The GOP Is Fuming After the Pentagon Abruptly Pulls Back from Europe |
The GOP Is Fuming After the Pentagon Abruptly Pulls Back from Europe
The Trump administration called off the deployment of thousands of troops to Poland without explaining its decision to Congress.
Republicans are furious with the Trump administration after its decision to cease all troop deployment to longtime U.S.-ally Poland. The decision is the latest of Trump’s anti-European defense tendencies, coming just a month after the Pentagon removed 5,000 troops from Germany after criticism from German Chancellor Friedrich Merz over the Iran war.
“I just want to say this is a slap in the face to Poland; it’s a slap in the face to our Baltic friends,” Representative and Armed Service Committee member Don Bacon told Politico. “It’s a slap to the face of this committee … “I may not represent 100 percent of people on this committee, but I think I represent the views of the vast majority … We disagree.”
“We don’t know what’s going on here, but I can just tell you we’re not happy with what’s being talked about, particularly since there’s been no statutory consultation with us,” said Armed Services Chair Representative Mike Rogers, suggesting that the move was made without congressional oversight. Although the Pentagon stated that pulling troops was “not an unexpected, last-minute decision.”
Top Armed Service Democrat Adam Smith felt similarly.
“The only answer I’ve got is, ‘Well, that’s what they told us to do.’ Okay, why?” Smith said. “If there’s some strategy behind it, then you guys ought to know and you ought to be able to communicate it to us.”
Poland is the only European country that prefers a U.S. military presence.
JD Vance Humiliates Himself as Crowd Stays Silent During His Speech
The vice president used a memorial service to try to score political points.
A charisma-less Vice President JD Vance was met Friday with humiliating silence when he tried to transform a memorial event into a political stump speech.
Speaking at a memorial service outside the U.S. Capitol for the Fraternal Order of Police’s National Peace Officers, Vance got a quiet reaction to his raving about the Trump administration’s efforts to end cashless bail.
“How about we have a federal government that puts violent criminals in prison, as opposed to letting them out of jail?” Vance said. There was a long, awkward pause, before the quiet members of the audience slowly started clapping.
please clap pic.twitter.com/RkKrK9HAhG— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 15, 2026
please clap pic.twitter.com/RkKrK9HAhG
It’s possible that the crowd of law enforcement officers and their families are aware that there is no significant documented increase in violent crimes among arrestees out on cashless bail, which allows people suspected of a crime who can’t meet bail to avoid spending time in a cage before they’ve been convicted.
Or perhaps the audience weren’t impressed by how Vance used his pulpit to deliver a political speech.
In honoring the fallen law enforcement officers, Vance took credit for a historic drop in violent crime—when rates were already dropping nationwide before Donald Trump came into office. Experts have said there is little evidence to suggest that Trump has had a significant impact on crime rates.
Still, Vance attributed a drop in violent crime to the Trump administration’s efforts to stop “the tide of narcotics and migrant crime flooding across our borders.” Of course, immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than U.S.-born citizens. But this is just the run-of-the-mill xenophobia one can expect from Vance, who has admitted to telling racist lies for attention. And who could forget when he readily put a target on the back of immigrant children?
This painfully cringey racist is the person Trump wants to prop up in 2028, and maybe we should let him. If Vance’s performance Friday is any indication, there may very well be a Democrat in the White House in two years.
Mike Johnson Says He Has No Clue Trump Is Ready to Betray Taiwan
Donald Trump is suddenly caging on whether he’ll go through with a planned arms sale to Taiwan.
House Speaker Mike Johnson still doesn’t know anything about what Donald Trump is saying.
Johnson has spent the bulk of his time atop the House dodging attempts by reporters to pin down his opinion on the Trump administration’s various machinations. That remained true during a press huddle Friday, when a journalist asked Johnson about the president’s relaxed approach to safeguarding Taiwan from China’s control.
“Should President Trump have been more committal when it comes to Taiwan during his visit to China?” asked a reporter.
“I haven’t seen—I’ve been really busy the last couple days, so I haven’t seen the exact readout on how that discussion went,” Johnson said. “I heard a couple little comments off-hand of what he said. He feels like they had a very productive meeting, they talked about some really important issues. I’m awaiting a sit-down with him and go through it in detail.”
“We’ve always been concerned and we’ve made America’s interests very clear, our position on Taiwan. They need to stay independent and secure there and we have an interest in that, as does everyone around the world, because of chip manufacturing and other reasons there,” Johnson continued, adding that he couldn’t speak on the topic further because he had not yet discussed it with the president.
It’s remarkable that Johnson—as one of the most powerful lawmakers in Congress—does not feel empowered to speak independently about U.S. policy. Yet it’s perhaps equally alarming that his strategy is to consistently play inept and ignorant as to the White House’s activity, particularly since Trump refused to commit to a planned arms sale to Taiwan after meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Chinese leadership warned the U.S. against supporting Taiwan, promising that doing so would place U.S.-China relations in “great jeopardy.”
“‘Taiwan independence’ and cross-strait peace are as irreconcilable as fire and water,” a readout from the Chinese government stated. “The U.S. side must exercise extra caution in handling the Taiwan question.”
China has reaffirmed for years that Taiwan is an inalienable part of its territory, and that it intends to formally reunite with the island nation. More than 23 million people live in Taiwan, and its sovereignty is highly contested........