Good morning, everyone. I’m tracking several major developments today, including growing frustration inside the White House as the President becomes increasingly enraged over coverage showing him struggling to stay awake during high-stakes meetings and “seething” over comparisons to “sleepy” Joe Biden. At the same time, FBI Director Kash Patel reportedly overrode internal objections to have veteran agents escort his girlfriend’s inebriated friends home, and we’re uncovering new details about the boat strikes in the Southern Caribbean that make it ever more likely they violated international laws of war.
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Here’s what you missed:
President Donald Trump, 79, has grown intensely angry over mounting media coverage scrutinizing signs of his declining cognitive and physical health, with aides and insiders describing him obsessing for days over stories comparing him to “Sleepy Joe” as outlets highlight instances of him dozing off in meetings, misspeaking during press events, and appearing with unexplained bruising, while the White House insists he remains in excellent health and dismisses concerns as politically motivated attacks.
This comes after during a press conference yesterday for the peace deal between Rwanda and the Congo showed Trump struggling to stay awake for the second time in one week.
FBI agents are furious at Director Kash Patel this morning. According to MS Now, multiple current and former FBI personnel allege that Director Kash Patel repeatedly diverted his girlfriend’s FBI SWAT security detail to chauffeur one of her intoxicated friends, over agents’ objections, fueling broader concerns that he has misused elite bureau resources for personal convenience, shown volatile and insecure leadership marked by tirades and image-focused demands, and engaged in behavior reminiscent of past directors removed for ethics violations, all while publicly denying the allegations and insisting he is responsibly stewarding taxpayer funds.
CNN reporting says surveillance video from the Sept. 2 operation showed two survivors clinging to the capsized remains of their boat for roughly 41 minutes after an initial strike killed nine people and split the vessel in half; senior commanders, including Adm. Bradley, debated next steps as the men struggled without radios or any visible communications devices.
Bradley told lawmakers he ordered a second strike because the remaining portion of the vessel appeared to still contain cocaine and could theoretically allow the survivors to float to safety and resume trafficking, a justification one source familiar with the briefing described as “f**king insane.”
U.S. Southern Command said the Pentagon conducted another lethal strike on a suspected drug-trafficking vessel in the eastern Pacific, killing four people, marking at least the 22nd such operation in recent months under the Trump administration, which continues to face congressional scrutiny and allegations of possible war crimes over earlier strikes while defending the actions as lawful and aimed at boats allegedly linked to narcotics and designated terrorist organizations.
In exclusive reporting overnight, I confirmed that the Trump administration has refused a routine meeting requested by California Gov. Gavin Newsom to discuss long-delayed federal recovery funds for the devastating Los Angeles fires, an unprecedented break from decades of bipartisan disaster-response practice that has left billions in aid stalled, thousands of displaced survivors without clarity, and local governments and insurers unable to move forward as DHS and FEMA decline communication and the White House fails to submit the standard recovery proposal to Congress.
Speaker Mike Johnson is struggling to control the House floor as an unusually rebellious GOP conference increasingly bypasses him with discharge petitions, derails leadership-backed bills, and publicly challenges his authority, a breakdown fueled by the party’s razor-thin majority, falling Trump approval ratings, and pre-midterm anxiety, even as some Republicans continue to defend Johnson’s leadership.
The Supreme Court allowed Texas to use a new congressional map for the 2026 midterms that was designed to increase Republican seats, pausing a lower court ruling that found the map was an unlawful racial gerrymander, prompting sharp criticism from Democrats and civil rights groups, strong support from Texas officials and the Trump administration, and a dissent from the Court’s liberal justices who argued that minority voters were improperly moved for racial reasons.
Warner Bros. Discovery agreed to sell its studios and streaming assets — including HBO, HBO Max, DC properties, and the broader Warner film library — to Netflix for $82.7 billion in cash and stock, a groundbreaking deal that would merge Hollywood’s largest streamer with a century-old studio, expand Netflix’s global dominance, require a massive $59 billion bridge loan, and trigger intense antitrust scrutiny from lawmakers and regulators concerned about market concentration, political influence, and the impact on creators and competition.
According to NBC News, Vice President JD Vance said online gossip about his wife Usha Vance occasionally appearing without her wedding ring has not strained their relationship, noting that they both find the speculation amusing and that their marriage remains as strong as ever, while also acknowledging the broader challenges their family faces living in the public eye and highlighting Usha’s growing role in the administration through her national childhood literacy initiative.
The European Commission fined Elon Musk’s platform X about $140 million for violating the EU’s Digital Services Act by failing to adequately combat hate speech and misinformation, prompting sharp pushback from Musk’s allies, including Vice President JD Vance, while EU officials defended the penalty as a proportionate enforcement action unrelated to censorship, noting that X was the first company investigated under the law and may still appeal the decision.
Cloudflare suffered its second outage in under a month after a firewall adjustment meant to protect customers from a newly disclosed software vulnerability briefly took down major sites like LinkedIn, Zoom, Canva, Shopify and Downdetector for about 30 minutes, renewing expert concerns that the internet is overly dependent on a few centralized infrastructure providers whose failures, even when accidental and minor, can quickly ripple across the globe.
A Guardian investigation reports that El Fasher, once a city of 1.5 million, has become a “massive crime scene” six weeks after the Rapid Support Forces seized it, with satellite imagery revealing mass graves, incineration pits, and the disappearance of up to 150,000 residents; experts estimate at least 60,000 people have been killed in what may be the worst atrocity of Sudan’s civil war, as markets sit abandoned, humanitarian access is blocked, famine conditions deepen, and new evidence emerges of earlier RSF attacks on civilians in nearby displacement camps.
A Politico report confirms federal prosecutors are urging a judge to jail Taylor Taranto, a Jan. 6 defendant pardoned by Donald Trump, after he unexpectedly returned to Washington, D.C., wandered near Rep. Jamie Raskin’s neighborhood, and resumed erratic livestreaming that raised fears he is repeating the behavior that previously led to weapons and threat convictions; the judge ordered Taranto to return to Washington state immediately while he considers the request and warned he is prepared to incarcerate him if he violates any orders.
Good news:
Young griffon vultures will soon be reintroduced to Romania’s Carpathian Mountains a century after all native vulture species disappeared, a key step in building a “European Yellowstone” in the Făgăraș range, where conservationists aim to restore a fully functioning ecosystem by returning keystone species like bison, beavers, and vultures, whose scavenging and nutrient cycling roles are essential for ecological balance.
14-year-old Miles Wu won the $25,000 Thermo Fisher Scientific Junior Innovators Challenge after designing an award-winning Miura-ori origami structure that can support more than 10,000 times its own weight, inspired by deployable disaster shelters and tested across dozens of paper types and fold variations, with his work now fueling plans for further innovation and supporting his future education.
The UK has launched a large national trial of a fast, non-invasive breath test designed to detect pancreatic cancer by analyzing volatile organic compounds linked to the disease, a major step toward earlier diagnosis for a cancer usually found at stage 4, with researchers calling it the most significant advance toward a lifesaving breakthrough in 50 years and aiming to refine the technology with data from 6,000 patients across 40 sites.
See you this afternoon.
— Aaron
