Buckley Carlson is stepping down as Vice President JD Vance's deputy press secretary to launch a political consulting firm, a move that lands squarely in the middle of a bitter public feud between his father and President Trump.
The younger Carlson, described as a twenty-something staffer who has served in Vance's press office since the start of the second Trump administration, is joining a wave of White House alumni heading for the private sector. Politico first reported the departure, noting that Buckley had planned to leave the vice president's office last year but stayed on for transition purposes.
No one in the administration has publicly tied Buckley's exit to the escalating clash between Tucker Carlson and Trump. But the timing is hard to ignore. The departure comes against the backdrop of weeks of sharp, personal exchanges between the president and the elder Carlson, the kind of public rupture that puts staffers in an impossible position.
Earlier this month, Trump posted a lengthy attack on Tucker Carlson, writing:
"Flailing Fools like Tucker Carlson, who couldn't even finish College, he was a broken man when he got fired from Fox, and he's never been the same, Perhaps he should see a good psychiatrist!"
On Friday, Trump escalated further on Truth Social, linking to a CNN segment by data analyst Harry Enten that suggested the president was winning the feud in the court of public opinion. Trump added his own commentary, as the New York Post reported:
"Tucker is a Low IQ person, Always easy to beat, and highly overrated."
The 56-year-old Carlson, for his part, has spent months criticizing the administration without always naming the president directly. He blamed allies including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for grievances related to the conflict with Iran and privately lobbied Trump against military action there.
That private lobbying gave way to public dissent. In a BBC interview earlier this month, Tucker Carlson said he was "horrified" by Trump's declaration that "a whole civilization will die tonight" if Iran did not agree to a deal. And in a separate appearance on Newsmax, Carlson went further, saying:
"I've always liked Trump and still feel sorry for him, as I do for all slaves."
Carlson claimed Trump "can't make his own decisions" and is "hemmed in by other forces." Those are extraordinary statements from a figure who was, until recently, one of the most prominent voices in Trump's media orbit.
Before joining Vance's office, Buckley Carlson served as deputy chief of staff for then-Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana in 2019. His move to the vice president's press shop placed him at the center of an administration his father was increasingly willing to criticize in public.
Vance himself has remained conspicuously quiet about the Trump-Carlson feud. The vice president has not been quoted commenting on the dispute or on his staffer's departure. That silence may be strategic, Vance occupies a position that requires loyalty to Trump while maintaining relationships across the broader conservative coalition, including with media figures like Tucker Carlson who helped elevate his national profile. Vance's 2028 ambitions depend on keeping both lanes open.
The feud has also exposed fault lines in the conservative media world. Trump sided with radio host Mark Levin against Carlson, Megyn Kelly, and Candace Owens in what amounted to a factional split among right-leaning podcasters and commentators. Trump called Tucker "kooky" after the pundit criticized Operation Midnight Hammer, the administration's military strikes on Iran.
For Buckley Carlson, the professional calculus was straightforward enough. Staying in a press role where your father is publicly feuding with your boss's boss is untenable. Launching a consulting firm gives him distance from a conflict he did not start and cannot resolve.
Buckley is not the only staffer heading for the exits. He joins several other White House alumni who have departed for private-sector work since the start of the second Trump administration. The names of those other departures were not disclosed, but the pattern suggests a normal cycle of staff turnover, accelerated, perhaps, by the political turbulence surrounding the administration's foreign policy decisions and internal media disputes.
The vice president's office, meanwhile, faces the practical task of replacing a press staffer during a period when the administration is drawing intense scrutiny. Vance has navigated other politically uncomfortable moments, including conceding that the administration mishandled the Epstein files rollout. How he manages the fallout from the Carlson departure, and whether he addresses the underlying feud, will say something about his political instincts.
Several questions remain unanswered. No one has confirmed whether Buckley Carlson's departure was directly prompted by the feud or was simply a career move whose timing happened to coincide with it. The name of his new consulting firm has not been disclosed. And the full scope of Tucker Carlson's private lobbying against military action in Iran, who he spoke to, when, and what arguments he made, remains unreported.
Usha Vance has spoken publicly about the family's approach to political life, but neither she nor the vice president has weighed in on the personnel change. The silence from Vance's camp is telling, not because it reveals a hidden agenda, but because it confirms the obvious: there is no good public statement to make when the president and a staffer's father are trading insults on social media.
Tucker Carlson's claim that Trump "can't make his own decisions" is the kind of charge that would end most political relationships permanently. Whether it ends this one depends on whether either man decides the fight is worth more than the alliance. For Buckley Carlson, the smart play was to stop waiting for an answer and start building something of his own.
When the adults in the room can't stop fighting, the kid in the press shop does the only sensible thing, he walks out and hangs his own shingle.
The Trump administration notified Congress it will hold refugee admissions to 17,500 for fiscal year 2027, a fraction of the 125,000 target the Biden administration set, with the vast majority of slots reserved for Afrikaners facing persecution in South Africa.
The State Department sent the notice on Tuesday, just one week before the new fiscal year opens in October. The plan keeps the ceiling exactly where it landed after the administration raised it mid-year in fiscal 2026, when it declared an emergency over conditions in South Africa. That earlier ceiling had started at just 7,500, the lowest on record, before the Afrikaner carve-out pushed it to 17,500. Now that number becomes the baseline going forward, as first reported by Breitbart.
The gap between the Biden-era target and the Trump ceiling is stark: 125,000 versus 17,500. Even against the program's long-run average of roughly 92,000 admissions per year since 1980, the new cap represents a sharp reduction. During Trump's first term, admissions bottomed out at 15,000. The current figure is higher than that floor but still signals the administration's intent to keep the program narrow and selective.
The State Department notice states that admissions will "primarily be Afrikaners from South Africa." The justification, laid out in the notice itself, points to land seizures carried out without compensation, government policies that push Afrikaners out of jobs and classrooms, and rhetoric that the administration says fuels violence against them.
The notice also argues that Afrikaner arrivals will assimilate in a way that "preserves taxpayer resources for U.S. citizens", a pointed contrast with the broader refugee pipeline, which provides special federal aid for several years after arrival and access to nearly all welfare programs. The projected cost of the resettlement effort stands at $500 million.
The Afrikaner focus did not come out of nowhere. Secretary of State Marco Rubio's State Department announced visa restrictions on South African officials last week, citing uncompensated land seizures and race-based discrimination. U.S. Ambassador Brent Bozell said the visa policy is only the first step in a series of escalatory measures aimed at Pretoria.
South Africa's government has pushed back. Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola argued the visa move echoed a mischaracterization pushed by fringe groups. The office of South African President Cyril Ramaphosa asserted a sovereign right to address centuries of racial injustice, a framing that treats land reform as domestic policy, not grounds for international intervention.
The administration's broader immigration enforcement posture has drawn sharp lines on who gets in and who does not. Under the Afrikaner-first policy, applicants from Afghanistan, Sudan, the Republic of Congo, and Myanmar have been shut out of the refugee program entirely since Trump reopened it for South Africans. Those four countries had long been major sources of refugee admissions under previous administrations.
HIAS, a pro-migration organization that helps place refugees in American communities, attacked the decision. Naomi Steinberg of HIAS accused the administration of "diminishing and distorting" a four-decade legacy in service of political whims.
That criticism fits a familiar pattern. Resettlement contractors, the nonprofits paid to resettle refugees, have long defended the program's scale and scope. They cite the roughly 92,000-per-year average since 1980 as evidence the system can handle large numbers. The Trump administration's counter-argument is blunt: scale is not the same as selectivity, and taxpayers deserve a say in who arrives and at what cost.
The administration's willingness to use the refugee program as a diplomatic lever against South Africa marks a departure from how the system has traditionally operated. For decades, admissions were driven primarily by conditions on the ground in conflict zones, not by bilateral disputes between Washington and a foreign capital. The Afrikaner carve-out ties refugee policy directly to a foreign-policy confrontation, with the State Department using both visa restrictions and refugee slots to pressure Pretoria over its land-reform agenda.
The broader fight over immigration policy continues to define this administration's posture on Capitol Hill. While House Democrats have spent energy on political theatrics, the White House has moved methodically to reshape who enters the country and under what terms.
The timeline makes the policy trajectory clear. Biden's agencies set the admissions target at 125,000 in his final year. Trump took office and cut the fiscal 2026 ceiling to 7,500. Then came the South Africa emergency declaration, which more than doubled the cap to 17,500, but exclusively for Afrikaners. Now that same 17,500 figure carries forward into fiscal 2027, locking in both the reduced number and the demographic priority.
Several questions remain unanswered. The administration has not detailed the specific "unforeseen developments" in South Africa that justified the emergency declaration. It has not disclosed how many Afrikaners have already been admitted under the fiscal 2026 program. And the criteria for who qualifies as an "Afrikaner" for refugee purposes have not been made public.
Those gaps matter. A refugee program that names a specific ethnic group as its primary beneficiary invites scrutiny over how eligibility is defined and verified. The administration has made a bold bet that the Afrikaner case, land seizures, employment discrimination, targeted rhetoric, is strong enough to withstand that scrutiny.
Meanwhile, the diplomatic standoff with South Africa shows no signs of cooling. Ambassador Bozell's warning that visa restrictions are just the beginning suggests the administration is prepared to escalate further. The administration's willingness to use leverage in international negotiations has been a consistent theme, and the South Africa situation fits that pattern.
For the Afghans, Sudanese, Congolese, and Burmese applicants who had been waiting in the pipeline, the policy shift is not abstract. Their applications are frozen. The administration has made a choice about who deserves refuge in America, and for now, the answer is specific: Afrikaners facing persecution in a country whose government treats land seizures and racial preferences as instruments of justice.
Critics like some Republican members of Congress have raised concerns about the political optics of immigration enforcement broadly. But the refugee cap is a different kind of fight, one where the administration is not just reducing numbers but redirecting the entire purpose of the program toward a single population it considers persecuted and assimilable.
The refugee resettlement system has operated since 1980 as a volume-driven humanitarian pipeline. Administrations of both parties set annual ceilings, and resettlement contractors filled them with applicants from wherever the crises were worst. The Trump administration is rewriting that model. Under the new approach, the ceiling is low, the beneficiary group is named, and the stated rationale ties admissions to both persecution abroad and assimilation at home.
Whether that model holds depends on whether the Afrikaner case remains politically and legally durable. South Africa's government rejects the premise. Resettlement groups call it a distortion. And the applicants from four other countries are left with no path forward.
A government that tells taxpayers exactly who is coming, why they qualify, and what it will cost is doing something the refugee program has rarely done. That alone is worth more than another round of open-ended promises and uncapped numbers.
Outgoing Rep. Jared Golden handed Republican Rep. Mike Lawler a rare cross-party endorsement in a competitive New York House race, and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries responded by calling Lawler a "partisan hack."
Golden, a Maine Democrat who is not seeking re-election, published an op-ed on Monday backing Lawler's bid for a third term representing New York's 17th District, a swing seat in Westchester and the lower Hudson Valley that could help determine which party controls the House. Fox News Digital reported that Jeffries fired back Tuesday with a statement dismissing the endorsement as a "smoke-and-mirrors ploy" from a lawmaker whose district sits "more than 400 miles away."
The public clash exposed a growing rift inside the Democratic caucus. Golden has broken with Jeffries repeatedly in recent months, on procedural votes, on trade policy, and now on a head-to-head endorsement that directly undermines the party's effort to flip Lawler's seat. For Jeffries, the episode is the latest sign that his grip on moderate members is slipping at the worst possible time.
Golden's endorsement was not a vague gesture. He pointed to specific legislative work the two men did together, including the Northeast Lobstermen Protection Act, a bill Lawler cosponsored that passed the House floor with bipartisan support and would extend a pause on lobster industry regulations until 2035. Golden called Lawler "a true partner to me, and a friend to fishing families he will never represent."
Golden also cited at least three separate instances in which Lawler crossed the aisle, including work on restoring collective bargaining rights for federal employees affected by the Trump administration. He noted that the nonpartisan Lugar Bipartisanship Index ranked Lawler the fourth-most bipartisan member of Congress in its most recent analysis.
In his written statement, Golden framed the endorsement as a defense of the institution itself:
"I am leaving Congress in January by my own choice, but I have not given up on the institution, and voters should not either. The Congress we get is the one we elect, and the country needs fewer members who treat the job as a stage and more who treat it as work."
Golden added that Lawler holds one of just three Republican seats in the country that Kamala Harris carried in 2024, a district where voters have already shown they are willing to split tickets. "Representing districts like ours forces you to work for people who disagree with you," Golden wrote, "and it teaches you that those people are not your enemies. They are your neighbors."
Jeffries did not treat the endorsement as a polite disagreement among colleagues. His statement to Fox News Digital went directly at Lawler's character and record:
"Mike Lawler is a partisan hack and Trump sycophant who Cait Conley will defeat in November. In desperation, he is peddling an 11th-hour endorsement from a retiring congressmember who represents an out-of-town district more than 400 miles away."
Jeffries called the endorsement a "smoke-and-mirrors ploy" that would "do nothing to change the outcome of the race," insisting the election would be decided by voters in Westchester and the Hudson Valley. He praised Lawler's Democratic challenger, Cait Conley, as a "combat veteran and patriot" and claimed Lawler was "an unadulterated phony who has never shown bipartisan courage when it matters," the New York Post reported.
The tone was striking. Jeffries did not simply disagree with Golden's judgment. He treated the endorsement as an act of sabotage, a framing that says more about the pressure Democrats feel in Lawler's district than it does about a retiring congressman's op-ed.
Lawler won re-election in November 2024 even as Harris carried his district at the top of the ticket. That kind of ticket-splitting makes the seat one of the most closely watched in the country. Most projections favor Democrats in the district, but the race against Conley is considered neck-and-neck, and the outcome could affect which party holds the House majority.
That context explains why Jeffries reacted so forcefully. A cross-party endorsement from a sitting Democrat, even a retiring one, gives Lawler a bipartisan credential that is hard for attack ads to erase. Golden is not some anonymous backbencher. He held what he described as "the most challenging district of any Democrat in the country" by earning support from Democrats, independents, and Republicans alike.
Lawler responded on X by thanking Golden and emphasizing their shared belief that governing should come before partisanship:
"We share a firm belief that what's best for the people should come before one's party, and that if more members on both sides of the aisle took that approach more often, the country would be better off for it."
The endorsement did not come out of nowhere. Golden and fellow moderate Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington broke ranks with Jeffries on a procedural "rule vote", the kind of internal party-discipline measure that leadership treats as a loyalty test. They did it twice within one month.
Jeffries called the first defection a "breach of trust." The second time, the rebuke carried less weight. When a minority leader has to keep punishing the same members for the same offense, the punishment starts to look like a pattern of failure rather than a pattern of discipline.
Golden has also praised President Trump's tariff efforts, a position that put him at odds with most of his caucus. His willingness to side with Trump on trade policy signaled months ago that he was not interested in toeing the party line on his way out the door.
Golden's retirement itself undercuts one of Jeffries' talking points. His Maine district, rated R+4 by the Cook Partisan Voter Index, is widely expected to flip Republican once Golden leaves. So the same party that is trying to take Lawler's seat in New York is almost certainly going to lose Golden's seat in Maine. The net math is not as favorable as Jeffries' rhetoric suggests.
The broader trend is not limited to Golden and Perez. More than 100 House Democrats have broken with leadership on high-profile votes in recent months, a sign that Jeffries' ability to hold his caucus together is under serious strain heading into the midterms.
Strip away the rhetoric and Jeffries' statement reads like a concession that the endorsement matters. If Golden's backing were truly irrelevant, a retiring lawmaker from 400 miles away, as Jeffries put it, there would be no reason to issue a multi-paragraph attack calling Lawler a "partisan hack," a "Trump sycophant," and a "phony." You do not unload that kind of language on a threat you consider trivial.
Golden's endorsement also complicates the Democratic attack line against Lawler. Jeffries wants voters to see Lawler as an extremist who hides behind a moderate image. But Golden, a Democrat who won repeatedly in Trump country, is telling voters the opposite: that Lawler is exactly the kind of bipartisan lawmaker Congress needs. "He would rather pass a bill with the other party than score a point against it," Golden wrote, according to the Washington Examiner.
That is a harder argument for Jeffries to counter than a Republican endorsement would be. A Democrat vouching for a Republican's bipartisan credentials carries weight precisely because it costs something. Golden gains nothing from this endorsement. He is leaving. He made the call anyway.
The revolt Jeffries faces inside his own caucus is no longer a matter of one or two stray votes on procedural motions. It has escalated to a sitting Democrat actively campaigning for the other side in one of the most consequential House races in the country.
When your own members start endorsing the opposition on your home turf, the problem is not the endorsement. The problem is the leadership that made it possible.
President Trump has secured a sweeping, no-expiration agreement with Denmark and Greenland that grants the United States permanent military access and veto power over foreign activity on the island, a deal that blocks Russia and China from the Arctic and costs American taxpayers nothing.
Trump announced the agreement in a statement describing it as an "Infinite Life" deal that gives Washington "permanent control over security, and all other needs, in Greenland, completely addressing ALL of our many U.S. concerns." The three governments, the United States, Denmark, and the semi-autonomous territory of Greenland, plan to formally sign the pact at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, the New York Post reported.
The deal stops short of annexation. Denmark retains sovereignty over Greenland. But the practical effect is unmistakable: no U.S. adversary can establish a military base, station forces, or make sensitive investments on the world's largest island without express written approval from Washington.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the agreement "a huge win for the United States and the American people," saying it keeps Greenland inside North America's strategic defense perimeter while shutting the door on adversaries. Fox News noted that the deal bars China, Russia, and other non-NATO adversaries from establishing military bases or making sensitive investments on the island, a provision with immediate strategic consequences.
Greenland sits atop vast reserves of rare earth elements critical to military systems, electric vehicles, and renewable energy technology. China currently dominates more than 90 percent of global rare earth processing capacity. Locking Beijing out of Greenland's mineral wealth is not a side benefit of the deal, it is a central one.
The agreement also carries weight in the broader pattern of Trump's push to secure permanent U.S. military footholds in strategically vital regions, moving from rhetoric to binding commitments.
Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen framed the pact as a stabilizing force. Breitbart reported his remarks:
"A long period of uncertainty will hopefully be replaced by a binding agreement that strengthens security in the Arctic and North Atlantic."
That statement amounts to an acknowledgment from Copenhagen that the old arrangement, in which Denmark nominally defended Greenland but lacked the resources or will to do so against great-power competitors, was no longer tenable.
Washington plans to immediately begin building a large military presence on the island. Reports indicate three new military bases are planned for southern Greenland, a region that has seen almost no permanent U.S. military infrastructure since the Cold War drawdown. The expansion signals that the agreement is not merely a diplomatic document but the start of a concrete buildup.
Trump emphasized that the deal comes at "NO COST" to the U.S. government, a claim the Washington Examiner highlighted in its coverage. The financial terms have not been fully detailed, but the administration's framing positions the agreement as a security gain without a new spending line, a contrast to decades of defense commitments that carried enormous price tags for American taxpayers.
The deal also fits alongside other recent moves by the administration to assert U.S. control over strategic resources abroad, including Trump's pursuit of majority control over Venezuelan oil reserves.
Trump first floated the idea of acquiring Greenland during his first term, drawing ridicule from much of the media and the European political establishment. Denmark's then-prime minister called the notion "absurd." The press treated it as a punchline.
Seven years later, the punchline has a signature line at the United Nations. The agreement may not transfer territorial sovereignty, but it delivers the strategic substance Trump sought from the beginning: permanent basing rights, overflight access, veto authority over foreign military and investment activity, and a physical American presence that no future administration can easily undo.
Critics who dismissed the Greenland push as bluster now face a finished product. The deal still requires approval from Danish and Greenlandic lawmakers, and political resistance in both parliaments could slow ratification. But the framework is set, the terms are public, and both governments have signaled support.
While opponents have spent years questioning Trump's capacity and intentions, including baseless speculation about his fitness for office, the administration has continued to produce concrete policy outcomes.
Trump posted his announcement with characteristic directness:
"From now on, no US adversary can EVER have a base in Greenland, have a military presence in Greenland, or make sensitive investments in Greenland, without our express written approval."
The administration has paired the Greenland agreement with a broader pattern of formalizing previously discussed policy positions into binding action, moving from executive orders on immigration to permanent security arrangements abroad.
The agreement's permanence depends on legislative approval in Denmark and Greenland. Greenlandic politics have grown increasingly independence-minded in recent years, and some lawmakers may resist a deal that, while preserving formal sovereignty, effectively cedes security authority to Washington for the foreseeable future.
Danish lawmakers face their own political calculations. Rasmussen's endorsement suggests the governing coalition views the pact as preferable to the alternative, an Arctic increasingly contested by Moscow and Beijing with Copenhagen unable to defend its own territory. But parliamentary debate could surface objections over the scope of U.S. veto power and the planned base construction.
For the United States, the deal requires no Senate treaty ratification under the terms described so far, though the details of the basing agreements and any associated funding will likely draw congressional scrutiny as construction begins.
The administration has not disclosed a timeline for when the first new bases would become operational, or how many U.S. personnel would be stationed on the island. Those details will shape whether the agreement functions as a genuine deterrent or a symbolic footprint.
None of that changes the core achievement. A deal that the foreign policy establishment mocked as impossible is now on its way to a signing ceremony at the United Nations. The Arctic's most strategically important landmass will host American forces on a permanent basis, and the two nations most eager to exploit its resources, Russia and China, need Washington's permission to set foot there.
The people who laughed loudest in 2019 have the least to say now. That tends to happen when results replace speculation.
President Trump says Donald Trump Jr. repaid Russian boxing executive Umar Kremlev after costly Bahamas wedding festivities drew scrutiny over possible foreign influence.
President Donald Trump told reporters Friday that his eldest son reimbursed Kremlev, who spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on celebrations tied to the younger Trump’s wedding. CNN reported that the president said he understood the money had been repaid.
Kremlev’s spending reportedly covered post-wedding events in the Bahamas, including a rented private island and fireworks. The repayment addresses the largest concern: a foreign businessman covering a substantial personal expense for the president’s son.
Reuters described the reimbursement as planned and reported that Democrats in Congress opened an investigation into the financing. Trump also said he understood that his son had already paid Kremlev back.
Bettina Anderson Trump defended the arrangement as a gift from a friend. The New York Post reported that Kremlev financed an extra private island and fireworks following the couple’s May wedding.
President Trump offered a direct account of his son’s response: “I hear he paid him back. I understand that Don paid him back.” He also called the original arrangement “totally allowed” and “very common.”
But the exact amount remains undisclosed. No public account cited here states when the money changed hands, how Trump Jr. paid it, or whether the reimbursement covered every expense.
The Washington Examiner reported that Kremlev’s contribution included a private island reception and guest lodging. Those details suggest a large bill, even without a final dollar figure.
Breitbart reported that Trump Jr. and his wife publicly acknowledged Kremlev hosted two nights of celebrations. The events took place after the wedding ceremony, according to the couple’s account.
Reimbursement was the cleanest response available. Accepting a major gift from any politically connected foreign businessman invites questions, even if the people involved describe it as personal generosity.
That same problem appears whenever family relationships overlap with public power, as recent scrutiny involving political spouses has shown. Private relationships do not stay private when they touch the highest levels of government.
Kremlev heads the International Boxing Association. He has received Vladimir Putin’s “Order of Friendship,” belongs to the pro-Kremlin Night Wolves biker club, and has been personally sanctioned by Ukraine.
Kremlev’s press office said he and Trump Jr. shared “common interests in boxing, hunting and the outdoors.” Bettina Anderson Trump also rejected claims that the gift carried a hidden political purpose.
“Friendship doesn’t require a political motive. Generosity doesn’t automatically come with an agenda. And sometimes a wedding gift is simply a wedding gift,” she said.
Her defense explains the couple’s view, but it does not erase the public interest. Kremlev’s ties made the size and source of the gift relevant, regardless of the couple’s personal intentions.
Other Trump family representatives drew firm boundaries. First Lady Melania Trump’s spokesperson said she “does not, and has never had, a relationship with Mr. Kremlev.”
The spokesperson also said Melania Trump played “no role whatsoever” in organizing the event and knew nothing about its financial planning. Eric Trump’s spokesman said Eric had never heard Kremlev’s name.
Republican Sen. John Curtis of Utah criticized the original arrangement in blunt terms: “To me it just stinks. It’s corruption, I don’t like it...this is a big deal.”
Democrats in Congress opened an inquiry into the financing, Reuters reported. No legal or regulatory investigation had been announced in the account updated September 19.
Those are different tracks. A congressional inquiry can seek records and testimony, while a legal investigation would examine whether any law or rule was broken.
The record still lacks basic details. The public does not know the exact sum, the repayment date, the payment method, or whether Trump Jr. reimbursed Kremlev for the full cost.
Those gaps do not disprove the president’s statement. They do explain why a clear accounting would settle the matter faster than dueling political claims.
Trump Jr. did the right thing by repaying the money. Public trust is best served when powerful families remove foreign financial entanglements quickly and disclose the facts plainly.
An Indiana father who left his one-week-old son alone with a dog known to bite people has been sentenced to 16 years in prison, after the animal attacked the infant at least 180 times in a home so filthy that police could barely walk through it.
Austin Kinsey accepted a plea deal on neglect charges stemming from the death of baby Jason Anthony Weaver in September at the family's home in Markle, Indiana, a small town roughly 25 miles southwest of Fort Wayne. As part of the agreement, prosecutors dropped the highest-level neglect charge. A court handed down the 16-year sentence on Monday.
The case lays bare a catastrophic failure of basic parental responsibility. A five-year-old husky and pit bull mix named Chomp, a dog the family itself admitted had bitten people before and showed aggression toward other animals, was left with unsupervised access to a helpless newborn in a home that authorities later declared unfit for human habitation.
The baby's grandfather, Timothy Kinsey, told investigators he heard the infant making noises and discovered Chomp dragging the one-week-old around the room. Responding officers attempted CPR, but Jason Anthony Weaver could not be saved.
The injuries were devastating. The baby suffered wounds across his head and body, brain hemorrhages, fractured ribs, and tears in his lungs, the result of at least 180 bites from the family dog. The sheer number of wounds points to an attack that was not momentary. It went on long enough to inflict damage that no week-old infant could survive.
Austin Kinsey's account, recorded in a police report obtained by the New York Post, claimed he had been playing video games in the same room as the newborn and stepped away only briefly to speak to other family members. That brief absence proved fatal.
The tragedy echoes other recent cases in which children have died because the adults responsible for them failed at the most basic duty of protection. In Georgia, a mother was charged with murder after her toddler died in a 117-degree car while she worked a hospital shift.
Court documents paint a damning picture of what the family knew about Chomp, and chose to ignore. Family members described the dog as gentle with the week-old baby but admitted that Chomp could be jealous, had shown aggression toward other animals, and had bitten other people before.
One family member told investigators they kept a firearm in the house specifically in case the dog "acted up." That detail alone reveals the household understood the animal posed a serious threat. They kept a gun ready for the dog, but left a newborn within its reach.
Chomp has since been euthanized.
The conditions inside the home compounded the negligence. An officer noted in the police report that responding law enforcement encountered a "strong odor of animal, trash, and dirt everywhere." Court documents described the residence as overflowing with bugs, trash, dirty dishes, and dirty clothes. Bugs were found on the baby's car seat.
An unidentified officer summed up the scene in the police report, as reported by WPTA:
"There was so much trash and debris, officers could barely walk through the home."
Authorities ultimately ordered the family to vacate the property after determining it was not fit for habitation. The home where a newborn was expected to live and grow could not even meet the minimum standard for occupancy. Cases involving young children dying in unfit home environments have drawn increasing public attention in recent months.
Austin Kinsey was not the only adult held responsible. Six family members in total were arrested soon after the baby's death: Kinsey, the baby's mother Violet Weaver, grandfather Timothy Kinsey, grandparents Rita Wickey and Michael Wickey, and uncle Tony Kinsey.
Kinsey initially faced two counts of neglect and one count of harboring a non-immunized dog that caused an injury. The plea deal dropped the most serious neglect charge in exchange for the 16-year sentence.
Violet Weaver is scheduled for a change of plea hearing later this month. Cases against Timothy Kinsey, Rita Wickey, Michael Wickey, and Tony Kinsey remain active. The specific charges against those four family members have not been publicly detailed.
The number of adults charged suggests that prosecutors view the negligence as systemic, not the failure of one person, but of an entire household that allowed a dangerous animal near a defenseless infant in a home unfit for habitation. In another recent case involving the death of an infant, five people faced murder charges, reflecting a growing willingness by prosecutors to hold multiple adults accountable when a child dies on their watch.
Jason Anthony Weaver lived one week. He never had a chance to crawl, walk, or speak a word. Every adult in that house knew the dog was dangerous. They said so themselves. They kept a gun ready for the animal. And still, a newborn was left within its reach in a home so filthy that first responders could barely navigate the floor.
Austin Kinsey's 16-year sentence, secured through a plea deal that dropped the most serious charge, will strike many as lenient given the outcome. Whether the remaining family members face similar accountability remains to be seen. Courts have shown a willingness to impose severe sentences when the facts demand it. The facts in Markle demand no less.
A society that cannot protect a week-old baby from a known-dangerous animal inside his own home has failed at something more fundamental than law enforcement. It has failed at common sense.
Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who voted to confirm Pete Hegseth as Defense Secretary, now says Hegseth "needs to go" and is backing a fellow Republican's effort to impeach him.
Tillis told reporters Thursday that he supports removing Hegseth from the Pentagon, whether through impeachment or a simpler path: President Trump replacing him directly. The outgoing senator's remarks came days after Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, introduced eight articles of impeachment against Hegseth in the House, citing the Defense Secretary's handling of the Iran war and an alleged violation of his oath to support and defend the Constitution.
The intra-party revolt is unusual. Two Republicans, one in the Senate, one in the House, are now publicly calling for the removal of a cabinet secretary appointed by a president from their own party. And Tillis is not hedging.
Asked whether Republicans should support Massie's impeachment articles, Tillis stopped short of directing House colleagues but made his own position unmistakable. The Hill reported his response to reporters:
"He needs to go, whether it's impeachment or the most expedient route, just the president to replace him, would be great."
He added: "I'll let the House do what the House is going to do. I think I'm pretty well staked out on my assessment of Mr. Hegseth."
Tillis is not seeking reelection in November, which frees him from the political cost that might silence other GOP senators. But his criticism has been building for months, not days. Earlier this year, he told Politico that Trump firing Hegseth was on "a Christmas wish list" and alleged that Hegseth had misled the president on the dynamics of the war in Iran.
That allegation, that the Defense Secretary gave the commander-in-chief a misleading picture of an active military conflict, is among the most serious charges a senator can level at a Pentagon chief. Tillis has not provided public evidence to support it, and Hegseth has not responded publicly to the claim, at least not in any statement captured in the reporting.
Massie introduced his impeachment resolution on Tuesday. The eight articles center on Hegseth's conduct regarding the Iran war and accuse him of violating his constitutional oath. The full text of the articles has not been reproduced in available reporting, and the specific factual allegations within each article remain unclear.
Massie has previously accused Hegseth of violating the War Powers Resolution over the Iran conflict, a charge that goes to the heart of whether the executive branch overstepped its authority in committing military force without proper congressional authorization.
The impeachment articles' current status in the House, whether they have been referred to committee, whether any other members have co-sponsored them, is not clear from available reporting. No other Republican senator has publicly endorsed or opposed the resolution.
Tillis escalated his rhetoric on the social platform X earlier this month, writing that he had "never witnessed more inept management of the brave men and women who serve our country." He followed that with a direct appeal to the president:
"I urge the President to find a new leader at the Pentagon who will retain and empower our military talent rather than diminish it."
The senator's complaints center on personnel decisions. He has accused Hegseth of pushing out experienced military officials, a pattern that came to a head at the end of August when Army Secretary Dan Driscoll resigned. Driscoll had clashed with Hegseth over firings of the Army's senior leadership and other changes to the department.
Hegseth has faced a series of controversies during his tenure. He previously rejected reports that the White House was searching for a replacement for his deputy, pushing back on narratives about instability at the top of the Defense Department.
Driscoll's departure is the most concrete example of the internal friction Tillis describes. When a service secretary, the civilian head of an entire military branch, walks away over disagreements with the Defense Secretary about who should lead the force, it raises questions about whether the Pentagon's senior ranks are being managed or simply cleared out.
One fact adds weight to Tillis's criticism: he voted to confirm Hegseth in the first place. This is not a senator who opposed the nomination from the start. He gave Hegseth the benefit of the doubt, watched the results, and concluded the appointment was a mistake.
That trajectory matters. Critics who opposed a nominee before confirmation can be dismissed as partisan. A supporter who reverses course based on what he says he has observed in office is harder to wave away.
Meanwhile, the political environment around Hegseth has grown more hostile from multiple directions. The Pentagon reversed one of Hegseth's own policies regarding flu vaccines for recruits after an outbreak sickened hundreds at a training base, a reversal that undercut his authority on a decision he had personally championed.
Democrats have piled on with their own brand of opposition. One swing-district Democrat told a crowd she wanted to "beat the s*** out of" Hegseth, rhetoric that does nothing to advance serious oversight but illustrates the intensity of feeling on Capitol Hill.
Scrutiny has also extended to Hegseth's family. His wife Jennifer's reported hands-on role at the Pentagon drew fresh questions about influence and access at the highest levels of the Defense Department.
Neither Hegseth nor the White House has responded publicly to Tillis's latest remarks or to Massie's impeachment resolution, at least not in any statement captured in the reporting. That silence leaves a significant gap. A Defense Secretary facing impeachment articles from a member of his own party and a public demand for his firing from a Republican senator would normally create some form of rebuttal.
It also remains unclear how many other Republicans share Tillis's view but have kept quiet. The senator himself acknowledged the political dynamics at play, deferring to the House on impeachment while making his own stance unmistakable. Whether Massie's articles gain co-sponsors or die in committee will say more about the GOP's appetite for this fight than any single senator's remarks.
The deeper question is one Tillis has raised but not fully answered: What exactly did Hegseth tell the president about the Iran war, and was it accurate? If a Defense Secretary misled the commander-in-chief about an active conflict, that is not a management problem. It is a trust problem. And trust, once lost at that level, is not easily rebuilt.
When members of a president's own party start filing impeachment papers and calling for his cabinet secretary's head on the record, the problem is no longer about optics. It is about whether the person running the Pentagon still has the credibility to do the job.
A tearful Savannah Guthrie used a live segment on the Today show to renew her family's desperate appeal for help finding her 84-year-old mother, Nancy, who vanished from her Tucson, Arizona home in January, after actress Allison Janney dedicated her Emmy win backstage to the missing woman.
Guthrie, 54, was filling in for absent co-host Sheinelle Jones on Tuesday's broadcast of Today with Jenna & Sheinelle when the program aired a clip from the 2026 Emmy Awards press room. Janney, 66, had just won Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series the night before in Los Angeles. Instead of celebrating her own triumph, she turned the moment toward a family she has never stopped thinking about.
Willie Geist introduced the clip, calling Janney's remarks a "beautiful expression of sympathy." In the footage, Janney told reporters:
"I honestly can say I think about Nancy every day and think about the loss and what Savannah and her family are going through. I don't think I'm alone, I think all of America is thinking about her."
Guthrie broke down on camera. Her voice cracked as she responded.
"I was so touched to see her do that. It's her moment, [after] her triumph, for her to sit and take a moment to think about our family... I never let a moment pass if I get one to talk about my mom and how much we miss her and love her."
Nancy Guthrie was last seen at her home in the Catalina Hills area near Tucson, Arizona, on January 31. FBI-recovered doorbell camera footage showed a masked, armed individual tampering with the camera at 1:47 a.m. on February 1, just hours after Nancy had returned home, National Review reported. Bloodstains confirmed to be Nancy's were found at the scene. A bloodstain pattern analysis expert told Newsweek the evidence showed what is called a "drip trail," meaning blood dripped continuously from a person or object, consistent with someone who was bleeding as they were moved.
Two ransom notes demanding $4 million in Bitcoin followed on February 2 and February 6. The second note claimed Nancy had "perished." Both notes contained details about the crime scene, the location of Nancy's Apple Watch, a smashed backyard floodlight, suggesting the author had direct knowledge of what happened inside the home, Fox News reported.
FBI Special Agent in Charge Heath Yonke of the Phoenix Division acknowledged the ransom demands publicly: "We are aware of a ransom letter that was sent to the local media and then to national outlets. As with every lead, we are taking it seriously." But multiple deadlines set in the notes passed without payment, and at least one demand has been identified as fraudulent.
The case remains unsolved months later. High-profile crimes against elderly victims, and the agonizing limbo families endure when answers never come, have drawn public attention in recent years, much as emotionally charged criminal cases continue to grip the country.
Dr. Kris Mohandie, a forensic psychologist who previously helped convince O.J. Simpson to surrender to authorities, has publicly questioned the legitimacy of both ransom letters. The Pima County Sheriff's Office released the notes, and Mohandie studied them closely.
"Unfortunately, I think this case is a simple matter of a burglary gone wrong and then attempts to cover things up," Mohandie told the New York Post. "There are a lot of things wrong with that ransom note, and it raised a lot of questions for me of veracity."
Authorities released the notes publicly in hopes someone might recognize what they described as the "unique linguistic style" of the author. So far, no arrest has been made.
On the six-month anniversary of her mother's disappearance, Guthrie posted an emotional plea on Instagram. "This is our beautiful Mom," she wrote. "Six months ago, someone took her out of her bed in the dead of night. We have lived every moment, every breath, and every heartbeat in agony and despair ever since." She added: "We are begging for help. We are desperate. We need someone to come forward. Someone knows something."
On Tuesday's broadcast, Guthrie echoed that desperation. "My whole family, my sister and my brother and I and all of our extended family, are just in such pain," she said. "We need help, so thank you to Allison Janney for remembering us and for giving an opportunity for me to renew that call. We just want our mom home and to be able to give her a proper goodbye, that's all."
Geist reminded viewers to contact the FBI with any information. Guthrie added: "You can call anonymously too, our family needs you."
The emotional wave on Tuesday's show did not begin with Nancy Guthrie's case. Earlier in the broadcast, Guthrie and co-host Jenna Bush Hager, 44, discussed Lady Gaga's new motherhood. Gaga, 40, and her husband Michael Polansky, 42, had recently become parents.
That conversation turned personal. Guthrie reflected on having her own children later in life, her daughter Vale, now 12, and her son Charlie, now 9. She had Charlie just two weeks before turning 45.
"I had my babies in my forties, which I think is a great time to have your kids. I didn't plan it that way, but that's how life turned out. It's like anything; there are pluses, and there are minuses, but I think being a little more stable in your career and stuff is wonderful because you're not trying to juggle all the different things you're trying to juggle when you're in your twenties and thirties."
Guthrie paused and added, with a small laugh: "I like to think there's a little wisdom, but also, you get tired more quickly."
Bush Hager's eyes filled. "I know you felt this way, that you were just so delighted that it could happen for you," she told Guthrie. The broadcast world has seen no shortage of major changes among TV news anchors in recent months, but Tuesday's moment stood apart, raw, unscripted, and centered on something far more personal than ratings or career moves.
Guthrie responded: "I'll never be over it. I just feel so profoundly lucky that I got to have my kids, and I was so late in life to do it. I mean, I had Charlie, and I turned 45 two weeks later."
Bush Hager recalled visiting Guthrie when her children were newborns. "I got to come and sit on your couch when you were a brand new mama," she said. Guthrie smiled through tears: "We did all those early toddler years as next door neighbors." The exchange between two women who have spent years side by side on morning television, and who clearly share a bond that extends well beyond the studio, carried a weight that no teleprompter could manufacture.
Sheinelle Jones, the show's regular co-host, was absent Tuesday after attending the Emmy Awards in Los Angeles the night before. Her absence gave Guthrie the co-hosting chair, and, as it turned out, a platform to speak directly to a national audience about her family's ordeal. The Washington Examiner noted that Guthrie declined to comment on reports that one ransom note claimed Nancy had died shortly after the abduction, but expressed her family's desperation for any answers.
In the entertainment world, personal loss and public tribute have long intersected in unexpected ways, from the passing of beloved figures to the quiet gestures that remind audiences these are real people behind the cameras and on the stages.
An 84-year-old woman is still missing. Her daughter asked America for help on live television. The least the rest of us can do is pay attention.
A New York Times, Siena University poll released with less than 50 days before the midterms shows New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani carrying a higher favorable rating than Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez among likely voters, a gap that should worry Democrats banking on her national star power.
Mamdani, the self-described Democratic socialist who rose from the New York City Council to Gracie Mansion, posted a 38 percent favorable rating against 33 percent unfavorable in the survey of slightly more than 1,500 likely voters conducted September 8, 13. Ocasio-Cortez, the four-term congresswoman from the same ideological lane, managed only 30 percent favorable, and her unfavorable number sat at 41 percent, eight points higher than Mamdani's.
The margin of error was 2.9 percentage points, meaning the eight-point favorability gap between the two progressive figures falls well outside statistical noise. For a congresswoman who has not ruled out a 2028 presidential bid, the numbers amount to a cold reality check delivered by her own party's most respected polling partnership.
The demographic breakdowns, reported by USA TODAY, tell a sharper story than the topline numbers alone. Mamdani drew 41 percent favorable among women and 35 percent among men. His unfavorable rating among women was just 23 percent, nearly half the 43 percent unfavorable he earned from men.
Ocasio-Cortez fared worse on both sides of the ledger. She posted 32 percent favorable among women and 27 percent among men. A majority of male likely voters, 51 percent, viewed her unfavorably, and a third of women did too.
Put plainly: Mamdani is nine points more popular with women than Ocasio-Cortez, and he carries eight points less disapproval from men. For a politician whose brand was built on grassroots energy and viral social-media moments, those are stubborn numbers to spin.
Age breakdowns reinforce the pattern. Mamdani's strongest support came from voters aged 18, 29, where he hit 51 percent favorable, a majority. He held 49 percent among voters 30, 44, dropped to 37 percent among those 45, 64, and fell to 26 percent among seniors 65 and older.
Ocasio-Cortez's best age group was 30, 44, at 43 percent favorable. Among the youngest voters, the cohort most associated with her political rise, she managed only 35 percent. She matched Mamdani's floor among seniors at 26 percent and scraped 25 percent among voters 45, 64.
The congresswoman who once embodied millennial progressive energy now trails a relatively new mayor among the very voters she claims to champion. That trajectory matters if she intends to mount a serious White House campaign. Her odds in the 2028 Democratic nomination race have been climbing in betting markets, but favorable-unfavorable numbers like these suggest the broader electorate is not keeping pace with the speculation.
Mamdani led among non-White voters broadly, posting 47 percent favorable compared to Ocasio-Cortez's 26 percent in the same category. Among Black likely voters, Mamdani earned 46 percent favorable to her 37 percent. Among White voters, he led 38 percent to 27 percent.
Ocasio-Cortez did hold one demographic advantage: Hispanic likely voters gave her a 49 percent favorable rating, well above Mamdani's 37 percent in the same group. It was her single strongest showing across every demographic slice in the poll.
Still, a Democratic socialist who built her career on multiracial coalition politics should not be trailing a fellow progressive across nearly every racial and ethnic category. Sen. Ted Cruz has warned that Democrats are handing their party to figures like Ocasio-Cortez and Mamdani. The poll suggests voters may be sorting between the two on their own terms, and the congresswoman is not winning that contest.
Beyond the head-to-head favorability comparison, the Times-Siena poll found Democrats leading Republicans 51 percent to 43 percent on the generic congressional ballot among likely voters. That eight-point margin, if it holds through Election Day, would represent a significant headwind for Republican candidates in competitive districts.
The poll also tested which party voters trust more on three major issues. Democrats led on health care, 60 percent to 36 percent. They led on immigration, 52 percent to 45 percent. And they led on the cost of living, 51 percent to 43 percent.
Those immigration numbers deserve scrutiny. Republicans have spent years building an advantage on border security and enforcement, and a seven-point deficit on the broader immigration question among likely voters signals either a messaging failure or a polling sample that skews toward blue-state respondents. The poll's geographic scope was not explicitly defined in the reporting, which makes the generic-ballot and issue-trust findings harder to evaluate at face value.
Meanwhile, internal Democratic divisions have not disappeared. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries has faced caucus revolts over members breaking ranks, a reminder that the party's apparent polling strength masks real fractures beneath the surface.
The poll found that a majority of likely voters disapprove of Trump's handling of every major issue tested, including tariffs and the war with Iran. The specific disapproval percentages on those individual issues were not detailed in the reporting, leaving the severity of the numbers open to interpretation.
What is clear is that the poll's architects chose to test issues, tariffs, Iran, health care, cost of living, immigration, that cut across both parties' vulnerabilities. The results on the Democratic side of the ledger look strong in the topline. But topline generic-ballot leads have collapsed before, and issue-trust advantages do not always translate into seat gains when individual candidates carry unfavorable ratings as high as Ocasio-Cortez's 41 percent.
Ocasio-Cortez's political setbacks are not limited to polling. Her past public claims have sometimes outrun the facts, contributing to the kind of credibility erosion that shows up in unfavorable numbers over time.
Mamdani and Ocasio-Cortez share an ideological label, a city, and a political generation. They do not share a favorability profile. The mayor is above water, 38 percent favorable, 33 percent unfavorable, a net positive of five points. The congresswoman is deeply underwater, 30 percent favorable, 41 percent unfavorable, a net negative of eleven points.
That sixteen-point net-favorability gap between two politicians from the same wing of the same party, measured by the same poll at the same moment, is not a rounding error. It suggests that voters are distinguishing between the person who governs a city and the person who performs on cable news and social media. Executive responsibility, even in a city as chaotic as New York, may be granting Mamdani a credibility that Ocasio-Cortez's congressional tenure has not.
Progressive Democrats watching the 2028 landscape should take note. Progressive candidates have won recent primaries by leaning into cultural fights, but winning a primary and winning broad favorability are different exercises entirely. Ocasio-Cortez's numbers suggest the latter remains elusive.
When more voters dislike you than like you by double digits, the problem is not messaging. It is the product.
Bob Mackie, the nine-time Emmy-winning designer who dressed Cher, Carol Burnett, and a generation of entertainers, has died at 87, closing a career that spanned more than six decades.
Mackie's team confirmed his death Monday in a statement posted to his Instagram page. "He lived his 87 years to the fullest, fulfilling his dream of being a Fashion and Costume Designer, which is all he ever wanted to do," the statement read. Fox News reported that Mackie died of pneumonia. He is survived by his granddaughter Alyssa Townsend, great-granddaughters Kyla and Keira Townsend, and former wife Lulu Porter.
The California native built a career that few in the fashion or entertainment world could match. He won nine Emmy Awards, earned three Oscar nominations, took home a Tony Award in 2019 for his contributions to "The Cher Show," and was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 2002. In June 2019, the Council of Fashion Designers of America honored him with the Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award at the Brooklyn Museum of Art in New York.
Known as the "Sultan of Sequins," Mackie didn't just make clothes. He made entrances. His designs, heavy with beadwork, feathers, and bright color, turned performers into spectacles and award shows into front-page events. He pioneered the "nude illusion" dress, a form-fitting design layered over sheer fabric that created the appearance of bare skin beneath sequins and embellishment.
Mackie started at the bottom, working as a sketch artist for film costume designers before landing his first major client: actress and singer Mitzi Gaynor, whose Las Vegas revue shows in the 1960s gave him a platform to develop his flamboyant style. That early work led to an eleven-year run designing costumes for "The Carol Burnett Show," a stint he once described as "fabulous."
In a 2024 interview with Good Morning America, Mackie explained the difference between fashion design and costume work. "When you're a costume designer, you better understand what that person does," he said. "'What, as a performer, what kind of timing do they have? How do they move if they're a dancer?' It's all you have to think about that. You don't just send them out in a sweet little dress and hope for the best. It doesn't work that way."
That philosophy, designing for the performer, not just the body, defined his work across every medium. He created looks for Diana Ross, Tina Turner, Whitney Houston, and Dolly Parton. He designed costumes for Carol Channing in the 1974 Broadway production "Lorelei" and for Liza Minnelli in 1999's "Minnelli On Minnelli." In 1982, he launched his own ready-to-wear Mackie label, and he later collaborated with Mattel to design outfits for Barbie dolls.
The entertainment world has lost several beloved figures in recent months, including sitcom director James Burrows, whose own career helped define an era of American television.
No collaboration defined Mackie's career more than his work with Cher. The two met in 1971, and by Cher's own telling, the connection was instant. She previously told People magazine about the encounter:
"I see this guy over my shoulder walking in the door and he's beautiful. I turned around and there's this tall, kind of Adonis-looking guy with curly blonde hair and a suntan. And I went, 'Oh my God, you're so much younger than I thought you'd be.' He said, 'You're so much thinner than I thought you'd be.' And it was kind of like that from then on."
Cher called the partnership "a match made in heaven." Over the following decades, Mackie designed for her television shows, concert tours, and award-show appearances, including the now-famous looks that turned red carpets into cultural events. As recently as 2021, the two appeared together at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures Gala in Los Angeles.
On Monday, Cher posted a tribute on social media. "My dear Bob has gone up to heaven," she wrote. "Knowing him, he's bringing Sequins, Beads, & his sketch pad. Good nite sweet Prince."
The loss echoes a broader pattern of the entertainment industry saying goodbye to figures who shaped its identity. Singer Lauren Bennett, known for "Party Rock Anthem," also died recently, a reminder that the industry's losses cut across generations.
Carol Burnett, whose variety show gave Mackie one of his longest and most visible creative homes, posted her own tribute Monday. "Sadness doesn't come close to how I feel," she wrote.
"I loved him very much. As for his genius, there are fashion designers who don't do costumes and there are costume designers who don't do fashion. Bob did it all. There was no one like him."
Burnett's distinction captures what set Mackie apart. He moved between Hollywood, Broadway, television, Las Vegas, and the fashion runway without losing a step. His costumes were not just worn, they performed. They were built for movement, for timing, for the specific way a singer held a note or a comedian landed a punchline.
His influence reached younger performers as well. Breitbart reported that Mackie created looks for some of the biggest names in entertainment across multiple decades, and Fox News noted that stars like Sabrina Carpenter and Miley Cyrus had recently worn his archival designs. Carpenter posted her own tribute: "Terribly devastated. I feel so lucky to have met Bob."
Mackie's costumes remained on public display as recently as January 2026 at the Palm Springs Art Museum in California, near the desert home where he had lived and continued sketching designs. In 2024, he sat for an interview about his documentary, "Bob Mackie: Naked Illusion," a title that nodded to the signature illusion dresses that made him famous.
Celebrity news continues to draw national attention across the spectrum, from serious personal matters involving public figures to the passing of artists whose work shaped American culture.
The statement on Mackie's Instagram page offered a fitting summary: "His genius and extraordinary designs will live on forever, continuing to bring beauty into this world." The cause of death, pneumonia, and the names of his surviving family were confirmed separately, but no details about where he died or the exact circumstances have been made public.
What remains is a body of work that defined American glamour for more than sixty years, nine Emmys, three Oscar nominations, a Tony, a lifetime achievement award, and a client list that reads like a roll call of twentieth-century entertainment royalty. Mackie didn't chase trends. He built them, one sequin at a time, for performers who understood that the costume was part of the act.
Bob Mackie spent six decades proving that real craftsmanship, knowing your performer, knowing your fabric, knowing the moment, never goes out of style. Hollywood could use more of that kind of discipline.