WASTIN’ AWAY IN MAGA-RITAVILLE

Is Donald Trump’s notoriously vice-like grip on his own party loosening? Infighting, fractures, rebellion, and a massive reversal… all spell trouble for MAGA.

• After months of brazen attempts to sweep his storied relationship with deceased child sex predator Jeffrey Epstein under the rug, President Donald Trump was finally forced to do his least favorite thing: Surrender. “House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide, and it’s time to move on from this Democrat Hoax,” Trump wrote on Truth Social last night. Never mind that he has, in fact, been desperately trying to hide whatever is in there.

• It was a shocking reversal from the president’s firm stance just days ago, when he launched a last-ditch effort to pressure House Republicans against voting to release more Epstein files (in which his name appears many, many times). Let’s be clear: Trump doesn’t want the files released. But faced with defeat, he simply switched sides, so he could claim to be on the winning team. Cut your losses, I guess!

• This is just the latest sign of Trump’s political weakness. First, his party took a shellacking in elections earlier this month. Trump tried, and failed, to get Senate Republicans to destroy the filibuster. His team is now pulling back on some of his beloved tariffs, while scrambling to lower grocery prices. And that’s not even to mention the rebellion of MAGA superstar Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).

• Greene has broken with Trump on several issues. But her attempts to get the Epstein files released have proven explosive: Trump formally disavowed Greene on Friday, describing her as a traitor and encouraging a GOP primary against her during next year’s midterms.

• “I am now being contacted by private security firms with warnings for my safety as a hot bed of threats against me are being fueled and egged on by the most powerful man in the world,” Greene tweeted over the weekend. “The toxic and dangerous rhetoric in politics must end and we need healing in this country for all Americans.”

• Democrats are giddy about the split within MAGA. “We are a big tent. We must be a huge, vast tent. I say this is a party that’s got room for Marjorie Taylor Greene if she wants to come over,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) said at an event in Florida yesterday. If so, she has some explaining to do on many other issues…

Greene isn’t the only Republican facing threats, as Trump seeks to punish disloyalty.

• It happened again last night: Trump called for the ouster of two Indiana GOP lawmakers after his attempt to force redistricting fell flat. “Because of these two politically correct type ‘gentlemen,’ and a few others, they could be depriving Republicans of a Majority in the House, A VERY BIG DEAL!” Trump wrote on Truth Social last night. Hours later, one of those lawmakers’ homes was swatted.

• Trump is also flirting with the most radical factions of his party. Trump defended far-right commentator Tucker Carlson after his controversial interview with Nick Fuentes, the antisemitic incel leader whose followers believe in preserving America’s white, Christian identity.

• “You can’t tell him who to interview. If he wants to interview Nick Fuentes, I don’t know much about him … get the word out. People have to decide,” Trump told reporters yesterday. Afterwards, Fuentes, who famously dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago years in 2022, posted: “Thank you Mr. President!”

• Even Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), one of the most divisive voices in the Republican Party, is raising the alarm. “We have a responsibility to speak out even when it’s uncomfortable,” Cruz said in a statement to Axios. “When voices in our own movement push dangerous and misguided ideas, we can’t look the other way.”

Cruz may simply want to run for president again in 2028. MTG may be thinking the same. Either way, it’s bad news for Trump when his staunchest allies start pushing back.

ICE COLD

Donald Trump’s federal agents’ reckless tactics are causing “fear and uncertainty” across Charlotte, North Carolina, according to the local sheriff.

Hundreds of ICE and Border Patrol agents arrested more than 100 people in Charlotte over the weekend, Mecklenburg County Sheriff Garry McFadden told What A Day. The operation is the Trump administration’s latest attack on Democrat-controlled cities.

Many of the people arrested aren’t the dangerous criminals that the administration claims to target, McFadden said. One example: “A lady was filming and her hand touched the vehicle as they were passing,” he said. “The officer got out … his hand brushed her hand, and they arrested her.”

Some of those arrests have taken place at restaurants, grocery stores, and Home Depot parking lots, according to local media. In one instance, congregants doing yardwork outside of church scattered into the nearby woods when agents arrived and detained a member.

“The agents asked no questions and showed no identification before taking one man away, whose wife and child were inside at the time, the pastor said. They attempted to grab others, too,” the Charlotte Observer writes. “Inside the church, women and children sobbed as they wondered whether their loved ones had been taken.”

The Department of Homeland Security is trying to push a very different narrative: “During the first two days of Operation Charlotte’s Web, Border Patrol arrested over 130 illegal aliens who have all broken the immigration laws of our country,” DHS said in a statement today.

On Friday, McFadden told What A Day that he planned to stay in contact with Trump officials during the operation, in an effort to minimize the disorder. Has his strategy worked?

“I have had communication with ICE every day since this happened. The communication was positive and constructive,” McFadden said. But Border Patrol, which is conducting many of the arrests, won’t even pick up his calls.

“I can’t tell another law enforcement how to conduct their business, even if they’re in my city. I can only suggest it,” he added. “And that’s where it’s a problem.”

WHAT ELSE?

Is Donald Trump planning for war with Venezuela? The State Department plans to designate a Venezuelan cartel as a terrorist organization, and the U.S. deployed multiple warships and thousands of troops to the region recently. This excellent column from my former colleague also lays out Trump’s thinking: “Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro and his closest aides should consider reading up on Turkey. Some Trump administration officials are talking about exiling them there,” she writes. “Unless they agree to go to Russia. Or Azerbaijan. Or maybe Cuba.”

The enrollment of new international students at American universities dropped by 17 percent this fall, according to a new survey.

FBI Director Kash Patel’s 27-year-old country singer girlfriend has an FBI SWAT security detail to protect her from potential threats, MS NOW reports. Keep in mind that Trump pulled security clearances for many of his perceived enemies, including former national security adviser John Bolton, who was the target of an Iranian assassination plot. A lot of people don’t like country music, I guess!

FEMA Director David Richardson resigned today. He may be best remembered as the guy who didn’t know when hurricane season was… or that volcanoes are under FEMA’s purview. He also seemingly didn’t know about his own resignation when a reporter asked him before it went public: “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Decent summary of his whole tenure, tbh.

Humanitarian officials are scrambling to reopen schools in Gaza, after most of them were destroyed by Israeli bombings over the past two years. More than 600,000 children have gone without education since then, causing officials to warn of “terrible consequences for an entire generation.”

China is rapidly expanding its nuclear site, carving new tunnels and hollowing out chambers that suggests the possibility of new testing, according to researchers. This comes after Trump announced the U.S. would restart its own nuclear testing, while his own top officials try to change his mind. You can think of Trump kind of like a reverse Oppenheimer: He doesn’t have to test nukes, but he really wants to.

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Mike Waltz heaped praise on rap star Nicki Minaj for highlighting the persecution of Christians in Nigeria, describing her as “arguably the greatest female recording artist.” She responded with a reference to her rabid fan base: “The Barbz & I will never stand down in the face of injustice. We’ve been given our influence by God. There must be a bigger purpose.” You really never know what the Barbz are up to.

LIGHT AT THE END OF THE EMAIL…

Donald Trump’s case against former FBI Director James Comey is in serious danger of falling apart. A federal judge slapped the Department of Justice’s handling of the case, and ordered that grand jury materials be given to Comey’s lawyers. It’s a rare decision seemingly sparked by mistakes by Lindsey Halligan, Trump’s handpicked U.S. attorney. “The record points to a disturbing pattern of profound investigative missteps, missteps that led an FBI agent and a prosecutor to potentially undermine the integrity of the grand jury proceeding,” Judge William Fitzpatrick said. In other words: There’s a chance the case could be dismissed.

The BBC is “determined to fight” any lawsuit that Donald Trump throws its way, after he threatened to sue for $5 billion over an edited clip of him speaking before the January 6 insurrection. There is “no basis for a defamation case,” BBC Chair Samir Shah told staff in an email this morning.

Flight cuts imposed by the Trump administration during the shutdown ended today. My anxiety levels about traveling home for Thanksgiving just dropped dramatically.

Electric vehicle sales in South America are rising… without those heinous Cybertrucks littering the city streets. Unlike in the United States, Tesla isn’t the big player: Cheaper Chinese EVs are dominating the market, along with Toyota, Kia, and Hyundai.

A camera caught a wild wolf using a fishing float to pull a crab trap from the depths of the British Columbia shores — what may be the first documented instance of a wild wolf using a tool, according to researchers. Maybe it’s not AI superintelligence we need to be worried about.…

Nintendo released three images from its upcoming “The Legend of Zelda” movie, based off the beloved video game series. As Engadget writes: “Zelda is armed with a bow, giving me hope that she’ll be more than just a damsel in distress. It’s 2025, after all, and the titular character certainly deserves to smack down some moblins.”