Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the Trump administration is “thinking” about taking an equity stake in defense and munitions companies, Politico reports.
Said Lutnick: “There’s a monstrous discussion about defense. I mean, Lockheed Martin makes 97 percent of their revenue from the U.S. government. They are basically an arm of the U.S. government.”
The Atlantic says the Department of Homeland Security posted an image promoting Roosevelt’s New Deal that shows Uncle Sam standing at a crossroads which is annotated: “Which way, American man?”
“It’s a reference to the title of a canonical text for neo-Nazis and white nationalists, the 1978 book by William Gayley Simpson, Which Way Western Man?, which depicts Jews, Black people, and nonwhite immigrants as an existential threat to the United States.”
CNN: “The meeting with Indiana lawmakers comes amid a White House pressure campaign for Republican-dominated states to redraw Congressional maps ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. President Donald Trump hopes to stop Democrats from winning back the House – where Republicans have a very narrow majority.”
Voters at a rowdy town hall meeting in Missouri demanded that Rep. Mark Alford (R-MO) denounce President Donald Trump’s “lies”—and told him to get his head “out of Trump’s ass,” the Daily Beast reports.
Other constituents complained about the president’s support for Russia and booed his mass-deportation policy.
The Washington Post identified “six main factions of today’s Republican Party, spanning wealthy Silicon Valley executives and health-conscious moms along with the business leaders, antiabortion activists and budget-cutting conservatives who drove earlier eras of GOP politics.”
“In the first months of Trump’s administration, fault lines in that coalition have repeatedly surfaced — over tariffs, the scope of deportations, federal budget cuts, and whether countries such as Ukraine and Israel should receive aid.”
“By force of personality and his popularity among Republican voters, Trump has held his coalition together… Doubts remain within the party about how a coalition whose unity depends so heavily on Trump will hold together in coming years when his role changes.”
“Opposition to French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou’s government gained momentum on Tuesday, adding to the likelihood that it could be forced out as soon as next month,” Bloomberg reports.
“Three of the largest opposition parties in France’s National Assembly — the far-right National Rally, the leftist France Unbowed and the Socialists – have all indicated they will vote against the motion, which would force the government to resign.”
“President Donald Trump on Monday stateside warned of steeper tariffs on China if exports of rare-earth magnets were curbed, threatening a precarious trade truce between the world’s two largest economies,” CNBC reports.
Said Trump: “They have to give us magnets, if they don’t give us magnets, then we have to charge them 200% tariffs or something.”
Wall Street Journal: Top Chinese trade negotiator set to head to U.S. as talks resume.
“To President Trump’s many roles, formal and self-designated, add a new one to the list: chairman of all boards,” Axios reports.
“The president has assumed a quasi-authority to orchestrate how the private sector operates, both broadly and down to the management and ownership of individual companies.”
“No one’s stopping him, so he continues to confidently plow ahead.”
Rachel Bade: “To many Washington insiders, President Trump’s early August Beltway crime crackdown seemed like an opportunistic and hamhanded pivot after getting walloped for weeks over the Jeffrey Epstein affair.”
“But if it wasn’t clear then, it is now: The White House’s public safety play is a deliberate ploy to refocus the narrative on an issue that favors Republicans ahead of the midterms — one that’s already backing Democrats into a corner.”
“If his recent escalation was an attempt to goad Democrats into declaring that crime isn’t a problem, repelling swing voters in the process, top Democrats did not disappoint him.”
“We go in, we will solve Chicago within one week, maybe less. But within one week, we’ll have no crime in Chicago, like no crime in D.C.”
— President Trump, quoted by Politico.
“California Republicans are again asking the state Supreme Court to block California from redrawing its congressional boundaries, charging chief proponent Gov. Gavin Newsom and his legislative allies with violating the state Constitution, the same day the White House said it would also sue California,” the Sacramento Bee reports.
A new Change Research poll finds 52 percent of “registered voters in Indiana — which Trump won by 19 points last year — said they are against Republicans revising their maps, with 43 percent ‘strongly’ opposing the effort.”
“That opposition rises to 60 percent after voters are informed of arguments for and against redistricting.”
Playbook: “It’s a massive moment for the nation and the economy. Trump’s actions suggest he has his eye on a far more ambitious prize than just replacing Fed Chair Jerome Powell when his term ends next May. Instead, the president appears to want total control over the bank’s interest-rate setting structures. Firing Cook now would give Trump a majority of appointees on the Fed’s seven-person board, ahead of a key moment next year when the board reappoints the independently chosen regional chairs who make up the rest of the voting bloc.”
“The bottom line: Plenty of Fed watchers believe we’re seeing the greatest threat to its independence in generations.”
Associated Press: Why the Federal Reserve has historically been independent of the White House.
New York Times: Can Trump fire a Fed governor?
Virginia gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger (D) is out with a new ad attacking Winsome Earle-Sears (R) for supporting President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
Playbook: “It marks the first time a major Democratic candidate has targeted a Republican opponent over the megabill, which Earle-Sears said ‘does so many great things.’”
“California’s two biggest Republican names have both returned from retirement to fight Proposition 50, the mid-decade partisan gerrymander being promoted by top Democrats. Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is raising money for a Stop Sacramento’s Power Grab committee, while former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has backed donor Charles Munger Jr.’s Protect Voters First,” Politico reports.
“But the two committees are not coordinating their efforts… That distance reflects a core divide among the Republicans jumping into the fray against Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Prop 50 — one faction that hopes to manage President Donald Trump’s involvement, one that wants to keep him far away.”
“The Utah Legislature will need to rapidly redraw the state’s congressional boundaries after a judge ruled Monday that the Republican-controlled body circumvented safeguards put in place by voters to ensure districts aren’t drawn to favor any party,” the AP reports.
“The U.S. will increase tariffs and impose export restrictions on countries that tax or regulate U.S. tech firms, President Trump said on Monday evening, in his most direct threat to retaliate against nations that he views as discriminating against companies such as Google and Meta Platforms,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
CNBC: Trump vows ‘substantial’ new tariffs, chip restrictions on countries with digital taxes.
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.
