House Dems go into “complete meltdown” as Schumer folds  —  House Democrats erupted into apoplexy Thursday night after Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said he would support Republicans' stopgap government funding measure.  —  Why it matters: House Democrats feel like they “walked the plank,” in the words of one member.

First They Came for Columbia  —  Like many autocrats before him, Donald Trump has launched what could be a devastating attack on universities.  —  Over the last week, the Trump administration has cancelled $400 million in grants and contracts to Columbia University and $800 million in grants to Johns Hopkins University.

Fear and Loathing in the West Wing  —  Inside the revolt against Elon Musk...  Welcome back to The Red Letter.  —  The tolerance for Elon Musk inside of the White House is wearing thin, as they deal with the fallout of his calamitous interview with Larry Kudlow when he touched the third rail - entitlements.

The right dominates the online media ecosystem, seeping into sports, comedy, and other supposedly nonpolitical spaces  —  A new Media Matters analysis found 9 out of the 10 top online shows assessed are right-leaning … The 2024 presidential election has been dubbed the “podcast election” …

USPS signs agreement with DOGE, agrees to cut 10,000 workers: ‘Broken business model’  —  The service plans to cut 10,000 employees in the next 30 days through a voluntary early-retirement program  —  U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy informed members of Congress on Thursday he has signed …

Vance booed at Kennedy Center after Trump board takeover  —  Vice President Vance was met by a chorus of boos from audience members at the Kennedy Center while attending a National Symphony Orchestra performance late Thursday.  —  The former Ohio senator responded to the jeers with a smile …

GOP lawmaker booed at North Carolina town hall, escorted from building  —  “How do you justify cuts to the VA?” demanded one angry constituent.  —  A man shouts at Rep. Chuck Edwards during a congressional town hall meeting on March 13, 2025 in Asheville, North Carolina.

Musk Immediately Calls for Judges to Be Impeached After DOGE Rulings  —  Elon Musk threw a tantrum after his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was dealt a series of legal setbacks, immediately calling for the impeachment of federal judges.  “Without judicial reform …

Fiasco for Musk as He Craters in New Polls and DOGE Cuts Lose in Court  —  Elon Musk is suddenly facing lots of bad news.  A judge just ordered the Trump administration to reinstate thousands of fired federal workers, a blow to Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency.

Focus group: Trump swing voters in Michigan have buyers' remorse  —  Most Michigan swing voters in our latest Engagious/Sago focus groups said that although they voted for President Trump in November, they have objections, frustrations and fears about his behavior since he returned to power.

Trump Shuts Down Pentagon Office Linked to Russiagate Probe  —  President Donald Trump has shut down a little-known Pentagon office that paid more than $1 million to an FBI source who spied on the Trump campaign as part of its 2016 investigation into Trump's links to Russia.

Washington, DC, Region Braces for ‘Devastating’ Cuts from Congress  —  Local leaders across the DC metro area are raising alarms about a stopgap measure in Congress that would trigger a $1 billion budget shortfall for the city.  —  A decision before Congress to strip $1.1 billion …

Everybody Hates Elon  —  And other tales of collapsing confidence  —  After Donald Trump won the 2024 election, progressives had one great fear about his economic policies — namely, that he wouldn't do much.  Oh, he'd slap on a few tariffs, make a big show of eliminating “woke” spending …

There Was a Second Name on Rubio's Target List  —  As the details of Mahmoud Khalil's arrest by U.S. immigration agents first emerged this week, attorneys I spoke with were so astonished that they wondered if the government had made a mistake.  President Donald Trump and other administration officials …

Who's Running the DOGE Wrecking Machine: The World's Richest Man or a Little-Known Bureaucrat?  —  Insiders tell ProPublica that Amy Gleason is only in charge on paper, while Musk's top lieutenants really run DOGE.  One person who has been in meetings with Gleason described her as having …

Canada is so furious at the US right now  —  The US and Canada are meant to be the best of friends, but they're in the midst of a pretty ugly fight.  —  It began with President Donald Trump's ascent to the White House, when he began referring to his outgoing Canadian counterpart as …

Farmers face steep losses in the middle of Trump's trade war and funding cuts  —  From funding cuts to tariffs, farmers have found themselves struggling to find markets for their products and facing the risk of steep losses for the year ahead.  —  Jennifer Gilkerson never imagined …

Trump's fantastical claim of a $200 billion ‘subsidy’ to Canada  —  No matter how we do the math, the numbers don't add up.  —  Just now  —  “We're spending $200 billion a year to subsidize Canada.”  — President Donald Trump, during remarks with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, March 13

Friday Catblogging  —  A tribute to Kevin Drum  —  Kevin Drum, pioneer of an entirely new communication medium called blogging, was in my life for more than 20 years.  I wouldn't exactly call him a friend, more of a colleague, but I knew more about him than some of my friends.