How DeSantis is Making Trump Look More Electable  —  The FL Governor is running a race designed in a lab to strengthen Trump  —  The largest drivers of electoral outcomes are beyond anyone's control — the mood of the country, the state of the economy, world events, etc.

Biden Appeal Opens a New Front in Battle Over Internet Speech  —  The Biden administration's battle with Republican-led states over free-speech limits escalated with its appeal of a judge's sweeping order barring federal officials and agencies from communicating with social media companies over postings they deem objectionable.

Attorney who challenged Trump's 2020 loss gives up law license as states weigh disciplining him  —  Attorney Lin Wood, who filed legal challenges seeking to overturn Donald Trump's 2020 election loss, is relinquishing his law license, electing to retire from practicing rather than face possible disbarment.

Belarus leader claims Wagner chief is in Russia, adding uncertainty about his fate after revolt  —  The mercenary leader who led a short-lived mutiny against the Kremlin is in Russia and his Wagner troops are in their field camps, the president of Belarus said Thursday, raising new questions …

Bypassing Biden: Democrats Think of What Could Have Been  —  In Michigan, a governor with a powerful message seems ready for the next step, but an octogenarian president stands in her way.  —  MACKINAC ISLAND, Mich. — At the very moment last month that images of President Joe Biden falling …

Former U.S. officials have held secret Ukraine talks with prominent Russians  —  The aim of the discussions is to lay the groundwork for potential negotiations to end the war, people briefed on the talks tell NBC News.  —  LONDON — A group of former senior U.S. national security officials …

Former press secretary Kayleigh McEnany says White House cocaine can't be Hunter Biden's  —  Former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany eliminated Hunter Biden as a suspect in the Biden administration's cocaine bag scandal despite the president's son's well-documented history of drug use.

A New Poll on the Trump Indictments Has a Surprising Result  —  A new POLITICO Magazine/Ipsos poll finds one thing that unites people on the Trump indictments.  —  Not much unites the country when it comes to Donald Trump.  And the public's reaction to the former president's two historic indictments …

Trump posted what he said was Obama's address, prosecutors say.  An armed man was soon arrested there.  —  WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump posted on his social media platform what he claimed was the home address of former President Barack Obama on the same day that a man with guns …

Tony Evers uses veto powers to extend annual increases for public schools for the next four centuries  —  Molly Beck Jessie OpoienMilwaukee Journal Sentinel  —  MADISON - Gov. Tony Evers, a former public school educator, used his broad partial veto authority this week to sign into law …

Australian minister calls Trump Jr a ‘big baby’ over cancelled tour  —  Australian Home Minister Clare O'Neil on Thursday called Donald Trump Jr. a “big baby”, after the son of the former U.S. president cancelled a planned speaking tour.  —  The younger Trump, who had been booked on a three …

Philadelphia shooting suspect isn't trans, officials say, but speculation continues  —  An adviser to the district attorney's office addressed the speculation Wednesday, saying the suspect hasn't “identified themselves as trans,” only as male.  —  Less than 24 hours after Monday's mass shooting …

He was the CIA whiz kid in 'Charlie Wilson's War.' His new book offers advice for the US in Ukraine  —  After the last Soviet troops left Afghanistan in 1989, defeated by an insurgency equipped and guided by the U.S., a two-word cable arrived at CIA headquarters: “WE WON.”

Justice Jackson's Incredible Statistic  —  Her dissent from the ruling on affirmative action makes an obviously implausible claim.  —  Even Supreme Court justices are known to be gullible.  In a dissent from last week's ruling against racial preferences in college admissions …

How Tom Brady's Crypto Ambitions Collided With Reality  —  The superstar quarterback is among the celebrities dealing with the fallout from the crypto crash.  Others, like Taylor Swift, escaped.  —  Erin Griffith covers start-ups and venture capital, and David Yaffe-Bellany writes about the crypto industry.

7/6/23 ☀️ Punchbowl News AM  —  THE TOP … In an interview ahead of next week's NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, McConnell backed Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Bob Menendez's (D-N.J.) hold on the proposed sale of F-16s to Turkey.

Josh Hawley rings in July 4 with fake quote with antisemitic, white nationalist roots  —  BY THE KANSAS CITY STAR EDITORIAL BOARD  —  Maybe it's time for Josh Hawley to get out of the history business.  —  Missouri's senior senator on Tuesday decided to celebrate July 4 with another bit of online trolling.

Trump Begins to Sour on ‘Spotlight Hound’ Kari Lake for VP  —  Trump advisers say Kari Lake has been losing her footing with the former president because, in his eyes, she always wants attention.  —  When the annual Conservative Political Action Conference straw poll was taken this year …

My Deeply Unsettling Return to the Moms for Liberty Conference  —  Beneath the “joyful warrior” cosplay was a startlingly dark agenda.  —  Last Friday morning, at the beginning of a hot June day in Philadelphia, I walked through a phalanx of about a hundred protesters in order …

Fight or Flight: Transgender Care Bans Leave Families and Doctors Scrambling  —  Laws in 20 states have left the fate of clinics in doubt and families with transgender children searching for medical care across state lines.  —  David and Wendy Batchelder hate the thought of putting …

Aubrey O'Day: I had sex with Donald Trump Jr. ‘in a gay club bathroom’  —  Aubrey O'Day claims her long-rumored affair with Donald Trump Jr. began “in a gay club bathroom.”  —  During a recent appearance on Michael Cohen's “Mea Culpa” podcast, the 39-year-old reflected on the first time …

The strange story of why Kentucky officials must swear they never fought in a duel  —  Kentucky is the only state in the country where the swearing-in ceremony of people taking their oath of office routinely elicits giggles from those present.  —  The cause of those giggles is the Kentucky Constitution …

2 top public health positions in Ron DeSantis' administration are vacant  —  The positions are vacant as the CDC says Florida is seeing its first cases of malaria in two decades.  —  TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Two of the top public health officials in Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis' administration …

U.S. Is Destroying the Last of Its Once-Vast Chemical Weapons Arsenal  —  Decades behind its initial schedule, the dangerous job of eliminating the world's only remaining declared stockpile of lethal chemical munitions will be completed as soon as Friday.  —  Dave Philipps reported from Pueblo, Colo., and John Ismay from Richmond, Ky.

Ukraine war: Four killed in Lviv as Russian strike hits apartment building in western city  —  A Russian rocket has hit an apartment building in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, killing at least four people, Ukraine's interior minister says.  —  Ihor Klymenko added another 32 people …

Ex-Prisoners Face Headwinds as Job Seekers, Even as Openings Abound  —  An estimated 60 percent of those leaving prison are unemployed a year later.  But after a push for “second-chance hiring,” some programs show promise.  —  For this article, Talmon Joseph Smith interviewed dozens …

U.S. Prevents Iran from Seizing Two Merchant Tankers in Gulf of Oman  —  Story by NAVCENT Public Affairs  —  U.S. Naval Forces Central Command / U.S. 5th Fleet  —  GULF OF OMAN - On July 5, U.S. forces prevented two attempted commercial tanker seizures by the Iranian Navy after the Iranians …