Buckle up because this morning’s newsletter has a lot: love letters, a catering truck escape, and a security clearance she avoided for over a year. How one small dig from a senator blew up into a week of scrutiny over Natalie Harp, the aide standing closer to Trump than almost anyone in his orbit.
A new House report puts a $1.7 billion price tag on Trump’s pardons, money that should have gone to crime victims and instead lined the pockets of convicted allies who donated big and lobbied hard. Tens of thousands of Indiana residents are marking nine straight days without power today, throwing out spoiled food and sleeping without air conditioning as patience wears thin. And a full rundown of today’s other news, from the administration gutting legal aid for over 20,000 migrant children while building new facilities to detain them, to deportation flights landing in Haiti and Liberia, to tornadoes tearing through the Northeast, to a beef deal that quietly admits Trump’s own tariffs drove prices up in the first place.
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Here’s the news:
Let’s get into it.
Natalie Harp:
Trump’s West Wing exploded over a small dig from Sen. Jon Ossoff, who mocked Trump for preferring to “travel with Natalie” on his “flying palace” rather than do his job as the Iran war drags on. Communications director Steven Cheung and spokesman Davis Ingle responded with vulgar, personal attacks on Ossoff, calling him a “cuck loser” and a “feminine theatre kid.” When CNN’s Kristen Holmes asked Trump about the comment directly, he snapped “be quiet” at her, and the official White House Rapid Response account then attacked her personally, saying her future children would be “sickened and embarrassed” by her question. The disproportionate reaction backfired, turning a passing jab into days of sustained national coverage of who Natalie Harp actually is. Trump allies, including one of his sons and a Cabinet member, rushed to publicly defend her, which only fueled more scrutiny.
Natalie Harp, 35, is a former OAN host turned Oval Office gatekeeper, so close to Trump that aides nicknamed her the “Human Printer” for constantly handing him printouts of favorable news and polling. She was one of only a handful of aides who fled with Trump in a catering truck during a security scare in Turkey this summer, leaving even the Secretary of State behind on what became a decoy plane. Two sources told MS NOW she declined for over a year to complete the standard SF-86 security clearance paperwork required of West Wing staff, with Trump himself eventually intervening before she finally completed it in recent months. National security officials and White House staff have separately raised concerns that her unusually close, round-the-clock access gives her more exposure to sensitive information than nearly any other senior official, and that she feeds Trump unvetted material that plays to his worst instincts. The White House insists she “has a security clearance like everyone else” and is simply a “loyal and hardworking” aide.
The Daily Beast, drawing on letters supplied to Trump biographer Michael Wolff, published two intimate notes Harp wrote to Trump in 2023 after a golf trip to Scotland and Ireland, when she was 31 and he was 76. In them she calls him her “Guardian and Protector,” says she envies women “whose only job seems to be to talk with you and look pretty” and wants that job herself, and repeatedly describes herself as “unworthy” of him. She apologizes at length for minor mishaps on the trip and signs off “With all my heart, Natalie” and “Always, Natalie.”
Wolff says the letters were discovered and circulated by campaign staff alarmed at how close Harp was getting to Trump, calling the dynamic “not a relationship that should exist in a professional setting.” Harp’s estranged brother has separately told CNN he believes she has an “unhealthy obsession” with the president, while the White House dismissed the coverage as “Trump-Deranged” media noise. Here is the second letter:
Pardons:
A new House Judiciary Committee Democratic report, from ranking member Rep. Jamie Raskin, finds Trump’s pardons have wiped out $1.7 billion in court-ordered restitution and fines owed to crime victims, calling it a “massive redistribution of wealth in favor of convicted criminals.” It highlights former Nikola CEO Trevor Milton, pardoned before a judge could rule on nearly $700 million in restitution, after Milton and his wife donated over $1.8 million to pro-Trump committees; fraudster Jason Galanis, whose victims lost over $80 million in restitution, and who then unsuccessfully tried to reclaim $2 million he’d already repaid; and Ozy Media’s Carlos Watson, pardoned en route to prison, wiping out $37 million owed to defrauded investors. The report also cites roughly $3 million in forgiven restitution owed by January 6th rioters and clemency for former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez, convicted of drug trafficking conspiracy, who allegedly cultivated ties to people “in President Trump’s orbit.” You can see the full amounts below in this spreadsheet:
The committee argues Trump has “demolished” a traditionally nonpartisan pardon system, partly by firing U.S. Pardon Attorney Liz Oyer in 2025 and replacing her with Trump ally Ed Martin, whom Oyer has called an “ideological extremist” so unqualified the Senate previously tanked his nomination for U.S. Attorney for D.C. The report accuses Trump of letting clemency flow to “high-bidding,” deep-pocketed convicts who lobbied through or enriched Trump allies and attorneys, and of recipients securing pardons by flattering Trump or paying people close to him. Democrats note the irony that House Republicans have made “fighting fraud” a talking point to justify immigration crackdowns and cuts to health care and food assistance, while Trump pardons convicted fraudsters wholesale. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Judiciary Committee Democrats, currently in the minority, say they’re seeking control of the panel after the 2026 midterms, which would let them issue subpoenas, hold hearings, and depose witnesses over the pardons. The report frames the findings as evidence of systemic self-dealing rather than isolated clemency decisions. It’s part of a broader pattern of Democratic oversight reports building a paper trail ahead of a possible change in House control.
Indiana Power:
Tens of thousands of residents in northwest Indiana, particularly Gary, entered a ninth straight day without power on Thursday following the deadly August 11 storm, throwing out spoiled food, lining up for hot meals, and hunting for places to charge phones, with Northern Indiana Public Service Co. reporting 68,000 customers still out, mostly in Lake County, and full restoration not expected in some areas like Gary until Tuesday. Community resilience researcher Courtney Page-Tan warned that health risks compound with each passing day, from carbon monoxide poisoning tied to poorly ventilated generators to medical devices losing charge and spoiled refrigerated food, while local voices described mounting exhaustion: hairstylist Shatiya Hardin said her Gary neighborhood is “always in survival mode” but that patience is wearing thin nine days in, and East Chicago resident Kevin Mejia has been sleeping on the floor without air conditioning while fielding hundreds of requests for food and help from neighbors, especially the elderly. The outages have also closed schools across the region, including Gary’s roughly 4,300-student district since August 13 and Portage Township Schools, which delayed its start to August 25 over downed trees and safety concerns, a disruption Page-Tan said hits paycheck-to-paycheck families hardest when parents miss work for lack of childcare.
About 250 miles southeast in Columbus, Ohio, heavy rain dumped more than 3 inches in 12 hours on Thursday, triggering flash flooding that swamped roadways just as the city was still cleaning up from severe weekend storms. First responders rescued two women trapped on foot in a flooded creek and saved a 12-year-old boy who was swept off a bridge while riding his bicycle in high water, according to Fire Division Lieutenant Nick Davis. Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther said the city has been “all hands on deck supporting residents since last week” and is now shifting focus to recovery despite what he called “this curveball from Mother Nature.” NIPSCO, the Indiana utility, separately described the storm damage in its territory as “unprecedented and widespread,” noting that neighboring Illinois, served by a different utility with fewer trees and some buried power lines, recovered from the same storm system much faster.
Other news:
CNN sources say Trump joked that aide Natalie Harp, dubbed the “human printer,” could replace outgoing press secretary Karoline Leavitt, and on Thursday night he posted an AI-generated image of himself at the press podium captioned “The Best Press Secretary.” Sources say political commentator Scott Jennings has emerged as the frontrunner for the job and reportedly met chief of staff Susie Wiles at a D.C. steakhouse, though he was coy when CNN asked him about it directly. A White House official told CNN “it feels like her and Susie are the only people holding this place together sometimes,” referring to Leavitt, underscoring anxiety over her exit. Jennings has separately defended Harp against criticism from Sen. Jon Ossoff, telling Politico “somebody needs to defend her honor” since she “never put her name on a ballot.”
The US deported over 160 people to Haiti on Thursday, the first flight since the Supreme Court let the administration end TPS for roughly 350,000 Haitians. The plane landed in Cap-Haïtien rather than Port-au-Prince, since the capital’s airport is under a flight ban and gangs control an estimated 70% of the city, and many deportees covered their faces out of fear of being targeted. Arrivals included both TPS holders and Haitians who’d served US prison sentences, and were sent off with as little as $65; one man, deported after 19 years in prison for a crime he denies, told the AP he left Haiti at age 5 and has family in New York, but “ICE just sent me here.” Haiti’s government says it isn’t requesting these returns, and activists warn the country — where gang violence has displaced 1.5 million people and killed over 3,100 people this year — has no real capacity to absorb them, especially with 140,000+ more already deported there from the Dominican Republic alone.
The Trump administration let a federal contract funding legal aid for over 20,000 unaccompanied migrant children expire July 31, replacing the nearly 100-organization network with a $20 million deal with US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants and a $158 million contract with Our Rescue, a group founded by an ex-ICE agent accused of sexual exploitation and trafficking that has no apparent immigration legal experience. Groups like Houston’s GHIRP (500 clients) and Michigan’s MIRC (withdrawing from 520 of 950 cases, laying off its 70-person team by October) are being forced to drop hundreds of child clients even as asylum interviews and court hearings get fast-tracked, and a court filing cites children as young as one appearing in court without a lawyer. Advocates say ORR has increasingly shared data with ICE that’s led to over 12,000 arrests of sponsors and parents, effectively using children as “bait,” while deportations of unaccompanied minors have tripled since Trump’s first term. The administration is simultaneously building new detention capacity specifically for children, including a proposed 3,000-bed emergency facility and a 528-bed Louisiana facility on a site with high “forever chemical” contamination, despite existing shelters running at only about 27% occupancy.
Trump this morning touted a deal to lower beef prices by cutting tariffs and easing quotas on imports (up to 300,000 metric tons tariff-free, sold 25% below market price) to address the smallest US cattle herd since 1951 (86.2 million head), but the move is also a tacit admission that his tariffs pushed those prices up in the first place, since if removing them brings prices down, imposing them must have raised them. Supporters call it relief for shoppers and breathing room for herds to rebuild, while skeptics say it just papers over deeper supply problems.
The U.S. carried out its first deportations Thursday under an agreement for Liberia to accept up to 1,200 non-Liberian deportees, sending 20 people, a mix of African, North American, South American, and Caribbean nationals, to Roberts International Airport outside Monrovia, one of the Trump administration’s largest efforts yet to deport people to countries other than their own. Liberia’s Justice Minister Natu Oswald Tweh said deportees can seek asylum there if they wish, while the State Department declined to answer specific questions about the deal but called implementing the administration’s immigration policies a “top priority,” and Homeland Security declined to confirm the flight “for operational security reasons.”
A man dressed as Darth Vader addressed San Diego’s Public Safety Committee on August 19 to satirize the city’s 550+ Flock license plate readers, which track vehicles’ movements, makes, models, and even bumper stickers. He joked about using the surveillance network to follow children and hunt down Luke Skywalker in his X-Wing, with council members playing along and calling him “Darth Vader” throughout. The stunt landed amid a real debate over the technology, with supporters crediting it for recovering stolen cars and aiding investigations, while critics warn of privacy invasions and potential misuse by officers. It’s part of a broader nationwide reckoning over license plate reader surveillance that the costume was clearly designed to needle.
Ukrainian intelligence official Maj. Gen. Vadym Skibitskiy says the roughly 8,500 North Korean troops now in Russia include a new drone unit of about 400 operators capable of striking targets inside Ukraine, and Putin may ask Kim Jong Un for up to 50,000 more troops when the two meet in September. North Korea has also supplied at least 150 KN-23/24 ballistic missiles (40 delivered so far, including two suspected in a July 30 strike that killed four children) plus roughly 90 personnel to help with launches, in exchange for Russian air defense systems like the S-400 and a Pantsir-1 launcher already received.
Third-country deportation agreements are often deliberately opaque, with migrants sometimes sent to countries they’ve never set foot in or where they face safety risks; per Third Country Deportation Watch, the administration has struck such deals with at least 35 countries, including 14 in Africa, and deported more than 23,000 people to 26 countries under these arrangements, though Liberia’s own six-page agreement from September 2025 doesn’t specify numbers or nationalities. The deal is also central to the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran man mistakenly deported to a Salvadoran prison, whom the administration has vowed to send to Liberia after being blocked from returning him to El Salvador; Abrego Garcia says he’d accept deportation to Costa Rica instead, which has agreed to take him, but the government hasn’t acted on that option, and he’s now fighting the Liberia deportation in federal court in Maryland.
Cameroon’s 93-year-old President Paul Biya, the world’s oldest head of state, returned to Yaoundé on Thursday after more than 10 weeks abroad, the longest recorded absence of his 44-year presidency, having left in June for what his office called “a brief private stay in Europe” that fueled speculation about his health and a possible power vacuum. Biya, who began his eighth term after a widely disputed October election that triggered protests leaving at least 16 people dead, was not shown deplaning or holding any briefings, appearing only to wave to supporters from his vehicle as close collaborators awaited him at the airport. Cameroon has no constitutional bar on a president leaving for months, but with no vice president, an office Biya alone controls filling, opposition figures say the country has effectively been run on “autopilot” in his absence; parliament reinstated the vice presidency in April, though critics called the move a power grab since Biya can appoint or dismiss the deputy and define the role’s authority at will. His nearly half-century in power has coincided with Boko Haram insurgency in the north, separatist conflict in the west, and a stagnant economy, leaving much of the population, more than 70% of which is under 35, disillusioned with a leader older than almost all of them.
Severe storms and possible tornadoes tore through the Northeast on Thursday, with a likely tornado ripping through Atlantic Beach on Long Island's outer barrier, destroying a beach club and littering the shoreline with debris, prompting Nassau County to declare a state of emergency, though officials reported no serious injuries or deaths. Flash flooding closed part of the Long Island Expressway in Queens and stranded dozens of drivers, while in Jersey City, New Jersey, emergency crews used inflatable boats to rescue 69 people trapped in flooded cars. A likely tornado also struck Dover, Delaware, causing significant damage, downing trees and power lines, and knocking out electricity to more than 1,000 customers, though police reported no serious injuries there either. The National Weather Service said it couldn't immediately confirm a tornado at the Long Island beach but had warned of waterspouts in the area, and meteorologists expected the storm system to move offshore and taper off through the evening.
A charter Cessna 441 crashed Thursday at the remote Cape Newenham Long Range Radar Site Airport, about 450 miles west of Anchorage, killing all eight people aboard, two pilots and six passengers, after taking off from Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport; the aircraft was operated by Anchorage-based Security Aviation under a civilian contract, and search and rescue teams confirmed no survivors after landing near the site. U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Robert Davis called it “a devastating loss for our military family and the communities we serve,” while Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, who said she’s flown with Security Aviation extensively and knows many of its pilots, offered condolences and thanked the Coast Guard, NTSB, Alaska State Troopers, and Rescue Coordination Center for their response; the names of those killed will be released 24 hours after next of kin are notified.
Karmelo Anthony’s attorneys are seeking a new trial after the 19-year-old was sentenced to 35 years for fatally stabbing 17-year-old Austin Metcalf during a bleacher confrontation at a Texas high school track meet last year, arguing that an off-the-record agreement between both sides to withhold inflammatory evidence, including a text where Anthony fantasized about stabbing someone and Metcalf’s history of fighting and using racist language, tainted the June trial. Defense attorney Russell Wilson also alleged the original judge ran a “shadow docket” that improperly shielded character evidence “off the record, at an astonishing clip,” while prosecutor Bill Wirskye defended the trial as fair, noting Anthony’s own original attorneys agreed to the arrangement and that Anthony, who is Black, “went there that day spoiling for a fight” against Metcalf, who was white, having withheld evidence of Anthony’s own obsession with weapons in exchange. The case has drawn intense national attention and racial framing on social media despite both sides maintaining race wasn’t the cause, alongside threats against the original trial judge, fabricated autopsy reports circulating online, and witness intimidation attempts. Anthony already won one procedural victory this week when Judge Michael Chitty replaced Judge John Roach, who had been removed partly over a TV interview in which he said jurors “got it right,” and Chitty will now decide whether to grant the retrial, with the hearing set to continue Friday.
See you soon.
— Aaron
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