Is This the Distraction? With Pete Hegseth by his side at Fort Bragg on Tuesday, Donald Trump announced that more bases once named for Confederate leaders would again bear their former names. He also called out “Gavin Newscum,” the leader of the state he has sent federal forces to. Last night, Rep. LaMonica McIver was also indicted for “forcibly impeding and interfering with federal law enforcement officers” by an interim U.S. attorney who was recently Trump’s personal lawyer.
Politics is conditioned to view Trump’s actions as some variant of 3D chess. Democrats on Capitol Hill have watched events unfold in Los Angeles and warned allies to stay focused on the big Medicaid cuts Republicans are debating instead. Sen. Chris Murphy took some flak on Bluesky this week after he told MSNBC that the events of the past few days were “probably also a distraction from the main story” (meaning the bill).
“Listen, it can be two things at once,” Murphy told NOTUS yesterday of Trump sending the National Guard and Marines to LA. “I mean, it’s important in and of its own right. But, its primary intent is likely to distract the entire conversation away from the massively unpopular bill that’s going to destroy our economy.”