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“One of the leading Democratic super PACs is pledging to spend $30 million defining potential Republican presidential candidates during the 2028 primary season,” NOTUS reports.
“The Priorities USA effort, described first to NOTUS, is aimed at younger, disengaged voters living in seven battleground states. Priorities USA is training its attacks on Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.”
“In Colombia’s tightest-ever presidential contest, half of voters registered a desire for change after four years of the country’s ambitious leftist experiment under President Gustavo Petro,” Bloomberg reports.
“Yesterday’s preliminary count showing victory for Abelardo de la Espriella, a MAGA-supporting lawyer with dual US citizenship who has never held elected office, is another leap into the unknown for Colombia.”
“More clearly, the result represents a win for President Donald Trump and his efforts to impose US control over the Western hemisphere.”
“President Trump said twice in two days last week that he doesn’t want to be associated with Herbert Hoover, who served during the early years of the Great Depression,” Axios reports.
Said Trump: “I have one primary wish as president, in terms of people: I never want to be the late, great Herbert Hoover.”
And another time: “I’ve studied presidents — some good, some bad, some great… And the one president I did not want to be was the late, great Herbert Hoover.”
“Majorities of Americans say they’re more likely to vote for candidates in November who support ideas to lower their health costs,” according to the latest Axios-Ipsos American Health Index.
“Their support for ideas across the political spectrum — from renewing Affordable Care Act subsidies to expanding direct sales of prescription drugs — shows the power of voters’ demands for relief.”
British prime minister Keir Starmer announced he will “resign as leader of the Labour Party,” the BBC reports.
Starmer said the question his party is asking is whether he is best placed to lead it into the next general election.
He said he has “heard the answer” of his party to that question and “accepts that answer with good grace.”
Wired: The UK just lost its sixth prime minister of the decade.
CNN: “For the better part of a decade, Trump’s central indictment of former President Barack Obama’s Iran nuclear deal was simple: Giving Tehran access to frozen assets enriched a dangerous regime and got the United States little in return.”
“Trump’s current secretary of state and vice president went even further, co-sponsoring legislation as senators that argued Iranian frozen funds could not be safely released because the money, even with rules governing its use, could end up being utilized in a dangerous way.”
“Now, all three are backing an agreement that spells out US commitments to potentially release those funds and lift sanctions on Tehran but leaves specific details on Iran’s nuclear program to future negotiations.”
“An influential conservative nonprofit covertly funded a series of super PACs with names suggesting liberal provenance as the groups injected hundreds of thousands of dollars into key nominating Democratic contests across the country,” CNN reports.
“Rushing to launch Graham Platner’s Senate bid, Dan Moraff, a progressive up-and-comer and Platner’s top strategist, asked a Democratic research firm to vet the political novice,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“A thorough background check of a Senate candidate, which has become standard practice in key races, can take several weeks and cost roughly $20,000 or a monthly retainer. Moraff asked for an expedited, cheaper review to be done within days, according to people familiar with the matter.”
“In three days, New York-based Northside Research produced a brief, risk-assessment memo for Moraff in lieu of a detailed research book—or the start of one—that can be hundreds of pages long.”
“Sen. Jon Ossoff’s general election machine is roaring to life,” the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports.
“The Democratic incumbent’s campaign said it raised more than $1 million in the 24 hours after Rep. Mike Collins clinched the Republican nomination, powered by roughly 27,000 online donors who gave an average of $38.”
“The haul is the latest sign of the financial juggernaut Ossoff has built around small-dollar fundraising. His campaign has socked away more than $32 million to battle for a second term.”
“We’ve already made great progress over just the last few hours. I expect that we will make additional progress in the hours to come.”
— Vice President JD Vance, quoted by NOTUS, even though Iranian negotiators walked out of their meeting with the U.S.
“Gavin Newsom is gambling that embracing Joe Biden will be more popular among Democrats than running away from him in the party’s 2028 presidential primary,” Axios reports.
“The California governor — unlike most potential Democratic candidates for president — has spent the last 18 months courting Biden and his family, publicly defending the ex-president’s legacy as others have distanced themselves.”
The Atlantic: “Donald Trump’s war against Iran began with one gamble and ended with another. Initially, the president bet that he could stop Iran’s nuclear ambitions by bombing Iran’s revolutionary regime out of existence. So he spent tens of billions of dollars, and upended the global economy, only to sign a memorandum of understanding undoubtedly weaker than any deal he could have struck before the war. Embedded in this document is a new gamble: that if Iran’s revolutionaries can’t be dislodged by force, they might instead be bribed to abandon their identity.”
“The memorandum offers a bundle of American inducements so lopsided that it reads as if Tehran wrote the plan unilaterally.”
“Oil prices inched up and stocks dipped on Sunday as the status of the Strait of Hormuz remained unclear, underscoring how challenging it may be to restore energy flows through the region,” the New York Times reports.
“Colombia’s voters on Sunday elected a Donald Trump-endorsed right-wing businessman in a presidential runoff, ending a period of left-wing rule that coincided with the country’s worst security crisis in decades,” Semafor reports.
“Abelardo de la Espriella proposed bombing gang-held territory and building 10 El Salvador-style megaprisons, while his opponent, the leftist ruling-party senator Iván Cepeda, had pledged to continue negotiating with armed groups under President Gustavo Petro’s “Total Peace” strategy.”
Bloomberg: Trump-backed conservative leads in Colombia presidential runoff.
“President Donald Trump kept his feud with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni going on Sunday while simultaneously bashing NATO for being a bunch of freeloading ingrates who did nothing to help the USA in its war against Iran,” Mediaite reports.
“Trump ripped Meloni — without mentioning her by name — and NATO in a Truth Social post.”
Said Trump: “After spending Trillions of Dollars on NATO, Italy, and its Prime Minister, wouldn’t even think of becoming involved with the Islamic Republic of Iran and their very serious Nuclear Threat.”
He added: “For decades, we defend them but, when tested, they are not there to defend us, and the rest of the World. Not good!”
“Sen. Ruben Gallego repeatedly used campaign cash to fund luxury outings with his wife and to care for his children since launching his campaign for Senate in 2023,” Politico reports.
“The Arizona Democrat has used his leadership PAC to fund recent trips to Miami, Chicago, Disneyland and Disney World with his family. Gallego has tapped that PAC and his main campaign committee for more than $18,000 in reimbursements for child care since 2019 — including $400 to his wife’s mother for babysitting.”
“Just a week after the completion of President Donald Trump’s much-hyped $14 million renovation of the iconic Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, the water is green and a thin layer of ‘American flag blue’ paint originally meant to augment the color of the feature has begun to peel,” NOTUS reports.
“But rather than blaming Mother Nature or the contractor who won a no-bid contract for the renovation, Trump has turned his ire on another alleged culprit: vandals.”
“Iran’s chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf warned the United States on Sunday against making threats at the Islamic republic, vowing that “our armed forces are ready to respond”,” South China Morning Post reports.
Said Ghalibaf: “Don’t they think that if their threats had any effect, they would not have reached today’s state of desperation? We do not take American threats into account.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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