• Musk departs: Tomorrow will be Elon Musk’s last day serving as the head of Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). In a post on X, Musk wrote, “As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end, I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending. The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.” It’s fair to say that no single individual during the early days of the Trump administration shook up the Washington establishment more than Musk. His work championing DOGE’s efforts to expose government waste, fraud, and abuse was a welcome and needed change. On a related note, Musk expressed his “disappointment” with the Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill Act, calling it a “massive spending bill” that will increase the deficit while “undermining the work” of DOGE.

• DOGE spending “cuts” heading to Congress: The White House will send a rescissions package to Congress next week to codify some of the DOGE cuts. If approved, Congress will give the president authority to block already allocated funds for Fiscal Year 2025. This is good, if meager, news: the rescissions package is not expected to include significant savings, at least not in terms of government spending, with only $9.4 billion saved. The primary sources of blocked funding will be NPR, PBS, and USAID — all good targets that have been mismanaged and need to be downsized. Still, $9.4 billion is a far cry from the $2 trillion bandied about in the early days of DOGE. House Speaker Mike Johnson has promised to act quickly to approve this rescissions package and make good on DOGE’s cuts.

• Trump’s EOs in Big Beautiful Bill: While no tax on tips has been one of the headline-grabbing elements within the Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill, it would be far from the most consequential. The spending bill also codifies at least 15 of Donald Trump’s executive orders. These include his orders preventing taxpayer funding from being given to nongovernmental organizations that provide abortions, developing the Golden Dome, tightening regulations around federal workers, enforcing immigration and the border, protecting children from sex-change procedures, undoing Joe Biden’s green energy agenda, and more. Should the bill pass, the codifying of many of Trump’s executive orders would indeed have a much more enduring and long-term impact on government and the country moving forward, well after Trump is out of office. This has always been the problem with EOs, and despite the negative spending issues with the bill, codifying Trump’s EOs might justify passing it.

• Seattle kerfuffle expands: Over the weekend in Seattle, Christians who were holding a public worship service were attacked by a bunch of antifa and “transgender” thugs. The Christians were the victims, yet Seattle’s Democrat Mayor Bruce Harrell effectively blamed them for the violence. Referring to the Christians as “extreme right-wing,” the mayor effectively labeled them as bigots due to their biblical views on sexuality, claiming that the Christians provoked the violence by promoting their beliefs. Well, now the FBI is investigating the incident, with Deputy Director Dan Bongino announcing on X, “We have asked our team to fully investigate allegations of targeted violence against religious groups at the Seattle concert. Freedom of religion isn’t a suggestion.”

• California track meet hints that maybe boys and girls are different: It’s not much, but it’s the first sign that California may be willing to acknowledge the self-evident truth that boys and girls are biologically different. The California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) announced Tuesday that any “biological” female student athlete who missed out on qualifying for an automatic spot at the CIF State Track and Field Championships by one spot will be extended an invitation to compete. Additionally, CIF told The Daily Wire that a biological female athlete who places, for example, fourth behind a male competing as a woman will still get the bronze medal she earned.

• Judge rules Rubio overstepped on revoking visa for anti-Semite protester: Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian, had his visa revoked by the Trump administration due to his fomenting of anti-Semitic protests at Columbia University. Secretary of State Marco Rubio defended the decision, noting that the federal government has every right to allow and remove foreigners it deems a threat to national interests. A judge decided that Rubio likely overstepped in revoking Khalil’s visa, citing the “vagueness” principle. “The issue now before the court has been this: does the Constitution allow the Secretary of State to use Section 1227, as applied through the determination, to try to remove the petitioner from the United States?” Judge Michael Farbiarz asked. “The court’s answer: likely not.” However, the judge also found that Khalil has yet to provide compelling evidence for his immigration application.

• How many illegals are there in America? It’s a question without a clear answer, but one that is necessary to answer to determine deportation policy: How many illegals reside in America? The number commonly mentioned is 10 million. This could reference one of two pieces of data — in the Obama and Trump years, the estimate of noncitizens living in America was approximately 10-12 million. Then, under Biden’s border invasion, another estimated 10 million crossed the border, though Stephen Miller and JD Vance think this may be a significant undercount. That would put the total estimate at about 20 million. However, some of those border crossings were repeated attempts where individuals were caught, sent back, and tried again; others who came into the country on work visas remained after their visas expired, losing legal status. The Center for Immigration Studies estimates the correct figure to be roughly 16 million.

• Mortgages for illegals: For young Americans defaulting on their student loan debt, it may come as a shock to learn that a company is helping illegal immigrants buy homes in America, but that’s what The Prysma Lending Group is doing. “You have a right to homeownership, regardless of legal status,” says the Connecticut lending group against all logic and reason. The Daily Wire reports that Prysma also publishes guides helping its illegal customers avoid ICE or trigger a “reasonable fear” interview to earn a stay of deportation. Prysma is relying on illegals who have an individual taxpayer identification number (ITIN), which they say is enough for a mortgage even without a Social Security Number or green card. For honest Americans, there is little more infuriating than illegal aliens getting a fast track to homeownership, as it feels increasingly out of reach for native-born Americans.

• 50% of Americans say we’re heading in the right direction: For the first time in the 20 years of Rasmussen Reports posing this question, a majority of Americans are optimistic. According to Rasmussen, this is “uncharted territory.” Rasmussen’s Mark Mitchell noted that “the % of people who say the U.S. is headed in the right direction has never been higher than today.” RealClearPolitics is also seeing a trend toward optimism. In November, 26% of Americans believed America was on the right track; now it’s 44%. President Donald Trump commented on the direction of the nation on Monday, declaring, “Our Nation is staging one of the greatest and fastest comebacks in history. In just 4 short months, we are respected again, respected like never before.” Our nation was built by people with a “can-do” spirit, and Trump is fighting to keep that spirit alive.

Headlines

• Trump shuts down Paramount’s $15 million offer to settle “60 Minutes” lawsuit (The Wrap)

• Trump administration cuts off visa access for foreign officials “complicit” in censoring Americans (National Review)

• RFK Jr. tells doctors to discard unscientific guidelines promoting child gender transitions (Daily Signal)

• ICE arrests illegal alien who threatened to assassinate Trump (DHS.gov)

• Elon Musk tried to block Sam Altman’s big AI deal in the Middle East (WSJ)

• Harvard revokes professor’s tenure in rare move amid data manipulation allegations (Fox News)

• MIT scraps DEI office, ends programs amid Trump’s fight with Harvard (NY Post)

• Colorado Springs’s first black mayor implicated in hate-crime hoax at federal trial (Daily Wire)

• Humor: Biden, Macron team up to form support group for battered and abused world leaders (Babylon Bee)

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Follow Thomas Gallatin, Sterling Henry, and Jordan Candler on X/Twitter.