250th Birthday Blues

Today’s notice: Thinking bigger about this American moment. Trump tells Republicans to be more like Democrats. One Big, Beautiful midterm afterthought? One battleground Democrat’s podcast hustle. Meet our new data analysis section. And: Congress’ mental health challenge.

NOTUS Newsletter is taking a Fourth of July break but will be back in your inbox Monday.

THE LATEST

Americans on America at 250. There’s been such a political headwind around this weekend’s semiquincentennial – are you on Donald Trump’s Freedom 250 team? Or Congress’ America 250 team? – that it can be difficult to pull back and think about the history of the momentous occasion. America is not a place recreated every two years on federal election cycles. It’s an ongoing narrative. And a slew of public polls posted ahead of this weekend show that many Americans are not loving this chapter in our national story.

“American Pride Falls to 25-Year Record Low,” found Gallup. “Just a third of the public believes the American Dream still exists,” found the AP. “Nearly identical shares of adults from Trump states, Harris states and swing states say they believe the nation’s best years are in the rearview mirror — 58% in all,” found NBC News.

We all know what the professionals have to say about this. It’s Trump and the Republicans’ fault, say Democrats. It’s the feckless Democrats who are behind it, say the Republicans. It’s the fault of a secret cabal of sentient lizards possibly, says various internet punditry.

On the National Mall, we asked Americans what’s behind the negativity. NOTUS’ Angie Orellana Hernandez walked around the Great American State Fair and asked people why they think their fellow Americans are feeling low.

“It’s your choice to feel how you want to feel. I choose to feel happy and proud, and that’s my right as a human, that’s my right as an American citizen,” said Judith Kalaora, visiting from Massachusetts. “I’m a first-generation American. My father left his country because of persecution. I am a great supporter of immigrant rights. I am also a supporter of the respect of our American culture.”

“I’m torn,” said Melissa Watts, who took public transportation from Virginia to the Mall yesterday. “I’m very hopeful because I want us to succeed and keep moving forward, and of course, I have children and grandchildren, and hopefully someday great-grandchildren that will be able to be proud to be in this country.”

Open tabs: Colorado Governor Fires Officials Who Opposed Freeing Election Denier (NY Times); The problems of an America 250 celebration tied to Trump (CNN); Fireworks on Mall likely to cause hazardous air pollution, documents show (WaPost); The Vultures Arrived Before the Rescue Teams (The Atlantic)

From the White House

Trump gripes about House chaos. Pool reports from Tuesday night’s Rose Garden Club dinner at the White House did not catch everything Trump said to an assembled crowd that included around 80 Republican members of Congress. The sit-down dinner was a raincheck rescheduled from weeks ago, and was billed as a thank-you to members who are reliable votes for the White House. (“People I love and respect,” is how Trump said it, according to remarks overheard by the excluded pooler on the driveway outside the briefing room.)

But after two weeks of Republican infighting that sent lawmakers home early this week, Trump took time to go off on the 14 Republicans currently blocking House floor action, NOTUS’ Kadia Goba reports.

The president said the opposition party would never fracture like the Republican conference has. “With all their problems, Democrats stick together,” Trump said, according to two people who attended the dinner.

From the Hill

Remember the Republican tax cut bill? “[C]ould all of us as Republicans do more and talk about it more, including the administration? I would say, yes,” said Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa), one of the incumbents running in a swing district who say focusing voters’ attention on the Working Families Tax Cuts Act (aka the OBBB) could help them in a tough cycle.

One year after the signature legislation passed, NOTUS’ Al Weaver and Kadia report that Republicans are frustrated with messaging around it. “It’s obviously been mixed,” Senate Republican leader John Thune (South Dakota) told NOTUS.

But a sales pitch that’s mid may be just part of the problem. “I don’t think we’re able to do it until the gas comes down,” Rep. Michael Rulli (R-Ohio) said.

From the campaign trail

Democratic dark money in Pennsylvania. Former news anchor Janelle Stelson, the Democratic nominee running against Rep. Scott Perry (R) in the state’s 10th Congressional District, was paid $45,000 to host four episodes of a podcast that is nearly impossible to find online now, NOTUS’ Avani Kalra reports. Voting for America, which funded the project, is led by three alumni of the DNC and DCCC, alongside a political lawyer. The group was founded in June 2024, which was the same year Stelson ran her first campaign for the seat, and the money represented a significant part of her income in 2025.

A campaign spokesperson said the pods gave Stelson “an outlet to uplift her own community and shine a light on the issues that people are facing.”

Affordability fight in North Carolina. Former Gov. Roy Cooper, the Democratic nominee for Senate, has been crisscrossing the state with a direct message for these times: the “Make stuff cost less” tour. This week the NRSC is up with an ad that highlights the price hikes that occurred during Cooper’s time as governor, NOTUS’ Christa Dutton reports.

It’s a microcosm of the debate that many strategists on both sides say will define the midterms nationwide – who will voters trust to lower prices? Cooper’s team says Republican nominee Michael Whatley has his own record to answer for, pointing to his time as a corporate lobbyist, particularly for a North Carolina energy company.

NOTUS ANALYSIS

Our new data section launches today, with all numbers crunched by our resident cruncher, Andrew Van Dam.

This one is for the new college grads. There’s good news: The scariest predictions about the new-grad job market haven’t shown up in the data. But that doesn’t mean all majors are made the same when it comes to gainful employment. Using Census data, Andrew answers the question: Which College Majors Have the Best (and Worst) Career Paths?

NOTUS METRO

Sign up for our local newsletter. NOTUS has some of the best reporters covering D.C.-area news, sports and culture. Sign up for all the latest!

Local news. Just Weeks Into a Summer of Celebration, D.C. Residents Are Already Feeling Fatigue, by Shamira Muhammad

NOTUS PERSPECTIVES

Democrats shouldn’t get too optimistic about the midterms, warns John B. Judis, in an in-depth piece assessing the outcomes that are likely in November. Also today at NOTUS Perspectives: Dana Milbank gets his pens confiscated (“could be weapons”) at the Great American State Fair, and Matt K. Lewis implores everyone not to let Trump ruin July Fourth.

NEW ON NOTUS

Will Congress get serious about mental health after the return of Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-New Jersey) this week? There are no formal rules for lawmakers around disclosing their health issues and no requirements regarding what they reveal to their constituents, party leaders or even their own staff, NOTUS’ Paul Kane and Joe Gould report. And some members say there remains a stigma around mental health issues that makes disclosure challenging.

“If you’ve never gone through depression or anxiety, you just don’t know what it is, and you don’t know how hard it is, and how it consumes every second of your life,” former Rep. Adam Smith (D-Washington), who kept his own battle with depression while in office quiet for fear of the consequences, told NOTUS.

More: Prosecutors to Review More Than 1,000 Cases After Broadview Six Debacle, by Torrie Herrington

Kash Patel’s Late Stock Disclosure Raises STOCK Act Questions, by Dave Levinthal

Meet the Highest-Paid White House Staffers, by Torrie Herrington

NOT US

• The Supreme Court’s Zero-Sum Session, by Felicia Kornbluh for The American Prospect
• The left won big in NYC. Now it has to survive a redistricting effort., By Joe Anuta for Politico
• How the Iran War Ignited a Clash Between Trump and the Saudi Crown Prince, by Edward Wong for The New York Times
• Trump honors a president he sees as a peer — Theodore Roosevelt, by Natalie Allison and Dan Diamond for The Washington Post

BE SOCIAL

🔥

Thank you for reading! If you liked this edition of the NOTUS newsletter, please forward it to a friend. If this newsletter was shared with you, please subscribe — it’s free! Have a tip? Email us at tips@notus.org. And as always, we’d love to hear your thoughts at newsletters@notus.org.

The newsletter was produced by Kelly Poe, Brett Bachman, Thomas Burr and Erik Schutz. Photo by Jacquelyn Martin/AP.