Good evening. I’m British Chris, and this is Raw America.
Former Trump White House chief strategist Steve Bannon says his former boss will likely declare a national emergency before the end of August in order to try and influence the midterm elections. Republican Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky is directly accusing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is breaking federal law by keeping American troops at war past the statutory 90-day limit. First Lady Melania Trump is skipping her husband’s do-over speech at tonight’s rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Dinner. And Paramount will now have to wait at least another year until its planned merger with Warner Bros. Discovery goes through.
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Steve Bannon Predicts Trump Will Declare ‘National Emergency’ Just Before Midterms
Steve Bannon, who is one of Donald Trump’s closest allies, is now predicting the president will declare a national emergency sometime next month.
According to Bannon, Trump’s recent national address last week claiming “shocking vulnerabilities” in the 2020 election was a key indicator. But Bannon says that speech was just the opening salvo: the endgame is his draconian SAVE Act.
That’s the bill requiring every American voter to produce a passport or birth certificate just to be able to cast a ballot in an election. But according to the Brennan Center for Justice, roughly 21 million Americans could lose their voting rights under this law. Many of those voters are women who changed their name when they got married and don’t have matching ID documents. Others who would be disenfranchised are poor, rural or elderly.
Bannon doesn’t think Congress will be able to pass it through conventional means, so he’s predicting Trump will instead manufacture a crisis. He didn’t rule out his former boss sending ICE agents or even the National Guard to polling places. He also said Trump may use the emergency declaration to try and ban mail-in ballots, even though nearly a third of voters used them in 2024.
One longtime Democratic strategist told reporters this scenario is believable, even if Bannon is exaggerating. Remember that this is the man who ran Trump’s 2016 campaign and was the chief strategist in Trump’s first White House. When he says Trump is plotting an emergency declaration around the midterms, that’s something everyone needs to prepare for.
Massie Accuses Hegseth of Breaking the Law
The War Powers Act explicitly says a president can’t keep American troops in combat more than 90 days without an official act of Congress. The Iran war blew past that window months ago.
So how did Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth handle it? On Wednesday, the Defense Department quietly revised its casualty count from 18 American service members killed in the war to 14.
The New York Times reported the Pentagon’s revision was due to those four deaths happening after Trump declared a ceasefire back in April. Essentially, the Pentagon wants is all to believe there were two separate Iran wars with a clean break in between.
Thomas Massie isn’t buying it. He called the number swap an “absurd ruse” and flatly accused Hegseth of breaking the law by going more than 90 days without obtaining congressional authorization.
This accusation comes after six articles of impeachment were filed against Hegseth in April. The first article accuses him of waging war on Iran without a formal declaration of war or statutory authorization from Congress. If the House votes on the impeachment measure, Hegseth would face what’s been called the harshest constitutional punishment available against a sitting Cabinet secretary, which has only happened twice in American history.
Melania Skipping Out on Trump’s Next Big Speech
The rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Dinner will happen tonight, but First Lady Melania Trump won’t be sitting next to her husband when he delivers his speech.
Remember, the last one got stormed by an armed gunman who came dangerously close to Trump before he was taken down. This do-over is happening at the Waldorf Astoria — in the building formerly known as the Trump International Hotel — instead of the Hilton. There’s also a much smaller guest list, with around 680 people attending instead of the 2,600 at the first dinner.
In addition to Melania, Vice President JD Vance will also be skipping the event, along with Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The White House said it’s due to scheduling conflicts, but the first lady, the vice president and the secretary of state all sitting out the same high-profile event the president is headlining is still noteworthy.
Trump’s first planned speech he never got to deliver was billed as a chance to settle scores with the media. Even the head of the White House Correspondents’ Association says she has no idea what he’s actually going to say, because apparently even his own speechwriters don’t know until he’s up there.
Hundreds of former journalists and press freedom groups sent a letter to the correspondents’ association ahead of tonight’s dinner, pushing reporters to call out the administration’s attacks on the press from the lectern. Trump is giving his speech tonight as his administration threatens to pull broadcast licenses and recently attempted to subpoena three New York Times reporters over their coverage of security issues on Trump’s Qatari-gifted Air Force One jet.
Paramount Skydance Punts on Warner Bros. Discovery Merger Until 2027
Paramount Skydance — which is owned by David Ellison, the son of pro-Trump billionaire Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison — agreed Friday to hold off on its planned merger with Warner Bros. Discovery until June of 2027.
The announcement comes after U.S. District Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin, who was appointed to the bench by former President Joe Biden, issued a 14-day temporary restraining order while deciding whether to grant a motion for a longer-lasting preliminary injunction. Paramount Skydance agreed to the delay while lawsuits by multiple state attorneys general and the Writers Guild of America played out in court.
Previously, Paramount Skydance had hoped to complete its merger with Warner Bros. Discovery (the parent company of CNN) by the end of September, with a steep penalty of $7 million per day kicking in for every day after September 30 should the merger still be in limbo by then. If the merger goes through, the Ellison family would fully control CBS, CNN, Warner Bros. studios, Discovery, MTV, HBO and a slew of other media properties. The Ellisons also have a controlling stake in TikTok’s U.S. operations. The merger has already been approved by both the Department of Justice and European regulators.
New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is leading the effort by state attorneys general to stop the merger alongside California Attorney General Rob Bonta, celebrated Friday’s delay as “a critical victory in our efforts to uphold the law and protect the film and television industries.” The fight continues, but Friday’s announcement is a major win for everyone opposed to billionaire media consolidation.
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Here are a few stories you may have missed:
‘Sick of This S—’: Mike Johnson Explodes at House GOP. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) erupted at House Republicans during a meeting this week after a small group of GOP lawmakers blocked a veterans’ bill due to Johnson’s broken promises to their faction. The Louisiana Republican reportedly shouted “I’m sick of this s—” before apologizing to members, including a child who was present. Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R-Fla.) said he was growing frustrated with a “minority” of Republicans using the House GOP’s slim majority to extract demands.
DNC Announces South Carolina as First 2028 Primary State. Democrats in South Carolina will be the first to vote for their party’s presidential nominee in 2028, according to the calendar released Friday by the Democratic National Committee. South Carolina beat out various other states including Georgia, North Carolina and Tennessee. South Carolina is seen as an important bellwether of how the Democratic Party’s Black voter base will vote in the presidential primary.
Kentucky Republicans Accused of Covering for Mitch McConnell. As of Friday, the office of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) still has yet to release video or audio of the senator, despite claims that he is recovering from his June 14 hospitalization. Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Charles Booker — who is running against Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.) in this fall’s Senate contest — is now accusing Kentucky Republicans of hypocrisy given that they called for former President Joe Biden to suspend his 2024 due to health concerns. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and the rest of Kentucky’s congressional delegation have yet to provide any updates on McConnell.
