Trump’s Ballroom Quest Gets Even More Unhinged |
Trump’s Ballroom Quest Gets Even More Unhinged
Donald Trump is trying to get a key Senate adviser fired.
The Senate parliamentarian is a nonpartisan referee for the legislative branch, a role that has quietly existed for almost a century. So of course Donald Trump is mad at the current one.
Trump pressured Senate Majority Leader John Thune in a private phone call Monday to fire Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, according to reporting by Semafor and NOTUS. Two days earlier, MacDonough ruled against Senate Republicans allocating $1 billion for the president’s ballroom project in their budget reconciliation bill.
Despite Trump claiming for months that his ballroom would be entirely funded through donations, his cronies in the Senate have tried to sneak in an extra billion for “securing” the space (which is not even built yet). The proposed reconciliation bill also funds the Department of Homeland Security through 2028.
MacDonough, the first woman to be appointed parliamentarian, has served in the role since 2012. One of her jobs is to review all reconciliation bills and cut provisions the Senate cannot make a good case for. While her cuts aren’t technically binding and can be overruled with a majority vote, ignoring her would be a huge break from precedent—and we all know the Senate loves precedent.
Thune was dismissive of the idea of firing MacDonough, according to NOTUS.
“No,” the majority leader told NOTUS when asked if he would consider the idea. “We’re going through a process that we go through every time we have a reconciliation bill and the people on both sides are mad at the parliamentarian. That’s been true.” Thune also let things slide in 2025 when Trump moaned to him about MacDonough’s rulings on Medicaid provisions.
The phone call represents yet another attempt to influence the legislative branch from our current commander in chief, who routinely decries people and policies that don’t benefit him on social media.
Republicans are not expected to take out this “security” allotment but instead adjust the clause’s language and potentially ask for less money. If MacDonough clears the new version, the bill could go to the Senate floor for a vote in the next few weeks.
Only One Republican Dares to Criticize Trump’s Corrupt Slush Fund
Senator Bill Cassidy is speaking up as the rest of his party remains silent.
Just one lone Republican has spoken out against President Trump’s corrupt “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”
Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy—who was just defeated in a primary against Trump-endorsed Representative Julia Letlow and state Treasurer John Fleming—sounded off in opposition to the slush fund.
“We are a nation of laws; you can’t just make up things.… It is as if somebody sued themselves and agreed upon a settlement with themselves that’s going to be funded by the rest of us,” Cassidy told NBC’s Sahil Kapur Monday night. “Now if that’s the case, what? Wait a second! I just came off the campaign trail. People are concerned about making their own ends meet, not about putting the slush fund together without a legal precedent.”
Cassidy’s right. Trump created the slush fund as part of a settlement after suing his own IRS, setting aside nearly $1.8 billion of taxpayer money for anyone who felt unfairly targeted by the Biden administration— from January 6 rioters to right-wing think tanks, to the president’s own super PAC. The fund’s guidelines also note that once a recipient has received their money, the Trump administration has “no liability whatsoever for the protection or safeguarding of those funds, regardless of bank failure, fraudulent transfers, or any other fraud or misuse of the funds.”
While the Republicans maintain their complete radio silence on the president’s self-enrichment scheme, Democratic senators have launched a separate probe into Assistant Attorney General Todd Blanche and whether he’s actually recused himself from the president’s personal legal matters given that he used to be Trump’s personal lawyer.
Bari Weiss Is Already Losing Power at CBS News
Weiss’s bosses are considering pulling back her control over content.
Bari Weiss might soon be forced to hand over the reins to CBS News.
As Paramount closes in on its potential deal with Warner Bros. Discovery, executives at the networks are considering avenues to remove Weiss from her position overseeing CBS News.
The top brass is reportedly having informal discussions about changing Weiss’s mandate, particularly as the groups look ahead to a potential merger with CNN. Instead, they would bring in a new, more experienced executive to run the department, giving Weiss “less control over the linear product,” reported Puck News Monday.
It’s unclear how formal the talks to reorient Weiss have been, but she would likely lose day-to-day control over several major CBS properties, including Evening News, CBS Mornings, and 60 Minutes. Weiss would maintain broad editorial influence but would largely be shifted to oversee the news division’s digital growth.
A spokesman for Paramount told Puck that “Bari has the full support of Paramount and David Ellison as the editorial leader overseeing CBS News and 60 Minutes. Reports suggesting otherwise are inaccurate.”
Weiss, the founder of the pro-Israel blog The Free Press and a former New York Times opinion columnist, was tapped as the newsroom’s newest chief late last year, despite the fact that she........