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Furious MAGA influencer blasts Fox News as ‘TV for stupid people’ after booking yanked



Far-right activist Laura Loomer unloaded on Fox News on Thursday, branding the network "TV for stupid people" after management yanked her booking to discuss an exclusive Zelensky interview and then aired a segment days later on whether AI could fix women's boyfriends.

Loomer had spent late July in Ukraine, traveling to Kyiv and Kharkiv and reversing years of pro-Russia commentary. She landed a 45-minute sit-down with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that CNN described as an "exceedingly friendly" interview. Trump shared a clip on Truth Social and wrote, "Very good!!!"

Despite that presidential seal of approval, Loomer says Fox News wanted no part of her scoop. In a post published on X, she said host Howard Kurtz had booked her on his podcast to talk through the reporting before management intervened.

"Fox News management killed the spot off 20 minutes before the interview was supposed to take place," she wrote.

She was not subtle about what she saw as the network's real priorities.

"They had no time for the biggest interview of the week, but they had time for a segment 2 days later on whether AI can 'fix your boyfriend,'" she wrote, punctuating the complaint with a clown emoji.

Fox & Friends aired a segment earlier this week featuring contributor Brett Cooper analyzing the "stay-at-home boyfriend" trend and a new AI agent called Orchid pitched as a tool to help men manage relationship tasks.

"Fox News is truly TV for stupid people," Loomer wrote. "They won't talk about things that actually matter, but they always have time for bimbo guests and bimbo news stories that have no actual news value."

The blowup is the latest chapter in a slow-motion feud between the Trump ally and the network's leadership. Loomer erupted at Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott over the same canceled booking, alleging she has been on an internal blacklist since 2017.

Loomer also claimed her Ukraine reporting rattled Russian state television enough to prompt calls for her assassination. Kremlin propagandist Vladimir Solovyov devoted part of a recent broadcast to Loomer, branding her a "fool" and saying she should be "rolled into the asphalt."

Was cafeteria worker Denise Whitmarsh fired from school over packing extra meals for hungry kids?

Some posts sharing the fabricated story claimed the firing happened in Bridgehaven, Pennsylvania.

Australian reporter lays into fleeing Rick Scott over unconstitutional ‘witch hunt’



An Australian TMZ reporter confronted Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) outside a Senate hearing Thursday, challenging him to explain how punishing someone for using the Fifth Amendment could be constitutional.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee had just voted 8-5 along party lines to hold former top federal health official Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress for invoking his Fifth Amendment right 111 times at a hearing last week. TMZ reporter Charlie Cotton caught Scott in the hallway immediately after.

"Now maybe I'm just, like, not in the know because I'm Australian," Cotton said to Scott, "but how can you hold someone in contempt and punish someone for using a constitutional right? Isn't it there to use as a right?"

Scott argued Fauci had no grounds to use it.

"He had a pardon, so he — he didn't have that right to do that once he had the pardon," the senator said.

"But didn't he have risk of prosecution because if he'd misspoke, or if he'd lied or something?" Cotton pressed.

"Yeah, if he lied," Scott admitted.

"So he was at risk?" Cotton pointed out.

"He didn't have the right," Scott insisted.

"But not from the hearing," Cotton said, "because the hearing — if he lied, you said that he could be held, you know, accountable for that."

"He could've just told the truth," Scott said. "That's all he had to do."

"Well, he felt like it was a witch hunt," Cotton pushed back, "and you guys would stop at nothing to catch him and send him to prison."

"That's not my intention," Scott said. "I just want to get information."

"It's Rand Paul's intention, though," Cotton pressed.

"No," Scott said. "It's for his actions."

As Cotton was asking his next question, the Republican senator quickly walked away.

"Yep. Okay then," the TMZ reporter said.

Former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told Newsweek that invoking the Fifth was "the right legal move" — the pardon covered past conduct, but pleading the Fifth protected Fauci from perjury charges based on anything he said at the hearing.

As CEO of Columbia/HCA, Scott himself invoked the Fifth Amendment 75 times in a 2000 civil deposition while the company faced a federal investigation that led to a $1.7 billion settlement — at the time the largest Medicare fraud case in American history, Florida Phoenix reported.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) planned to hand-deliver the contempt referral to the Justice Department Thursday, bypassing a full Senate floor vote, CBS News reported.

Trump Fundraising Email Warns Recipient’s ‘Supporter Status’ Is Canceled Unless They Pay Up

A Wednesday email blast from President Donald Trump told followers their "supporter status" had been canceled, directing them to donate in order to restore their standing in the MAGA movement.

The post Trump Fundraising Email Warns Recipient’s ‘Supporter Status’ Is Canceled Unless They Pay Up first appeared on Mediaite.

‘Roadkill Ratatouille’: RFK Jr’s new cooking show buried in mockery



Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. nauseated the nation Thursday when he launched a cooking show critics feared would likely include roadkill.

"The Real Food Show" launches Thursday on his department's website and will feature celebrity chefs helping to prepare meals like "Crispy Salmon Cakes with Apple, White Bean & Green Salad" and highlighting some personal favorites like kimchi, yogurt and sauerkraut, reported USA Today.

“I use store-bought sauerkraut,” he told the newspaper, then described the correct way to eat the fermented cabbage. “The way that you're supposed to eat it is bite for bite. You take a bite of the meat, take a bite of the sauerkraut. That is kind of the prescribed, perfect way of eating it. You know, I don't do that perfectly every time that I try.”

Kennedy converted other Trump administration officials, including Vice President JD Vance, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, to the sauerkraut diet, and he said they'd all lost weight since then.

“I will literally eat anything because I don't have a gag reflex," Kennedy said. “I love experimenting with foods. When I travel, I'll eat … street vendors’ cooking."

Kennedy said he cooks two “rudimentary” meals a day, adding that his repertoire was eggs, bacon, cheeseburgers and hamburgers, but he said his wife Cheryl Hines is a much better cook.

“I can cook a really good omelet,” Kennedy said, "and then my specialty would be steaks and meat and fish.”

The show's launch generated some skeptical coverage given Kennedy's history of handling roadkill and overseeing an outbreak of several food-borne illnesses since taking over the nation's public health.

"Why is Kennedy directing his attention to making cooking videos instead of managing these real problems? One reason could be that Kennedy has reportedly 'checked out' of his job and barely attends meetings, showing up to work at 10 a.m. only to leave around 4 p.m. He seems to care only about overhauling dietary guidelines and pushing an anti-vaccine agenda. The latter has led to a 35-year record high for measles cases in the U.S.," noted The New Republic.

"Because who doesn’t want to prepare grub with the guy who, among many things, has a brain part-eaten by worms; a supposed car full of severed animal parts; and a history of snorting lines off toilets?" asked Jezebel, suggesting that Kennedy might share recipes with viewers for "Roadkill Ratatouille," "Lemongrass Liver Salad" and "Anti-Diarrhea Yogurt."

"Roadkill Collector Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Launches Cooking Show and Warns America: ‘I Don’t Have a Gag Reflex,'" announced Mediaite.

"Someone posted this in slack and I actually thought it was The Onion," laughed MS NOW's Brandy Zadrozny.

GOP senator snaps at ‘mistaken’ Trump as Todd Blanche turmoil heats up



Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) fired back at President Donald Trump on Wednesday, saying opposition to his IRS tax settlement runs far deeper than just two senators.

At 11:15 AM, Trump wrote on Truth Social that acting Attorney General Todd Blanche was "a STAR" with the potential to be "one of the Greatest Attorney Generals of All Time."

He blamed Cornyn and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) — "both of whom I refused to Endorse, and whose political careers have been ended by my action" — for blocking the confirmation.

Just seven minutes after Trump backed down, Cornyn rubbed salt in the wound by responding to Trump on X.

"POTUS is mistaken if he believes concerns about the provisions in his tax lawsuit settlement are limited to me and Senator Tillis," Cornyn wrote on X.

The standoff forced the Senate Judiciary Committee to scrap a scheduled Thursday vote on Blanche's nomination, a setback for one of Trump's top Cabinet picks, MS NOW reported.

"I have no objection to temporarily withdrawing Todd's name, if they do not do the right thing, and putting him back after Cornyn and Tillis are out of office," Trump wrote on Truth Social, threatening to pull the nomination entirely and resubmit it once both senators leave office.

Earlier Wednesday, before Trump's post, Cornyn and Tillis had told Politico that someone inside the White House — not Trump himself — was blocking a deal.

"I don't know who it is — I'm just trying to get them out of the way so we can get the president his AG," Tillis said.

"If this were just between me and Todd Blanche, we would have worked this out, but, apparently, he's getting some pushback from higher ups at the White House," Cornyn said, adding that he did not know who was responsible. "I don't know who, but it doesn't need to be this hard."

"Why don't you call over the DOJ and tell them they have one hour and 50 minutes to get me what I asked for," Cornyn told reporters Wednesday afternoon, as negotiations with the Department of Justice dragged on, MS NOW reported.

"What I've advised the chair, and I would assume Senator Cornyn said something similar, is that we're not prepared to vote yes yet," Tillis said Wednesday night, confirming neither senator had moved.

‘More about botox than bombs’: GOP candidates have a Hegseth headache — Dems are delighted



Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's blunders and bluster are about to become a central argument against Republican lawmakers in the upcoming midterm election, according to a new report.

Democratic candidates and campaign strategists consider the controversial Donald Trump Cabinet member to be a target-rich subject when it comes to putting their GOP opponents back on their heels, Politico reported Thursday.

"The more Hegseth puts himself out there, the more he does the work for us," said Matt Corridoni, a Democratic strategist told Politico.

"Normally the Secretary of Defense is not such a politically focused position, but he has pushed it into hyper politics. So you're going to see candidates using him as a foil more and more."

Hegseth's television personality has made him instantly recognizable, and his record of controversy provides endless ammunition for Democrats in key districts, the report states.

"Campaign planners said they expect candidates to call out Hegseth even more as the war against Iran continues," the report stated. "Trump has repeatedly said the Defense secretary was among the first and most vocal proponents of the fight, which has now lasted more than five months and led to a spike in global energy prices."

Cait Conley, an Iraq war veteran running for New York's 17th Congressional District, has been particularly brutal, calling Hegseth unqualified and incompetent while quipping that he knows "more about botox than bombs."

Rebecca Bennett, a former Navy helicopter pilot running for New Jersey's 7th Congressional District, has made Hegseth's removal a centerpiece of her campaign. She's called for his resignation at every stop, framing him as a threat to military integrity.

"Pete Hegseth is a disgrace to the office that he holds, and the reason why I believe he is deeply dangerous is partially because of the polarization," Bennett said.

"We have an obligation to call those things out when we see it, and to make sure that we are standing up for our service members who do not have the ability to speak out about these things."

Trump folds on Blanche as GOP senators hand him devastating defeat



President Donald Trump conceded Thursday he may pull his own attorney general nominee rather than give two outgoing Republican senators what they are demanding.

Trump made the admission on Truth Social after the Senate Judiciary Committee postponed a vote on acting Attorney General Todd Blanche's nomination Wednesday night. The vote was canceled when it became clear two Republicans would block it.

Those two senators — Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) — are leaving Congress at the end of the year.

"Todd Blanche is a STAR, and everyone knows it!" Trump wrote on Truth Social. "He has the potential to go down as one of the Greatest Attorney Generals of All Time."

"I have no objection to temporarily withdrawing Todd's name, if they do not do the right thing, and putting him back after Cornyn and Tillis are out of office," Trump wrote.

Trump also attacked both senators directly, calling them men "whose political careers have been ended by my action" — a reference to his decision not to endorse them. He added that "both Cornyn and Tillis voted for Merrick Garland," invoking former Attorney General Merrick Garland, a name Republicans cite as a symbol of Democratic overreach.

On Capitol Hill Thursday morning, Cornyn told reporters the situation had taken a turn for the worse. Asked whether Blanche could be confirmed before the August recess, he said the odds were against it.

"It's looking doubtful," Cornyn told reporters, according to NBC News congressional reporter Laura Weiss.

Cornyn said talks with Blanche had been "very constructive" and that he believed a deal was close Tuesday night. But by Thursday morning, something had shifted.

"Other people intervening," he said. He told NBC News congressional correspondent Julie Tsirkin he did not know whether the president himself was standing in the way.

At the heart of the standoff is a settlement Trump's Department of Justice reached with the Internal Revenue Service. The deal granted Trump and his family immunity from tax audits and created a nearly $1.8 billion fund to compensate people who said they had been targeted by the government for political reasons.

The fund was later abandoned, but Cornyn wants that abandonment in writing — and wants the audit immunity narrowed so it does not cover future tax filings, according to MS NOW.

"All I want them to do is to confirm what he said in his sworn testimony before the Judiciary Committee, with regard not only to the weaponization fund, but also who is protected from future audits and what agencies of the federal government are bound by the release," Cornyn told reporters, according to CBS News.

The Department of Justice, Cornyn said, had not delivered. "They've simply refused to cooperate," he said, according to The Hill.

As of Thursday morning, Cornyn said he was waiting on a DOJ response to his latest offer and had no meetings or calls scheduled with the White House or the Department of Justice.

Red flags fly as ‘very suspicious’ move from Todd Blanche has confirmation in doubt



CNN analyst Andrew McCabe on Tuesday pointed out that the Department of Justice never responded to President Donald Trump's IRS lawsuit — and how that could impact Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche's nomination.

The former deputy director of the FBI told CNN anchor Kasie Hunt that, as Blanche's nomination remains in limbo ahead of Thursday's vote, further questions about Trump's former personal attorney have come to light.

"Let's remember, there essentially was never really a true lawsuit here," McCabe said. "The president sued the IRS for $10 billion. The Department of Justice never even answered the complaint. So, there were never two opposing parties. The Justice Department never stood up and defended the United States in the way that it did in every other suit brought by the same leak from the same person."

This was unusual, McCabe explained.

"And because of that oddity, that's a very suspicious decision on the part of people like Todd Blanche and others," he said. "The lack of a true controversy meant that the entire thing was about to get dismissed. Before that could happen, they entered into these agreements. One of them, of course, created the weaponization fund, and the second one essentially granted complete immunity forever to Donald Trump, his family members and businesses."

McCabe described the situation further.

"It was basically a giveaway from the Department of Justice to the president," McCabe said. "How this thing stands or was ever conceived — I have no idea. I've been around many, many settlements of criminal matters, some of which involved IRS criminal matters, and have never seen any language like this. I think it's absolutely unprecedented and an incredibly bad idea."

The IRS settlement became a sticking point for some Republican senators during Blanche's confirmation hearing. On Tuesday, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) said there is no deal on Blanche's confirmation because of the settlement and the so-called anti-weaponization fund, Politico reported.

Trump appalls with ‘last pat on the head’ for Lindsey Graham: ‘Has he ever felt sad?’



The way President Donald Trump honored late Sen. Lindsey Graham's coffin left onlookers disgusted online.

Sen. Lindsey Graham was mourned at his Washington, D.C., funeral on Tuesday after he died unexpectedly at the age of 71 earlier this month. Trump created plenty of noteworthy moments at the occasion, including by apparently falling asleep and by delivering a stunning ad-lib during the tribute.

However, he also drew online criticism by tapping Graham's casket as he passed. In a post on X, journalist and policy consultant Adam Cochran called Trump a "performative jack—" who "thinks he's testing a watermelon."

"Biggest narcissist ever," posted New York Times opinion writer Elizabeth Spiers on Bluesky. "Has Trump ever felt sad for someone else ever? If he has, it has never come up in any profile or coverage of him — going back to the mid 80s."

"Press F to pay respect," joked writer Aidan Moher.

"It's called the Narcissist's Knock, reserved for moments when a person incapable of giving a crap about another human being pretends to give a crap about another human being and fails spectacularly," posted writer Rex Huppke.

"One last pat on the head of the loyal senator who gave up his dignity for TV hits and free hats," mocked journalist Mike Rothschild.

"This is the sort of thing you do when you're the only one at the funeral who knows that the deceased is actually still alive in the coffin and you want to taunt them once more before the first shovel of dirt lands," wrote historian Charles Louis Richter.

"Biggest narcissist ever. (Not that Graham deserves an outpouring of feeling.)," Elizabeth Spiers, an opinion writer for the New York Times, posted on Bluesky. "Has Trump ever felt sad for someone else, ever? If he has, it has never come up in any profile or coverage of him — going back to the mid 80s."

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Furious MAGA influencer blasts Fox News as ‘TV for stupid people’ after booking yanked



Far-right activist Laura Loomer unloaded on Fox News on Thursday, branding the network "TV for stupid people" after management yanked her booking to discuss an exclusive Zelensky interview and then aired a segment days later on whether AI could fix women's boyfriends.

Loomer had spent late July in Ukraine, traveling to Kyiv and Kharkiv and reversing years of pro-Russia commentary. She landed a 45-minute sit-down with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that CNN described as an "exceedingly friendly" interview. Trump shared a clip on Truth Social and wrote, "Very good!!!"

Despite that presidential seal of approval, Loomer says Fox News wanted no part of her scoop. In a post published on X, she said host Howard Kurtz had booked her on his podcast to talk through the reporting before management intervened.

"Fox News management killed the spot off 20 minutes before the interview was supposed to take place," she wrote.

She was not subtle about what she saw as the network's real priorities.

"They had no time for the biggest interview of the week, but they had time for a segment 2 days later on whether AI can 'fix your boyfriend,'" she wrote, punctuating the complaint with a clown emoji.

Fox & Friends aired a segment earlier this week featuring contributor Brett Cooper analyzing the "stay-at-home boyfriend" trend and a new AI agent called Orchid pitched as a tool to help men manage relationship tasks.

"Fox News is truly TV for stupid people," Loomer wrote. "They won't talk about things that actually matter, but they always have time for bimbo guests and bimbo news stories that have no actual news value."

The blowup is the latest chapter in a slow-motion feud between the Trump ally and the network's leadership. Loomer erupted at Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott over the same canceled booking, alleging she has been on an internal blacklist since 2017.

Loomer also claimed her Ukraine reporting rattled Russian state television enough to prompt calls for her assassination. Kremlin propagandist Vladimir Solovyov devoted part of a recent broadcast to Loomer, branding her a "fool" and saying she should be "rolled into the asphalt."

Was cafeteria worker Denise Whitmarsh fired from school over packing extra meals for hungry kids?

Some posts sharing the fabricated story claimed the firing happened in Bridgehaven, Pennsylvania.

Australian reporter lays into fleeing Rick Scott over unconstitutional ‘witch hunt’



An Australian TMZ reporter confronted Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) outside a Senate hearing Thursday, challenging him to explain how punishing someone for using the Fifth Amendment could be constitutional.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee had just voted 8-5 along party lines to hold former top federal health official Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress for invoking his Fifth Amendment right 111 times at a hearing last week. TMZ reporter Charlie Cotton caught Scott in the hallway immediately after.

"Now maybe I'm just, like, not in the know because I'm Australian," Cotton said to Scott, "but how can you hold someone in contempt and punish someone for using a constitutional right? Isn't it there to use as a right?"

Scott argued Fauci had no grounds to use it.

"He had a pardon, so he — he didn't have that right to do that once he had the pardon," the senator said.

"But didn't he have risk of prosecution because if he'd misspoke, or if he'd lied or something?" Cotton pressed.

"Yeah, if he lied," Scott admitted.

"So he was at risk?" Cotton pointed out.

"He didn't have the right," Scott insisted.

"But not from the hearing," Cotton said, "because the hearing — if he lied, you said that he could be held, you know, accountable for that."

"He could've just told the truth," Scott said. "That's all he had to do."

"Well, he felt like it was a witch hunt," Cotton pushed back, "and you guys would stop at nothing to catch him and send him to prison."

"That's not my intention," Scott said. "I just want to get information."

"It's Rand Paul's intention, though," Cotton pressed.

"No," Scott said. "It's for his actions."

As Cotton was asking his next question, the Republican senator quickly walked away.

"Yep. Okay then," the TMZ reporter said.

Former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told Newsweek that invoking the Fifth was "the right legal move" — the pardon covered past conduct, but pleading the Fifth protected Fauci from perjury charges based on anything he said at the hearing.

As CEO of Columbia/HCA, Scott himself invoked the Fifth Amendment 75 times in a 2000 civil deposition while the company faced a federal investigation that led to a $1.7 billion settlement — at the time the largest Medicare fraud case in American history, Florida Phoenix reported.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) planned to hand-deliver the contempt referral to the Justice Department Thursday, bypassing a full Senate floor vote, CBS News reported.

Trump Fundraising Email Warns Recipient’s ‘Supporter Status’ Is Canceled Unless They Pay Up

A Wednesday email blast from President Donald Trump told followers their "supporter status" had been canceled, directing them to donate in order to restore their standing in the MAGA movement.

The post Trump Fundraising Email Warns Recipient’s ‘Supporter Status’ Is Canceled Unless They Pay Up first appeared on Mediaite.

Jack Smith Probe Reportedly Continues a Full Year Past Expected End Date — as Trump Admin Guts Watchdog Agencies

Two DOJ watchdog offices have been hit with a “20-year high” in complaints while investigations into those complaints have hit a “20-year low.”

The post Jack Smith Probe Reportedly Continues a Full Year Past Expected End Date — as Trump Admin Guts Watchdog Agencies first appeared on Mediaite.