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Aug 28, 2026 - World

CIA Director John Ratcliffe's secret trip to Russia came at the personal direction of President Donald Trump while senior White House aides were kept in the dark.According to a Thursday report by the Wall Street Journal, the covert diplomatic mission to Moscow was tightly held as Trump dispatched his top spy to carry a message to top Kremlin figures. Trump's move bypassed aides and military brass who would ordinarily be looped in beforehand, The Journal noted.The choice to send Ratcliffe as an envoy also marked a shift, The Journal pointed out. Earlier rounds of talks were led by other Trump confidants but failed to halt the fighting in Ukraine. Trump then turned to Ratcliffe, according to anonymous U.S. officials who talked to The Journal.Ratcliffe reportedly also took a secretive route into Russia as he flew into Moscow aboard an unmarked U.S. C-17 military cargo plane out of Latvia, according to The Journal. European officials told The Journal that the move sent them scrambling to figure out what had happened once word got out about Ratcliffe's mission.Two European officials told The Journal that they were briefed on the meeting. Ratcliffe used the sit-down to stress Washington's continued backing of NATO's mutual-defense pledge and to warn Russia off any strike on alliance members, they told The Journal and later reporting revealed.Trump brushed off worries about Russian aggression when reporters asked him about Ratcliffe's mission on Thursday, The Journal noted. Putin "won't attack NATO territory," Trump told reporters.He also downplayed Ratcliffe's trip when he told conservative radio host Glenn Beck in an interview that the mission was "semi-routine," The Journal noted.Officials along NATO's eastern edge struck a similarly calm tone, according to The Journal. Latvian Prime Minister Andris Kulbergs addressed the matter in a video posted to social media, The Journal reported."There is currently no reason for concern," Kulbergs said. "Latvia's level of military threat hasn't changed. The risk of direct military invasion threats to Latvia is currently low."Former senior U.S. intelligence official J.C. Lintzenich, now at the German Marshall Fund, struck a graver tone when talking to The Journal, however."Putin has a tolerance for extraordinary risk and is even potentially willing to escalate to compel de-escalation," Lintzenich said. "But he is unlikely to roll the dice on actions that could threaten the Russian state."

Aug 27, 2026 - World

A Wall Street Journal piece is warning that GOP candidates are "running scared" from President Donald Trump as voter frustration grows in Iowa.A Thursday opinion piece published by The Journal highlighted the growing frustration among Iowa voters, which it tied to the hits to farmers caused by tariffs and the war in Iran, and how it's causing GOP candidates to create some separation with Trump."So many people are just so angry," Terry Arbogast, an Iowa nurse, told The Journal. "Things are hitting us more negatively," Dave Struthers, an Iowa farmer, added. "It's frustrating when you don't get your stuff going," southern Iowa limestone miner Brian Schaer said. "Iowans are frustrated, discontented, and downhearted," The Journal piece summed up. "That bodes ill for Republicans in November, and many GOP candidates are running scared—ducking interviews, avoiding issues, seeking a MAGA stance that doesn't involve praising Donald Trump. They're trying to be as generically Republican as they can."According to the Journal, Iowans say that they're downbeat because they've seen a 53 percent decline in net farm income between 2022 and 2024, and rural voters aren't convinced that the GOP has done enough to help them recover."Tariffs, wars, corporations taking advantage, lack of competition," Struthers, the farmer, told The Journal. "Those kinds of things that are on Iowa farmers' minds.""Right at the onset of the Iran war, fertilizer prices increased sharply due to disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz," economist Christopher Pudenz told The Journal. "The longer that conflict drags out, the more likely that it's going to impact fall fertilizer needs and then spring 2027 fertilizer needs."Trump won Iowa three times, and the entire congressional delegation is Republican, The Journal noted. However, the state has a couple of "competitive" races that have attracted national political figures, including Barack Obama, who filmed a video of him playing basketball with Democratic Senate candidate Josh Turek, the Journal noted.Republican gubernatorial candidate Zach Lahn told The Journal that "the first polling that came out pre-primary had me down about 10 points," and although he closed the gap somewhat, the Cook Political Report determined his race "leans Democratic." An August Emerson poll has Lahn's Democratic opponent, State Auditor Rob Sand, up 48 percent to Lahn's 43 percent. Sand is the only elected statewide Democrat in Iowa.

Aug 27, 2026 - World

President Donald Trump lashed out at a Fox News correspondent on Thursday over what he called "a particularly inaccurate report” about the U.S. war with Iran.“Jonathan Hunt of FoxNews did a particularly inaccurate report on the Failing Islamic Republic of Iran,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “I don’t want to meet, they do. In fact, they are begging to make a deal.”Trump concluded his heated post by demanding action from one of Fox News’ top anchors. “Bret Baier should straighten out his flunkies, for a change!” the president told his followers.

Aug 26, 2026 - World

CNN's Erin Burnett was floored on Wednesday's broadcast of "OutFront" by video of a catastrophic flash flood in Nepal that has left at least 150 people dead and more than 47 Americans missing. Reports indicate that the flooding was caused by a half-mile-wide chunk of a glacier breaking off. CCTV captured footage of a wall of black, muddy water destroying buildings and cars as it tore through a town. Officials expect that toll to rise in the coming days, Burnett reported. Burnett highlighted one segment that showed a seven-story building enveloped in water, looking as if "a bomb hit it.""This is unforgettable," Burnett said. "You can't unsee that. You see that black wall of water? That looks like a bus depot of some sort, and it rolls through. And then, just as if they were matchbox cars, we don't even know how many innocent people's lives were lost in that instant."

Aug 26, 2026 - World

CIA Director John Ratcliffe made a secret trip to Moscow this week specifically to warn Russia against attacking NATO countries, according to people briefed on the visit — a trip President Trump publicly dismissed as merely "semi-routine."The trip was first reported on Tuesday, despite Kremlin denials that any talks were going on.The visit, whose purpose is now confirmed by the Wall Street Journal, marks Ratcliffe's first publicly known trip to the Russian capital and comes on the heels of fresh U.S. intelligence assessments warning that Vladimir Putin could test NATO's resolve with a limited strike on an allied country, likely a Baltic nation, sometime in the next few years. Officials are worried Putin, boxed in by the war in Ukraine and facing domestic pressure, could launch anything from a cyberattack to a small-scale land incursion.Complicating matters further, U.S. weapons stockpiles have been stretched thin by both Ukraine transfers since Russia's 2022 invasion and the ongoing war with Iran, potentially factoring into Putin's calculus about how the West would actually respond to an attack.Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed Ratcliffe met with Russian intelligence officials during the trip, though not directly with Putin, who Peskov said was briefed on the discussions afterward.Trump offered little clarity when asked about the visit during a Wednesday interview with radio host Glenn Beck, quickly pivoting to talk about ending the Russia-Ukraine war instead."Something may come out of it," Trump said. "We're working very hard to get that war ended, and frankly they both want to see it ended at this point."Ratcliffe's trip follows several previous visits to Moscow by U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff amid ongoing peace negotiations, but international visits by a sitting CIA director are notably rare. The last time an agency chief traveled to Moscow was November 2021, when then-Director William Burns delivered his own warning to Putin not to invade Ukraine — a warning that ultimately went unheeded just months later.