Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R) on Friday addressed a question both Republicans and Democrats were asking on the heels of conservative activist Charlie Kirk's death: Will the tragic event finally mark a turning point?
"This is our moment: Do we escalate or do we find an off-ramp?" an emotional Cox said at a news conference, where he announced a suspect in Kirk's murder had been apprehended in his state. "It's a choice." |
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The assassination of Charlie Kirk has united the parties in a sense of dread that the country has arrived at a dangerous place. How it got here, however, remains very much in dispute.
President Trump wasted no time blaming the "radical left" for the death of Kirk, a prominent MAGA activist. And a number of congressional Republicans echoed the charge.
Democrats noted Trump's long history of normalizing political violence and hammered Republicans for casting blame before the shooter's motives were known. Some amplified their calls for tougher gun laws, which most Republicans oppose. |
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BY JARED GANS AND JULIA MUELLER |
Missouri Democrats see turning to the public as the best way to stop a new GOP-friendly congressional map from taking effect despite their minority status in the state legislature.
Gov. Mike Kehoe (R) is poised to sign the new map into law for the 2026 midterms after the state Senate gave approval on Friday. The map would likely give Republicans one additional seat in the House as the GOP tries to hold its narrow majority, taking out a current Democratic House member.
But Democrats may be able to send the issue to Missouri voters as a veto referendum for them to decide whether the map should be used. |
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BY EMILY BROOKS AND REBECCA BEITSCH | FBI Director Kash Patel is taking heat over his handling of the manhunt for Charlie Kirk's assassin from key figures in the MAGA movement in which he initially became a star.
Patel stumbled in the early hours after the shooting when he indicated on X that a suspected shooter was in custody, before it later turned out the killer was still at large. |
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KCharlie Kirk's widow on Friday said she will work to preserve the legacy of the conservative activist and carry on the mission of Turning Point USA.
"To everyone listening tonight across America, the movement my husband built will not die. It won't. I refuse to let that happen. It will not die," Erika Kirk said in a Friday night livestream, making her first public comments since her husband's death.
"All of us will refuse to let that happen," she continued. " No one will ever forget my husband's name, and I will make sure of it." |
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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is warning civilian and military employees that the Pentagon is "tracking" any comments from them that celebrate or mock the Wednesday assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
"We are tracking all these very closely — and will address, immediately. Completely unacceptable," Hegseth wrote Thursday on social media. |
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Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, while speaking at the University of Notre Dame Friday, addressed Charlie Kirk's killing and stressed the need to "learn to have disagreements in a civil and collegial way."
At the start of her appearance to promote her new book, "Listening to the Law: Reflections on the Court and Constitution," Barrett was asked to comment on the recent violence. |
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Ousted MSNBC analyst Matthew Dowd said it bent its knee to a "right wing media mob" after the outlet fired him over comments he made on air about the shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
"The Right Wing media mob ginned up, went after me on a plethora of platforms, and MSNBC reacted to that mob," Dowd wrote in a a Friday Substack post. "Even though most at MSNBC knew my words were being misconstrued, the timing of my words forgotten (remember I said this before anyone knew Kirk was a target), and that I apologized for any miscommunication on my part, I was terminated by the end of the day," |
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Actor Sean Penn reflected on meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin in a Thursday interview with late night host Jimmy Kimmel amid rising tensions in eastern Europe.
Penn and Putin crossed paths during the Moscow International Film Festival in 2001 during a dinner with approximately 20 people, including actor Jack Nicholson. |
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OPINION | President Trump's decision to change the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War seems to conflict with his boast to have resolved up to seven different wars in his campaign to win a Nobel Peace Prize. The name change actually changes nothing in the U.S. defense posture, but it does fortify the image that Trump would like to convey of an incredibly strong American military machine — so strong that no foreign leader would dare to challenge it. The stronger the United States appears militarily, the less likely any foreign power would doubt American supremacy. Peace, then, according to this logic, will prevail. |
OPINION | Israel's strike on Doha shattered the illusion that Hamas's leaders could hide safely behind Gulf skylines. But a look further back shows this immunity had gaps.
The Mossad's botched 1997 attempt to kill Khaled Meshaal in Jordan and the 2010 assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai had already shown Israel's long arm. However, what is striking is not Israel's reach or boldness, but the folly of Arab states that continue to shelter and facilitate a movement that has brought them nothing but ruin. Hamas has exported conflict and invited chaos into these states. The correct lesson for Arab states to learn from the Doha airstrike is that none of them should welcome Hamas onto their soil. |
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BY BENJAMIN MULLIN, JACK HEALY AND DAVID W. CHEN |
On the windswept prairie of South Dakota, a tribal public radio station is selling off its old records to pay the bills. In Warm Springs, Ore., the NPR affiliate is considering dropping "All Things Considered" to focus on tribal issues.
In Bunker Hill, Kan., (population 103), the public TV station may eventually have to cut ties with PBS, pulling children's shows like "Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood."
"We are crippled here," said Betsy Schwien, the general manager of Smoky Hills PBS in Bunker Hill. "It is the absolute worst-case scenario."
The decision by President Trump and Republicans in Congress to strip $500 million from public broadcasters this summer is forcing profound changes that will reshape the airwaves, especially in rural and tribal areas of the country. |
BY SIOBHAN HUGHES, LINDSAY WISE AND ANNA WILDE MATHEWS |
The next federal-funding deadline is just weeks away. Democrats say restoring billions of dollars in health-insurance subsidies for Americans is the minimum price of their vote, holding the threat of a shutdown over Republicans' heads.
Democrats are more confident in their negotiating stance compared with March, when a similar attempt to play hardball fizzled. While today's talks pit them against Republican leaders who want a two-month spending deal with no big additions, they are finding support among rank-and-file GOP lawmakers fearing political backlash if their voters are hit by higher health-insurance bills next year.
"Republicans have to come to meet with us in a true bipartisan negotiation to satisfy the American people's needs on healthcare, or they won't get our votes, plain and simple," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) said Thursday. |
When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered this week's attempted assassination of Hamas leaders in Qatar, he took a major gamble in his campaign to pound the group into submission.
With signs growing that the mission failed, that gamble appears to have backfired.
Netanyahu had hoped to kill Hamas' senior exiled leaders to get closer toward his vision of "total victory" against the militant group that attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and pressure it into surrendering after nearly two years of war in the Gaza Strip.
Instead, Hamas claims its leaders survived, and Netanyahu's global standing, already badly damaged by the scenes of destruction and humanitarian disaster in Gaza, took another hit. |
BY ALEX HORTON AND TARA COPP |
The Trump administration has drafted a proposal to activate 1,000 Louisiana National Guard troops to serve in a law enforcement mission focused on the state's "urban centers," according to Pentagon planning documents outlining what would be a significant expansion of the military's role in policing American citizens.
Among the documents is an unsigned, undated draft memo from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to Attorney General Pam Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem that describes the "unique advantage" of the Pentagon's proposed approach to law enforcement in Louisiana. This plan, the draft memo says, would allow the military to supplement law enforcement in cities such as New Orleans and Baton Rouge so long as Gov. Jeff Landry, a Republican who has expressed support for the idea, asks the federal government for such assistance.
It is not clear that Landry has made such a request. It is not clear either if the proposal has been approved by federal and state officials.
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