NewsNation Chief Washington Anchor and On Balance host Leland Vittert was a foreign correspondent for four years in Jerusalem. He gives you an early look at tonight's 9 p.m. ET show, delivered straight to your inbox. |
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In the Wild📸: TMZ solicited viewers' pictures showing members of Congress enjoying their recess — aka vacation — while Department of Homeland Security workers still aren't getting paid and Americans deal with LONG TSA lines. - 📷Photos were rolling in over the weekend:
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‼️A lot happened this weekend: - ✈️The 82nd Airborne Division and other special operations troops arrived in the Middle East. This gives the president an option for a ground attack in Iran.
- 🗣️Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., said boots on the ground in Iran was a step too far
- 🚨The "No Kings" protest, complete with communist flags — yes, these were the same people who wanted Chinese-like lockdowns during COVID
- 😁And I went to the dentist this morning.
- ‼️My dentist asked me how long the war with Iran would go — I said I have no idea, but just before he plunged the big needle into my jaw, he said his college-aged son was very worried about a draft.
- ⁉️A DRAFT?!?!?!?
- Unseen🗣️: On college campuses and social media, there is this conversation in America about whether we are going to have a draft.
- Simple answer‼️: Of course, there isn't going to be a draft, I told my dentist, but then I got to thinking —
- 🚨The conversation itself is terrible for Trump.
- ‼️Trump won by capturing young men — mostly in college and some not — yet the last thing they want is a draft, and the idea of this war is really scary to them.
- Vice President JD Vance's isolationist wing of the Republican Party still exists
- Largely rural, non-college-educated whites who all either served or knew people who did in Iraq and Afghanistan
- 🗣️Mark Levin speaks for the traditionally conservative part of America
- Levin: "Why would we need troops on the ground? …We've got to get the uranium… [Iran] can make dirty bombs. … You need to get to the uranium."
- 📺MS NOW this afternoon — "Iran war shines light on fractures in Trump's coalition"
Ground truth ☑️: The last five weeks have shown how extraordinary our military is - ‼️Over 11,000 targets struck
- ‼️150-plus Iranian vessels damaged or destroyed
- ‼️Over 11,000 combat flights
- It's stunning — but now it's a political question about whether Iran is going to define his presidency — he must win
Forever true☑️: History, they say, is written by the victors — Trump must now either win or sell whatever ends up happening as a win — the stakes are that high.
Watch tonight📺: Bill O'Reilly tonight on how Trump can win in Iran. |
‼️President Trump has three major options for escalating the war in Iran: reopen the Strait of Hormuz with Navy escorts, seize Iran's uranium buried deep inside a mountain or occupy Iran's oil terminals on Kharg Island. - The last two involve significant amounts of ground forces.
- ✈️Over the weekend, hundreds of U.S. Special Operations forces landed in the Middle East — bringing the total American troop presence to over 50,000
Option 1 🌊: Reopening the Strait of Hormuz with Navy escorts - 🚢This would involve warships in the strait moving along with commercial ships to protect them from Iranian missiles and drones
- 🛢️Oil prices are at $114 a barrel today — up 28% from last week.
- 📈It was $89.33 per barrel a week ago.
- 🗣️Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is looking to retake the Strait by the Navy:
- 🎤Bessent: "The U.S. is going to retake control of the Strait, and there will be freedom of navigation, whether it is through U.S. escorts or a multinational escort.
Option 2 ⛰️: Seize Iran's uranium that's buried deep inside mountains - ⚖️Trump is weighing the risky military operation to get Iran's 1,000 pounds of uranium, according to U.S. officials.
- 🚨Officials say this is a very complex and risky mission that would have American soldiers in Iran for multiple days — but would accomplish Trump's goal of preventing Iran from ever being able to make a nuclear weapon again.
- ⚠️Trump warns Iran must do what the U.S. says, or it's not going to be good
- 🎤Trump: "They're going to give up nuclear weapons. They're going to give us the nuclear dust. They're going to do everything that we want to do. And you know what? They're going to go on and maybe have a great country again. But if they don't do that, they're not going to have a country."
Option 3🚨: Take over Iran's Kharg Island - 🛢️Kharg Island is the key to Iran's oil industry.
- It handles around 1.5 million barrels a day
- 💣Trump threatened to "completely" destroy the island
- 🎤Trump: "If for any reason a deal is not shortly reached, which it probably will be, and if the Hormuz Strait is not immediately 'Open for Business,' we will conclude our lovely 'stay' in Iran by blowing up and completely obliterating all of their Electric Generating Plants, Oil Wells and Kharg Island (and possibly all desalinization plants!), which we have purposefully not yet "touched."
- ‼️Destroying or taking over the island will cut off the IRGC's economic lifeline.
Sound the alarms🚨: Iran's parliament speaker this weekend warned the U.S. against a ground invasion, saying: - 🗣️Iran forces are "waiting for the arrival of American troops on the ground to set them on fire and punish their regional partners forever. Our firing continues. Our missiles are in place. Our determination and faith have increased… As long as the Americans seek Iran's surrender, our response is clear: Far be it from us to accept humiliation."
Watch tonight📺: Retired Brig. Gen. John Teichert and Vice Admiral John W "Fozzie" Miller |
🤦Trump haters might come to love originalist judges — at least when it comes to the birthright citizenship case. - 📰The New York Times is right when they say, "For generations, most legal experts and the courts have agreed that the Constitution guarantees citizenship to nearly all babies born in the United States."
- But this week, the Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether that unquestioned truth applies to the children of illegal immigrants and birth tourists.
Look back 🔙: Trump issued an executive order revoking birthright citizenship for new births of illegal immigrants; a bunch of people sued to stop it. Now, the court will decide exactly what the 14th Amendment means - ✏️14th Amendment: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside."
👍Trump's record at the Supreme Court would make any coach jealous. - ‼️In 2025, SCOTUS ruled in favor of Trump in 21 of the 25 cases it considered.
- ☑️Some of his wins:
- Ending the de Facto Amnesty Program (2025)
- Transgender Military Ban (2025)
- Terminate Federal Grants to NIH DEI Initiatives (2025)
- Much of the media and Democrats love to brand it the "Trump court" or at least "Trump judges."
- Intellectually honest‼️: Most of the Trump judges were appointed; one can argue whether they actually rule as originalists, now a commonly used slur by the Left.
- To them, "originalists" is code for racist, misogynist and backward — all the things they can't say about Supreme Court justices.
- Now, originalists might be their savior.
Watch tonight📺: Tom Dupree on whether you can really ever predict what the court will do. |
Racism, Sexism and Trump🤦 |
👀The "NO Kings" rally this weekend exposed Democrats' problems going forward - ‼️In places, communist and Hamas flags outnumbered American flags.
- ‼️It focused largely on Trump being an "authoritarian" while completely ignoring the irony.
- ‼️When not addressing Trump, the rally focused on identity politics and protecting, among others, illegal immigrants.
Truth exposed🤦: Democrats have two things to run on: hating Trump and America is "racist and sexist" - 🗳️America in 2008 elected President Obama in part because many whites wanted to finally put race behind us — electing a Black president would finally move us past the original American sin of slavery.
- 🤦Instead, Obama and the team made everything about identity politics
- Look back 🔙: In 2004, Obama declared at the Democratic National Convention there isn't a white or Black America but a United States of America
- ✅Then Obama got elected — and suddenly everything became about race
- 🤦Now, Democrats need America to be racist and sexist — without identity politics and hating Trump, they don't have much
- 🎤Michelle Obama: "As we saw in this past election, sadly, we ain't ready…That's why I'm like, don't even look at me about running, because you all are lying. You're not ready for a woman. You are not."
- Really?!?! After everything America gave you and your husband, you are going to lecture us.
Good read 📰: Axios summed up this problem in their excellent campaign 2028 note - Headlined "Some Dems' 2028 strategy: a straight, white, Christian man"
- ‼️This fundamentally explains the Democrats' problem — to them, it's all about identity, but to most Americans, it's about what will make their lives better!
- Trump factor‼️: Democrats' desire to investigate and hate Trump knows no ends.
- 📰Axios is out with the Democrats' target list for who they will investigate when they win the House.
- Newsflash 💥: Americans want things to get better for them — their lives. Investigating Trump does none of that.
- It just further divides us.
Watch tonight📺: Former Obama policy adviser Laurie Watkins and Democratic strategist Madeline Summerville on why it's hard for Democrats to embrace anything other than grievance. - Be fair⚖️: Trump won on grievance — it works.
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Every night during On Balance, Leland Vittert asks "why?" about the most pressing matters of the day, with an intellectual, balanced and sometimes irreverent take on the news. Make sure to let us know your thoughts on social media and by replying to this email. |
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