Axios: “The threat of criminal charges targeting Trump enemies, such as former FBI director James Comey and former CIA director John Brennan, is no longer confined to the base’s imagination.”

“With Trump at the peak of his powers — and the Justice Department brimming with loyalists, pretexts and political will — MAGA is primed for a historic reckoning.”

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) told the Daily Mail that she feels that the Republican party has lost touch with its base, and suggested she may abandon the party entirely.

Said Greene: “I don’t know if the Republican party is leaving me, or if I’m kind of not relating to Republican party as much any more. I don’t know which one it is.”

“Elon Musk contributed $15 million to President Trump and congressional Republicans just days after his public blowup with Trump, an indication the tech billionaire was looking to make peace with the White House,” Axios reports.

“But Musk reversed course less than two weeks later, when he called for the creation of a third party.”

Noah Smith: “I think it’s pretty uncontroversial to say that the MAGA movement is the most powerful and important political movement in America today, by a wide margin. Trump’s control of the presidency, and his unprecedented domination of the Republican Party, mean that even though MAGA isn’t a majority of Americans, it has complete control over the federal government. That control will diminish, but not disappear, if Democrats take back one or both houses of Congress next fall. In the meantime, despite falling popularity, MAGA reigns supreme.”

“And yet I can’t help thinking that despite its current dominance, the MAGA movement doesn’t have much of a long-term future. It has managed to win some elections, by harnessing popular rage — against Democrats, against immigration, against educated elites, against economic conditions, etc. But rage doesn’t last forever.”

“In order for a movement to have longevity, I think it needs to build something. Things like physical infrastructure, institutions, and culture have a lifetime that long exceeds the cascade of emotions that first brings a movement into being.”

Punchbowl News: “It’s hard to see how this week could’ve gone worse for President Donald Trump and House Republicans.”

“Paralyzed by infighting over the scandal surrounding the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, GOP lawmakers spent the week alternating between bickering among themselves or lamely trying to blame the Democrats for the Epstein debacle. They never came close to figuring out what to do next or how to do it. And at the end of the week, House Republicans left town in the middle of the night with the scandal only getting worse, not better…”

“Trump tried falsely blaming Democrats for the Epstein scandal, including former Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama, as well as former Attorney General Merrick Garland and former FBI Director James Comey. The Justice Department even fired Maurene Comey – James’ daughter and a longtime federal prosecutor who worked on the Epstein case – this week.”

“Yet this seemed to make things worse, not better. It was a hugely uncharacteristic moment for Trump since his return to the White House. Trump has had an iron grip over the GOP and his base. This week showed that even Trump has limits.”

NBC News: “The move represents a trend in Congress during President Donald Trump’s second term. Republican lawmakers across the ideological spectrum keep casting votes in favor of bills even while warning that they’re deeply flawed and may require fixing down the road. In some cases, lawmakers explicitly threaten to vote ‘no’ on bills before eventually folding and voting ‘yes.'”

“It isn’t unusual for lawmakers to back legislation they call imperfect. But this year, that contrast has become more stark. It comes as Trump has solidified his grasp over the GOP base, resulting in lawmakers growing increasingly leery of crossing him and risking their political futures.”

“Former Jan. 6 defendants are the new draw at local Republican fundraisers, helping to fill seats at normally sleepy events while getting a platform to tell their version of the Capitol riot,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

Sam Stein: “Is Donald Trump a stronger and more skilled politician than he was eight years ago—or are the guardrails that once hindered him just weaker?”

“That question has come up often over the last six months as Trump has enjoyed a series of successes that eluded him during his first term in office. Clearly, he has used the power of the presidency in ways neither he nor any prior president has before. He hasn’t just changed the shape and direction of the executive branch and moved his agenda through Congress, but reshaped entire sectors of American society—from academia, to entertainment, to the law itself.”

“Yet what has stood out along the way is not how far Trump has pushed the envelope but how little resistance he’s encountered.”

Punchbowl News: “Trump and GOP congressional leaders got the big spectacle they wanted on July 4. A White House signing ceremony for the One Big Beautiful Bill, lots of flags, fireworks, even a B-2 bomber flyover. Speaker Mike Johnson gave Trump the gavel he used to close out the House vote.”

“But now comes the reality — and the headlines back home. Medicaid cuts of nearly $1 trillion. No extension of Obamacare subsidies. Tens of billions of dollars in SNAP cuts. Governors may be forced to call special legislative sessions to deal with gaping holes in their own budgets.”

“While the biggest federal cuts won’t come until after the midterm elections, the negatives for the GOP reconciliation megabill may overwhelm any political boost that Trump and Republicans get from extending and expanding the 2017 Trump tax cuts, at least in the short term. That means vulnerable GOP lawmakers get hit now, with the worst coming later. Republicans will need to turn around public perception of the OBBB, even in their own party.”

“Republicans had a hard time persuading some of their own lawmakers to support the party’s big tax-cutting and domestic-policy bill. They might have an even harder time selling it to the public,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“Polls show that the bill is unpopular. Opposition outweighed support by more than 20 percentage points in recent Fox News and Quinnipiac University polls. Some Republican lawmakers facing tough races next year represent the most Medicaid-reliant districts. They will have to defend the big cuts in the bill to Medicaid, the health-insurance program for low-income and disabled people, as well as to rural hospitals and to nutrition assistance, once known as food stamps. Those cuts help fund tax cuts in the bill that President Trump called for during the 2024 campaign.”

Politico: “The Republican base now includes more working-class and low-income people, many of whom receive their health insurance through Medicaid.”

“But the traditional sentiment of many Republican lawmakers toward the social safety-net program — that it provides handouts on taxpayers’ dime — has largely remained the same.”

“History and dismal public polling suggest President Donald Trump’s $3.3 trillion tax bill, approved by Congress on Thursday, could help Democrats win back the House in the 2026 midterm elections,” the Washington Post reports.

“The bill is deeply unpopular — with nearly 2-to-1 opposition, according to a Washington Post-Ipsos poll conducted in June. But Republicans still have an opportunity to shape public perception of the bill because more than a third of Americans had no opinion of it and two-thirds said they had heard either little or nothing about it.”

“So both parties are racing to define it. Republicans are touting new tax breaks for seniors and service workers. Democrats are attacking the bill as a giveaway to the rich that will lead to millions of low-income Americans losing their health care.”