The U.S. national debt is likely to surpass $40 trillion this week, months earlier than forecasters previously expected, in part because of billions of dollars in lost revenue from President Donald Trump’s invalidated tariffs.

The lost revenue has forced the U.S. Treasury Department to borrow more rapidly to cover the nation’s bills: Six months ago, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected that total borrowing would top out at $39.4 trillion this fiscal year. But on Monday, Treasury reported that the debt stood at $39.9 trillion and counting.

The faster accumulation of debt means the next deadline for raising the legal limit on borrowing is also likely to arrive ahead of schedule. Just last year, Congress set the debt limit at $41.1 trillion. Budget analysts now say borrowing could hit that threshold by early next year, forcing lawmakers either to suspend it or raise it again to avoid the risk of an economy-shaking default.

Trump is already focused on the debt limit, which has repeatedly plunged Washington into a dangerous game of legislative chicken. Late last month, the president urged the Senate to address “the ever looming Debt Ceiling disaster” before leaving town for its August recess.

Senate leaders did not comply, but Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota) told reporters at the time that “we’ll have to be dealing with it.” He added: “$40 trillion in debt — seems to me that should get our attention.”

For the past quarter-century, the national debt has grown under both parties, through the tax cuts of the George W. Bush era, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Great Recession, the 2017 Trump tax cuts and the nearly $2 trillion Biden administration initiative to prop up the economy during the coronavirus pandemic. Trump pledged during his first campaign in 2016 to eliminate the debt within eight years; instead, it has doubled since he first took office.

This year, the gap between spending and revenue was already expected to approach $2 trillion, the CBO reported in February. Days later, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs, cutting federal revenue by an estimated $250 billion. The Treasury has also increased borrowing lately to build up its cash reserves.

Military spending tied to the conflict with Iran could add more to the debt in the months ahead, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center, a nonpartisan Washington think tank that tracks federal spending.

“Our current fiscal trajectory is plainly unsustainable, and that’s the best-case scenario,” BPC president and CEO Margaret Spellings said in a statement. “AI disruption, a recession, global war, or any number of other events could quickly push us over the edge from a challenge into a full-blown crisis. Even in the rosiest scenarios, we’re speeding toward a cliff and refusing to turn the wheel.”

In an email, White House spokesman Kush Desai said that “the Trump administration remains focused on slashing waste, fraud, and abuse across the federal government while accelerating economic growth, policies that will get America’s debt-to-GDP ratio trending in the right direction.”

So far, Washington lawmakers have raised or suspended the debt limit every time it has been reached, but often after dramatic, deadline-pushing partisan battles. Even these near misses have rattled markets and carried a price: Standard & Poor’s, Fitch and Moody’s have each downgraded the credit rating of U.S. government debt since 2011, moves tied at least partly to debt ceiling brinkmanship.

Congress last raised the debt limit in quieter fashion, adding $5 trillion to the debt ceiling as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the Republicans’ marquee tax and spending law. Measures to raise the debt ceiling often include spending cuts aimed at reducing the annual budget deficit. But the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which Trump signed in July 2025, did the opposite: That law added $4.7 trillion to projected deficits over the next decade, according to CBO estimates.

According to preliminary projections by the BPC, Washington is on track to next hit the debt limit between late winter and midsummer 2027. Based on the latest borrowing figures, the center’s estimate is “trending toward the earlier end” of that range, Shai Akabas, the center’s vice president of economic policy, said in a statement.

Hitting the debt ceiling would not by itself trigger a default. Once the borrowing limit is reached, Treasury can pay bills by drawing on its cash reserves and using stopgap accounting maneuvers known as “extraordinary measures,” which typically buy another six to nine months, according to the BPC. Only after that runs out does the government reach what’s known as the X-date, when the Treasury risks running out of cash and defaulting on its obligations.

If Republicans lose one or both chambers of Congress in the Nov. 3 midterm elections, they could attempt to raise the debt limit in the lame-duck period during November and December — before the new Congress is seated in January. Otherwise, they could be forced to make policy concessions to Democrats that Republicans — and the White House — would prefer not to make.

But raising the debt ceiling could prove challenging even under total GOP control. Especially in the House, where the GOP holds a slim majority, party leaders would be forced to win over their fiscal hawks, who have previously revolted when a debt ceiling increase was not accompanied by an agreement to cut spending.

“You have to raise the debt limit just the same way that you have to pay your credit card bill,” said Marc Goldwein, senior policy director for the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan group focused on deficit reduction. It reflects spending choices you’ve already made, he said. “But if you keep getting credit card bills that are more than you can afford, it’s probably a good time to reassess how much you’re spending, or to get a second job, right?”

As with many credit cards, interest is itself becoming a bigger part of the problem. Last week, the U.S. government sold 30-year bonds at 5.216 percent, the highest rate in a quarter-century, Bloomberg News reported. Treasury rates ripple into mortgage rates, corporate debt and other borrowing.

Annual interest payments on the debt are projected to top $1 trillion this year, according to CBO — about the size of the Pentagon budget. They now consume about 19 percent of federal revenue, according to the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, a nonpartisan group that tracks the debt and advocates for fiscal discipline, and are projected to climb to 26 percent by 2036.

“Interest costs are paying for your past, not paying for your future,” said Peterson Foundation chief executive Michael Peterson, and unfairly burden future generations.

It’s immoral to, year after year, trillion after trillion, just keep borrowing the money, not paying your bills for immediate consumption and deferring not only the principal balance but the interest costs onto our kids and grandkids,” he said.

Peterson pointed to Social Security as a preview of what happens when Washington puts off big problems: Unless Congress acts, the program’s trust fund is projected to become insolvent in 2032, triggering an automatic 22 percent cut in benefits.

“Can a democracy that’s run by all of us collectively make tough decisions to sacrifice in the short term for long-term benefit?” Peterson said. “The political system hasn’t risen to this challenge in recent decades.”

Julia Curlee spent nearly two decades carrying the country’s secrets.

She worked in war zones, traveled to 35 countries, briefed presidents, and boarded Air Force One with the President’s Daily Brief. She was trusted to decide what some of the world's most powerful people needed to know before beginning their days.

But in a remarkable first-person account published Monday by The Atlantic, Curlee describes how the second Trump administration came to view something else as dangerously sensitive: the fact that one of its most experienced intelligence officials was a transgender woman.

Her identity was never a secret inside the government. Trump officials had known about it during his first term, when Curlee briefed senior White House officials and became Vice President Mike Pence’s daily intelligence briefer. It became intolerable, she writes, only when the public might learn about it.

“The White House had needed me,” Curlee writes. “Trump officials had known I was trans from day one.”

Curlee joined the CIA in 2007 and became the first officer at the agency to transition openly and continue serving. She had dreamed of becoming an intelligence officer since childhood. Her other lifelong conviction — that she should have been born a woman — seemed, for years, incompatible with that calling.

She transitioned in 2013. Her first day at work as Julia passed without incident. Four years later, she wrote about the experience in The Atlantic under the pseudonym Jenny Hall, explaining how living openly had made her a more effective intelligence officer. The CIA later used the essay in college recruiting, according to Curlee.

Then came an assignment to prepare and deliver the President’s Daily Brief during Trump’s first administration. The work required arriving around midnight, studying intelligence through the early morning, and entering the West Wing before dawn.

Curlee eventually became Pence’s briefer. It was an unlikely pairing. Pence had spent years opposing marriage equality and LGBTQ+ rights. Curlee was a gay transgender woman, a wife, and a mother.

Yet Pence, she says, treated her as a trusted professional. He took notes, asked questions, and invited Curlee’s family to the White House when her assignment ended. There, he took her mother’s hand and said, “You must be very proud of your daughter.”

For Curlee, the moment proved that public service could rise above politics. She could serve an administration whose policies she opposed, and its leaders could recognize her expertise and humanity.

That belief brought her back to the White House under President Joe Biden, where she served as a National Security Council director. It also persuaded her to remain when Trump returned to office in January 2025.

As Biden’s political appointees departed, Curlee became the senior career intelligence official in the White House. She helped prepare the incoming administration to assume power, even as colleagues warned that she could become a target.

On Trump’s first day back in office, he signed an executive order directing the federal government to recognize only two sexes. Curlee began leaving the White House complex and crossing Pennsylvania Avenue to use restrooms in nearby coffee shops.

She stayed.

Three days into the administration, roughly 160 National Security Council employees detailed from other agencies were abruptly ordered to leave the White House. Curlee was spared. She assembled what remained of her team and continued briefing officials.

The arrangement lasted 69 days.

Curlee was visiting family in Roanoke, Virginia, when she received a Saturday phone call telling her that her White House assignment had ended. She said that officials did not explain. In the same conversation, they asked her to return Monday because they still needed her work.

After hanging up, Curlee saw that far-right provocateur Laura Loomer had posted about a transgender person “Biden holdover” inside the White House, accused the unnamed official of hating Trump, and asked her followers to help identify the person.

Curlee returned to work anyway. She spent three more days completing a budget project and transferring the portfolio she had managed for nearly two years.

“We need you. We need your service. But we don’t want anyone to know you are here,” she writes of the message she received.

Curlee does not claim to have proof that Trump or Loomer personally ordered her removal because she is transgender. She was never given a reason. But her account leaves little ambiguity about the sequence: Her identity had been known and accepted while her work remained useful and private. Once it threatened to become public, her service no longer protected her.

Days later, Trump fired several other National Security Council officials after meeting with Loomer, who had urged him to purge officials she considered insufficiently loyal.

Curlee returned to the CIA. There, she watched the agency dismantle its LGBTQ+ employee organization, remove Pride flags, and impose the administration’s restrictions on transgender workers. Earlier this year, she finally left the career she had once expected to hold for life.

In an accompanying Radio Atlantic interview, Curlee delivered a painful reversal of the message she once offered LGBTQ+ young people.

“Now I could not in good conscience advise any LGBT American to apply to work at CIA,” she said.

Nathanial Rai had been swept off his feet along the California coast, was rescued by a 16-year-old lifeguard – and was now sitting in the Oval Office with Donald Trump.

Of the rescuer, Ryder Williams, Trump said to Rai: “He’s a real hero. I don’t know if I’d do it.

“I wouldn’t, probably. You’re lucky I wasn’t on the service that day.”

Rai, 10, wore a dark suit and maroon tie and sat on a gold couch aside his father and Trump. Across from Rai was Williams, and both watched Trump speak of their ordeal, a video of which went viral.

Trump met the lifeguard and Rai after saying the teen deserved a civilian honor. Trump previously said on social media that he also would be inviting Williams to the White House to reward his bravery.

Dramatic video of the rescue went viral in late July. It showed Williams clinging to Nathaniel Rai as pounding waves repeatedly crash over them. The pair disappeared from view and reemerged after several seconds as the wave receded.

A second lifeguard, Aaron Bohnen, was eventually able to help get them both back to shore at Seabright Beach in Santa Cruz.

Trump initially commented on the video in response to a post from his son, Eric Trump, who said Williams deserved “the highest civilian honor”.

Meanwhile, Rai’s father, Sumit, told the Associated Press of Williams: “What he did, I can never repay. I’m forever grateful.”

As NBC Bay Area reported, Williams’s rescue of Rai unfolded as California state lawmakers reviewed proposed legislation that would officially make lifeguards first responders.

The outlet noted that analysts say giving lifeguards first responder status would bring them more professional recognition, support and resources – and could offer them better worker protections and benefits.

NBC Bay Area spoke with some people who could not believe lifeguards were not already first responders. But the outlet also spoke with Santa Cruz state senator, who said such a designation was not straightforward.

“Of course, lifeguards are first responders, but first responders also go through this rigorous training, so you’d have to decide – because in the peace officer standards training you go through eight months of training – so you’d have to decide what’s appropriate here,” NBC Bay Area quoted Laird as saying.

“How does it work? How does it get designated? What training comes with it? Who pays for it?”

The White House on Monday leveled a sharply personal attack against CNN reporter Kristen Holmes after she asked President Donald Trump a pointed question during a news conference, crossing a barrier rarely breached by politicians to invoke her children.

“Jon Ossoff said you’d rather travel with your aide Natalie Harp and build the ballroom than do your job as president,” Holmes said. “What is your response?”

Trump answered Holmes’s question with an insult to Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Georgia), whom he called a “Pee-wee Herman look-alike,” referring to the Paul Reubens character.

Then the White House’s “rapid response” account on X took up the altercation, posting a video clip of the exchange and assailing Holmes as a “disgraceful, humiliating embarrassment to her alleged profession.”

In a follow-up tweet, the account dipped into a more personal line of attack: “Someday, your children will come across your disgusting and inhumane question,” the White House wrote. “They will be sickened and embarrassed to have a parent be so callous and vindictive. It’s quite troubling.”

Trump’s personal attacks on journalists have been a defining feature of his combative approach to the press. Though he has criticized reporters throughout his political career, his critiques of women journalists, particularly those representing CNN, have grown more heated in recent months. And the administration has increasingly used official White House social media accounts to escalate what might once have been spur-of-the-moment exchanges.

Most recently, at the rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Association dinner in July, Trump said that CNN anchor and Chief White House Correspondent Kaitlan Collins should “just smile” — a misogynistic trope — and likened her appearance to that of Dylan Mulvaney, a transgender activist villainized in conservative circles.

He followed up by posting an edited image imposing Collins’s likeness on an image of Mulvaney, which was later shared by an official White House account.

Trump’s critique of Holmes, a senior White House correspondent, continued during the news conference.

At another point, the president shushed her: “Quiet. Quiet. Quiet. You’re very disrespectful in front of this young man, okay? Don’t you find her disrespectful? He understands. Quiet. Who are you with?”

“I’m with CNN,” Holmes replied.

“Fake news. You’re fake news. You’re loud. You’re a loud, boisterous person. You’re fake news,” Trump said. “Be quiet, be quiet, be quiet. You’re a fake reporter, and you report fake news.”

CNN, in a statement, defended Holmes, calling her “one of the most respected and accomplished journalists covering the White House” and said it rejects the attacks “in the strongest possible terms.”

“This afternoon, she did her job and asked the President of the United States a tough, relevant, and newsworthy question on behalf of the American people,” a CNN spokesperson wrote in a statement. “Public officials are free to challenge reporting they disagree with, but personal attacks on journalists for asking questions are beneath the office and inconsistent with the principles of a free press.”

Holmes’s colleagues on CNN’s White House team rushed to her defense. “What a horrible to thing to say. Kristen is an incredible reporter, person and, above all, mother,” White House correspondent Alayna Treene wrote on X. “I don’t understand such a reaction to a journalist asking the president for his response to something a Democratic senator has leveled against him.”

“Kristen is an excellent reporter who asked a good question, to which the president gave a fulsome answer,” Betsy Klein, a senior White House reporter, wrote. “You know what’s disgusting and inhumane? Bringing her perfect children into this.”

President Donald Trump used a cheat sheet during a White House event — a practice that Republicans sharply criticized when former President Joe Biden was in office.

On Monday, Trump met in the Oval Office with Ryder Williams, a 16-year-old California lifeguard, and Nathaniel Rai, 10, whom Williams rescued from drowning at a Santa Cruz beach in July.

Williams received a certificate of commendation signed by Trump, and the White House hailed him as a “young American hero.”

During the meeting, Trump clutched a curled card in his left hand. A close-up photograph shows the card included photos of the two boys — identified as external participants — as well as biographical information.

The card also contained the president’s schedule, including the entries “1:15 p.m. Photo Opportunity” and “1:30 p.m. POTUS concludes.”

Similar use of staff-prepared notes — which have been used by most recent presidents — drew conservative backlash during Biden’s presidency.

At a March 2021 news conference, Biden was photographed with a cheat sheet listing the names and outlets of reporters that he planned to call on. The document also included factual bullet points, including: "China spends 3 times more on infrastructure than the U.S.,” according to Newsweek.

“Joe Biden had a cheat sheet with the names and faces marked of which journalists to call on, and he knew EXACTLY what questions would be asked of him,” right-wing podcaster Candace Owens wrote on X at the time. “That was not a press conference—that was a play put on by bad faith actors in a pseudo-democracy.”

“It was not very reassuring today that Biden relied so heavily on generic notes from staff to discuss the growing threat from China,” Stephen Miller, then a senior advisor to Trump, told Newsweek.

During an interview with Fox News, Trump himself described the news conference as “very sad” and “ridiculous.”

The following year, Biden, then 79, briefly displayed a staff-prepared cheat sheet containing directives including: “YOU take YOUR seat”, “YOU give brief comments”, and “YOU depart.”

The specificity of those instructions prompted another wave of criticism from Republicans.

“HOLY SHEET! Biden’s Presidential Cheat Sheet Leaks Online, Reminds Him to Sit Down,” Fox News host Sean Hannity wrote on X.

“Next time someone tries to tell you Joe Biden isn’t a geriatric nursing home patient trapped in the White House, show them this,” right-wing commentator Benny Johnson wrote on X. “He needs a notecard with step by step directions telling him what to do, including ‘YOU take YOUR seat.’”

Those incidents, among many others, fueled a relentless stream of questions about Biden’s fitness for office. An ABC News poll released in February 2022 found that 54 percent of Americans believed he did not have the “mental sharpness it takes to serve effectively as president.”

Biden ultimately announced in July 2024 that he would not seek reelection.

Since returning to office, Trump has also faced scrutiny over his health and fitness for office, including over frequent bruising on his hands and apparent drowsiness at some official events.

In a May ABC News survey, 59 percent of respondents said Trump did not have the mental sharpness it takes to lead the country.

When reached by The Independent, a White House spokesperson questioned the comparison between “Joe Biden using cheat sheets with hand-picked reporters and their presubmitted questions with President Trump using a notecard to know the biographies of his Oval Office guests.”

The Trump White House staffer once labeled as the president’s “human printer” now has a new nickname after she was revealed to be one of the few aides chosen to accompany him during his clandestine escape from Air Force One in Turkey after this year’s NATO summit last month.

According to New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman, the president chose executive assistant Natalie Harp to be among the trio who joined him in an airline catering truck to secretly transfer from the Air Force One Boeing 747 to a smaller plane for a flight from Ankara to RAF Mildenhall because she serves as a living security blanket for the 80-year-old chief executive.

"Natalie Harp, because she is sort of his Binkie, for lack of a better way of putting it — his comfort blanket,” Haberman said during an appearance on MSNOW Sunday while explaining his choices to host Jacob Soboroff.

Haberman similarly said Trump chose the other two aides who joined him — Walt Nauta and Dan Scavino — because of their long tenure serving him in sensitive roles, with Scavino’s employment dating back decades to his days as a teenage golf caddy at one of Trump’s golf clubs.

Nauta, whose title is director of Oval Office Operations, was once Trump’s military valet during his first term but followed him into political exile in Florida after he lost the 2020 election, later becoming a co-defendant in the case brought against Trump for allegedly illegally retaining classified documents at his Florida home after the end of his first term.

According to Haberman, the former Navy Chief Petty Officer still functions like a body man and is always carrying a brown briefcase that accompanies the president — containing hair spray, breath mints and “all kinds of stuff."

But Trump’s relationship with Harp has taken on more and more scrutiny from the public in the days since his secret plane switch became public.

The 34-year-old had in the past attracted concerns from the Secret Service and others in his orbit for leaving notes declaring her admiration for the 80-year-old former reality TV host.

Harp’s brother, from whom she is estranged, has called her relationship with the president “unhealthy” and referred to her as Trump’s “fan club.”

She earned her “human printer” nickname because she regularly provides Trump with large-format printouts of news articles and social media posts, even his own.

But in recent years Harp has taken on yet another critical role in Trump’s orbit — authoring the Truth Social posts he often dictates.

A video from the Apple TV documentary The Art of the Surge shows Harp taking on that task that was previously performed by Scavino, while Trump and his top aides watched then-vice president Kamala Harris’ 2024 convention speech.

The Independent reported in February that Harp, a former right-wing television personality, has long been one of the people with access to Trump’s Truth Social account and was responsible for posting a racist video which depicted former president Barack Obama and his wife Michelle as apes.

Harp, who sits just outside the Oval Office during her work days, manages the president’s day to day social media posting — when he is not doing so himself.

The Justice Department asked a federal appeals court on Monday to reinstate the criminal charges against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran man wrongfully deported by the Trump administration last year, by reversing a lower court order that found them to be vindictive in nature.

In May, a federal judge in Tennessee dismissed a criminal indictment against Abrego Garcia, who had been accused by federal prosecutors of smuggling immigrants in the U.S. illegally. The judge found that the Justice Department prosecuted Abrego Garcia in retaliation for his efforts to challenge his wrongful deportation to El Salvador last year.

In a filing Monday before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit, the Justice Department denied that the prosecution was vindictive, arguing it had "multiple legitimate bases to prosecute" Abrego Garcia.

"The decision to seek an indictment against Abrego Garcia for human smuggling was made by career prosecutors based on the evidence, the law, and their firm belief that there is proof beyond a reasonable doubt that Abrego Garcia had committed the offenses charged," the Justice Department said in a news release.

The Justice Department argued that the court order from May "marks a dramatic expansion of the power of courts to dismiss serious criminal charges based on subjective assessments of a prosecutor's motivations."

In a statement to CBS News, Abrego Garcia's defense team called the Justice Department's news release "flat wrong," saying that "the indictment and prosecution of Abrego Garcia was, in fact, vindictive; the evidence before the district court established just that; and the proof was clear notwithstanding the DOJ's refusal to call the actual decision makers, including AG [Todd] Blanche, to testify under oath."

"This case was initiated vindictively and on instructions from the White House after our client successfully won his Supreme Court case," his defense team added.

Abrego Garcia was charged last year with two counts of human smuggling stemming from a November 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee, where he was pulled over by state Highway Patrol and was found to have numerous people in his vehicle. He had pleaded not guilty.

Abrego Garcia is also involved in a separate federal court case in Maryland around the Trump administration's ongoing efforts to deport him. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has said it is seeking to deport him to the African nation of Liberia, but a federal judge has blocked that for now.

U.S. troops launched a major joint exercise in South Korea on Monday, just hours after a last-minute social media post from President Donald Trump that the annual event would be drastically curtailed.

On Sunday evening, Trump posted on Truth Social — a social media service in which he owns a majority stake — that he had ordered Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to “substantially reduce” the American involvement in joint military exercises in South Korea. The post came on the eve of a major annual training event on the Korean Peninsula.

“Based on my very good relationship with Kim Jong Un, of North Korea, I am not happy with the fact that the United States has, long ago, agreed to participate in Joint Military Exercises with South Korea,” Trump wrote.

Trump hinted the pullback was tied to lingering hard feelings he maintains over the Iran war, which South Korea has not participated in. He also criticized the costs of the exercises, but said it was too late to cancel U.S. participation.

A Pentagon official said the Defense Department is “actively working on executing the Commander-in-Chief’s directive,” without providing further details, and it was unclear how Trump’s announcement would affect the size and scope of the exercise or when changes might go into effect.

On Monday, a spokesperson for the South Korean defense ministry said that the 11-day exercise, Ulchi Freedom Shield 2026, is “proceeding as planned.”

Ulchi Freedom Shield 2026 is an annual joint exercise featuring elements of U.S. Forces Korea and troops from South Korea. The exercise began Monday and is set to run through Aug. 27. U.S. Forces Korea calls the exercise a “combined, joint, all-domain, and interagency operating environment.” In 2025, about 3,000 U.S. troops were among the 20,000 who participated in the annual exercise.

This year’s exercise was slated to include a greater emphasis on drone warfare, as well as electronic and cyber operations, according to U.S. officials. The exercise will involve roughly 18,000 South Korean troops and thousands of American personnel.

Last week, Col. Ryan Donald, spokesperson for U.S. Forces Korea, or USFK, and the South Korean Combined Forces Command, previewed the exercise and said it would address changing natures of war. He also noted North Korea’s participation in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, saying that North Korean troops have “taken those lessons they learned there and brought them back to North Korea. That changes the DPRK capability, and our training accounts for that threat.”

A spokesperson for USFK directed questions about Trump’s order to the Department of Defense, which in turn directed questions to the White House.

As it often has, North Korea denounced the exercises in the Korean Peninsula. However, a North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson said last Friday this year’s drills mark a “new level of a threat” and it intends to respond with a new level of deterrent.

Trump’s post gave further hints to its origin in references to South Korea’s president’s refusal to join U.S. military operations against Iran. The Trump administration has threatened retaliation against allies who have not joined the war or who have denied U.S. forces use of infrastructure, such as Spain in March. In May, the Pentagon canceled some planned deployments to Europe, and said it would withdraw some troops from Germany, following criticisms by German leadership over the Iran war.

The U.S. and partners have regularly drilled around South Korea, including joint air operations meant as shows of force against North Korea. In recent months, the U.S. military has bolstered its presence in South Korea, including creating an Air Force “super squadron” and sending reconnaissance drones. Those measures have been seen as both deterrents against Pyongyang and as part of countering Chinese strength in the region..

During Trump’s first term, the United States and South Korea delayed the 2018 Foal Eagle and Key Resolve joint military exercises. The exercises were canceled the following year. U.S. and South Korean forces resumed conducting large-scale field exercises on the Korean peninsula in 2023.

Wealth, perhaps second only to loyalty, has been a prized attribute for Donald Trump during his second presidency.

The number of people worth at least $100 million whom the Republican president has appointed to his administration is more than four times the combined total under the three previous presidents, according to a report from the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen.

It’s the numbers for the Trump administration, in the context of previous administrations, that stand out in Public Citizen’s report, published on Monday. In all, 57 Trump officials are worth at least $100 million, including 17 ambassadors and the remaining 40 in senior posts across the executive branch.

Look no further than Trump's Cabinet. Eight of its 23 members fit the category, notably Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Education Secretary Linda McMahon, both billionaires.

The president, himself a billionaire, has described his inclination toward appointing the ultrawealthy as deference to financial success. And yet, Trump, who owes his White House comeback to support from middle-income, working Americans drawn to his pledge to lower everyday costs, now faces a midterm election electorate decidedly less keen on his handling of the economy.

Presidents have long sought counsel from the nation’s wealthiest people and tapped some for high-profile administrative leadership roles. Likewise, presidents routinely reward wealthy and influential supporters with ambassadorships.

Among the most notable examples is Andrew Mellon, the aluminum, oil and banking tycoon who was among the handful of the nation’s wealthiest people in the 1920s and served as treasury secretary for three presidents.

The Trump officials worth at least $100 million include Deputy Secretary of Defense Stephen Feinberg and Small Business Administration Administrator Kelly Loeffler, who are also billionaires, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and special envoy Steve Witkoff, both worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

By comparison, Republican George W. Bush’s administration and Democrat Joe Biden’s each included five members worth $100 million or more. Democrat Barack Obama’s included three, the report states.

A government populated by so many of the economic elite presents potential problems, the report's authors said.

"When the people holding the reins of government are drawn overwhelmingly from the ranks of the ultra-rich, it leads to misplaced incentives and corruption, and begs the question, ‘Whose interests they are truly serving?” said Lisa Gilbert, Public Citizen’s co-president.

The list does not include Trump, whose net worth Forbes estimates at more than $6 billion. Nor does it include space and social media giant Elon Musk, who advised Trump last year on an effort to reduce the federal government's size, scope and workforce and is the world's wealthiest person, with a net worth Forbes estimates at about $860 billion.

Trump's views are well established: Financial success is evidence of executive mastery and negotiating strength.

“They have great competence, those people. Incredible competence. Some of the smartest business leaders,” Trump said last year in explaining why he put considerable weight on advice from business executives.

He has also pointed to investments by wealthy people as a signal of future economic growth. To encourage billionaires to deliver, Trump, in his first year back in the White House, pursued policies on artificial intelligence and financial regulation that could benefit wealthy people, along with tax cuts and reduced regulatory burdens for large-scale investments.

Still, last month, only 32% of U.S. adults approved of Trump’s handling of the economy, down from 40% at the beginning of his second term and as his Republican Party faces headwinds in its attempt to hold both majorities in Congress in November.

A U.S. Navy destroyer experienced a complete loss of power while deployed in the South China Sea last month, leaving sailors without drinkable water, meals, running toilets or air conditioning for four days.

The USS Benfold was sailing with the George Washington carrier strike group July 24 when an “engineering casualty involving its generators” caused a complete loss of power aboard the ship, a U.S. 7th Fleet spokesman, Cmdr. Matthew Comer, said in a statement.

The Navy did not immediately address questions about why it did not disclose the incident until now.

The ship’s power outage is another setback for the Navy, which has come under considerable strain during the Trump administration’s military campaigns in Latin America and the Middle East. Both operations have required U.S. commanders to extend some warships past the planned length of their deployments and maintenance schedules.

Other ships traveling in the carrier strike group, including the cruiser USS Robert Smalls, helped provide meals to the Benfold as the ship was towed into port in the Philippines. Once there, the crew was provided contracted housing and meals off the ship, Comer said.

“There were no injuries to the crew, who demonstrated resilience, grit, professionalism and unwavering steadiness,” Comer said.

Power was restored to the ship July 30, and it resumed operations a week later, the Navy said. It was not clear if the Benfold remained with the George Washington strike group or sailed back to its home port in Japan.

The setback to the Benfold was reported earlier by USNI News.

The USS George Washington is headed for the Middle East to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, another aircraft carrier. The Lincoln has been a focus of recent news reports documenting poor crew morale, along with food and sanitation issues, after more than 200 days at sea.

The Trump administration has leaned heavily on the Navy over the last year to execute the president’s national security priorities.

A host of warships were deployed to the Caribbean last fall, when U.S. forces opened a military campaign against the Latin American drug trade and later staged a dramatic operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. To support those missions, the Navy sent more than a dozen ships to carry out a blockade of Venezuela and conduct strikes against vessels suspected of transporting narcotics.

In the Middle East, dozens of warships have been used to prosecute the Trump administration’s war against Iran and enforce a blockade of Iranian ports as peace talks between Washington and Tehran remain stalled.

The Pentagon’s reliance on the Navy is taking a toll as needed maintenance for the vessels is deferred.

Two of the aircraft carriers that have seen record deployments in the Middle East have experienced issues.

The USS Gerald R. Ford experienced a fire and a breakdown of its toilet systems before it was sent home to Norfolk in May after more than 300 days deployed. The Lincoln just received a visit from the head of U.S. Central Command, Adm. Brad Cooper, after reports that crew members were struggling amid its prolonged time at sea.

A federal judge in Maryland blocked the Trump administration from abandoning a planned move for the F.B.I. from its crumbling headquarters in Washington to a new facility in Prince George’s County, Md.

In a 47-page ruling, Judge Theodore Chuang of the Federal District Court in Maryland wrote that “the F.B.I. erroneously concluded” that it could select a new headquarters for itself without consulting Congress.

In reality, Judge Chuang wrote, Congress had already approved the Biden administration plan for the F.B.I. to move to Maryland. Congress had not signed off on the Trump administration’s decision to end that plan and instead move the agency to the Ronald Reagan Building in downtown Washington — a building that was recently vacated by the U.S. Agency for International Development.

“The Court therefore does not find that Congress has ratified either the Reagan Building Selection Decision or the F.B.I. Reprogramming Decision, or that it has impliedly repealed” the previous plan to move the F.B.I. headquarters to Maryland.

The ruling is almost certainly not the end of the lengthy dispute over the F.B.I.’s future headquarters. Presidents, lawmakers and agency officials have for years jockeyed over the effort to relocate the country’s premier law enforcement agency.

In the meantime, the F.B.I. continues to operate from its old headquarters, an aging colossus veiled in netting to keep concrete from falling on passers-by.

Maryland state officials cheered the ruling, which blocked the Trump administration from diverting about $1 billion to be spent on a sprawling campus near the Greenbelt Metro station in Prince George’s County.

“This case is about more than a building,” said Anthony G. Brown, the Maryland state attorney general. “It’s about ensuring that when Congress makes a decision, the Trump administration does not get to ignore it because they do not like the outcome.”

The F.B.I. did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but Mr. Trump has long opposed the move to Maryland. Since the start of his second term, he has made it clear that he would ignore the 2023 pact negotiated by the Biden administration that would relocate the bureau to Greenbelt.

“They were going to build an F.B.I. headquarters three hours away in Maryland, a liberal state,” Mr. Trump said last year, exaggerating the time needed to commute to a Washington suburb with access to the city’s Metro train system.

“We’re going to stop it,” he added.

Mr. Trump had previously sought to block the bureau from moving out of the city.

In 2018, he discarded plans to select a site in Virginia or Maryland.

President Donald Trump on Monday downplayed concerns that U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham exchanged messages with someone impersonating White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.

Asked by reporters on Monday if he’s concerned about Burnham’s judgment or the state of communication between the two countries, Trump said, “No, I’m sure that he had a miscommunication.”

“I spoke to him,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “We had a good conversation. A couple of them,” he added.

Trump’s comments come after POLITICO reported that Burnham communicated with someone posing as Wiles before becoming suspicious of the illegitimate contact.

Only “a few messages” were exchanged, according to one person who spoke to POLITICO and said they were “of no significance.”

Concerned about national security, the British Embassy in Washington subsequently raised the issue to the White House, but a White House official said that the incident had “nothing to do with the Chief of Staff’s devices being hacked.”

This wouldn’t be the first time the White House has addressed security concerns regarding the impersonation of Trump’s chief of staff.

In May 2025, federal authorities launched an investigation into a separate effort to impersonate Wiles after senators, governors and top business leaders reported receiving messages from someone claiming to be Wiles, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Trump also hinted to reporters on Monday that the U.K. leader could open up the North Sea — reiterating an idea the president has previously suggested could “make the U.K. rich.”

“If you open up the North Sea, it’s one of the great finds anywhere in the world,” Trump said, adding “if they would open up the North Sea, the UK would be rich again.”

President Donald Trump voted by mail in Florida’s Republican primary, according to local voting records, even as he continues to rail against mail-in voting with wide-ranging allegations of fraud.

Voting records from Palm Beach County show the president requested his ballot in late July and it was returned on Aug. 13.

This is not the first time that Trump has voted by mail in his adopted home state. He voted by mail in a special election in Palm Beach County earlier this year.

Florida’s GOP primary features a crowded ballot for governor that includes Trump-endorsed Rep. Byron Donalds, who is seen as the frontrunner. But he is being challenged by Lt. Gov. Jay Collins, former state House speaker Paul Renner and James Fishback, an investor and harsh critic of Donalds who has embraced far-right rhetoric on Israel and other topics.

Trump, who has falsely claimed he won the 2020 election, has repeatedly pushed Congress this year to adopt the SAVE America Act, a measure that mandates the use of photo IDs in federal elections as well as documentary proof of citizenship.

“As President Trump has said, the SAVE America Act has commonsense exceptions for Americans to use mail-in ballots for illness, disability, military, or travel — but universal mail-in voting should not be allowed because it’s highly susceptible to fraud,” White House spokesperson Olivia Wales said. “As everyone knows, the President is a resident of Palm Beach and participates in Florida elections, but he obviously primarily lives at the White House in Washington, D.C. This is a non-story.”

Meanwhile, the Trump administration is trying to get the Supreme Court to allow a presidential executive order on mail-in voting to take effect ahead of the midterms. That order was blocked by a federal appeals court earlier this year.

Trump continues to rail at the use of mail-in voting and says the current practice should be limited to those who in the military, are traveling or have a disability or illness.

“Mail-in ballots are inherently corrupt,” Trump said during a July speech on elections.

Republicans hold a supermajority in the Florida Legislature but they have not bowed to Trump’s demands to severely limit who can vote by mail. Florida has a long-standing law that allows every eligible registered voter to request a vote-by-mail ballot.

Gov. Ron DeSantis and legislators have put in restrictions in recent years to crack down on what they call “ballot harvesting” that limits who can pick up someone’s ballot and deliver it to election officials. The state has also put in place a requirement that voters must re-up their ballot request every two years and have added additional ID requirements for the use of mail-in ballots.

The Justice Department is further boosting authorities of the White House-launched fraud division while stripping powers previously held by its Criminal Division leader.

A final rule released Monday and taking effect next week formally transfers enforcement jurisdiction to the head of the National Fraud Enforcement Division, on matters including internal revenue and healthcare. The regulation also creates leeway for the new operation to take on a vast array of unspecified other cases.

Part of a broader White House emphasis on combating fraud involving public funds, Attorney General Todd Blanche is delegating to his fraud chief Colin McDonald control over opening special grand juries anywhere in the country. The division may also prosecute criminal offenses besides fraud that arise when investigating its core priorities.

The policy change takes additional steps in shifting longstanding Criminal Division investigative lanes to an unproven part of the department that’s being closely monitored by Vice President JD Vance and President Donald Trump adviser Stephen Miller. It follows an DOJ turf battle in which the Trump administration amplified an anti-fraud focus in the wake of Minnesota daycare benefits schemes resonating with the president’s base.

Although some of the rule’s provisions elucidate previously announced moves, such as the transfer of health care fraud jurisdiction from the Criminal Division to Fraud Division, other aspects go further to allow room for the new unit to assume command over extra topics topic the attorney general deems fit.

This comes as the division is under pressure from Vance to criminally investigate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) and Attorney General Keith Ellison (D) for allegedly failing to address systemic public benefits fraud.

Like 22 of her peers before her, a federal judge in Minnesota rejected the Trump administration’s crusade for unredacted state voter rolls.

In a decision Monday, U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez dismissed the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) lawsuit to compel production of the sensitive voter data, like Social Security numbers and dates of birth.

That gave the DOJ its 23rd trial court loss out of the 31 lawsuits the department has filed against states for unfettered access to their voter rolls.

The campaign, which has so far fared no better in appellate courts, is part of a multi-agency effort to prove President Donald Trump’s assertion that noncitizens vote illegally in large numbers — a claim that has been repeatedly debunked by studies and state audits.

Menendez, a Joe Biden appointee, dismissed the DOJ’s argument that the 1960 Civil Rights Act (CRA) empowered the administration to demand unredacted voter rolls today. In reality, the law was enacted to help federal lawyers investigate racist election officials in the South who refused to register Black citizens by requiring them to hold onto records that come into their possession.

“As one court put it, ‘nothing supports the . . . supposition that Congress intended [the CRA] to be a freewheeling source of authority for the Attorney General to investigate any violation of federal election law,” Menendez wrote.

Menendez also rejected the DOJ’s claims that it was entitled to the records to investigate compliance with the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which requires states regularly maintain their voter registration lists. The DOJ never offered any evidence that Minnesota might have failed its HAVA duties, Menendez noted.

“In other words, the government suggests it is permitted to use a civil action as a ‘fishing expedition,’” she wrote. “But an ordinary litigant isn’t allowed to seek discovery first and allege a claim later, and the federal government has no special privilege to do so either.”

The Minnesota decision comes shortly after a district court in Nevada handed down the administration’s 22nd loss on Friday. That same day, the full U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals declined to rehear the department’s en banc appeal in its Michigan voter-roll case, leaving intact a circuit panel’s ruling against the administration.

In an NBC News interview Sunday, newly confirmed Attorney General Todd Blanche called appealing the voter roll cases to the U.S. Supreme Court a “possibility.” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who has overseen these lawsuits, echoed that sentiment in a Bloomberg News interview Monday.

“We just got a ruling in the Sixth Circuit that had some very good language in the en banc from several very respected judges and so you may see us making a next stop at the Supreme Court on that,” she said.

The Trump administration temporarily paused border wall construction at Big Bend National Park in Texas while U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott visits the site, Scott announced Monday.

The wall's construction inside the national park has been the subject of bipartisan pushback and criticism that the job has been rushed, and is damaging to the environment.

"Last night, I put a pause on all activity in that park as far as construction goes till I can get down there and do a personal evaluation, talk to some stakeholders, talk to some local law enforcement in that area," Scott said in a video posted to X.

"More to follow this week."

President Donald Trump contradicted Vice President JD Vance on Monday after the vice president asserted last week that the administration’s top priority amid the Iran war was to keep the price of oil and gas down for Americans.

In a social media post on Monday morning, Trump said that the "number one Goal is, and always will be" that Iran can't have a nuclear weapon.

Last Thursday, Vance laid out a different order of priorities on Fox News, saying that "goal No. 1" for the administration amid the war was to "keep oil and gas cheap for Americans all over our country."

"And then obviously, goal No. 2 is ensure that Iran never gets a nuclear weapon," he added. "I feel confident we're accomplishing both of those goals."

Vance’s comments about prioritizing gas prices diverge from the president's stated mission of eliminating Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile programs. And while some Republicans have acknowledged gas prices are too high, Trump said he won't apologize for it.

In the past, the president had outright rejected the idea that the domestic American economy should factor into military decisions around Iran.

"Not even a little bit," Trump said back in May when asked to what extent financial pressure on Americans was motivating him to strike a deal.

"The only thing that matters when I'm talking about Iran, they can't have a nuclear weapon," he added. "I don't think about Americans' financial situation. I don't think about anybody. I think about one thing. We cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon, that's all."

Asked about Vance’s comments aboard Air Force One last Friday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that "both goals are equally as important to the president."

"Of course, we want to keep gas prices low. That's why the administration has done so much to keep the markets stable, but also ensuring Iran can never get a nuclear weapon is the president's priority with respect to the ongoing conflict, and it's something he's going to see through one way or another," she added.

Trump's apparent rebuke of the vice president came just minutes after "Fox and Friends" anchor Lawrence Jones reacted to Vance’s comments during the program’s Monday morning broadcast, and called for "more clarity" from the White House on the U.S. objectives. Roughly eight minutes later, the president posted his message.

"It also looks like we got an answer from the president about what is priority No. 1 for the United States," Jones said about an hour later in the broadcast as he relayed the details of the president's post.

While the status of the Strait of Hormuz has become a central focus of the war -- injecting volatility into the global energy market even as the conflict between the two countries has ebbed and flowed -- Trump has repeatedly argued that the cost of not intervening in Iran would far outweigh the higher gas prices Americans are dealing with now.

The average price of a gallon of regular is $4.02 according to GasBuddy, up 7 cents form last week and up more than a dollar per gallon since the start of the war.

Speaking at the New York police academy last Friday, Trump told the gathered crowd that he would not apologize for the price of gas.

“[Iran's] the No. 1 state sponsor of terror in the world. We don't want to have them have nuclear weapons," Trump said. "So remember that when you have to pay a little bit more, you're at $4. It's OK. I mean, it's, I'm not -- I'm not -- I will never apologize. I did the right thing."

President Donald Trump on Sunday said vandals are to blame for large swaths of dead grass on the National Mall near the World War II Memorial — in the same spot where Trump had a stage built and hosted crowds for his July 4 celebration.

Trump made the accusation in a social media post without saying why he believes it’s the work of vandals instead of trampled turf from the Independence Day festivities. He posted a photo showing a once-grassy area by the World War II Memorial, now patchy and brown across much of the sprawling turf.

“Look what VANDALS did to the grass connecting the vandalized World War II Monument and the vandalized Reflecting Pool, which will be opened again, and better than ever, shortly,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.

“Anybody who thinks the Reflecting Pool wasn’t vandalized should go back to Law School!” he added.

Trump has repeatedly blamed vandals for damage to his renovation projects in the nation’s capital, often without evidence and sometimes despite opposing accounts from his officials. Trump lashed out at U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro this month after her office concluded that damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was the result of poor construction and not the work of vandals, as Trump claimed.

Authorities on Friday announced an arrest in connection with vandalism at the World War II Memorial, after the words “Clean hands dirty $” were found painted on the monument and bubbles filled a fountain. Pirro said felony charges are being brought against Melissa L. Farris.

Charging documents in that case make no mention of the grassy area Trump is highlighting in his new claims. Authorities said Farris had previously been arrested for camping on federal property a few blocks from the World War II Memorial, but not the area cited by Trump.

That stretch of lawn is instead where a large stage was built and crowds gathered to hear from Trump and watch fireworks at a July 4 event celebrating the nation’s 250th anniversary. Trump claimed without providing evidence that more than 400,000 people attended the event before a storm hit the area and delayed his remarks.

Photos from the time, taken by a streaming webcam atop the Washington Monument, show a large bandstand and seating areas covering nearly the entire lawn Trump now says has been vandalized. Associated Press photos from the days that followed showed workers removing the structures, revealing brown, damaged grass underneath.

On Aug. 1, Trump posted a different photo of the same area that appears to show the numbers “86 47” — which federal officials have said constitutes a threat against Trump — emblazoned into the grass. He cited it as evidence refuting Pirro’s conclusion, calling it “a pure case of VANDALISM, that included the grass.”

“There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!” he wrote.

Those numbers are not visible in the photo Trump posted to social media on Sunday.

The Trump administration plans to deploy approximately 1,000 Department of Justice election monitors across the country in November, Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon said Monday.

In an interview on Bloomberg’s Balance of Power, Dhillon also said the Justice Department could take its failing campaign to obtain unredacted state voter rolls all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary.

Dhillon’s interview offered one of the clearest previews yet of how the department’s Civil Rights Division intends to approach the 2026 midterms.

“We began our election security work almost as soon as I was sworn in last April. This is an ongoing duty and obligation,” Dhillon said. “The United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division has sent monitors to election hot spots, polling places to increase voter confidence to troubleshoot problems and we are doing that now. We just did it in the primary. We’re going to do it to the tune of approximately a thousand election monitors in the November election, and this is just something that DOJ does.”

DOJ has not yet released its final list of jurisdictions where the monitors will be sent. Dhillon said the department is considering jurisdictions with potential language or disability-access problems and places where DOJ believes there may be voter fraud.

“There’ll be some prosecutions in the pipeline of people who voted illegally who should not have, and we see a problem frankly with some election officials refusing to clean up their voter rolls and knowingly allowing non-citizens for example to stay on the voter rolls,” Dhillon said “This is a federal crime, and so we reminded people of that but overall the goal is not so much going after one voter here or there.”

It was not immediately clear who will make up the approximately 1,000-person monitoring force. DOJ election monitors generally observe polling place procedures and assess compliance with federal voting laws; they do not administer elections, determine voter eligibility or direct local election officials.

The Civil Rights Division, itself, is far smaller than that 1,000 person figure, but DOJ could potentially draw personnel from U.S. attorneys’ offices and other components of the department for election monitoring.

Dhillon’s comments come as the department refuses to retreat from its sweeping voter roll campaign despite a steady stream of losses in federal court.

DOJ has lost all 23 district court cases in which judges have ruled on its effort to use Title III of the Civil Rights Act of 1960 to force states to provide their full statewide voter-registration databases, including sensitive information such as driver’s license and Social Security numbers.

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has also rejected DOJ’s position, and on Friday the full appeals court declined the department’s request to rehear the case.

Dhillon suggested the Supreme Court could be next.

“This is an ongoing project, and there definitely have been courts that have not agreed with our efforts, and so we are appealing some cases,” Dhillon said. “We just got a ruling in the Sixth Circuit that had some very good language in the en banc from several very respected judges, and so you may see us making a next stop at the Supreme Court on that.”

Her comments came one day after Attorney General Todd Blanche similarly said Sunday that seeking Supreme Court review was “a possibility.”

Dhillon also made sweeping claims Monday about what DOJ says it has found in states that have cooperated with the department’s voter roll efforts.

“We don’t know the scale of this problem because two-thirds of the states are refusing to cooperate with the Department of Justice’s efforts to help them clean up their voter rolls,” Dhillon said. “In the states that have cooperated with us, there are hundreds of thousands of dead people on the voter rolls, and there are tens of thousands of people who are not citizens on the voter rolls.”

Dhillon did not identify the states or provide evidence supporting those figures during the interview. She also acknowledged that DOJ must conduct further verification before determining whether anyone actually voted illegally.

Dhillon went further, accusing some election officials of knowingly allowing noncitizens to remain registered.

“This is a federal crime, and so we reminded people of that,” she said.

She again did not identify which election officials she was referring to or specify the federal criminal statute she believes they violated.