Eric Rich

@BWI_Airport can confirm

If you are traveling today or tomorrow, please arrive to the airport 4 hours early. We have not previously experienced checkpoint wait times similar to what we are seeing this morning. Travelers most impacted are those departing from Concourses A, B and C.

@JakeShindel 3.5 hour line at #bwi this morning. Got here at 5:30 am for a flight at 9, made it but barely. Lots of empty seats.

Flew out of BWI-Marshall this morning. Gate attendant said the flight is fully booked, but there are a LOT of open seats. I’d say around 30-40% of seats are filled. If you’re flying, get to the airport early. Took 2.5 hours to get through security.

@DenShtilierman here is the story washingtonpost.com/world/2026/03/…

The Washington Post published an article that, under normal circumstances, would have caused a political earthquake in Europe. But we live in a time when even such things no longer surprise anyone. The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) seriously considered a scenario involving a staged assassination attempt on Viktor Orbán. Not metaphorically. Not an “information campaign.” But literally — to stage an attack to boost his approval ratings ahead of the election. An SVR document, obtained and verified by European intelligence, explicitly describes a strategy titled “the Gamechanger” — “the staging of an assassination attempt on Viktor Orban,” which would “shift the perception of the campaign out of the rational realm of socioeconomic questions into an emotional one.” The inspiration is obvious: the assassination attempt on Trump in 2024 sharply boosted his ratings. But that’s not the most interesting part. According to European security services, Hungarian Foreign Minister Szijjártó regularly called Lavrov right during breaks in EU meetings and provided “live reports” on the negotiations, the parties’ positions, and possible decisions. In other words, Russia wasn’t “trying to gain access to information.” It already had it. Right at the table. “Every single E.U. meeting for years has basically had Moscow behind the table,” the publication quotes a representative of a European security service. Meanwhile, Szijjártó made 16 official visits to Moscow after the start of the full-scale invasion. But it is important to understand: this is not a Hungarian peculiarity and not a coincidence. It is the Kremlin’s systematic work over decades—within the EU and NATO. During the war in Georgia, Sarkozy was in constant contact with Medvedev and coordinated positions. The result was an agreement that effectively preserved the Russian occupation. After his chancellorship, Schröder joined Gazprom and Rosneft — this was a telling slap in the face and confirmation of Russia’s institutionalized influence on European energy policy. Berlusconi promoted Putin’s interests within the EU for years and also acted as an informant. Fico deserves a separate mention. The Prime Minister of Slovakia, who “miraculously” survived an assassination attempt in 2024, became an even more outspoken conduit for Kremlin narratives after his recovery. He blocks aid to Ukraine, travels to Moscow to pay homage, parrots Putin’s talking points word for word—and yet remains the prime minister of an EU and NATO member state. An interesting coincidence: after the assassination attempt, his approval ratings also rose. The question of “whether there are Kremlin agents in the EU and NATO” is no longer relevant. They exist. The question is: at what level and how many of them are there? Because when a minister from an EU member state calls Lavrov after every meeting—that’s no longer infiltration. That’s integration. And the worst part of this story isn’t even Orbán or Szijjártó. It’s that the system tolerates it. For years, the EU has been “expressing concern” while Russia literally sits at their negotiating table. And until this logic changes—the Kremlin won’t need to “break through the defenses.” It’s already open from the inside.

NEW for @newlinesmag, @ChrisOsieck and I investigated a March 5 air strike on an EMS base and recreational area in Zibashahr Park, Shiraz. 20 people were reportedly killed, including 3 medical workers. A review of post-strike videos and images, along with satellite imagery and mapping data, shows that this civilian park was directly hit, raising questions about whether the incident was a case of mistaken targeting. newlinesmag.com/spotlight/airs…

Knowing about the world is not a luxury. It is a necessity. After layoffs at @washingtonpost now AFP wants to reduce expatriate positions by 2/3. Don’t be surprised: Soon activists and lobbyists, living comfortably in the West, will replace foreign correspondents reporting from crisis regions. It’s already happening. lemonde.fr/en/opinion/art…

Picked up my notebook this morning — full of notes from a recent reporting trip — and got hit with another wave of grief over all the stories that now won't be told. I'm looking for work, preferably in Kyiv, should anyone need a dogged, empathetic reporter. DM/email.

SCOOP: A US disaster response firm submitted a plan to White House officials that would guarantee 300% profits and a seven-year monopoly over a new trucking and logistics plan for #Gaza @AramRoston and I report on the draft and its cash potential --> theguardian.com/world/2026/feb…

1) What “All schools are ready and we want our students to come back…however we are still closed to students.”?!? Then open up the schools!

Absolutely bewildering that @MCPS is closing schools tomorrow, eight days after the storm. Hard to see this as anything but a failure on multiple levels of government. Kids need to be in school.

here is their story washingtonpost.com/investigations…

Notable from the NTSB chair today. While no one at the FAA did this work, the Washington Post did. Days after the crash, ⁦@byaaroncdavis⁩ ⁦@Blaskey_S⁩ and ⁦@abtran⁩ calculated the space between an approach to 33 and route 4 — key to gauging risk at our airport.

some (rare) good news for the journalism industry: The Philadelphia Inquirer is profitable inquirer.com/opinion/commen…

The @WaysandMeansGOP held a hearing on the impact of rising health care costs on patients and families.  We have to have serious reform of health insurers, pharmacy benefit managers, and their subsidiaries to reduce the cost of healthcare.

Once you grasp this, and understand also that our elected content creators and their staff are also massive content consumers, everything happening now from New York to Minnesota to Greenland becomes comprehensible. The entire political economy runs on dopamine hits now.

Incredible censorship here — you must pledge only to report what the Pentagon wants you to report and do no original news gathering…

JD Vance's prior positions included a natalist agenda (much bigger CTC, free childbirths), greater skepticism of Wall Street (fees on credit cards, penalties for executives of failed banks), and opposition to large federal health care cuts It’s hard to see that vision reflected in the current GOP tax bill

Open-source researchers including @Osinttechnical, @thenewarea51 and @vcdgf555 were the first to spot the B-2 mission shortly before midnight Central Time on Friday. Refueling patterns indicated the B-2s were likely taking off with heavy payloads #link-RTUSAVDFKJCZXEK376NZRFAUR4" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">washingtonpost.com/world/2025/06/…

NEW: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth directed the installation of Signal on a computer in his Pentagon office, illustrating the extent to which he integrated use of the unclassified platform at the center of his political troubles with the secure systems the U.S. government uses.

Still seeing a lot of people suggesting that DOGE remains a largely inconsequential effort/big show that in practice does little but squander Trump's political capital. (This is how I read @mattyglesias today, but he can correct me if I'm misreading.) I could be wrong, of course, but I think the idea that DOGE is going to end up reflecting typically ineffectual presidential EOs has a high likelihood of being wrong, and that its ultimate impact is likely quiet substantial, though we don't know yet for sure Just to take some recent examples: DOGE is providing the groundwork for a massive reduction of staff at the IRS (some reporting says 50%, tho we are getting conflicting info there). It appears to have played a key role in shredding USAID. DOGE appears to be currently putting to market huge numbers of federal buildings. It is reshaping the civil service to be far more compliant with Trump's directives. It has targeted scores of Education Department changes. Its allies have suggested cutting SSA staff by 50%. It's worth stressing these things are really just in their early days. The latest guidance from OMB, working with DOGE, calls for large-scale layoffs of federal workers beyond the hundreds of thousands we have already seen the admin attempt to push out. They're aiming to eliminate hundreds if not thousands of federal functions, and implement an enormous reduction in the size and capacity of federal personnel. Every reporter thinks what they cover is the most important thing, and I'm clearly no exception lol. But DOGE still seems to me to be far likelier to be a very big deal than not

USAID security leaders on leave after trying to keep Musk's DOGE from classified info, officials say apnews.com/article/doge-m…