It sounds like the start of an only-in-D.C. joke: - Three Republican power players walk into a bar for a freewheeling conversation. They unwittingly sit next to a liberal comic. She then skewers them in an Instagram post recounting their chat. Why it matters: It became no laughing matter for one of the Republicans —oilman Harry Sargeant — who's trying to improve his uneasy relations with the Trump administration, partly related to his business dealings in Venezuela. - His rapprochement efforts were complicated last month when senior administration officials became aware of the comic's social media post, in which she alleged that Sargeant spoke negatively about President Trump. The big picture: The story illustrates the panopticon of…
When Richard Gere publicly criticized President Trump's USAID cuts, the White House communications director responded not with a policy defense but by recycling a baseless urban legend that has followed the actor for more than 35 years. On July 21, White House communications director Steven Cheung posted on X: "Not going to listen to a […] The post White House invoked a decades-old, unsubstantiated rumor to dismiss Richard Gere — and revived a story that says more about America than about the actor appeared first on American Almanac .
When Richard Gere publicly criticized President Trump's USAID cuts, the White House communications director responded not with a policy defense but by recycling a baseless urban legend that has followed the actor for more than 35 years. On July 21, White House communications director Steven Cheung posted on X: "Not going to listen to a guy who may have put a gerbil up his a**." The post came after Gere, 77, criticized what he called Trump's "ignorance" regarding cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development at an event promoting an educational partnership on migration. Gere also remarked, "He has idiots around him." Cheung's response did not address USAID, migration policy, or any of Gere's specific claims. Instead, it reached…Open
Oscar-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney has built a nearly four-hour documentary around the premise that Elon Musk is a fraud, relying heavily on disgruntled former partners and a Starlink election-rigging theory that officials already debunked. The film, titled Musk, premiered at the Venice Film Festival on Tuesday and is scheduled to open in theaters October 16. […] The post Alex Gibney's nearly four-hour Musk documentary leans on scorned exes and debunked conspiracy theories appeared first on American Almanac .
Oscar-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney has built a nearly four-hour documentary around the premise that Elon Musk is a fraud, relying heavily on disgruntled former partners and a Starlink election-rigging theory that officials already debunked. The film, titled Musk, premiered at the Venice Film Festival on Tuesday and is scheduled to open in theaters October 16. It runs three hours and forty-five minutes, including a ten-minute intermission, a runtime that suggests Gibney needed every spare minute to stitch together a case that keeps circling back to claims the public record has already addressed. Gibney, who previously directed documentaries on Enron and Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, began the project in 2023 and expanded its scope…Open
Reminiscent of Orson Welles' "The Third Man": Every stolen antibiotic or antiretroviral resold through a back-channel pharmacy represents both a taxpayer dollar that bought nothing and a patient who got an expired, mishandled, or counterfeit dose instead of treatment.
The agency played an important role in responding to earlier disasters like the 2015 earthquake. But the U.S. and other countries have pulled back, Nepali officials and humanitarian groups say.
The U.S.-backed program previously supported “investments in HIV testing, counselling, community-based organizations and other key health system intervention.”
The planned reductions — targeting programs that combat the spread of deadly diseases — coincide with an administration push to make developing nations spend more.
Federal investigators spent years building a case that a taxpayer-funded nonprofit billed two agencies for the same dangerous-pathogen research in Wuhan, and no one has been charged with it, leading to questions of whether grant fraud on that scale carries any consequence.
Newly uncovered documents show Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases collaborated closely with the CIA on sensitive “forensic microbiology” efforts, raising fresh questions about accountability and blurred lines between public health and intelligence. The Daily Caller News Foundation reports that an undated interagency agreement details how Fauci’s NIAID worked hand in glove […] The post Documents reveal Fauci’s NIAID quietly partnered with CIA on bioterror research appeared first on American Almanac .
Newly uncovered documents show Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases collaborated closely with the CIA on sensitive “forensic microbiology” efforts, raising fresh questions about accountability and blurred lines between public health and intelligence. The Daily Caller News Foundation reports that an undated interagency agreement details how Fauci’s NIAID worked hand in glove with the CIA’s Biological Technology Center on programs involving bioterrorism-linked germs and “forensic comparative analyses.” The CIA provided funding and helped NIAID obtain pathogens, while both agencies sought to develop a “robust forensic microbiology capability.” Data from the research could not be shared…Open