Donald Trump now claims that Democrat “thugs” sliced up the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool with a sharp razor and has threatened up to 10 years’ jail for would-be saboteurs.

But despite insisting he has proof of who is to blame, federal agencies still have not produced evidence to back up the president’s ever-changing allegations.

For days, Trump has pointed reporters toward the National Park Service and the Department of the Interior for proof that saboteurs deliberately damaged the newly renovated pool.

Yet neither agency has publicly released documentation supporting his allegations that vandals caused the algae blooms and peeling blue liner plaguing the project, despite repeated requests by the Daily Beast and others.

Trump, however, floated yet another theory on Wednesday: that the damage was done by fans of Hillary Clinton-loving Democrats who entered the pool and sliced a massive gash into it with a razor.

The story was a variation of Trump’s previous explanation earlier this week: that vandals had taken to the landmark with a knife or box cutter. He also initially claimed that the gash was about 250 feet, but he now says it is 350 feet.

“Thugs,” Trump told reporters on Wednesday when asked about the pool during a meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.

“They (authorities) just told me a little while ago. Six have been arrested, and like six or seven are under investigation. They had pictures and everything else. They went to the bottom, and it’s not a paint job, it’s very expensive, it’s not rubber - but it’s like rubber - and they went down with probably a box cutter or a very sharp razor of some kind or knife, and they cut, and then they started ripping it up.”

“You know, one of the guys, he’s a member or a big player to ActBlue,” Trump added, referencing the Democratic Party fundraising platform.

“He’s a big Hillary supporter, he’s a big supporter of Sleepy Joe Biden.”

The Daily Beast visited the pool on Wednesday but could not see a 350-foot gash while walking along the iconic landmark, which is not far from the steps where Martin Luther King Jr gave his historic “I have a Dream” speech in 1963.

But with preparations underway for America’s 250th anniversary celebrations, fresh fencing was erected around sections of the Reflecting Pool while a swathe of mobile CCTV cameras appeared across the site, adding to the already heavy security presence.

Road closures, detours and security checkpoints stretched across the area but no arrests were observed during almost an hour at the site.

One National Guard member stationed nearby said he had not personally witnessed any vandalism that day.

However, visitors John and Barbara, tourists from Minnesota, told the Daily Beast they noticed an unpleasant odor coming from the water when the wind shifted.

“There’s definitely a smell when the breeze comes across,” Barbara said.

The original renovation job was given, without a competitive tender process, to a Virginia-based company that had previously carried out work on a swimming pool at one of the president’s golf clubs.

But the makeover has been derailed by two major issues: a bright green algal bloom and peeling of the pool’s new, controversial “American Flag Blue”- tinted coating.

Trump spent weeks bragging about the renovation, which has now cost taxpayers about $14.5 million.

At one point, the president even traveled to Wisconsin for the first time since the election to speak to struggling farmers, only to veer off into a long winded tangent about the project. He even brought them “before and after” pictures.

The president on Wednesday floated sending people to prison for 10 years if they were found guilty of sabotage.

He said the pool had a “world class surface” until vandals “came in, and they cut it up, and they grabbed it and they pulled it.”

“They’re sick people, so I think they’re in big trouble,” he added.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Leonard Cohen’s estate has objected to Donald Trump’s planned use of his song “Hallelujah” at the Freedom 250 rally in Washington.

Trump, 80, said weeks ago that singers Lee Greenwood and Christopher Macchio would take the stage at the Great American State Fair, with Macchio singing the 1984 single, among other tunes.

“The Leonard Cohen Estate has learned that the song ‘Hallelujah’ is to be performed at a Donald Trump rally on June 24,” says a Facebook post on Cohen’s account. “This use is not authorized, and the Estate does not support or approve of this or any similar usage. Thank you for your attention to this matter.”

The White House did not immediately respond when asked about the statement from Cohen’s estate. The Canadian singer-songwriter died in November 2016 at age 82.

Several musicians, like Martina McBride, The Commodores, Young MC, and Bret Michaels, pulled out of the event upon learning of its political nature, leaving Greenwood, Macchio, Flo Rida, Vanilla Ice, and Alexis Wilkins, the 27-year-old girlfriend of FBI Director Kash Patel, who insists she was invited “on my own accord.”

Trump, his campaigns, and his administration have a long history of using music from artists—or their estates—who want nothing to do with him.

In 2020, Tom Petty’s family issued a cease-and-desist order to the Trump campaign for playing “I Won’t Back Down” at a rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

“Trump was in no way authorized to use this song to further a campaign that leaves too many Americans and common sense behind,” they said in a statement then. “Both the late Tom Petty and his family firmly stand against racism and discrimination of any kind. Tom Petty would never want a song of his used for a campaign of hate. He liked to bring people together.”

That same year, Neil Young objected to Trump playing “Keep On Rockin In The Free World” at a July 4th event at Mount Rushmore.

Last year, Sabrina Carpenter called out the administration for using one of her songs in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement video, writing, “This video is evil and disgusting. Do not ever involve me or my music to benefit your inhumane agenda.”

And earlier this month, Ariana Grande wrote on a White House TikTok on immigration: “Please do not ever use my music ⁠in relation to this barbaric, inhumane, heinous nonsense.“ She added: “F--- ICE.”

Obsessed with pop culture and entertainment? Follow us on Substack and YouTube for even more coverage.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Yet another of President Donald Trump’s vanity projects has left a nasty scar on an iconic Washington, D.C. landmark.

The White House South Lawn, the featured site of the president’s 80th birthday bash, housed the 600-ton metal behemoth dubbed “The Claw” for Trump’s birthday fight night, which ruined the historically pristine green lawn in the process.

As can be seen in aerial photos captured on Wednesday, workers have arrived to repair the grass damaged by the UFC Freedom 250 event held on June 14.

Large mats can be seen covering most of the South Lawn ahead of its planned resodding, though patches of discolored grass and dirt peek out along the edges of the mats.

ScottsMiracle-Gro, an Ohio-based private company run by Trump supporter CEO James Hagedorn, promised $1 million in “a combination of monetary and product support,” including resodding plans, to the restoration efforts.

“The president knows a lot about grass. I think his history and past with golf courses,” Nate Baxter, the company’s COO, told Fox Business on June 13. “It was really interesting to watch our tour scientists and President Trump talk through each of these.”

UFC President and longtime Trump ally Dana White initially estimated the cost of the grass replacement at $700,000 in a statement to Sports Business Journal in October. The UFC had originally planned to cover the lawn restoration bill before ScottsMiracle-Gro offered to pick up the tab.

“This was one of the greatest and most historic sports events in history, and President Trump hosting it at the White House is a testament to his vision to celebrate America’s monumental 250th anniversary,“ White House spokesperson Davis Ingle previously told the Daily Beast when asked whether the South Lawn would be restored before July 4. ”Anyone who finds a problem with that clearly suffers from a severe and incurable disease known as Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

The nearby Ellipse, which housed a UFC fan event on Trump’s octogenarian day, also sustained similar damage from the fight-night extravaganza, as seen in photos taken earlier this week.

Trump’s other vanity projects, such as his botched Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool renovation and his demolition of the White House East Wing to make way for his $600 million ballroom, have irrevocably changed the historic People’s House and its surrounding landmarks.

The president tried—and failed—to plaster his name on the historic John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. After a federal judge ordered the removal of his name from the premises, a permanent tarp has been erected in front of the venue’s facade to hide his humiliating loss.

The disaster caused by the Reflecting Pool’s failed renovation has also infuriated the president, who has blamed its algal bloom and cut-up basin on alleged “leftist” vandals. However, government documents obtained by The New York Times contradict the president’s claims of vandalism.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

President Donald Trump has been spotted with bruises on both of his hands, along with broken skin, as scrutiny about the state of his health mounts.

A photo taken by photographer Aaron Schwartz as Trump hosted NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte in the Oval Office showed the president’s chronically bruised right hand slathered in a greasy layer of makeup, with the beige coating appearing stiff and rubbery as it settled into the creases of his skin.

His typically unblemished left hand also appeared to bear a dark purple bruise, haphazardly covered with the same beige makeup.

Meanwhile, one of the knuckles on the president’s left hand was marked by broken skin, the surface appearing cracked and lightly scabbed, giving his “good” hand a visibly unhealthy appearance.

The latest bruising on Trump’s hands comes after he sported concerning marks last week at the G7 summit in France, where he was first spotted with a crescent-shaped mark on his left hand, and later with a red puncture mark on his right thumb.

Several social media users speculated whether it was caused by a prick from a glucose test, which measures blood sugar levels.

When reached for comment on Wednesday, the White House continued to attribute the chronic bruise on Trump’s right hand to frequent handshaking.

“President Trump is the sharpest, most accessible, and energetic president in American history. The President is a man of the people and he meets more Americans and shakes their hands on a daily basis than any other President in history. President Trump’s commitment is unwavering and he proves that every single day,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle told the Daily Beast in a statement.

But the handshake explanation appears harder to square with the bruise on Trump’s left hand, which he is not known to use for handshakes. The White House did not comment on the bruising on his left hand on Wednesday.

The latest sighting of the president’s makeup-covered hand comes after White House reporters Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman revealed in their new book Regime Change that Trump’s longtime aide and personal valet, Walt Nauta, carries a go bag for the president to access whenever needed—filled with makeup, hairspray, Tic Tacs, a clothes steamer, and scissors so he can trim his own hair when it pokes over his collar.

After Trump, the oldest person to be inaugurated as president, underwent his annual physical and dental at the end of May, Trump’s personal physician, Navy Capt. Sean Barbabella, wrote in a memorandum that the president “remains in excellent health, demonstrating strong cardiac, pulmonary, neurological, and overall physical function.”

According to the memo, the roughly three-hour examination included an extensive laboratory evaluation, which found that the president’s glucose levels and cardiac biomarkers, among several others, were “within normal limits.”

Nevertheless, the president continues to face scrutiny over his physical and cognitive health. In addition to his bruises, he frequently appears with swollen ankles, which the White House says are caused by chronic venous insufficiency, a condition common in seniors where leg veins struggle to push blood back up to the heart. Regime Change revealed that the president is also struggling to hear.

Trump has also developed a tendency to fall asleep during high-level meetings, regularly makes mental gaffes, and his repetition has caused a leading psychiatrist to question his fitness for office.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Padma Lakshmi may have gained reality TV clout as the host of Top Chef. But for her new show, she made some significant changes.

“I wanted to do things differently. So there are a lot of changes that people wouldn’t recognize just watching the show,” Lakshmi, 55, told host Kevin Fallon on Obsessed: The Podcast about her CBS series America’s Culinary Cup.

The food enthusiast and longtime host explained that “not treating our chefs like children” was important to her, adding that she removed gimmicks like “locking them up and taking their phone away.”

The former Top Chef host said she finds moves like that “inhumane.”

“I also didn’t think it produced good food,” she continued. “You know, if you’re under duress and you haven’t slept because your bunk mate is snoring all night, that’s going to affect your performance. And, you know, if you think about any captain of industry, whether it’s, you know, again, boxing or tennis or singing, right? You don’t deprive them of their rest or their normal food, or, you know, access to their family.”

Lakshmi’s CBS show premiered in March, with Lakshmi serving as the primary host, judge, and executive producer.

She emphasized the importance of “atmosphere” on set, saying that her years as a reality show host showed her what she wanted to do differently. Beyond Bravo’s Top Chef, a competition she hosted for 19 seasons, Lakshmi created and hosted Hulu’s Taste the Nation with Padma Lakshmi. For her work across the two shows, Lakshmi has earned 16 Primetime Emmy Award nominations—but has never won an individual prize.

The bestselling author of several cookbooks, Lakshmi stated that she’s “not a chef” but a “food writer and producer.” Her decades-long experience in this world, however, taught her to listen to what chefs really need, which she used as a foundation for her latest series.

“I’ve been around, you know, hundreds of chefs, and I listened to them, and I heard what they were saying, and they were like, ‘We just want to cook. We just want to cook the best food we know how,’” she said. “We really are treating these people like the rock stars that they are.”

Lakshmi continued to underscore the difference between Top Chef and her new show, saying, “I just thought this should be for this is a really elite contest, and it should be focused on what matters to a chef. And what matters to a chef is, you know, these principles of really being a world-class, world-renowned chef.”

Eliminating the “gimmicks,” she said, made this work.

Lakshmi stepped down from Top Chef in June 2023, making a shock announcement that it was “time to move on” and “make space” for other projects.

“After much soul searching, I have made the difficult decision to leave Top Chef,” Lakshmi wrote on social media. “Having completed a glorious 20th season as host and executive producer, I am extremely proud to have been part of building such a successful show and of the impact it has had in the worlds of television and food.”

Lakshmi’s reign on the Bravo show is seen as both a catalyst for her fame and an elevation of the show’s status. The former model said that, despite her gratitude for this, the series interfered with her personal life. “You can have it all, but you can’t have it all at once,” she told Harper’s Bazaar in April 2024. “I didn’t have a lot of time for a social life. When was I going to find somebody I wanted to hang out with?”

Her departure made way for new projects and time with her daughter, Krishna, 16.

America’s Culinary Cup featured 16 elite chefs in its first season, competing to win a prize of $1 million. The show was nominated for two Critics’ Choice Awards, including a “Best Host” nomination for Lakshmi.

All 11 episodes of America’s Culinary Cup are available to stream on Paramount+.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel to watch new episodes of ‘Obsessed: The Podcast’ every Wednesday and Friday. And follow our feed to listen to the show the next morning on your favorite podcast platform.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

The NATO chief who once called Donald Trump “daddy” returned to Washington on Wednesday to win the president over with flattery—and this time he brought props.

During a meeting in the Oval Office, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte used oversized charts to highlight what he described as the president’s accomplishments, turning a high-stakes meeting on transatlantic security into an extraordinary suck-up.

“I want to show you what this president was able to achieve,” Rutte said, as he got up from his chair next to Trump and headed over to his props on the other side of the room.

One chart touted the jobs created in the United States by investments from European companies. Another showed the sharp increase in European defense spending since Trump began pressuring NATO allies to contribute more.

“And I start with this chart,” Rutte began, pointing to the graph.

“This chart is about the Trump trillions. The Trump trillions shows you the increase Europeans and Canadians are paying into defense since you took office in 2017…”

The display, which came amid U.S. threats to reduce troops in Europe, was the latest sign of a foreign leader flattering the 80-year-old president in a bid to stay on his good side.

But few have embraced that approach more enthusiastically than Rutte, the former Dutch prime minister who sparked memes, merchandise, and mockery last year when he referred to Trump as “daddy” during a NATO summit while discussing his role in resolving disputes within the alliance.

Rutte’s so-called “daddy diplomacy” has been wearing thin among jittery U.S. allies in recent months amid Trump’s ongoing attacks on NATO over their refusal to get involved in the Iran war.

Reports also emerged earlier this year that the White House was considering a plan to punish some of the member countries who Trump believes were unhelpful with his war in Iran.

But on Wednesday, the NATO chief appeared determined to preserve unity within the alliance amid continued questions about America’s long-term commitment.

And Trump, for his part, appeared delighted by the presentation.

“I have great respect for him,” the president said of Rutte, noting that NATO might not have reached its current position under different leadership.

“If anybody else were in that position, we wouldn’t be here today,” he added.

Asked what he wanted from America’s NATO allies, Trump was clear: “Just be loyal.”

“I just want their loyalty.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Country music star Kane Brown, 32, suffered a frightening injury after getting hit in the head by a normally innocuous projectile: a golf ball.

The accident came just as ​Brown was scheduled to perform at Tight End University’s closing event, rendering him unable to appear.

Tight End University is an annual summit in Nashville, Tennessee, founded in 2021 by National Football League players George Kittle, Travis Kelce, and Greg Olsen. The trio designed the three-day program to bring together the NFL tight end community. The “Tight Ends & Friends” concert, however, is open to the public.

​On June 23, the “Miles on It” singer shared photographs of his injuries from the incident, including a brutally bloodied ear, on his Instagram story.

On the first image, Brown wrote, “Shot to the head by a golf ball.”

The following photo, which offers another angle of the gruesome injury, is captioned, “Just a scratch.”

While not a professional, Brown is an avid golf enthusiast. He estimated the ball that hit him was traveling “150 to 180 mph.”

​The musician also shared a short video showing followers his ear. “Well, 23 stitches later,” he explains, “and a slight concussion…now we’re at Chick-fil-A.”

​In the video, Brown’s collar appears stained with a stream of blood, with dried blood slightly bobbing on his throat as he speaks. Though he’s giggling and shrugging off the injury, the caption suggests the situation may be more serious.

“They said it will probably get worse in the next 48 hours, but I’m alive, and that’s all that matters,” he wrote, adding, “Holy crap.”

​Fans learned that Brown would not be performing when former NFL players and Bussin’ With The Boys podcast hosts Will Compton and Taylor Lewan appeared on stage.

A TikTok video shows Lewan, 34, informing the crowd, “I have very unfortunate and devastating news that took place earlier today.”

After the audience fell silent, he assured them, “But we just want to say he’s OK.”

Compton, 36, continued the announcement.

“Kane Brown got hit with a golf ball today on the golf course,” he said. “He says concussion, but the football guys don’t buy it.”

​Fans seemed slightly disappointed when Compton said, “he’s not going to make it, but just for a moment, we’re gonna do a moment of silence for Kane Brown not being here tonight.”

As the crowd began to boo, the men onstage promptly reminded attendees that they were supposed to observe a moment of silence for the singer.

The noises of dissent grew louder.

“They’re still making noise. Some nasty people in the crowd, I hear,” Compton said, sounding disappointed. “Some people don’t respect concussions. That’s cool.”

“We’re trying to look out for our boy a little bit,” he added.

On social media, users voiced confusion over the “moment of silence” for Brown.

“A moment of silence is for honoring dead people, not people that got hit with a golf ball,” one person wrote.

“A moment of silence for being hit by a golf ball and getting some stitches?” another said, adding, ”Sorry it happened, but that’s a bit much.”

​Still, some social media users praised the NFL players’ act of kindness.

“He got hurt, you guys, he was at the hospital,” one supporter wrote. “If it had hit him a little differently, he could have died. I’m glad he’s OK.”

“Right in the ear! That’s got to be horribly painful! Poor guy,” another said.

​Brown’s absence was likely forgotten after Tight End University founder Travis Kelce’s fiancée, Taylor Swift, made a surprise appearance at the concert.

​The 36-year-old pop star performed several songs, closing the set by singing a duet with country artist Lainey Wilson.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

A tropical cruise vacation ended with a massive fight between two families as they disembarked the ship this week.

Footage of the Monday altercation, shared on X by The New York Post, shows the brawl erupting as one woman in a black dress lunges at another woman in pink pajamas at a Miami customs checkpoint.

The fight quickly escalated as several others jumped in, sending bystanders fleeing from the area amid flying fists and hair-pulling. Footage shows police officers attempting to intervene as the fight spreads across the disembarkment zone, but they struggle to hold back all involved parties.

It ultimately landed 16 passengers on Carnival’s “do not sail” list.

The Carnival Conquest ship left Miami on Friday, June 19, and returned Monday, June 22, stopping at Celebration Key, the cruise ship company’s private island in the Bahamas, on Sunday, June 21.

“We do not tolerate such behavior, and 16 people have been placed on our Do Not Sail List,” a spokesperson for Carnival told People.

The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office also spoke out about the altercation, stating that it was “deemed a mutual combatant incident,” and that neither of the parties pressed charges.

The footage has gone viral on social media, and Carnival is getting some of the backlash.

“Reminder to myself: Never go on a Carnival Cruise,” one user wrote on X under a post made by the New York Post.

“This is the reason I will not go on a @CarnivalCruise,” another user wrote. “Because, obviously, it’s a carnival.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Anyone who vandalizes Donald Trump’s Reflecting Pool should be forced to sell their homes, cars, and even pets to pay for repairs, one MAGA congressman said.

Texas Republican Troy Nehls has parroted the 80-year-old president’s narrative that recent issues with the Reflecting Pool were caused not by the hasty $16 million renovation that he ordered, but by nefarious saboteurs conspiring against him to damage his pet project.

With chunks of blue sealant peeling off from the bottom of the pool and algae turning the water green, Trump has claimed vandals with “razor blades and knives” are responsible and has grown so angry that he ordered the pool be drained for a second round of renovations.

To pay for the second Trump-ordered renovation, Rep. Nehls told TMZ that the imaginary vandals should sell off all their belongings.

“I would take their homes, if they have a home, if they have a car. Hell, if they have a dog,” a visibly angry Nehls said. “I’d make them sell everything to fix it.”

“Absolutely,” he added.

Elected Republicans and conservative media outlets, including Fox News, have largely fallen in line with Trump’s baseless claim that the Reflecting Pool has been sabotaged.

Trump has tried to blame the disastrous renovation on anonymous “leftist” vandals, claiming they have committed very serious crimes and will spend “years in jail!”

He has claimed that these made-up vandals used a “knife or blade” to tear a “gash” into the pool’s sealant. His description of the alleged gash has gone from 250 feet to 300 feet to 350 feet.

“It was purposefully and criminally done, and somebody had to work very hard, probably in the dark of night,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Tuesday.

Neither the president nor the White House has provided any substantial evidence of the apparent gash.

The New York Times reported that Trump’s “vandals” narrative is even at odds with reports from his own government.

Internal documents reviewed by The Times found that two National Park Service workers did indeed find two small cuts within the foam lining the pool’s expansion joints, but that those cuts were entirely unrelated to the “American flag blue” paint coating that has been floating up to the water’s surface.

It also said that the cuts were unrelated to the blooming algae problem.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Megyn Kelly melted down over Larry David’s critique of Donald Trump and his tacky 80th birthday celebration, insinuating that David’s insults about the UFC match were elitist.

“Speaking of DEI and wokeness, Larry David, whose show I enjoy, I think Curb Your Enthusiasm is so clever and very funny, but I just wish he would stop with the political over-the-top stuff,” began Kelly, 55, on a new episode of The Megyn Kelly Show.

Kelly then cut to footage of David’s comments at the premiere of his new HBO sketch show, Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness: An Almost History of America. Speaking to Variety, David called Trump’s White House UFC match a “travesty.”

“What else can you say about it? It was embarrassing. I was embarrassed to be an American,” David, 78, said.

The Curb Your Enthusiasm star and Seinfeld creator is no stranger to condemning the 80-year-old president and mocking his supporters.

Kelley, however, took great offense to his latest remarks and offered a ludicrous theory in turn.

“There’s no question Larry lives in either Beverly Hills or Bel Air and is living it up big, and looked at these guys,” she said, “and had absolutely nothing that he could relate to on this more of a working-class American sport, turned his nose up at it and walked away saying, ‘I’m embarrassed to be associated with them.’”

Kelly is worth millions herself, walking away from her NBC News contract with a reported $30 million payout after she was fired for defending the use of blackface in Halloween costumes.

The conservative commentator, nonetheless, suggested that David’s income bracket means he’s not allowed to criticize Trump.

A mostly MAGA diehard, Kelly herself has increasingly admonished Trump and his administration, but has maintained her ire toward liberal media figures, such as Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, and now David.

David’s assessment of the UFC fight comes after days of controversy. The match marked the president’s birthday but was held under the premise of America’s 250th anniversary. The White House lawn was transformed to contain the cage fight, attended by MAGA’s elite.

But the event took a darker turn when heavyweight fighter Josh Hokit used a vile slur against former First Lady Michelle Obama, ending his victory speech by saying, “Michelle Obama is a man! Am I right, America?”

The fighter has since attempted to defend himself, saying, “I thought I was giving her a compliment,” on a new episode of The Ariel Helwani Show.

David’s new HBO show, a sketch-comedy miniseries, was produced by Barack and Michelle Obama. The series remixes America’s history with David’s signature humor, placing the comedian at various, significant points in the country’s 250-year legacy.

Obsessed with pop culture and entertainment? Follow us on Substack and YouTube for even more coverage.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Joe Rogan conceded that the most outrageous moment from Donald Trump’s birthday UFC fight at the White House could have been easily avoided.

The Trump-friendly podcaster, who served as the master of ceremonies at Trump’s Freedom 250 event on the South Lawn of the White House, said that the UFC should have seen the vile slur against Michelle Obama coming.

“That guy, Josh Hokit,” who used his mic time to disparage the former first lady, “he’s got a shtick. Like, he’s got a character he does—The Incredible Hoke,” Rogan said on the latest episode of The Joe Rogan Experience.

“And so he’s basically like a pro-wrestling bad guy, who also is a really good fighter,” he continued. “So there’s a real problem there. This guy keeps winning.”

While Rogan sidestepped his guest Tim Dillon’s interjection that what Hokit said on the White House grounds was “crazy”—that “Michelle Obama is a man”—he said the scenario was predictable based on Hokit’s persona.

“They probably, in retrospect, if they wanted to avoid this, probably shouldn’t have had him fight on the White House lawn,” Rogan admitted. “Because if he said that at the T-Mobile Arena or in Madison Square Garden—outrageous—but not that big a deal.”

The reflection comes after Rogan remained silent following Hokit’s bizarre declaration during their televised exchange from the White House matchcage. According to CNN, Trump “appeared to show a half-smile” in response, and neither he nor Rogan has condemned the comments. The Obamas have not commented.

Despite the misstep, Rogan said the spectacle as a whole was “amazing.” In May, he revealed that he wasn’t immediately sold on the idea before he apparently came around.

“The White House thing is odd. I don’t like it,” he said then. “I just don’t think that you should compete in a world championship fight in a non-controlled environment... You wouldn’t ask them to play a world championship basketball game outside in the sun. That would be crazy.”

Rogan didn’t have the same complaints after the event, he said on Wednesday, admitting he was awestruck by the experience: “There is this moment where the UFC thing was going on, where the planes flew overhead, where it was just like, I’m like, is this even real? It was pretty amazing, like, as a piece of entertainment. It was also the only UFC card in the history of the sport, where every fight was a knockout.”

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Read more at The Daily Beast.

President Donald Trump’s dream of building a massive triumphal arch hasn’t become reality yet—so he settled for a tacky plywood version in Washington’s iconic National Mall.

The towering replica now sits opposite a giant Ferris wheel as a centerpiece of the Great American State Fair, a sprawling patriotic festival the president will kickstart with a rally on Wednesday night.

The Fair, which runs until July 10, is supposed to mark weeks of celebrations for America’s 250th birthday. Instead, it is already attracting attention for all the wrong reasons.

Trump is scheduled to headline the opening rally after a string of retro performers dropped out of a planned concert series, including Poison frontman Bret Michaels and Milli Vanilli.

As more and more musicians withdrew, an incensed Trump then demanded on Truth Social that organizers cancel the event before announcing that he would headline a rally himself at the State Fair as a replacement for the “highly paid, Third Rate `Artists,’” his team had booked.

Among the acts now performing at Trump’s rally are MAGA favorite Lee Greenwood and Alexis Wilkins, the country singer better known in Washington circles as FBI Director Kash Patel’s girlfriend.

The fair was pitched as a World’s Fair-style showcase featuring exhibits from all 50 states, concerts, food vendors, and military displays.

However, several Democratic states, including North Carolina, Connecticut, Maine, and Illinois, have declined to participate.

Some critics have accused organizers of turning a national celebration into a political event, and some businesses have publicly distanced themselves from the festival after finding it was not entirely non-partisan.

Despite this, about a dozen die-hard Trump fans were waiting in line before midday outside the makeshift fairgrounds on Wednesday, more than nine hours before Trump was due to take the stage.

Tourists who passed the plywood arch also stopped to take photos of the structure, although one man told the Daily Beast he had no idea what exactly he was posing in front of.

Trump’s real arch, however, has been proposed for another area in D.C. known as Memorial Circle and was recently approved by his handpicked Commission of Fine Arts.

Just as Napoleon Bonaparte had the Arc de Triomphe or Chinese Emperor Qin Shi Huang had the Great Wall, Trump wants his own giant “United States Triumphal Arch” sitting between the Lincoln Memorial and the entrance to Arlington National Cemetery.

The 80-year-old president announced the project in October at a dinner party for billionaires donating to his White House ballroom.

Asked at the time who it would be built for, the president was unequivocal: “Me,” he replied.

The arch is one of many projects Trump has undertaken, though not all have been successful. A few blocks away, for example, a revamp of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has instead become one of Washington’s most mocked public works projects.

Elsewhere, there are other signs of the destruction some of Trump’s ventures have caused. For instance, damaged grass now covers the Ellipse, the site outside the White House where the UFC set up a fan festival coinciding with Trump’s Freedom 250 birthday bash earlier this month.

Wednesday night’s rally is also unfolding against a backdrop of growing tensions between America250—the bipartisan commission created by Congress to oversee the nation’s semiquincentennial—and Freedom 250, the Trump-backed group that has become the public face of many anniversary events.

The latter group is headed by Trump State Department official Keith Krach, who serves as CEO, and also includes MAGA power players such as top fundraiser Meredith O’Rourke and campaign strategist Chris LaCivita.

However, critics argue that Freedom 250 has eclipsed the original commission and transformed what was intended as a broad civic celebration into something far more political.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

A retired soap opera actress is reentering the spotlight more than a decade after she left Hollywood.

Rather than promoting a new role or project, however, All My Children star Marcy Walker, 64, is making headlines with a heartbreaking health revelation.

The description of a GoFundMe page created on June 17 by two of Walker’s friends, Johanna Humphries and Melissa Braverman, reveals Walker’s battle with an unspecified medical condition.

“Recently, many of us had the absolute joy of reconnecting with Marcy during a special virtual livestream event,” the description reads. “Seeing her smile, hearing her reflect on those magical years, and feeling her warmth after so much time away from the spotlight was a beautiful reminder of why we fell in love with her in the first place.”

​The description continues, “But beyond the glamour of the screen and the joy of our recent reunion, life brings real-world challenges. Today, Marcy needs our help.”

The organizers stated that Walker is in dire need of assistance.

“While she has spent years giving her time, energy, and heart to others—both as an actress and later through her dedicated ministry and community work—she is currently navigating an ongoing health issue where financial support is urgently needed,” they wrote.

​Known for her role as Liza Colby in the ABC daytime soap opera, Walker resigned from acting in Hollywood to devote herself to her ministry at Life.Church, an evangelical megachurch in Edmond, Oklahoma.

​Walker told Edmond Outlook in 2012, “After a long time of praying, God told me that the scales had tipped, and I said I’m walking away from acting.”

She now lives privately with her husband of 26 years, Douglas Smith.

The actress also shares her 37-year-old son, Taylor Collins, with her third ex-husband, camera operator Stephan Collins. Taylor appeared as a baby in Santa Barbara, another major soap opera in which Walker appeared.

​Despite her efforts to step away from the limelight, Walker has resurfaced in the public eye due to her ongoing health journey. The GoFundMe aims to raise $18,000.

Ahead of the creation of the fundraiser, her former Santa Barbara co-star and friend, A Martinez, 77, co-hosted a livestream with Walker.

The two-hour June 7 livestream included moderation from Melissa Braverman, who created the GoFundMe campaign later that month.

The event was advertised as “a moderated discussion exploring the actors’ favorite memories from the Santa Barbara set.”

Tickets were available for purchase, and after the $100 fee was announced, the two Daytime Emmy winners faced backlash.

​Martinez clarified the reason for the steep ticket price in an Instagram post, in which he revealed that his former co-star was experiencing health struggles.

“There is a fee to attend, and some folks have expressed disappointment over the cost,” Martinez wrote. “Out of respect for my partner’s privacy, I did not speak to the reasons for the fee when I first posted.”

​The actor, who played Walker’s love interest on the show, continued, “The fact is, Marcy has been ill and is working hard to get well, and in the process has come face to face with the financial challenges that so often plague those of us unlucky enough to need serious medical care in our country.”

​The reunion marked the first time the pair had been publicly seen together since 2024, when they appeared on the red carpet for Santa Barbara’s 40th anniversary.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

A White House official crashed out after a top Democrat questioned President Donald Trump’s health.

White House Communications Director Steven Cheung erupted at Rep. Ted Lieu, calling him a “dumba--” for suggesting Trump may have abruptly canceled a bill signing due to a mystery illness.

“Ted Lewd is a dumbass,” Cheung wrote. “He probably spent hours laughing to himself, thinking that peddling this lie would be funny. Sadly for Ted, there’s no special new drug to cure being a b---h.”

That post came after Lieu, of California, leaned into rumors that the anonymous 79-year-old who received access to an Eli Lilly obesity drug—the only person approved—may have been the president before his 80th birthday this month.

“There was supposed to be a big signing ceremony today in the Capitol, and then all of a sudden, Donald Trump decided he’s not coming to sign the bill,” Lieu said. “Well, why is that? Did he wake up on the wrong side of the bed? Is he unable to stay awake today? What’s causing him to chicken out again? Is it Taco Wednesday, or is it side effects from a drug? We don’t know.”

Lieu, who represents Los Angeles in Congress, continued, “This erratic behavior from the President is very concerning. He has trouble staying awake at multiple White House events and cabinet meetings. He has clearly some weakness in one of his arms. He’s got swelling in his hands, and the White House needs to come clean.

“What we know is his report saying that one person in America got this special new drug was a 79-year-old person who’s very high profile, and this drug can only be given to someone under the compassionate use provision, meaning you do that if someone basically has a terminal illness. So we need to know, did Donald Trump get this special drug from Eli Lilly, and did he get it under that provision, and, if he did, why is that the case?”

The mystery patient was first revealed by Stat News. It reported on Tuesday that a drug called retatrutide drew the interest of several top health officials, suggesting the person who obtained it was high up the chain of command.

As Lieu noted, the patient was prescribed the drug through the FDA’s “compassionate use” program. The program is defined as a “potential pathway” for a patient with a serious or life-threatening disease or condition to access an investigational medical product outside a clinical trial.

The White House has flatly denied that the patient is Trump in emails to the Daily Beast—though the president, who is obese, does meet the criteria for the drug, having gained 14 pounds since last year to weigh a total of 238 pounds.

White House spokesman Kush Desai dismissed the rumor and referred to Stat journalist Lizzy Lawrence as an “unserious gossip columnist.” However, his denial came after he initially refused to comment on whether the patient was Trump when Stat News reached him.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Tucker Carlson has revealed on Alex Jones Live the Democrat whom President Donald Trump believes could win the White House in 2028.

The former Fox News host, who had a very public falling-out with Trump, said the president believes that his troller-in-chief, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, could win over voters.

“I know Trump is very convinced that Gavin has a shot,” Carlson said.

This comes as a surprise given the pair’s long-running feud. Trump has spent years mocking Newsom as “Gavin Newscum” and as recently as March declared the California governor was no longer a “viable presidential candidate” after Newsom publicly discussed his dyslexia during a memoir promotion tour.

Carlson’s remark comes just weeks after he unexpectedly showered Newsom with praise during an appearance on comedian Jimmy Dore’s podcast. The former Fox News anchor called the California governor “very charming” and “unbelievable” while predicting he could become the Democratic nominee.

Carlson wasn’t exactly offering a full endorsement when speaking with Jones; he argued that Newsom’s greatest political asset is his ability to deceive.

“He’s a sociopath who will say anything while passing a lie detector test,” Carlson said.

Jones used this as a perfect tie-in to the former VP: “And he can talk, unlike Kamala Harris!” the conspiracy theorist added.

Newsom has not formally announced a White House bid, though he’s widely expected to run once his term as governor ends. If he does, he could face a Republican ticket led by Vice President JD Vance or Secretary of State Marco Rubio, assuming Trump abides by the constitutional rule preventing a third term.

The conversation eventually turned to Carlson himself. Despite speculation fueled by his increasingly bitter split with Trump and the Republican Party, the conservative commentator insisted he has no plans to run.

“I don’t want to run for president,” Carlson said. “I do want to be involved in offering an option of some kind.”

Once one of Trump’s loudest media allies, the broadcaster spent the 2024 campaign advocating for the president before critiquing the U.S. military involvement in Iran. Trump has since returned fire, branding Carlson a “low-IQ person” who has “lost his way.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Tensions boiled over between President Donald Trump and Republican Senator Bill Cassidy when the pair came face-to-face in the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday.

Trump, 80, was on Capitol Hill to attend the Republican Senate luncheon where Cassidy confronted the president about the war with Iran and his memorandum of understanding, calling the president’s foreign policy move a blunder, according to a person in the room.

The pair went at it even as others tried to step in. It came after Cassidy was one of four GOP senators to vote for a war powers resolution to prevent the president from resuming military force against Iran on Tuesday infuriating the president.

Senators leaving the luncheon were stony faced as they fled past reporters. Sen. Ted Cruz described the meeting as “spirited” and “lively” while others tried to downplay the yelling match between the two men.

Cassidy it appeared had been itching for a confrontation with the president who backed his primary challenger who won the primary against the Louisiana senator earlier this year.

At one point, Cassidy even stopped calling Trump “Mr. President” and started referring to him as “brother,” sources told Punchbowl News.

After the meeting, Cassidy appeared sarcastic when he told reporters that the meeting had gone “swimmingly.” The senator took the opportunity to challenge Trump while the president was complaining about why GOP senators would vote for the war powers resolution, which passed 50 to 48.

Cassidy told reporters gathered in the U.S. Capitol afterwards that the president raised his voice and the senator lost his temper, which he admitted was not appropriate, calling it the “Irish” in him. He said Trump even brought up his primary loss. Cassidy said he eventually sat down and tried to de-escalate the situation.

But even his fellow senators declined to publicly back Trump.

“They harbor bad feelings,” GOP Sen. Jim Justice observed afterward. “Maybe that’s fair.”

The president also went after Sen. David McCormick in the meeting for not being present to vote against the war powers resolution, a source told MS NOW, even though the Pennsylvania Republican was literally traveling with the president on Tuesday when the vote took place and it would have passed even if he had been there.

The Trump-Cassidy showdown came just hours after Trump blindsided Republicans and sent them scrambling by refusing to sign a landmark bipartisan housing bill just as GOP members were hoping to take a victory lap and promote the legislation to help struggling Americans ahead of the midterms.

Trump said he would not sign it and demanded Republicans pass his so-called SAVE America Act first, but Republicans after the luncheon attempted to downplay the president throwing their plans into chaos. Even if Trump does not sign the bill, it automatically goes into law in 10 days.

Senators in the room said the president did the vast majority of the talking and only took a few questions.

After he emerged from the meeting, Trump claimed they had a “really great meeting” and said he was proud of the Republican Party before appearing to allude to the confrontation.

“We like our leader, we like everybody really in the room. I don’t like a few people, but that’s okay,” Trump said, but he did not name names.

The president exited the U.S. Capitol without taking any questions from reporters‚ an unusual move for Trump.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

President Donald Trump’s side-by-side appearance with Senate Majority Leader John Thune has poked a fresh hole in his height claims.

When the White House released the results of the 80-year-old president’s physical last month, it listed him at 6-foot-3—as Trump has long claimed.

But on Wednesday, standing beside Thune, who is widely reported to stand tall at 6-foot-4, the president didn’t quite measure up.

Despite their purported one-inch difference, the 65-year-old Republican leader towered over Trump, who had made the trip to the Capitol for a closed-door luncheon with GOP senators.

One photo taken by photographer Kevin Dietsch of the two men walking side by side on level ground appeared to show Thune’s line of sight landing around the top of the president’s signature straw-colored coiffure, making the official one-inch gap difficult to discern.

Back in 2012, Trump listed his height at 6-foot-2 on his New York driver’s license, which Politico obtained through an open records request. But by 2018, his first White House medical report began putting him at 6-foot-3.

Trump—who has a habit of exaggerating numbers when it suits him—has routinely fallen short of his height claim when tested in side-by-side comparisons.

Prince William, who is also widely reported to be 6-foot-3, appears noticeably taller than the president whenever the pair pose side by side. William, 44, appeared much taller when the two were photographed together in Paris ahead of the reopening ceremony at Notre-Dame Cathedral in December 2024.

Meanwhile, the president’s listed weight in his White House physicals has also raised a few eyebrows.

Last Month, MS NOW put it to the eyeball test, putting a photo of the president—listed by the White House at 224 pounds last year and 238 pounds this year—side by side with two athletes of similar listed sizes: Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver DK Metcalf, 28, and Seattle Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold, 28.

The comparison showed Metcalf, listed by the NFL at 6′4″ and 229 pounds, and Darnold, listed at 225 pounds and 6′3″, alongside a photo of Trump, whose physique appeared markedly different from both athletes despite the supposedly comparable measurements.

“The real problem is that he built so much of his brand around hypermasculinity... and being a tough guy, and so much of... that MAGA cult-like behavior is about his brand of being a strongman,” pollster Cornell Belcher told the MS NOW panel. “But, and this is where it gets really problematic, because it begins to crumble when he’s falling asleep, when he can’t string together a sentence, when he clearly has visible signs of being 80.”

The Daily Beast has chronicled Trump’s accumulating health issues since his return to the White House. The oldest person to assume the presidency, Trump is frequently spotted with bruises on his hands and swollen ankles.

But the White House continues to project a rosy view of the president’s health—much like its official height-and-weight claims—often bragging about his vitality.

That led cardiologist Jonathan Reiner to tell The Washington Post after the release of Trump’s latest medical report, “There just seems to be a lack of candor from the White House.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Frasier star Kelsey Grammer had a bizarre meltdown over the president’s Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, ranting about Donald Trump’s critics and claiming they are “consumed by hatred.”

In an interview with Fox News’s Jesse Watters, the MAGA actor defended Trump’s disastrous, multimillion-dollar renovation of the historic monument. Watters preempted his interview with Grammer, 71, with a monologue of his own, suggesting that the pool, which has been plagued by algae, peeling paint, and dead wildlife, is a patriotic gift from the president to his people, and the left “hates everything they see.”

“That pool is America’s mirror. We look in it, and we love what we see,” Watters said. “The left hates everything they see. They want it broken and murky. They don’t want it to reflect the greatness of the nation.”

The host then introduced Grammer, who gave his stamp of approval. “I liked the monologue. Nice touch. Very nice, man,” the actor said.

Asked by the Fox News host why “we can’t have nice things,” Grammer launched into a tirade against the left, also somehow suggesting that the mockery of the president’s pool is politically motivated. “There is a virus that has infected a very small number of people, I think, who just want to tear things down.”

“They’ve been consumed by hatred. And, of course, hatred ends up basically destroying you. So they’re welcome to it,” he continued. “I pray for them. I pray for everyone to find a decent sentiment in their hearts about this country and about the people who run it these days and about those who love it, because it’s worth loving.”

Grammer is a staunch supporter of Trump. The high-profile conservative frequently gushes about the octogenarian president, calling him “extraordinary” and “one of the greatest presidents we’ve ever had.”

In the wake of his latest comments, the Golden Globe-winning actor was widely mocked online for his defense of the pool and the president.

Tennis player Martina Navratilova wrote on X, “We love America Kelsey, we don’t love the people running it. Ok? That is not hate, that is love and caring. Try again…”

One X user said, “Consumed by hatred, @KelseyGrammer? Like the current president of the United States? The petulant man-child whose entire agenda is based on revenge for perceived disobedience against him? Come on, man! Trump is the one who has infected this country with hatred."

And another wrote in response, “F--- Frasier.”

Since the president’s vanity project took an ill-fated turn, Trump and his allies have promoted conspiracy theories that the Reflecting Pool was targeted by his foes. On Monday, Trump told reporters that vandals made an incision within the pool, cutting it “violently” and tampering with the renovation.

“They cut it up good,” Trump raged, with no evidence to back his claims. “And then they cut it 200, 350-foot slips in the form of lots of little slips, a real horrible stuff.”

MAGA commentators have made similar allegations, claiming the pool was sabotaged. “What if the bureaucrats left it over in the pipes on purpose?” right-wing radio host Grant Stinchfield asked last week. “We know that those inside government don’t like President Trump.”

Trump has become consumed with the pool’s restoration and the public reaction to it, sending in National Guard members and U.S. Park Police to patrol its outskirts and threatening to sue ABC News for reporting on the drama.

The president announced on Tuesday that six people were arrested “for the damage they did to our Country’s now beautiful Reflecting Pool.” The arrests included 67-year-old David Hearn, a three-time Olympic canoeist, who said he was held “incommunicado” in a lockup for hours.

Obsessed with pop culture and entertainment? Follow us on Substack and YouTube for even more coverage.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

One of the top musicians of the 1990s has revealed how her traumatic childhood spiraled into a shoplifting addiction years before she became a Grammy-nominated star.

Singer-songwriter Jewel Kilcher, typically referred to mononymously as Jewel, opened up last Tuesday in an episode of the No Magic Pill podcast about her journey from a homeless teenager stealing food in San Diego to a chart-topping artist determined to break the cycle of addiction that surrounded her growing up.

Kilcher, 52, said she was raised in a saddle barn in Alaska before her parents divorced when she was eight and her mother left. She was then raised mostly by her father, who she said became “physically abusive” and drank heavily.

“My whole world really turned upside down,” she said of the turbulent period in her life.

The “You Were Meant for Me” singer said she spent much of her childhood performing with her parents in bars, where she watched adults try to numb themselves in destructive ways.

“When I looked at all of these people in bars, I saw that everybody was trying to cover their pain,” Kilcher said. “And there were different ways to cover pain.”

Witnessing the toll addiction took on the adults around her convinced Kilcher to swear off drugs and alcohol at an early age.

“I think just cuz I had such an extreme front row seat to see what it did,” she said. “It didn’t look glamorous.”

But Kilcher said her own unhealthy coping mechanism emerged after she moved out at 15 and ended up living alone in her car in San Diego.

“My panic attacks were getting worse. My agoraphobia was getting worse,” she said. “I didn’t have food. I didn’t have water. I didn’t have anything. I didn’t have gas for the car.”

Kilcher said her descent into shoplifting began with food as she struggled to get by.

“It started with carrots, which apparently are the gateway vegetable,” Kilcher quipped, explaining that she was trying to learn about “food as medicine” while dealing with kidney problems.

But what began as a survival tactic slowly turned into something she said she could no longer control.

“It kind of just evolved into stealing things that weren’t food and things that I didn’t need,” she said. “Stealing for me really became a real addiction. It was compulsive. I couldn’t control it.”

Kilcher said one humiliating moment in a dressing room finally jolted her awake.

The singer, who also wrote about the incident in her memoir, Never Broken: Songs Are Only Half the Story, recalled trying to shove a white dress she did not need down her pants.

Then she caught a glimpse of herself. “I saw my reflection in the mirror, and I was a statistic,” she said.

Kilcher said the moment forced her to confront the exact future she had been trying to avoid.

“I’m a homeless kid that is shoplifting, and I’m going to end up in jail or dead, you know, if this keeps going.”

The realization became a turning point for the singer, who would eventually grow to become a four-time Grammy nominee. Kilcher said she began retraining her mind by focusing on small, physical actions, including writing down everything she did with her hands over a two-week period.

“I haven’t had a panic attack in two weeks,” the singer remembered realizing.

“What I stumbled on was being radically present,” she said. “Journaling about my hands all day … I literally would watch my hands open a door. I’d watch my hands not shake a hand, or whatever it was.”

The practice, she said, helped her interrupt the panic and compulsive behavior that had begun to define her life.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio brought a “good friend” along to a high-level meeting with UAE officials: President Donald Trump’s son-in-law.

Michael Boulos, the husband of Tiffany Trump, sat next to the Secretary of State during a meeting with UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan on Wednesday.

Rubio said in a social media post that they discussed Trump’s peace deal with Iran, transit through the Strait of Hormuz, and the stability of the Middle East.

“I thanked the UAE leadership for their unparalleled support, praised their courage and resilience in the face of Iran’s attacks, and reaffirmed our commitment to Emirati security and to our strong bilateral partnership,” he wrote.

A photo posted by Rubio, 55, showed Boulos, 28, smiling next to him as they sat across Emirati officials.

The state secretary later told reporters that Boulas “was just here because his brother lives here, and I’m a good friend of Michael, so we had a chance to catch up,” The Wall Street Journal’s Vera Bergengruen reported.

Boulos married Tiffany, the president’s daughter from his second wife, Marla Maples, in 2022. The couple shares one son who was born last year.

In April, Rubio and Boulos were part of Trump’s posse when he attended a UFC match in Miami, Florida.

Boulos, a Lebanese-American businessman, is no stranger to the world of diplomacy. He is the son of Massad Boulos, Trump’s senior adviser for Arab and African Affairs.

Just last month, Boulos and Tiffany met with Sergio Gor, the U.S. Ambassador to India, on a trip that the president’s second daughter described as a “dream come true.”

A New York Times report last year found that Boulos’ family and their associates quickly saw their financial fortunes rise after he asked for Tiffany’s hand in marriage in 2021.

The first deal involved Jared Kushner, the husband of Ivanka Trump and a senior adviser to the president.

Boulos, who at the time was working for his cousin’s yacht brokerage, pitched Kushner an investment in a 50-meter superyacht. Kushner took the offer without knowing that the firm had overcharged him by $2.5 million.

A spokesperson for Boulos and Tiffany told the Times that he received only a prenegotiated finder’s fee in the yacht deal and had since ended his business ties to his cousin Jimmy Frangi, the yacht broker.

“Mr. Boulos is proud of and honored by his close, familial relationship with Mr. Kushner,” the spokesperson said.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

A judge is hitting back at Donald Trump’s seemingly childish response to having his name scrubbed from the Kennedy Center.

Last month, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper found that the president had illegally put his name on the performing arts center when it was added in December. Further, the Obama-appointed judge ruled that only Congress had the power to change the name of the Kennedy Center, formally known as “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.”

But it seems Trump’s team isn’t taking that well.

On June 13, workers complied with the judge’s order, removing Trump’s name from the once-storied performance center. But in its place, they erected scaffolding and a tarp that almost completely obscures the name on the building.

The scaffolding and tarp extend almost entirely up the side of the building. Crews even ensured that the doors to the center below the sign remained accessible, suggesting the cover-up would stay in place for some time.

Cooper, for his part, appears to have caught on. On Wednesday, the federal judge ordered a status report by the last day of July detailing “the purpose for and status of the tarp and scaffolding that Defendants have erected on the front portico of the Center, to the extent they remain at that time,” Deadline reported.

Legal representation for Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, who sued Trump and the Kennedy Center after he slapped his name on the institution, slammed the scaffolding scandal as a “petty act of defiance,” according to the outlet.

The Kennedy Center Board of Directors, which Trump stacked with loyalists last year, did not respond to a request for comment from the Daily Beast. Last week, a Kennedy Center employee on the scene said they had not been told when the construction equipment would come down, if at all.

Cooper’s July 31 deadline isn’t the only one the Kennedy Center is scrambling to meet. Last week, the federal judge gave the center just days to update the court on its plans to remain open after blocking the president’s plan to shutter the institution for two years.

The controversies are playing out just days before the annual Mark Twain Prize event on Sunday, which will be presented to anti-woke comedian Bill Maher—likely rubbing salt in Trump’s wounds.

While Maher previously sat down with Trump for a headline-grabbing White House dinner, the president went on to slander him as “very boring” and relentlessly “ANTI-TRUMP.”

In fact, the White House even attempted to intervene on Trump’s behalf and block Maher from receiving the prestigious comedy award altogether. Ultimately, the effort was yet another defeat for the president at the Kennedy Center.

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Jelly Roll shared new videos documenting his shocking weight-loss journey.

The 41-year-old “Need a Favor” singer, who once weighed 540 pounds, reflected on his incredible physical transformation on Instagram on Tuesday.

Jelly, whose real name is Jason DeFord, started the video with an old clip of himself from before his weight loss, walking with his head down in the pouring rain, looking exhausted.

The video then cut to clips of his December 10 appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast.

“Every time I said I was going to lose the weight, Joe, I lied to myself,” he tells Rogan in the clip. “I would tell myself I’m going to do this. I’m going to go do that. And then I’d go tell my family that.”

Jelly continued, sharing that he had a message for a specific demographic: “There’s a big person listening to this right now, or a drug addict, or somebody who wants to change some part of their life that right now is going, ‘I’m gonna start next Monday.’”

He then reflected on the obstacles he encountered that day, when he had promised to start his fitness journey with a walk.

“That first Monday comes, Joe, it is pissing rain,” he said. “Cats and dogs, dude. And I wake up, and I’m like, ‘s--t.’”

Jelly said that the eldest of his two children, Bailee Ann, 18, suggested that he could do his walk on a treadmill.

But Jelly was determined to go outside.

“I was like, ‘I’m done lying to y’all, and I’m done lying to me. I told y’all I was going to go do this walk, and I’m going to do this walk,’” he said.

The video then showed more clips of Jelly’s first days walking in the rain before cutting to a present-day video of him running in the rain.

Over the latter clip, he wrote, “Today, I’m sprinting in the rain.”

He added, “Because one day, not that long ago, I stopped lying to myself. I barely made it up my driveway that day. I’m alive today because I didn’t lose faith. F--- Monday. Start today.”

In the running video, Jelly was lip-syncing to his song “Hands Up,“ which he released on Wednesday.

The lyrics on the chorus go, “Everybody put your hands up / If you ain’t perfect, but you try / Put them way up to the sky / Touchin’ heaven kinda high.”

He captioned the post, “Make the choice. You can do it.”

Jelly also interacted with fans in the comments.

“I’m down two hundred pounds in the last two years,” one fan wrote. “It’s been amazing watching your transformation.”

To this, Jelly replied, “That’s incredible.”

In January, Jelly showed his weight-loss results on the cover of Men’s Health.

He had stated that the cover was his goal in a December 2024 episode of his then-wife Bunnie Xo’s podcast, Dumb Blonde.

In the magazine interview, Jelly thanked his chef, sports nutritionist, and medical team for the weight loss.

One of his key changes, he said, was treating his food addiction. In April, Jelly weighed 276 pounds, a whopping 264 pounds less than his heaviest.

On May 18, Jelly filed for divorce from Bunnie, whose real name is Alisa DeFord, after almost 10 years of marriage.

On her podcast, the 46-year-old New York Times best-selling author shared that Jelly was “feeling himself” amid the weight loss and that he had “started dating” after the breakup.

The two remain on good terms, and Bunnie said that they are “still having a baby together.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Barack Obama said that Donald Trump’s “constant” mentioning of him is “very strange”—but also revealing.

The former president appeared on the popular sports podcast All The Smoke on Wednesday, where he was asked how he manages to keep calm publicly in the face of Trump’s frequent attacks on his legacy.

“Don’t just want to cuss his a-- out sometimes?” he was asked by host and former NBA star Matt Barnes.

“I mean, the thing about it is—look, you got to ask him what it is that… the obsession,” Obama replied. “Obviously, you know, I have a room in his head—a suite in his head.”

“But the thing about it is that was always clear to me: Look, first of all, when I was president, the last thing I had time to do was worry about what somebody said or what my predecessor did. They’re gone. I’ve got work to do,” Obama continued. “If you’re doing the job right, every day, you’ve got five, 10 things that are real hard, and you have to be constantly focused.”

“The idea that I’d be worrying about somebody who came before and me trying to measure, ‘What’s he done today? Look, constantly worrying about that is a strange thing to me,” he said. “It shows me somebody who’s not focused on the American people and the job they’re supposed to do.”

Trump’s frequent mentions of Obama have only increased since the former president first left office, according to CNN, which reported that Trump mentioned Obama’s name 537 times—an average of 1.8 times per day and an increase from both years prior, according to the outlet.

He hasn’t slowed down in his second term, several years later. While deflecting from the steadily rising costs of his Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool renovation, when asked why he hadn’t delivered on the shorter timeline and lower costs for the project, he told reporters on Monday, “Are you ready? Barack Hussein Obama.”

The 44th president said that he took a very different approach to the presidency than his late-night posting successor.

“The other thing that I learned pretty early in this gig was you have to screen out the noise in order for you to understand what’s in front of you and deal with it,” he explained on Wednesday. “My whole presidency, I never watched cable TV, never watched cable news, never read, I didn’t have social media.”

“There were people on my staff whose job it was to monitor what are folks saying because you also want to have input when you’re getting constructive criticism or when the American people are all like, ‘Look we’re upset about something.” You need to get that feedback loop. And the flip side of that is you also then don’t get puffed up when things are going good.”

Obama also said that despite Trump’s constant negative commentary about him, he has never seen that energy in face-to-face interactions with Trump.

“The other thing I believe in, and part of what we try to teach in our leadership training, is I believe in face-to-face,” he said. “I believe in conversation. So if this—whoever you were talking about—was in front of me, which has happened a couple times, he doesn’t talk like that because he knows better.”

“I think there is—that filter of the phone creates a situation where people just say kind of crazy stuff that they would never say to your face with no consequences,” he added.

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Whitney Houston’s estate blasted Oprah Winfrey for claiming the late singer appeared high on drugs during her final appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show.

The pushback comes after Winfrey, while speaking at Cannes Lions, recounted Houston’s 2009 appearance on her talk show, claiming the singer relapsed and fell off the stage while under the influence of drugs. Houston died in 2012 at the age of 48 from accidental drowning.

Pat Houston, Whitney Houston’s estate manager and sister-in-law, rejected that account in a statement to TMZ.

“Whitney absolutely fell off the stage, but it was during a sound check, and it was due to the darkness of the area and her unfamiliarity with the stage. She was absolutely not high,” she said.

“Like many people, she faced personal battles, but it is inaccurate and unfair to attach that struggle to every performance or every chapter of her life. What the studio audience witnessed on stage was the result of discipline, talent, and commitment—not the assumptions others project,” Houston continued.

She added, “Whitney’s humanity included triumphs and struggles, but on that day, she showed up as the professional and gifted artist she always worked to be. We owe her the dignity of telling the truth, not repeating myths.”

Recalling Houston’s final appearance on the program in 2009, Winfrey described a private conversation she had with the singer before the interview.

“We did the whole, ‘Hey girl, how you doing?’ greeting thing and then I stopped the cameras, and I went behind stage, and I said, ‘So tell me, what do you want to happen here? And I’m gonna tell you what I want to happen here,’” adding, “And that was one of the most powerful interviews.”

Winfrey claimed that when Houston returned to perform later, the singer had relapsed.

“I had such trust from The Oprah Show audience… I think it was her last show with us, and she had gone back on drugs,” Winfrey said. “The first interview I did with her when we’d gone behind stage and I asked her about her intention, she was clean, but the day she came to my show then to perform in front of the audience, she was not, and she fell off of the stage.”

Winfrey also said the incident was never publicly revealed at the time because she feared the fallout for Houston, explaining, “I knew that if that story got out… she would be destroyed by that.”

“And so even though the audience was there and the audience had cameras, I begged them not to put those pictures out because it would ruin her life, and they did not. That would not happen today, I can tell you that,” Winfrey said.

Houston openly discussed her addiction struggles during her 2009 interview with Winfrey, including her drug use during and after her marriage to Bobby Brown.

The singer died in February 2012. Her death was ruled an accidental drowning, with heart disease and cocaine use listed as contributing factors.

The Daily Beast has contacted a representative for Winfrey for comment.

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Actress and director Olivia Wilde chimed in on a viral image that sparked worry over her health and drew unflattering comparisons to a J.R.R. Tolkien character.

On April 24, the 42-year-old actress gave a red carpet interview to SFGate at the 2026 SFFILM Festival in San Francisco. In a clip published on TikTok, the House star was happily discussing her upcoming comedy film, The Invite—in theaters on June 26—but it was her appearance that drew thousands of comments.

A widely circulated screenshot from SFGate’s video showed the actress’s gaunt appearance, leading social media users to liken her to the eerie, ravenous The Lord of the Rings character Gollum and voice concerns over her health.

The highly publicized demise of Wilde’s relationship with Ted Lasso star Jason Sudeikis, with whom she shares two children, fueled previous rumors regarding her emotional well-being. The couple, who dated for nine years and were engaged for seven, split up in 2020, and in 2022, Wilde was infamously served child custody papers onstage at CinemaCon.

Despite the breakup having happened years earlier, some online spectators linked it to her appearance in the viral 2026 SFGate video.

Fans thought Wilde may be experiencing “temporal wasting,” a possible sign of malnutrition. Others suggested she was using the popular appetite-suppressing drug Ozempic or another GLP-1 medication.

On Wednesday, Wilde told The Cut how she really felt about the ordeal.

“It was a terrible image,” she said, and, further agreeing with the online comments, added, “I did look like Gollum.”

Earlier this May, Wilde addressed the discourse in an Instagram video, in which she laughed. “Listen, that is a fisheye lens,” she remarked in the social media post. “I’m not dead!”

Now, she revealed her straightforward response was driven by two factors: she had enjoyed multiple classes of wine, and conservative commentator Megyn Kelly had compared her appearance to that of a corpse.

On April 30, Kelly said on her SiriusXM The Megyn Kelly Show that Wilde was “less hot than ever.”

“She looks skeletal,” Kelly said. “She looks like she should go into a hospital right now, because she looks like a corpse with the very swollen eyes, like the eyeballs sticking out the way they do on a true anorexic. There is nothing left but skin and bones.”

Adding, “She certainly looks like she’s on Ozempic.”

On June 17, Wilde also addressed the image on Alex Cooper’s Call Her Daddy podcast.

The actress stated that she had seen the photo right after the interview was posted, but thought “no one’s going to see this.”

“And then suddenly it was f---ing everywhere,” she said. “And I was like, ‘Oh my God.’”

The video was taken in a wide-angle setting that distorted the image, and Wilde recalled thinking, “Oh no, but that is not how I actually look.”

Wilde said she was able to laugh about the whole thing with her friends.

“I mean, the thing that is great about having really good friends is that they are the ones who laugh the hardest,” she said.

In the podcast episode, Wilde also discussed aging in her industry.

“I imagine it’s the same for like athletes that there is this ticking clock. And it is like, ‘Well, I better enjoy this because by the time I hit like 35, I’m a geriatric,’” she said.

Becoming a director eased her fear of aging.

“As a director, you are more valuable the more experience you have,” she explained. “And I loved the idea of like, I’ve shifted into something that I can grow old in, [it] made me really excited as opposed to being anxious about getting older.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.