Thursday Afternoon News Updates on New Year's Day - 1/1/26
 Thursday Afternoon News Updates on New Year's Day - 1/1/26Hi everyone. I hope the first day of the New Year is off to a good start for you. I wanted to check in with a midday update because a lot happened over the past 24 hours. Let’s start with New Year’s Eve at Mar-a-Lago. Footage from the event shows a president who looked unwell and unsteady. While Americans across the country were worrying about rent, food prices, and health insurance premiums that rose sharply as of January 1, the scene at Mar-a-Lago was a parade of tacky excess and bad taste. Vanilla Ice performed “Ice Ice Baby.” Cabinet members and senior Trump loyalists like Stephen Miller and Kristi Noem danced along. It was surreal, almost dystopian, watching officials tied to mass deportations and federal crackdowns partying amidst what appeared to be a sad, pathetic nostalgia tour. Against that backdrop, The Wall Street Journal published a new report on Trump’s declining health. The piece described growing concern among people around him about visible signs of aging. Trump responded in his usual way, with rambling explanations and excuses that only raise additional questions He claimed, for instance, that the bruising and bandages frequently visible on his hands are the result of taking far more aspirin than doctors recommend because he wants his blood to be “nice, thin blood pouring through my heart.” He also insisted that he routinely applies makeup to his hands when he gets “whacked.” The Journal reported on an incident when Trump’s hand abruptly began to bleed when a ring worn by Attorney General Pam Bondi made contact with it. The bleeding “alarmed” some who witnessed the incident. Trump also denied falling asleep during cabinet meetings, despite the fact that we’ve seen him do so repeatedly with our own eyes.. According to him, reporters are simply catching him mid-blink. “They’ll catch me with the blink.” Again, this was presented as an explanation meant to calm fears. To me, it’s only done the opposite. But you can let me know your thoughts in the comments. The Journal report also revisited Trump’s contradictory statements about advanced imaging. Over the past few months, Trump has publicly bragged about getting an MRI as part of his physical and claimed a doctor told him it was the best result ever seen. Now, he says he never had an MRI at all, and that the imaging was actually a CT scan. When the Journal asked if they could interview Trump’s doctor, Sean Barbabella, to get more details, the White House refused. That was just the physical side of things. Mentally and emotionally, Trump rang in the New Year in a full-blown meltdown on social media. Instead of a message wishing Americans well, or even silence, he posted a series of angry, erratic rants. He Jared Polis, and told his enemies to “rot in hell.” He reposted images claiming U.S. windmills were killing bald eagles, even though the photo he posted depicted a dead falcon in Israel in 2017. He also announced the withdrawal of National Guard deployments from cities like Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland, while simultaneously threatening to return in “a much different and stronger form” if crime supposedly surged again. Never mind the fact that Trump had to give up his National Guard takeover after losing in various courts, including a 6-3 Supreme Court ruling last week that stated Trump’s justification for sending National Guard personnel to Chicago was not sufficient. California Governor Gavin Newsom’s press office responded to Trump, writing, “We won in court and forced him to [remove the Guard]. Trump’s rambling here is the political version of “you can’t fire me, I quit.” Meanwhile, the Department of Justice has acknowledged that roughly five million additional Epstein-related documents exist beyond what has already been disclosed. Less than five percent of the total material has been produced so far. House Oversight Democrats called this a blatant violation of federal law and raised fresh questions about what is being hidden and why.
At the same time, reporting detailed how Mar-a-Lago employees were sent to Jeffrey Epstein’s home for so-called “house calls” during the years when Epstein was a fixture around Trump’s club. According to the reporting, Epstein was not even a member, but Trump instructed staff to treat him like one. Employees warned each other about Epstein’s behavior, yet the practice continued for years. Add to that Trump’s decision, just before the New Year, to terminate the long-standing lease held by the National Links Trust to manage public golf courses in Washington, D.C. The administration provided no clear plan for what comes next, even as it demanded the nonprofit continue operating the courses for the time being. Renovations were halted, workers were left in limbo, and the message was that contracts mean nothing if Trump wants to put his name on something and profit from it. Economically and politically, the numbers are moving in the wrong direction for Trump as well. Polling shows a dramatic collapse in his approval among independents over the past year, with especially steep declines on the economy and immigration, the very issues he claimed would anchor his second term. That context matters even more as we watch Trump spending New Year’s Eve auctioning off artwork at his private club, dismissing multimillion-dollar bids as “peanuts,” while millions of Americans are bracing for higher costs and fewer protections. Then there’s the ongoing fiasco of the U.S. military’s failed attempts to seize another oil tanker. This has been going on for two weeks now, and it keeps getting worse for the administration. The tanker, known as the Bella 1, shad been on its way to pick up oil in Venezuela when U.S. forces tried board and seize in the Caribbean Sea. And failed. The Bella 1 evaded U.S. seizure and sailed back toward the Atlantic Ocean, and the chase has been ongoing. And now, Russia is claiming protection over the tanker, and the ship’s crew has painted a Russian flag along its side. Now Russia is formally demanding the U.S. stay away. It’s an international crisis that in normal times would be getting far more attention. And in other news, Zohran Mamdani has officially been sworn in as Mayor of New York City. MeidasTouch and Legal AF host Karen Friedman Agnifilo was in attendance covering the event, and grabbing interviews with attendees such as New York Attorney General Letitia James. We’ve been streaming the inauguration ceremony all morning on the MeidasTouch YouTube channel. Thanks for being here with me on the first day of the year. We’ve got a whole lot of work ahead of us. I look forward to fighting for our democracy alongside each and every one of you. |
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