Good morning. I’m Thom Hartmann.
Barack Obama is mocking Donald Trump’s “obsession” with him, saying he’s living rent-free in Trump’s head. Raw America’s Capitol correspondent was at Trump’s rally on the National Mall and found it particularly lacking in both crowd size and energy. Maine voters are laying blame for the loss of abortion rights squarely at Susan Collins’ feet on the fourth anniversary of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade. And the U.S. Postal Service is now threatening to withhold mail ballots from states that don’t hand over their voter rolls to Trump.
Before we get into it, let’s talk about why you’re choosing to get your news from Raw America instead of from a cable network owned by a MAGA billionaire. You’ve seen what Jeff Bezos has done to the Washington Post, and what the Ellisons have done to CBS News. And Trump’s Justice Department just gave them the green light to do the same thing to CNN. Independent media outlets like Raw America are the last thing standing in the way of the billionaires and their attempt to silence journalism. We’re bringing you the straight news free from their influence, and without any corporate advertisers censoring us. But that also means we can’t do any of this without reader support. If you’re still reading Raw America on the free list, today is the best day to upgrade to a paying subscription. We’re counting on you.
Obama Says Trump’s ‘Obsession’ with Him Proves He’s Not Focused on the Job
As a private citizen for the last decade, Barack Obama doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about Donald Trump. But he’s increasingly getting reminders that Donald Trump can’t stop thinking about him.
In an interview on the “All the Smoke” podcast this week, host Matt Barnes asked Obama about Trump’s relentless fixation on him and his record. Barnes said Trump is “still very fascinated with you and your family, constantly bringing you guys up,” so how does Obama keep his cool?
Obama chuckled before saying: “I obviously have a room in his head,” then, with emphasis, “a suite in his head.”
Barnes quipped that the suite was “rent free,” and Obama elaborated: “When I was president, the last thing I had time to do was worry about what somebody said or my predecessor did. They’re gone. I’ve got work to do.”
He called Trump’s obsession with him “a strange thing,” and said it signals something important: “It shows me somebody who is not focused on the American people and the job they’re supposed to do.”
He’s not wrong if you just look at the last few months of 2026. Trump called Obama a “traitor” in May and, at the recent G7 Summit in France, claimed the Iranians had called Obama a “stupid son of a b—,” regarding the nuclear deal Obama negotiated with Iran in 2015. Then Trump turned around and cut his own deal with Tehran. Obama pointed out last week that the new Iran agreement leaves the U.S. “worse off” than it was before Trump launched his war on Iran back in February.
Trump also posted a racist meme to his Nazi-infested social media site earlier this year depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes. Trump claimed at the time that he didn’t notice it, then blamed an unnamed White House staffer before the post was taken down without any apology. Trump also said nothing after a UFC fighter insulted Michelle Obama on the White House lawn last weekend.
When Obama dedicated his presidential center in Chicago last week, Trump’s response was an AI-generated meme on Truth Social comparing it to an overflowing garbage can.
Obama has largely kept his composure despite Trump’s constant attacks. He and Trump even appeared to have a cordial relationship at Jimmy Carter’s funeral last year.
Obama’s patience isn’t the story, but rather that the current president of the United States has spent the better part of a decade obsessing over his predecessor instead of focusing on his own job. Obama’s right. That’s strange. And the American people deserve a president who’s paying attention to them instead.
Richard Nixon kept an enemies list too, and it didn’t save his presidency. It exposed a man so consumed by who he hated that he forgot the country was supposed to be the whole point of the job.
Raw America Reports from Trump’s Low-Energy Rally
(A man lying on the grass at the National Mall during President Donald Trump’s rally at the National Mall on Wednesday, June 24, 2026. Photo by Luke De Cresce / Raw America)
Donald Trump promised that Wednesday’s MAGA rally at the National Mall would be “the greatest rally ever.” But Raw America Capitol correspondent Luke De Cresce was on the ground, and what he saw suggested that Trump is losing juice even among his own supporters.
Trump’s “Great American State Fair” is supposed to be the flagship event of Freedom 250, the administration’s big celebration of the nation’s 250th anniversary. There were fighter jets doing flyovers every few minutes. Trump himself spoke. But the crowd was noticeably small and disinterested.
Raw America walked the full length of the mall and found large stretches of grass completely empty. Speaker after speaker took the stage to heap praise on Trump to a dwindling audience. Apparently, the musical performance from FBI Director Kash Patel’s 27-year-old girlfriend, Alexis Wilkins, wasn’t the draw Trump was hoping for, especially after most of his headliners had already canceled.
The event may have been doomed from the start. As many as eight Democratic-led states already pulled out of the Great American State Fair, seeing it more as Trump throwing a party for himself rather than a unifying national celebration. And the most interesting action Wednesday wasn’t even inside the event.
Just outside the security line, Raw America noticed a group of protesters wearing “Team Algae” shirts and carrying colorfully worded signs about the Epstein Files. Trump supporters filing into the event weren’t happy about it. The protesters were loud, visible, and clearly getting under MAGA’s skin.
The rally itself was the usual parade of loyalty. Outside, people were asking questions the administration still has yet to answer. That contrast is revealing. Trump wanted a spectacle. What he got instead was canceled musical acts, a small crowd, and protesters reminding him about the Epstein files just outside the gates. So, maybe not quite “the greatest rally ever.”
That same stretch of grass once held a quarter million people who came for Martin Luther King and a dream bigger than any one man. A crowd shows up when there’s something real to believe in, and no number of flyovers can manufacture that.
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Maine Voters Blame Susan Collins for Roe v. Wade Being Overturned
Wednesday marked the fourth anniversary of the Supreme Court’s 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson decision, which overturned the constitutional right to abortion that had existed under Roe v. Wade for nearly 50 years. And in Maine, Democrats made sure to remind voters exactly who helped put the Court in a position to do it: Senator Susan Collins.
On October 5, 2018, Collins took the Senate floor and delivered a 43-minute speech defending her decision to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, expressing her “fervent hope” that he’d reduce the number of partisan 5-4 decisions.
But just four years later, Kavanaugh joined the majority in Dobbs. So did Neil Gorsuch, whom Collins also confirmed. The Court voted 6-3 to uphold Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban, and 5-4 to wipe out Roe entirely.
Since then, more than 20 states have imposed partial or full abortion bans.
Maine Democrats didn’t just focus on Kavanaugh, but also highlighted Collins’ broader record of supporting dozens of other right-wing judges who are similarly hostile to abortion rights, including several confirmed in Trump’s second term.
Collins, who’s running for a sixth Senate term, still defends the Kavanaugh vote, despite saying she disagreed with the Dobbs ruling. When asked about her recent judicial confirmations, she fell back on the argument that it’s not appropriate to ask nominees how they’d vote on future cases.
It’s worth noting that Collins has also voted to confirm all three current Supreme Court justices who support abortion rights, and she voted to confirm a large majority of President Biden’s judicial nominees. She also co-sponsored a Senate bill that would have codified Roe into law before Dobbs came down.
But Democratic Senate nominee Graham Platner isn’t letting her off the hook on the recent confirmations. “She has been voting for and confirming at the federal level anti-choice judges,” Platner said after earning the Planned Parenthood endorsement this week.
The fight over Collins’ legacy is shaping up to be one of the defining battles of the 2026 Senate cycle. And this anniversary is a reminder of what’s actually at stake when Senate votes on lifetime judicial appointments get cast.
Maine sent another Republican to the Senate once named Margaret Chase Smith, and in 1950 she stood on that same floor and put conscience ahead of her own party with her Declaration of Conscience. That’s the standard Maine set, and it’s fair to ask whether today’s senior senator is living up to it.
USPS Threatens to Withhold Mail Ballots to Blue States
This one’s important, so pay close attention.
The U.S. Postal Service is proposing a new rule that would allow it to withhold mail ballots from any state that refuses to hand over absentee voter lists to the Trump administration.
Postmaster General David Steiner told the Senate Homeland Security Committee about the proposal during his Wednesday testimony. Democratic Senator Gary Peters of Michigan asked Steiner directly: if a state refuses to turn over its absentee voter rolls, would the USPS still deliver ballots to that state’s voters?
Steiner confirmed the answer is no, and added that the U.S. Postal Service would tell the state it needs “the manifest.”
Under the proposal, states would be required to provide lists to the federal government of everyone who’s requested a mail-in or absentee ballot before an election. The rule cites Donald Trump’s executive order from March aimed at mail-in voting.
The rule flies directly in the face of the Constitution, which explicitly grants states the authority to run their own elections. While Congress has a limited oversight role in regulating elections, the executive branch can’t weaponize the Postal Service as a to override states. That’s not how it works.
And let’s all remember that Donald Trump himself voted by mail in previous elections. The same president who called that method of voting “cheating” uses it himself.
If the proposed rule goes into effect, states that don’t play along could see their voters denied access to mail ballots. This could include states that conduct all elections by mail, like California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Vermont, and Washington state. That’s a direct threat to voting access for tens of millions of Americans.
This is the kind of rule that sounds innocuous until you realize what it actually does. And it gives the White House immense power over states that the Constitution never intended it to have.
Article One, Section Four hands the running of elections to the states and to Congress, and it never once mentions the president. That omission wasn’t sloppy drafting, it was the whole point of keeping any single office from deciding who gets to vote.
Fund the Journalism Bringing You the Unvarnished Truth
In this newsletter we covered how Trump is trying to use the post office to prevent millions of blue state voters from casting ballots and how voters in Maine are connecting the dots between their incumbent Republican senator and fundamental rights being stripped away from half the population. We even provided direct coverage from Washington exposing Trump’s rally as pathetic bluster. Raw America is bringing you straight reporting without a billionaire owner telling us what we can and can’t say. But we can only keep this work going if enough readers on the free list decide today is the day they step up and become paying subscribers. Don’t wait. Every subscription is an act of resistance against the right-wing oligarchs using their money to silence accountability reporting.
I’m Thom Hartmann. The fight is here. Thank you for being in it.
STORIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED:
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Republican Congressman Who Has Been Missing Since March Returns Home. Rep. Tom Kean (R-N.J.) is now back home for the first time in months, after an extended absence over an undisclosed medical episode. Kean has missed more than 100 votes in the House of Representatives since March 5. A spokesperson for his office told the New York Times that Kean will return to Washington on June 30, where he is expected to explain his lengthy absence. Kean is running for a third term in one of the most competitive congressional districts in the country.
Senate Republicans Flip Votes on Iran War Resolution After Trump Berates Them. Two members of the Senate Republican Conference who recently voted with Democrats to rein in President Trump’s ability to wage war in Iran took a different tone on a separate measure. Sens. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) initially voted this week to support a War Powers Act resolution, which passed with a 50-48 margin. But after Trump spent the better part of a Wednesday meeting with senators haranguing them over the vote, Cassidy opposed a nearly identical measure, while Paul voted present.
White House Helped Meta and Google CEOs Dodge Senate Grilling Session. Politico is reporting that the White House stepped in to prevent Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg — whose company owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp — and Google CEO Sundar Pichai from having to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee over their companies’ child safety protocols. The White House reportedly convinced Judiciary Committee chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) to allow the CEOs of Instagram and YouTube (which Google owns) to testify instead of Zuckerberg and Pichai.
Bodycam Video Shows Moment Cops Arrested Man for Speaking Out Against Data Centers. Newly obtained body camera footage shows the moment police in Claremore, Oklahoma arrested farmer Darren Blanchard, who was charged with criminal trespassing in February for speaking too long at a city council meeting about a proposed data center. Blanchard maintains his arrest was “retaliatory,” and that he was “engaging in protected speech at a public meeting.”
