Newsweek: Iran threatens to release 100GB of Trump aides’ emails: What to know

An Iran-linked hacking group has threatened to release a batch of emails it said it has stolen from President Donald Trump‘s longtime aides, including adviser Roger Stone and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.

Reuters reported Monday that a cyberattack group that hacked the president’s campaign in 2024 claimed it had roughly 100 gigabytes of emails it could leak.

The hackers, operating under the pseudonym Robert, did not provide information about the content of the emails or when they plan to release them, according to the news agency. The group previously released some emails in the lead-up to the U.S. presidential election last year.

In online chats with Reuters, they said they also had emails from the accounts of Trump attorney Lindsey Halligan and Stormy Daniels, the adult film actress who it was revealed was paid $130,000 to sign a non-disclosure agreement about an affair she says she had with Trump.

A “hostile foreign adversary is threatening to illegally exploit purportedly stolen and unverified material in an effort to distract, discredit, and divide,” the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said late on Monday.

Unfortunately our Grifter-in-Chief is an inept buffoon seemingly unable to conduct himself in a respectable, uncompromisable manner.

https://www.newsweek.com/iran-hackers-threaten-leak-trump-emails-2092864

Associated Press: California senators demand Trump immigration officials stop using Medicaid data

California’s two U.S. senators demanded on Wednesday that the Trump administration stop using personal data of millions of Medicaid enrollees — including their immigration status — as part of its sweeping deportation campaign.

In a letter to top administration officials, Democratic Sens. Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla expressed alarm over an Associated Press report last week that detailed how deportation officials had obtained the sensitive data over the objections of career health officials. They wrote that health officials needed to stop sharing the information and that the Department of Homeland Security should “destroy any and all such data” it had obtained.

The AP reported that CMS transferred the data last week to DHS officials. Internal CMS records obtained by the AP showed the Medicaid agency fought the request, arguing that sharing the data would violate rules and federal law. Trump appointees overruled them, giving CMS a 54-minute deadline to share the information with DHS, according to emails obtained by AP.

“We are deeply troubled that this administration intends to use individuals’ private health information for the unrelated purpose of possible enforcement actions targeting lawful noncitizens and mixed status families,” the senators wrote.

https://apnews.com/article/immigration-medicaid-trump-deportation-padilla-schiff-california-a7a701026de1f954cfbdf545a7d91cb8

Inquirer: Vaccine experts removed by Trump health chief sound the alarm

Vaccination experts recently fired by Donald Trump’s administration sounded the alarm in a Monday editorial, saying they were “deeply concerned” by the actions of a US health secretary known for his vaccine skepticism.

Last week Robert F Kennedy Jr dismissed all 17 members of a key advisory committee, accusing them of financial conflicts of interest.

Two days later, he announced the appointment of eight new members, including several vaccine critics, such as a biochemist who became the darling of the anti-vax movement.

His brainworms must be acting up again — nothing that a couple healthy servings of bushmeat and road kill can’t help.

https://globalnation.inquirer.net/280850/vaccine-experts-removed-by-trump-health-chief-sound-the-alarm

Associated Press: Judge rules some NIH grant cuts illegal, saying he’s never seen such discrimination in 40 years

A federal judge ruled Monday it was illegal for the Trump administration to cancel several hundred research grants, adding that the cuts raise serious questions about racial discrimination.

U.S. District Judge William Young in Massachusetts said the administration’s process was “arbitrary and capricious” and that it did not follow long-held government rules and standards when it abruptly canceled grants deemed to focus on gender identity or diversity, equity and inclusion.

In a hearing Monday on two cases calling for the grants to be restored, the judge pushed government lawyers to offer a formal definition of DEI, questioning how grants could be canceled for that reason when some were designed to study health disparities as Congress had directed.

Young, an appointee of Republican President Ronald Reagan, went on to address what he called “a darker aspect” to the cases, calling it “palpably clear” that what was behind the government actions was “racial discrimination and discrimination against America’s LGBTQ community.”

After 40 years on the bench, “I’ve never seen government racial discrimination like this,” Young added. He ended Monday’s hearing saying, “Have we no shame.”

https://apnews.com/article/nih-research-trump-cuts-dei-rfk-4fec9f308f3ff427185a12e88f260c81

Associated Press: NIH scientists publish declaration criticizing Trump’s deep cuts in public health research

In his confirmation hearings to lead the National Institutes of Health, Jay Bhattacharya pledged his openness to views that might conflict with his own. “Dissent,” he said, ”is the very essence of science.”

That commitment is being put to the test.

On Monday, scores of scientists at the agency sent their Trump-appointed leader a letter titled the Bethesda Declaration, challenging “policies that undermine the NIH mission, waste public resources, and harm the health of Americans and people across the globe.”

It says: “We dissent.”

In a capital where insiders often insist on anonymity to say such things publicly, 92 NIH researchers, program directors, branch chiefs and scientific review officers put their signatures on the letter — and their careers on the line. An additional 250 of their colleagues across the agency endorsed the declaration without using their names.

The letter, addressed to Bhattacharya, also was sent to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and members of Congress who oversee the NIH. White House spokesman Kush Desai defended the administration’s approach to federal research and said President Donald Trump is focused on restoring a “Gold Standard” of science, not “ideological activism.”

In other words, screw the experts and follow the lead of Robert “Brainworm” Kennedy, Jr.

Got bush meat? The road kill is a bit chewy today.

https://apnews.com/article/nih-letter-bethesda-declaration-bhattacharya-89724aee201f3e99fc1159adcbf9ac94


More here:

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2025/06/nih-bethesda-declaration-bhattacharya-letter/683081

ABC 7 KABC: RFK Jr. says he is removing all 17 members of CDC’s vaccine advisory committee

The committee makes recommendations on the safety and efficacy of vaccines.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced on Monday he is removing all 17 sitting members of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory committee and replacing them with new members.

The Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices (ACIP) makes recommendations on the safety, efficacy and clinical need of vaccines.

“Today we are prioritizing the restoration of public trust above any specific pro- or anti-vaccine agenda,” Kennedy said in a statement. “The public must know that unbiased science — evaluated through a transparent process and insulated from conflicts of interest — guides the recommendations of our health agencies.”

Is a lunatic with brainworms who eats bush meat and road kill competent to restore public trust in any health-related matters?

https://abc7ny.com/post/rfk-jr-says-he-is-removing-17-members-cdcs-vaccine-advisory-committee/16707806

CNN: Immigration Raids “Made for TV”

Dr. Phil was embedded with ICE during controversial Los Angeles immigration raids

As federal agents prepared to fan out in Los Angeles for a controversial immigration crackdown, the officers were greeted by a familiar face: Dr. Phil McGraw.

The television personality and his camera crew were on hand before and after the raids that took place on Friday and triggered several days of street protests.

McGraw was there “to get a first-hand look at the targeted operations,” according to his conservative TV channel, MeritTV.

McGraw also had “exclusive” access to Trump’s border czar Tom Homan, a spokesperson for the channel said. The two men sat down for taped conversations about the Immigration and Customs Enforcement efforts both “the day before and day after the LA operation.”

The TV personality and Homan were also together at the Homeland Security Investigations field office in L.A. on the morning the raids began.

McGraw’s presence on the ground in L.A. reinforces the made-for-TV nature of Trump’s immigration crackdown.

The former daytime talk show host was embedded with ICE officials in Chicago back in January, when some federal agents were told to be camera-ready for a show of force at the very start of President Trump’s second term.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/09/media/dr-phil-mcgraw-ice-immigration-raids-los-angeles

Talking Points Memo: Trump Stonewalls Federal Judges In New Round Of Brazen Defiance

A Constitutional Clash In Three Acts

In three closely watched anti-immigration cases, the Trump administration continued its slo-mo constitutional defiance of the judicial branch …

Act I: Non-Responsiveness

Act II: Delay Shenanigans

Act III: Misdirection And Mischaracterization

Read the article for the details:

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/morning-memo/trump-stonewalls-federal-judges-in-new-round-of-brazen-defiance

CBS News: RFK Jr. releases report on childhood chronic disease. Here’s what to know.

The White House’s “Make America Healthy Again” or “MAHA” commission, led by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has published its first report on what it says are four leading drivers of childhood chronic disease. 

“The report is the product of a consensual process, and it represents a collaborative effort of all the agencies and the White House. And it represents a consensus that is probably the strongest and most radical consensus by a government agency in history about the state of America’s health,” Kennedy told reporters in a call ahead of its release.

Who’s going to take advice on our children’s health from a moron who takes his grandchildren swimming in a sewage-contaminated creek where swimming is banned for public health reasons? A moron who’s had brain worms likely because he eats bush meat and road kill?

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/rfk-jr-maha-report-childhood-chronic-disease

MSNBC: Democrats grill RFK Jr. over ‘devastating’ funding cuts at fiery hearing

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., warned HHS’ proposed budget for 2026 would “leave America sicker and weaker.”

In her opening statement, Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, the top Democrat on the subcommittee, noted that under the proposed budget, NIH funds would be cut by nearly $18 billion compared with the previous fiscal year.

“That would have a devastating impact on research into lifesaving cures and treatments,” Baldwin said, warning it would set “back medical innovations by decades.”

Baldwin said that while the hearing was meant to focus on next year’s budget, the proposal provided insight into what Kennedy was doing at the agency now, in fiscal year 2025. Since Donald Trump returned to the White House, HHS has cut more than 20,000 jobs and slashed billions of dollars for scientific research as part of the Department of Government Efficiency’s effort to reduce the federal budget.

Baldwin questioned the secretary over the department’s withholding funds that were already appropriated by Congress, including thousands of dollars in grants for research on rare diseases, Alzheimer’s and cancer. “We’re not abandoning any lifesaving research,” Kennedy answered. “We’ve cut administrators, we’re cutting waste, we’re cutting duplicative programs.”

The senator also pressed Kennedy about the proposed cuts to NIH and asked whether the lack of funding would slow the development of treatments and cures. “We are the sickest country in the world, so that money has not been well-spent,” Kennedy replied.

Keep in mind that this is a Secretary of Health and Human Services who had brain worms, eats bush meat and road kill, and takes his grandchildren swimming in a creek polluted with raw sewage. And he’s lecturing us on health?

https://www.msnbc.com/top-stories/latest/rfk-jr-contentious-congressional-hearing-funding-cuts-rcna208070