Trump Puts Words in the Mouths of Dead Soldiers to Defend His War
https://newrepublic.com/post/213366/trump-speaks-for-dead-soldiers-iran-war
Trump Puts Words in the Mouths of Dead Soldiers to Defend His War
Donald Trump is now speaking for the soldiers killed in his war with Iran.
President Trump tried to claim Wednesday that U.S. soldiers killed in the Iran war all agreed with his stated mission.
Trump made the remarks as he was about to board Air Force One and head to Dover Air Force Base for a dignified transfer ceremony to honor the remains of four soldiers killed in the Iran war over the last week.
“Some of you are going with us to honor our heroes, and they are indeed great heroes actually. All of them said very strongly, ‘We can’t let, we cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon.’ They won’t have a nuclear weapon. So we’re going to honor them,” Trump said.
It makes sense for a president to say that the deaths of U.S. troops are not in vain. However, saying that they all proudly spoke in favor of the war is another story. Military service compels troops to follow orders and deploy wherever they are told, regardless of their personal opinion.
Iran has responded to U.S. and Israeli strikes on its territory with missile strikes across the Middle East, including on Israel, oil infrastructure in the Middle East, international business targets, and U.S. military bases. That has put U.S. troops on the front lines of the war, and so far, at least 18 American soldiers have been killed since hostilities began in February, with more than 500 wounded.
Some soldiers have accused the U.S. government of downplaying injuries from the war, and even lying about the nature of some of the strikes. For Trump to claim that soldiers who are no longer alive were in full agreement with his war is astounding, and insulting to their memories. Trump has no idea how the fallen soldiers felt about the war or if they agreed with it, and the opinions of U.S. troops are as diverse as those of any other group of Americans. The soldiers honored in Dover Wednesday were simply doing their duty and following orders.
“Don’t Have a Plan”: Republicans Panic as Trump Ramps Up in Iran
Republicans are “preparing for the bottom to fall out” of the midterms over Donald Trump’s endless Iran war.
The president’s inability to resolve the Iran war is spelling disaster for endangered Republican lawmakers this November.
The U.S. and Iran continued to exchange strikes this week, pushing the prospect of a potential peace deal further out of reach. The escalating conflict has killed four more American service members and sent gas prices shooting back up.
That’s put incumbent Republicans in a bind: The party already had a short list of accomplishments to curry favor with voters ahead of the midterm elections. Now, even races once thought to be safe zones for the conservative party are in doubt. Battleground areas now include Iowa, Alaska, and Ohio, as well as House districts that Donald Trump carried by double digits in 2024.
“We’re preparing for the bottom to fall out,” one GOP operative working on midterm races told Politico Playbook Wednesday. “Republicans are running out of runway here to improve their political fortunes before November.”
The war has taken an enormous toll on American life, inflaming the cost of practically everything as shipping companies contend with rising oil prices. Iowa Democratic state Representative Josh Turek—who is running for the Hawkeye State’s Senate seat—told Politico that the war has become a touchstone for his campaign.
“Everywhere I’m going—it doesn’t matter, urban or rural areas—people are telling me they’re struggling just to keep food on the table, a roof above their head, and now with this unnecessary war in Iran, we’re looking at being able to afford gas,” Turek said.
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly rejected the idea that Trump’s scoresheet was negatively impacting Republican races, contrasting his “record of success” on national security issues with an alleged Democratic interest in “transgender surgeries for children.”
But off the record, people around the president aren’t so confident that his influence on the upcoming races is a good thing. One unnamed person close to the White House told Politico that the administration had badly mismanaged the war, and that the conflict was largely driven by Trump’s inability to see that he’d lost.
“They don’t have a plan here,” the person told Politico.
The source warned that a ground invasion—which Trump has repeatedly floated and Tehran has welcomed—could spark another long and inconclusive Middle East war that “runs the risk of ruining his second term.”
“This is a classic escalation trap,” they said.
Trump Pitches Crazed Plan to End Iran’s Control of Strait of Hormuz
Donald Trump’s fallback plan is apparently just war crimes.
President Donald Trump threatened Wednesday to keep committing war crimes against Iran in order to stop attacks in the Strait of Hormuz.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump vowed to destroy “one bridge or power plant” for every time Iran attacks a ship in the Strait of Hormuz.
Targeting civilian infrastructure is prohibited by international humanitarian law. Attacking a power plant would cause disproportionate harm to Iranian civilians.
If Trump does follow through on his threat, it wouldn’t be the first time the U.S. military has committed war crimes in the president’s military campaign against Iran.
The U.S. military has reportedly already bombed a nuclear power plant, executed a deadly double-tap strike on a bridge, violated the rules of engagement, and killed dozens of children at a primary school.
Trump’s turn to war crimes is a clear example of his failed negotiation tactics. The president’s plan seems to be to just keep bombing until the other side gives up. Meanwhile, the U.S. military is running out of weapons and money.
Trump’s threat to escalate these lawless strikes comes as the death toll of U.S. service members has risen to 18, with hundreds more injured.
What Did Trump Do With the Billions He Collected From Venezuelan Oil?
Billions in revenue from Venezuelan oil has gone missing—and the Trump administration keeps changing its story.
The Trump administration has raked in about $13 billion after taking over Venezuela’s oil exports in the wake of its kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro, according to a Financial Times analysis. But six months later, and one month after two devastating earthquakes, that money is nowhere to be found.
When Trump first seized the “millions of barrels” of oil back in January, he assumed complete control. His administration eventually proclaimed that it would use any profit from the sales for “the benefit of the American people and the Venezuelan people.” The State Department has since claimed that “billions of dollars have been disbursed to the Venezuelan economy” and that “financial monitoring is under way to ensure funds benefit the Venezuelan people.”
But none of that has been proven to be true. The Financial Times reported Wednesday that there has been no evidence of oil money going back into the hands of the Venezuelans Trump claimed to care for, and that Venezuela’s first-quarter gross domestic product was the lowest it’s been in five years.
“Trump’s invasion of Venezuela has been about oil, power, and graft from the very beginning, with billions of dollars in Venezuelan oil revenue being controlled by the Trump administration without transparency or safeguards,” Democratic Representative Joaquin Castro told the FT, adding that all of Congress had been “kept in the dark” by the Trump administration. And on Tuesday, Republican Representative María Elvira Salazar called on Trump to make the transactions known, citing “the importance of transparency over where the money is going.”
It seems clear that the most corrupt president in history is withholding oil revenue from Venezuelans who badly need it, as oil makes up nearly a quarter of the entire country’s GDP. In January, Semafor reported that Trump would be keeping proceeds from the first $500 million sale of Venezuelan oil in an offshore bank account based in Qatar. It might be worth checking up on that account.
MAGA Flips Out Over Zohran Mamdani’s Call to Arrest Netanyahu
Republicans are furious after the New York City mayor called on the federal government to act on the ICC’s arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s call for the federal government to arrest Israeli Prime Minister and suspected war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu when he visits New York has caused the far right to lose their minds.
Mamdani posted a video on social media Tuesday night laying out the International Criminal Court’s charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity against Netanyahu, noting that while the city couldn’t arrest him, the U.S. government should. That video set off MAGA politicians and the far right.
“Would be easy to say NY Mayor is just an ignorant bigot, but he is not dumb. He’s an evil anti-Semite who deliberately lies about serious things like ‘genocide’ to stoke Jew hate. If anyone should be arrested, it’s the Mayor of NY for incitement. NYC should be ashamed,” U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee posted.
“The same crowd that rushes to condemn Israel never has much to say about the terrorists who started the war, massacred civilians, raped women, kidnapped children, and still hide behind their own people. Mamdani wants the headline that comes from attacking Netanyahu, not the consistency that comes with confronting Hamas,” Senator Tim Scott complained, calling Mamdani’s words “ridiculous.”
Representative Mike Lawler tried to label Mamdani hypocritical for only calling for Netanyahu’s arrest, while opposing the Trump administration’s arrest of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. “Sadly, he has not called for the arrest of Putin, Xi, the Ayatollah, or any other enemy of America,” Lawler whined. But Mamdani has said he thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin should be arrested, and the leaders of Iran and China don’t have arrest warrants from the ICC.
Meanwhile, Islamophobic Representative Randy Fine simply responded with, “You are a Muslim terrorist.”
Multiple international organizations have joined the ICC in calling Netanyahu and Israel’s massacre of Gaza a genocide, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
Even though Mamdani’s post was symbolic, it still drove conservatives nuts because they refuse to acknowledge Palestinians as human beings, let alone acknowledge the horrific crimes Israel has committed in Gaza since 2023. These people, along with President Trump, are blocking any sort of accountability for the destruction of Gaza and the murder of tens of thousands of innocent people.
Trump Tries to Claim That 18 Dead Soldiers Is a Good Thing, Actually
Donald Trump made a bizarre post on Truth Social about the casualty numbers for various U.S. conflicts.
President Donald Trump is trying to use the number of U.S. service members he’s gotten killed to sell Americans on his war with Iran.
No sooner had the American death toll risen to 18 than the president started bragging that their deaths weren’t such a bad thing.
“Afghanistan War: 20 years, 2,000 DEAD. Iraq War: 9 years, 4,600 DEAD. Vietnam War: 19 years and 5 months, 58,220 DEAD. Korean War: 3 years and 1 month, 36,574 DEAD. Venezuela War: 1 day, 0 DEAD. Iran Military Conflict: 4 months, 18 DEAD,” Trump wrote on Truth Social Tuesday.
This isn’t the first time Trump has used the deaths of U.S. service members to hype himself up.
At the first dignified transfer in March, Trump sported a gaudy $55 gold-embroidered “USA” baseball cap. The second dignified transfer he skipped altogether. The third was used for content—against the wishes of the families of the deceased.
Following the collapse of Trump’s ceasefire deal, at least four U.S. service members have been killed, bringing the official death toll to 18. Roughly 500 U.S. service members have been injured, according to the Department of Defense.
Trump Begs Judge to Give Back Money He Just Paid E. Jean Carroll
Donald Trump is refusing to just accept the L here.
Donald Trump has made billions of dollars grifting the American public since returning to office, yet he’s still trying to find a way to weasel out of paying E. Jean Carroll.
The president cannot accept the reality that he lost: Trump’s legal team demanded that the former Elle columnist repay him the $5.6 million that he was court-mandated to give her, The Independent reported Tuesday.
The money was disbursed to Carroll from a court-controlled escrow account on July 9—three years after a nine-person jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll in the mid-1990s and defaming her in the early 2020s when she went public about the attack. Trump had done everything in his power to avoid paying Carroll her due, including attempting to take the case to the Supreme Court, although it ultimately refused to hear the case in June.
“But rather than accept the reality that he had lost, [Trump] has engaged in a series of maneuvers trying desperately to forestall payment,” Carroll’s lawyers wrote in a legal filing Monday night, noting that the payment should have been the end of the case.
“But Defendant now demands yet another unprecedented remedy,” Carroll’s attorneys continued. “The judgment here is final, the money has already been disbursed, and Carroll is entitled to keep it.”
Her team added that each of the president’s attacks has a “domino effect” that subjects the writer to “ongoing and prolific harassment” from people who take Trump’s word as gospel, “including a multitude of death threats and other threats of physical injury.”
The sum is just the tip of the iceberg for how much Trump owes Carroll, however. After the 2023 civil case, Trump tried and failed to sue Carroll for defamation, insisting, despite the jury’s determination, that he had not sexually abused her. A federal judge eventually ruled that Trump—not Carroll—was the liable party, as he had defamed the advice columnist by denying the sexual abuse on the basis that she wasn’t his “type,” and by accusing her of inventing the sexual assault allegations against him for the benefit of her book.
A jury awarded Carroll $83.3 million in that case, though Carroll has not yet seen a dime from that decision.
Justice Department Secretly Investigating Republican Congressman
Representative Cory Mills appears to be under investigation.
After months of scandal, Republican Representative Cory Mills is finally under criminal investigation.
MS NOW, citing two anonymous sources, reports that the Department of Justice has launched a criminal probe into the Florida man, who is accused of sexual misconduct, campaign finance violations, financial disclosure violations, accepting inappropriate gifts, and multiple ethics violations.
A third source told MS NOW that the FBI has spoken to at least one person about Mills’s finances and the allegations against him, which are numerous. Mills told the outlet by phone, “This is the first I’m hearing about it.”
“The [Federal Election Commission] dismissed all the campaign stuff,” Mills said, referring to allegations he misused campaign funds. He said that he thought the investigation must be about “all the things stemming from the Ethics investigation.” The House Ethics Committee launched an investigation into Mills last November, and was still gathering evidence about Mills’s misconduct as of May this year.
Mills allegedly harassed his ex-girlfriend, former Miss United States Lindsey Langston, and threatened to release revenge porn of her after she dumped him last year upon learning of his affair. Mills also allegedly assaulted the second woman he was dating, who reported him to police.
Mills didn’t face any criminal consequences in the latter case, as the interim District of Columbia U.S. attorney at the time, Ed Martin, refused to sign the Metropolitan Police Department’s arrest warrant. Later reports found that Mills tried to get out of being arrested by threatening to call then–Attorney General Pam Bondi. Also in 2025, news reports revealed that Mills was caught with sex workers in 2021 in the East European country Georgia while en route to Afghanistan.
Mills has ignored calls to step down, and Republicans in Congress have decided not to pursue expelling him from the House. Mills is still running for reelection, and it remains to be seen if he’ll face any consequences in Florida’s August 18 primary, or the November general election.
Pete Hegseth Gives Suspiciously Low Estimate of Total Cost of Iran War
Donald Trump’s war is projected to cost much, much more.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth just lowballed the Iran war to the tune of about $62.5 billion.
Hegseth, alongside officials including Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine, appeared before the Senate Appropriations Committee Tuesday to update lawmakers on the state of the war and to request nearly $88 billion more for “urgent needs” in the war effort.
About 15 minutes into Hegseth’s testimony, Illinois Senator Dick Durbin asked if he had a new estimate for how much the war in Iran has cost so far.
“Senator, the estimate we have as of today is $37.5 billion,” the defense secretary replied.
In reality, both U.S. intelligence officials and independent analysts are putting the total cost of the war upward of $100 billion. That’s at least $62.5 billion more than Hegseth claimed.
“It’s my understanding that this whole supplemental funding request is $87.6 billion,” Durbin continued. “We are told the Department of Defense still has $75 billion in un-obligated funding from last year’s reconciliation package. Is that true?”
Hegseth stammered about his predecessor, Lloyd Austin, and replied that he couldn’t offer “specific numbers” as to where that extra $75 billion in defense spending had gone.
At the start of the month, Popular Information’s Stephen Semler published an independent review of U.S. expenses in the war so far, including $28 billion in mobilization, administrative, and immediate combat costs; $46.7 billion on missiles, interceptors, and bombs; $20.3 billion on damaged or destroyed military assets; $2.9 billion on Israel’s bombs and interceptors; and an additional $4.8 billion on war costs to nonmilitary U.S. agencies. Put that together, and you have a whopping $102.7 billion—not counting repairs and replacements for the 42 U.S. aircrafts that have been lost, damaged, or destroyed.
Hegseth’s testimony came only days after the U.S. military announced the deaths of at least three more American service members in the war, bringing the official death toll to 17. (A fourth service member is still missing.) The secretary is calling the request for more funding part of his national defense strategy, “peace through strength.”
The Trump administration’s war in Iran is wildly unpopular, and Republicans know it. Maybe Hegseth thinks lowballing the price tag will distract the American people with a discount rate.
Taylor Farms Backtracks After Trying to Hide Role in Diarrhea Outbreak
Taylor Farms initially claimed the FDA apologized for reporting what turned out to be a false positive test on its iceberg lettuce.
Taylor Farms must be very sorry to have ever claimed that the Food and Drug Administration apologized to them.
The pro-Trump produce supplier deleted all mentions on social media of the aforementioned penitence following a false positive by the FDA that incorrectly identified some of Taylor Farms’ products as a source of the cyclospora outbreak that has caused explosive diarrhea across the country.
In statements since scrubbed from social platforms, the vegetable company said Monday that the FDA had “apologized” for the error.
That set off the federal government, which initiated a typhoon of P.R. damage control that has since been described by agriculture journalists as a “public health communications nightmare.”
On Monday, the FDA denied that it had offered the company any such apology. And in its own since-deleted post, the Department of Health and Human Services asserted that Taylor Farms’ statement “DOES NOT change the basis for FDA’s ongoing outbreak investigation or the overwhelming epidemiological data supporting the current voluntary recall by Taylor Farms.”
“Epidemiological evidence and traceback analysis provide strong, actionable public health evidence,” HHS shared Tuesday afternoon, responding to a CNN report that Mexico denied its regional cases had anything to do with the current outbreak in the U.S. “By looking at the supply chain—from point of sale to distributors, processors, and growers—the data gathered from the 5-state outbreak converged on shredded iceberg lettuce from Taylor Farms locations in Mexico.”
Taylor Farms is one of the largest fresh-produce suppliers in the country, providing products to Walmart, Sam’s Club, Kroger, SYSCO, Aldi, Target, and Dollar General. It also sells food for private-label brands, such as Whole Foods’ “365” line, and offers assembly-line products for a slew of fast-food chains, including McDonald’s, KFC, Pizza Hut, Subway, and more.
Taylor Farms said that it had recalled all of the shredded iceberg lettuce that was grown and processed in central Mexico out of an “abundance of caution.”
“While the FDA traceback is indicating a specific independent farm, which represents less than 1% of the U.S.’s iceberg lettuce supply, as the potential source of the outbreak, we have removed all iceberg lettuce from the region indefinitely,” the company said Friday in a statement.
Yet somehow, sending Americans rushing to the lavatory isn’t the only scandal plaguing Taylor Farms. The supplier’s parent company, Taylor Fresh Foods Inc., reportedly donated $1 million to Make America Great Again Inc.—a super PAC affiliated with the president—in March 2025.
Company executives also met with White House officials and FDA representatives last week, just before Taylor Farms issued a voluntary recall of its Central Mexico lettuce supply, reported the Daily Beast Tuesday.
Since the beginning of May, the CDC has confirmed 1,645 cases of cyclosporiasis and is investigating 5,100 more, though the agency noted that most cases have likely gone unreported. Still, both totals are substantially higher than normal: This time last year, just 249 cases had been reported. So far, 141 cases have resulted in hospitalization, and no one has died from the disease.
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