Only one student has registered for courses at West Virginia University’s new Washington Center, an academic program mandated by Republican lawmakers for the campus, reports @amelianews.bsky.social. Lawmakers have allocated around $3 million to the Washington Center in the last two years.
The U.S. used to send refugee officers around the world. Now, they're only going to South Africa, where the Trump administration has singularly focused U.S. refugee resettlement efforts on the country’s white population.www.notus.org/immigration/…
Rod Joseph, a Florida Republican congressional candidate, asserts that everyone is “born straight” and people become LGBTQ by choice.“You cannot be born gay. That’s impossible biologically."He's running in FL20, a district with large #LGBTQ population.#Florida #politicsgift link …
America’s small businesses are giving up on health insurance. Employers and workers confront unaffordable premium hikes, with no relief in sight. http://www.statnews.com/2026/07/07/s… via @statnews.com
Dozens of insurers in 16 states and D.C. have proposed increasing next year’s premiums by a median of 14%, according to a review of initial rate filings by KFF, a nonpartisan health policy organization.
Breaking news: The US military has launched what it called 'a series of powerful strikes' against Iran in response to the Islamic republic’s attacks on commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz. ft.trib.al/mbpDos5
Breaking: The U.S. revoked a waiver that allowed the sale of Iranian oil after attacks on commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz on.wsj.com/4wvN9sa
1. The Pentagon has refused to provide an accurate accounting of the costs of the Iran War, so Popular Information crunched the numbers. The DIRECT COSTS are at least $103 BILLION in the first 120 days. This is $73 billion more than the latest official estimate.
2. Last week, OMB Director Russell Vought said the US had spent $30 billion on the Iran War. This makes little sense since Vought has already requested $72 billion to cover Iran War costs.
4. This does not include the indirect costs — higher gas prices, inflation, veterans care, interest on the debt — that some experts believe will push the total costs above $1 trillion.
I find it weird that we learn that tRump had a long phone call with Putin with no aids on the line and then goes to a NATO summit and calls for everything Putin wants. Putin wants his puppet in control of the region where Greenland is so he can have access to the area, and Putin wants US troops pulled from Europe, and Putin wants NATO weakened. Hugs.
President Donald Trump on Tuesday resurrected his push for the U.S. to acquire Greenland.
He suggested the U.S. could pull its troops from Europe in response to the Continent’s continued pushback on the issue.
Trump’s comments came shortly after he arrived in Ankara, Turkey, for a NATO summit.
U.S. President Donald Trump (L) gestures as he speaks during a bilateral meeting at the Bestepe Presidential Compound as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (R) looks on, following Trump’s arrival to attend the annual NATO Summit on July 7, 2026 in Ankara, Turkey.
Win Mcnamee | Getty Images
President Donald Trump on Tuesday resurrected his push for the U.S. to acquire Greenland, and suggested the U.S. could pull all of its armed services members out of Europe in response to the Continent’s continued pushback on the issue.
The island territory “should be controlled by the United States,” Trump said shortly after he arrived in Ankara, Turkey, for a NATO summit.
The 32-member alliance — which includes Denmark, of which Greenland is a part — fell into a crisis in January, as Trump demanded that the U.S. must take control of the island territory on national security grounds.
In a bilateral meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday afternoon Ankara time, Trump vented that Europe’s refusal to go along with his expansionist desire is “what hurt my relationship with NATO.”
“Because Greenland doesn’t help Denmark. Denmark doesn’t spend money to really help Greenland, but it’s an important part for the United States,” Trump told reporters.
“And it’s surrounded by China ships and Russian ships, and that’s not going to happen, the ships, is, it’s not going to happen,” he said, repeating claims about foreign military threats against the self-governing island that experts on Greenland have denied.
Greenland “should be controlled by the United States, not by Denmark,” Trump went on. “And when they wouldn’t go along with it, and with all the money we spend to help them with Russia — we don’t have to spend any money.”
“We could remove all of our soldiers out of Europe,” he said. “Because as you probably noticed, Europe’s a very different place than it was 20 years ago.”
“And they better be careful,” Trump went on, speaking broadly about Europe, “with immigration and energy. If they’re not careful with those two things, you’re not going to have a Europe anymore.”
He then ended the portion of the meeting that was open to the press.
Working group talks
Trump’s comments thrust Greenland, a vast, sparsely populated and largely frozen Arctic island, back into the geopolitical spotlight.
The U.S. president’s pursuit of Greenland had become a major trans-Atlantic issue at the start of the year, sparked by Trump’s repeated claims that the U.S. needed to acquire the island. Greenlandic lawmakers have insisted the island is not for sale.
Trump, who had refused to rule out the use of military force to annex Greenland, abruptly announced in late January, however, that he and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte had formed a “framework of a future deal” with respect to the territory.
A working group of representatives from the U.S., Denmark and Greenland have since been meeting to discuss the way forward.
Residential apartment buildings in Nuuk, Greenland, Jan. 25, 2026.
Sean Gallup | Getty Images News | Getty Images
Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen reportedly said late last month that he expects the working group to find a solution by the end of the year.
Asked Tuesday about Trump’s latest comments on Greenland, Finnish President Alexander Stubb told CNBC’s Steve Sedgwick: “Be more Arctic, be more cool. If it is about Arctic security, we have seven countries that are Arctic nations in the alliance.”
He added: “Finland has trained 1 million soldiers in Arctic conditions; we basically live in Arctic conditions. Let’s keep that in mind. Let’s, you know, continue the process that the Danes, the Americans and the Greenlanders have.”
This is a serious report. Grim shows Israeli soldiers blocking a family from taking their ill and dying 2 year old to a waiting ambulance until the kid died. They show a video of IDF Israeli soldiers making Palestinians get into a small car then tossing in a stun grenade and slaming the door shut. Complete and uder disregard for life and they take joy in hurting and degrading the Palestinians because they know they will suffer no consequences for what they are doing. The hosts elaborate on a Palestinian doctor in israeli custody who has been tortured, beaten, and starved for 2 years with no charges. The description of what he looks like now and the abuse he suffered is horrific. If you are a politician who supports Israel doing these acts you have no business representing the US. Hugs
A federal judge rejected President Donald Trump’s request for more time to respond to New York writer E. Jean Carroll’s demand for $5.8 million she won in a civil lawsuit against him.Judge rejects Trump bid to delay $5.8M payment to E. Jean Carroll.www.usatoday.com/story/news/p…
The Coast Guard just removed the Clearwater from the tall ship parade in NYC for having "Save the Clean Water Act" and "Indigenous Rights, Racial Justice, Climate Solutions” banners.They were escorted out by the Coast Guard, US Navy, and NYPD.www.instagram.com/p/DaYOP8OlIq…
Belgian diamond group that won tariff relief gifted Trump a lavishly encrusted ring All told, 321 diamonds, 56 sapphires, 13 emeralds and six rubies encrust the watch-sized gold ring presented this week to Bill White, the U.S. ambassador to Belgium, to give to President Donald Trump…. …
Went down to the Great American State Fair. My personal highlight might have been this Madison cosplayer arguing before literally ones of people that we’re a republic and not a democracy.
tRump is desperate not to have anymore files or information released. His personal lawyer / attack dog is now the person in charge of the DOJ. He will do or say anything to protect tRump and the wealthy abusers. I fear that this was very close to saying to the court “go fuck yourself, we are not going to obey the court”. Hugs
The Department of Justice on Thursday declined to turn over additional information from the Epstein files as ordered by a judge, arguing the materials include sensitive victim information or were appropriately redacted as required by law.
Hours ahead of the deadline to turn over the materials or explain why they were properly withheld, Associate U.S. Attorney General Stanley Woodward asked the judge to delay the deadline by 60 days or disregard it entirely by accepting the DOJ’s reasons for withholding the materials.
“Although the Government strongly disagrees with the Court’s ruling that the [Epstein Files Transparency Act] is enforceable by private parties through the Administrative Procedure Act, the Government welcomes this opportunity to resolve any confusion regarding the records at issue in this case,” Woodward wrote.
Close up image of a tablet screen displaying a portrait of Jeffrey Epstein beside the official U.S. Department of Justice website page titled Epstein Library in Washington District of Columbia United States on February 11, 2026.
Veronique Tournier/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images
According to Woodward, some emails in question — which had their senders and recipients concealed — were redacted to protect the names of victims. For one of the emails, Woodward claimed that some of the information was withheld because “many communications written by victims, without context, can appear disturbing on their face.”
Woodward also claimed that the redactions to a draft 2007 indictment from the Southern District of Florida were present in the original file obtained by the Department of Justice and that they have been unable “to locate an unredacted version of this specific photocopy.”
Regarding the interview notes from a woman who made unsubstantiated assault claims about President Donald Trump, Woodward claimed that the materials were “deemed duplicative of the typewritten reports memorializing the interviews.”
“Their handwritten nature further complicates the redaction process and increases the risk of inadvertent disclosure of victim [personal identifiable information] — including because of technical limitations on the Department’s ability to run meaningful quality control checks for victim PII across handwritten materials,” he wrote.
The claims made by the woman were uncorroborated, and Trump has denied the allegations. The DOJ has released the interview reports from some of those interviews, but not the underlying notes.
The U.S. Department of Justice logo is seen on a podium before a news conference, Monday, May 4, 2026, in Washington.
Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP
Woodward also pushed back on the U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan’s conclusion that the Department of Justice effectively conceded that they violated the law passed by Congress to force the release of the Epstein files.
“Indeed, the Department has not knowingly violated, nor has it ever acknowledged violating, the EFTA as it continues working to comply with statutory requirements,” he wrote.
In his order last week, Sullivan rejected the DOJ’s arguments against releasing the materials and concluded that the Public Integrity Project, a public interest law firm, demonstrated that independent journalist Katie Phang was harmed by the materials being withheld.
The DOJ began releasing thousands of pages of documents related to Epstein late last year, following the release of the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
However, the department faced criticism from some lawmakers who questioned whether the department violated the act by withholding some materials and missing the deadline to release the files.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has stated repeatedly that the DOJ has complied with the law.
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