The Dictatorship
Trump pardons yet another former Republican lawmaker with a fraud conviction
Donald Trump issued more pardons this week for criminally corrupt former government officials.
At a time when the administration is threatening the health care of millions of Americans and locking up immigrants en masseit’s notable that a principal beneficiary of Trump’s sympathy these days seems to be convicted criminals who have ties to his family or political movement.
Trump on Thursday pardoned former Tennessee House Speaker Glen Casada and his former chief of staff, Cade Cothren, NBC News reported. Both were convicted in September on corruption charges that involved wire fraud and attempted money laundering:
Casada, a Republican, was sentenced in September to 36 months in prison after being convicted on 17 charges, including wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Cothren, the aide, received a shorter sentence. Casada confirmed the pardon on Thursday in a statement to NBC affiliate WSMV in Nashville, saying: ‘Yes the president called me today and granted me a full pardon. I am grateful of his trust and his full confidence in my innocence through this whole ordeal.’
The investigation into Casada and Cothren began during Trump’s first presidency, their trial was adjudicated by a Trump-appointed judge and the pair were ultimately convicted by a jury. Yet a White House official defended the pardon in a statement to NBC News that accused the Biden administration of mistreating the Republicans:
‘The Biden Department of Justice significantly over-prosecuted these individuals for a minor issue involving constituent mailers — which were billed at competitive prices, never received a complaint from legislators, and resulted in a net profit loss of less than $5,000. The Biden DOJ responded with an armed raid, perp walk, and suggested sentences exceeding 10 years — penalties normally reserved for multimillion-dollar fraudsters,’ the official told NBC News.
Trump — who was convicted of fraud himself last year and continues to fight that reality — is building on his first-term legacy of shielding public officials convicted of corruption from accountability. In addition to Casada and Cothren, Trump commuted the sentence last month of convicted fraudster George Santos, the former Republican representative from New York.
It remains to be seen whether the president will publicly deny knowing who Casada and Cothren are, as he did when asked about his recent pardon of convicted crypto investor Changpeng Zhao, who has helped fuel the Trump family’s crypto empire.
Americans, for the record, don’t seem to like Trump’s pardons for his financial benefactors and political allies. An October YouGov/Economist poll found broad majorities of respondents opposed Trump’s pardons for Santos and Zhao.
As talks loom between the U.S. and Iran, negotiators face a simple and daunting task: turning a 14-point memorandum of understanding into a comprehensive nuclear deal within 60 days.
The ticking clock was set in motion on Thursday, according to Vice President JD Vance, following the signing of the MOU one day earlier. That signing brought an official end to military hostilities. What it did not do is resolve the conflict that caused them.
Some agreements took effect immediately upon signing: a cessation of hostilities, the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, the lifting of the U.S. naval blockade, the issuing of oil waivers and initial steps to unfreeze billions of dollars in Iranian assets.
But those were the easy parts.
What remains are the metaphorical landmines — the unresolved questions the MOU largely deferred rather than decided, each with the potential to blow up any prospect for a nuclear deal. On Thursday evening, the White House announced that Vice President JD Vance will not attend talks in Switzerland that had been planned for Friday — a decision that may well be read as a signal of just how far apart the two sides are. A White House spokesperson acknowledged in a statement that while the U.S. delegation has been prepared to depart at the first available opportunity, “the logistics of these negotiations have never been simple or predictable.”
Here is what the negotiators will actually have to solve:
The future of the Strait of Hormuz
The MOU ensures safe passage of commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz “with no charge for 60 days only,” and outsources the negotiating responsibility for ensuring long-term toll-free passage to Gulf allies — ceding responsibility for a key outstanding issue.
“We don’t ever want this to happen again — that’s not about tolling, that’s about ensuring that the Straits are never used as a choke point for the global economy ever again,” Vance said at the White House on Thursday. “If that’s not reflected in the final deal, there’s not going to be a final deal.”
Recognizing the Iranians will “assert their rights as aggressively as they can,” a senior U.S. official was confident Gulf states would preserve their own self-interests and press Iran to allow toll-free passage.
There’s also the matter of demining the waterway. Iran has 30 days for “removing the technical and military obstacles and demining,” but mine removal could take weeks or even months — potentially testing U.S. patience if ship traffic doesn’t recover quickly.
In a joint statement following this week’s G7 summit in France, leaders said a defensive initiative led by France and the UK could help by “protecting merchant vessels, reassuring commercial shipping operators, and supporting verification that all mines are removed.”
Sanctions and frozen assets
Senior U.S. officials have said sanctions relief for Iran would be tied to its performance — but haven’t yet indicated what those benchmarks will be.
“As they dial up their good behavior, we can dial up the economic relief,” Vance said in broad terms on Thursday at the White House. “If they dial down their good behavior, we can turn it off.”
The MOU commits the U.S. to ending all Iranian sanctions — including those imposed by the U.N. Security Council and the International Atomic Energy Agency — “in an agreed-upon schedule as part of the final deal.” How quickly the U.S. is willing to provide this economic relief could become a sticking point.
Complicating matters further: whether lifting of sanctions would require congressional action, and how the State Department’s designation of Iran as a State Sponsor of Terrorism factors in.
Then there’s the unfreezing of billions of dollars of Iranian assets. Though the Trump administration insists any release would be tied to Iran’s performance, the MOU’s own text undercuts that: Paragraph 13 says the process of releasing assets must begin before negotiations even start, handing Iran an upfront incentive rather than one to earn.
“It’s clearly a huge loophole and a potential for disagreement,” said Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East advisor and negotiator for the State Department, calling the text’s language “destructive ambiguity.”
The Lebanon front
The MOU calls for “the immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon.”
“We expect Hezbollah is not going to be firing rockets and firing drones at the Israelis, and we also expect that the Israelis are not going to be going wild in Lebanon, right? Both sides have to honor their end of the deal,” Vance said at the White House on Thursday.
Yet Israel did not sign the aforementioned “deal.”
Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Yechiel Leiter said it’s “unnecessary” for Lebanon to have been included in an agreement between the U.S. and Iran, pouring cold water on the idea that Israel would cease its offensive against Hezbollah and occupation of southern Lebanon — even if Iran says that’s a dealbreaker for negotiations.
“This is something that we simply can’t live with,” Leiter told NPR on Tuesday. “We can’t have jihadi terrorists on our border. … We’re not going to withdraw from South Lebanon, and the mad men of Tehran have no business poking their nose into Lebanon.”
A U.S. official confirmed that U.S.-brokered peace talks between Israel and Lebanon will continue as planned next week at the State Department. Whether the Lebanon provision holds will depend on Iran keeping Hezbollah in check and Trump keeping Netanyahu in line.
Iran’s reconstruction
The MOU promises that within 60 days, the U.S. would work “with regional partners” to develop a plan guaranteeing at least $300 billion for Iran’s “reconstruction and economic development.”
Trump has insisted that there “is no 300 Billion Dollar payment to Iran by the U.S.” using taxpayer money. That may technically be true, but the U.S. has still committed to delivering that sum in the form of investment. That means convincing private corporations and Gulf allies — many of which are dealing with economic disruption and rebuilding costs after facing strikes from Iran — to invest in a country the Trump administration is still threatening to attack again if Iran reneges on its end of the deal.
Vance said there is a “great desire from the Arab world and from outside the Arab world to actually get involved in Iran if they behave properly.” Pressed by MS NOW whether private money would be included, Vance said he assumes countries like the United Arab Emirates would be part of the picture.
But Gulf leaders expressed concern to MS NOW about the agreement’s financial provisions that could strengthen Iran economically at a time when many Gulf states believe pressure should have been maintained.
Iran’s highly enriched uranium and nuclear program
For the duration of negotiations, Iran will “maintain the current status quo of its nuclear program,” per the MOU. What happens after that is the central outstanding question — the one that led to war in the first place.
The MOU provides no consensus on what to do with Iran’s existing stockpile of enriched uranium, only an agreement to “resolve” the matter. It doesn’t distinguish between the roughly 900 pounds of highly enriched uranium — material close to bomb-grade — and the 11 tons enriched to various levels above the 3.67% threshold set by the JCPOA, which Trump withdrew from during his first term.
A senior U.S. official said downblending the stockpile would be the minimum standard, with Washington pushing for “more than that” during negotiations. Vance alluded to “gentlemen’s agreements,” noting that Iran has “promised that they would allow inspectors in to destroy that highly enriched stockpile, and then, of course, it’s not usable anymore, you take it somewhere else.” Iran has not formally agreed to anything beyond a general promise to resolve the issue.
Whether Iran will be permitted to enrich in the future, and to what extent, remains an open question. The MOU commits the two countries to discussing “the issue of enrichment and other mutually agreed matters,” promising a “satisfactory framework” related to Iran’s “nuclear needs” in a final deal.
Notably, the U.S. has already backed down from one of its previous red lines, dropping Trump’s earlier demand for zero enrichment forever in favor of allowing Iran to maintain a civilian nuclear program.
“We’re not bothered at all by the idea of civilian power plants in Iran,” a senior U.S. official said. “What we’re bothered by is the type of infrastructure that would allow them to jump from civilian power generation to nuclear weapons development. … We feel quite confident that if they meet their obligations under this agreement, they’re not going to have that infrastructure to build a nuclear weapon.”
A senior administration official insisted Iran has committed to dismantling its nuclear weapons program, including its nuclear site, noting that the countries would “figure out how to do that in the technical negotiations that will follow.” But abandoning its nuclear program will be a tough domestic sell for the Islamic Republic to make.
Inspections and implementation
Trump has repeatedly hammered the Obama-era JCPOA for not having a strong enough verification and inspections system. But his own MOU offers little clarity on what will replace it, only a vague commitment that “an executive mechanism will be established to monitor the successful implementation of this MOU and the future compliance of the final deal.”
Given that Iran blocked IAEA inspectors from accessing its nuclear facilities under the JCPOA, a stronger inspection system represents perhaps the most important potential U.S. win in final deal talks — if Washington can secure one.
“If we feel comfortable with the inspection and enforcement regime, that is when they will get some of the benefits of negotiation,” a senior administration official told reporters last week, without providing specifics of what that verification regime would entail nor confirming the role of the UN or IAEA.
Miller, the former State Department negotiator, compared the MOU to Trump’s 20-point Gaza plan — a document that pushed the conflict out of the headlines but left unsolved problems on the humanitarian, disarmament and reconstruction fronts.
“I see very little chance, without significant flexibility on the part of both sides, that 60 days is going to be enough” to bridge the “Grand Canyon-like gaps that separate Tehran and Washington,” Miller said.
And though the MOU’s 60-day deadline allows for extension “with mutual consent,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the military is “prepared to restart if we need to” if Iran does not show progress in complying with U.S. demands.
Trump, speaking at the G7, was blunter still.
“If it doesn’t get done in 60 days, that’s all right,” Trump said. “We go back to bombing.”
The Dictatorship
New York mayor, other leaders push to ban horse-drawn carriage rides after Indian teen’s death
NEW YORK (AP) — The death of a young tourist who jumped from a runaway horse carriagein Central Park has intensified calls to ban the old-time attraction from one of New York City’s most recognizable destinations.
Romanch Mahajan, 18, died after he got off of the four-wheeled carriage as its horse sprinted through the parkwithout the driver.
He is believed to be the first person to die in a horse carriage accident since they were introduced in Central Park more than 150 years ago, according to the labor union representing the industry and the Central Park Conservancy, which manages the 843-acre (341-hectare) park.
The conservancy was among those arguing Thursday that the carriage industry should be suspended until more protections can be put in place. Mahajan’s death was the eighth horse-related incident in the park over the past 13 months, the group said.
“The record is undeniable: crashes, runaways, horse deaths, injuries, and now a devastating loss of human life,” said Edita Birnkrant, head of the animal welfare group New Yorkers for Clean, Livable, and Safe Streets.
Animal rights activists have long said the carriage horses are overworked, can get easily spooked on city streets and live in inadequate stables while their drivers regularly flout city rules. All of those allegations have been denied by the horse and carriage owners, who say the animals are well cared for and the stables are fine.
The conservancy has argued that horses can no longer safely share park roads teeming with joggers, cyclists, pedestrians and motorized scooters, noting that other U.S. cities, including Chicago and San Antonio, have also recently done away with the nostalgic rides.
But carriage industry leaders said the fatal crash underscores the need for better protections, not outright elimination of the quaint attraction that harkens back to a romanticized, bygone New York.
“We’re absolutely gutted and stunned by this tragedy,” said Alexander Kemp, a vice president with the Transport Workers Union Local 100, the labor union representing carriage drivers and owners. “We have shuttered the stables and ceased operations today while we have extensive internal discussions of safety protocols and how they can be improved.”
Horse carriages weren’t running Thursday and it was not immediately clear when the rides, which cost about $72 for the first 20 minutes, would resume.
The owner of the carriage involved in the fatal crash also suspended the driver indefinitely, and has plans to retire the horse from the business, according to the union. It said the driver improperly dismounted to take a photograph of his passengers.
Celebrating a high school graduation turned tragic
Mahajan had been on a family trip celebrating his recent high school graduation when the family decided to take a ride on one of the park’s often photographed, richly decorated carriages.
His father, Deepak Mahajan, toldThe New York Times the family had arrived from India on Monday, the same day Romanch learned he had been accepted to a university in Jaipur.
They had spent the trip visiting many of the city’s popular tourist attractions, including the Statue of Liberty and the Brooklyn Bridge.
The carriage driver hopped off to take a photograph of the family near a fountain when the horse suddenly bolted, Mahajan said.
Romanch’s mother fell out of the carriage, and the teen jumped out in an attempt to save her, according to his father.
“He was screaming, ‘Mom!’” Deepak Mahajan recounted to the Times.
But Romanch hit his head on the ground before the carriage clipped another horse-drawn vehicle and eventually toppled over. The father, his wife and younger son escaped with minor injuries.
“This incident should be taken very seriously,” Mahajan said. “It took my son’s dream away.”
Carriage owners and drivers fear end to livelihood
New York City leaders vowed to work swiftly to end the industry in the wake of Romanch’s death.
City Council Speaker Julie Menin said the legislative body would hold a hearing next month on a long-simmering bill that would ban horse carriages and help drivers transition into new jobs.
Last year, the park conservancy revived debateover the carriages when, for the first time, it threw its support behind what’s known as Ryder’s Law.
“The time to act is now,” she wrote on the social platform X.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani also reiterated his support for ending the industry, saying he’d work with the council, the industry and animal welfare advocates to “deliver a just transition that protects workers while ending horse-drawn carriages in Central Park once and for all.”
Other recent mayors have made similar pronouncements. Mayor Bill de Blasio vowed to shut downthe industry “on Day One” in office, only to come up against years of council opposition. Mayor Eric Adams, Mamdani’s predecessor, came out against the industry near the endof his single term.
Onur Altintas, who owns four horses and a carriage operating in Central Park, was among those worried about an end to their livelihood. He said the industry provides hundreds of jobs to drivers, stable hands, farriers, and others in horse-related trades.
“We are sad about what happened. Nobody wants that. But it’s not like this is happening every day,” said Altintas. “Car crashes and plane crashes are happening every single day. One horse makes an accident, and the world is destroyed? Come on.”
The longtime owner and driver said the industry needs better regulations to make it safer. He said “90%” of horse-related accidents could be avoided simply by installing hitching posts throughout the park so drivers could safely tether and secure their horses, including at popular tourist photo stops.
The Transport Workers Union on Thursday said legislation recently introducedinto the council would do just that.
“Drivers can’t leave their carriage. They have to be on it all the time,” Altintas said. “But it’s impossible. We have to go to the restroom. We have to eat. We have to do things.”
Sen. Tammy Duckworth sent a letter Thursday urging the head of the Federal Aviation Administration to resist any pressure from President Donald Trump to prioritize construction of his planned triumphal arch over aviation safety.
The letter from the Illinois senator, the top Democrat on the Senate’s aviation subcommittee, adds to questions and concerns over Trump’s proposed 250-foot (76-meter) arch for the nation’s capital. Pushed by Trump to commemorate the country’s 250th anniversary, it would be more than twice as tall as the Lincoln Memorial.
Duckworth wrote that the FAA’s initial review of the arch appears to have been expedited and raised questions about whether the president or his White House aides are “already improperly pressuring FAA to prioritize rubberstamping Trump’s vanity arch over public safety.”
Officials are looking to complete the towering edifice within three years, possibly requiring 20 hours of work per day and cranes up to 320 feet (106 meters) tall, according to a National Park Service preliminary report, which Duckworth cited in her letter to FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford.
The agency said it would respond directly to Duckworth.
The arch’s close proximity to the complex airspace of Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, where a U.S. Army helicopter collided with a commercial jet last year, killing 67 people, was a key concern for Duckworth.
The crash “underscores the consequences of inadequate coordination and the need for extreme caution when evaluating any new obstruction in this environment,” she wrote. The FAA must be “firm in rejecting any improper or irresponsible pressure” from Trump on the matter.
In a previous statement, the FAA said that a preliminary feasibility study found “no adverse impacts to operations” at the nearby airport. The top of the structure, however, would need to be lit with red obstruction lights, which it called “a common safety tool.”
The agency said a full study in coordination with the park service would come next.
Duckworth added another concern in her letter, that the arch would interrupt the historic sightline between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery, and thereby “offensively desecrate the hallowed symbolism.”
- The clock is ticking on an Iran talks. Here’s what still has to get done.
- New York mayor, other leaders push to ban horse-drawn carriage rides after Indian teen’s death
- Sen. Duckworth urges FAA to reject pressure to approve Trump’s triumphal arch
- The Pentagon says the Iran war cost $29 billion. Experts say it’s far more.
- Republicans raise concerns that Trump’s Iran deal could come at Israel’s expense
- The clock is ticking on an Iran talks. Here’s what still has to get done.
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