• Trump calls on Senate GOP to cancel August recess: President Donald Trump on Saturday called for Senate Majority Leader John Thune to cancel the traditional August recess and “long weekends” to confirm more of his nominees. In addition to taking off virtually the entire month of August, the Senate typically operates on a Monday-Thursday schedule, barring a major deadline. The Senate has acted fairly quickly, confirming 94 of Trump’s picks, but another 262 nominees are waiting, and 293 positions do not yet have a nominee. Trump’s first judicial pick wasn’t confirmed until nearly six months into his term.

• EPA cutting staff by a quarter: In a move to downsize and refocus, the Environmental Protection Agency announced on Friday that it would be laying off 3,700 of the agency’s 12,448 employees, equating to a 23% staff cut. The move comes as EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin is eliminating the Office of Research and Development to focus the agency on air and water pollution. Furthermore, a new Office of Applied Science and Environmental Solutions will be created. “EPA has taken a close look at our operations to ensure the agency is better equipped than ever to deliver on our core mission of protecting human health and the environment while Powering the Great American Comeback,” Zeldin explained. “This reduction in force will ensure we can better fulfill that mission while being responsible stewards of your hard-earned tax dollars.” The EPA estimates that these changes will save taxpayers nearly $750 million.

• Mayor Pete wasted $80B on DEI: Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg spent a lot of money while heading the U.S. Department of Transportation, but he left little tangible physical development from all that spending. That’s because Buttigieg focused billions of dollars on promulgating woke DEI ideology rather than actually fixing the nation’s outdated and decaying infrastructure. Buttigieg, who infamously called roads and bridges racist, distributed over $80 billion in grants promoting a DEI agenda. Meanwhile, transportation-critical industries, such as air traffic control, were effectively ignored. As one air industry official put it, Buttigieg had “little to no interest” and took “definitely zero action” to modernize air traffic control, but that didn’t stop him from “vilifying” the airline industry for delays, 54.3% of which were due to weather, 34.7% due to air carriers, and 10.6% attributable to the national aviation system.

• Alleged Trump-Epstein birthday letter ties back to Steele dossier organization: The Wall Street Journal last week published a birthday letter Donald Trump allegedly wrote to Jeffrey Epstein in 2003. Donald Trump outright denies that the letter is real, and the source strengthens his claim. Joe Palazzolo, one of the WSJ reporters who published the hit piece, worked at Main Justice until 2019. Main Justice was founded by Mary Jacoby, the wife of Glenn Simpson, who founded Fusion GPS. Fusion GPS is the organization that fabricated the Steele dossier at the behest of Hillary Clinton and the DNC. Furthermore, Jacoby and Simpson both began their careers at The Wall Street Journal before transitioning into opposition research. In short, the same network that brought about the Russia-Russia-Russia hoax seems to be at it again with the Epstein letter. Trump has sued the Journal for what he calls a defamatory story.

• Trump wants Redskins, Indians back: On Sunday, Donald Trump threatened to prevent the National Football League’s Washington Commanders from returning to Washington, DC, if the team’s owners don’t revert to the old “Redskins” name. “I may put a restriction on [the Commanders organization] that if they don’t change the name back to the original ‘Washington Redskins,’ and get rid of the ridiculous moniker, ‘Washington Commanders,’ I won’t make a deal for them to build a Stadium in Washington,” Trump posted on his Truth Social. The team is currently involved in negotiations with city officials to secure a deal for the construction of a new stadium at the aging RFK Stadium site in southeast DC. Trump also called on Cleveland’s Major League Baseball team to dump its “Guardians” name and return its “Indians” moniker.

• Tech company CEO caught on kiss cam resigns: Last week, an embarrassing episode from a kiss cam at a Coldplay concert dominated social media. Andy Byron, the married CEO and cofounder of tech firm Astronomer, was caught embracing the married head of his company’s HR department. When the two realized they were on camera, they separated and ducked away, which spurred Coldplay frontman Chris Martin to say to the crowd, “Oh, look at these two. Either they’re having an affair or they’re very shy.” Naturally, the scene provided much fodder for the meme industry. Over the weekend, Byron tendered his resignation, with Astronomer’s board stating that the company “is committed to the values and culture that have guided us since our founding. Our leaders are expected to set the standard in both conduct and accountability, and recently, that standard was not met.” Indeed.

• Illegal alien ambushes and shoots ICE officer in the face: On Saturday, an illegal alien was caught on video with an accomplice ambushing and exchanging gunfire with an ICE officer. The officer fought off the attack despite being shot in the face. He is now hospitalized and in stable condition. DHS called the attack an attempted robbery. One suspect, Francisco Mora Nunez, was apprehended at the border in 2023 and released into the country as part of Biden’s border invasion. Nunez was already under a deportation order at the time of the attack. He has a warrant for kidnapping in Massachusetts and was first ordered deported in 2003, according to Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Trisha McLaughlin.

• NYT admits Iranian nuclear sites “badly damaged”: The New York Times and other Leftmedia sources worked very hard to undercut the successful Operation Midnight Hammer, muddying the issue by claiming the strike was unsuccessful. Now the paper claims to have a “new assessment” that paints “a clearer picture” of what happened. “Fordo was badly damaged, and potentially destroyed,” the Times now says, after exhaustively pursuing every source that said otherwise. The article outlines the various sources, including a new U.S. assessment, a senior Israeli official, and the International Atomic Energy Agency, all of which report that the sites were severely damaged and likely set back by years, in contrast to the single Defense Intelligence Agency early report speculating otherwise. The enriched uranium is likely still intact, albeit buried under tons of rubble; U.S. sources discount that threat as Iran is now without the facilities to manufacture a weapon.

Headlines

• Biden’s stunning exit, one year later: The dropout heard around the country (Fox News)

• Another Biden aide takes the Fifth as Republicans mull hauling in family members (NY Post)

• DOJ leads effort to ensure federal agencies comply with Trump order making English official language (Just the News)

• Biden’s “pistol brace” is no more after FPC, DOJ settlement (Bearing Arms)

• Pentagon announces Marine general tapped to lead Naval Academy in historic first (Fox News)

• Obnoxious liberal bureaucrats hold saddest rally ever, prove that Trump was right to fire them (Washington Free Beacon)

• China leads list of foreign citizens buying U.S. property (Newsweek)

• Beef prices in the U.S. hit record highs (Morning Brew)

• Humor: State-run propaganda program shut down (Babylon Bee)

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