The Intercept

Head of the White House Faith Office Paula White-Cain sings as she stands next to Donald Trump and other religious leaders during a National Day of Prayer event in the White House Rose Garden on May 1, 2025 in Washington, D.C. Photo: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images Since the Trump regime launched its war on Iran, his administration has gotten a lot more biblical. In the last few weeks, Trump and his circle have delivered a chorus of mandates — many sounding as if sent from the Alm

U.S. Customs and Border Protection is set to order a vast arsenal of chemical grenades, sprays, projectiles, and other weapons, according to procurement materials reviewed by The Intercept. The purchase follows months of abuse of these very munitions on American streets. CBP will spend up to $50 million on what it refers to as “Less Lethal Specialty Munitions,” a euphemism for weapons intended to merely hurt or disable a target rather than killing them. The agency is looking for a vendor who

Iran shot down a U.S. Air Force F-15 fighter jet, U.S. officials said on Friday. At about the same time, a second U.S. plane, an A-10 Warthog, crashed near the Strait of Hormuz. Both aircraft had two-person crews, U.S. officials told The Intercept, and in both cases, one crew member was rescued and one remains missing. The downing of the U.S. plane undermined an assertion of strength President Donald Trump made in a nationally televised speech earlier this week. “They have no ant

In the body camera footage, a police officer parks his black SUV on the grass, a rosary swinging from the rearview mirror. He exits his car, moves briskly past a pair of protesters, and points an accusatory finger at the suspect: a 7-foot-tall inflatable penis holding an American flag. The alleged crime? Unclear. There’s no sound at first, only the silent spectacle of a person in a penis suit turning toward a cop with a stance that says, “Who, me?” A handmade sign comes into view in the perso

After more than a month into the U.S.–Israel conflict with Iran, President Donald Trump addressed the nation directly for the first time on Wednesday about why he dragged the country into an unprovoked illegal war. During his wide-ranging speech, Trump made numerous false claims, including repeatedly emphasizing the nuclear threat Iran posed. The reasons the Trump administration have given for partnering with Israel in this war have been varying and at times include religious undertones, espe

The mother of the last remaining Afghan detained at Guantánamo Bay is pleading with the Trump administration to free her son, who has been held in detention for nearly two decades without ever being charged with a crime. In a letter shared exclusively with The Intercept, Safora Yousufzai calls on President Donald Trump to release her son, 60-year-old Mohammad Rahim, citing his poor health and “advanced age” and arguing that “his prolonged detention has significantly affected both his physical

By constitutional design, the press is antagonistic to the government. As the late Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black wrote in his opinion defending the publication of the Pentagon Papers more than 50 years ago, “Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government.” Such a free and unrestrained press requires a cohort of committed legal advocates. Whether to counter the federal government’s repeated insistence on ignoring freedom of information laws, or the Tr

Sen. Bernie Sanders endorsed socialist New York State Assembly Member Claire Valdez on Thursday in a Democratic primary shaping up as a test of how factions of New York City’s progressive wing will work together under Mayor Zohran Mamdani.  The race to replace retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez in New York’s 7th Congressional District has put major progressive organizations and figures at odds. Hoping to capitalize on growing national frustration with conservative Democrats and ling

Iranian American support for the U.S.–Israel war on Iran has plummeted, as euphoria over Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s death shifts into concern over the conflict’s growing civilian toll, according to a new poll. Nearly two-thirds of Iranian Americans now oppose the war after opinions were near evenly divided at the start of the conflict, according to a Zogby Analytics survey. “This is a war that is supposedly being fought in our name. There’s a lot of wish-casting and projection

A protester demonstrating for trans rights in New York City on Feb. 3, 2025.  Photo: Charly Triballeau/AFP via Getty Images On Tuesday, the Supreme Court marked International Trans Day of Visibility with yet another ruling that puts the lives of trans people at risk. The justices ruled that Colorado’s statewide ban on conversion therapy for young people likely violates a Christian counselor’s First Amendment rights. The decision threatens conversion therapy bans nationwide, whic

Federal Communications Commission chair Brendan Carr speaks during the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Grapevine, Texas, US, March 27, 2026.  Photo: Shelby Tauber / Bloomberg via Getty Images When Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr talks about broadcast licensees serving the “public interest,” he loves to emphasize “localism.”  Localism is the idea that powerful entities (in this case, broadcasters) should serve the needs and interest

U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum speaks alongside Venezuela's interim president, Delcy Rodríguez, after their meeting at the Miraflores Palace in Caracas on March 4, 2026. Photo: Federico Parra / AFP via Getty Images “What we did in Venezuela, I think, is the perfect, the perfect scenario,” U.S. President Donald Trump told the New York Times in a March 1 interview about his plans for war on Iran. Things have not gone as Trump hoped, to put it mildly. Trump’s search for t

The majority of immigration arrests made by federal agents during President Donald Trump’s enforcement surge in Minnesota last winter were of people with no criminal background, according to The Intercept’s analysis of newly revealed government data. The data belies a common talking point made by the White House during the massive immigration operation: that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were arresting thousands of “dangerous criminal illegal aliens.” From December 2025

Iranian Red Crescent emergency workers use an excavator to clear rubble from a residential building that was hit in an earlier U.S.–Israeli strike in Tehran, Iran, on March 23, 2026. Photo: Vahid Salemi/AP Over the weekend, the U.S. and Israel bombarded two universities in Iran, the Isfahan University of Technology and the Iran University of Science and Technology in Tehran. These are not, of course, the first attacks on civilian infrastructure in President Donald Trump and P

President Donald Trump talks endlessly of “peace.” He ran for office promising to keep the United States out of conflicts, claims to be a “peacemaker,” has campaigned for a Nobel Peace Prize, and founded a so-called Board of Peace. “Under Trump we will have no more wars,” he said on the campaign trail in 2024. Yet Trump has immersed the U.S. in constant conflict, outpacing even other presidential warmongers like Richard Nixon, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. The White House a

With Donald Trump deploying federal agents to TSA checkpoints, an ICE agent is seen at the John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City on March 23, 2026. Photo: Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu via Getty Images The night before we were set to fly out of John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, I approached my partner with a confession: For the first time that I can remember, I was afraid of flying with a Latino last name. It was a new sort of affront I had to

A man sweeps up debris near a residential building that was hit in an airstrike in the early hours of March 27, 2026, in Tehran, Iran.  Photo: Majid Saeedi/Getty Images The U.S.–Israel war on Iran was supposed to end quickly in either an “unconditional surrender” or regime change. Weeks into the conflict, none of it has happened. There appears to be little cause for celebration in Washington, notwithstanding Secretary of War Pete Hegseth’s daily jingoistic proclamations. Ther

A Democratic National Committee member is proposing a symbolic resolution for consideration at a DNC meeting next month to reject the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s massive spending on Congressional races. The measure, sponsored by a young DNC member from Florida, could put party leaders on the spot about the pro-Israel lobbying group’s outsized role in Democratic primaries. A lobbying behemoth that for decades courted lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, AIPAC has becom

The youth-led Sunrise Movement is seizing on the U.S.–Israel war in Iran to boost challengers to sitting Democrats, joining a coalition of progressive groups arguing that lawmakers who take money from defense contractors and AIPAC cannot meaningfully oppose the war.  In Denver, Sunrise is endorsing Melat Kiros, an anti-war candidate and attorney who was fired for refusing to take down her post on the genocide in Palestine, the group shared exclusively with The Intercept. Kiros is challenging

Donald Trump’s second term has been broadly defined by an overwhelming sense of chaos. Every week the U.S. finds itself in a new crisis of the president’s making. The war in Iran and the broader Middle East is stretching into its fourth week, as the administration prepares to send thousands of troops to the region for a possible ground invasion. The U.S. oil blockade on Cuba has plunged the country deeper into a humanitarian crisis. The Department of Homeland Security sent ICE to airports across