The 60-Day Gamble: Diplomacy in the Shadow of the Strait

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(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

A diplomatic breakthrough, cautious and unfinished, may be taking shape between Washington and Tehran. American and Iranian negotiators have agreed in principle to a sixty-day memorandum of understanding — a framework that would extend the ceasefire and open formal talks on Iran’s nuclear program. The terms, largely settled as of Tuesday, await final approval from both governments. President Trump has not yet signed off; Iran has not confirmed its acceptance. The president, one official said, wants a few days to think it over. That restraint is telling. This is a man who generally does not pause for reflection on the

Newsom Wants Taxpayers to Fund His Portrait While Californians Can’t Afford Rent

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(Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

California Gov. Gavin Newsom wants $33,000 in taxpayer money for an official portrait of himself — and the timing could hardly be worse. The request appears quietly in his proposed 2026–27 budget under a line item labeled “Governor’s Portrait,” covering the traditional painting destined to hang in the State Capitol alongside California’s past governors. It is a longstanding Sacramento tradition. It is also, in this particular moment, a gift to his critics. State officials have spent months warning of serious long-term budget pressures. Californians face some of the highest housing costs in the nation, gas prices that remain stubbornly elevated,

They Raided Trump — Then Started Sweating: Biden DOJ’s Own Lawyer Questioned Legality

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(Photo by U.S. Department of Justice via Getty Images)

A senior Justice Department official — a career attorney with decades inside the institution — sent a quiet, anxious email two days after the FBI’s August 2022 raid on Mar-a-Lago. She hadn’t known the raid was coming. And she wasn’t sure it should have happened the way it did. The email, recently surfaced by Just the News as part of a broader inquiry into the weaponization of federal law enforcement, was written by Patty Stemler, a longtime DOJ veteran whom Attorney General Merrick Garland had tapped in 2022 to help consult on Trump-related cases. She sent it to Sophia Brill,

The Fraud Task Force Has Its First Big Scalp — And Vance Wants More

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(Photo by Heather Diehl/Getty Images)

Not every theft is the same. Among the worst is people stealing from the sick and helpless. That is what Vice President JD Vance was talking about Thursday when he announced that the Justice Department has charged 15 people in Minnesota in connection with fraud schemes allegedly involving roughly $90 million in Medicaid and social service funds. One case stood out. A defendant allegedly billed Medicaid for round-the-clock care for a disabled man who was later found dead — a man who, prosecutors contend, received no actual services. Vance called it sickening. He was right. “Our message is simple,” he

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