MAGA Devastates Trump, Calls For His Impeachment

MAGA Wants Impeachment; Trump Blocks British Over Epstein; Vance is Out On Iran; Pope Keeps Going

Good morning.

This morning, a new poll shows 55 percent of Americans support impeaching Donald Trump, putting him in Richard Nixon territory at the height of Watergate. The Trump administration is actively blocking British investigators from accessing unredacted Epstein files that could lead to prosecutions of Prince Andrew and others. JD Vance has been pulled from the next round of Iran peace talks, with Kushner and Witkoff heading to Pakistan in his place. And Pope Leo XIV has directly challenged the Justice Department’s decision to reinstate the death penalty and firing squad executions, hours after the announcement was made. Corporate media is softening all of it. The FCC chair has made clear what happens to broadcasters that don’t. And the Ellisons are remaking the networks one by one. Let’s get into it.

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55 PERCENT OF AMERICANS NOW SUPPORT IMPEACHING TRUMP. THAT INCLUDES ONE IN FIVE OF HIS OWN VOTERS.

A new poll from Strength in Numbers and Verasight finds that 55 percent of Americans support the House voting to impeach Donald Trump, against 37 percent opposed. Pollster G. Elliot Morris noted that the net plus-18 result “puts Trump in the neighborhood of the numbers Richard Nixon saw at the peak of the Watergate scandal in August 1974.”

The headline number is striking. The breakdown is more so.

Among Democratic voters, 88 percent support impeachment. That is expected. Among Republicans, 21 percent support it. Among voters who cast a ballot for Trump in 2024, 21 percent now want him removed from office. As the poll noted, that means roughly one in five of the people who put him back in the White House now want him gone.

The poll comes as Trump’s late-night and early-morning Truth Social tirades have drawn fresh scrutiny over his mental fitness, and as prominent figures in conservative media have openly broken with him. Tucker Carlson this week publicly apologized for helping elect Trump, saying on his podcast, “In very small ways, but in real ways, you and me and millions of people like us are the reason this is happening right now. I want to say I’m sorry for misleading people.”

Several House Democrats have also called for removal via the 25th Amendment. With the House majority now at a razor’s edge, none of these moves are purely symbolic. They are previews.

TRUMP IS BLOCKING BRITISH INVESTIGATORS FROM THE EPSTEIN FILES

The Metropolitan Police have sent a formal request to the U.S. Department of Justice for access to unredacted Epstein documents, after earlier informal attempts to obtain them were ignored by the Trump administration. The DOJ insisted on the formal process, and any resolution could take a long time, with sources saying Trump officials may set additional conditions before taking any action.

The stakes are significant. British investigators are actively pursuing potential prosecutions of former Prince Andrew and former UK Ambassador Peter Mandelson, among others. Thames Valley Police are investigating Andrew over allegations of possible misconduct in public office related to claims that sensitive information was passed to Epstein while he served as a British trade envoy. The Metropolitan Police have opened a similar inquiry into Mandelson’s activities as a Cabinet minister. The European Anti-Fraud Office is also investigating Mandelson’s tenure as an EU trade commissioner.

“It is difficult to make anything stick without those documents,” one source told the Guardian. “The U.S. could have handed them over without making British police go down the formal route.”

The Epstein files are not going away. The Justice Department’s own inspector general has now launched an investigation into the Trump administration’s failure to release the full set of documents required by law.

VANCE IS OFF THE IRAN TALKS. KUSHNER AND WITKOFF ARE GOING INSTEAD.

Vice President JD Vance will not travel to Pakistan for the next round of Iran peace talks, which are set to resume Saturday. Special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner will go in his place.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt framed Vance’s absence as a strategic call, saying he would remain on standby in the U.S. and travel to Islamabad only “if we feel it’s a necessary use of his time.” She said there has been “some progress” from the Iranian side in recent days, without elaborating.

Iran’s own top negotiator will also not attend the next round. The previous talks in Islamabad collapsed on April 12 after 21 hours without a deal, with both sides citing fundamental disagreements over enrichment, trust, and preconditions.

Vance has been a complicated figure in the war narrative. He publicly supported the strikes but has not done so, sources say, with the enthusiasm the White House wanted. His own Senate record includes a 2023 statement calling the 2003 Iraq invasion “an unforced disaster” and warning against repeating its lessons. He now says things are different because “we have a smart president, whereas in the past we’ve had dumb presidents.”

Whether replacing the most credible U.S. negotiator with the president’s son-in-law and a special envoy Iran has already said it distrusts produces a different result than the last round remains to be seen.

POPE LEO CONDEMNS FIRING SQUADS — HOURS AFTER THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT REINSTATED THEM

Hours after the Justice Department announced it was lifting the moratorium on federal executions and reinstating the firing squad as an approved method, Pope Leo XIV issued a direct condemnation.

“The dignity of the person is not lost even after very serious crimes are committed,” Leo said in a video message to DePaul University in his native Chicago, marking the 15th anniversary of Illinois abolishing the death penalty. “The church teaches that the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person.”

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the end of the moratorium by attacking Biden, calling the previous administration’s refusal to carry out executions a “failure in duty.” The last federal execution was carried out in the final days of Trump’s first term.

Leo has now repeatedly and publicly clashed with this administration, challenging the Iran war, the immigration crackdown, and now capital punishment. He has refused to join Trump’s “Board of Peace,” has not visited the United States since his election, and will spend America’s 250th birthday with African migrants on a Mediterranean island rather than at the Washington celebrations.

The polling suggests it is working for him. A Reuters/Ipsos survey conducted among more than 4,500 U.S. adults this week found Leo’s favorability at 60 percent. Trump’s approval in the same poll stands at 36 percent, tied for the lowest of his second term.

THIS IS WHY RAW AMERICA EXISTS — AND WHY WE NEED YOU TODAY

Let’s be straight with you this morning.

The government is blocking foreign allies from prosecuting Epstein’s associates. It is reinstating firing squads. It is pulling its most credible negotiator from peace talks while oil sits above $90 a barrel. And one in five of Trump’s own voters now want him removed from office.

The press that is supposed to cover all of this is being bought by the billionaires who benefit from the silence, threatened by a regulator who has told broadcasters what happens when they step out of line, and handed to Trump allies who have said directly that the coverage will change once they’re in charge.

Raw America was built to be the thing that doesn’t get bought.

Because of your support, we have had reporters on the ground at the most important hearings of this political era. We have broken exclusives the corporate press buried. We are joining the D.C. press pool and going after the interviews that hold power accountable, bringing them directly to you unfiltered and unbought.

That coverage requires your support. We have no corporate backer, no billionaire pulling our strings. That also means we are behind on our fundraising. But here is the truth: if just 5 percent of the people reading this became paid subscribers today, we would hit our entire 2026 expansion goals. We could meet this moment the way it demands.

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Stay Strong. Stay Vigilant.

John, Justin and The Raw America Team

STORIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED

• Hegseth fired the Secretary of the Navy — while the Navy is blockading Iran. Secretary of the Navy John Phelan was ousted this week amid tension with Pete Hegseth, who believed Phelan was moving too slowly on shipbuilding reforms and was also irked by Phelan’s direct communication with Trump, which Hegseth viewed as an attempt to bypass him. The announcement came even while U.S. naval forces are enforcing a blockade of Iranian ports and have redirected 31 vessels and boarded two ships in the Strait of Hormuz. Sources say Phelan found out he was fired when he saw the Pentagon spokesman’s post on X. It is the latest in a long series of senior military firings since Trump took office.

• The DOJ has paid out more than $8.5 million to Trump allies since he returned to the White House. The Justice Department has paid more than $8.5 million to resolve legal claims brought by Trump allies and supporters since his return to office. Critics say the settlement pattern opened the floodgates after the DOJ agreed to pay Ashli Babbitt’s family, with one observer saying it made people realize that “under Donald Trump the Department of Justice is a piggy bank.” The settlements are being approved by officials who previously represented Trump and his allies, including Acting AG Todd Blanche, Trump’s own former criminal defense attorney.

• Democratic candidates are outraising Republicans in the races that will decide Congress — but the party apparatus is being outspent. Texas Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico raised more than $27 million in the first quarter of 2026, leading a pack of Democrats who outraised Republican incumbents in several key Senate matchups, including in the deep red strongholds of Montana and Nebraska. The catch: the DNC, DCCC, DSCC, and allied super PACs have been outraised by their Republican counterparts in the 2026 cycle overall, meaning Democratic energy at the candidate level may not be matched by the institutional infrastructure needed to win close races in November.

• Voters now prefer Democrats on the economy for the first time since 2010. New polling shows that for the first time in 16 years, voters prefer Democrats on the economy, and Republicans disapprove of Trump’s handling of inflation. The shift comes as gas prices sit above $4 a gallon nationally and consumer confidence has fallen to record lows. The economy was Trump’s strongest issue in 2024. It may no longer be.

• Trump’s meme coin holders are getting a private dinner at Mar-a-Lago. The top holders of Donald Trump’s meme coin will receive access to a conference at Mar-a-Lago featuring Trump-branded merchandise and potential face time with the president, even as the coin has lost significant value since its launch. Ethics watchdogs say the arrangement is an unprecedented pay-to-play scheme, with foreign nationals among those eligible to buy access to the sitting president through a cryptocurrency he personally profits from. No congressional investigation has been opened.