Johnny Boot

New: Tulsi Gabbard told Trump in February she did not support a clean FISA reauth. Helps explain while she’s largely been MIA as White House tries to sell skeptical lawmakers on the program. Screenshot below from POLITICO’s Morning Cyber:

Today, Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger announced L3Harris is expanding its operations with a more than $1.2 billion investment in Orange County. Spanberger's husband works for L3Harris. According to the governor's press release, "Governor Spanberger approved two grants of $12.5 million and $500,000 from the Commonwealth’s Opportunity Fund to assist Orange County with the projects. The Governor also approved a performance-based grant of $5 million from the Virginia Investment Performance Grant, an incentive that encourages continued capital investment by existing Virginia companies. Funding and services to support L3Harris’ employee training activities will be provided through the Virginia Jobs Investment Program."

It's fascinating to see what social media reveals about a person before they become the Pope. Before he became Pope Leo XIV, Cardinal Robert Prevost was on Twitter trashing Trump, criticizing Vance, calling for open borders, promoting COVID vaccines, endorsing stricter gun control, and tweeting after George Floyd: "We need to hear more from leaders in the Church, to reject racism and seek justice." The account was deleted the day he was elected.

So the Pope met with David Axelrod last week. David Axelrod. Obama's campaign architect. A man who is not Catholic, has never met a pope before, and whose entire career has been engineering political narratives for the American left. And then, by pure coincidence, the Pope immediately started lobbing shots at the Trump administration, and three US Cardinals popped up on 60 Minutes doing the same thing. All organically, I'm sure. I'm a practicing Catholic. I need you to understand that part. But in my opinion, Trump has all the right to lash out at him. Maybe you'll disagree, but in the end, Trump talks like Trump. Water is wet. I'm talking about MY Church being run like a DNC satellite office but with a golden throne. This is the same Vatican that watched governments padlock churches during COVID and said nothing. That let Biden take communion while funding abortion and said nothing. That fired Bishop Strickland for defending actual Church doctrine. That removed Bishop Fernández in Puerto Rico for defending religious exemptions THE CATECHISM ITSELF supports. But somehow Trump is the threat to human dignity. Pope Francis was bad. Leo has turned out to be worse. Francis at least was vague about his politics. Leo went and hired the consulting firm. The man has ignored the slaughter of Christians across Nigeria, the Sahel, India, Syria, Bangladesh, Pakistan. Hundreds of believers murdered, churches burned, pastors kidnapped. His response? Platitudes about dialogue. OF COURSE he won't even name who's doing the killing. But he'll fly across continents to make interfaith gestures the week after his people coordinated a media hit on a sitting US president. The weaponization of belief is obvious. You get the Pope to pick a fight with Trump, and suddenly millions of conservative Catholics have to choose between their faith and their vote.

So the Pope met with David Axelrod last week. David Axelrod. Obama's campaign architect. A man who is not Catholic, has never met a pope before, and whose entire career has been engineering political narratives for the American left. And then, by pure coincidence, the Pope immediately started lobbing shots at the Trump administration, and three US Cardinals popped up on 60 Minutes doing the same thing. All organically, I'm sure. I'm a practicing Catholic. I need you to understand that part. But in my opinion, Trump has all the right to lash out at him. Maybe you'll disagree, but in the end, Trump talks like Trump. Water is wet. I'm talking about MY Church being run like a DNC satellite office but with a golden throne. This is the same Vatican that watched governments padlock churches during COVID and said nothing. That let Biden take communion while funding abortion and said nothing. That fired Bishop Strickland for defending actual Church doctrine. That removed Bishop Fernández in Puerto Rico for defending religious exemptions THE CATECHISM ITSELF supports. But somehow Trump is the threat to human dignity. Pope Francis was bad. Leo has turned out to be worse. Francis at least was vague about his politics. Leo went and hired the consulting firm. The man has ignored the slaughter of Christians across Nigeria, the Sahel, India, Syria, Bangladesh, Pakistan. Hundreds of believers murdered, churches burned, pastors kidnapped. His response? Platitudes about dialogue. OF COURSE he won't even name who's doing the killing. But he'll fly across continents to make interfaith gestures the week after his people coordinated a media hit on a sitting US president. The weaponization of belief is obvious. You get the Pope to pick a fight with Trump, and suddenly millions of conservative Catholics have to choose between their faith and their vote.