Trump’s Economic Gamble

“If you’ve watched Donald Trump demonize immigrants to fuel his political rise over the last decade, the former president’s insistence that immigrants are abducting the cats and dogs of Americans and eating them shouldn’t come as a surprise,” NOTUS reports. “It probably also shouldn’t come as a surprise that Republican lawmakers are not only indifferent to the former president making these claims; they largely support him spreading the conspiracy.”

Punchbowl News: “Led by Speaker Mike Johnson — and under pressure from President Donald Trump — House Republicans drafted a six-month stopgap government funding bill that includes the SAVE Act. The package would require proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections while keeping agencies and departments open through March 28 — early into a potential Trump presidency.” “But Johnson couldn’t round up enough GOP votes to pass the Republican-drafted bill, so he delayed any floor action.

“America’s fickle young voters represent one of the largest groups of undecideds and persuadables left in this presidential election,” Axios reports. Key takeaway: Kamala Harris’ current 15-point lead over Donald Trump among young voters “would be the worst showing by a Democrat since John Kerry lost in 2004.”

New York Times: “The previous week, claims that Haitian immigrants were stealing and eating pet cats in Springfield, Ohio, had begun circulating on social media. None of the reports had been substantiated, and local officials in Springfield — a small city where, in recent years, public services have been strained by a large influx of Haitian migrants — said they had seen no evidence that any of them were true.

“North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has shown new signs he’s girding for battle by saying the time is over for peaceful reunification with South Korea and he has the right to annihilate his neighbor,” Bloomberg reports. “To back up his threats, Kim has shown off a plant to enrich uranium for bombs while ramping up strike capabilities with a blistering pace of tests for his newest ballistic missiles — making them bigger, deadlier and better able to strike the US and its allies in Asia.”

Axios: “Every age group has seen declines in religious affiliation during the past decade, but the largest jumps are among Americans ages 30 to 49 — older millennials and younger Gen Xers, the data from the nonpartisan Public Religion Research Institute show.” “From 2013 to 2023, the percentage of religiously unaffiliated among that age group skyrocketed nearly 48%.”