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  • Farmers struggle to get basic services from depleted Agriculture Department

    Farmers struggle to get basic services from depleted Agriculture Department

    WASHINGTON — Mary and Zachariah Ben, farmers in New Mexico, believed they were on the verge of buying the property of their dreams last fall: 47 acres, with enough cropland to grow heirloom corn and a processing facility to expand their organic baby food business.

    But the low-interest loan they secured from the Agriculture Department to make the purchase in Aztec, N.M., was on hold for months, first during the government shutdown that lasted until mid-November and then as federal workers left the agency in droves. Only half a dozen loan specialists who could help process their claims remained in the entire state, the couple learned, leaving them in limbo indefinitely and the seller impatient to know whether the agreement would ever go through.

    Zachariah Ben, who along with his children is a member of the Navajo Nation, ultimately turned to private lenders instead, and the family absorbed more than $200,000 in interest as a result. “At least we got the land because we could have also lost that, and we would have if we had to wait” on the Agriculture Department, Mary Ben said.

    The experience of the Bens, whose aim of providing organic and shelf-stable options for young children appears to align with some of the Trump administration’s stated goals, is not unique. Across the country, farmers and rural residents describe struggling to obtain the basic services the Agriculture Department is meant to offer, including loans and grants, technical assistance, and financing for housing and utilities. Sharp attrition under the Trump administration, largely through voluntary resignations and dismissals by the Department of Government Efficiency, have left many of the Agriculture Department’s local offices with skeletal staffing — and, in some counties, with no one at all.

    The ripple effects of the Agriculture Department’s depleted workforce illustrate how the Trump administration’s mission of shrinking the federal bureaucracy has undercut a competing priority: delivering for farmers, a core political constituency. Strained government resources also risk posing additional challenges for a farm economy that administration officials have described as “dire,” increasing barriers to entry for new farmers who need more assistance, impeding assistance to producers already facing tough economic conditions, and hampering basic services and government aid in the most remote and poorest places.

    “All these practical things that make the wheels go around in a community were facilitated by USDA, and it was with staff who knew how to navigate and had the trust of the local community,” Sen. Pete Welch of Vermont, the top Democrat on the Senate subcommittee on rural development, said in an interview. “It’s something that was working, was working well, and was very cost-efficient. And now it is being demolished.”

    Trump administration officials have defended the staffing cuts as voluntary and necessary to trim a bloated agency.

    “We don’t have the money in our budget to pay for all of the employees that were hired in the prior administration,” Stephen Vaden, the deputy secretary of agriculture, said in a congressional hearing in July. He emphasized that the reductions were “voluntary decisions made by individual employees who chose, with the information that the agency provided to them, to seek a new career elsewhere.”

    Overall, more than 20,000 workers out of more than 110,000 left the Agriculture Department through the first half of 2025, according to an inspector general report. Recently obtained data showed that the Farm Service Agency, a division whose approval the Bens sought in applying for a low-interest loan, has no staff left in dozens of counties across the country, forcing farmers to travel long distances for assistance or to simply give up. Among divisions that directly work with farmers and aid rural residents, the percentage of departures is even higher.

    The Agriculture Department said that it currently had about 93,000 employees after hiring more workers this year, and that it believed staffing levels were adequate as “services and supports have become more targeted and efficient” through planned technological improvements.

    Still, its plans to fundamentally overhaul the agency, as well as funding cuts proposed by President Donald Trump’s latest budget, are likely to deepen difficulties for farmers and rural communities.

    Already, the agency is moving more than half of its staff in the Washington region out of the nation’s capital, a move that is all but certain to further thin the ranks of the agency. Such losses will affect the department’s ability to finance home loans, carry out agricultural research, and service farmers, according to federal workers, farm groups, and rural lenders. (Unions and farm organizations have mounted a legal challenge to that plan.)

    Likewise, Trump’s budget for the next fiscal year proposes a nearly $5 billion cut to the Agriculture Department, essentially eliminating programs for beginning farmers, conservation, and rural aid.

    Some of the steepest cuts have fallen on a part of the Agriculture Department responsible for improving the economy and infrastructure in rural communities, leading to long delays in aid for residents and charities alike.

    The subagency, known as Rural Development, has lost about 1,700 workers, or more than a third of its staff, since the Trump administration took office.

    In New Mexico, questions directed at the agency often languish for weeks, as do approvals of key documents, with emails and queries bouncing among staff members scattered across the state and in Washington, said Lorenzo Alba Jr., the executive director of Casa de Peregrinos, an anti-hunger charity in the area.

    After receiving a grant from the Rural Development section at the end of the Biden administration to build a food pantry in Hatch, N.M., the charity is still waiting for $300,000 in federal funding. For now, Casa de Peregrinos has cobbled together other sources of financing to set up and operate a makeshift pantry with limited hours and food varieties, despite no refrigeration or air-conditioning.

    “Our pantry should have been up and running, fully renovated by now,” Alba said. He added that the delays had led costs to balloon to $600,000 from $475,000, money the charity could have used to buy more food and serve more families.

    “I quit blaming the USDA on this because I didn’t know what they were going through,” he said. “Now I do.”

    It is unclear whether staffing cuts have been a factor, but in the last year the subagency has also financed far fewer loans and grants. As of mid-August, with a little more than a month left in the 2026 fiscal year, the agency has approved nearly 52,000 investments worth $15.8 billion. In comparison, in the past three fiscal years, the agency made between 63,000 and 74,000 investments totaling $24 billion to $40 billion annually.

    Another crucial service the department offers — helping producers carry out sustainable farming practices through its Natural Resources Conservation Service — has lost more than 2,700 workers, or nearly one-fourth of its staff, forcing farmers to miss contract deadlines and turn to expensive private consultants for advice.

    In central Nebraska, Clay Govier, who farms corn and soybeans on 3,500 acres in Broken Bow, described the cascading effect of 50% staffing cuts at his local conservation agency. The technician he had worked with took a buyout at the start of the Trump administration. Now, Govier and his family coordinate with someone who travels between two counties to survey different farms.

    Though the technician is knowledgeable, “he’s stretched very thin because if he needs a signature, he has to drive to our farm and then he drives back or we have to drive to him, and it just burns up an entire morning to get some basic paperwork done,” Govier said.

    As a result, the office is missing more details and overlooking crucial steps to verifying the farmers’ practices these days, leading to delays in the contract cycle and payments.

    “Farming is an art and a science,” he said. “It’s so different for every operation, every state, every region, so you need local NRCS staff that understand their region and how to implement these programs.”

    In southwestern Pennsylvania, Amanda Butterfield worked with the conservation service for nearly a decade, first to restore roughly 180 acres of strip-mined land in Meyersdale into pasture for a herd of beef cattle. After her technician shared anecdotes about burnout and long working hours, Butterfield turned instead to private consultants who work for agribusinesses. But that advice often comes at a steeper cost, like the expectation of buying certain products.

    Butterfield also added that staffing turnover at her local Farm Service Agency had led to errors and inefficiencies: A new worker hired to replace an employee who had left asked her husband to report crop acreage, unaware that the ranch did not grow crops at all.

    “We’ve completely lost a whole group of experts within our communities across the United States that can no longer help and support us,” she said.

    This article originally appeared in the New York Times.

  • European leaders mark Ukraine’s 35th Independence Day as Russian invasion pushes on

    European leaders mark Ukraine’s 35th Independence Day as Russian invasion pushes on

    KYIV, Ukraine — European leaders joined President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Monday to celebrate the 35th anniversary of Ukraine’s independence and boost its long-range missile program as Russia pressed on with its 4-year-old invasion of the country.

    One of President Vladimir Putin’s key goals in starting a war with Russia’s neighbor in February 2022 was to return Kyiv to Moscow’s orbit. Ukrainian lawmakers voted on Aug. 24, 1991, to proclaim the country’s independence, and a nationwide referendum later that year overwhelmingly approved it.

    With no significant changes on the front line for months and no apparent progress after more than a year of U.S.-led peace efforts, both countries are locked in a spiral of escalating aerial attacks that are killing civilians and smashing infrastructure.

    Europe rallies around Ukraine

    U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham, on his first overseas trip since taking office last month, joined almost a dozen other European leaders, as well as other dignitaries, in Kyiv on Monday.

    “For Ukraine, independence is not an abstract idea. We defended it against all odds,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said on social media. “In times like these, nations learn how important it is to have allies by your side.”

    Burnham co-chaired a meeting of what’s been dubbed the Coalition of the Willing — a group of over two dozen countries helping Ukraine resist Russia’s onslaught.

    Burnham said he is pushing British industry to help a Ukrainian project that is working on a low-cost alternative to the U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems that are desperately needed but are in short supply. He urged other countries to encourage Washington to adopt stiffer sanctions on Russia and press Moscow to accept U.S. attempts to secure an unconditional ceasefire.

    Zelensky said in a speech at Kyiv’s St. Sophia Square that the presence of European leaders reflected continental fears about Russia’s wider ambitions.

    “We all understand that in this Russian war against us — against Ukraine — far more is being decided than the future of Ukraine and Eastern Europe,” he said.

    “No nation in a war like this could rely solely on its own weapons,” Zelensky said. ”No nation could withstand attacks of such intensity without the world’s help.”

    Ukraine eyes local production of Anglo-French missile

    The leaders brought pledges of further military and financial support. Burnham announced his government has agreed to allow defense company MBDA to release classified information relating to British components used in the SCALP long-range missile. That paves the way for France and Ukraine to advance plans for the weapon’s production in Ukraine.

    SCALP is the French version of the U.K.’s Storm Shadow missile, with both systems incorporating shared technology.

    “Ukraine has been Europe’s protector, not a drain on our security, but the front line of keeping Europe safe,” Burnham said, adding that Kyiv and its partners “must keep up the pressure on Moscow.”

    Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the Kremlin views the plan “extremely negatively.” He accused the U.K. of “taking part in this war” on Kyiv’s side.

    Ukraine has leaned heavily on NATO countries for help fighting Russia’s bigger army, although relations with the United States have been cooler under President Donald Trump.

    Russia, meanwhile, is getting help from North Korea and China.

    Ukraine displays its drones in a parade

    Ukraine’s swift development of innovative drone technology has enabled it to blunt Moscow’s battlefield progress as well as hit targets deep inside Russia, as far as 1,200 miles from their border. The speeches in St. Sophia Square were accompanied by a parade of domestically produced weapons.

    Both Russia and Ukraine are trying through long-range strikes to inflict economic pain, disrupt military supplies, and erode public morale.

    Ukraine’s long-range drones have repeatedly hit facilities in Russia’s vital oil industry, causing fuel shortages, and have also engaged in a campaign against Russia’s largest online retailer, Wildberries.

    But foreign suppliers also have to take into account their own needs, weapon production levels, and the depth of stockpiles.

    As the air war has intensified, Ukraine’s stocks of Patriot interceptors to counter Russia’s ballistic missiles have dwindled. Kyiv urgently needs more interceptors before winter, when Russia routinely bombards its power grid, but the demands of the Iran war and slow output of the sophisticated interceptors have left Ukraine short and vulnerable.

    Finnish President Alexander Stubb said he believed that striking Russian targets like Wildberries was a “sensible military strategy” that would hasten peace negotiations.

    Ukrainian strikes kill 3 teenagers

    Three teenagers were killed and six children were wounded in the southern Russian city of Krasnodar, Russia’s children’s rights ombudsperson Maria Lvova-Belova said, as Ukraine attacked several warehouses of Ozon, another online retailer, for the third straight day, according to officials and the company.

    Ozon said a large fire raged at its logistics facility in the suburbs of Krasnodar following the overnight attack.

    A drone also hit the grounds of an Ozon logistics center in the southern Russian region of Adygeya, said regional Gov. Murat Kumpilov, although the company said its warehouse wasn’t damaged.

    In all, four Ozon premises appeared to have been targeted.

    Meanwhile, Ukraine’s General Staff said its forces struck the Russian state-owned Kamenetsky Combine defense company in the Rostov region overnight, starting a fire. The plant produces rocket and missile fuel, it said.

    Russia’s Defense Ministry said its air defenses overnight intercepted and destroyed 351 Ukrainian drones over eight Russian regions, the Crimean Peninsula, and the Azov and Black seas. Moscow illegally annexed Crimea in 2014.

    The ministry also said its forces overnight struck Ukrainian ports and vessels delivering military cargo.

    Russia has also turned its sights on Ukrainian shopping malls, supermarkets, and gas stations in recent months. Russian drones struck a shopping center in central Ukraine in a daytime attack Friday, killing 16 people and wounding 130, Ukrainian officials said.

    Ukraine’s southern Odesa region came under a large-scale Russian missile and drone attack Monday, with food storage facilities and energy infrastructure among the targets, regional authorities reported.

    Eighteen people, including two children, were injured in a Russian drone strike on Chernihiv in northern Ukraine, according to Ukraine’s Emergency Service.

    It was not possible to independently verify each side’s reports.

  • Trump’s economic approach draws concern from some Republicans

    Trump’s economic approach draws concern from some Republicans

    President Donald Trump’s economic policies drew a fresh round of concern from some Republicans over the weekend who criticized his trade policies, as others in the party sidestepped questions about his broader approach amid a midterm election that has put consumer prices front and center.

    Rep. Ashley Hinson (R., Iowa), who is running in one of the most competitive Senate races, reiterated her opposition to Trump’s recent announcement that he would lower tariffs for up to 300,000 metric tons of imported ground beef over the next 90 days, which he claimed would push down costs.

    “We need to focus on affordability, but I think this isn’t the way to do that,” Hinson told Fox News in an interview broadcast on Sunday Morning Futures, arguing it would hurt domestic cattle ranchers. The import taxes, she said, are helping U.S. cattle ranchers restore the U.S. cattle supply, which remains at a 75-year low.

    On Saturday, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, considered one of the most vulnerable Republican incumbents, implored Trump to reverse course on Canadian import taxes and “reach a fair agreement” after trade talks between the United States and Canada collapsed.

    “If the Administration proceeds with these tariffs, they will increase costs for Maine families, as most businesses will have no choice but to pass on the tariffs to their customers through higher prices,” Collins wrote in a social media post, urging “both sides to return to the negotiating table.”

    Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican who is running for reelection, refused to grade Trump on the economy when asked about it on ABC News’ This Week on Friday. He said that “people are not talking to me about Trump” on the campaign trail.

    Pressed again, Abbott said, “We all need to have prices lowered,” adding that he thought Trump was “on a track to get us there.”

    The comments from candidates in key races reflected the distance some Republicans have tried to draw from Trump at a moment when polls show that voters have major concerns about the economy and the president’s stewardship of it, including cost increases driven by an unpopular war with Iran. The remarks also revealed some of the geographic sensitivities to the administration’s economic approach that could come into play in November in battleground states such as Iowa and Maine.

    The White House did not respond to a request for comment. Trump has defended his economic actions.

    But some Republicans are unnerved by recent developments.

    Hinson joined other Midwestern Republicans, including Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and both of Nebraska’s senators, who criticized Trump’s beef import tariff cuts. Sen. Tim Sheehy (R., Mont.) said he had “advised President Trump against this course of action for a year.”

    The breakdown of trade negotiations with Canada kicked the Trump administration’s 50% tariffs on a range of Canadian goods into gear and prompted Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada to promise “dollar for dollar” counter-tariffs on American imports.

    Former Vice President Mike Pence, who served in the first Trump administration before breaking with Trump, expressed concern about the trade standoff between the United States and Canada on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday.

    “The last thing we need right now, as our economy is getting back on its feet, is a trade war with Canada,” Pence, a critic of Trump’s tariffs, said, adding, “That’s how I would advise the president: Drive a hard bargain, but let’s pursue free trade with free nations, especially our partners to the north.”

    On Sunday, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told Fox News Sunday that “Canada gets the benefit of trading with the U.S. way more than the U.S. gets the benefit of trading with Canada” and that it was “foolish” for Canada to think it could win a trade war with the United States.

    Carney said the United States had made unreasonable demands of his country in trade negotiations.

    John Barrasso (R., Wyo.), the Senate majority whip, who is not up for reelection this year, defended Trump’s handling of negotiations — but he also said that the United States needed to maintain its trade relationship with its northern neighbor.

    Canada would “be wise” to return to the bargaining table and move forward, he said on Sunday Morning Futures, “because we need to continue trade with Canada.”

    He added, “The president is very consistent: We’re going to make sure to protect our workers and bring jobs back to America.”

    Democrats have sharply criticized Trump on the economy. On Sunday, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D., Md.) said Trump had broken his campaign commitments to keep the United States out of foreign wars and to lower prices.

    “He’s done the opposite,” Van Hollen told NBC’s Meet the Press. He added, “Broken promises, betrayal.”

    The campaign of Troy Jackson, the Democrat challenging Collins in Maine, slammed Trump’s tariffs.

    The tariffs are “a tax on Maine families and small businesses,” Dan Gottlieb, a spokesperson for Jackson’s campaign, said.

    Sen. Tim Scott (R., S.C.), a staunch supporter of Trump, sought to redirect an interview when pressed on Trump’s tariffs. Asked on Meet the Press if he agreed with Collins’ comment that they would increase costs for families, Scott, who presides over the Senate Republicans’ campaign arm, pivoted to arguing that Trump had inherited economic problems from his predecessor, President Joe Biden Jr.

    The interviewer, Kristen Welker, interjected to say that Trump had been in office “for two years.”

    Asked if Trump had broken his campaign promise to lower costs, Scott again dodged the question, saying the election would be about differences between Democrats and Republicans.

    “At the end of the day, the American people need to see the contrast,” Scott said. “And the good news is, they’re seeing the contrast.”

    This article originally appeared in the New York Times.

  • Shelley Fabares, ‘Johnny Angel’ singer and actor in ‘The Donna Reed Show’ and ‘Coach,’ dies at 82

    Shelley Fabares, ‘Johnny Angel’ singer and actor in ‘The Donna Reed Show’ and ‘Coach,’ dies at 82

    Shelley Fabares, an actor who was a fixture on television for decades from her days as a young teenager on The Donna Reed Show, through One Day at a Time and Coach, has died. She was 82.

    She died Saturday in Los Angeles, her family said in a statement to the Associated Press. No cause was given.

    “To her family and friends, Shelley was a source of love, strength, laughter, and comfort,” her family wrote. “She had a remarkable ability to make people feel welcomed, valued, and cared for.”

    Ms. Fabares was born in Santa Monica, Calif., in 1944, and started acting as a young child. Her first television credit came at age 10 when she appeared on The Loretta Young Show. Many movies and television shows followed: She acted with Paul Newman, Frank Sinatra, and Eva Marie Saint in a Producers Showcase production of Our Town; was in the Rosalind Russell movie The Girl Rush and the Rock Hudson drama Never Say Goodbye. Other early credits include Annette, Captain Midnight and the “Black Leather Jackets” episode of The Twilight Zone.

    Her biggest break came when she was cast as Mary Stone on The Donna Reed Show, where she was a regular from 1958 through 1963. During that time she also got a recording contract and had two Top 40 hits including “Johnny Angel.” In the early 1960s, she also co-starred in three movies with Elvis Presley: Girl Happy, Spinout and Clambake.

    “I think the years on The Donna Reed Show, the years from 14 to 19, were so incredibly important,” Ms. Fabares told the Los Angeles Times in 1993. “Donna Reed was simply an extraordinary woman, a woman of great strength, kindness, integrity, and compassion. I am not trying to make her sound like a saint, but she had the most profound influence on me. I carry her with me today.”

    In the late 1970s, Ms. Fabares made an impression as Francine Webster on the CBS sitcom One Day at a Time. She also played James Caan’s wife in Brian’s Song. One of her biggest roles came when she was cast as Christine Armstrong in Coach, although the show took a minute to find its audience.

    “I did always feel from the very beginning if they could find the right spot for us, this was a show that would last,” she said in the 1993 Los Angeles Times interview.

    Ms. Fabares married twice, first to producer Lou Adler in 1964. She had been married to M*A*S*H actor Mike Farrell since 1984. She was also a devoted advocate for awareness of Alzheimer’s, which affected her mother.

    In early 1999, a visit to the emergency room for an esophageal bleed revealed that she had progressive liver failure. After spending 22 months on a waiting list, she had liver transplant surgery in October 2000.

    In an interview with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles three years after the transplant, she said she’d been “changed by the experience” and was eternally grateful to Farrell, who was with her “every step of the way.”

    Her family, in their statement, said, “We will remember Shelley for her kindness, loyalty, wit, courage, and beautiful spirit. We will miss her deeply — not only as a celebrated performer, but as the loving and extraordinary person she was in our everyday lives.”

  • Secret White House bunker undercuts Trump’s ballroom lawsuit, ex-officials say

    Secret White House bunker undercuts Trump’s ballroom lawsuit, ex-officials say

    President Donald Trump has claimed that the White House needs a massive new ballroom because it would provide him and future presidents with a secure, hardened facility. But former officials say the argument fails to acknowledge that the presidential complex already has one.

    More than a decade ago, federal officials built a highly protected bunker, embedded deep underground, that can shelter the president and his top aides in a national security emergency, according to three former officials.

    The facility, which was secretly completed during the Obama administration, can house dozens of people for up to multiple weeks, two former officials said. It’s buried more than 60 feet underneath the White House complex and built to withstand a nuclear blast, two of the officials said, ensuring the president and his team have a secure command center to run the country in times of extreme duress.

    The bunker’s existence, the former officials said, undercuts the Trump administration’s emerging legal argument in the ongoing lawsuit over the $600 million ballroom complex’s construction: that the facility must be completed due to its significance for U.S. national security.

    The people spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss elements of the secretive facility, some of which have not been previously reported.

    The Washington Post is withholding some details of the bunker and its construction in order to not compromise sensitive White House security protocols.

    Asked about Trump’s assertions about the need for a new military complex, the White House defended the project and criticized past officials for discussing existing security structures.

    “The East Wing Modernization Project is inextricably tied to the security of the President, the White House grounds and the certain security infrastructure assets,” said White House spokesperson Davis Ingle in a statement.

    “Recent events such as the foiled attack on the historic UFC Freedom 250 event at the White House proves exactly why the East Wing Modernization Project is severely needed for large scale events, which include drone proof structures and drone ports among other critical security enhancements,” Ingle added.

    Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. issued an order Friday allowing the Trump administration to continue ballroom work in the short term as the Supreme Court weighs an emergency appeal in a lawsuit challenging whether the construction requires the approval of Congress.

    A U.S. district judge and a federal appeals panel have both ordered the administration to stop building the ballroom until lawmakers authorize the project. But the judges carved out an exception: Construction on national security needs, such as a planned military complex underneath the ballroom, can continue.

    In August court filings supporting the White House’s case, Trump’s top national security team urged the Supreme Court to allow the project to proceed. The construction, they said, comes as the president faces rising threats from foreign adversaries and terrorists, alongside advances in commercial drone technology that could more effectively target White House grounds.

    Trump officials argued the ballroom complex would provide essential security upgrades to the president’s residence and help guarantee the U.S. government could continue functioning during a crisis.

    White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller wrote in his filing that the facility “serves continuity-of-government interests by ensuring that the President and senior national security staff are able to operate from a protected facility during any attack on the nation’s capital.”

    Army Secretary Dan Driscoll has repeatedly asserted the ballroom’s construction would help resolve an “emergency” in the White House’s “defensive posture” posed by the spread of military-grade drones.

    Driscoll told the Supreme Court in an Aug. 13 filing that completing the ballroom complex was necessary so Trump could run the country in a crisis.

    “Securing this reinforced subterranean node guarantees uninterrupted command and control in place,” Driscoll wrote, calling the project “a nondiscretionary prerequisite to ensure the President can maintain continuity of government, uninterrupted operations, and effectively exercise National Command Authority during an attack or global crisis.”

    The arguments echoed the Trump administration’s increasing effort to rely on national security as a way to justify the ballroom’s completion.

    Trump has taken to calling the project a “military complex” in his public comments and social media posts, and has repeatedly posted AI renderings of drones, troops, and even fuel tanker trucks stationed on the future East Wing roof to press his case.

    “The ballroom is so much a military component with the drones and the bomb shelters,” Trump told reporters on the South Lawn on Wednesday.

    The White House has been racing to complete the project before any court-ordered halt takes effect. Officials told the Supreme Court earlier this month that construction was about “65% complete” and that about 250 workers are working 20 hours per day, seven days a week to quickly finish it.

    The structure goes five stories deep into the ground, and much of the underground work has been completed, the administration said. The project is already 70 feet above ground in some places, officials told the Supreme Court.

    After asserting in court last year that the secure portion of the project could be carried out independently of the ballroom, the administration has reversed its argument.

    Maj. Gen. Garrett R. Hoffman, director of the White House Military Office, told the Supreme Court that the aboveground ballroom and belowground military facility are “inextricably intertwined elements” and that the new construction “provides extraordinary protection to these spaces that has not been available in the past.”

    Officials have also stressed that the concrete, steel, and other materials used for both parts of the project are being chosen for national security reasons. In court filings, they detailed how the ballroom’s construction materials are intended to stop bombs, rockets, missiles, and even nuclear blasts.

    “It is, in a very large way, a ‘safe room’ for the Presidency and the continuity of government,” wrote Joshua Fisher, a senior White House official who is managing the project, in his Supreme Court filing.

    The two former officials noted this same argument had been invoked two decades ago to construct the White House’s existing subterranean bunker that is hardened against nuclear blasts and other threats. They questioned why the administration has suggested that the White House lacks such a secure location, including one that could help ensure a functioning government in national security crises.

    They also contrasted secretive efforts to build the existing bunker to the current project. Details about the secure White House facility are among the most closely guarded secrets in the U.S. government, the former officials said, and its construction was concealed from many lawmakers, administration officials, and the public.

    During the new ballroom’s construction, Trump has repeatedly revealed private aspects of the planned East Wing military complex, such as its medical capabilities and “drone port.” And the renovation has occurred in public view, potentially allowing foreign adversaries to spy once-hidden elements of the White House complex — a threat Trump officials invoked in their court filings to urge that construction continue.

    Trump has separately accused the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the organization that sued to halt the ballroom’s construction, of being “treasonists.” He has claimed that the nonprofit group, which Congress charged with helping preserve historic buildings, was asked not to file a lawsuit for national security reasons.

    “I said the problem with the suit — I told them this — is that we have many military things in this ballroom, and ideally, they shouldn’t be revealed,” Trump said in the Oval Office on Aug. 17. “But now they are revealed, so the world knows about it.”

    The National Trust’s filings have not revealed any new information about the ballroom project that Trump or the administration did not previously disclose.

    National Trust officials also told the Post that they were never briefed on the bunker, that they were not asked by Trump or the White House to not file a lawsuit, and that they sued to halt the ballroom because they believe the president does not have the authority to unilaterally make wholesale changes to the historic White House grounds.

    Trump officials did share classified information directly with U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon as he weighed the National Trust’s arguments, beginning last year. Leon ultimately ordered a halt to ballroom construction but said the administration could keep working on the underground military complex.

    The White House’s protections for presidents have evolved as threats have increased.

    For decades, the White House bunker was limited to a small facility located in the basement of the East Wing, built during World War II to help protect President Franklin D. Roosevelt in case of an emergency. That site — known as the Presidential Emergency Operations Center, or PEOC — is where the Secret Service hurried Vice President Dick Cheney and first lady Laura Bush during the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

    The attacks of Sept. 11 prompted the White House to begin work on a much more secure facility, said journalist Ronald Kessler, who referenced construction of the bunker in his 2018 book, The Trump White House: Changing the Rules of the Game. The upgraded facility, he wrote, was completed during the Obama administration, had a monthslong food supply, and was equipped with its own self-contained airflow system.

    “It’s a serious issue. What could be more important than maintaining continuity of government?” said Kessler, who supports the Trump administration’s efforts to expand the White House’s secure facilities through the ballroom project.

    Kessler and the former officials who spoke with the Post acknowledged the necessity of providing the president with a secure facility amid ongoing serious threats. Trump has faced multiple assassination attempts, the latest of which — from Iran earlier in the summer — prompted the Secret Service to stage an elaborate ruse that ended with the president flying back from the NATO summit in Ankara on a separate aircraft, apart from Air Force One.

    Still, the two former officials questioned the White House’s public case that the existing architecture is insufficiently hardened. The existing site, the two people said, is buried deep into the Washington bedrock, accessible by a private elevator and built specifically to protect the president from a vast array of threats, including an attack from a weapon of mass destruction.

    Its specifications, the former officials said, include many of the safety protocols the White House is describing in an attempt to justify the new ballroom complex.

    The former officials also warned that the administration’s abrupt decision to demolish the East Wing, and expose what sat underneath it, could have itself created national security risks. The PEOC, two former officials said, sat only about 20 feet under the East Wing and may have been destroyed or damaged in the construction process.

    Fisher, the White House official managing the project, said that he was worried that halting construction now could unwind nearly a year of work.

    “Pausing work now, as the district court has ordered, will jeopardize everything we have done so far,” Fisher told the Supreme Court. “Depending on how long that freeze persists, it might force us to tear down everything we have done as a degraded mass, to allow for whatever comes next — something that would be disruptive and extremely dangerous.”

    Similar arguments have not swayed lower-court judges.

    Leon, the district judge who first ordered the administration in March to halt its ballroom construction, chastised Trump officials for arguing that they needed to complete the project for safety and security reasons.

    “Here is the bottom line,” Leon wrote in a follow-up ruling in April. “Defendants themselves forged ahead and created this ‘coordinated and managed safety hazard’ on White House grounds.”

  • Iran’s rial currency hits new record low as US prepares to announce more sanctions

    Iran’s rial currency hits new record low as US prepares to announce more sanctions

    TEHRAN, Iran — Iran’s currency hit a record low Monday as Washington prepared to announce new sanctions it said would add further pressure on an economy already battered by previous sanctions and a U.S. naval blockade.

    The rial dropped to 2.02 million to the U.S. dollar as trading opened on currency markets. Iran’s official Central Bank rate stood at around 1.5 million rial to the dollar, but the market rate is what most Iranians pay.

    The currency had already been under pressure before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, as Iran faced double-digit inflation and negative growth, but has repeatedly hit new lows as nearly six months of war have taken an even greater toll.

    Iranians find daily staples increasingly unaffordable. Since the war began, rice is up some 60% and prices of beef are more than 150% higher. The International Monetary Fund forecasts that GDP will contract more than 5%.

    Still, economic pressure has not yet translated into political pressure. Iran retains a key strategic advantage: Its attacks and threats on ships in the Strait of Hormuz have brought traffic in the vital waterway to a near halt, damaging the world economy and heaping pressure on U.S. President Donald Trump ahead of congressional elections.

    The war, as a result, has devolved into a fight over who controls the strait, through which a fifth of the world’s traded oil transited before the conflict. Iran is now refusing to fully reopen it unless it can charge ships.

    Iran and Oman, which is on the opposite side of the strait, are reportedly in the final stages of agreeing upon a plan for joint management of the waterway. Oman’s foreign minister is set to visit Iran on Tuesday.

    In an attempt to break the impasse, Trump’s administration promised even stronger sanctions than those already in place would be announced Monday, including secondary sanctions on countries that continue to do business with Iran.

    “President Trump decimated Iran’s economy to a point where the rial has never been weaker and inflation has rarely been higher,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent wrote Sunday in an opinion piece in the Financial Times. “The regime’s final refuge now lies in the self-deception of fearful nations that still believe accommodating aggression can secure a durable peace.”

    Already last week, the United Arab Emirates announced that it was suspending all trade with Iran. The UAE has long been one of Iran’s largest trading partners and its biggest source of imports.

    Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei told reporters in Tehran on Monday that “any escalation of this situation will undoubtedly bring about consequences.”

    “Our hands are not tied,” he added.

    Pakistan, which played a key role in brokering a 60-day ceasefire in June, sent a high-level delegation to Iran on Monday to discuss ending the war, the military said.

    In downtown Tehran, 73-year-old Sadegh Mahmoudi did not hold out hope for a resolution. He joined a line of about a dozen people to purchase U.S. dollars with his remaining savings to hedge against further declines.

    “There is no hope for a deal and peace,” he said.

  • European leaders join Zelenskyy in Kyiv for Ukraine’s Independence Day as Russian invasion pushes on

    European leaders join Zelenskyy in Kyiv for Ukraine’s Independence Day as Russian invasion pushes on

    KYIV, Ukraine — European leaders joined President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv on Monday for official celebrations marking Ukraine’s Independence Day as Russia pushes on with its 4-year-old invasion of the country.

    One of President Vladimir Putin’s key goals in starting a war with Russia’s neighbor in February 2022 was to place Kyiv in Moscow’s orbit. Ukrainians voted overwhelmingly for independence in 1991.

    With no significant changes on the front line for months and no apparent progress after more than a year of U.S.-led peace efforts, the warring countries are locked in a spiral of escalating aerial attacks that are killing civilians and smashing infrastructure.

    EU leaders rally around Ukraine

    U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham, on his first overseas trip since taking office last month, on Monday joined almost a dozen other European leaders, as well as other dignitaries including European Council President Antonio Costa, in Kyiv.

    “For Ukraine, independence is not an abstract idea. We defended it against all odds,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said on social media. “In times like these, nations learn how important it is to have allies by your side.”

    Burnham was to co-chair a meeting of the so-called Coalition of the Willing group of countries helping Ukraine resist Russia’s onslaught, with the leaders of France and Germany expected to join online.

    The visiting leaders took to Kyiv pledges of further military and financial support. Burnham is expected to announce that the U.K. Government has agreed to allow defense company MBDA to release classified information relating to British components used in the SCALP long-range missile, according to his office. That would pave the way for France and Ukraine to advance plans for local production of the weapon in Ukraine.

    SCALP is the French version of the UK’s Storm Shadow missile, with both systems incorporating shared French and British technology.

    Ukraine has leaned heavily on NATO countries for help fighting Russia’s bigger army, although relations with the United States have been cooler under President Donald Trump.

    Russia, meanwhile, is getting help from North Korea and China.

    Both Russia and Ukraine are trying through long-range strikes to inflict economic pain, disrupt military supplies and erode public morale.

    Ukraine’s long-range drones have repeatedly hit facilities in Russia’s vital oil industry, causing fuel shortages, and have also engaged in a campaign against Russia’s largest online retailer Wildberries.

    Ukrainian strikes kill 3 teenagers

    Three teenagers were killed and six children were wounded in the southern Russian city of Krasnodar, Russia’s children’s rights ombudswoman Maria Lvova-Belova said Monday, as Ukraine attacked several warehouses of Ozon for the third straight day, according to officials and the company.

    Ozon is one of Russia’s major e-commerce retailers. The company said a large fire raged at an Ozon logistics facility in the suburbs of Krasnodar following the overnight attack.

    A drone also hit the grounds of an Ozon logistics center in the southern Russian region of Adygeya, regional governor Murat Kumpilov said, though the company said its Adygeya warehouse wasn’t damaged.

    In all, four Ozon premises appeared to have been targeted.

    Russia’s Defense Ministry said its air defenses overnight intercepted and destroyed 351 Ukrainian drones over eight Russian regions, as well as occupied Crimea and the waters of the Azov and the Black Seas.

    The ministry also said that its forces overnight continued to strike Ukrainian ports and vessels delivering cargo for the armed forces.

  • Trump’s school voucher program could become a public school cash machine

    Trump’s school voucher program could become a public school cash machine

    Forget student fun runs, PTA bake sales and Saturday morning car washes.

    The future of public-school fundraising may soon look more like a payroll deduction. Or perhaps door-to-door campaigns each tax season asking filers to earmark donations to support nearby public schools.

    When President Donald Trump’s tax overhaul known as the One Big Beautiful Bill last year created the first national school-voucher-style program to help families pay for private schools or home-school costs, it allowed public schools to benefit as well. According to U.S. Treasury guidelines released in June, the program allows specific nonprofits to collect donations that people direct from their federal taxes for a vast array of public school costs, such as transportation or tutoring.

    Sara Hazel, president of the Denver Public Schools Foundation, the fundraising arm for Colorado’s largest school district, is among a small but growing number of district leaders who have said they plan to take advantage of the financial opportunity. She said she plans to tell potential donors, “Do you want that money going to the IRS or going to local kids?”

    The program doesn’t officially start until the new year, but its resemblance to private-school vouchers has inspired opponents of school choice to line up against it. Still, supporters and even cautious critics say the Republican-backed initiative could mean a financial boon for public schools.

    The program works like this: Taxpayers can contribute up to $1,700 to what’s known as a scholarship-granting organization and receive a credit on their federal income taxes. It’s a dollar-for-dollar credit, meaning every pledged dollar reduces what an individual owes to the Internal Revenue Service by the same amount.

    These new intermediaries could be formed by an array of nonprofits, including public-school foundations, with approval from their state. The scholarship-granting organization would then pass on the money to private school and home-school applicants in the form of scholarships — or to school districts so they could cover certain services for student applicants.

    Marguerite Roza, a school finance expert, has advised school districts — many of which have bandaged their slashed budgets by shuttering campuses or issuing pink slips — that they can’t afford to ignore this new source of funding. “Any time there’s an available revenue source, generally we don’t see districts saying, ‘No thank you,’” said Roza, director of the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University.

    States must opt into the program, and so far, 30 states have done so. Now it’s up to individual school district leaders in those states to decide if they want to try to tap into the money.

    School finance experts suggest the scholarships could help districts access funding comparable to 3 percent of their entire budget. But tapping into this unexpected revenue risks political backlash and logistical headaches. Governors and superintendents may face fierce resistance from teachers unions, which in many states have portrayed the new program as a Trojan horse for the expansion of vouchers in education because it also allows money to be funneled to families to pay for private school.

    Some opponents also raise concerns about creating a new funding system that could favor school districts with a ready pool of wealthy donors over those in low-income communities where few residents may owe enough in federal taxes to contribute to the scholarships.

    “In low-income areas, you’re going to find it’s not easy for school districts to raise this money,” said Thomas Toch, director of the think tank FutureEd at Georgetown University.

    He said he worried that the inclusion of public school districts in the legislation was little more than a ploy, a shrewd political strategy to further school choice in states otherwise unlikely to support it.

    “It was designed to make the case that this program can support the public sector in order to win support in blue states,” Toch said.

    The mechanics of the tax credit scholarships represent a dramatic departure from how the federal government supports schools.

    The money for the scholarships never flows through federal Department of Education coffers, entirely bypassing Congress and its spending decisions.

    Treasury regulators will soon issue formal rules to set additional guardrails for the program. But the law suggests the scholarships could be used to cover an expansive list of expenses that public schools often struggle to fund including costs such as field trips, textbooks or support services.

    The inclusion of public schools now places some governors, superintendents and school boards in a new dilemma: Do they choose to tap into a Trump-backed program that could boost their bottom line, or leave the tax-credit cash on the table for others to claim?

    “The reality is this program exists, and if there are dollars on the table that can go to our children and families, I don’t understand the purpose of not trying to do everything we possibly can,” said Justin Dayhoff, chief financial officer for Nevada’s Clark County School District, which includes Las Vegas.

    His district, like many around the country, is strapped for cash as health insurance and other costs increase and fewer students enroll in public school due to population decline. Enrollment in Clark County — the nation’s fifth-largest district — has dwindled by more than 35,000 students, or 11 percent, since before the pandemic and it laid off five dozen staff ahead of this new school year.

    How big a financial difference the voucher-style program would make for school districts remains to be seen.

    Some school finance experts expect soliciting donations could be as simple as districts partnering with employers to enroll their workers in the tax credit program, perhaps as another form in their regular HR paperwork. (Many employers already partner with nonprofits like United Way to collect pretax donations from paychecks.)

    Roza, of Georgetown, estimated a district could bring in about $200 per student by enrolling its own employees into the program. Convincing major companies to do the same — directing proceeds to nonprofits supporting students who attend local public schools — could push that figure higher. City and county governments might participate as well.

    “Local employers are an absolutely critical piece of this puzzle,” said Hazel, with the Denver Public Schools Foundation.

    Her organization hasn’t officially approached any of its corporate partners yet about enrolling their employees in the tax credit program. (Past donors to the foundation have included Chevron, the Colorado Rockies and United Airlines.) But Hazel’s already thinking about whether Denver Public Schools will have to compete with other Colorado districts attempting to woo the same business leaders.

    “We’re the largest school district in Colorado, so we already have an advantage,” Hazel said. “But how can we go to a company and say, ‘Your employees must choose between all these great school districts?’”

    But her new fundraising plans will come with steep operational hurdles.

    Under the new law, at least 90 percent of all donations to scholarship-granting organizations like Hazel’s must go directly to student scholarships, leaving relatively little to cover marketing, staff, annual independent audits and payment processing. Fees already take 4 percent of each credit card transaction, Hazel said.

    Yet even as she awaits further clarity from Treasury on how organizations can collect donations, she’s imagining what the money could mean for Denver schools.

    “My dream is I can give every second grader a tutor and we get everyone to grade-level reading and math,” Hazel said. “There are things like that that are so scalable and would support every student.”

    This story about the One Big Beautiful Bill was produced by the Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education.

  • The midterms feel like 2006 all over again

    The midterms feel like 2006 all over again

    WASHINGTON — The war in the Middle East is increasingly unpopular. So is the president as his numbers dip perilously — a common development in the sixth year of a presidency. Congressional Republicans are embroiled in unsavory scandals. Americans are shelling out big bucks for gas while economic anxiety runs high.

    The grim backdrop for November’s midterm elections has created a steep challenge for Republicans and opportunities for Democrats that look much the same as those they encountered in 2006. Back then, congressional Republicans faced the voters at the midpoint of President George W. Bush’s second term, with the public roiled by the war in Iraq, high fuel prices and a series of ugly accusations against members of the GOP majority on Capitol Hill.

    “It is striking,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic minority leader and chief architect of his party’s Senate campaign strategy this year and two decades ago. “The analogy is amazing.”

    The parallels are not perfect, since politics and campaigns have both changed radically over 20 years. But the comparisons are instructive, as officials in both parties stare down the final months of an election that will determine who controls Congress for the remainder of President Donald Trump’s term.

    “This is 2006 2.0,” said Rahm Emanuel, who in 2006 was an ambitious Democratic House member from Illinois and Schumer’s counterpart across the Capitol as the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “The similarities are eerie.”

    Emanuel and Schumer both have good reason to look back fondly on 2006, when Democrats triumphed in a blue wave.

    Exceeding expectations that year, Democrats picked up six seats in the Senate, taking control of the chamber. In the House, where the Republican majority seemed to have exhausted itself after a dozen years, Democrats gained 31 seats and installed Nancy Pelosi, who is now retiring, as the first woman speaker. Bush, another victim of the six-year presidential itch, famously branded the outcome “a thumping.”

    This year, the Senate map is stacked against Democrats — they would need to win at least four Republican-held seats to take control, all but one of them in states that Trump won in 2024. And not all of the most competitive races have gone as party leaders had hoped. But Democrats have benefited from some political twists in places where they had not anticipated being competitive, such as in Texas, where Trump’s primary endorsement of the state’s attorney general, Ken Paxton, over Sen. John Cornyn, put that seat in play.

    The nonpartisan Cook Political Report on Thursday moved its ratings of the Texas and Iowa Senate races from leaning Republican to a toss up, underscoring the expanding battleground that Democrats would need in order to replicate 2006. Democrats say that they believe they are also increasingly competitive in other states carried by Trump two years ago, including Kansas.

    While clear similarities exist this year, significant differences are present as well — not the least of which is that Americans consume and process political content far differently than they did 20 years ago, with an emphasis on digital media rather than traditional television advertising.

    Other structural changes have taken place that could influence the results. The two parties this year engaged in a redistricting war that could help stem some of the House losses Republicans might have suffered in a midterm year that traditionally runs against those in power. Polarization runs deeper, making it harder to shake voters from their party identification. Trump’s hold on his base seems stronger than Bush’s was in 2006, though it is potentially weakening amid a backlash to the war with Iran.

    In the Senate and the House, the Democratic establishment did not get its preferred candidates through the primaries in some key races, including in Maine and Michigan. And the rise of far-left socialist candidates has Republicans seeing an opening to try to brand Democratic contenders across the country as part of a movement out of step with typical Americans.

    For those reasons and more, Republicans say the comparison between the two elections comes up short.

    “Democrats are running with a radically different party on a dramatically different map, and the fundamentals are stacked against them,” Mike Marinella, a spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said in a statement. “Republicans have stronger candidates, a historic fundraising advantage and a more favorable battlefield, while Democrats are letting socialists hijack must-win races from Michigan to Colorado, Arizona, California and Maine.”

    In 2006, the war with Iraq was the central issue in the campaign as Americans soured on Bush’s handling of the conflict, particularly after his main justification for the invasion — the claim that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction — turned out to be false. Trump’s conflict with Iran has not gone on nearly as long, nor has it produced the same level of casualties. But Bush had significantly more support at the start. Public opposition helped drive approval numbers for the two presidents below 40%, a dangerous midterm level, as both wars also drove up fuel costs.

    Then as now, Democrats tried to capitalize on kitchen-table economic concerns with the potential to drive voters. In 2006, it was Bush’s proposal to privatize Social Security, which never came to pass. Now, it is the Republican-written law slashing Medicaid and other safety net programs to pay for large tax cuts, as well as the GOP’s decision to allow healthcare subsidies to expire, sending premiums soaring.

    “We found an issue early,” Schumer said, recalling 2006. “Rahm and I did Social Security. Now we found the costs issue, particularly led by healthcare.”

    Another undercurrent of the 2006 campaign has an equivalent today: the image of disturbing Republican misconduct. Twenty years ago, Democrats campaigned against a “culture of corruption,” pointing to a series of financial and sex scandals that led to resignations and jail time for a series of senior Republicans.

    Then, in September 2006, it was disclosed that Rep. Mark Foley, R-Fla., had sent sexually suggestive messages to male House pages, and that Republican leaders had failed to take action even when they had been alerted to his actions, putting a cloud over the party two months before the election.

    This year, Republicans have again had to contend with high-profile sexual misconduct accusations against multiple House members, though Democrats have had their own to deal with as well, a difference from 20 years ago.

    Top Democrats have sought to emphasize Republican conduct on Capitol Hill and in an administration in which the president, his family and his allies have faced scrutiny for profiteering. In an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” this month, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the Democratic leader, said a central element of the Democratic campaign agenda was “pushing back against the corruption that has been unleashed on the American people, and holding the crooks accountable beginning on day one in January of next year.”

    It is not clear whether it will all add up to a repeat of 2006. But Nathan Gonzales, editor of the nonpartisan Inside Elections, sees the potential for the factors working against Republicans building into a resounding voter backlash against the party in power, as they did two decades ago.

    “I remember 2006 when everything snowballed against Republicans,” Gonzales said. “Ordinarily unrelated events got lumped together under one umbrella. Everything was Bush’s fault. The war with Iraq and Mark Foley really had nothing to do with each other, but it cultivated an appetite for change. I could see that happening again.”

    This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

  • Letters to the Editor | Aug. 24, 2026

    Letters to the Editor | Aug. 24, 2026

    Real fear

    Wondering if a situation I not long ago experienced in a Walmart would change Luis F. Carrasco’s mind about both sides having extreme ways we disagree. I saw a gentleman wearing the famous red MAGA hat. I said he looked like he supported Donald Trump. He looked at me and said, “You want to make something of it,” while pulling up his shirt — to show off the gun he was carrying. The fear Mr. Carrasco is talking about isn’t just a concern about being yelled at. It’s the same fear felt by liberals like me, judges, people in Congress, and others when we hear our president tell his supporters that violence is not just OK, but recommended.

    Joe Obelcz, Hatfield

    Preventive healthcare

    Earlier this summer, a Spotlight PA article detailed how advocates and lawmakers were trying to figure out how to keep the state’s children insured as the Trump administration’s Medicaid cuts loom. As children prepare to head back to school, I remain struck by how that article highlights an important reality: The most valuable healthcare is often the illness that never occurs because it was prevented.

    A pediatric well-child visit is far more than a physical exam. It is where developmental delays, postpartum depression, food insecurity, mental health concerns, and life-threatening illnesses may first be recognized. It is also where trusting relationships are built, relationships that help families feel comfortable discussing concerns, accepting recommended vaccinations, and seeking care before small problems become crises.

    Difficult budget decisions are inevitable, but how we make them matters. Protecting children’s access to pediatric primary care through Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program is an investment in healthier families, lower healthcare costs, and stronger communities. Every child deserves the opportunity to grow up healthy, and that starts with ensuring they can see their pediatrician.

    Eliza Sitter, Philadelphia

    Unsung hero

    It’s recently been reported that the U.S. Navy is thinking about removing Doris Miller’s name from its newest aircraft carrier. Miller was a cook aboard the USS West Virginia during Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. He also happened to be Black. On that day, Miller, in the face of enemy bombing, displayed extreme heroism by saving the life of the ship’s injured captain and manning an anti-aircraft gun that brought down at least one Japanese plane, if not more. He was later awarded the Navy Cross, the first Black American to receive it. Two years later, he made the ultimate sacrifice for his country when his carrier was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine and he went down with it.

    The “shocking” part of this story is that the U.S. Navy is seriously considering replacing Miller’s name with that of … wait for it … Donald J. Trump. And what heroism did Trump exhibit to warrant such an honor? Sure, he avoided military service during the Vietnam War because of “bone spurs.” But who knows, if not for such “bone spurs,” Trump may very well have saved more than one captain and brought down thousands of enemy planes, ending that war like he claims to have ended so many other wars during his second term in office. That counts for a lot among his cabinet members. And he certainly has been courageous, playing golf despite his “bone spurs” (by one tally, he’s spent about 22% of his second term golfing).

    Of course, none of this is shocking. Trump cares only about three things, and not one of them involves bettering the lives of the average American: enriching himself and his family at every opportunity, seeking retribution against his perceived enemies, and slapping his name on anything and everything he can. None of that would be possible if not for the compliance of this Congress and this Supreme Court. It’s time to put a stop to this nonsense and elect officials who are serious about the real issues facing our country — and who have solutions that put the American people first.

    Jeffrey Meyer, Chicago, Ill.

    …

    The possible renaming of the USS Doris Miller as the USS Donald J. Trump reflects the reality of the president’s second term. During his first term, Trump made an attempt to connect with African American voters despite his own pre-presidential comments and actions. In his second term, Confederate names on Army forts are in, woke is out — as are assistance to college students of color, Project Head Start, and other government programs aimed at giving marginalized people an opportunity to advance in our society. The disrespect shown to America’s first Black hero of World War II follows in the wake of Pete Hegseth’s purging our military of qualified Black and female generals and admirals. Trump 45 was challenging to endure, Trump 47 is moving our country closer to self-centered one-person rule.

    Paul L. Newman, Merion Station

    Blame game 2.0

    In the coming years, we may witness the return of one of America’s oldest and most reliable excuses — only updated for the digital age. For generations, students fell back on the classic line, “My dog ate my homework,” a phrase that became shorthand for avoiding responsibility with a smile. Today, we’re on the verge of adopting its modern successor: “The AI messed it up.”

    Already, artificial intelligence is being quietly positioned as a cultural scapegoat. A poorly worded email? Blame the AI assistant. An awkward social media post? Must have been the algorithm. A missed deadline? The chatbot must have misunderstood. The technology is new, but the impulse is ancient: when something goes wrong, point to anything except ourselves.

    The irony is that AI doesn’t remove human responsibility — it increases it. These tools are powerful, but they are not autonomous moral agents. They don’t decide our tone, our judgment, or our priorities. Yet we seem eager to hand them not only our tasks, but our accountability.

    If we’re not careful, “The AI did it” will become the next cultural reflex, allowing us to sidestep ownership of our words and actions. It may not be long before society looks back and realizes that the dog never ate the homework — and the AI didn’t write the email. We did.

    Steve Abramovitz, Cherry Hill

    Toeing the line

    Your recent editorial on how American troops are being strained for nothing during the Iran war, referred to Trump ducking service during the Vietnam War “with the reported assistance of a sympathetic Queens podiatrist.” The doctor in question had good reason to be sympathetic: his landlord was Fred Trump, Donald’s father.

    As The New York Times reported in 2018, the podiatrist, Dr. Larry Braunstein, died in 2007. But his daughters say their father often told the story of coming to the aid of a young Mr. Trump during the Vietnam War as a favor to his father. They said his role in Mr. Trump’s military exemption had long been the subject of discussions among relatives and friends. “It was family lore,” Elysa Braunstein told The Times. “It was something we would always discuss.”

    In keeping with his lifelong passion for telling the truth, Trump later claimed that it was a high draft lottery number that kept him from being called up — but he got the bone spurs deferment in 1968: the lottery wasn’t instituted until a year later.

    Isaac Segal, Cherry Hill

    Muscular politics

    Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth says that his mandatory screening program for testosterone deficiency for the troops is “necessary to allow them to operate at their absolute best.” This is an inaccurate, inappropriate and irresponsible action from incompetent Trump cabinet officials, including the Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. As a practicing physician, I was alarmed by Hegseth’s plan, which goes against current guidelines issued by the Endocrine Society, American Urological Association, American College of Physicians and the Food and Drug Administration, all uniformly recommending against population-level screening, and advocating only for symptom-driven case detection at any age, in association with other medical illnesses including type 2 diabetes, chronic kidney disease, obesity, and chronic opioid and corticosteroid use. Testosterone replacement therapy, even if clinically warranted, has well documented serious side effects including fractures, pulmonary embolism (lung blood clots), and a potential increase for atrial fibrillation, a heart rhythm abnormality that is associated with blood clots including stroke. Unfortunately, our military continues to be led astray by an unqualified, self-serving weekend television host whose ego and ill-advised decision-making place our troops at increased risk of long-term health problems.

    Jay Klazmer, Cherry Hill

    Join the conversation: Send letters to letters@inquirer.com. Limit length to 150 words and include home address and day and evening phone number. Letters run in The Inquirer six days a week on the editorial pages and online.