Trump sputters in Reflecting Pool humiliation

Okay, I just have to start with the reflecting pool because the story just keeps getting crazier and crazier. I mean, is it an omen of things for Trump? I don't know. Maybe. Is it a sign of his complete incompetence and obsession with weird stuff that doesn't really matter? Definitely, I think that's pretty much for sure. And I'm going to go through, I just have to go through all of the developments here. But first, I just want to welcome back Caroline Leavitt, who is back from maternity leave and seems to be wrapped fully in kind of love and compassion. Want to talk about the baby or the algae? Where would you like to start? Well, the baby is certainly much more enjoyable to talk about, Sean. But the algae is obviously the news of the day, and it is completely ridiculous. It's unbelievable to see these people, these deranged leftists in algae costumes with team algae on their backs. What does that even mean? Only the Democrats could hate beautifying our nation's capital and making it a symbol of pride again. But this is what the American people elected President Trump to do. First of all, I'd be happy to hear about the baby. Congratulations to her on her baby. That's amazing. But the launch into the insanity of the Democrats so quickly and the choice to go on Sean Hannity right back from maternity leave, I'm just going to say it's a choice. It's a choice. OK, so here's some updates and kind of where things stand on the pool. And I don't want to miss anything. So I've got some notes here. OK, you've probably I mean, maybe I should call it a swamp. Have you seen the color of it? The color of it is very, very green. There it is. That's the color of the reflecting pool right now. So let's start. That was not the original color of the reflecting pool, nor what the reflecting pool is supposed to look like. And by now, I mean, it was supposed to be American flag blue. That's that's what Trump described it as. That was the paint job. That was the plan. Remember, he did a no bid contract. He said it was an emergency, had to get it done. That's people. They're cleaning out the algae, cleaning out the algae. Now there's peeling paint. That is part of the issue that we're seeing in the reflecting pool. Could that have an impact on the ducks who are dead? We don't know. We'll have to see when they do the duck autopsies, when those are done. But lots of impacts of the peeling paint. But you can see the peeling paint there. Not how it's supposed to work. Remember, no bid contract to cost multiples of what it was supposed to cost. Then there is this latest development, which is as crazy as it sounds. And you may have even seen this. Trump is claiming there is a 350 foot long gash and was done with knife or a knife or razors that that explains what is happening with the peeling paint and Just think about how crazy that is. Somebody or multiple people would have to, I guess, go to the reflecting pool in the dark of night, because obviously this wouldn't happen during the day in the middle of Washington, D.C. near monuments and see through the algae with a sharp enough knife to cut 350 feet through the reflecting pool. I guess that is what the idea is here. Now, as crazy as that sounds, it's even crazier given what Trump himself has said in the past not so long ago about the integrity of the pool ceiling. And just in case you haven't seen that, we're going to play that for you. This will last for at least 50 years. You'll never have a leak. It's very strong. You couldn't if you had a knife. I don't want to give anybody ideas. If you had a knife, you can't even cut it so strong, so powerful, powerful rubber. It is beautiful sealed. I mean, OK, he it was so on the nose there. I mean, he described this as you couldn't cut it with a knife. You just heard him say that. But now his accusation is that some vandals in the dark of night, I suppose, are cutting 350 feet through the algae. And that is what's happening here and not the pure sheer incompetence of the people he hired to paint and seal the pool. Things you just can't make up. Now, this is all related. The whole rest of this was related to America's 250th anniversary, which is coming up next week. And as a part of that, there is something called Trump's Great American State Fair. And the lineup that has been assembled is not exactly star studded or nearly as star studded, not even comparably as star studded as the opening of President Obama's library, which he, of course, had Stevie Wonder, John Legend, Christina Aguilera, Jennifer Hudson, Bruce Springsteen, Bono. I'm sure I'm forgetting a few performers. OK, so not exactly that. This is the one also I should remind you where a bunch of artists already dropped out, too. So even with the original lineup was not comparable to the Obama lineup, but the original lineup had Milli Vanilli. OK, the one remaining member, I should say, Martina McBride. All right. Bret Michaels. That was part of the thing. Slated to perform now are Lee Greenwood. Of course, Lee Greenwood's always there when Trump needs him. Christopher Macchio. And wait for it. Kash Patel's girlfriend, Alexis Wilkins. Now, this surely doesn't have anything to do with her boyfriend being the FBI director, does it? I mean, surely not. Right. Well, what was quite telling is that Wilkins tweeted within two hours tweet after the lineup announcement. And you can see it on your screen. And I'm just going to give you some highlights. I've been a country music artist for years now. I've had a successful career in both music and commentary strategy. People don't get to negate that for clicks or headlines. I was invited to sing this anthem on my own accord, as I have been many other places throughout my career. I'm no longer. I'm skipping ahead, accepting false narratives and total sham accusations that diminish my hard work and earned accomplishments. All right, Alexis, defensive much now I would note. I don't know how the decisions were made, but just to give you a sense, if you're trying to beat out these allegations, she has, even though she's been a country music artist for years, approximately five thousand eight hundred and sixty three monthly listens on Spotify. OK, and just to give you a point of comparison, Laura Trump, great singer Laura Trump, has up almost double the number of monthly Spotify monthly listeners as Alexis, Alexis Wilkins. So there you go. OK, moving on from Trump to to happier, interesting news, the Democratic primaries. There have been there have been Democratic primaries nearly every week, but there were big Democratic primaries in a number of states last night and primaries in general. But some of the most interesting ones were in New York, and they were interesting for a couple of reasons. One is that Mayor Mamdani decided to put his political weight behind a couple of candidates. And these candidates were in very liberal districts of New York. But still, it was still super interesting. There's no other way to cut it than this was a huge, huge night for Mayor Mamdani and his political power in New York and the power of his endorsements. Endorsements don't always move people to vote for the person that you're endorsing. But in this case, there's no doubt they did. So to give you a sense, he endorsed three candidates, two of them, Daria Liza Avila Chevalier. She defeated an incumbent member of Congress, Congressman Espaillat. OK, she defeated him. And then Brad Lander, who he also endorsed, defeated Dan Goldman, who is also a sitting member of Congress. So two people that Mayor Mamdani endorsed defeated two sitting members of Congress. The other person he endorsed, Claire Valdez, in New York 7, she didn't defeat a sitting member of Congress, but Nydia Velazquez is retiring. And Nydia Velazquez had endorsed a candidate, Antonio Reynoso, who was no schlub himself. I mean, he was the Brooklyn borough president, which is a pretty significant role in New York. And still, Claire Valdez defeated Antonio Reynoso. So a very big night for Mamdani. And the thing that's interesting about it is he made the decision. He took some rest of his political weight there. He didn't just endorse and then be mom. He fundraised for these people. He went and did campaign events for them. He really threw a lot of the weight of his political movement behind it. What it tells me, I mean, it tells me a lot more about Mamdani than it does about the individual candidates or individual new potential members. These people are going to win because they're very progressive districts and we'll see what they do. But most people couldn't pick most of these candidates out of a lineup. It's just that they were endorsed by Mamdani and that helped a lot of them push it over the edge. The other thing that's interesting about this is Israel, because it and policy toward Israel, now the entire Democratic Party has moved left. And you can see that just by votes and the number of Democrats who have voted against providing additional funding for Israel in recent months. And that number keeps increasing. Now, one of those people who voted against providing additional funding to Israel is Dan Goldman, who was just defeated because of his position, because he does not call Gaza a genocide. That is a big part of it. And Brad Lander is more progressive than Dan Goldman on that particular issue. But that does tell you the entire party has moved. But that also tells you how the most progressive wing of the party has moved. And Israel and candidates' positions on funding for Israel on Gaza is unquestionably an issue in a lot of different races. This is also probably going to create a headache for Kathy Hochul, because now there are more members of the DSA, Democratic Socialists, who are going to be in the New York delegation. So that's interesting. And it does not look great for Hakeem Jeffries. Now, to his defense, he is the Democratic leader. They historically do endorse sitting members of Congress. Should that always be the policy? I'm not sure. I don't know that it should be. But it has been the policy, and that's what he does. And he's known some of these members. He's from New York himself. He's known some of these sitting members for a very long time. But it's hard to say what it's going to do for his leadership. I mean, if he, if the Democrats win back the House, which they likely will, and he is a candidate for speaker, there's not obvious challenges to that, nor do I think there will be. Brad Lander has said he would vote for him. The other two whom I'm Donnie endorsed have not yet said that. So that is an interesting thing to watch. So lots of interesting things to watch and impacts. What I don't think it means is that the Democratic Socialist agenda is the party platform for every candidate across the country moving forward, because every district, including in New York, is very different. I mean, even in New York, if you just look to New York 12 and the district where Michael Lasher won, and he defeated George Conway, and he also defeated Jack Schlossberg, is of course a Kennedy member of the Kennedy family. That's a district where they were far more conservative on issues related to Israel. Most of the leading candidates, except for Jack Schlossberg actually, wouldn't say whether they would vote against funding for Israel. And then if you look to the district that is the best Democratic pickup, Mike Lawler's district, who's a Republican, who's only been there for four years, the winner of the Democratic primary has a national security background, would be considered much more moderate. My point is the Democratic Party is a big freaking umbrella, big tent party. So really interesting for Mamdani's power, going to create some headaches for Hochul and going to create some headaches potentially for Jeffries. It definitely tells you some things about the movement on some issues in the party, but I don't think it tells you about where the platform of the party is going to be in 2028. We'll see. There's lots more to come from this, obviously. The other thing that's interesting with the support for all the different kinds of candidates running in primaries that stuck out to me this week is that Democratic turnout has been absolutely through the roof. And just to give you a sense, turnout has increased in nearly 93% of the 121 Democratic House primaries that were also contested in 2022, compared with 57% of the contested Republican primaries. That is a huge increase and it shows you kind of across the board how much more Democratic enthusiasm has really gone up. And Democrats are also, and this is a good sign, it's a good sign of how the party is rebuilding because Democrats are also smashing ballot recruitment records and fielding more candidates in races than they have in decades. And this is something you talk to a lot of people and they complain for good reason. Like we have to run people in different races to see if they actually have a chance of winning. You don't know what the electorate is going to necessarily be for. Just to give you a sense, in Minnesota, for the first time, the party is a candidate for every state legislative race. In Texas, the party is also fielding candidates for every legislative seat for the first time in its modern history. In South Carolina, they've got candidates in every race where the party hopes to break a Republican supermajority. In Arizona, there's candidates everywhere seeking to flip both chambers. And in North Carolina, they're contesting all but two seats. Those are some states that are quite blue, some of them even more red than blue, and that tells you a lot. This is all going on despite the Trump administration's efforts and not despite, it's probably, I mean, this is probably part of what's motivating him to create more chaos and insanity in the system. And it means people are not afraid of that. They're not going to take it sitting down and people are still showing up. And that's a very, very good sign because there's undoubtedly going to be more shenanigans coming up. But as a reminder, I mean, just today, Trump said he wouldn't sign a bipartisan housing bill. There was actually, they had built the staging for this. It was supported in a bipartisan way. If you're Republicans, you're quite freaking pissed off right now because this is something they could have talked about as having accomplished and Democrats voted for it too. He canceled that until Congress passes the Save America Act. And why? Why is he obsessed with that? Because it would overhaul elections in 50 states. It would add new proof of citizenship. It would add voter ID requirements. Essentially, it would make it much harder for people to participate in the process. And he recognizes with Democratic turnout, with the fact that Democrats are winning special elections, he's got to get into some shenanigans. So that is exactly what he's doing. And earlier this week, I also know that the pushback worked in court. It's not just people standing up and voting. That's an important part of it. But there's been some big blows to Trump in court. A federal judge actually blocked Trump from creating basically what would be privacy freaking nightmare ahead of the midterms. He was trying to create this database that would include social security numbers and citizenship status, which would have been kind of a twofer for him because it could have been used for mass deportations, but also to overhaul federal election laws. And it is pretty significant. I mean, the judge in the case ruled that they're already trying to do this. And it is all based on this completely bullshit accusation about election fraud, which is so rare. It barely ever happens ever. So it's all very telling. The point is, Democrats very excited, very enthused. We see that across the country. And everybody should be clear eyed about what the Trump administration is going to continue to try to do. But as of now, people are not being deterred. OK, the other thing I wanted to mention, that's not really about politics, but sort of. Hunter Biden is back on the scene. You may have seen this. You may have heard it. He's done a bunch of things. He did Candace Owens podcast. He did Governor Gavin Newsom's podcast. He's done a bunch of things out there. But he also it was Father's Day just this last weekend, as you all know. And he posted basically a tribute to his dad, which was incredibly beautiful. I posted it there on the screen. You can also find it, too. And I just want to highlight part of it. He said, I'm not trying to become my father. I'm trying to carry what he gave me. And if I can do that, even imperfectly, that will be enough. Happy Father's Day, Dad. I love you. There's a lot more, he says. But what I love about this is that, one, he's not afraid to be out there. He's imperfect. He'd say that. But he also used this as a moment to kind of highlight his love for his dad, somebody who has been beaten down quite a bit. But no one can speak to that probably more than Hunter, who his dad has stood by throughout many trials and tribulations in his life and many challenges and many tragedies. Now, to give you kind of a contrast here, I will say Ivanka and Don Jr. did post about their dad on Father's Day. So I guess good for them. But what about Eric Trump? What did Eric Trump, someone who's chronically online, post for his dad on Father's Day? Nothing that we could find. So there is that, quite telling, as always. One last fun thing that I have been thinking about, I was at the Obama Library opening last week. I worked for him for 10 years. And it was just this joyful and hopeful reminder of what's possible. And nobody believed he could win when he ran in 2007. I started working from the week he announced he was running. That's a reminder of that. He announced he was running just weeks after the 2006 midterm elections when Democrats won back the House. Maybe there's some parallels here. Who really knows? And there's not enough I can say about the joy and hope that was felt at that event in that room, in large part because of the people who were there. It wasn't just Cristina Aguilera. That wasn't even the most important part. Or John Legend. It was the people who had believed and been a part of the movement from the very beginning. And it reminds me of what we're seeing across the country right now. But there's been content that's been kind of coming out in recent days that has been really fun. And one of them is this post that Michelle Obama and George W. Bush have this sort of special relationship, I guess I could say, a friendship. They've sat next to each other at a lot of events. And so she posted, or her team posted about this moment that I think really captures the vibes of the entire opening. And it was this moment basically where George W. Bush gifted Michelle Obama some Altoids. And he was basically paying tribute to this very sweet moment between them that went viral at former Senator John McCain's funeral. You can see it right there when they sat next to each other. It was all a reminder. I was watching George W. Bush during this event. I was thinking, he seems to be having a good time. And also, maybe he was like, maybe I should have joined this whole thing earlier. The only sitting president who was not there, the only alive president, I should say, former or current, was Donald J. Trump, who was, of course, not invited. But it was all a reminder of civility and hope and joy and what politics is really supposed to be about.