March 17, 2026

Earlier today, akaWendy posted a link to New York City Mayor Zorhan O'Mamdani's St. Patrick's Day message. It's quite good.

Gregory Svirnovskiy & Jacob Wendler of Politico: “... Donald Trump on Tuesday fumed at longtime American allies he says aren’t doing enough to help the U.S. and Israel in their war against Iran, now arguing that their assistance was never needed after spending days publicly requesting their help. 'Because of the fact that we have had such Military Success, we no longer “need,” or desire, the NATO Countries’ assistance — WE NEVER DID!' he wrote on Truth Social. 'Likewise, Japan, Australia, or South Korea. In fact, speaking as President of the United States of America, by far the Most Powerful Country Anywhere in the World, WE DO NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!'... Trump continued to chastise allies in the Oval Office on Tuesday afternoon, telling reporters that “all of our NATO allies were very much in favor of what we did.'... [Sen. Lindsey] Graham [R-S.C.] wrote on X Tuesday that 'never heard him so angry in my life.'” (MB: That's because Lindsey was hiding under his desk in the Capitol when Trump was throwing ketchup at the wall on January 6.) 

Jim Tankersley of the New York Times: “European officials have a long list of reasons, spoken and unspoken, for refusing [to help Donald Trump in his war against Iran].... 1. They never wanted this war and don’t want a part of it.... 2. It’s not NATO’s job.... 3. They don’t think it will work … 4. … and if it did, it could prolong the war.”

Maegan Vazquez of the Washington Post: “The House Oversight Committee has subpoenaed Attorney General Pam Bondi as part of its probe of the Justice Department’s investigation into deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, ordering her to testify before the panel on April 14.... A Justice Department official, however, quickly dismissed the subpoena as pointless, declining to say whether the attorney general would comply.” A Politico report is here.

Josh Gerstein of Politico: “Chief Justice John Roberts defended the Supreme Court Tuesday against a sustained flurry of attacks ... Donald Trump unleashed against the justices in recent days for striking down the core of his politically pivotal tariff policy. 'Personally directed hostility is dangerous and it’s got to stop,' Roberts said during an appearance at Rice University in Houston. Roberts did not mention Trump directly and made an effort to frame intemperate criticism of the judiciary as emerging 'from all over' and 'not just any one political perspective.' But with Trump lashing out at the justices — or at least some of them — every few days since his high court defeat last month, it seemed clear the chief justice sought to counter the president’s public expressions of displeasure. In Trump’s latest salvo Sunday, he appeared to broaden his crusade against the court, faulting them not only for the tariffs ruling but for failing to back him in 2020 when he contended without evidence that he’d been reelected. 'Our Country was unnecessarily RANSACKED by the United States Supreme Court, which has become little more than a weaponized and unjust Political Organization,' Trump wrote in a lengthy rant on Truth Social. 'The sad thing is, they will only get worse!'” Here's the New York Times report.

Ellen Nakashima, et al., of the Washington Post: “The intelligence community’s top counterterrorism official said Tuesday he was stepping down over the U.S. and Israeli war on Iran — the first senior official to openly break ranks with the White House over a conflict stretching into its third week. 'After much reflection, I have decided to resign,' Joe Kent, the head of the National Counterterrorism Center, posted on X in a letter to ... Donald Trump. 'I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran.' Kent continued: 'Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.'... Kent’s resignation lays bare the schism within the Trump coalition between those who are skeptical of U.S. military interventions overseas and those who believe in the exercise of U.S. military might to advance America’s interests around the world.’’ The New York Times report is here. The AP's report is here.

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The New York Times' liveblog of developments in the Iran war is here. From the pinned item: “A tanker anchored near a port in the United Arab Emirates was hit by a projectile early Tuesday, the first strike on a ship in and around the Strait of Hormuz in five days, as countries in Europe and beyond rebuffed President Trump’s call for help unblocking the vital oil route.... Iran has said that it would not allow oil shipments that benefit the United States and its allies to pass through the strait.... At least 17 vessels in the region have been attacked since the war started in late February.... Germany, Japan, Italy, Australia and the European Union have said they would not participate in the U.S. effort to reopen the strait, while France, South Korea and Britain were noncommittal.... In Lebanon, Israeli forces have launched a 'ground maneuver,' Defense Minister Israel Katz said, defying the leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Britain, who said in a statement that any Israeli ground offensive 'would have devastating humanitarian consequences.'” ~~~

     ~~~ The AP's live updates are here. 

Victoria Craw of the Washington Post: “Israel’s defense minister said Tuesday that Iran’s top security official and the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ volunteer force were killed in overnight strikes in Iran, claiming to have taken out two of Tehran’s most senior remaining officials. Ali Larijani, the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran, and Gholamreza Soleimani, commander of the Basij, were 'eliminated' in strikes overnight, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement.” The AP's report is here.

Dan Lamothe of the Washington Post: “The number of U.S. troops who have been wounded or injured during the U.S.-Israeli campaign against Iran now exceeds 200 across seven countries, a U.S. military spokesman said Monday, providing the most detailed accounting yet of how American personnel have been put in harm’s way. Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins, the chief spokesman for U.S. Central Command, said U.S. troops have been wounded in Bahrain, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, primarily in the first few days of the conflict. More than 180 of them have returned to duty, he said.”

We have some countries where we have 45,000 soldiers, great soldiers, protecting them from harm’s way, and we have done a great job. And well, we want to know, do you have any mine sweepers? ‘Well, we’d rather not get involved, sir.’... For 40 years, we’re protecting you, and you don’t want to get involved. -- Donald Trump, Monday, complaining about the refusal of allies to put their navies in harm's way to try to fix Trump's mistakes 

We are not involved in military operations in the Strait of Hormuz.... [Italy] never said — but neither did France, no other European country has offered to send military ships to force a passage through the Strait of Hormuz. -- Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani

This is not our war; we did not start it. -- German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius ~~~

~~~ Michael Shear of the New York Times: “As ... [Donald] Trump’s assault on Iran enters its third week, European leaders are largely resisting his bellicose demands for help in reopening the Strait of Hormuz.... Sending their navies for what he called a 'very small endeavor' is the least that Europe’s presidents and prime ministers can do, Mr. Trump suggested over the weekend. At an event on Monday at the White House, Mr. Trump complained that some European leaders were not showing their appreciation for everything that the United States had done to protect the continent.... [British Prime Minister Keir] Starmer has arguably been the European leader most eager to please Mr. Trump. And yet, on Monday, he vowed at a news conference that his country 'will not be drawn into the wider war' with Iran.' Outside of official circles, Mr. Trump’s demand has been met with outright ridicule in China.” 

That Would Be a “Nein.” Nette Nöstlinger of Politico: “Germany's government rejected ... Donald Trump's demand that NATO allies help secure the Strait of Hormuz, declaring that the alliance had no place in the war. 'This war has nothing to do with NATO. It's not NATO’s war,' Stefan Kornelius, a spokesperson for German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, told reporters in Berlin on Monday. 'NATO is a defensive alliance, an alliance for the defense of its territory,' he added. Trump had warned NATO allies on Sunday they face a 'very bad future' if they refuse to help secure the Strait of Hormuz, pressing Europe to support an American effort to reopen the key maritime corridor.” (Also linked yesterday.) 

Sebastian Starcevic & Victor Jack of Politico: “Europe's message to Donald Trump on Monday was clear: We're not helping you secure the Strait of Hormuz.  Foreign ministers from the 27 EU countries gathered in Brussels to discuss the American president’s call for European countries to help secure the narrow waterway, a vital oil shipping channel that Iran has largely blocked in retaliation for U.S. and Israeli airstrikes.... But after hours of closed-door talks about the war in Iran, Europe’s foreign envoys made clear they see this as America’s problem to solve.” See also Krugman, linked below.

Marie: There's a reason I posted Trump's complaint that allies are not providing minesweepers for his "little excursion": here's what RAS dug up: ~~~

~~~ Andrew Feinberg of the Independent (March 11): “As ... Donald Trump warns Iran against using mines to threaten oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, the U.S. Navy’s purpose-built minesweepers are sitting stateside thousands of miles away with no plans to put them to use.... Even as tensions between the U.S. and Iran continued to ratchet up over the last few months, the Trump administration continued with plans to bring the ships back to the U.S. for disposal this past January.... [One vessel, the Seaway Hawk, which was carrying four decommissioned minesweepers,] arrived in Philadelphia on Tuesday, the day Iran reportedly began laying mines.” ~~~

~~~ Spencer Ackerman in Forever-Wars on minesweepers: "The Navy's few remaining minesweepers are far from the Gulf — they're in Japan — and the shittiest, least-survivable hull in the fleet, the Littoral Combat Ship, would be called upon to, well, get blown up. That's because the Navy doesn't want to do demining. It wants other navies to do the demining mission, and has for a long time." And other things: "It's shocking — even if, after taking a deep breath, it is not surprising — to see the Bush administration's Iraq War surpassed as the most reckless and destructive war of my lifetime."    

Ellen Nakashima, et al., of the Washington Post: “Despite more than two weeks of relentless airstrikes, U.S. intelligence assessments say, Iran’s regime likely will remain in place for now, weakened but more hard-line, with the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps security forces exerting greater control.... Western officials and analysts who study Iran said they see little near-term prospect of a “regime change” end to the 47-year-old Islamic republic or the rise of a more democratic government. The latter is a goal cited by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and sometimes by Donald Trump, who has said he’ll know the war is over 'when I feel it in my bones.' U.S. intelligence assessments issued since the war began predict Iran’s regime will remain intact and possibly even emboldened....” (Also linked yesterday.) 

Lily Kuo of the New York Times: “The war in Iran is threatening a fragile détente between China and the United States, with the two powers now moving to postpone a much anticipated summit meeting after ... [Donald] Trump demanded that China send warships to the Gulf. Mr. Trump on Monday said that he had requested that his visit to Beijing at the end of the month be postponed because of the war. Just a day earlier, he threatened to delay the meeting if China did not contribute warships to end Iran’s de facto blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which is squeezing oil markets.... Chinese officials have reacted coolly to the president’s call for nations to escort merchant vessels through the strait. When asked on Monday about the president’s proposal, the Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said only that his country called on 'all parties to immediately cease military operations.'”

Gordon Lubold, et al., of NBC News: “Military officials have included options in regular war planning for President Donald Trump to end the conflict in Iran should he decide to do so.... So far, he hasn't.... The timeline for the duration of the war 'could change every day,' according to one ... [source].” 

Trump Lies About Support from Former U.S. President. Monica Alba of NBC News: "...  Donald Trump [twice] told reporters Monday that one of his predecessors told him he wished he had been the one to bomb Iran. [Aides to all four living U.S. former presidents denied their boss spoke to Trump.] Trump declined to reveal the name of the former president he claimed to have spoken to, although he ruled out George W. Bush. The New York Times story is here. MB: Are we supposed to think that Trump has suddenly become a model of discretion?

Michael Grynbaum of the New York Times: “The Trump administration has unleashed a multifaceted pressure campaign against news organizations as it increasingly bristles at media coverage of a Middle East military operation that many Americans oppose. Official Pentagon briefings now include attacks on outlets like CNN, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth nit-picking headlines.... [Donald] Trump is turning to his bully pulpit on Truth Social to accuse 'Highly Unpatriotic “News” Organizations' of airing 'LIES' about the war and musing about 'Charges for TREASON.'... Mr. Trump’s top media regulator, Brendan Carr of the Federal Communications Commission, issued an explicit warning to broadcast television networks on social media, writing that 'hoaxes and news distortions' could lead to the revocation of licenses for local stations, a threat that Mr. Trump said he was 'so thrilled to see.'” ~~~

     ~~~ Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times: “Rarely in modern history has an American administration made such blatantly authoritarian efforts to subdue its critics. Such naked coercion is a screaming sign of democratic breakdown. But we shouldn’t lose sight of how Trump is failing to bend the country to his will. Even as he’s wrecking American institutions, Trump is revealing the limits of his cultural influence.... Taboos against deriding a wartime American leader have disintegrated, and this administration can’t reassemble them by force.”  

An excellent Bluesky thread by Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) on Trump's miscalculations in going to war with Iran and where that leaves the U.S. & Israel. Murphy begins, "It’s crystal clear now that Trump has lost control of this war." Thanks to RAS for the link. (Also linked yesterday.)  

Mad King of the World, Ctd. Annie Correal, et al., of the New York Times: Donald “Trump raised the possibility of the United States 'taking' Cuba on Monday, telling reporters at the White House, 'I do believe I will be having the honor of taking Cuba.... Taking Cuba. I mean, whether I free it, take it. I think I can do anything I want with it.... They’re a very weakened nation right now.' The president’s words came on the same day as Cuba experienced a nationwide blackout, amid diminishing fuel supplies. On Monday evening, Cuban officials had also planned to announce that the country’s Communist government would open itself to foreign investment, including from the United States, Cuba’s deputy prime minister, Oscar Pérez-Oliva Fraga, told NBC News.” A Politico story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Frances Robles, et al., of the New York Times: “As U.S. and Cuban officials negotiate over the future of the Communist-ruled and economically besieged Caribbean island, the Trump administration is seeking to push President Miguel Díaz-Canel from power.... The move would topple a key figurehead while keeping in place the repressive Communist government that has ruled Cuba for more than 65 years. The Americans have signaled to Cuban negotiators that the president must go, but are leaving the next steps up to the Cubans.... The United States so far is not pushing for any action against Castro family members, who remain the country’s top power brokers.... That is consistent with the general desire of Mr. Trump and his aides to force regime compliance rather than regime change in their foreign policy.” Update: the link has been changed to one that appears to be a gift link.

Donald Tha God. Catie Edmondson of the New York Times: “For weeks on Capitol Hill, there had been quiet murmurs about the health of an ailing veteran House Republican, Representative Neal Dunn of Florida, and whether he would be able to serve out the duration of his term because of what was rumored to be a grave diagnosis. On Monday, at a news conference called to discuss the Kennedy Center..., [Donald] Trump aired the quiet part out loud, claiming credit for having saved Mr. Dunn’s life in an unusual and at times uncomfortable exchange that publicly laid out the congressman’s formerly private prognosis in new detail.... “So, long story short,” [Speaker Mike] Johnson said [at the news conference,] Mr. Trump had been able to connect Mr. Dunn, 73, to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Since then, Mr. Dunn 'has a new lease on life' and 'acts like he’s 30 years younger.' 'Number one, it was bad because I liked him, Mr. Trump said. Number two, it was bad because I needed his vote.... I did it for him first and the vote second,' the president said, adding: 'But it was a close second.'”

Callum Jones of the Guardian: “Donald Trump has claimed he has 'the absolute right' to impose new tariffs after the US supreme court ruled many of the import duties he imposed last year were illegal. The president attacked the court in a late night broadside on Sunday, accusing it of having 'unnecessarily RANSACKED' the US – and failing to show him sufficient loyalty.... '... as the Court pointed out, I have the absolute right to charge TARIFFS in another form, and have already started to do so,' Trump wrote on social media.... The supreme court’s decision did not say the president had the absolute right to charge tariffs in another form. 'This completely inept and embarrassing Court was not what the Supreme Court of the United States was set up by our wonderful Founders to be,' Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. 'They are hurting our Country, and will continue to do so.'” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Paul Krugman: “... even as Trump begs in his graceless way for help [from other nations in securing the Strait of Hormuz], his administration is preparing to hit the very nations he is appealing to with another round of tariffs — tariffs that will be imposed based on an obviously false, bad faith, totally insulting argument.... One important point that isn’t emphasized enough is that in addition to being illegal under U.S. law..., [Trump's] tariffs were a gross breach of contract. Most U.S. tariff rates were set in 1995, as part of the negotiations that among other things created the World Trade Organization. These tariffs were bound' by international agreements, which have almost as much force as treaties. But the U.S. just ripped those agreements up, without even trying to make a case for its actions....

“Now, [Trump] officials have been scrambling for legal strategies to reimpose high tariffs.... They’re going to slap tariffs on Canada, not because they claim that Canada uses slave labor, but because China does, and they claim that Canada is hurting America because it isn’t doing enough to stop those slave-produced goods from entering its own market. Nobody, and I mean nobody, believes this story.”

They Don't Know Much About Art & Architecture, But They Know What Trump Likes. Jonathan Edwards & Dan Diamond of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump’s appointees to the federal planning commission that controls the fate of his White House ballroom project are not legally qualified to serve, critics say — raising the possibility of a court challenge. The federal law governing the National Capital Planning Commission requires that commissioners have 'experience in city or regional planning.' Appointees have traditionally been professionals in planning, architecture or historic preservation. Trump’s three appointees to the commission — White House staff secretary Will Scharf, White House deputy chief of staff James Blair and Office of Management and Budget associate director Stuart Levenbach — lack that required expertise, according to watchdog groups, several former members of the commission and congressional Democrats.... 

“Critics say the same pattern is evident at the Commission of Fine Arts, the other panel reviewing the ballroom building proposal. Trump has filled several seats there with political allies, including Chamberlain Harris, his 26-year-old executive assistant whose desk sits just outside the Oval Office. When Congress created the arts commission 116 years ago, it directed presidents to appoint “well-qualified judges of the fine arts.””

Dan Diamond of the Washington Post: “Susie Wiles, the White House chief of staff and a longtime confidante of ... Donald Trump, has been diagnosed with breast cancer, the president announced Monday. 'Her prognosis is excellent,' Trump said in a statement about Wiles, 68. She will continue to work while she receives treatment, he said.” (Also linked yesterday.)

Lauren Gurley of the Washington Post: “Some 200,000 immigrant truck drivers will begin to lose their commercial driver’s licenses as they expire under a new Trump administration rule that [took] effect Monday. The Transportation Department’s rule will weigh on the beleaguered trucking industry, which is critical to transporting goods across America at a time when energy costs are surging due to the war in Iran. The rule bars immigrants who are asylum seekers, refugees or recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, from obtaining commercial driver’s licenses. And it’s part of the Trump administration’s widening campaign against immigrant truck drivers following several high-profile accidents last summer.... 'The Trump administration has conceded that there’s no empirical relationship between a person’s nation of domicile and safety outcomes,' said Wendy Liu, a lawyer at the Public Citizen Litigation Group, which is leading a lawsuit against the rule.”

Hamed Aleaziz of the New York Times: “Greg Bovino, the combative border official empowered by the Trump administration to run major immigration operations across the United States, plans to retire in the coming weeks, he told The New York Times on Monday.... His brash style, including his regular social media commentary, earned him criticism from the left and praise from the right. The operations his team conducted spurred lawsuits and allegations of racial profiling.” MB: He's probably negotiating a contract with some right-wing media outlet -- because if there's anything Greggers enjoys as much as squirting pepper spray in the face of a dark-skinned person, it's boasting about it on the teevee. 

Maria Cramer of the New York Times: “A New Jersey woman who took part in pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Columbia University in 2024 has been released from a federal immigration detention center in Texas, where she had been held for more than a year. The woman, Leqaa Kordia, 33, was freed on Monday, about a month after she said she had been chained to a hospital bed following a seizure inside the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas, where she described filthy and inhumane conditions. She has not been charged with a crime. On Friday, she appeared before an immigration judge, who ordered her released on $100,000 bond. It was the third time that the judge had ordered her release. But government lawyers had appealed the judge’s earlier decisions, forcing her to remain in detention. On Monday, she was released after the government did not make another appeal. Her lawyers and family said her health had diminished considerably at the center....”

Sarah Blaskey of the Washington Post: “A rookie immigration officer [-- Nolan De Long --] fresh out of the Trump administration’s abbreviated basic training program made critical errors in paperwork that became the government’s justification for detaining [Carlos De La Garza,] a California man for days in December, federal court records show.... At basic training, [De Long] had received only one-third of the instruction time the agency once dedicated to teaching recruits how to fill out [a] form....”

Madison Pauly of Mother Jones: After a revolt among employees of the large architectural firm DLR Group, “CEO Steven McKay wrote to employees that 'moving forward, DLR Group will not do work ... for ICE detainment or deportation facilities.' DLR Group wouldn’t walk away from its existing contract, or commit to ending its relationship with private prisons, executives communicated to employees. But it would donate the estimated $300,000 in profits from [an] Oklahoma job [it had previously contracted to do] to immigration-related causes.... The uprising within DLR Group isn’t the only example of workers pushing back on their employers’ business dealings with ICE — but it may be one of the more successful ones. Since the surge of ICE enforcement in Minneapolis, more than two thousand tech workers at companies like Amazon and Microsoft have petitioned their White House-cozying CEOs to cancel ICE contracts, to no avail.” 

⭐Apoorva Mandavilli of the New York Times: “In a severe blow to the Trump administration’s health agenda, a federal judge in Massachusetts on Monday blocked the government from implementing a series of decisions on vaccines made over the last year by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The ruling also reversed, at least for the time being, all decisions made by the panelists that Mr. Kennedy appointed to the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices, which makes recommendations on which vaccines Americans should take. The court decision will prevent the committee from meeting later this week, as it was scheduled to do. The judge’s ruling brought an abrupt halt to the major changes that Mr. Kennedy ... had set in motion.... Those included cutting down the number of diseases covered by routine immunization, and restricting access to Covid vaccines, two pillars of Mr. Kennedy’s vaccine agenda. In his decision, Judge Brian Murphy, of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, noted that the vaccine committee has historically made decisions through careful review of scientific evidence, 'a method scientific in nature and codified into law through procedural requirements.' But, he added 'unfortunately, the government has disregarded those methods and thereby undermined the integrity of its actions.'” The AP's report is here.

As Predicted. Josh Gerstein & Kyle Cheney of Politico: “The man charged with planting pipe bombs at Democratic and Republican party headquarters on the eve of Jan. 6, 2021, says he’s protected from prosecution by the sweeping clemency ... Donald Trump decreed for participants in the attack on the Capitol. Lawyers for Brian Cole Jr. filed the provocative motion Monday arguing that the felony charges he faces of transporting and maliciously using explosives should be dismissed because Trump granted clemency to anyone convicted of or charged with crimes 'related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021.'”

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Florida. Uh, Young Republicans Sue for Right to Promote Antisemitism. Dana Goldstein of the New York Times: “The University of Florida has blocked a Republican student group from operating on campus over accusations of antisemitism, after a photo showing two people giving a Nazi salute was posted online. The group, the University of Florida College Republicans, could lose access to campus spaces and funds under the decision, which was announced on Saturday. The university’s move came after an education and pro-Israel activist shared the photo on social media.... On Monday, the University of Florida College Republicans filed a federal lawsuit against [the university's interim president Donald] Landry. The complaint argues that the university violated the student group’s First Amendment rights and sought to punish it for the protected, off-campus speech of a member.”