On Monday, President Trump revealed White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles has been diagnosed with early stage breast cancer.
“She has a fantastic medical team and her prognosis is excellent,” Trump said in a Truth Social post.
Trump went on to call Wiles “one of my closest and most important advisors.”
“Melania and I are with her in every way, and we look forward to working with Susie on the many big and wonderful things that are happening for the benefit of our Country!” the president said.
Trump:
Susie Wiles is an incredible Chief of Staff, a great person, and one of the strongest people I know but, unfortunately, she has been diagnosed with early stage breast cancer, and has decided to take on this challenge, IMMEDIATELY, as opposed to waiting. pic.twitter.com/DEgiwVleqQ
Praying for Susie Wiles as she begins treatment. She is a fighter and an incredible public servant who has worked tirelessly in service to our country. Wishing her strength, comfort, and a full recovery. https://t.co/72JFIvQZMd
— Congressman Russell Fry (@RepRussellFry) March 16, 2026
This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.
ANALYSIS – With just three weeks to go until the U.S. midterm elections, a New York Times/Siena poll of likely voters finds the Republican party is gaining momentum national over the Democrats as concerns over the economy, inflation, illegal immigration, and crime, grow among voters.
When the the Times sounds the alarm, even in an understated way, expect things to be far worse for the Democrats than reported.
But when the Times “Chief Political Analyst” resorts to breaking down the numbers in the most comical and petty way, to lessen the impact on Dems, expect a red wave.
According to this poll, 49% of likely voters plan to vote for a Republican to represent them in Congress on November 8, compared with 45% who plan to vote for a Democrat.
That’s a four-point lead, versus a one-point lead Democrats reportedly had over Republicans just last month, making the total swing in voter preference in just a few months five points.
That’s a significant shift.
Rising inflation and declining stocks are making the economy the number one concern for voters, who believe Republicans are better equipped to deal with these concerns.
And this could mean that not only will the GOP most certainly win back the House but may gain control of the Senate too.
As the New York Times writes:
… [that’s a] notable swing from last month, when Democrats led by one percentage point among likely voters. Since then, the warning signs for Democrats have begun to add up, including Republican polling gains in key Senate races like those in Nevada, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, and surprising Republican strength in districts in Rhode Island and Oregon where Democrats would normally be safe.
The Times explains that this isn’t a one-off poll:
It adds, as I have predicted it would since the Roe vs Wade reversal:
The evidence for a shift toward Republicans appears to be underpinned by a change in the national political environment. Gas prices went up again. The stock market is down. A variety of data suggests that the electorate’s attention is shifting back to issues where Republicans are on stronger ground in public opinion, like the economy, inflation, crime and immigration, and away from the summer’s focus on democracy, gun violence and abortion, where Democrats have an edge.
In other words, the conditions that helped Democrats gain over the summer no longer seem to be in place.
But America’s “paper of record” can’t help itself so it desperately still tries to spin the narrative in a less damaging light for the Dems.
So, Nate Cohn, The Times’ chief political analyst, formerly with liberal New Republic, then goes on to laughably diminish the GOP four-point advantage into “only” a three-point advantage due to “rounding” of the poll result numbers.
He further goes on to spend a great deal of time discussing the intricacies of polling, and how imperfect polling is.
Something that I totally agree with.
However, this level of inane wonkery to diminish polls showing one party’s advantage nationally is something I’ve never seen in over 30 years of politics.
Meanwhile, many experts point out that the biggest error in polling in today’s political environment is how undercounted conservative Republicans are in the polls.
This was highlighted in a recent Washington Post piece that used Ohio as an example:
A look at the Marist poll’s fine print suggested something that should make Democrats nervous in the run-up to Nov. 8: Pollsters might be seriously undercounting the Republican electorate — specifically, the working-class White voters who were crucial to Trump’s electoral success.
What caught my attention in the poll’s details was the information that 45 percent of respondents had a college degree. A check of the most recent census data indicates that in Ohio, only about 29 percent of the adult population has a bachelor’s degree or higher.
The writer, Mark Weaver, an election law attorney, and communications consultant,adds something I have discussed before – that conservative Republicans and Trump voters have been cowed into silence, but they still vote.
He notes:
This isn’t just about a single poll or a single state. I regularly talk with pollsters and campaigns, and I hear a common lament: Trump voters distrust pollsters and the media that reports on poll results, and simply won’t participate, out of protest or paranoia.
He continues discussing undercounted ‘shy’ or ‘submerged Trump voters’:
Trump supporters might have the added worry of being attacked for frankly stating their views. Stories of those affiliated with Trump being arrested, subpoenaed, doxed or mocked — with Trump providing angry amplification — result in a lower social trust of strangers inquiring about political views.
So, if the the Times “Chief Political Analyst” wanted to be a real polling wonk, perhaps he should ask why the polls have been so wrong about Republicans recently.
And instead of doing intellectual summersaults to diminish a four-point GOP lead, admit the GOP lead is probably MUCH, MUCH, greater.
Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.
Elise Stefanik with Donald Trump via Wikimedia Commons
House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik was the bearer of bad news this week.
Stefanik (N.Y.) announced she is revoking her endorsement of former Ohio state lawmaker Crag Riedel’s bid for Congress over his reported criticism of former President Trump.
Earlier this week, I informed Craig Riedel (OH-09) that I will be withdrawing my endorsement. I was very disappointed in his inappropriate comments regarding President Trump. As we begin 2024, my focus is on ensuring we nominate the strongest candidates on the ballot who are…
“Earlier this week, I informed Craig Riedel (OH-09) that I will be withdrawing my endorsement. I was very disappointed in his inappropriate comments regarding President Trump, Stefanik wrote Thursday in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. “As we begin 2024, my focus is on ensuring we nominate the strongest candidates on the ballot who are committed to electing President Trump this November and expanding our House GOP Majority.”
Riedel came under fire last month after leaked audio showed the Ohio lawmaker was not interested in Trump’s support.
In the audio, first obtained by the Charlie Kirk Show, Riedel was asked, “You’re not looking for a Trump endorsement, are you?”
By Ralph Alswang, White House photographer - https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/clinton-epstein-maxwell/, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=143417695
This isn’t what the media says. He reportedly had Epstein tossed after repeated thefts from the spa…
During an impromptu press conference aboard Air Force One on Tuesday, President Donald Trump accused Jeffrey Epstein of “stealing” Mar-a-Lago spa employees — claiming that abuse survivor Virginia Giuffre, now deceased, may have been among them. Trump added that Epstein was expelled from the club for that reason.
Despite his best efforts, the president’s response to the so-called Epstein files firmly remains in the public consciousness — and threatens to erode his standing with independents and some right-leaning voters.
As the president made his way to Turnberry, Scotland and his “Trump Turnberry” resort, Trump was still being peppered with questions about the scandal. The questions have followed him everywhere he’s gone during the trip, as reporters questioned him about developments like the potential pardoning of Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.
While in Scotland, Trump also revealed the reason for his falling out with Epstein, telling reporters that his then-friend was poaching employees from Mar-a-Lago. The White House had previously claimed, in a statement, that “The fact is that the president kicked him out of his club for being a creep.”
The grilling continued when Trump gaggled aboard Air Force One on the way home from Scotland, and the president just casually let slip that one of the employees Epstein allegedly poached from him was Giuffre, who killed herself in April. Below is the full exchange:
Trump: People were taken out of the spa, hired by Epstein… I told him we don’t want you taking our people, whether it’s spa or not spa. He did it again, I said out of here.
Reporter: Was one of the stolen people Virginia Giuffre?
Trump and Epstein knew one another from the late 1980s to the early 2000s, appearing together at Mar‑a‑Lago events in the early 1990s. The two reportedly fell out around 2004.
Legal testimony has indicated that Giuffre, while working at Mar‑a‑Lago as a spa attendant at age 16–17, was recruited by Ghislaine Maxwell to serve as Epstein’s masseuse, later testifying to being trafficked to powerful men, including Prince Andrew.
Following a seven-hour meeting with the Department of Justice, Maxwell has offered to testify before the House Oversight Committee — on the condition that she receive full immunity.
New reports indicate that big names in finance are opting in to support former President Trump despite his controversies.
According to a report from Politico, a number of billionaires are willing to shake off personal concerns about Trump and embrace him for 2024. Some of the titans include Point Bridge Capital founder Hal Lambert, hedge fund executive Nelson Peltz and hotel mogul Robert Bigelow.
“Historically, some of the way Trump treats people doesn’t sit well with them when you have choices, but there’s really not many choices anymore,” Carolina Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon said Wednesday on “FOX & Friends.”
The change in attitude is largely due to Trump’s “pro-business” policies and previous standing on the world stage, Dundon said.
Dundon highlighted the Biden administration’s collective “nonsense” is contributing to growing support for Trump among the Wall Street elite in addition to everyday Americans.
“Some of the things have gotten to where it’s hard to support nonsense,” he told host Brian Kilmeade.
Trump might be banking on his now-public company becoming his cash cow but financial filings are showing a concerning big picture.
Last week, the parent company of Trump’s Truth Social media company went public as the likely Republican nominee seeks to pay off numerous legal bills.
Trump holds upwards of 78 million shares in the firm, officially dubbed Trump Media & Technology Group, that are now worth billions of dollars after the initial round of sales of company stock.
But according to the company’s SEC filings, the fundamentals do not come remotely close to justifying the stock price. In fact, it brough in just $4.1 million in revenue in 2023 and suffered a net loss of over $58 million. A majority of those losses are attributable to its debt, although its operating costs were still approximately four times higher than its revenue stream.
Trump is not allowed to sell his shares for six months, and some analysts have predicted that a Trump-led sell-off will trigger a major dip in stocks.
Former New York Assistant Attorney General Adam Pollock has argued that the company is “essentially worthless” and Fox Business host Stuart Varney predicted that the stock would crash if it looks like Trump is going to lose his bid to retake the White House.
“I think it’s almost like a meme stock, and that’s the way it’ll play out,” said Varney. “It’s a bet on whether Trump wins or loses in November of this year. If he loses, I think the stock goes way down. If he wins or looks like he’s going to win, I think the stock does well because then Truth Social will do well.”
President Trump on Monday said that Russia and Ukraine will immediately begin negotiations on a ceasefire, following phone calls with the leaders of each country. He also noted the Vatican has offered to host the talks.
The White House said Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin for about two hours, after speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky earlier in the day.
Trump has been pushing for a 30-day ceasefire in the war, and the White House said before Monday’s calls that he was frustrated with both sides.
The president called for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine before entering office, and more than two months of direct diplomacy has failed to get Putin to agree to even basic terms.
The announcement of direct negotiations comes after Putin last week skipped appearing at direct talks in Turkey that he proposed.
On Monday, Trump described the tone and spirit of his conversation with Putin as “excellent.”
“If it wasn’t, I would say so now, rather than later,” he wrote in a post on his social media site, Truth Social.
Trump said he agreed with Putin that “largescale TRADE” can happen between Russia and the U.S. “when this catastrophic ‘bloodbath’ is ove
This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.
There’s a wealth of new polling data on the Democratic presidential nomination contest, with polls from The Wall Street Journal and Associated Press both finding that even Democratic voters are concerned that President Joe Biden is too old to run.
The AP/NORC poll of adults (not registered voters) found that 77 percent of respondents believed Biden was too old to serve another term.
And for the hardened Team Blue partisans who shout “ageism!” at such findings…69 percent of self-identified Democrats said Biden’s age is a big issue (among Republicans, it was a whopping 89 percent – which shouldn’t come as a surprise).
But this must be a fluke, an outlier, and a one-off. Surely, the age issue can’t be that big a deal for Mr. Biden. Except The Wall Street Journal poll confirmed it is.
The Journal asked a split question – one if voters think Biden’s mental fitness is sufficient for the job, the other specifically on whether he is “too old.”
On the mental ability, 60 percent questioned Biden’s mental ability. On age, a total of 73 percent said he is “too old.”
What are the comparable numbers for former President Donald Trump?
A 49-46 split says Trump isn’t mentally up for the job. On age, another spilt, with 47 percent saying he’s too old and 45 saying he isn’t.
As always with polls, the numbers are snapshots in time and subject to change.
What these data points do, though, is reinforce narratives that have long been whispered in Democratic circles: Biden’s time has passed, and he would be wise to bow out and allow someone else to take the fight to what looks like Donald Trump in 2024.
But such whispers against an incumbent are very hard to translate into hard reality. What could bring them a tad bit closer to the fore are the other items in the Journal poll, particularly the sense that most people think the economy has hit a rough patch, and they are feeling the effects:
…58% of voters say the economy has gotten worse over the past two years, whereas only 28% say it has gotten better, and nearly three in four say inflation is headed in the wrong direction. Those views were echoed in the survey by large majorities of independents, a group that helped deliver Biden’s victory over Trump in the 2020 presidential race. Voters were almost evenly split on the direction of the job market.
It’s not a wipeout for Biden, but the data are hardly comforting to an incumbent who has staked his presidency on a massive reworking of the economy, with government intervention and support leading the way. Team Blue partisans will say it’s early, these things take time, etc., etc. And they aren’t entirely wrong.
But there’s also the iron law of politics to contend with: if you’re explaining, you’re losing. And until the data show voters are feeling better about their own particular economic situation, then Mr. Biden will need more than a slogan – “Bidenomics” – and promises of widespread prosperity to save his own political future.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of Great America News Desk. It first appeared in American Liberty News.Republished with permission.
The former Arkansas governor who also launched an unsuccessful bid for the White House is set to appear regularly on Mondays on the news outlet’s politics and campaign-oriented evening show, “The Race.”
He joined the news outlet as a political analyst for the first time on Monday.
“I am excited to be part of the Scripps News team as we head into one of the most consequential elections in history,” Hutchinson said in a press release. “Scripps News is committed to balance in its coverage of politics, and that is what America needs at this critical moment.”
According to The Hill, the former Arkansas governor performed poorly in the primary as the Republican contest underscored former President Trump’s enduring dominance within the party. He ultimately dropped out in January after the Iowa caucuses.
After Republican nominee Donald Trump survived an assassination attempt he saw a renewed level of support from influential individuals.
Former President Donald Trump claimed that Facebook founder and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg promised he would “never vote” against him and not vote for “a Democrat” in 2024 in a new interview with New York Magazine‘s Olivia Nuzzi.
Trump told Nuzzi that after he survived an assassination attempt in July, “Mark Zuckerberg called up and said, ‘I’ve never supported a Republican before, but there’s no way I can vote for a Democrat in this election.’ He’s a guy that, his parents, everybody was always Democrat. He said, ‘I will never vote for the people running against you after watching what you did.’ So I mean, people really appreciated it. I don’t — I think it was very natural what I did. I think it was natural.”
A spokesman for Meta, however, told Nuzzi that “As Mark has said publicly, he’s not endorsing anybody in this race and has not communicated to anybody how he intends to vote.”
Trump had previously said that Zuckerberg said he wouldn’t be “endorsing a Democrat, which is the first time in his life that he hasn’t done.”
