Tag: media buzz

Trump ignores elections as Democrats stumble on the way to likely victories

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The Democrats running for governor in New Jersey and Virginia should win easily.

And yet the races are tighter than the prognosticators had expected. Here’s why.

Mikie Sherrill, a former Navy officer and ex-prosecutor as well as a sitting congresswoman, should clobber Jack Ciattarelli, a onetime assemblyman who has already run twice and lost.

Since I began my career at a New Jersey newspaper, I can tell you that the Garden State has never been as solidly blue as it is now.

SHERRILL PULLS OUT ALL STOPS WITH OBAMA ENDORSEMENT, STAR-STUDDED NEW JERSEY CAMPAIGN PUSH AS RACE TIGHTENS

Rep. Mikie Sherrill, D-N.J., is doing everything she can to make her gubernatorial faceoff with Republican ex-Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli a referendum on the Trump administration. (Eduardo Munoz/Reuters)

One problem that Sherrill faces is that outgoing governor Phil Murphy is extremely unpopular, and voters tend not to reward the party in power when they’re ticked off.

And then there’s the Trump factor, which hangs over Tuesday’s races like a storm cloud.

While Ciattarelli called Trump a “charlatan” in 2015, they’ve since made up and the president has endorsed him. In 2012, he voted against a bill legalizing same-sex marriage but has since flipped his position.

Sherrill is doing everything she can to make the election about Trump. She pounds away at the president, knowing full well that Ciattarelli can’t separate himself from the Trump agenda on any issue without potentially triggering his anger.

What’s more, Trump canceled a $16 billion tunnel between New Jersey and New York. That is poison among North Jersey commuters.

Throw in a month-long government shutdown, and the weekend’s suspension of SNAP food benefits, and you’ve got a perfect storm for Sherrill.

But with Ciattarelli campaigning in minority communities, it’s just not going to be a cakewalk.

TRUMP STUMPS FOR ENTIRE VIRGINIA GOP TICKET, WHILE YET TO FORMALLY ENDORSE EARLE-SEARS

In Virginia, Rep. Abigail Spanberger, a former CIA officer, would ordinarily be rolling to victory against Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, the first Black woman to win a statewide race. Trump has not endorsed her.

But Spanberger has displayed a distinct lack of courage, and that’s hurt her.

The Democrat running for attorney general, Jay Jones, is widely viewed as a disgrace. He texted a colleague that he had “two bullets” for the then-speaker of the House of Delegates, Todd Gilbert. Oh, and he’d like to see his children die.

Spanberger could have insisted that he bow out of the race, that this was absolutely appalling behavior. But she didn’t. She still backs Jay Jones. That made her look like just another self-serving political hack.

Embattled attorney general nominee Jay Jones continues to be a political albatross for Virginia Democrats. (Maxine Wallace/The Washington Post/Getty Images)

The press has largely given Spanberger a pass, making it into a one- or two-day story before moving on. But Earle-Sears, a combat veteran, has thrown most of her advertising budget at this one issue, while also playing up the trans women in men’s sports controversy.

Spanberger is running against the Trump economy as a way of playing up the affordability issue in the commonwealth. She casts the Trump tariffs as a “massive tax hike on Virginians.”

Virginia is not as blue as New Jersey, but the northern suburbs certainly are, a place where untold numbers of federal workers have been fired or aren’t getting paid during the shutdown.

Spanberger is trying to convert some Trump voters in rural areas. But as former senator Joe Manchin told Politico, “If you have a ‘D’ by your name in rural America – grassroots, rural, religious America – they’re going to lose, no matter how they try to switch.”

Spanberger is still on track to win by double digits, in a state won by Kamala Harris – so she seems to have ridden out the storm.

NEW POLL IN KEY SHOWDOWN FOR VIRGINIA GOVERNOR INDICATES SINGLE-DIGIT RACE

Trump, who has been consumed by foreign travel and mediating wars, has paid little attention to this week’s elections, publicly at least. He has not campaigned for anyone in person during the final stretch. It’s as though he knows he has a losing hand – probable losses in left-leaning states – and doesn’t want to be associated with the outcome.

Barack Obama, the de facto champion of the leaderless Democrats, campaigned for Spanberger and Sherrill on Saturday.

Former President Barack Obama joined Spanberger, pictured, and Sherrill on the campaign trail over the weekend. (Steve Helber/AP Photo)

That brings us to New York City and its toxic, melting pot, heavily ethnic, punch-in-the-nose brand of politics.

Here Trump is playing a role by constantly denouncing Zohran Mamdani, the front-runner who would be the city’s first Muslim mayor, as a “communist.”

The Republicans are already running against Mamdani, the self-proclaimed socialist. He is a gift from the political gods. They are making him the face of the Democratic Party.

Andrew Cuomo, who learned politics from his father Mario, when I first met him, was outhustled by Mamdani. The polls are suddenly tightening, but the charismatic Mamdani is still likely to win, largely because Republican Curtis Sliwa, the former Guardian Angel who has no chance, refuses to drop out.

The hard-edged Cuomo is hardly an ideal candidate. He was forced to resign as governor four years ago after a torrent of sexual harassment allegations, which he denies.

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Hakeem Jeffries finally gave Mamdani a lukewarm endorsement, despite the fact that he doesn’t recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, because he’s the expected winner. If that happens, Mamdani won’t be able to deliver on most of his promises for free goods and services, because he’ll need help from Albany and other power centers.

And that will be hung around the neck of every Democrat running in places far less liberal than the five boroughs. The Republicans will make sure that Mamdani is the most famous Democrat in the country, the symbol, fairly or not, of a far-left party.

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Off-year elections are usually a snooze, testing turnout when the incumbent president isn’t on the ballot. But this one has more twists and turns than the L.A. Dodgers hanging on by their fingernails to beat the Toronto Blue Jays.

Howard Kurtz is a media and political analyst and the former host of FOX News Channel’s MediaBuzz. Based in Washington, D.C., he joined the network in 2013 and regularly appears on Special Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum among other programs.

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November 3, 2025
With a nuclear backdrop, Trump eases tensions with Xi but merely returns to the status quo

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Donald Trump, who prides himself on being a peacemaker, is going nuclear.

For more than 30 years, the Americans and the Russians – and before that, the Soviets – negotiated over limiting nukes. The theory was simple: Both countries had the power to destroy the world several times over, so why spend untold billions on an endless arms race?

Trump made the announcement just before meeting with the president of China, which is the third-ranking nuclear power, but is quickly catching up.

“Because of other countries testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis,” the president wrote. Although “we have more nuclear weapons than anybody,” he added about testing, “I think it’s appropriate that we do also.”

TRUMP BREAKS 33-YEAR NUCLEAR TESTING SILENCE AS WORLD BRACES FOR DANGEROUS NEW ARMS RACE

This comes as Vladimir Putin is doing some military muscle-flexing, saying he’s developing a “Poseidon” nuclear-powered torpedo that could bury a country such as the United Kingdom under a tsunami of radioactive water, rendering it uninhabitable.

I’ll leave it to the experts to debate whether it makes sense for Trump to plunge into a costly weapons buildup in a rapidly changing nuclear landscape.

But politically it may be a tough sell at a time the White House says it can’t find the money to keep the SNAP program from shutting down on Saturday, because of the government shutdown that has now reached the one-month mark.

The contrast led to a bitter exchange with Chuck Schumer, who said Trump was “gallivanting in Asia, dancing in Malaysia” rather than meeting with Democrats to end the shutdown. The president, saying he’s worked really hard, called Schumer’s remarks “almost treasonous!!!”

The Kremlin is reportedly developing a nuclear-powered torpedo capable of burying a small country in radioactive water. (Ramil Sitdikov/Pool/Reuters )

It’s true that Trump hasn’t really engaged on the shutdown, hoping the other party will be pressured by the rising level of pain.

Now that the dust has settled, it seems that Trump didn’t walk away with much from his 90-minute session with Xi Jinping, other than papering over their differences.

Both sides agreed to postpone higher tariffs for a year, which eases tensions but is really just a return to the status quo. It’s a classic Trumpian tactic of making threats and softening his stance later. Maybe he’ll even agree to talk to Canada again after his pique about that Reagan ad on tariffs.

There wasn’t a word on TikTok, which was thought to be one of the easier problems to solve. Trump has lined up some wealthy allies to buy the hugely popular app, but he needs Xi’s approval – and didn’t get it.

TRUMP SCORES FOUR BIG WINS WITH XI, BUT HAS ONE BIG MISS

During their talk in South Korea, Xi also agreed to postpone restrictions on rare earth minerals that are crucial for making today’s ultra-fast computer chips.

Beijing also agreed to resume its purchases of American soybeans to previous levels over the next three years. That’s good news for our farmers, but again, basically a return to previous levels. Treasury Secretary Howard Bessent says the level could go even higher, but that’s just an optimistic guess.

Xi, by contrast, cares about one issue above all – and Trump says it didn’t come up (unless it is being kept secret).

It’s Taiwan.

President Trump and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping talked in South Korea, though it doesn’t appear the former walked away from the meeting with much. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters)

Several reports say Xi had hoped Trump would slightly soften his language on what China views as a breakaway province. The U.S. has always pledged to defend the island if it’s attacked. Xi didn’t expect it, but a Trump statement that the U.S. doesn’t support Taiwan independence – which other presidents, including Bill Clinton, have said – would help the Chinese dictator gauge the climate if he does decide to move against the country (as we see it) 100 miles off its coast.

Trump has claimed that China doesn’t want to invade Taiwan, and didn’t say much to reporters beyond “Taiwan is Taiwan.”

All this amounts to a welcome reset of U.S. relations with China, easing months of harsh rhetoric. But Trump, who now plans to visit China, essentially brought things back to square one.

Trump has maintained that “Taiwan is Taiwan.” (Carlos Garcia Rawlins/File Photo/Reuters)

Footnote: I’ve been saying for months that Trump was not going to seek a third term, that he was basically trolling the press by toying with the idea.

Turns out I was right.

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“I guess I’m not allowed to run,” which is “too bad,” he told reporters on Air Force One. He’s right. It’s flatly prohibited by the Constitution.

So for all the media speculation, some of it stoked by Steve Bannon, some of it sparked by his grand ballroom plan – why build it if he wouldn’t be using it? – Trump was never serious about it.

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No president wants to be viewed as a premature lame duck. By leaving the door ajar, Trump projected the idea that the press, the politicians and the public might have to deal with him after 2028. But now it’s been slammed shut.

Howard Kurtz is a media and political analyst and the former host of FOX News Channel’s MediaBuzz. Based in Washington, D.C., he joined the network in 2013 and regularly appears on Special Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum among other programs.

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October 31, 2025
Selective outrage: Trump, Democrats mainly denounce the other side’s scandals

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The group chat was racist as hell.

Black folks were called “monkeys” and “the watermelon people.”

The group chat was also utterly anti-Semitic.

“I love Hitler.” Kill them in gas chambers. “I’m ready to watch people burn now.”

JD VANCE TELLS DEMS OUTRAGED OVER YOUNG REPUBLICANS’ LEAKED GROUP CHAT TO ‘GROW UP’

Oh, and there were jokes about rape (“epic”). And a slur against gay people, involving actions by cows.

That reporting by Politico – based on 2,900 pages of leaked chats by the Young Republicans organization – has caused a national uproar.

But JD Vance dismissed it as a “college group chat” and says “kids do stupid things, especially young boys.”

In fact, these were young adults under the age of 40 (according to the rules), working as political strategists and government staffers.

Republicans and Democrats alike are dealing with intra-party extremism problems… but only seem particularly willing to call it out when the other side’s doing it. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images; Mike Kropf/Richmond Times-Dispatch via AP, Pool)

Vermont state Sen. Sam Douglass apologized and resigned, saying he had to protect his family in the face of death threats. His wife, Brianna, posted that “you’re giving nationals to [sic] much credit and expecting the Jew to be honest.”

William Hendrix, working for the Kansas attorney general’s office, has been fired.

Bobby Walker, chair of the New York State Young Republicans, lost his planned spot on a campaign. Peter Giunta has been ousted by a New York assemblyman.

The whole thing is sickening, disgusting and stomach-turning.

FROM AOC TO ZOHRAN MAMDANI, THE DEMOCRATS ARE PEDDLING FAR-LEFT POLITICS

Don’t take my word for it. The Young Republican National Federation says it’s “appalled by the vile and inexcusable language revealed … such behavior is disgraceful, unbecoming of any Republican, and stands in direct opposition to the values our movement represents.”

New York GOP leaders have now voted unanimously to disband the state’s Young Republicans chapter.

But with some brave and prominent exceptions, most Republicans don’t want to talk about the chat fiasco. They have been pivoting to an awful scandal involving, naturally, a Democratic candidate.

Democrats, meanwhile, have hesitated to withdraw support for Jay Jones – their nominee for Attorney General of Virginia – after texts rife with charged, violent rhetoric were released. (Maxine Wallace/The Washington Post/Getty Images)

Jay Jones, running for attorney general in Virginia, was revealed by National Review to have had a violent exchange about a colleague in 2022, when both were in the House of Delegates.

Jones was fantasizing about going after Todd Gilbert, then the House speaker.

Gilbert gets “two bullets to the head,” then Jones said he wanted the speaker’s children to “die in their mother’s arms.”

JD Vance said Jones “has been fantasizing about murdering his political opponents, “I’m sure the people hyperventilating about sombrero memes will join me in calling for this very deranged person to drop out of the race. Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin has done just that.”

President Trump weighed in, saying “the Radical Left Lunatic Jay Jones” had made “SICK and DEMENTED jokes, if they were jokes at all,” about “the murdering of a Republican Legislator, his wife and their children.” The president called Jones an “animal” and that “anybody would be put in prison for what he said.”

Now all this is horrible and nauseating – and it gets worse.

JAY JONES MURDER TEXTS LATEST CASE OF DEMOCRATS CIRCLING THE SCANDAL WAGONS

Abigail Spanberger, the Democrat running for Virginia governor, said she was “disgusted” by Jones’s remarks and issued a statement: “I made clear to Jay that he must fully take responsibility for his words. What I have also made clear is that as a candidate – and as the next Governor of our Commonwealth, I will always condemn violent language in our politics.”

What she definitely did not do was pull her support for the man behind the “violent language.” She still backs Jay “two bullets” Jones. So do most Democrats, with some prominent exceptions.

So each side is engaging in classic whataboutism – insisting that we train our gaze on the other side’s misconduct.

And you know full well if the situations were reversed, Democrats would be denouncing the “two bullets” candidate and Republicans would be slamming the racist and anti-Semitic group chat.

In an ideal world, both would be equally condemned regardless of party.

There are also questions of real political violence – like the horrific Sept. 10 assassination of Charlie Kirk. (Trent Nelson/The Salt Lake Tribune/Getty Images)

David French, the conservative, anti-Trump columnist for the New York Times, says there’s a “twisted moral calculation” that he blames in part on Trumpism but admits the trend began well before DJT got into politics.

“The result is a push-pull dynamic that pushes people of good character out of the party and pulls in new leaders and new people who share the leader’s ethos. Every year, this cultural trend reinforces itself. Decency becomes rarer, and decent people feel more isolated…

“Meanwhile, the trolls multiply until the radicals become the mainstream and the previous mainstream becomes the fringe.” Even compassionate conservative George W. Bush would be deemed too liberal for the Trump GOP. So would Ronald Reagan, who was pro-immigration, and Richard Nixon, who created the EPA.

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And then there’s the question of real violence, in the wake of the horrifying assassination of Charlie Kirk, not to mention the two attempts to muder Trump last year.

“Rising vitriol and escalating illiberalism raise the perceived stakes of elections to such an extent that virtually every partisan American is all too willing to overlook almost any lesser evil to avoid the greater evil of an electoral loss,” says French.

It’s the ultimate means-justify-the-ends argument. It’s really about seizing and holding power. Nothing else matters. And that’s revolting.

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It’s chilling to read that the fringe is now the mainstream, that nothing is more important than defending your side, your team, your ideology, details be damned. But that’s the world in which we now live.

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October 22, 2025
Trump deserves huge credit for achieving peace in Gaza, but marred the moment with his campaign of retribution

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President Trump issues plenty of threats.

Sometimes they get results, sometimes they don’t.

And sometimes it’s just bluster. Especially if it’s an online posting, such as saying that Chicago’s mayor and Illinois’ governor should go to jail for resisting him on dispatching troops to the Windy City.

But his relentless personality – backed by the world’s most powerful military – can be overpowering.

TRUMP NOMINATED FOR NOBEL PEACE PRIZE OVER ISRAEL-HAMAS CEASEFIRE DEAL

President Trump’s recent headway on Middle East peace has been remarkable – though it’s been marred at the last second with echoes of the Letitia James prosecution. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

It’s hard to overstate what a remarkable achievement Trump is in the process of assembling by getting Israel and Hamas to end their brutal and bloody two-year-old war.

It’s fair to say no other president could have pulled this off. Joe Biden certainly couldn’t. In fact, not since Jimmy Carter staged the marathon Camp David talks with Anwar Sadar and Menachem Begin has a president brokered peace between the Israelis and one of their Arab enemies.

Trump himself engineered the Abraham Accords, with help from Jared Kushner, joined by the U.A.E. and Bahrain, in his first term, and later by Sudan and Morocco. That gave him the experience to tackle this immensely tougher challenge and spur more Nobel Peace Prize speculation.

Trump had to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu into accepting his peace deal. (Chen Mengtong/China News Service/VCG via Getty Images)

Now some quick caveats are in order. The president says he expects the remaining 20 hostages to be returned Monday or Tuesday, but the Hamas terrorists could come up with new objections that derail the train.

Reporters were asking about Phase 2, which would include returning the bodies of deceased hostages, but the president wisely deflected those questions.

So no popping of champagne corks quite yet.

EXCLUSIVE: ISRAELI AMBASSADOR SAYS NO PEACE IN GAZA UNLESS HAMAS HANDS OVER ALL 48 HOSTAGES, DISARMS

Presumably, it was these reservations that prompted anchors and correspondents on the air to appear rather sober-faced as they covered the latest developments. But I think it was more than that.

Some of these journalists are not exactly supportive of Trump. And so it’s not easy for them to shower him with credit. They say the right words – tremendous accomplishment and so on – but the body language sends a different message.

Look, Israel has been in a state of war, or cold war, with the surrounding countries since its founding in 1948.

And in a broader sense, the Jews and the Arabs have had hostile relations for many centuries. It’s in the Bible, the plea to Pharaoh to “let my people go.”

Now, there remain crucial unanswered questions about who will rule Gaza, most of it reduced to rubble, in the future. Israel was subject to a brutal massacre on Oct. 7, but it has also found itself increasingly isolated as more than 60,000 Palestinians have been killed. Many Israelis, and American Jews, believe Bibi Netanyahu let the war drag on too long to protect his political standing.

Trump had to pressure Bibi into accepting his peace deal, essentially by threatening to have the U.S. walk away.

Now Hamas is essentially being asked to surrender by turning in its weapons. Trump says he will join with other countries in a peace council to prevent the resumption of war. But those details remain murky, beyond the fact that the terrorists will no longer be in charge, as they have been since Israel voluntarily withdrew from the Gaza Strip nearly two decades ago.

GRAND JURY INDICTS NY AG LETITIA JAMES ON BANK FRAUD CHARGES IN VIRGINIA FEDERAL COURT

So just as the president was basking in some well-deserved praise for essentially remaking the Middle East, there was a new development.

A grand jury indicted Letitia James, New York’s attorney general, for mortgage fraud.

This, in a nutshell, underscores the duality of the Trump presidency.

It seems like a petty move, and in a video, James said “we will fight these baseless charges aggressively.”

A grand jury indicted New York State Attorney General Letitia James for mortgage fraud – in essence, underscoring the duality of Trump. (Jim Franco/Albany Times Union via Getty Images)

As with the recent indictment of James Comey, the indictment was returned only because Trump replaced his own U.S. attorney in Virginia’s eastern district with White House aide and loyalist Lindsey Halligan, who has no prosecution experience.

Trump told his AG, Pam Bondi, in a memo that James, like Comey, was “guilty as hell.” The Wall Street Journal says that “Pam” memo was intended to be secret.

Career prosecutors had decided there wasn’t enough evidence to charge James, who brought a civil suit against candidate Trump on real estate inflation that produced a fine which grew to half a billion dollars – so outrageous that an appellate court tossed it out. James also won her job by promising to go after Trump, calling him an “illegitimate” president.

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James has owned a home in Brooklyn for decades, and two years ago she bought a house in Norfolk, Va. with her niece.

The career prosecutors found little evidence that James was dishonest in completing the paperwork.

The media spotlight immediately shifted from Trump the global peacemaker to Trump the crusader who is doggedly pursuing a campaign of retribution against his enemies.

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At the very moment he was drawing praise from around the world, Trump stepped on his own story.

Howard Kurtz is a media and political analyst and the former host of FOX News Channel’s MediaBuzz. Based in Washington, D.C., he joined the network in 2013 and regularly appears on Special Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum among other programs.

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October 10, 2025
Democrats at a big disadvantage in shutdown as Trump starts slashing their programs

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The Democrats are taking a big gamble by going along with a government shutdown, one that they will probably lose.

The most important reason is that President Trump has a giant megaphone. Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer simply can’t compete in drawing media attention.

What’s more, while some Americans may blame both sides – can’t they act like adults and work out these budget fights? – the Republicans are blaming the “Democrat Party” for triggering the shutdown.

At yesterday’s White House briefing, itself a key advantage, JD Vance and Karoline Leavitt kept repeating, like a mantra, that the Democrats support “healthcare for illegal aliens.” That is bunk. They aren’t eligible. It’s already against the law, except in emergency situations. But Trump is pounding that message home through sheer repetition.

VANCE BLAMES SCHUMER’S FEAR OF AOC PRIMARY CHALLENGE AS SHUTDOWN CAUSE

Democratic leadership sits at a sizable disadvantage when it comes to government shutdown-related messaging. (J. Scott Applewhite, file/AP Photo)

A Washington Post editorial yesterday says “Democrats just marched into a shutdown trap … Progressives embraced the same disastrous mentality that led the House Freedom Caucus to believe it could come out ahead in previous government funding standoffs: They wrongly assumed their political leverage would withstand the ensuing fallout.”

A few minutes after the briefing, Hakeem Jeffries stepped before the microphones to declare that Republicans don’t want to provide healthcare “to working-class Americans.”

The minority leader said the administration is trying to “jam their extreme right-wing agenda down the throats of the American people … The Republican healthcare crisis is immoral.”

Frankly, it just didn’t sound as forceful or have the same impact.

Vice President JD Vance suggested Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., is pivoting left for fear of a primary challenge by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. (Alex Brandon, Pool/AP Photo)

Whatever the immediate toll of the shutdown – military people and hundreds of thousands of civilians not getting paid, food stamps on hold – Vance and Leavitt blamed it on Democratic intransigence. (Those laid off will get back pay once the shutdown ends.)

The vice president said Schumer is moving left because he’s terrified of a primary challenge by AOC. She says her only goal is to “stop this madness.”

The president has been more candid, telling reporters: “We can do things during the shutdown that are irreversible, that are bad for them and irreversible by them. Like cutting vast numbers of people out, cutting things that they like, cutting programs that they like.” Now that’s transparency.

The Dems don’t hold the moral high ground when it comes to kick-the-can votes to delay a shutdown, having frequently used the tactic when they were in charge. While Vance says they’d be happy to talk about healthcare during a seven-week delay, the other party feels they would lose whatever leverage they have, and it would be politically humiliating.

The Democrats are making a more complicated argument about healthcare, and that’s a tougher sell for the many millions who don’t follow the news closely.

KFF, which is Kaiser, says those on Obamacare would get socked if tax credits are allowed to expire at year’s end. Average premiums next year would be $888, but without the tax credits, would jump to $1,593 – a 114 percent increase.

That would really cripple the Affordable Care Act and knock millions off the rolls.

SOCIAL SECURITY, AIRPORTS, FOOD STAMPS: HOW ARE YOU AFFECTED DURING A GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN?

The Dems’ other objection is to deep cuts in Medicaid, despite Trump’s promise to protect the program. But that’s why we have elections. Having lost the House, Senate and White House, the party can’t expect the GOP to make sweeping changes to its preferred budget.

It just so happens – a coincidence, I’m sure – that the administration yesterday halted $18 billion in funding for two major transportation projects in New York City, expansion of the Second Avenue subway and new train tunnels under the Hudson River.

A shot at Schumer’s hometown? Vance says this is a question of “triage,” saving money on such projects to preserve essential services.

But it’s really a case of Trump going after Democratic priorities, as he said he would, since he preserved funding for one of his pet projects, the mission of returning to the moon, which seems less than vital at the moment.

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House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., appeared outraged by an AI image of him shared online by the president. (Nathan Posner/Anadolu/Getty Images)

What really got Jeffries mad after Monday’s unsuccessful White House meeting was a fake AI image posted by the president. It depicted him as having a handlebar mustache and wearing a huge sombrero, with mariachi music in the background.

Jeffries called the parody “racist” and demanded that the president “say it to my face.”

The bottom line, given the atmosphere of mutual distrust, is that this government closure could drag on for awhile. That would gradually boost the pain level, and the Democrats are already at a disadvantage.

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At this point the opposition party is trying to show the public that it can fight, and that, beyond the healthcare battle, may be its main message.

Howard Kurtz is a media and political analyst and the former host of FOX News Channel’s MediaBuzz. Based in Washington, D.C., he joined the network in 2013 and regularly appears on Special Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum among other programs.

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October 2, 2025
Why Trump is suing the New York Times, his white whale, without citing mistakes

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Donald Trump grew up in Queens – a very nice neighborhood, to be sure, but still an outer borough.

Across the East River is the glittering skyline of what those who don’t live there call “the city.” And in the midst of that island is the New York Times building.

When the Times found the real estate developer worthy of profiling, in 1976, it was puff piece at first sight:

“He is tall, lean and blond, with dazzling white teeth, and he looks ever so much like Robert Redford. He rides around town in a chauffeured silver Cadillac with his initials, DJT, on the plates. He dates slinky fashion models, belongs to the most elegant clubs and, at only 30 years of age, estimates that he is worth “more than $200 million.”

TRUMP ANNOUNCES $15 BILLION LAWSUIT AGAINST THE NEW YORK TIMES FOR DEFAMATION, LIBEL

President Donald Trump is now suing the New York Times in a $15 billion defamation case. ( Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

The Redford reference is now sadly dated because of the actor’s passing in his sleep (“Good way to go, I guess,” says Trump.) But in the piece, the “fast talker” acknowledged that his father, Fred Trump, who built middle-class housing in Queens and Brooklyn, only recently tried to crack the Manhattan market because of “psychology.”

(My favorite sentence: “Mr. Trump, who says he is publicity shy, allowed a reporter to accompany him on what he described as a typical work day.”)

I bring all this up, as a Brooklyn guy who has lived in Queens, to underscore how the president has always craved the paper’s approval.

TRUMP TAKES AIM AT CNN AND NEW YORK TIMES OVER IRAN STRIKE COVERAGE, BUT JOURNALISTS ARE SHRUGGING

And he got it – though the tabloids loved his feuds even more – until he went into politics.

Now the president has filed a $15 billion lawsuit against the New York Times.

It’s a strange suit, and it has a snowball’s chance in hell of succeeding.

A statement by the Times says the lawsuit “has no merit.” (Alexandra Schuler/picture alliance via Getty Images)

A Times statement says: “This lawsuit has no merit. It lacks any legitimate legal claims and instead is an attempt to stifle and discourage independent reporting.” What’s odd is that there was no triggering story, no specific inaccuracy alleged. That’s in sharp contrast to the president’s successful suits against CBS and ABC.

Of course, filing a suit – forcing even the biggest companies to spend a fortune on legal fees – is often the point.

Back in the 1980s, Trump sued the Pulitzer-winning Chicago Tribune architecture critic, Paul Gapp, for $500 million, for criticizing his plan to build America’s tallest building – a 150-story tower – in Manhattan. “One of the silliest things anyone could inflict on New York or any other city,” Gapp wrote.

Trump said he had “virtually torpedoed” the project, subjecting him to “public ridicule and contempt.” A judge later dismissed the suit as involving protected opinion.

The new suit names such reporters as chief White House correspondent Peter Baker and investigative journalist Michael Schmidt. It also names Susanne Craig and Ross Buettner, in part for their book “Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success.”

Craig revealed some of Trump’s tax returns, and she and her team won a Pulitzer for reporting on his finances.

In the ABC case, the network settled for $16 million for George Stephanopoulos having said Trump was found liable for rape, not “sexual abuse,” in the civil suit brought by E. Jean Carroll.

CBS also agreed to pay $16 million after the unethical editing of the Kamala Harris interview on “60 Minutes,” to make her sound more coherent.

He has also sued the Wall Street Journal’s parent company for reporting on his birthday message to Jeffrey Epstein – which he continues to deny, although the message from the predator’s files has surfaced with many similarities.

CBS PARENT COMPANY SPARKS MASSIVE OUTRAGE WITH TRUMP LAWSUIT SETTLEMENT

In the lawsuit against the Times, filed in Florida, the president just trashes its campaign coverage. He says on Truth Social he is moving against “one of the worst and most degenerate newspapers in the History of our Country, becoming a virtual ‘mouthpiece’ for the Radical Left Democrat Party. I view it as the single largest illegal Campaign contribution, EVER. Their Endorsement of Kamala Harris was actually put dead center on the front page of The New York Times, something heretofore UNHEARD OF! The ‘Times’ has engaged in a decades long method of lying about your Favorite President (ME!), my family, business, the America First Movement, MAGA, and our Nation as a whole. I am PROUD to hold this once respected ‘rag’ responsible…”

I’m going out on a limb to say that running an editorial on the front page falls under the category of free speech, and lots of papers have occasionally done it.

And remember, as the ultimate public figure, Trump would have to prove malice on the paper’s part, or reckless disregard for whether something is true or not.

ABC settled for $16 million in its Trump-involved lawsuit. (Gary Hershorn/Getty Images)

Given that the president’s coverage is overwhelmingly negative, let’s say for the sake of argument that the Times is leading the resistance.

The Trump suit blames “persistent election interference from the legacy media.”

But unless a plaintiff can point to a verifiable inaccuracy, it falls under the protective umbrella of First Amendment reporting and opinion.

SUBSCRIBE TO HOWIE’S MEDIA BUZZMETER PODCAST, A RIFF ON THE DAY’S HOTTEST STORIES

With Marine One in the background yesterday, ABC’s Jonathan Karl, whom Trump knows well, asked him about criticism of Pam Bondi’s investigations of left-wingers: “A lot of people, a lot of your allies, say hate speech is free speech.”

“She’d probably go after people like you! Because you treat me so unfairly! It’s hate! You have a lot of hate in your heart!”

A moment later, Trump said: “Maybe they’ll come after ABC. Well, ABC paid me $16 million recently for a form of hate speech, right? Your company paid me $16 million for a form of hate speech, so maybe they’ll have to go after you.”

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For the president, a lawsuit is wielded as a weapon. That’s why he’s suing the New York Times, the paper across the river, with which he’s always had a love-hate relationship – and lately, mostly hate.

Howard Kurtz is the host of FOX News Channel’s MediaBuzz (Sundays 11 AM-12PM/ET). Based in Washington, D.C., he joined the network in 2013 and regularly appears on Special Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum among other programs.

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September 17, 2025
Why Trump broke with RFK to defend the importance of vaccines

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If there’s one thing that Donald Trump absolutely, positively despises, it’s bad publicity.

And after RFK Jr. got absolutely hammered at that hearing the other day–including by a member of the leadership, Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso–he realized that he had to cut his losses.

What was he going to do, say ignore those Republican senators, like Bill Cassidy, who’s a doctor, like Barrasso, when he says that vaccines work and he’s deeply concerned that Kennedy misled the Hill during his confirmation hearings?

So after months of letting him “go wild,” in his words, Donald has broken with Bobby.

REPUBLICAN DOCTORS CLASH WITH RFK JR OVER VACCINES IN TENSE SENATE SHOWDOWN

“You have some vaccines that are so incredible. I think you have to be very careful when you say some people don’t have to be vaccinated…,” the president said.

“Look, you have vaccines that work. They just pure and simple work. They’re not controversial at all, and I think those vaccines should be used, otherwise some people are going to catch it, and they endanger other people,”

The president has had enough.

What’s more, Kennedy’s family–including his sister Kerry and former congressman Joe Kennedy III–demanded he resign, along with every Democrat on the Senate committee.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. appears before the Senate Finance Committee September 04, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

There’s some chatter that Kennedy may be let go after a decent interval. Trump really likes him, and the magic of the Kennedy name, but let’s face it, he’s damaged goods right now.

He also was poorly briefed, or didn’t do his homework. Remember that he cut a deal in exchange for dropping out of the presidential race, and offered the same arrangement to Kamala Harris.

When asked how many Americans had died of COVID, I instantly knew it was 1.2 million. RFK said he didn’t know. Asked whether the COVID vaccine had been helpful, he mumbled that he’d have to look at the data. There’s plenty of data available.

And that’s the problem. The greatest achievement of Trump’s first term, as even his detractors admit, was Operation War Speed, bringing the COVID vaccine to market at the height of the pandemic.

JOE KENNEDY III BLASTS RFK JR. AFTER FIERY SENATE HEARING, FUELING KENNEDY FAMILY INFIGHTING: ‘HE MUST RESIGN’

But Kennedy is the same anti-vaccine crusader he’s always been. He has called COVID “the most dangerous vaccine” ever. He’s insisted that vaccines cause autism, completely debunked by mainstream science.

CDC performed miserably during the pandemic, but Kennedy fired CDC chief Susan Monarez just one month after praising her appointment, and then called her a liar for supposedly admitting she was not trustworthy.

The campus of Centers for Disease Control is located near the reported shooting location in Atlanta. (Mike Stewart/AP Photo)

So RFK was in effect denigrating Trump’s huge accomplishment by firing the mainstream members of a vaccine panel and replacing them with vaccine skeptics or outright anti-vaxxers.

Kennedy’s view is that everyone else is conflicted because of ties to Big Pharma and that only he is pure. But his actions speak louder than his words.

INTO THE ARENA: HOSTILE DEMOCRATS, SKEPTICAL REPUBLICANS TEAR INTO KENNEDY ON THE HILL

Meanwhile, the president won a double victory at the Supreme Court. The justices, in what Politico says were 6-3 rulings, gave ICE the ability to carry out “roving” arrests and raids in California against those believed to be illegal immigrants.

SCOTUS also said the president can fire FTC member Rebecca Slaughter, one of two Democratic commissioners he dismissed in March at the supposedly independent agency.

Rebecca Slaughter, commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), during a House Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, July 13, 2023. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Then Trump checks the conservative media.

The Wall Street Journal editorial page, in a piece titled “Operation Warped Speed,” asks whether RFK is suffering from long COVID. The usually supportive New York Post called RFK a “paranoid kook” with a “tinfoil hat” that is “blocking out all sense.”

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So Trump got mostly booed at the U.S. Open, along with some cheers. Big deal. He’s endured far worse.

But having the nation’s highest court on your side is worth its weight in gold, Trump’s favorite decorating glitter.

Footnote: The Wall Street Journal has obtained Trump’s birthday message to Jeffrey Epstein, which he repeatedly insisted he never sent, prompting him to sue the paper.

Against the backdrop of a sketch of a naked woman–with Trump’s signature in the pubic area–there is this exchange:
Donald: We have certain things in common, Jeffrey.
Jeffrey: Yes we do, come to think of it.
Donald: Enigmas never age, have you noticed that?
Jeffrey: As a matter of face, it was clear to me the last time I saw you.
Donald: A pal is a wonderful thing. Happy Birthday–and may every day be another wonderful secret.

By itself, I don’t think it’s that big a deal. Lots of friends and acquaintances were solicited to send messages for Epstein’s 50th birthday. He could have owned it. But Trump *still* insists it’s fake.

By vehemently insisting it wasn’t conceivable that he sent such a message, Trump now has a mess on his hands.

Howard Kurtz is the host of FOX News Channel’s MediaBuzz (Sundays 11 AM-12PM/ET). Based in Washington, D.C., he joined the network in 2013 and regularly appears on Special Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum among other programs.

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September 9, 2025
Trump battles John Bolton, Chris Christie and threatens to pull funds from Wes Moore’s Maryland

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I asked Donald Trump the question. Everyone asked Donald Trump the question.

Would he engage in retribution in a second term?

And we all got the same answer: He’d be too busy for that. His only retribution would be success.

Well, if Trump is not engaged in turning government against his political enemies, he’s doing a pretty good imitation of it.

Now, hardball politics is as old as the republic. The founders engaged in it. Abe Lincoln engaged in it. And you think LBJ never got his way by threatening to pull a grant or two for a congressman’s pet projects?

Look, one thing I’ve learned covering Trump for decades is that he loves to fight. In New York, back in the day, he would do battle with the likes of Ed Koch and Leona Helmsley, the “Queen of Mean.”

BROADCAST BIAS: NETWORKS OOZE WITH SYMPATHY TO ANYONE WHO OPPOSES TRUMP

President Donald Trump has dismissed suggestions that he would target political enemies, but Trump’s combative approach reflects a pattern that has defined both his career and American politics more broadly. (Aaron Schwartz/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

When his divorce from Ivana became a tabloid sensation, Trump got on the phone with me to discuss why his proposed settlement was really generous.

We see that fighting instinct today when the president goes after not just Democrats but fellow Republicans who defy him, or won’t back his proposals – a number of whom have announced their retirements rather than lose a primary to a Trump-backed challenger.

We see that Trump-against-the-world approach with his crackdown on D.C. crime which, despite the home-rule issues, is being welcomed by some liberals (publicly and privately) because folks are scared in a city that can’t even stop teenage carjackings.

The next target is Chicago, which also has a Black mayor, with the Washington Post reporting that there has been weeks of secret planning to send thousands of National Guard troops there. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker has denounced this as an effort to spread fear, and sometimes it seems like the president is at war with urban America.

The underlying motivation is crucial: Trump believes that the Democrats waged “lawfare” against him for four years. There is no evidence that President Biden ordered such efforts, but Trump is convinced that the multiple investigations against him–as in the Stormy Daniels case–were part of a grand scheme to knock him out of the race.

And he has a point. Look at the outrageously illegal fine that Judge Arthur Engoron hit him with in the civil fraud case brought by New York AG Letitia James: $354 million, since grown to $515 million.

This was so blatantly unfair that an appellate court just threw it out as a violation of the Eighth Amendment, barring cruel and unusual punishment. James is appealing, and the court didn’t toss the whole case–the “fake” case, says Trump–but a half-billion-fine over real estate valuations seems pathetically unfair.

But when Trump cried foul, the media reaction was there he goes again, attacking every judge who disagrees with him. But Trump was right about Engoron.

The Trump DOJ, by the way, is now investigating Tish James for allegations of mortgage fraud.

So what the press sees as Trump going after his opponents is, in his eyes, just basic payback, an attempt at getting even.

Having said that…

“I just watched Sloppy Chris Christie be interviewed on a ratings challenged ‘News’ Show…on ABC Fake News,” “This Week” hosted by George Stephanopoulos.
“Can anyone believe anything that Sloppy Chris says? Do you remember the way he lied about the dangerous and deadly closure of the George Washington Bridge in order to stay out of prison, at the same time sacrificing people who worked for him, including a young mother, who spent years trying to fight off the vicious charges against her. Chris refused to take responsibility for these criminal acts. For the sake of JUSTICE, perhaps we should start looking at that very serious situation again?”

Christie, a onetime ally, was Trump’s harshest Republican critic during the campaign. As for the 2013 scandal known as Bridgegate, it was thoroughly investigated and two top Christie aides were convicted, but the Supreme Court, while blasting the conduct, overturned those convictions.

It’s worth pointing out that the decision to close some lanes on the George Washington Bridge, which created traffic chaos, was the governor’s attempt to strike back at a Democratic mayor who refused to endorse him.

“Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” wrote one of the convicted aides in a remarkably succinct message.

“I always thought he got away with murder,” Trump told reporters yesterday.

Having watched the Sunday shows, the president unloaded on two networks:

“Despite a very high popularity and, according to many, among the greatest 8 months in Presidential History, ABC & NBC FAKE NEWS, two of the worst and most biased networks in history, give me 97% BAD STORIES. IF THAT IS THE CASE, THEY ARE SIMPLY AN ARM OF THE DEMOCRAT PARTY AND SHOULD, ACCORDING TO MANY, HAVE THEIR LICENSES REVOKED BY THE FCC. I would be totally in favor of that because they are so biased and untruthful, an actual threat to our Democracy!!!”

CHRIS MATTHEWS SAYS DEMOCRATS ‘FALLING INTO A TRAP OF DEFENDING WHAT’S INDEFENSIBLE’ ON CRIME

President Donald Trump and former national security adviser John Bolton have feuded since Trump fired him in 2019. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

He added that ABC and NBC should be paying “Millions of Dollars a year in LICENSE FEES…Crooked ‘journalism’ should not be rewarded, it should be terminated!!!”

Now networks shouldn’t lose their licenses just because the president doesn’t like their coverage. Maybe they should be paying more for use of the airwaves, but that should apply to all networks; so far they’ve played by the rules.

Trump and John Bolton have been at each other’s throats since the president fired the national security adviser. There was a criminal investigation over Bolton’s 2020 book that Trump tried to stop, but it was cleared for publication.

I take Trump at his word that he didn’t know in advance about the FBI raid on Bolton’s Bethesda home. But twice in the days leading up to the raid, Trump was slamming him online for criticizing his efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war..

“Very unfair media is at work on my meeting with Putin. Constantly quoting fired losers and really dumb people like John Bolton, who just said that, even though the meeting is on American soil, ‘Putin has already won.’ What’s that all about?”

After the raid, Trump called Bolton a “low-life” and a “sleazebag” who suffers from “major Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

But two things can be true at once. Trump prosecutors had to show convincing evidence to a special court to get the search warrant approved. So it’s possible that Bolton did hang on to some classified documents.

After the raid, Trump posted that Bolton was among the “stupid people” who were making it “much harder” for him to end the war by ripping his approach to Putin.

I’ve known John Bolton for years–he used to be a Fox contributor–and I’m surprised he’s made no comment. There was just a little wave at the press pack when he returned home.

Next up: Wes Moore, Maryland’s first Black governor.

They’ve been jabbing each other back and forth, which is fine. But then the president posted this:

“Governor Wes Moore of Maryland has asked, in a rather nasty and provocative tone, that I ‘walk the streets of Maryland’ with him. I assume he is talking about out of control, crime ridden, Baltimore? As President, I would much prefer that he clean up this Crime disaster before I go there for a ‘walk.’ Wes Moore’s record on Crime is a very bad one.”.

DEMOCRATS’ NEW BOOGEYMAN IS A DIFFERENT KIND OF DONALD TRUMP

Governor Wes Moore of Maryland has been rebuilding the Francis Scott Key Bridge with funds approved by Congress as part of a package during the Biden Administration. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

There’s more:

Trump “offered” to deploy troops to Baltimore – which has a serious crime problem – after which he would accept Moore’s invitation to meet him on the streets.

Then came the threat: “I gave Wes Moore a lot of money to fix his demolished bridge. I will now have to rethink that decision???”

Moore has been rebuilding the Francis Scott Key Bridge since a reckless and out-of-control tanker destroyed it early last year. And for the record, Congress approved the funds as part of a package during the final stretch of the Biden administration.

But put that aside. Who would be hurt if Trump carried out this threat?

Millions of people in Maryland who rely on the bridge, or whose jobs are tied to commerce in that region.

So Trump is openly suggesting to use the official power of government to withhold funds that would hurt ordinary citizens. That is more troubling than the punching and counterpunching with Bolton and Christie.

For what it’s worth, I don’t think Trump would actually do it. It’s a brushback pitch.

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While Trump may view himself as evening the score, one day Democrats will occupy the White House again. They would feel fully justified in going after their opponents as payback for the way they were targeted for investigation. And the endless cycle continues.

Howard Kurtz is the host of FOX News Channel’s MediaBuzz (Sundays 11 AM-12PM/ET). Based in Washington, D.C., he joined the network in 2013 and regularly appears on Special Report with Bret Baier and The Story with Martha MacCallum among other programs.

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August 26, 2025