MOTHER JONES – Politics | Politics & Government

After 23 years of war and occupation, the last US soldiers officially left Iraq on Wednesday, Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell announced in a statement on the “successful conclusion” of operations against the Islamic State organization in Iraq. The war, launched on false claims that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, led to hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths and cost, conservatively, more than a trillion dollars (though tallying government war funding, like counting the dead, can be difficult). In 2002, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld confidently predicted that the war would be short: “I can’t tell you if the use of force in Iraq today would last five days or five weeks or five months. But it certainly isn’t going to last any longer than that.” US troops have withdrawn from Iraq at least twice before. After the Bush administration launched the war in 2003, US troops formally withdrew from Iraq in 2011. George W. Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” banner was, reportedly, packed up and sent to his presidential library. At the time, one military analyst called the whole thing the “least effective war for oil in American history.” But it wasn’t over yet: the US military ramped up its presence in 2014 under “Operation Inherent Resolve” to combat ISIS. Mother Jones maintained a “We’re Still At War” daily series between roughly 2009 and 2014. US soldiers stayed in the country for the rest of the decade, and beyond, until their “combat role” in the country ended in 2021. Even then, about 2,500 US soldiers remained stationed in Iraq as “military advisers.” Today, all those troops, too, are gone. “A new phase has begun, characterized by Iraq’s sovereignty, the strength of its institutions, the readiness of its forces, the unity of its decision-making, and balanced partnerships with its friends,” Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi said in a statement. [TheTopNews] Read More.

On July 3, the “Wings of Freedom” demonstrations over the National Mall featured three hours’ worth of aerial entertainment cooked up by the Trump administration as part of the America 250 celebration. There were parachute teams, the Air Force Thunderbirds, fighter jets, helicopters, and a “tri-bomber” formation that included a B-2 stealth bomber. On Independence Day, military aircraft flew over DC every 18 minutes for nine straight hours. For some people watching the show, it was a glorious display of American military power and aviation prowess. For many who live here, though, it was a form of “noise terrorism,” according to one TikToker, who likened the celebration to living in a war zone. During these nonstop military flyovers, locals shared stories online of pets hiding under the couch, night workers losing sleep, and the roar of low-flying aircraft setting off car alarms. Some complained that the jets recalled the terror of 9/11 after the plane hit the Pentagon. “Why are we having so many jets scorching over DC?” posted New York Times reporter Lulu Garcia Navarro during the July 3 display. “Nerve-wracking. I get 250 celebrations but it feels like the apocalypse.” Why are we having so many jets scorching over DC? Nerve-wracking. I get 250 celebrations but it feels like the apocalypse.— Lulu NYT (@LuluGNavarro) July 3, 2026 Enduring the occasional jet flyover comes with living in the Nation’s Capital. But none of those regular episodes compares with the martial air traffic Trump has inflicted on the city since taking office last year. “We’ve long had the ceremonial flyovers for funerals at Arlington National Cemetery,” says former local traffic reporter Dave Statter, who tracks aviation activity on his website. “But the Trump administration has brought in a new flyover era.” “We’ve long had the ceremonial flyovers for funerals at Arlington National Cemetery, but the Trump administration has brought in a new flyover era.” In previous administrations, the military flyover “was treated as an exception rather than the rule,” says Leon Panetta, a former member of Congress from California who served as both Defense secretary and CIA director during the Obama administration. “That doesn’t seem to be the case anymore.” Trump, who escaped the Vietnam War draft by claiming to be hobbled by bone spurs, has long shown a fascination with military hardware. He began deploying it for his own entertainment almost as soon as he took… [TheTopNews] Read More.

Editor’s note: This post originally appeared on author Garrett Graff’s Doomsday Scenario, which you can subscribe to here. Back in April, I wrote a column about what seemed-then to be the ongoing unraveling of FBI Director Kash Patel, the thirsty MAGA-influencer-turned-chief-law-enforcement-official who partied hard at the Olympics, protects his girlfriend with an FBI SWAT team, and has no competent staff around him to advise him not to fly the FBI’s jet to a hunting camp known literally as “Boondoggle Ranch.” The swirl of scandal around Patel seemed like it would imminently end his career, but the Trump administration’s depth and breadth of scandal is such that Patel was able to fade into the background for a few months as others took center-stage. Instead, Trump spent the spring cashiering all the high-profile women in his national security team — attorney general Pam Bondi, DHS secretary Kristi Noem, and director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, and then spent the summer dodging the possible impeachment of defense secretary Pete Hegseth. In the last two weeks, though, Patel has roared back to the headlines with a series of scandals — two of which appear to be reaching an apex this week, today even — that underscore the dangerous discord and disorganization at the FBI under his leadership. Let’s take a look, shall we? Scandal #1: Personnel Hacked. In what might turn out to be the gravest intelligence breach of the FBI in history — and perhaps one of the worst in all of US history — a criminal hacking group is claiming to have compromised the bureau’s hiring and personnel records. The group, known as ShinyHunters, appears to have “exfiltrated” data on perhaps tens of thousands of current and former FBI employees, both agents and not, perhaps even effectively everyone who has been hired by the bureau in recent years. “We hacked the FBI. We hold data on all FBI employees and applicants,” the group told 404 Media. The threat of a breach this massive is almost incalculable — and could destroy or undermine a generation of agents who work undercover or on assignments like counterintelligence. It’s not entirely clear what the breach includes, but preliminary information from the hackers seems to indicate it includes everything from home addresses and Social Security numbers to potentially even medical records. News organizations like 404 Media have been able to authenticate that at least some of the data… [TheTopNews] Read More.

A new poll from the Associated Press and KFF shows that while half of rural voters support the Trump administration’s Make America Healthy Again policies, most also say those policies have not benefited their communities. About 7 out of 10 rural voters went for Donald Trump in the 2024 election. But now, about 8 out of 10 rural voters polled say the administration’s healthcare platform—which includes abandoning long-standing vaccine policies, researching ultraprocessed foods, criticizing Big Ag, and promoting a red-meat-heavy diet—has “had a negative effect or no impact on the health of people where they live,” according to the AP/KFF poll of 2,241 rural voters, released today. 68 percent of those who self-identified as MAHA supporters agreed: while they support Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his MAHA platform, it isn’t making them healthier. At Mother Jones, we’ve been tracking the fractures in the Make America Healthy Again movement in partnership with the Food & Environment Reporting Network. Read more below. Women Built MAHA. MAGA Bros Have Taken It Over.Forget regulating food—manly MAHA cares about meat, testosterone, and erectile dysfunction. The California Lawmaker Forcing Big Food to Clean Up Its ActWhile DC dithers, Jesse Gabriel has quietly become America’s de facto food safety chief. Zach Lahn Is MAHA’s Great Farm Country Hope. Is He the Populist Hero He Claims to Be?He’s running for Iowa governor on promises to bust up Big Ag. But some farmers are questioning his authenticity. [TheTopNews] Read More.

This story is part of the Life After Roe package, appearing this week, which looks at the surprising resilience of the abortion access movement in the Dobbs era—and at how hardliners are doubling down on their efforts to ban abortion nationwide. When Lena walks into the cafe near an airport somewhere outside the US, she looks like any other traveler grabbing a cup of coffee before a flight. She orders a drink and picks a table out of earshot of other patrons, keeping her suitcase close by her side. In the clandestine world of underground abortion activists, Lena—not her real name—is a courier. The trips she takes abroad—we can’t say where—are supply runs to pick up generic versions of mifepristone and misoprostol, the two drugs that make up the standard medication abortion regimen. Soon, another traveler—her supplier—approaches her table, also dragging a suitcase. After a few minutes, the supplier heads to the bathroom, toting both their bags, and transfers abortion medication into Lena’s. Back at the table, neither has another pressing appointment, so they linger and chat. “It’s almost like we could be medical people discussing innovations and research,” Lena says. “It is nice to nerd out in safe places with safe people, because no one in my real life knows what I do.” Lena will sneak the pills back into the US, where they will be distributed to community support networks, a modern version of the underground feminist activists who helped women get abortions before Roe v. Wade. Since Roe’s overturning, these grassroots groups have sent abortion meds—for free—to tens of thousands of women who struggle to access care through mainstream channels, including minors, undocumented immigrants, and pregnant women past the first trimester. Unlike telemedicine providers who practice under blue-state shield laws, community networks operate outside the legal and medical systems. “It really doesn’t matter what [state and federal authorities] do legally—we will continue,” Lena says, adding, “there may come a time where we are one of the only, if not the only, option for the nation.” As the signs of an impending crackdown on aboveground abortion-pill providers become increasingly ominous, Lena and her fellow activists are stockpiling the medication—building relationships with new suppliers, devising new ways to get pills into the country, and sending more couriers on more supply runs around the world. “It’s kind of a let’s-take-matters-into-your-own-hands situation. No one’s coming to save us; we have to save ourselves.” “We’ve… [TheTopNews] Read More.