Episode October 14, 2026 9 min 25s

Desperate for Distraction

From Letters from an American Heather Cox Richardson

October 13, 2026

The attacks on James Talarico were likely an attempt to get ahead of another damaging story about Ken Paxton, The Wall Street Journal reported that Paxton spent New Year’s Eve in Dubai partying along with two fugitives from US Justice, While the administration claims to be cracking down on fraud in the SNAP program, criminal syndicates are stealing millions of dollars from more than 990,000 households, a theft that could be stopped with digital microchips but Congress and the Trump administration are not addressing the theft, Diesel prices have jumped in spite of Trump’s move to lift sanctions on Russia, A bipartisan group of senators is pushing back on the lifting of sanctions, Zelensky said Ukraine got no warning about Russia’s strike, raising concerns that Trump is not sharing intelligence with Ukraine, Trump’s new WH press secretary debuted, apparently having been appointed over the objections of Trump’s chief of staff, Susie Wiles, After being asked by the administration to resign after her shakedown of a donor was revealed, Kimberly Guilfoyle stepped down, Almost 6 in 10 Americans say they believe Trump is either illegally profiting from the presidency or doing something unethical but not illegal.

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