RNC dream scenario: Democrats hire Audie Cornish as their campaign consultant—and heed her advice. Because on today's CNN This Morning, which she hosts, Cornish claimed that Democrats can win in places like Tennessee by running to the left of Zohran Mamdani, the radical socialist mayor-elect of NYC! Discussing the results of yesterday's special congressional election in Tennessee's 7th district, won by Republican Matt Van Epps, Group Chat member Jerusalem Demsas said:  "The problem with [Dem candidate] Behn is that she was running to the left of Zohran Mamdani. That's not a way to win in Tennessee." Incredibly, Cornish responded: "Can I challenge that? You had Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez go down, right? Like, throw their support. So there is a path, because they're drawing crowds everywhere. And I think Behn and others think that that's the kind of path that they can use in their races."  Even Never Trumper Charlie Dent had to acknowledge that Cornish's suggestion was, to be kind, off-target: "In a plus-22 Republican district, plus-22 Trump district, Behn needed to win some Trump voters. Bringing AOC down to middle Tennessee is not the way to do it. Not the way to do it. It makes no sense." But by all means, Dems: make AOC the face of your party in deep red districts. For that matter, bring in Ilhan Omar to express her disdain for America. And why not import Mamdani himself to describe his plan to seize private property! Note: Despite having dumped big bucks into the race, even before the polls closed yesterday the Democrats were clearly seeing the writing on the wall. I received a fundraising email from Kamala Harris early in the day that contained this dread line: "If we come up short, we must not lose hope." As I posted at X, "Those internal polls must be BRUTAL!" Here's the transcript. CNN This Morning 12/3/25 6:13 am ET AUDIE CORNISH: Republicans breathing a sigh of relief this morning after a Tennessee special election. CNN projects Matt Van Epps will be the next Congress member representing the state's 7th district. He managed to fend off a strong challenge from Democrat Aftyn Behn by 9 percentage points. But that's a lot closer than the 22-point margin victory that President Trump had won by just over a year ago in an overwhelmingly Republican district.  MATT VAN EPPS: I've heard your stories, and I will be your fighter. As we look forward, I say this to my friends in the liberal media and to the professional panickers in my own party. Tonight we showed running from Trump is how you lose. Running with Trump is how you win.  CORNISH: So Van Epps is a former Army helicopter pilot and Tennessee state official. His victory means Republicans will hold on to their narrow House majority, as two additional seats also remain open. The group chat is back. So even though this is a kind of a dog-bites-man story, right, like this Republican won a Republican district, people have been looking at it because they thought that something different might happen. That different thing did not happen.  Jerusalem, why do you think that is? Because Aftyn Behn did overperform, so to speak, compared to past Democrats.  JERUSALEM DEMSAS: Yeah, I mean, every Democrat is going to overperform in this environment, because there's massive backlash, thermostatic backlash that's happening right now against the Republican brand, as the economy's not doing well, inflation still remains a concern for families, and the immigration raids are creating chaos in communities that people were not wanting. They wanted Trump to end immigration chaos. They didn't want a new form of immigration chaos.  And so, every Democrat's going to overperform. The question is, can you overperform enough to actually win in these really difficult districts? The problem with Behn is that she was running to the left of Zohran Mamdani. That's not a way to win in Tennessee.  And to me, it's not that I think she definitely could have won if she took on certain positions. But you can close that margin. You can make some persuasion gains with Republicans.  CORNISH: But can I challenge that? You had Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez go down, right? Like throw their support. So there is a path, because they're drawing crowds everywhere. And I think Behn and others think that that's the kind of path that they can use in their races.  DEMSAS: But mobilizing the people who are already going to vote for you is not how you win a persuasion battle.  CHARLIE DENT: In a plus-22 Republican district, plus-22 Trump district, Behn needed to win some Trump voters. Bringing AOC down to middle Tennessee is not the way to do it. Not the way to do it. It makes no sense. 

On Wednesday, ABC’s Good Morning America and NBC’s Today lied to their viewers to smear President Trump by choosing to ignore the context of his Tuesday comments lashing out at Somalis living in the United States as “garbage,” instead casting it as a “presidential tirade” either completely out of the blue or a way to lay the groundwork for Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE) operations in Minnesota, home to the largest U.S. enclave of Somalis. And, in the case of CBS Mornings, they only offered a single pathetic sentence explaining the President was slamming Somalis in the Land of a Thousand Lakes for allegedly participating in a welfare scheme. Before diving into this disinformation campaign, this was what actually happened: .@DailyCaller’s @ReaganReese_: “On Tim Walz, Mr. President, do you think he should resign over the fraud scandal in his state?” Trump: “That who should?” Reese: “Tim Walz over the fraud scandal in the state?” Trump: “Look, I think the man’s a grossly incompetent man. I thought… pic.twitter.com/iecc38UxUc — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 2, 2025   ABC was the most vindictive. Co-host and former Clinton official George Stephanopoulos lied through his teeth in a tease: “President Trump lashes out at immigrants from Somalia...as ICE plans to ramp up operations in Minnesota, home to the nation’s largest Somali population.” Co-host Robin Roberts was also on the team peddling leftist gruel: “But now we’re going to turn to President Trump lashing out against Somali immigrants as ICE prepares to increase activity in Minnesota, which has a large Somali population.” Senior political correspondent Rachel Scott dutifully stated off the top without any explanation that Trump “is calling immigrants from Somalia garbage, insisting he does not want them in our country and it comes as this morning, we are learning ICE is preparing to ramp up immigration enforcement operations in Minnesota which is home to the nation’s largest Somali community”: ABC's Rachel Scott and Mary Bruce are arguably the most dishonest TV journalists in the White House press corps. Here was Scott on Wednesday's 'Good Morning America' rehashing her story from Tuesday's 'World News Tonight' that falsely framed President Trump's comments about… pic.twitter.com/1mu89ysbDf — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 3, 2025   “This morning, ICE preparing to ramp up enforcement operations in Minnesota as President Trump lashes out at immigrants from Somalia saying we don’t want them in our country and continues to attack Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar,” she added ahead of a long Trump soundbite. Scott spent the rest of the segment working hand-in-hand with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) and St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter (D) (click “expand”): SCOTT: Minnesota’s home to the nations largest Somali population. Multiple law enforcement officials tell ABC News that ICE is preparing for a surge operation in the state, focusing on St. Paul and Minneapolis as early as this week. The city’s mayor said police will not help ICE when they arrive. FREY: Targeting Somali people means that due process will be violated, mistakes will be made. And let’s be clear, it means that American citizens will be detained for no other reason than the fact that they look like they are Somali. SCOTT: The Mayor of St. Paul saying this. MAYOR MELVIN CARTER (D): The words that launched this American experience start with we the people and I believe that the sacred moments in American history are the moments we’ve had to decide who the we is. Who gets to be included in the we? Do we mean black people? Do we mean women? Do we mean immigrants? SCOTT: The President criticizing Somalis for weeks now, terminating temporary protected status for Somalis and writing, “send them back to where they came from.” And this morning, the Trump administration cracking down immigration nationwide, pausing all applications for people from 19 so-called countries of concern including Somalia, Afghanistan, Venezuela, and Sudan. Immigrants with pending immigration and green card applications are now subject to review. As for the enforcement operations that are going to be taking place, we are learning in Minnesota, DHS putting out a statement what makes someone a target of ICE is not the race nor ethnicity but the fact that there in the country illegally, saying they don’t comment on potential operations.  Over on NBC, chief White House correspondent Peter Alexander also went down this path, claiming in a partial segment that “Somali immigrants [were] also the target of a tirade by the President yesterday.” Alexander falsely claimed “[t]hat presidential tirade there does not come in a vacuum” as “senior law enforcement official tells NBC News that immigration customs enforcement or ICE is prepping to target undocumented immigrants in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area this week.” Fact-check: The proper response to said “vacuum” comment would have been the welfare scheme that occurred on Governor Tim Walz’s (D) watch with millions of dollars lost.  Alexander could have done this and it wouldn’t have been that difficult as his colleague Gabe Gutierrez told the truth on Tuesday’s Nightly News: After NBC's Gabe Gutierrez mentioned on Tuesday's 'Nightly News' the context behind President Trump's remarks about Somalis, Peter Alexander completely ignored that on Wednesday's 'Today,' painting Trump's comments as merely a "presidential tirade" that came outu of nowhere… pic.twitter.com/sMDRkER0rd — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 3, 2025   CBS Mornings did the bare minimum, if one could even consider this single sentence an attempt to explain why Trump was “stoking a new controversy”: “He’s been talking about Somalis ever since the story broke last week about a fraud ring in Minnesota, which has the nation’s highest concentration of Somali Americans.” Wednesday's 'CBS Mornings' actually (sort of) did its job that Tuesday's 'Evening News' refused to do, which is explain (albeit in a puny, vague sentence) the Minnesota fraud scheme was why Trump ripped Somalis at Tuesday's Cabinet meeting pic.twitter.com/BL0XLJobZe — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 3, 2025   To see the relevant transcripts from December 3, click here (for ABC), here (for CBS), and here (for NBC).

As part of Democrats’ smear campaign to brand War Department Secretary Pete Hegseth as a war criminal for ordering a lethal strike on a boat suspected of bringing deadly drugs to the U.S., Representative Adam Smith (D-WA) went so far as to claim that Caribbean drug runners carrying cocaine are not a direct threat to Americans.  Despite the fact that cocaine is involved in more than 20,000 overdose deaths in the U.S. annually, Rep. Smith attempted to dismiss the threat during an interview with MS Now (formerly MSNBC) on Tuesday.  Smith said that he could sympathize with The U.S. military if they killed people they mistakenly thought were carrying bombs during the Biden administration - but not with the Trump administration’s deadly strike on a boat suspected of running drugs:  “When you're in the middle of an insurgency with roadside bombs and car bombs and all of that, even in the aftermath of the Afghanistan pullout, when we had that suicide bomber killed 13 service members and hundreds of people in Kabul, and we did that strike against a car that we thought was a threat that turned out not to be a threat. I have some sympathy for that. “But, people on a boat in the middle of the Caribbean carrying cocaine are not a direct threat to the lives of our service members or Americans, and there's certainly not a direct threat once that boat has been blown out of the water and two survivors are clinging to it. “So it's important to draw that distinction.” At issue is a September strike on a boat suspected of running drugs, where the second hit killed two of those on board. The strike was part of the Trump Administration's ongoing effort to stop the flow of deadly, illegal drugs into the U.S.      

Comedy Central’s Jordan Klepper stopped by The Daily Show: Ears Edition podcast on Monday to preview his upcoming special that claims there is a dissonance between President Trump’s campaign for the Nobel Peace Prize and his actions in cities like Portland, Oregon. As part of the sneak peek, Klepper hyped his travels to Portland, where he wandered into one of the city’s naked bike rides, which he portrayed as “uplifting” and “the best use of comedy” amid ICE operations. Klepper gushed, “I will say, when we showed up at the naked rally, it was cold. It was rainy. I didn't expect any people to be there. And there were hundreds and hundreds of naked people there. And after you get past the shock of so many naked people and dongs, it really was an uplifting, energetic vibe. It was people who were passionate about what was happening, what was happening with these ICE agents.”     He also recalled, “You saw these images, it was horrifying. And there are so many people who were like, we want to show up. We want to show solidarity. There was joy, there was comedy. I'm often asked, like, ‘What is the role of comedy in these weird, dark, and trying times?’” According to Klepper, “I think in the role of protest, this is the best use of comedy. It was organic, it was thoughtful, and it was joyful. And yet, that joy was being put up against these aggressive actions. And to me, it was like, this is joy as an act of protest. And that was very life affirming and interesting to see. We take that to the ICE facility, which is this sort of joyous act of solidarity. And when we arrive, like, there are these people dressed as animals. There's more protest, there's music, there's song, there is this feeling of protest. But there's also men who are shooting pepper bullets into the crowd.”  Klepper continued: There is an act of aggression that's happening. There's positive chants mixed with some right-wing agitators who are on the outside, who are screaming epithets at the naked people. They're being anti-LGBTQ. You're hearing a lot of stressful things. And then, as Scott says, suddenly, we see an aggressive act where these ICE agents push into the crowd, into a band that are literally dressed as bananas, playing music, shoved into the ground, pepper sprays being shot out. Our camera guy is coughing and pulled out because he's got pepper spray in his lungs. You're like, this, it's such a chaotic, wild moment that's filled with both joy and hatred and anger and righteous anger and cruelty and beauty, and fuckin' America right now. The implication is that law enforcement is beclowning itself because they are cracking down on people in costumes, but it actually just makes the people in the costumes look juvenile. Meanwhile, they allow Klepper to ignore the people in the crowd who are not joyful or uplifting. Here is a transcript for the December 1 show: Comedy Central The Daily Show: Ears Edition 12/1/2025 JORDAN KLEPPER: I will say, when we showed up at the naked rally, it was cold. It was rainy. I didn't expect any people to be there. And there were hundreds and hundreds of naked people there. And after you get past the shock of so many naked people and dongs, it really was an uplifting, energetic vibe. It was people who were passionate about what was happening, what was happening with these ICE agents. You saw these images, it was horrifying. And there are so many people who were like, we want to show up. We want to show solidarity. There was joy, there was comedy. I'm often asked, like, “what is the role of comedy in these weird, dark, and trying times?” I think in the role of protest, this is the best use of comedy. It was organic, it was thoughtful, and it was joyful. And yet, that joy was being put up against these aggressive actions. And to me, it was like, this is joy as an act of protest. And that was very life affirming and interesting to see. We take that to the ICE facility, which is this sort of joyous act of solidarity. And when we arrive, like, there are these people dressed as animals. There's more protest, there's music, there's song, there is this feeling of protest. But there's also men who are shooting pepper bullets into the crowd. There is an act of aggression that's happening. There's positive chants mixed with some right-wing agitators who are on the outside, who are screaming epithets at the naked people. They're being anti-LGBTQ. You're hearing a lot of stressful things. And then, as Scott says, suddenly, we see an aggressive act where these ICE agents push into the crowd, into a band that are literally dressed as bananas, playing music, shoved into the ground, pepper sprays being shot out. Our camera guy is coughing and pulled out because he's got pepper spray in his lungs. You're like, this, it's such a chaotic, wild moment that's filled with both joy and hatred and anger and righteous anger and cruelty and beauty, and fuckin' America right now.

Despite the dozens of convictions and all the evidence to send them away, Whoopi Goldberg, moderator for ABC News program The View, claimed the entire story was just “smoke and mirrors.” She added that it was all conducted in an effort by President Trump to “demonize immigrants.” She and co-host Sunny Hostin then teamed up to insist that Trump’s outrage and rhetoric about the massive fraud scheme was just him being “racist.” After playing an edited soundbite of Trump denouncing the scheme to defraud American taxpayers, Goldberg kicked off the discussion by downplaying the fraud: “Will trying to demonize immigrants till work for him or his base? Are they more concerned about other issues, right now? Is this going to continue? Or is this smoke and mirrors?” The first to spout off was purported comedian Joy Behar, who claimed the whole thing was distraction from Trump’s bad poll numbers: It seems like every time his numbers drop or he perceives his popularity is dropping no matter how much tush kissing the cabinet does on him – it's really disgusting to watch them kiss his butt, but anyway – every time that happens, he pulls out a race card. Last time it was the Haitians who were eating the pets. And now it's the Somalis in Minnesota who, by the way, there's only 84,000 Somalis in Minnesota, and 58 percent of them were born in the United States.   Downplaying the massive Somali welfare scheme in Minnesota, The View claims it's all "smoke and mirrors" and Trump's way of "trying to demonize immigrants." Behar also claims Biden's loss of the Somali vote over Gaza was actually Trump's lost voters; the real reason he's angry. pic.twitter.com/LL9vgTRyV5 — Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) December 3, 2025   Proving that she’d read anything someone put on a piece of paper for her, Behar seemed to mix up President Biden and Trump. She attributed Biden losing the Somali vote over his support for Israel to Trump. “But one of my spies told me that [Trump] lost support with the Somali Minnesota voters over the Biden administration’s handling of Gaza. So, again, it's personal. Everything’s personal with him,” she whined. She later walked that claim back after she was slipped another note, of course, she tried to spin it for Democrats too: “I got another note from one of my spies that says Democrats lost support among Somalis last year. Well, this will get their support back, I would think. Right?” Pretend independent co-host Sara Haines was the only one to admit that the fraud was real, but she too made it about Trump, decrying that he’s making people look at him and not the fraud. “But he's missing a win here. They did uncover it. They’re fixing it, this was a problem but because of how he talks about it, now it becomes it's all the Somalis,” she lamented.   The View calls Trump and his supporters "racist" for condemning the Somali welfare scheme: GOLDBERG [mockingly]: I don know why you keep saying that because he says he's not a racist. BEHAR: What does that say about people who follow him? HOSTIN: I have yet to meet a racist… pic.twitter.com/W0mjLZj0Yb — Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) December 3, 2025   Choosing to keep the focus on Trump and not the fraud, Hostin and Goldberg teamed up to suggest Trump’s focus and rhetoric surrounding the fraud was what was problematic about the whole situation; calling him “racist” in the process: HOSTIN: I think we need to call a thing, a thing. The President of the United States is using racist language. He is. He's using discriminatory language. He is targeting an entire group in a discriminatory way. GOLDBERG: Again. HOSTIN: Again and again and again. And when do we as Americans say being a racist or using hateful, racist language is unbecoming of the office of the president of the United States? We need to be able to say that. And we need to be able to say it out loud. As they were nearing the end of the segment, Goldberg argued that, “Even if everything that he is saying is correct, it doesn't change the fact that he is out of control” and “grasping at straws” to distract from the Epstein files.   Whoopi claims that "even if everything he's saying is correct," "he is grasping at straws" to distract from Epstein and prices. "What are you doing? why are you still there?!" she snaps at Trump through the camera. She also demands to know what's happening with the ballroom as if… pic.twitter.com/vD5ZN2FZUO — Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) December 3, 2025   She also didn’t seem to understand why Trump was still in office: “So, what are you doing? Why are you still there?!” The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read: ABC’s The View December 3, 2025 11:03:06 a.m. Eastern (…) WHOOPI GOLDBERG: Will trying to demonize immigrants till work for him or his base? Are they more concerned about other issues, right now? Is this going to continue? Or is this smoke and mirrors? JOY BEHAR: It seems like every time his numbers drop or he perceives his popularity is dropping no matter how much tush kissing the cabinet does on him – it's really disgusting to watch them kiss his butt, but anyway – every time that happens, he pulls out a race card. Last time it was the Haitians who were eating the pets. And now it's the Somalis in Minnesota who, by the way, there's only 84,000 Somalis in Minnesota, and 58 percent of them were born in the United States. HOSTIN: And 87 percent of them are naturalized citizens. BEHAR: But one of my spies told me that he lost support with the Somali Minnesota voters over the Biden administration’s handling of Gaza. So, again, it's personal. Everything’s personal with him. SARA HAINES: Well, and the problem is how he’s handles it. He had a valid criticism. This is rated as the number one fraud scheme during the pandemic. These were programs that were supposed to feed kids. There have been 59 people convicted. It was over $1 billion. That's a big deal and it's not about the Somalis, it's about those people that were convicted making bad decisions. You don't paint it with that kind of gloss. But he's missing a win here. They did uncover it. They’re fixing it, this was a problem but because of how he talks about it, now it becomes it's all the Somalis. (…) 11:04:48 a.m. Eastern BEHAR: I got another note from one of my spies that says Democrats lost support among Somalis last year. Well, this will get their support back, I would think. Right? (…) 11:05:33 a.m. Eastern ANA NAVARRO: A president who likes dog whistles. A president who likes to divide and have a target, and this time it's the Somalis. Before, it was the Haitians. Before, that it was the bad hombres the Mexicans; about the Venezuelans. You know, he wants to paint them all as gang members and members of Tren de Aragua. GOLDBERG [mockingly]: I don’t know why you keep saying that because he says he's not a racist. BEHAR: What does that say about people who follow him though? HOSTIN: I have yet to meet a racist that raises their hand and says, 'yes, I am a racist.'  but I think we need to be able to call- GOLDBERG: Oh, they do now. HOSTIN: Some do. Correct. Correct. GOLDBERG: They're very happy to tell you now. HOSTIN: I think we need to call a thing, a thing. The President of the United States is using racist language. He is. He's using discriminatory language. He is targeting an entire group in a discriminatory way. GOLDBERG: Again. HOSTIN: Again and again and again. And when do we as Americans say being a racist or using hateful, racist language is unbecoming of the office of the president of the United States? We need to be able to say that. And we need to be able to say it out loud. (…) 11:08:32 a.m. Eastern GOLDBERG: Even if everything that he is saying is correct, it doesn't change the fact that he is out of control. BEHAR: Yeah. GOLDBERG: He is grasping at straws. And Epsteingate is not going away. BEHAR: The prices are not coming down. GOLDBERG: Pete Hegseth is not going away. Prices haven't come down. I told you what we pay for eye drops. That hasn't changed. [Into the camera] So, what are you doing? Why are you still there?! HAINES: He's building that wing, that ballroom. GOLDBERG: You know, what? You notice you haven't heard anything about that? What's going on with that? (…)