Author name: moderat ereport

GOP Rep. Nancy Mace took a break from creepily posing outside public restrooms on Monday to announce that she will launch a bid for governor in her home state of South Carolina, joining a crowded Republican primary that is shaping up to be a race measuring who can kiss Dear Leader’s butt the hardest. “On Monday, August 4th, Nancy Mace will deliver a major address on the future of South Carolina,” Mace wrote in a post on X. “President Trump needs America First governors. South Carolina needs a fighter. Join us for the official start of a new South Carolina FIRST golden era. Mace, who has sought to gain ground with bigoted MAGA voters by pulling anti-trans stunts in restrooms, proudly declaring herself a “transphobe,” and praising Trump’s evil immigration agenda, would be the latest Republican to enter the open-seat governor’s race. Fellow GOP Rep. Ralph Norman already announced his bid, as have Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette and state Attorney General Alan Wilson. A poll released Sunday by the South Carolina Policy Council found a tight race with no clear leader. Mace is in first with 16%, followed by Wilson at 15%. Evette is in third with just 8%, followed by Norman with 6%. Rep. Nancy Mace greets President Donald Trump as he arrives to address a joint session of Congress at the Capitol on March 4. Donald Trump’s endorsement will loom large in the primary, as whomever he chooses would automatically catapult into front-runner status. It’s why the GOP candidates will likely heap gobs of nauseating praise on their autocratic idol—and Mace’s announcement shows she’s already trying to embrace Trump. “South Carolina deserves a bold, America First Governor who will be unafraid to stand alongside President Trump and hold the line,” Mace wrote in a post on X on Tuesday. Meanwhile, Norman was downright giddy to be the subject of a positive Truth Social post from Trump, and had previously posted an awkward photo of himself with Dear Leader for Trump’s birthday in which he called Trump “a bold leader who puts America First and isn’t afraid to take on the swamp.”  Evette’s campaign website features Trump’s big orange face as the splash image, while Wilson declares on his campaign website that he “is fighting for the MAGA agenda in court and standing with President Trump to protect our conservative values and keep South Carolina safe!” Ew.  Related | Nancy Mace’s attempt at transphobic gotcha question gloriously backfires Mace, for her part, will be the seventh conservative lawmaker to forgo a run for their House seat in order to run for governor of a deeply Republican state in 2026. It’s a sign that Republicans fear they will lose their House majority, as candidates who think their party is in for a rough election cycle often forgo reelection to their congressional seats. Ultimately, while the primary will likely be a race to the bottom with the contenders debasing themselves as they praise Trump and compete to prove they’re the most virulently anti-immigrant and anti-trans candidate, there is one silver lining to this field: Mace will not return to Congress, no matter the outcome of the primary. That’s because the election is taking place in 2026, and Mace cannot run for Congress and governor at the same time. So, good riddance, Nancy. Don’t let the bathroom door hit ya on your way out of Washington.

President Donald Trump can’t keep accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein off his mind. During a press conference on Friday, Trump whiffed a softball question about a Fox News report that FBI Director Kash Patel recovered secret documents related to the probe of Trump’s connections to Russia during the 2016 election. Instead of addressing the question directly, Trump ranted vaguely about his own administration’s inability to release its files on Epstein. “Well, I want everything to be shown. You know, as long as it’s fair and reasonable, I think it will be shown. And it should be shown. And I think [Patel] feels that way. And I think [Attorney General] Pam [Bondi] feels that way,” Trump said, seemingly mishearing or misunderstanding the question. “The whole thing is a scam. It’s a scam set up by the Democrats, and they love talking about it,” Trump added. “You know, if they had anything, they would’ve done it the week before the election. … They controlled the file. The Democrats controlled it. [Former FBI Director James] Comey and all the, you know, sleazebags, every one of them that you read about all the time. And I guess they got some problems now having to do with yet a different scandal.” YouTube Video In order to distract from his ongoing failure to deliver the long-promised Epstein files, Trump’s cronies have scrambled to concoct an embarrassingly baseless conspiracy theory involving Russia and former President Barack Obama.  But new polling suggests that the American public is not buying what the White House is selling about the Epstein files. And each seedy new revelation linking Trump to the convicted sex offender seems to only deepen public doubt. Trump, whose mind has long been a fantasy land of made-up facts, seems increasingly fixated on one thing these days: Epstein. 

A cartoon by Clay Jones. Related | You won’t believe Trump’s latest spin about Epstein scandal

Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri is back to his angry Republican populist cosplay, this time backing President Donald Trump’s latest half-baked idea: sending millions of Americans checks that would be funded by tariff revenues. The lawmaker has introduced legislation to make that a reality— all while railing against the idea that “rich” Democrats might get those checks, as if that’s the real injustice buried in this mess. “Well, you wouldn’t give it to everybody, you’d give it to the working people,” Hawley said on Trump loyalist Steve Bannon’s podcast. “You’d give it to our people. I mean, you know, the rich people don’t need it … what I mean by that is all those Democrat donors of Wall Street, all these hedge fund guys, who all hate the tariffs, by the way.” Hawley’s American Worker Rebate Act would send $600 to every American, with income caps at $75,000 for single filers and $150,000 for those who file jointly.  As I’ve said before, sending checks to taxpayers is smart politics. It’s baffling that Democrats insist on hiding their help inside the tax code, turning simple wins into complicated accounting exercises. That kind of political timidity has cost the party respect and trust. Related | Trump has a knack for good politics—and Democrats should copy it Trump, of course, originally pitched tariffs as a way to reduce the national debt. He claimed foreign countries would be footing the bill, and that tariff revenue would help balance the books. Instead, Americans got higher prices on everything from clothes to cars—with worse still to come—and the debt ballooned by trillions. But no one actually cares about the national debt, and least of all the Republicans who pretend to. Now Hawley wants to repackage that fallout as free money and act like he’s doing people a favor. Amazingly, Hawley’s math actually checks out. At $150 billion in tariff receipts, divided across the roughly 76% of the population that would qualify, the result is about $607 per person. So $600 fits the math. But will an extra $50 a month move the needle as living costs continue to skyrocket? Maybe on the fringes. But it doesn’t come close to offsetting the economic damage of Trump’s chaotic tariffs and his plan to deport the agricultural workforce keeping food prices stable. And that performative outrage over rich people getting checks? Please. The entire point of Trump’s One Big, Beautiful Bill, which Hawley backed, was to shovel massive tax cuts to the wealthy at everyone else’s expense. As journalist Judd Legum pointed out, using budget modeling from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Americans making $51,000 to $93,000 get an average tax cut of around $845. Those making under $50,000—the folks Hawley pretends to champion—will now pay $700 to $1,000 more in taxes. Even with the proposed rebate, they’re still underwater. And as for those terrible rich people who dared to vote for Democrats—the ones Hawley insists shouldn’t get a dime? They’re walking away with tax cuts ranging between $6,000 and $390,000. So yeah, they don’t need a piddly $600 check. Hawley and his Dear Leader Trump already made sure they were more than taken care of. If Hawley cared about fairness, he would’ve made this argument when Trump’s tax bill passed—when wealthy, blue-state Americans got the real benefits, and poor red-state Americans got the shaft. But of course, that would’ve meant opposing Trump. Instead, Hawley stayed loyal. And his reward? Trump called him “a second-tier senator” for a separate bill that would ban Congress members, the president, and vice president from stock trading. Oh well.

A daily roundup of the best stories and cartoons by Daily Kos staff and contributors to keep you in the know. Trump brags about hiking prices for Americans “WELCOME TO THE GOLDEN AGE,” he says as no one can afford food or rent. New poll finds Trump in hot water over Epstein scandal The “pedo president” is having a hard time weaseling out of this one. Trump administration steps up its heinous war on trans people They have their eye on the nation’s biggest threat: trans kids. Trump and his favorite white supremacist beg people to join ICE Have experience tormenting your neighbors? Interested in tearing apart families? Apply now! Cartoon: Nothing but air In one ear … As GOP moves to rig the map in Texas, Democrats gear up for a fight “Trump knows he can’t win the midterm election fair and square. So he’s trying to rig the rules.”  Trump’s FDA chief proves he’s absolutely clueless about public health Shocker: Another Trump team member has no idea what he’s doing. Click here to see more cartoons.

PoliticusUSA depends on the support of our readers. Please support us by becoming a subscriber. Subscribe now Democrats are stepping up and taking on the Trump administration’s illegal actions. House Judiciary Committee Democrats announced: Rep. Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, joined a dozen individual members of the U.S. House of Representatives in suing the Trump-Vance Administration, challenging its unlawful obstruction of congressional oversight that the members have sought to conduct at federal immigration detention facilities, in which both citizens and noncitizens have been detained without due process. The Administration has implemented a new, unlawful policy that blocks these Members of Congress from obtaining the information necessary to perform their constitutional duty to ensure the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is complying with federal law in operating these facilities and to oversee how billions in taxpayer dollars are being spent. The Administration is mandating a seven-day waiting period and prohibiting access to field offices where people are being detained, despite a federal law that prevents these restrictions. The lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia demands that the Administration comply with a federal law that guarantees Members of Congress the right to conduct oversight visits to any DHS and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) sites where noncitizens are detained without prior notice. Other plaintiffs include Assistant Democratic Leader Joe Neguse; Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chair Rep. Adriano Espaillat; Homeland Security Committee Ranking Member Rep. Bennie G. Thompson; House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Ranking Member Rep. Robert Garcia; House Homeland Security Committee Subcommittee on Border Security and Enforcement Ranking Member Rep. J. Luis Correa; Rep. Jason Crow; Rep. Veronica Escobar; Rep. Dan Goldman; Rep. Jimmy Gomez; Rep. Raul Ruiz; and Rep. Norma Torres. At a time when the Administration is detaining more individuals than ever before—over 58,000 people—and reports of mistreatment, overcrowding, unsanitary conditions, and the detention of U.S. citizens are growing, the need for real-time, on-the-ground oversight has never been more urgent. Eleven people have died in immigration custody in the first six months of this Administration. DHS’s recent mass layoffs of internal oversight personnel only deepen the concerns about this conduct and possible abuse. At a time when private citizens are intervening to stop ICE from grabbing and detaining people off the streets, it is vital that members of Congress have access to immigration facilities. Read more