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‘That’s my question!’ CNN host frustrated as guest rattles off GOP soundbites



CNN anchor Brianna Keilar pressed Rep. Jimmy Patronis (R-FL) over the issue of a proposed a Medicaid work requirement as Republican lawmakers consider making cuts to pay for President Donald Trump's mega spending bill.

Trump met with Republicans on Capitol Hill Tuesday to motivate them to iron out their differences over the bill since he can only afford to lose three GOP votes in order to pass it.

Keilar noted that almost 140,000 of Patronis's constituents received Medicaid, which worked out to "roughly one out of every six people."

She asked if any of them would "lose Medicaid coverage" if the new work requirement for "able-bodied" people went into effect before 2029, as the congressman preferred. And she asked for clarification on who constituted an "able-bodied" person.

"For example, should a young adult male in your district who is in the throes of addiction be expected to meet those requirements while in rehab?" Keilar asked.

EXCLUSIVE: Trump accused of new grift that puts Qatari plane in shade

"Right now, a young adult male in the state of Florida is not eligible for Medicaid unless he's disabled or has some other type of disability that's given that pathway," Patronis answered.

"Well, I'm asking if he should be eligible, facing a medical issue like that," Keilar said.

"So, that individual does not have access to expanded guaranteed Medicaid health benefits if he's an able-bodied male, because it's not part of Florida's acceptance into that program," Patronis answered.

Keilar then asked about the nation as a whole, not just Florida.

Patronis said, "When you've got able-bodied males that have the ability to go out and seek employment in order to maybe secure health insurance to the private sector, that frees up dollars for disabled, for elderly, for women. So again —"

Keilar interrupted, "Is that person abled-bodied, though? Sir, that's my question! But, congressman, that's my question. Is that an able-bodied person, someone who is in rehab dealing with addiction?"

After a lengthy debate, Patronis concluded, "I definitely want to make sure that the elderly or seniors are women or children — that they always have a robust safety net that always takes care of them. That is the purpose of Medicaid."

Watch the clip below via CNN.

‘Null and void’: Judge demands DOGE action reversed in major slap for Trump



A judge ruled against President Donald Trump's administration in a decision Monday over the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), Politico legal reporter Kyle Cheney posted on X.

The USIP's goals are to promote conflict resolution and peacebuilding globally through a congressionally funded, independent, non-profit organization, its website says. Judge Beryl Howell said that having the executive branch take it over is not legal and "should be treated as null and void," said Cheney.

Trump established DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, through an executive order upon entering office on Jan. 20. The goal was to make significant budget cuts to reach $2 trillion in savings by eliminating "waste, fraud and abuse," as tech billionaire Elon Musk described in a March Fox News interview.

ALSO READ: 'I would not be happy': GOP senator wants DOGE to back off as agencies heads confirmed

Among those cuts was the USIP — which is actually under the purview of Congress, not the president.

Judge Howell's ruling reads: "As an independent entity exercising inconsequential government power and de minimis, if any, executive power, Congress’s ability to restrict the President’s removal power is even greater than that outlined in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, 295 U.S. 602 (1935), Seila Law v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, 591 U.S. 197 (2020), and the Supreme Court’s other seminal presidential removal power cases. Applying those cases, Congress’s restrictions on the President’s removal power of USIP Board members are squarely constitutional, and the President and his Administration’s acts to the contrary are unlawful and ultra vires."

"The actions that have occurred since then—at the direction of the President to reduce USIP to its 'statutory minimums'—including the removal of USIP’s president, his replacement by officials affiliated with DOGE, the termination of nearly all of USIP’s staff, and the transfer of USIP property to the General Services Administration ('GSA'), were thus effectuated by illegitimately-installed leaders who lacked legal authority to take these actions, which must therefore be declared null and void.

Read the full court ruling here.

Trump official rakes in $150M tax-free with ‘ethics agreement’: report



President Donald Trump's commerce secretary Howard Lutnick is emulating his boss by transferring away "his ownership interests in multiple affiliated companies" to trusts that will benefit his adult children, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday.

Lutnick, a billionaire, served as chairman and chief executive of financial-services firm Cantor Fitzgerald until he was appointed to Trump's cabinet in February.

In keeping with "a government ethics agreement," Lutnick created the trusts to benefit sons Brandon Lutnick and Kyle Lutnick, "as well as Lutnick’s other adult children."

In addition, former Cantor Fitzgerald affiliates "agreed to buy back more than 16.4 million shares of its stock from Lutnick," leaving him $151.5 million richer.

Add to that $127 million from real-estate adviser Newmark Group, which agreed to buy back 11 million shares from Lutnick, the company's former executive chairman.

EXCLUSIVE: Trump accused of new grift that puts Qatari plane in shade

"Lutnick won’t have to pay capital gains taxes on the sales as long as he puts the proceeds into Treasuries or a broadly based mutual fund — assets that don’t pose a conflict of interest," Bloomberg reported.

Brandon Lutnick, who serves as chief executive officer of Cantor Fitzgerald said in a statement, “Kyle and I are honored to continue building on our father’s legacy, leading Cantor Fitzgerald alongside the exceptional executive team we have in place today."

Donald Trump has come under fire for remaining in charge of his businesses despite transferring his assets to "a trust managed by his children while he is working overtime to lead the country to economic prosperity," according to a White House spokesperson.

The New York Times reported this month that sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. have raked in billions of dollars in recent deals that "directly benefit the president."

The deals include a luxury hotel in Dubai, a residential tower in Saudi Arabia, two cryptocurrency ventures, a new golf course complex in Qatar, and a new private club in Washington that "will personally benefit not only Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., but also President Trump himself," the Times reported.

Read The Wall Street Journal story here.


‘Confused libs’: Don Jr. flips out at backlash over his Biden cancer joke



Donald Trump Jr. accused Democrats of not being able to take a joke about former President Joe Biden's stage four prostate cancer.

In a post on X, Trump wondered how former First Lady Jill Biden, a doctor of philosophy, could have missed her husband's cancer and called it a "coverup."

"What I want to know is how did Dr. Jill Biden miss stage five metastatic cancer or is this yet another coverup?" he asked.

The president's son faced backlash online for failing to understand the difference between a PhD and a medical doctor.

EXCLUSIVE: Trump accused of new grift that puts Qatari plane in shade

"I sometimes forget that part of the mental disorder of leftism is an inability to understand sarcasm," Trump wrote Monday in his defense. "So for the confused libs out there, I'm well aware that Jill Biden is a fake doctor, not a real one...Unlike the Dems who were calling for her to be Surgeon General in 2020."

Trump ended his missive with a clown face emoji.

Trump explodes as he’s bombarded by ‘nasty questions’ on Air Force One



President Donald Trump didn't hide his disgust when asked Friday why he was allowing white South African farmers into the United States but "closed off that door" to many other refugees.

A U.S.-funded charter flight brought close to 60 Afrikaner families to the the U.S. state of Idaho earlier this week under a humanitarian program designed for people fleeing war or persecution.

Afrikaners are white South Africans of Dutch descent.

"What message does that send? Why is that fair?" the reporter is heard asking on an audio recording made aboard Air Force One as Trump returned to the U.S. after a tour of the Middle East.

EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE

“I think if I see people in distress, I don’t care what color, what they look like, what anything—their size, their height, their eyes. I don’t care,” he said.

“But, I think that from all evidence, the farmers in South Africa are being treated brutally. And it’s been reported, and nobody wants to cover it, but they happen to be white. And if they were Black, I’d do the exact same thing. And we treat people very well when we see there’s a genocide going on,” he said. “So if it’s a genocide, that’s terrible. And I happen to believe it could very well be.”

In February, the South African courts ruled that talk of a "white genocide" is merely a myth.

Trump then branded the reporter's question as “nasty.”

“And I’m not looking for reporting because, believe me, it’s easier for me not to do anything. It’s a lot easier because I don’t get nasty questions like that,” the president said.

“But the fact is that we’re about saving lives, and we’re gonna do that. So we’ve made a home, and we’ll make a home for other people that are treated badly, no matter what their color.”

Listen to the audio here.

Trump asks Supreme Court to let him resume mass purge



President Donald Trump is asking the Supreme Court to lift lower court orders preventing him from continuing his mass firings of the civil service, reported The Associated Press on Friday.

These firings have been on hold in part due to a ruling by a federal judge in San Francisco last week.

The report noted that the lawsuit in question was brought by an array of plaintiffs, including "the cities of San Francisco, Chicago, and Baltimore; the labor group American Federation of Government Employees; and the nonprofit groups Alliance for Retired Americans, Center for Taxpayer Rights, and Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks."

EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE

U.S. District Judge Susan Illston, appointed by former President Bill Clinton, "questioned whether Trump's Republican administration was acting lawfully in trying to pare the federal workforce," the report noted.

She "directed numerous federal agencies to stop acting on Trump's workforce executive order signed in February and a subsequent memo issued by the Department of Government Efficiency and the Office of Personnel Management," although her order will expire on its own next week.

Since taking office, Trump has sought to slash personnel at agencies across the board, much of it with the blessing of tech billionaire Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency task force.

In many cases, these firings had to be walked back simply because critical functions broke. In one of the most high-profile cases, Trump fired hundreds of vital workers at the National Nuclear Safety Administration and had to re-hire many of them.

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