Donald Trump wants to crush The Swamp. The leaks, the sneaks, and the secrets are all there. Our writers, David Gardner, Farrah Tomazin, Sarah Ewall-Wice, and Laura Esposito, are sifting through the ooze so you don’t have to. Don’t miss out.
In this week’s news from the ooze: April Ryan, Karoline Leavitt, Stefano Forte, Queen Elizabeth, Weijia Jiang, Jeffrey Epstein, Kimberly Guilfoyle, Rev. Shannon Fleck, King Charles, Bettina Anderson, Mary Peltola, Charlie Kirk, Melania Trump, Thomas Massie, Cara Castronuova, and absolutely no members of Congress.
Trump’s Very Unlikely Royal Pen Pal
At first glance, King Charles and President Donald Trump seem to be the most unlikely of friends.
But appearances can be deceptive. Both had to wait a long time to finally get the jobs they always thought they deserved, and were starved of attention from the people they loved most (Queen Elizabeth and “movie star” Melania!). They feel misunderstood and underappreciated, they own a whole load of gold, and they have both faced No Kings protests.
But The Swamp can reveal that their secret friendship is keeping the Special Relationship afloat.
We have learned that Trump sends Charles a personal note each week with his private views on his very public presidency, and the pen pals share news about their families. One would imagine the odd couple wondering what to do with Andrew, the black sheep royal formerly known as Prince. Or sharing health tips as they try to stave off old age.
Britain’s prime minister, Keir Starmer is the leader with the country’s political power, but Trump has been screening his calls ever since he hesitated to support the U.S./Israeli war on Iran. Now it is King Charles who has the direct line to the Oval Office.
No doubt, Trump will be sending the king a few tips on what to include and what to leave out in His Majesty’s address to a joint meeting of Congress on June 28, to mark the 250th anniversary of American independence. It will be the first speech by a British monarch to Congress in more than 30 years. (Queen Elizabeth, Charles’s mother, addressed Congress in 1991 and was greeted with a standing ovation.)
Presumably, Trump would insist that Charles leaves out any mention of his brother’s bestie Jeffrey Epstein. Reps Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie asked the royal to include a reference to the victims’ fight for justice in his speech after he rebuffed an invitation to meet with survivors during his trip. Don’t hold your breath for that one.
The president may well drop a note this week asking his old friend to include a message of support for Operation Epic Fury. Expect a carefully qualified, diplomatically oblique reiteration of the history between the two nations.
Charles will definitely want to avoid the subject of Canada—where the king is head of state—becoming America’s 51st state.
Ever polite, Charles has written back to Trump. They do, after all, have one other interest in common. They both love architecture. It is true that Charles prefers a more classic style—his favorite architect Léon Krier doesn’t think a decent building has been built in Europe in 70 years—while the president prefers the smell of wet cement. But Charles is certain to get a VIP tour of Trump’s ballroom construction. And if anything is going to stop the U.S. pulling out of NATO it will be the king’s willingness to approve of Trump turning the White House into Trumpingham Palace.
When Trump Wasn’t the Most Deranged Thing in the White House
The White House Briefing Room has seen its fair share of shouting matches over the years, but Donald Trump’s Monday update on Iran might be a new low. With only 49 fixed seats for more than 100 reporters, the narrow aisles were heaving as journalists spent hours jostling for space before the president’s arrival, with some even camped out since dawn. Then came the wildcard: an unfamiliar outlet’s representative who decided that decorum was optional. The male reporter tried to push his way into the front of the room at the last minute, much to the chagrin of everyone else. Veteran correspondent April Ryan wasn’t having it, loudly calling him out from across the room. “Go to the back!” she demanded. Lindell TV’s Cara Castronuova, a former boxer and Biggest Loser trainer, also lashed out, phone raised and ready to document the chaos. White House Correspondents Association president Weijia Jiang tried to restore order, but the obnoxious reporter was having none of it.
Worst of all, nobody knows who the reporter is (except the White House and they’re not saying.) All of which raises a broader question: why, in 2026, are the world’s press still crammed into what feels like an airline middle seat with bad lighting? Trump has poured effort into everything from the Lincoln bathroom revamp to his ballroom vanity project —but the James Brady Briefing room, a former theater that has accommodated the media since 1970, remains a relic. If Trump’s latest press conference proved anything, it’s that the briefing room doesn’t just need a refresh. It needs a full-blown expansion before the president’s next appearance turns into another White House UFC event. Which, come to think of it, is just how he likes it.
Kimberly Announces Greece Is Just Like Home
In a triumph of diplomacy, Kimberly Guilfoyle has managed to bring Palm Beach to Athens. Donald Trump may have thought he was doing Junior a favor by banishing “Kimber-lay” to Florida so his oldest son could walk down Worth Avenue with fiancée Bettina Anderson without being bothered, but now the U.S. Ambassador to Greece has found an official reason for a regular return trip to the President Donald J. Trump Airport. She announced in an “historic” X post that Greece will henceforth be paired with “the great state of Florida” through the U.S. National Guard State Partnership Program.
We’re not altogether clear but we’re guessing that means National Guardsmen and women will now be able to interchange use of sunshine, sandy beaches. Opa!
Praise the Lord: MAGA’s Got a New Hotspot
On the subject of the divine, Karoline Leavitt’s 7.45a.m. women’s prayer group at the White House might be the most exclusive morning ritual in town—but by Sunday, the overflow crowd has somewhere else to go. King’s Church, an evangelical congregation once crammed into the Penn Social sports bar in downtown D.C., has become such a MAGA hotspot that it’s now pulling in hundreds of Washingtonians to a new and bigger home on K Street, a few meters from the Washington Post’s headquarters.
The crowd skews young and hyper-ambitious—Capitol Hill staffers, federal workers, think tank types—all turning faith into the city’s latest must-attend gathering. The church began in D.C. in 2018 with about 30 people, rising slightly to about 50 a year later. Now, it has about 700 attendees, with an average age of just 28. What’s more, about 30 percent are new believers, according to pastors Ben Palka and Wesley Welch. The Damascene conversions reportedly accelerated after the assassination of Charlie Kirk. Meanwhile, the leadership fits the vibe: staff pastor Daniel Davis was a Senate speechwriter, while Palka claims a “defense and national security” background. “Jesus did not come into your life to help you achieve your ultimate goal,” Palka insisted during his latest sermon. “He is your ultimate goal.” However, some in the congregation might have a more earthly goal. In a city where proximity to power is its own religion, this K Street congregation has become a kind of spiritual annex to the MAGA movement: young, plugged-in, and politically fluent. Of course, there’s one guest it would love to have: Trump himself. The president was too busy popping into his golf course to go to any church on Easter Sunday, the holiest day of the Christian calendar. But he can be guaranteed a warm welcome any time at King’s Church. And obviously, no chance of any pesky No Kings types.
Living Large Away From the Last Frontier
Alaska has long been a red state, but the Senate race this year has been gaining fresh attention as the map becomes increasingly competitive. On the Republican side, the Senate Leadership Fund plans to spend $15 million to help keep the Alaska seat in Sen. Dan Sullivan’s GOP hands. That’s a load of loot, but Sullivan’s a big spender, FEC filings show. Since re-election in 2020, he’s splurged through:
- $35,000 at the Capital Grille, home of the $200 bone-in dry-aged ribeye;
- $20,000 at the now-shuttered French restaurant Bistro Bis;
- $20,000 at Charlie Palmer Steak, also now defunct;
- And $14,000 at the ultra-discreet 116 Club, a Capitol Hill row house where lobbyists rub shoulders with legislators over the city’s (supposed) best crabcakes.
Joe’s Seafood also makes the list, along with Bistro Cacao, a restaurant “known for romance.” It’s not just D.C. where the corporate card took a battering. There was $132,000 on multiple stays at the five-star “premier luxury” Kiawah Island Golf Resort right off the beach in South Carolina. Rooms among the “world class amenities” start at $800 and suites reach more than $2,700 a night. Sullivan’s Truth North PAC also spent more than $100,000 at the very-much-not-in-the-true-north La Quinta Resort and Club in La Quinta, southern California, a “desert oasis” with golf and luxuriant spas. Isn’t life grand?
Out of Africa and Into MAGA
Stefano Forte, president of the New York Young Republican Club, is taking his far-right agenda beyond the bounds of the Big Apple. The 28-year-old popped up in D.C. last week alongside Ernst Roets—an Afrikaner activist who’s fueled the GOP’s fixation on an ongoing “white genocide” in South Africa—where the duo unveiled plans for a National Mall vigil commemorating “victims of farm attacks” and “persons excluded by racially discriminatory legislation” in the country. They might want to check in with some of the white South Africans given asylum to come here by Donald Trump. They want to go back where they came from.
Mark Your Calendars
The countdown is on to the White House Correspondents Association’s annual dinner. Donald Trump will be there, Oz the Mentalist will be there… and The Swamp will be too. This year has a new addition to the party scene, with Grindr having a gathering at an undisclosed location on Friday night. The Swamp is swiping right on every party invitation… so send them our way.
NOT SPOTTED in Washington: Nearly all of the 535 lawmakers who make up Congress. Because while the President of the United States is threatening to annihilate Iranian civilization, lawmakers can’t be bothered to cut short their more than two-week vacation. GOP congressional leadership had no comment to The Swamp on Trump’s threats or the growing calls for him to be removed from office, despite the mounting calls for Congress to do its job, or anything at all.
