“JD ‘I don’t give a shit’ Vance says killing people he accuses of a crime is the ‘highest and best use of the military.’ Did he ever read To Kill a Mockingbird? Did he ever wonder what might happen if the accused were immediately executed without trial or representation??”

— Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), on X, tearing into Vance’s defense of the U.S. military’s strike on an alleged drug vessel leaving Venezuela.

New York Times: “The Trump administration continues to erode the power of Congress, trampling on its constitutional prerogatives in ways large and small. Through it all, Republicans in charge have mostly shrugged — and in some cases, outright applauded — as their powers, once jealously guarded, diminish in ways that will be difficult to reverse.”

“In recent weeks, GOP leaders have looked on passively as the president has fired a litany of agency leaders whom senators worked for weeks to confirm, from the CDC to the Internal Revenue Service to the Federal Reserve.”

“And they have shown little appetite for challenging the administration, even as a few have expressed occasional displeasure about the consequences of their decisions earlier this year to swallow their reservations about some of his nominees and confirm them.”

“Donald Trump this spring dubbed himself the ‘fertilization president,'” Politico reports.

“But some conservative family policy advocates say he’s done little so far to publicly back that up and are pushing to get the White House in the remaining months of the year to prioritize family policy — and help Americans make more babies.”

“Americans’ views of President Donald Trump’s job performance remain negative amid a flurry of activity from his administration on tariffs, immigration and public health,” according to the latest NBC News Decision Desk Poll.

“Notably, the poll shows U.S. adults expressing strong, bipartisan support for vaccines as Trump’s health and human services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has moved to limit certain shots.”