Today’s notice: The new House Oversight ranking member lays out his Epstein plans. Is the Sydney Sweeney saga remaking MAGA’s connection to celebrity? A report from the MAHA farmers’ market. And: How the Laura Loomer pressure operation works.
THE LATEST
The Epstein story is not slowing down: The House may be in recess, but its focus on Jeffrey Epstein has not taken a break.
Preparing for Ghislaine Maxwell: The Epstein associate and convicted sex trafficker is expected to testify before the House Oversight Committee in the fall. The top Democrat on Oversight, Rep. Robert Garcia, told NOTUS’ Riley Rogerson and Daniella Diaz that the committee is “going to negotiate” with her and her team.
A “nonstarter”: That’s what Garcia had to say about Maxwell’s demand for immunity.
“She’s not going to dictate the terms of her subpoena,” he said. “And she’s not going to dictate the terms of her deposition to Congress. I intend to be at the deposition when that happens. We’re obviously negotiating what that looks like. But this is not a good person.”
More subpoenas: Oversight’s chair, Rep. James Comer, issued Epstein-related subpoenas Tuesday for documents and (in a sign this story is going to keep being a big story) Bill and Hillary Clinton among other former officials.
No one is letting go. “It’s definitely not going to fizzle, and we’re not going to lay the foot off the gas,” Garcia said.
Big media revelations continue to come out of this years-old case. On Tuesday, The New York Times published more photos from inside Epstein’s former Manhattan residence and more of those deeply uncomfortable birthday letters.
Stay tuned: Top officials in President Donald Trump’s White House are set to meet tonight at the vice president’s residence for a strategy meeting on how to handle the growing crisis, according to CNN.
Open Tabs: Switzerland’s president rushes to D.C. to avert tariffs (AP); MTG presses Trump to pardon George Santos (Axios); RFK Jr. Pulls Back on U.S. mRNA Vaccine Research (NOTUS); Inside Trump’s New Tactic to Separate Immigrant Families (NYT)
From the states
Calling the feds: Trump joined the call for the FBI to track down Democratic Texas legislators that left the state to deny a quorum for Republicans trying to redraw congressional lines. “They may have to,” he told reporters at the White House.
Sen. John Cornyn sent a letter to the bureau’s director, Kash Patel, formally requesting the FBI locate the legislators. “The FBI has tools to aid state law enforcement when parties cross state lines, including to avoid testifying or fleeing a scene of a crime,” he wrote.
That’s not all: Gov. Greg Abbott on Tuesday filed a lawsuit with the Supreme Court of Texas to remove the state House Democratic caucus chair, Gene Wu, from office after he fled to Illinois.
Democrats say they’re not backing down. “This is not the Democratic party of your grandfather, which would bring a pencil to the knife fight. This is a new Democratic Party. We’re bringing a knife to a knife fight, and we are gonna fight fire with fire,” DNC Chair Ken Martin said Tuesday. He became the latest prominent Democrat to call for gerrymanders to fight Republican plans.
From the White House
MAGA’s new favorite celebrity: “Not that I know of,” a MAGA strategist close to the White House told Jasmine when asked if there has been any official outreach to actress and denim pitchwoman Sydney Sweeney.
The administration is certainly not moving on: The Pentagon posted a picture of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth captioned he’s “got great jeans” and Trump posted about Sweeney.
What are they doing? “MAGA has tried, and Trump specifically, has tried to make a point of Taylor Swift’s fan base being right leaning, or of her herself not being very right. And it has never amounted to very much,” entertainment journalist Hunter Harris told Jasmine. “I think with Sydney Sweeney they’re trying that again … I don’t feel like it’s as effective or really sticking. Even the Trump tweet about her felt, honestly, not his best work, a little bit half hearted.”
THE BIG ONE
How big is Laura looming? Far-right provocateur Laura Loomer may be one person, but the network ready to support her appears to be much bigger than that. A group of influencers and social media accounts signal-boost her efforts — and win her headlines.
This is the week the media couldn’t stop commenting on her power in Trump’s Washington. The Washington Post published a thorough profile of Loomer’s access, one of several major dives into what she’s up to.
How she works: The former FDA vaccine chief, Dr. Vinay Prasad, resigned after being targeted by Loomer and an online cacophony of influencers calling for his ouster.
This keeps happening: Jasmine got tipped on what one of Loomer’s co-conspirators said was a coming “warning shot”: Their next target was Dr. Marty Makary, the FDA’s commissioner, who said publicly that he was attempting to bring Prasad back.
It wasn’t long until Loomer was posting a tirade about Makary: “I genuinely want to know if @DrMakaryFDA thinks the White House appreciates his comments that insinuate Vinay Prasad is still welcomed in the Trump admin if *he* decides he wants his job back,” she wrote on X.
What comes next: Sources familiar say it’s likely another pressure campaign will follow, with more influencers expected to get posting this week.
“I would imagine that Loomer’s engagement will activate other MAGA influencers who think that the Trump administration has been infiltrated by people who hate him,” the source familiar with the efforts said.
NEW ON NOTUS
The MAHA farmer conundrum: Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has walked back his pledge to ban pesticides in American agriculture. But his MAHA-minded followers are still giving him the benefit of the doubt.
“We think there’s lots of positive things coming, but we haven’t seen a whole lot,” Dan Stoltzfus, who owns a cheese company in Pennsylvania, told NOTUS’ Margaret Manto at the USDA’s Great American Farmers Market on the National Mall this week.
Scott Bessent *not* for Fed: “I love Scott, but he wants to stay where he is,” Trump said Tuesday on CNBC, seemingly ruling out the idea of naming the treasury secretary as the next chair of the Federal Reserve. Instead, Trump said he had his eye on four people: Kevin Warsh, a bank executive and former member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors; Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council; and two others who went unnamed.
More: Judge Blocks Trump’s Plans to Zero Out Funds for a Popular Disaster Aid Program, by Anna Kramer; Apple’s New iOS Update Could Damage the Polling Industry, by Nuha Dolby and Samuel Larreal; Trump Fires All Dems on the Puerto Rico Oversight Board, by Amelia Benavides-Colón; Musk’s ‘Five Things’ Emails Have Come to an End, by Emily Kennard
NOT US
- Why Trump Keeps Fundraising Like a First-Term President, by Josh Dawsey, Anthony DeBarros and Rebecca Ballhaus for The Wall Street Journal
- Trump and Schumer couldn’t clinch a deal. Now a shutdown hangs in the balance. By Jordain Carney for Politico
- Trump’s tax bill has triggered a solar gold rush, by Tim McDonnell for Semafor
- As fire season ramps up, thousands of Forest Service firefighting positions are vacant, by Kylie Mohr for High Country News
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