break it. Now, the jobs, investment, and opportunity Marylanders deserve are within reach.”
Anthony Brown (D-MD) · Aug 17, 2026

Eight Days After Being Sworn In, Attorney General Todd Blanche Refuses to Pledge That the Justice Department Will Act Independently of the White House — "No Attorney General Should Ever Pledge That"

In his first Sunday-show interview as attorney general, Todd Blanche was asked by NBC's Kristen Welker on the August 16, 2026 edition of "Meet the Press" whether he could pledge that the Justice Department would always act independently of the White House. He answered: "No, I'm not going to pledge that. And no attorney general should ever pledge that." Blanche went further, saying he would of course weigh President Trump's views in individual prosecution decisions, while insisting that Trump does not call him to order specific prosecutions and would never ask him to do anything unethical or illegal. In the same interview he declared the $1.8 billion "anti-weaponization fund" permanently dead — "There is no fund, there will be no fund" — and said he "absolutely" supports U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, whose handling of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool case Trump had publicly demanded she revisit. The remarks landed eight days after the Senate confirmed Blanche 50-49, with Republicans Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski joining every Democrat in opposition over precisely this concern — that Trump's former personal defense lawyer could not separate himself from the president. Post-Watergate norms have generally insulated Justice Department charging decisions from White House direction; Blanche's answer amounted to a public rejection of that convention. Congress was in August recess when he spoke, muting the immediate congressional response.

“There is this extraordinarily false narrative that the president wakes up in the morning and calls me and says, 'Todd, go prosecute X or Y.' He does not do that.”
Todd Blanche (R) · Aug 16, 2026

PreviousPage 2 of 3Next