“Generic drug manufacturers will have two years to move production to the U.S. or face a 100% import duty from August 2028, President Donald Trump said in a social media post Tuesday,” Bloomberg reports.
“That levy would then double a year later, to 200%, in August 2029.”
A new American Research Group poll finds just 30% of Americans say they approve of the way Donald Trump is handling his job as president and 67% say they disapprove.
The Economist: “As the ceasefire unravels, four-fifths think the war will last for ‘an extended period,’ finds a Reuters/Ipsos poll. Nearly half think it will grind on for a year or more, according to our own Economist/YouGov polling. Few find the prospect appealing. Net approval for Mr Trump’s decision to attack Iran now stands at -30% among Americans.”
“The war in Vietnam took six years to become as reviled as the Iran war has become in six months.”
“President Donald Trump minimized the prospect of immediate talks with Iran as the two sides exchanged strikes and Houthi militants in Yemen threatened shipping in the Red Sea,” Bloomberg reports.
“Trump vowed on Tuesday to respond if the Iran-backed group disrupted that waterway, but didn’t specify how.”
“President Trump threatened on Tuesday to accelerate the war with Iran by returning the conflict to where it began, with a bunker-busting attack on one of the country’s nuclear facilities,” the New York Times reports.
“But the target he has in mind, known among Western intelligence agencies as Pickaxe Mountain, is not complete. No nuclear experts believe it houses the kind of working equipment to enrich uranium, and convert that material to bomb fuel, like the three major nuclear sites Mr. Trump ordered bombed in June 2025, in what the Pentagon called ‘Operation Midnight Hammer.'”
“At most, experts say, Pickaxe Mountain for now is a deep underground storage site.”
“But for Mr. Trump, facing a turning point in the war, it may make little difference whether Pickaxe Mountain is empty or giving cover to the surviving remnants of Iran’s stockpile of nuclear centrifuges, the machinery critical to churning out bomb fuel.”
“President Trump has formally approved a landmark agreement with Saudi Arabia that will provide the country with a civilian nuclear program and potentially open the door to uranium enrichment in the kingdom’s territory, according to U.S. officials,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“The new deal, which would last 30 years, is estimated to be worth tens of billions of dollars. It is designed to give American companies a central role in developing Saudi Arabia’s nuclear infrastructure while shutting out other foreign competitors.”
“Sen. John Cornyn is threatening to vote down the ambassadorial nominations of two top Trump allies on Wednesday unless the Trump administration releases money aimed at fighting the spread of AIDS in Africa,” Semafor reports.
“President Trump said Tuesday that the U.S. military will bomb Iran’s Pickaxe Mountain, a deep underground site that the U.S. and Israel suspect could be used for nuclear activity,” Axios reports.
“Trump’s remarks, at the top of his meeting with the president of Lebanon at the White House, signaled that he is not interested in a ceasefire at the moment and is moving towards escalating the strikes on Iran.”
Said Trump: “We’ll be hitting that area very probably pretty soon. There’s not a thing they can do about it. You know, normally I wouldn’t say that. If I thought they could do something about it, I would never say that. But we’ll be hitting that area pretty soon, and very heavily.”
“Most of President Trump’s Cabinet will launch TikTok accounts Tuesday, a move that comes days after the Justice Department told federal employees it was safe to use the app because of its sale to a U.S.-approved owner,” Axios reports.
“Why it matters: The move is a striking shift from Trump’s first term, when his administration argued that TikTok posed a national security threat because of its ownership by China’s ByteDance.”
“The Department of Homeland Security plans to spend more than $30 million for body-worn cameras after the fatal shooting of two immigrants in the past two weeks renewed scrutiny of the Trump administration’s aggressive enforcement approach,” NOTUS reports.
“The Trump administration announced Tuesday it was withholding an additional $1 billion in Medicaid funds from California and Minnesota, the second time it has targeted the two states with Democratic governors for suspected fraud in their public health insurance programs,” the New York Times reports.
“The federal government will hold more than $867 million in payments from California and about $200 million from Minnesota until they can provide proof that certain claims were legitimate.”
“House Democrats issued a rebuttal to the White House’s attack on the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, arguing in a report that the Trump administration cherry-picked quotes, mangled basic facts and misstated who controls the institution — even as House Republicans escalate the fight by summoning the museum’s director to testify Tuesday,” the Washington Post reports.
“The dueling documents sharpen a months-long struggle over how to tell the nation’s story as its 250th birthday celebrations unfold, and whether a president can dictate the contents of the congressionally chartered institution.”
“Three months into the Iran war, bond market traders are tuning out President Trump’s posts on his personal social media site, Truth Social, analysts say,” Axios reports.
“Researchers from JPMorgan show that for the most part, his social media posts are noise, with very little ability to move the market.”
“President Donald Trump declared Democrat-run States will become the ‘Ghettos’ of the USA if companies and ‘rich people’ keep running away due to hefty taxes,” Mediaite reports.
Said Trump: “Rich people and Companies are pouring out of Dumocrat run Blue States at levels never seen before! If this trend continues, these States will become the ‘Ghettos’ of the Future — No people, no money, no hope.”
Politico: “The war in Iran has entered a bleak new phase.”
”After weeks of fragile peace and stalled negotiations, the weekend deaths of multiple U.S. service members — coupled with new reporting showing there may be more previously undisclosed injuries — have left White House allies afraid the president is rapidly running out of ways to extricate the U.S. from an unpopular, expensive conflict ahead of the midterms.”
Said a White House insider: “This is what a quagmire looks like.”
“U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on Tuesday signaled another round of President Donald Trump’s tariffs is on the way,” CNBC reports.
New York Times: “Ever since the United States on July 1 declined to renew the trade deal President Trump negotiated with Canada and Mexico in his first term, the Canadian government, and many Canadians, have been bracing for his administration to try to use pressure tactics to extract concessions on trade.”
“On Monday the administration did just that, upping the ante, as Mr. Trump made use, for the first time in history, of a nearly century-old provision to impose fresh tariffs on the second-largest U.S. trading partner.”
“But the move is more likely to elicit stoicism than panic from the Canadian side.”
“Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney spoke out Monday after the Trump administration announced a new 50 percent tariff on a range of exports from the U.S.’s northern neighbor,” NewsNation reports.
“Carney slammed the new import taxes as ‘the latest in a series of tariffs in direct violation’ of the trade agreement between the U.S. Mexico and Canada.”
Said Carney: “This trade dispute has raised costs for families, particularly in the U.S. Canada stands ready to engage intensively to address outstanding issues with the U.S. to the mutual benefit of our citizens.'”
The Guardian: Canada ready to “intensify” trade talks as Trump orders new tariffs.
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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