CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy says staffers in the network’s ranks have lost faith in CEO Chris Licht who has been at the center of controversy in recent weeks.
“There are a wide range of emotions coursing through the halls of CNN. Some staffers are frustrated. Others are angry. Many are sad about the awful state of affairs that has taken hold of an organization they love,” Darcy wrote in his Reliable Sources media newsletter late Monday. “There is one near-universal sentiment, however, that has been communicated to me: Licht has lost the room.”
On Monday, Lichet reportedly apologized to CNN staffers during the outlet’s morning editorial call over the negative press attention that has followed the publication of a lengthy profile of him.
In the piece, published Friday by The Atlantic, Licht was critical of the network’s coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic under the leadership of former top executive Jeff Zucker and discussed his ner vision for the network that focuses on facts rather than sensationalism.
“In the eyes of so many at CNN, there isn’t anything Licht can do at this point to win over their support,” Darcy wrote. “They’ve hit the wall with him. As one anchor texted me, in reference to Licht’s announcement on Monday that he will relocate his office to a newsroom floor at Hudson Yards: ‘We don’t want his office relocated to the 18th floor, we want it relocated out of the building’.”
Since taking the reigns at CNN, Licht has made a number of programming changes which say some of the network’s mainstays exit.
President Trump’s former campaign manager Brad Parscale has registered as a foreign agent for Israel.
Parscale was hired to create digital campaigns combating antisemitism and targeting young Americans in a contract worth $6 million.
Parscale signed a Foreign Agents Registration Act form this month, informing the Department of Justice that he and his business Clock Tower X LLC were now representing Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs “to develop and execute a nationwide campaign in the United States to combat antisemitism.”
In another registration form, Parscale also disclosed his partnership with Germany’s HAVAS Media Network as part of the arrangement.
Asked whether the agency was “supervised by a foreign government, foreign political party, or other foreign principal,” Parscale ticked the box “Yes,” explaining that the agency was being “supervised” by the “State of Israel.”
According to Parscale’s contract, his company is hired to create content where at least 80 percent “is tailored to Gen Z audiences across platforms, including TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, podcasts, and other relevant digital and broadcast outlets.”
The contract also states that “Agency shall provide strategic communications, planning, and media services in support of Client’s engagement by the State of Israel to develop and execute a nationwide campaign in the United States to combat antisemitism.”
Parscale will also reportedly work to influence AI models such as ChatGPT.
Parscale served as the Trump campaign’s digital media director in 2016, before going on to become Trump’s campaign manager in 2020.
Antisemitism has risen dramatically in the U.S. amid two years of Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, triggered by the U.S.-designated terrorist group’s attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. The Anti-Defamation League recorded 9,354 antisemitic incidents across the U.S. in 2024, the highest number on record since the ADL began tracking incidents 46 years ago.
The ADL said that for the first time in the history of the audit, a majority (58 percent) of all incidents contained elements related to Israel or Zionism.
By The White House from Washington, DC - President Trump and The First Lady Participate in an Abraham Accords Signing Ceremony, Public Domain,
President Donald Trump announced the United States will soon drop sanctions against Syria.
During lengthy remarks on Tuesday, Trump laid out his vision for the Middle East, sharing a major announcement: He intends to drop sanctions against Syria.
“I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness,” Trump said in a speech in Saudi Arabia, his first stop on the first international tour of his second term in office.
“In Syria, which has seen so much misery and death, there is a new government that we must all hope will succeed in stabilizing the country and keeping peace,” he said. “So I say good luck, Syria.”
The nation was cut off from the global financial system under ousted President Bashar al-Assad’s government, imposed during 14 years of civil war.
Trump called the sanctions “brutal and crippling” but “important” at the time.
Trump said both Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Erdoğan had encouraged him to lift the sanctions.
“Oh, what I do for the crown prince,” Trump quipped.
U.S. sanctions had slapped financial penalties on any foreign individual or company that provided material support to the Syrian government and prohibited anyone in the U.S. from dealing in any Syrian entity, including oil and gas, and Syrian banks were effectively cut off from global financial systems.
Trump also revealed he has invited Saudi Arabia to join his historic Abraham Accords.
“It has been an amazing thing, the Abraham Accords,” Trump said at a Saudi Arabia investment conference. “And it’s my fervent hope, wish, and even my dream that Saudi Arabia, a place I have so much respect for … will soon be joining the Abraham Accords. I think it will be a tremendous tribute to your country.”
Trump negotiated the Abraham Accords, which normalized relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, at the end of his first term in office. Now, he is hoping to see Saudi Arabia join it as well.
During lengthy remarks, Trump laid out his vision for the Middle East. Minutes later, he made a second major announcement: He intends to drop sanctions against Syria.
A prominent political operative for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential campaign has been charged with assault after allegedly choking and punching a woman in New York last weekend.
Trent Pool, a petition circulator, is running Kennedy’s ballot access fight was charged with assault and criminal obstruction of breathing.
According to an NYPD spokesperson, a little after 5 a.m. on Saturday morning Pool was engaged in a “verbal dispute” with a 25-year-old woman at the ritzy Soho Grand hotel in downtown Manhattan.
Police said the woman reported that Pool “wrapped his hand around her neck making it hard for her to breathe and then struck her in the face with a closed fist, causing pain.”
The woman refused medical attention, and Pool was arrested without incident.
In February, Pool was arrested for fourth-degree assault in Seattle, Washington, a spokesperson for SPD confirmed.
Pool’s firm, Accelevate 2020, which specializes in ballot access, petition and general campaign consulting, is being paid by the Kennedy campaign. Another ballot access firm run by Pool, Public Appeal, is also being paid by a super PAC supporting Kennedy, FEC reports show.
Vice President Vance said Thursday that billionaire Elon Musk will remain a “friend and an adviser” to the White House after Musk departs from his role as a special government employee next month.
“Of course he is going to continue being an adviser. And by the way, the work of DOGE is not even close to done. The work of Elon is not even close to done,” Vance told “Fox & Friends” co-host Lawrence Jones in an interview.
“DOGE has got a lot of work to do. And yeah, that work is going to continue after Elon leaves,” Vance continued. “But fundamentally, Elon is going to remain a friend and an adviser of both me and the president. And he’s done a lot of good things. People don’t realize how vast and uncontrolled the bureaucracy was. We’ve started to chip away at it, but there’s a lot of work to do. It’s not going to happen all in six months, it’s going to take a long and committed effort.”
A Wednesday report indicated that Elon Musk is preparing to step down from his role as head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in the Trump administration. President Donald Trump reportedly informed his inner circle and Cabinet members of Musk’s impending departure, with both parties agreeing that Musk will soon return to focus on his business ventures.
Musk’s tenure at DOGE has been marked by ambitious cost-cutting measures aimed at reducing federal spending by $1 trillion. While many view these efforts as successful, they have also sparked controversy, leading to widespread protests and legal challenges.
The exact timeline for Musk’s departure remains unspecified, but it’s anticipated to coincide with the conclusion of his special government employee status, which has a 130-day limit. Despite stepping back from his official role, Musk is expected to maintain an informal advisory relationship with the administration.
UK Government, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
This development comes amid reports of tensions within Trump’s inner circle regarding Musk’s prominent role in the administration. Some aides have expressed concerns about his influence and the potential political implications of his actions.
On Capitol Hill, Musk is increasingly viewed as a political liability by congressional Republicans, despite his alignment with aspects of the Trump’s America First agenda.
While Musk’s efforts to streamline government spending and slash bureaucracy through the Department DOGE have earned him praise from certain fiscal conservatives and right-wing populists, others within the GOP—particularly traditionalists and establishment figures—have expressed concern over his:
-Controversial public statements and social media presence, which have drawn negative attention and created unnecessary distractions.
-Growing political influence, which some fear undermines the White House’s messaging or creates the impression of a tech billionaire running government policy.
-Business entanglements, which raise questions about conflicts of interest as he juggles leadership roles in Tesla, SpaceX, X (formerly Twitter) and Neuralink.
Privately, even some Trump aides have reportedly grown wary of Musk’s visibility and the potential backlash from swing voters or moderate Republicans who view him as polarizing or self-serving.
Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
That said, Musk still commands a loyal following among many conservative voters—especially those aligned with anti-woke, pro-free speech and populist sentiments.
While there is no direct evidence linking the report of Musk’s impending departure from the Trump administration to Tuesday night’s Republican underperformance in Florida’s special congressional elections or the 10-point defeat in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, the timing is politically notable.
Republicans are beginning to question whether the administration’s focus on high-profile, unconventional figures like Musk has distracted from core electoral priorities. Others point to a broader concern: that the Trump team may be drifting out of sync with key voter blocs, including suburban moderates and independents, particularly in swing states like Wisconsin.
The Florida results, in districts Trump carried comfortably in 2024, and the surprising margin in Wisconsin, suggest potential cracks in turnout strategy or messaging—something Musk’s polarizing profile could exacerbate, at least among voters wary of his influence.
While not officially linked, yesterday’s underwhelming Republican electoral performances may be fueling pressure on the president to recalibrate, and Musk’s exit could be part of that reset.
Marine One lifts-off after returning President Donald J. Trump to Mar-a-Lago Friday, March 29, 2019, following his visit to the 143-mile Herbert Hoover Dike near Canal Point, Fla., that surrounds Lake Okeechobee. The visit was part of an infrastructure inspection of the dike, which is part of the Kissimmee-Okeechobee Everglades system, and reduces impacts of flooding for areas of south Florida. (Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian) [Photo Credit: The White House from Washington, DC, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons]
It’s over…
President Donald Trump said he is taking the government-generated documents found in Mar-a-Lago after his first term, where they were seized by the FBI, back to Florida.
The president took to Truth Social on Friday to say he is taking the documents back:
The Department of Justice has just returned the boxes that Deranged Jack Smith made such a big deal about. They are being brought down to Florida and will someday be part of the Trump Presidential Library. Justice finally won out. I did absolutely nothing wrong. This was merely an attack on a political opponent that, obviously, did not work well. Justice in our Country will now be restored.
The FBI seized the documents at Trump’s Florida home and resort in August 2022. Agents found boxes of documents all over Mar-a-Lago, including in a ballroom, a storage room, and a bathroom. Two months before, an attorney for Trump attested to the Department of Justice that to the best of her knowledge, no government documents were at Mar-a-Lago. The raid showed otherwise.
Trump has long claimed he declassified the documents in question and that he took them “very legally.”
“There’s something going on because they’re going after me viciously,” he said in March 2024. “Then all of a sudden it comes out that Biden took 10 times the number of documents that I did. And I took them very legally and I wasn’t hiding them.
On Friday, Kyle Griffin of NBC News reported that White House staffers were seen loading about 15 boxes on Air Force One en route to Mar-a-Lago.
Trump was criminally prosecuted by former Special Counsel Jack Smith, who alleged that the president willfully took classified material to Mar-a-Lago after departing the White House in January 2021.
Judge Aileen Cannon, who was appointed by Trump in 2020, ultimately dismissed the case on the grounds that Smith’s appointment as special counsel was illegal.
President Donald Trump signs Executive Orders, Thursday, April 17, 2025, in the Oval Office. (Official White House Photo by Molly Riley)
The Trump administration has escalated its campaign against Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, Nicolas Maduro, and has secretly authorized the C.I.A. to conduct covert action in the country, the New York Times reported on Wednesday, while citing United States officials.
The authorization is the latest escalation in the Trump administration’s intensifying pressure campaign against Venezuela. For weeks, the U.S. military has been targeting drug boats off the Venezuelan coast. American officials have been clear, privately, that the end goal is to drive Maduro from power.
The new authority would allow the C.I.A. to carry out lethal operations in Venezuela and conduct a range of operations in the Caribbean.
The agency would be able to take covert action against Mr. Maduro or his government either unilaterally or in conjunction with a larger military operation. It is not known whether the C.I.A. is planning any operations in Venezuela or if the authorities are meant as a contingency.
The development comes as the U.S. military is planning to escalate its ongoing operation, drawing up options for President Trump to consider, including strikes inside Venezuela.
The scale of the military buildup in the region is substantial: There are currently 10,000 U.S. troops there, most of them at bases in Puerto Rico, but also a contingent of Marines on amphibious assault ships. In all, the Navy has eight surface warships and a submarine in the Caribbean.
The new authorities, known in intelligence jargon as a presidential finding, were described by multiple U.S. officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the highly classified document.
The Trump administration’s strategy on Venezuela, developed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, with help from John Ratcliffe, the C.I.A. director, aims to oust Maduro from power.
Mr. Ratcliffe has said little about what his agency is doing in Venezuela. But he has promised that the C.I.A. under his leadership would become more aggressive. During his confirmation hearing, Mr. Ratcliffe said he would make the C.I.A. less averse to risk and more willing to conduct covert action when ordered by the president, “going places no one else can go and doing things no one else can do.”
President Trump ordered an end to diplomatic talks with the Maduro government this month as he grew frustrated with the Venezuelan leader’s failure to adhere to U.S. demands to give up power voluntarily and the continued insistence by officials that they had no part in drug trafficking.
Vice President Kamala Harris discussed her plan to reduce the cost of living in a town hall hosted by Oprah Winfrey on Thursday. The recently-anointed Democratic nominee stated that she would achieve this by lowering the prices of essential items.
The question posed to Harris was straightforward enough and, quite frankly, on the minds of most persuadable voters: “What will you do to lower costs?”
Here’s exactly what she said:
“Yeah. I first of all, thank you both for being here and yours is a, a story I hear around the country as I travel, and in terms of both rightly, having the right to have aspirations and dreams and ambitions for your family and working hard and finding that the American dream is for this generation and so many recently far more elusive than it’s been, and we need to deal with that. And there are a number of ways. One is bringing down the cost of everyday necessities, including groceries.”
Yesterday’s Michigan town hall has since been ridiculed by numerous MAGA celebrities.
During the 90-minute livestreamed interview, where Harris also took questions from the audience, the vice president discussed a number of key 2024 topics, such as abortion rights, immigration and gun violence.
A number of Donald Trump‘s supporters have mocked Harris for her at times lengthy responses during the event in the key swing state, with some suggesting that the vice president’s answers were a “word salad.”
This might be the worst world salad ever in the political career of Kamala Harris.
The whole time you could feel Oprah wanted her to stop.
The audience looks like they’re realizing how gone Kamala is.
During the interview, Harris told Winfrey that Americans are an “optimistic people,” adding: “Americans, by character, are people who have dreams and ambitions and aspirations. We believe in what is possible. We believe in what can be, and we believe in fighting for that.
“That’s how we came into being because the people before us understood that one of the greatest expressions for the love of our country—one of the greatest expressions of patriotism—is to fight for the ideals of who we are, which includes freedom to make decisions about your own body; freedom to be safe from gun violence; freedom to have access to the ballot box; freedom to be who you are and just be, to love who you love openly and with pride; freedom to just be.”
Reflecting on the perceived train wreck, politico and MAGA influencer Collin Rugg concluded, “After watching this and then watching the debate, I realize how much practice she had for that debate.”
“This interview is what Harris sounds like on a normal day.”
And television appearances as a presidential candidate don’t get friendlier than this…
New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu (R) called Vice President Kamala Harris the clear winner of Tuesday night’s presidential debate.
“Oh, Kamala definitely won the debate,” Sununu said during a Wednesday morning appearance on CNN. “There’s no question about that. So the question is, what does it mean, right? And it’s not just, what does it mean to everybody? What’s going to do that 10 percent of swing voters?”
“I think if you poll those swing voters, they want results,” he said. “They’re results-driven. It’s the cost of living, it’s the border, it’s public safety, those types of issues, you can be the change agent to make that better in their lives.”
The outgoing New Hampshire governor, who considered a presidential run of his own, praised Harris’s debate strategy Tuesday night.
“She kind of talked confidence in her answers, and then she took the last 30 seconds of almost every question and hit him with a personal attack, knowing that that would get under his skin,” Sununu said. “It was a very effective measure, and I give her a lot of credit on that. It kept him on the defensive, to be sure, and it’s ultimately, definitely, stylistically, why she openly won the debate.”
Sununu said the debate would move the needle “a little bit,” but argued neither candidate explained to voters how they would help lower costs for average Americans. The GOP governor added Trump failed to take advantage of openings to go on the offense over the economy.
“He should have talked about price controls,” Sununu said. “He should have talked about the cost of living more. I think he went like an hour, not even talking about inflation and those are real issues.”
Sununu said the ex-president should also draw a bigger contrast on foreign policy with Harris, saying on CNN there “was clearly more peace when” he was in office.
“That is a strength that he has, that he has not exploited in this campaign,” he said. “There is chaos in Ukraine, chaos in Israel. You know, there’s a lot of pressure going on in Taiwan. Let’s not forget about that. Let’s not forget about Afghanistan.”
Thor Brødreskift / Nordiske Mediedager, CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
On Friday, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld one-time former Trump adviser Steve Bannon’s Jan. 6th contempt of Congress conviction.
The news was reported by Politico senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney, who noted that the ruling was by a unanimous three-judge panel.
BREAKING: Steve BANNON's conviction for defying the Jan. 6 committee has been upheld by a unanimous three-judge panel of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals.
His four-month jail sentence has been on hold pending this ruling.
The three judge panel rejected Bannon’s appeal of his conviction for defying a subpoena to testify before the congressional subcommittee that investigated the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
Bannon was sentenced to four months in 2022 on one count for his refusal to appear before Congress and another count for failing to produce documents requested by the subcommittee.
Bannon’s conviction being upheld paves the way for him to be required to actually serve his four-month prison sentence.
This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.
