Britain’s got a new prime minister: Labour leader Andy Burnham takes office today after winning his seat in Parliament just last month. Will he have better luck in steering post-Brexit Britain back to smoother seas than did Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak, and Keir Starmer? Only one way to find out! Happy Monday.
Join Will Sommer and Sam Stein for MAGA Mondays today at 10:00 a.m. EDT on Substack and YouTube.
End Trump’s War. Now.
by William Kristol
Late yesterday afternoon, after a weekend in which at least three and probably four U.S. service members were killed as the United States-Iran war re-escalated, President Donald Trump made an appearance. He went down onto the field from his air-conditioned box at MetLife stadium to join FIFA President Gianni Infantino in presenting the World Cup trophy to Spain’s captain, Rodrigo “Rodri” Hernández Cascante.
Infantino then turned to leave to allow the Spanish players their well-deserved spotlight. But Trump stayed and lingered awkwardly on the edge of the celebrations. Infantino came over to suggest that Trump join him in exiting stage right. Nope. Rodri lifted the trophy high, and there was Trump, making sure, as the soccer columnist for the Guardian put it, that “he was a part of a moment of triumph he had little to do with.”1
Meanwhile, the war that President Trump has had everything to do with is the furthest thing from a triumph. As he returned to Washington from the World Cup, Trump told reporters that “Those great people, those great patriots, were out there fighting that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon.” But nothing about the last nine days of war has anything to do with Iran’s ability or inability to get a nuclear weapon. CENTCOM, on the other hand, said last night that the latest wave of U.S. strikes was intended to “further diminish Iran’s ability to attack commercial vessels and civilian mariners transiting the Strait of Hormuz.” But there is no reason to think even more bombing will prevent Iran from making the strait impassable. So Trump’s war is now a pointless war.
But Trump can’t accept this. The Washington Post quotes “one U.S. official familiar with internal administration discussions” as saying that “the U.S. is planning for a wider war.” But,
the official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media, cautioned that the expansion of U.S. operations will be limited by dwindling stockpiles of air defense and long-range munitions and constraints on the ability to surge more troops and aircraft into the area because of battle damage. “We do not have enough to safely sustain operations, and I don’t think the White House is aware of that,” the official said.
And an American soldier—who had previously deployed to Jordan’s Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, where 1st Lt. Tyler James Feehan, 25, and Pvt. Isabella Gonzales, 19, were killed as a result of Friday’s attack by Iran—said many of the facilities there are not able to withstand rocket, mortar, or drone attacks. “We’re getting beat up across the board,” he said.
So as Trump’s War nears its sixth month, its toll is now at least seventeen U.S. service members killed, with more than 430 injured. Trump’s War is also responsible for a massive drawdown of military stockpiles of important weapons, and has cost an estimated $113 billion and counting. Trump’s War has resulted in a collapse of U.S. credibility in the region and beyond. Trump’s War has managed to elevate Iran to a regional power with control of the Strait of Hormuz. And Trump’s War has damaged the global economy. In the United States, gas prices have gone from about $3 a gallon before the war to $4 a gallon today.
Meanwhile, as the Post points out, the Pentagon has not held a news briefing about operations against Iran since May 5. Trump’s Secretary of Defense did post on X Friday, assuring us that our service members’ “sacrifice only stiffens our resolve.” But an allegedly stiffened resolve to continue a pointless war is no justification for further sacrifice.
Trump said last night that “we hit them very hard again tonight, and we did that in honor of the, probably three, it’s probably three great patriots.” But the right way to honor our service members now is to prevent more of them from being killed. The way to honor our troops is by ending, not escalating, Trump’s War.
Congress is entrusted by the Constitution with the power “to declare War” and “to make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval forces.” Congress is in session this week. It should do everything it can to end Trump’s War.
AROUND THE BULWARK
Trump Preparing a New Attack on Head Start… The administration is considering a proposal to gut the program’s instructional standards while adding new restrictions tied to immigration, JONATHAN COHN exclusively reports in The Breakdown.
Senators Never Asked Blanche the Most Obvious Epstein Question… On The Illegal News, ANDREW WEISSMANN joins SARAH LONGWELL to discuss Todd Blanche’s confirmation hearing and Donald Trump’s bizarre stolen election conspiracy press conference.
How Badly Has Trump Botched the Iran War? On The Mona Charen Show, ERIC EDELMAN joins MONA CHAREN to dissect the many ways things have gone south with Iran. Also, a word about communism versus socialism.
The Michigan Democratic Primary… has grown absolutely toxic, LAUREN EGAN reports in The Opposition. Plus: One other establishment-vs.-progressives race to keep an eye on!
The Anti-Strategic President…On Shield of the Republic, HAL BRANDS joins ERIC EDELMAN to discuss Trump’s key strategic errors in the war with Iran.
Did you see Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey this weekend? Sonny Bunch reviewed the Nolan epic, calling it “the conclusion of Nolan’s Death Drive Trilogy.” Today at 2:00 p.m. EDT, he will host a live chat about the film for Bulwark+ members on Substack. Have questions? Leave them in the comments on “The Odyssey” Review.
Quick Hits
SMOKE TROUBLES: Donald Trump has spent years rabble-rousing about an “invasion” of immigrants across the U.S.-Mexico border—and now he’s suddenly talking about an invasion from Canada, too. “The United States is being unnecessarily invaded by filthy, polluted, and unhealthy air, the quality of which is dangerous, and totally unacceptable!” Trump fumed in a Truth Social post Friday. Insisting Canada had “refused to engage in basic Forest Management and Debris Removal” practices, Trump threatened that the economic costs to the United States “must of necessity be added to the TARIFFS Canada is currently paying.”
At least one GOP senator would go even further: On Friday, Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio introduced a bill to sanction Canadian government officials and revoke their visas over their failure to control wildfires.
The smoke drifting south from Canadian wildfires is no joke, blanketing the Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic regions for much of the past week with hazardous air. And Trump is actually partially correct that twentieth-century forestry practices of trying to smother all wildfires rather than aim for a certain level of controlled burning have led to a dangerous level of fuel buildup in our continent’s forests—although of course this isn’t just a Canadian problem, but an American one as well, and one hugely exacerbated by climate change.
But that doesn’t justify Trump and Co.’s ludicrously hostile response—one that once again inexplicably treats our northern neighbor as a hostile actor to be bullied and pushed around to make us feel better. Just one more pointless rift between us and an ally.
GAS TROUBLES: The war in Iran is starting to cause pain at the pump again. The national average price for gasoline is back over $4 today, up 13 cents from a week ago, while the international oil benchmark Brent crude was back over $90 a barrel.
Just over a month ago, at the G7 summit in France, Trump made clear he’d felt an urgent need to strike a deal with Iran because he felt he was running out of time before the closure of the Strait of Hormuz would lead to economic meltdown. “We run out of [oil] reserves in about four weeks,” he said. “There are reserves all over the world, and we would really run out, and there would be a time when you wouldn’t be able to get it. You want to see bedlam?” He was striking a deal, he said, “rather than possibly going into a depression, rather than having your favorite president be Herbert Hoover.” Well, we’ll see.
SALAD TROUBLES: Over the weekend, the Food and Drug Administration announced a seeming major breakthrough in its fight against a growing outbreak of the parasite cyclospora, which they said had been traced to lettuce grown in Mexico by major supplier Taylor Farms. Now, however, the FDA is walking that connection back. Here’s the Wall Street Journal:
Taylor Farms said that the Food and Drug Administration has apologized after the agency walked back an earlier statement that the parasite linked to an outbreak affecting thousands of people had been detected on a sample of its lettuce.
The FDA on Sunday said it has yet to identify the presence of cyclospora on samples of lettuce from the company despite recent tests. The agency now deems the detection that it reported Saturday a false positive after laboratory experts reviewed the sample results.
Taylor Farms, which supplies some of the country’s biggest retailers and restaurants, makes a range of products from salad kits to vegetable blends. Government agencies had linked shredded iceberg lettuce—served at locations of the restaurant chain Taco Bell—to reports of foodborne-illness in five states. The company said it initiated a recall “in an abundance of caution” of its iceberg lettuce grown and processed in central Mexico. Many of its other products remain on store shelves.
The air might hurt you! Your salad might hurt you! It’s a grisly summer out there.
Cheap Shots
Trump also hung around after the trophy presentation at last year’s Club World Cup final, and of course reveled in receiving the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize last year, which also involved much standing near glittery objects before a crowd.
Trump looked like such a fucking moron trying to inch his way into team photos of the SPANISH team. Moreover, Kash Patel continuing to show up to sporting events and live his best, taxpayer funded, life is also pathetic and tone deaf.
Donald Trump is notorious for not paying attention to the presidential intelligence briefings, which apparently have to be dumbed down so he can even understand them. Now he is claiming that during those briefings deep-state actors withheld information about China's actions during the 2020 election.
But how would he know? Did he keep the coloring books? Can we see them? And was he able to stay within the lines?
Unlikely.