Honest observer, citizen. Believer in the Enlightenment, science, freedom, tolerance, the benefits of business for society, and a secular State.
California, USA
Joined June 2016
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Publius retweeted
When I received the second report from our negotiating team after their meetings in Abu Dhabi, they told me that the Russians think and say they have already occupied half of Donbas, which remains under our control. These were military officers, Russian intelligence, and they were serious about it. Our team told them, “We don’t know how you can even say such things. We have video footage, images, other things proving that these areas are under our control.”
This is the problem. Putin lives in a different reality. Of course, he will be sharing with the Americans that he needs one or two months to fully occupy the east of Ukraine. I can draw a picture for him too where I fully occupy Russia. But it’s not true. What was good is that the American side confirmed the Ukrainian assessment of what is happening on the battlefield.
This is why we need to sit and speak at the level of leaders. There are a lot of questions. Like we spoke about the city of Kherson that is divided by the river today. The Russians control one bank, we control the other. But people want to live united on both banks. This is a Ukrainian city. Such issues are sensitive, but we have to speak about them. I think that tomorrow the teams will discuss the possibility of meeting at the level of leaders. I'm not sure that Russia is ready, but we will raise this topic.
From a conversation with journalists.
Publius retweeted
They gave the promotion boards instructions over the phone so as not to leave a paper trail. Boards were instructed to pull anyone who enforced a covid mandate, and anyone who was involved in the Afghan pullout.
Hegseth also went after anyone who had even attended or spoken at a diversity event in their careers.
There go all your minority officers.
Pentagon officials purportedly used internet searches on diversity, COVID and Afghanistan ties to withhold board-approved officer promotions. military.com/hegseths-office…
Publius retweeted
Gen Chris Donahue a brilliant combat leader. The best we have produced for a generation. A huge loss of talent and experience to our Armed Forces. Hegseth weakens our national security. Shallow.
Pete Hegseth was reportedly handed a briefing card explaining why a highly decorated U.S. general was not responsible for security at the site of the deadly Kabul airport bombing. He glanced at it — and, according to The New York Times, replied: “I don’t care.”
That is one of the most striking revelations in a New York Times investigation into the campaign against Gen. Christopher Donahue, one of the U.S. Army’s most experienced combat commanders.
According to the Times, Hegseth believed Donald Trump wanted someone held accountable for the disastrous 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan and the suicide bombing at Kabul airport that killed 13 American service members.
Donahue was a senior commander at the airport, but his paratroopers were not responsible for security at Abbey Gate when the bomber struck. Marines were manning the gate. In other words, Donahue appears to have become a convenient target — partly because he was the general in one of the defining images of America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
The famous night-vision photograph shows Donahue boarding the final U.S. military flight out of Kabul, making him the last American soldier to leave Afghanistan. Hegseth reportedly became fixated on the image and repeatedly referred to it as a “selfie.” It wasn’t. The photograph was taken by an Army photographer. Donahue did not take it and did not distribute it.
Hegseth’s then-chief of staff, Joe Kasper, reportedly tried to correct the record. On the way to the White House, Kasper handed Hegseth a card laying out several basic facts: the photograph was not a selfie, Donahue had not distributed it, and Donahue’s troops were not responsible for Abbey Gate when the bombing occurred.
According to the Times, Hegseth briefly looked at the card, handed it back and said: “I don’t care.”
Donahue’s military record makes the episode even more extraordinary. He served for roughly three decades, completed more than 20 combat deployments, commanded Delta Force and later helped develop new approaches to drone warfare after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. His supporters reportedly regarded him as a generational military talent.
Yet the more senior officers and lawmakers tried to defend him, the more determined Hegseth allegedly became. An effort to arrange a meeting between Donahue and Vice President JD Vance was reportedly derailed after Hegseth learned about it. Senators were later told that lobbying on Donahue’s behalf was only hardening Hegseth’s position.
On August 27, Donahue retired from the Army.
The contrast is remarkable. When a congressman previously suggested that troops deployed to Los Angeles had not been properly cared for, Hegseth indignantly declared: “No one in senior leadership cares more about troops than this secretary.”
But when his own chief of staff reportedly placed evidence in front of him showing that a distinguished combat commander was not responsible for the security failure Hegseth associated him with — and that the supposed “selfie” he had fixated on wasn’t even a selfie — Hegseth apparently did not ask for more information.
He did not reconsider. He did not ask whether he might be scapegoating the wrong man. According to The New York Times, he simply handed the card back: “I don’t care.”
Those three words say more about the episode than any congressional testimony ever could.
P.S. I'm moving from Twitter/X to Substack. Join me there for independent journalism, investigations, and political analysis. Free and paid subscriptions are welcome.
mykhailorohoza.substack.com
Publius retweeted
Pete Hegseth was reportedly handed a briefing card explaining why a highly decorated U.S. general was not responsible for security at the site of the deadly Kabul airport bombing. He glanced at it — and, according to The New York Times, replied: “I don’t care.”
That is one of the most striking revelations in a New York Times investigation into the campaign against Gen. Christopher Donahue, one of the U.S. Army’s most experienced combat commanders.
According to the Times, Hegseth believed Donald Trump wanted someone held accountable for the disastrous 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan and the suicide bombing at Kabul airport that killed 13 American service members.
Donahue was a senior commander at the airport, but his paratroopers were not responsible for security at Abbey Gate when the bomber struck. Marines were manning the gate. In other words, Donahue appears to have become a convenient target — partly because he was the general in one of the defining images of America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
The famous night-vision photograph shows Donahue boarding the final U.S. military flight out of Kabul, making him the last American soldier to leave Afghanistan. Hegseth reportedly became fixated on the image and repeatedly referred to it as a “selfie.” It wasn’t. The photograph was taken by an Army photographer. Donahue did not take it and did not distribute it.
Hegseth’s then-chief of staff, Joe Kasper, reportedly tried to correct the record. On the way to the White House, Kasper handed Hegseth a card laying out several basic facts: the photograph was not a selfie, Donahue had not distributed it, and Donahue’s troops were not responsible for Abbey Gate when the bombing occurred.
According to the Times, Hegseth briefly looked at the card, handed it back and said: “I don’t care.”
Donahue’s military record makes the episode even more extraordinary. He served for roughly three decades, completed more than 20 combat deployments, commanded Delta Force and later helped develop new approaches to drone warfare after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. His supporters reportedly regarded him as a generational military talent.
Yet the more senior officers and lawmakers tried to defend him, the more determined Hegseth allegedly became. An effort to arrange a meeting between Donahue and Vice President JD Vance was reportedly derailed after Hegseth learned about it. Senators were later told that lobbying on Donahue’s behalf was only hardening Hegseth’s position.
On August 27, Donahue retired from the Army.
The contrast is remarkable. When a congressman previously suggested that troops deployed to Los Angeles had not been properly cared for, Hegseth indignantly declared: “No one in senior leadership cares more about troops than this secretary.”
But when his own chief of staff reportedly placed evidence in front of him showing that a distinguished combat commander was not responsible for the security failure Hegseth associated him with — and that the supposed “selfie” he had fixated on wasn’t even a selfie — Hegseth apparently did not ask for more information.
He did not reconsider. He did not ask whether he might be scapegoating the wrong man. According to The New York Times, he simply handed the card back: “I don’t care.”
Those three words say more about the episode than any congressional testimony ever could.
P.S. I'm moving from Twitter/X to Substack. Join me there for independent journalism, investigations, and political analysis. Free and paid subscriptions are welcome.
mykhailorohoza.substack.com
Publius retweeted
I have a history PhD from Oxford and try to support all of my historical claims with strong evidence, particularly when regarding the president of the United States.
But based on a comprehensive review of 250 years of American history, it is simply irrefutable that Donald Trump is by far the most corrupt president in U.S. history when it comes to using the office to enrich himself and his family.
Here are the facts, and why there isn’t even a close second.
Trump’s own federal financial disclosure reported more than $1.4 billion in 2025 income from family crypto ventures, including about $635 million from his meme coin and nearly $800 million from World Liberty Financial. Reuters separately estimated that the family added at least $2.3 billion to its fortune from crypto ventures after Trump returned to the White House.
The clearest example of how Trump used the office came in May 2025. The 220 biggest holders of his meme coin were invited to dine with the sitting president at his private golf club. The coin jumped more than 60 percent when the dinner was announced. To get a seat at the table, you had to buy and hold a product that made the president money. Trump turned access to the presidency into a sales pitch.
The foreign dealings raise an even more serious question. Four days before Trump took office, an investment vehicle backed by a UAE national security official agreed to pay $500 million for nearly half of World Liberty Financial. The Wall Street Journal reported that $187 million of the initial payment was directed to Trump family entities.
Trump is clearly not the first United States president to be guilty of corruption, but the size and scale of his malfeasance put him in a league of his own.
Under Ulysses S. Grant, whiskey distillers and federal officials pocketed money by cheating the government out of liquor taxes. Under Warren Harding, Interior Secretary Albert Fall took bribes in exchange for leasing federal oil reserves. Richard Nixon had a personal tax scandal, but his defining abuse of presidential power was the Watergate cover-up, an effort to protect his hold on office. LBJ’s political connections helped turn a small Texas radio station into a family broadcasting empire.
By September 2025, less than eight months into Donald Trump’s second term, he and his family were roughly $5 billion richer than they had been around the 2024 election, according to Forbes. In comparison, a reasonable estimate is that all 44 other U.S. presidents combined added about $250 million to their wealth while in office, adjusted to today’s dollars. That puts the Trump family’s gain at about 20 times the estimated combined total for all other presidents over the course of two and half centuries.
The election results were, at least in part, a clear repudiation of this staggering and historically unprecedented corruption. Congress now has a mandate to investigate, follow the money, pursue the recovery of all ill-gotten gains, and enact enforceable safeguards so that no president can ever again use the White House as a vehicle for personal enrichment.
Publius retweeted
UNFORGIVEABLE: A Minnesota doctor just revealed Renée Good still had a pulse 8 minutes after she was shot by an ICE agent.
A physician on scene offered to administer aid and was denied.
In any courtroom, preventing medical aid after using deadly force isn’t just cruel, it’s an aggravating factor.
Publius retweeted
Confirmed --this really happened. They were not authorized to do it and the purpose is unclear.
Let this sink in: ICE agents reportedly blocked the emergency entrance of a Los Angeles hospital for TWO HOURS, forcing ambulances carrying people who needed emergency care to go elsewhere.
This isn’t law enforcement. This is a reckless abuse of power that put innocent people’s lives at risk.
An ambulance entrance is not a political battleground. A hospital emergency room is not an immigration checkpoint.
And federal agents do not get to hold an entire community’s access to emergency medical care hostage.
Imagine being in an ambulance, fighting for your life, only to be diverted because federal agents decided their operation mattered more than emergency access.
Where is the humanity? Where is the accountability? And where is the line that these agents are no longer allowed to cross?
You cannot claim to be protecting America while putting Americans’ lives in danger.
This isn’t making America great. It’s making America cruel. And anyone defending this should be ashamed.
Publius retweeted
This is a formal request for Susie Wiles and James Blair to stop harassing me with texts and calls.
If there is a factual inaccuracy in what I said, send it to me in writing and I will vigorously correct and apologize for any misstatements. I will note that everything I said is substantiated by other senior officials.
If you want to file a lawsuit and get into discovery of whether it’s provably true that Ballard and Continental had an undue influence on the White House policy process, do it.
I believe we are in an existential moment for the country, and Americans were owed an honest accounting of the past two years so we identify the problems we need to move on from.
Publius retweeted
I’m here for Powell Memo content.
It’s a 35 page document. We’re on about page 34.5.
James Talarico traces 50 years of trickle-down back to one 1971 document, the Powell memo, a corporate blueprint to buy power
“In fact, you can, you can pinpoint this one document called the Powell memo, 1971.”
“But if you read this memo, it's basically a blueprint for how corporate interests can start to dismantle the Great Society and the New Deal”
“They're going to spend massive amounts of money in our politics, buying politicians in both parties, elevate corporate voices in media, appoint sympathetic judges.”
“And that has really been the story of the last 50 years in this country, last five decades.”
w/ @jamestalarico
Publius retweeted
Are you fucking kidding us?
The US Secretary of Defense posts “Patriots in control,” a notorious QAnon slogan. THREE MINUTES later, Putin's envoy Kirill Dmitriev responds with “WWG1WGA,” another QAnon cult mantra.
What the actual fuck is this? A coordinated trolling operation? A joint US-Russian QAnon convention? Or have the lunatics finally taken over both asylums?
These people are running two nuclear powers, for fuck's sake.
Publius retweeted
When I first saw this clip I thought she was referring to Charlie’s favorite brand of hot sauce. But no, as it turns out they are selling Kirk Hot Sauce for $8.99.
Erika Kirk: “It’s the little things. I miss Charlie when I see his hot sauce on the shelf, which is now available at grocery stores everywhere.”
It’s an instinct.
Readers added context they thought people might want to know
The OP made up that second half of that quote. In the video Erika Kirk says no such thing.
x.com/RichardHanania…
Gov Shapiro - It seems like the State of PA might be able to investigate and potentially prosecute the instances that occurred in PA? @JoshShapiroPA @DaveSunday_
An investigation by the San Francisco Chronicle has uncovered disturbing findings in ICE’s own internal investigations of detainee deaths.
The Chronicle obtained 29 mortality reviews covering deaths between January 2025 and January 2026. ICE investigators found that 23 of the 29 people died after receiving medical care that fell below safe standards.
In at least eight cases, medical staff failed to perform CPR correctly or failed to perform it at all.
In 13 cases, staff failed to communicate warning signs to medical providers or incoming personnel.
The investigation also identified failures at Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, including the deaths of Fouad Saeed Abdulkadir and Chaofeng Ge.
At least 62 people have died in ICE custody since Trump returned to office. The investigation found no documented disciplinary actions or sanctions against the contractors or staff implicated in the deficient care.
If a hospital or nursing facility had documented failures of this magnitude, it could face immediate regulatory intervention, financial penalties, loss of federal funding, or even closure. Those responsible could also face criminal investigation.
ICE’s own investigators documented repeated failures in its detention facilities, including failures that preceded detainees’ deaths.
People held in government custody are dependent on that government for their medical care and their safety. These findings demand accountability.
Publius retweeted
@jaredkushner @SEPeaceMissions Your "new" European security architecture already exists. Moscow signed it in 1975 and 1990, then shredded it. My latest Diplomatic Cable: we need a Ukraine deal first, one European voice, and real diplomats to get it done. newsletter.ivodaalder.com/p/…
Publius retweeted
Russell Vought has found a neat way to make Congress optional: hold approved money until the fiscal year ends, then pretend the calendar did the canceling. In September, OMB sought $810 million in rescissions. The GAO said the administration couldn't use that request to let the funding expire. Somehow the man who lectures everyone about constitutional government keeps misplacing Article I.
The stakes are Head Start, disaster relief, medical research, and the basic promise that laws passed by Congress mean something. Get the records. Put the officials under oath. Close the claimed loopholes. A president doesn't get a line-item veto just because his budget director knows how to wait until midnight.
Russell Vought is the most powerful Trump official most Americans have never heard of. And Democrats are coming for his power.
@crampell explains how Trump’s budget chief helped undermine Congress’s authority and why his reckoning may be coming.
lnk.thebulwark.com/4irI149?u…
Publius retweeted
Joe Rogan just hosted his most important episode ever after Republicans lost the midterms as White House insider Calley Means just exposed the real people who are running Trump’s presidency and lists key inner circle names like Susie Wiles, Jame Blair, Richard Walters, and the most powerful lobbying firm known as Ballard Partners:
MEANS: “Susie Wiles is the most powerful chief of staff in modern American history. She has taken a stranglehold on any policy decision. No policy decision gets done without her office giving it the okay. She was one of the top lobbyists in the country. It is impossible to describe to you how demonic this culture is.”
CONTEXT: Means, who resigned from the administration in OCTOBER, says he witnessed an extraordinary concentration of power inside the White House.
He alleges that cabinet secretaries and senior officials spent enormous amounts of time attempting to win favor with Wiles' office because of its influence over which policies could advance.
He then identifies several people he believes were central to that power structure:
SUSIE WILES: White House chief of staff.
JAMES BLAIR: A longtime Trump political strategist and former deputy White House chief of staff.
RICHARD WALTERS: Deputy White House chief of staff and longtime Republican political operative.
WALKER BARRETT: Senior White House adviser with extensive congressional experience.
But the most consequential part of his accusation concerns the CORPORATE LOBBYING INDUSTRY.
Before entering Trump's White House, Wiles had a career representing corporate clients, including working at the influential Washington lobbying firm BALLARD PARTNERS.
And the money involved in that industry is staggering.
According to federal lobbying disclosures, Ballard Partners collected approximately $88 MILLION in lobbying revenue during 2025, more than QUADRUPLING its reported revenue from 2024.
That made Ballard one of the highest-earning lobbying operations in Washington.
And in MAY 2025, the watchdog organization Public Citizen identified SIX FORMER WILES CLIENTS that had reported lobbying White House offices during the administration's first three months.
Those clients included companies involved in tobacco, automobiles, fertilizer, and other major industries.
The White House disputed suggestions of improper influence and said Wiles generally did not participate in meetings or decisions involving former clients.
Those disclosures establish real corporate lobbying relationships.
They do NOT, by themselves, prove that Wiles improperly favored those companies or directed policies for their benefit.
But Means argues that the broader culture of Washington is precisely what Trump promised to confront.
Now consider the extraordinary political timing.
IMPORTANT NOTES: On NOVEMBER 3, Democrats won control of BOTH CHAMBERS OF CONGRESS in a sweeping midterm defeat for Republicans.
And TODAY, NOVEMBER 6, Trump announced that Susie Wiles will leave the chief-of-staff position, with Stephen Miller taking over on November 9.
Trump PRAISED Wiles for her service and said she would continue working for his political operation.
Publius retweeted
Putin does not have a veto over European security.
Any agreement to end the war must prevent Russia from re-arming and re-attacking.
This is why earlier this year, I put forward a paper with core demands towards Moscow, which was discussed by EU Foreign Ministers. This should be the basis for any negotiations.
Concessions should be on the aggressor, not on the victim.
My press remarks in Warsaw alongside @sikorskiradek and @andrii_sybiha ↓
Publius retweeted
Why should Congressional Democrats investigate corporate America if their mandate is to deliver real economic change? Because investigations are a key catalyst for securing reform and legislation. For much of the last century, Congress used to be the main institutional player working to secure an economy that serves working people. A key tool was oversight. Lawmakers routinely investigated complex markets and major corporations, identifying problems and exposing wrongdoing. A major goal of these investigations was to learn what was driving certain problems and figure out how to fix them.
After Democrats took back the House during the first Trump administration in 2019, I joined the House Judiciary Committee as a staffer on the Antitrust Subcommittee. Under the terrific leadership of @RepJerryNadler and then-Rep @davidcicilline, we pursued an 18-month investigation into Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google, securing key evidence of how their business practices were undermining competition and harming people, setting the basis for both lawsuits and proposed legislation.
A few lessons from that experience:
1. The quality of legislative oversight depends on the staff and the support of top members to confront power. Committee and Subcommittee Chairs that are focused on getting answers and unafraid to take on powerful corporate interests will make the difference between oversight that doesn’t surrender to their evasion tactics and oversight that aims low or flames out.
Even a relatively small number of dogged, talented lawyers ready to dive in can make a big impact. In the 1930s a single congressional lawyer, Ferdinand Pecora, helped reshape our entire banking system by subpoenaing records and interrogating top financiers, including J.P Morgan. The investigation exposed self-dealing, market manipulation, and tax avoidance, and laid the groundwork for foundational New Deal legislation, including the Glass-Steagall Act and the Securities Exchange Act.
2. Eliminating bottlenecks to moving investigations forward is key. For example, the House should make sure that Subcommittee Chairs can issue subpoenas rather than needing the sign-off of the full Committee or its Chair. A credible threat of sending subpoenas is critical for credible oversight.
3. Ensuring that members can develop the muscle to effectively interrogate CEOs requires investing in real preparation. In the lead up to the hearing with Bezos, Pichai, Cook, and Zuckerberg, the Antitrust Subcommittee spent months reviewing millions of documents collected from the firms, interviewing affected parties, briefing members on key evidence, and conducting practice hearings. Members came into the hearing deeply informed and able to rebut and call out CEO dissembling. The result was some of the most effective member questioning of executives we’ve seen in decades. @TheProspect wrote up a great overview: prospect.org/2020/07/30/triu…
4. For decades, institutional capacity in Congress has been extremely weak. Much of this traces back to the Gingrich Revolution, which was effectively the 1995 DOGE-ing of Congress. Republican leadership fired over 600 professional staffers, eliminated the Office of Technology Assessment, and gutted research capacity. None of that capacity was ever meaningfully restored.
As a result, members have way fewer resources to develop serious expertise or go deep on a new topic. Members should start rebuilding that capacity so the institution can fully play its Article I role, where Congress can again do serious policy development and legislating and serve as a real check on the executive and judicial branches.
5. AI markets should be high on the list of investigations. The business decisions of the major AI firms have huge public ramifications, yet the public is at a severe informational disadvantage when it comes to how these markets work and the choices these firms are making. A congressional investigation will help ensure future legislative action is based on a more complete view of what is going on rather than selective and partial corporate disclosures.
Publius retweeted
Criminal. Thank you, @RepStenyHoyer, for calling the Pentagon out on this. This is not Hegseth's money. This is the American people's money appropriated through a democratic process.
It is inconceivable that $400 million in appropriated military assistance still hasn’t been delivered to Ukraine. I urge the Pentagon to secure the delivery of this essential equipment right away in order to save lives, protect civilians, & help bring about the victory that must be this war’s end.
hoyer.house.gov/media/press-…
