Tropic Press: J.C. Bruce

ASK THE BIRD: Is it illegal for recovering MAGA cultists to burn their red hats?

Sat, 19 Sep 2026 10:00:59 GMT

Illustration by Tropic Press and Google Gemini

Editor’s Note: Every Saturday morning, we take a break from hard news to let Hermina Hermelinda Obregon, a.k.a. Miss Mingo, share her insights with readers. She’s a recovering newspaper reporter living in a bungalow off Duval Street in Key West. At least that’s what her official biography says, if you can believe that. She answers the day’s pressing questions about life, the news, and the best happy hour prices.

Dear Readers:

Last week, we discussed the horror some feel when confronted with red-hat-wearing MAGA cultists. In response, I received this video from Debbie P., who turned me onto this country protest anthem by musician Jack Nelson entitled Red Hat.

It tells the story of a small-town guy who has finally had it with Trump’s division and deceit, and decides to burn his red hat to set himself free.

And, yes, it is perfectly legal to burn those red hats. Be sure to tell your Republican friends. It’s the least we can do to save democracy.

Here’s the video:

DEAR MISS MINGO:

Cool video. Thanks. But do you think asking Republicans we know to burn their stupid red hats will do any good?

Hopeful in Hialeah

Dear Hopeful:

Who knows? Might be worth a try. You can always just forward this video to them via email or post it on your own social media accounts. The more cultists who see things like this, the more comfortable they might be in abandoning Trump’s sinking ship.

One more thought on that: A lot of people who have voted for Trump in the past did so because they have been lifelong Republicans and just couldn’t see their way clear to voting for a Democrat. Old habits die hard and all that.

They really don’t have to. Tell them that. Just urge them to stay home on election day. If enough Republicans sit this out, maybe the G.O.P. will come to its senses. Maybe.

DEAR MISS MINGO:

I dig your vibe and live for your column. Please continue.

Young and Broke in Tampa

I shall continue. Thank you. And let me add that I, too, at one point in my life, was in your boat — young and broke in Tampa.

I had a job, thankfully, but my car wouldn’t start, and I couldn’t afford to repair it, so I bicycled four miles to and from work every day, leaving home at 4 a.m., wheeling along Bayshore Boulevard, rain or shine (well, there was no sun that time of morning).

I couldn’t afford to pay my electric bill, so I ran an extension cord over to my neighbor’s unit at the duplex where I was living. Was always behind on my rent. But what I never lost was confidence that things would improve.

I was also blessed with having a job I really loved at a newspaper that no longer exists. I outlived the Tampa Times, and I’m still pecking away at my keyboard.

Stay strong. Don’t give up. You’re not alone. You can do this!

DEAR MISS MINGO:

Whoa! That must have been some sight—a flamingo on a bicycle!

Laughing Leonard in Lakeland

Dear Laughing:

Which reminds me of that joke, Leonard: Women need men, like fish need bicycles. But, just for the record because Truth and Accuracy are my middle names, I AM NOT ACTUALLY A BIRD. Okay?

DEAR MISS MINGO:

Miss Truth and Accuracy Mingo? Hahahaha.

Still Laughing in Lakeland

Dear Still Laughing:

You need help. Run, don’t walk, to the nearest mental health facility. Or bicycle, if you know how to pedal. Please.

DEAR MISS MINGO:

I’ll bet you were tempted to write: Women need Leonards like fish need bicycles, weren’t you?

Snickering in Sarasota

Dear Snickering:

I’ll be honest, yes, it crossed my mind. But only for a moment because I instantly realized how unfair that would be to all the decent Leonards out there. We must always take care not to overgeneralize. One bad Leonard does not mean all are bad.

In fact, through my friend Alexander Strange, I've met a very nice Leonard. He’s a judge and lives in Phoenix (and is Alex’s uncle). He’s actually been featured in several of the books in the Strange Files series. He’s quite a character.

DEAR MISS MINGO:

Whoa! Was that a cheap commercial message disguised as an actual comment from a reader?

Disturbed in Dunedin

Dear Disturbed:

That is a horrible thing to accuse an innocent flamingo of! You should be ashamed. But, yes.

ASK MISS MINGO

Got a question for Miss Mingo? About life, the news, or clever ways to avoid paying bar tabs? Write to her at MissMingo@Tropic.Press

Meet Miss Mingo

Want to know more about Miss Mingo? How she got her start? And whether she really lives with two cats—Deadline and Dateline—and a pet iguana named Skippy? You can find her official biography, such as it is, here. If you’re bar hopping on Duval Street in Key West and spot an intriguing woman in a pink hat that you suspect might be Miss Mingo, you can always offer to buy her a Cuba Libre. Will it actually be her? Is there an actual her? Life’s a mystery.

And now, some more shameless advertising…

The official Tropic Press Store is now open and ready for business. You can order your very own Miss Mingo merch online. All sales are final. Check out the store here:

Tropic Press Store

Editor’s Note:

Congratulations to Miss Mingo, who recently won the Florida Society of Professional Journalists’ Sunshine State Award for Best Blog and Newsletter.

You can support her work by subscribing to the Tropic Press newsletter (and, honestly, we need the help if you choose to become a paid subscriber, because her bar tab is killing us).

Floridians are drowning in insurance costs. David Jolly has a plan to fix that, but Byron Donalds is attacking it

Fri, 18 Sep 2026 10:01:16 GMT

Photo courtesy of NPR

Special to Tropic Press from Florida Phoenix

By Mitch Perry

The Byron Donalds campaign is aggressively attacking David Jolly’s plan to reduce homeowners’ insurance rates.

The Democratic candidate for governor is proposing a state catastrophic insurance fund that would remove hurricane and wind coverage from the private insurance market. He says doing so could reduce homeowners’ insurance costs by 60% to 70%.

Donalds counters on the campaign trail and in a television ad that Jolly’s plan would institute a $1,000 “hurricane tax” on Florida families.

“It’s all lies,” Jolly responded during a press conference in St. Petersburg this week when asked about the ad. He said his team has never published a detailed plan for anyone to dissect, and emphasized that “it does not include an additional $1,000 tax for homeowners. No governor is going to do that.”

The Donalds campaign cites a recently published study from Florida State University as the source of its contention that Jolly’s plan would blow a hole in Florida voters’ pockets if approved. But that FSU study isn’t based on Jolly’s proposal, but on a plan first introduced by a bipartisan pair of Florida lawmakers in 2024.

That proposal aimed to transform Citizens Property Insurance Corp. — the state-backed property insurer of last resort — by allowing all homeowners to become eligible to buy Citizens coverage specifically for wind damage.

What Jolly has proposed is a state-backed “catastrophic fund” for homeowners’ insurance, fully removing hurricane and wind coverage from the private marketplace and putting it into a state sovereign wealth fund, which he contends would substantially cut homeowners insurance rates.

He says the fund would be paid for by making insurance companies pay taxes that they now avoid, adding that fees on real estate transactions (better known as Florida documentary tax stamps) and existing tourist development taxes (TDTs), are also “on the table” to build up that fund.

Donalds said using TDT funds wouldn’t raise nearly enough money to fund Jolly’s plan, and that those funds are imposed at the county level. “I thought he believed in local control?” he said this week. “Apparently not.”

FSU study on 2025 proposed plan

The FSU study was published last month and lists potential advantages and risks for policymakers if all homeworkers used Citizens for wind coverage. Among the potential advantages: “An improved private market study and insurance solvency; Potential for lower cost of capital through public financing and greater uniformity in coverage and pricing structures.”

The negatives include: “The concentration of catastrophic risk in a single entity; Increased likelihood and magnitude of statewide assessments; Potential impact on state capital perception; Reduced competition and innovation in insurance markets; and exposure to special interest pressures in rate-setting and funding decisions.”

The FSU study also says that when the state assumes the risk of wind accounts, premiums could rise anywhere from 21% to 139%.

Donalds says it would be a government boondoggle, comparable to the federal Affordable Care Act. “Anytime the government takes over, it gets worse. The premiums get higher, and you don’t get the coverage that you were promised,” he said this week during a roundtable discussion in Indian Rocks Beach.

Jolly responds by noting that the state already has a state catastrophic fund (called the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund), created in a special legislative session following the destruction wrought upon Florida by Hurricane Andrew in 1992. “Right now, that fund only reimburses insurance companies for a share of their hurricane losses. It is a bailout for insurers,” he says on his campaign website.

Jolly notes that existing state law already says that if a devastating storm or series of storms leaves Citizens in a deficit, the company can charge its own policyholders a surcharge of up to 15%, and if a deficit still remains it can charge an emergency assessment of up to 10% per year on other property and casualty policies in the state not provided by Citizens, including homeowners, renters, and those with auto insurance policies.

The FSU study was commissioned in 2025 after Broward County Republican Rep. Hillary Cassel withdrew a legislative proposal (HB 13) that would require Citizens to make windstorm coverage available to all homeowners in Florida. The proposal was originally floated during the 2024 legislative session by Cassel (a Democrat at the time) and former North Fort Myers Beach Republican Spencer Roach, and something similar was proposed by a Florida lawmaker in 2006.

“What I really find interesting is that idea that I’ve been talking about for several years, the Democratic potential nominee, David Jolly, runs on my idea,” Cassel said on This Week in South Florida with Glenna Milberg right before last month’s primary election. “So, it is the solution, it is one of the solutions for property insurance, and we as Republicans have taken that on and are studying it with the number one insurance program in the country to figure out how we can apply that across the state.”

Donalds plan

Meanwhile, Donalds unveiled his “Bring Down the Bill” property insurance package this week. Among its provisions:

Reforming the Florida Hurricane Catastrophic Fund “by reducing an unnecessary surcharge on policyholders when the fund is strong.”
Maintaining 2022 and 2023 legislation that has resulted in a reduction of homeowners’ insurance lawsuits that, in turn, has helped lower insurance companies’ legal costs and resulted in lower homeowner insurance premiums.
Restructures the My Safe Florida Home grant and other grants by directing all state agencies receiving funding for projects that benefit homeowners to “coordinate on prioritizing grants for the greatest impact on homeowners.”
Create an “Insurer Scorecard” showing pricing, claims approval rates, denial rates, and time to payment for every carrier in Florida.
Work on reducing the number of Citizens policies. Since 2022, Citizens’ policy count has dropped from 1.4 million in late 2023 to approximately 274,000, according to a Citizens press release in June.

“I would simply ask: Are you good with what Byron Donalds wants to continue in the state of Florida with homeowners’ insurance? ‘Cause he’s offering more of the same and transparency,” Jolly said on Monday. “Transparency doesn’t reduce costs.”

Donalds countered on Tuesday during an event in Hillsborough County that Jolly’s homeowners’ insurance plan was “a big government takeover. That is Democrat policy 101. Blame everybody else, give it to the government. Make a grand promise that you know you can’t pay for, and then by the time you’re gone from office it’s the next person’s fault.”

Mitch Perry has covered politics and government in Florida for more than two decades. Most recently he is the former politics reporter for Bay News 9. He has also worked at Florida Politics, Creative Loafing and WMNF Radio in Tampa. He was also part of the original staff when the Florida Phoenix was created in 2018.

Florida Phoenix is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization. This story is republished with their permission. To support Florida Phoenix, click here:

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News 2 Use

If you haven’t done so already, check out the news2use section on the Tropic Press website. It’s a construction project right now, and we are adding new articles daily, the goal being to create a handy reference library you can use to contact your elected representatives, figure out when and where to vote, how mail-in ballots work, and more.

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible to increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

Florida’s candidates for governor debate the future of big AI data centers

Thu, 17 Sep 2026 09:46:15 GMT

Special to Tropic Press from Florida Phoenix

By Mitch Perry

Alarm about the potential threat to the labor economy and even human civilization itself from artificial intelligence has sharpened and may lead to even more anxiety for Floridians about AI and, specifically data centers, which power that technology.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei triggered the escalation Saturday by publishing a 3,800-word essay warning that AI models are advancing so rapidly that they potentially threaten humanity. Anthropic makes Claude AI.

Grassroots opposition to AI infrastructure because of its huge demand on local water supplies and the electrical grid had been growing more pointed since early this year, turning into an issue David Jolly and the Florida Democratic Party are using to attack Republican Byron Donalds in the Florida gubernatorial race.

Jolly, a Pinellas County Democrat, has promised that, if elected, he’ll declare a year-long statewide moratorium on construction of data centers in Florida, echoing a position espoused by lawmakers in 15 other states this year but that has become law only in New York.

Donalds dismisses Jolly’s stance as mere “politics,” but has made a notable retreat from his previous enthusiasm for data centers as the public has turned against such projects.

“I think the future of the state, what’s going to be important, are data centers and power. Those are going to be the two critical things for the state of Florida,” Donalds told government affairs consultant and attorney Justin Sayfie in an interview at the Economic Club of Miami in June 2025.

“You’re going to have data centers, tech firms, etc. We need to embrace that, not run away from that. … We are wide open. We have actual land. I mean, not here in Miami, but we have actual land in our state that is still pristine, available to use. We can build out that stuff and still maintain the beauty of our state.”

The Naples Republican voted in May 2025 for the U.S. House’s version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which included a 10-year moratorium on enforcement of state or local regulations for “artificial intelligence models, artificial intelligence systems, or automated decision systems.”

The U.S. Senate later voted to strip that language from the package, and President Trump signed that version into law.

Donalds now says he no longer agrees with the national moratorium.

“That’s one provision that I wasn’t probably the biggest fan of,” he said last week when asked about that vote during a Turning Point USA chapter meeting on the University of Central Florida campus. He added that he supported other provisions of OBBBA. “When you pass these pieces of legislation, especially when they get that big, there’s always going to be one or two things that you don’t agree with.”

State law

Donalds has expressed strong support for a state law (SB 484) regulating data centers pushed by Gov. Ron DeSantis earlier this year, and notes its sponsor was now-former Hialeah Republican state Sen. Bryan Avila, his recently minted running mate.

The legislation requires data centers to pay their own costs of service; establish large-scale consumptive use permits; and that water management districts or the Department of Environmental Protection force large-scale data centers to use reclaimed water for cooling.

It also calls for the Florida Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability to produce for the governor, House speaker, and Senate president a study related to construction and operation of large-scale data centers by July.

Jolly calls it “a good first start,” but adds, “Why is ratepayer protection considered an accomplishment?”

“I mean, what was the baseline before they suggested that these data centers had to pay for water and pay for electrical usage?” he asks. “Before that, it was tax breaks and hiding it from the public. Now they’re saying, ‘Well, let’s use transparency and make them pay for it.’ But the reality is, people don’t want them.’”

Although Donalds praises Avila’s sponsorship of the data center bill, his campaign isn’t saying anything about a corresponding Avila bill (SB 1118) that would have created a public-records exemption to keep information about potential data centers confidential for up to a year. The bill passed through all three of its assigned committees in the Senate but died on the floor.

“There’s no reason, at least in the spirit of Florida, there’s no reason why our elected officials should be signing NDAs, right?” Avila acknowledged to the Senate Committee on Community Affairs on Feb. 3, referring to non-disclosure agreements. He tried to soften the impact by telling lawmakers, “You look at other states and they’re signing NDAs for multiple years.”

Sen. Jason Pizzo, an independent from South Florida, was having none of that.

“The greatest implication and consequence of this bill is that local mayors and commissioners will look like they took a kickback — will make it impossible for them to convince their constituents that they didn’t take something from a billionaire developer, data center, whatever, and keep it quiet and not share it with their own neighbors, that one of these things were coming,” he told Avila during the committee meeting about why he could not support his bill.

“That is an impossible position to put local officials in. And it’s one that if any of my local officials in my 20 cities happen to violate, I will represent them for free. So, I have to vote no.”

Industry support for Donalds

Donalds has been a fundraising machine since he entered the race in February 2025, scoring dozens of contributions from artificial intelligence interests including multiple companies seeking to build hyperscale data centers in Florida, as Politico reported in July.

Speaking at the University of Central Florida in Orlando last week, he denied he could be influenced by any single industry despite financial contributions it has sent to his campaign.

“No. Because when I talk about policy and industries and economics, I do it from a laissez-faire approach,” he said. “I do it from essentially the Austrian School of Economics. That’s been my political foundation ever since I got into politics. When I talk about these issues, what you’re hearing right now are my thoughts. Not a white paper. Not some position paper. These are my thoughts. When I go into rooms with companies or interests or donors, I tell them what my plans are for Florida.”

Nineteen Florida local governments have paused or banned data centers, according to FloridaDataCenters.org. There would be a 20th, but although Hillsborough County voted in August to draft such a moratorium, county attorneys informed commissioners that such an ordinance can’t go into effect for another year because of a controversial 2025 state law (SB 180) banning moratoriums on development, which they thought would cover data centers.

Florida Democratic agriculture commissioner candidate Joey Mendoza Atkins speaking in Pinellas County as part of the Democrats’‘Data Center’ Donalds Tour on Sept. 15, 2026. (Photo by Mitch Perry/Florida Phoenix)

The Florida Democratic Party wants to supercharge the issue. It held a press conference Tuesday at a site where a developer had proposed a 17,000-square-foot data processing facility in Pinellas County. That proposal was quashed for the time being after the county commission imposed a one-year moratorium on data centers last month.

“This November, data centers will be a defining issue for Floridians and voters as they go to the ballot box,” said Joey Mendoza Atkins, the Democratic candidate for agriculture commissioner. “And when I’m Florida’s next commissioner of agriculture, keeping them out of communities is going to be a top priority.”

The Jolly campaign announced this week that the Democratic candidate will visit “Data Center Alley” in Northern Virginia “to see firsthand how out-of-control data center development has upended local communities.” The region has been described as the densest concentration of data centers in the world.

Bipartisan anger

Elizabeth Plantan is an associate professor of political science at Stetson University. She points to widespread uncertainty, anger, and fear about what AI means for the future of work and employment in the country — as well as the environmental concerns — driving bipartisan anger against these facilities.

“I think that this is unique, especially as we have more and more data and research on how polarized the American public is, that it’s quite surprising to have something with this much bipartisan pushback,” she said.

A public opinion poll published in July by the Public Opinion Research Lab at the University of North Florida showed that 68% of respondents said they would oppose building an AI data center in their area. A James Madison Institute poll of 1,400 Floridians also taken in July found that 49% of respondents said they either somewhat or strongly opposed data center investment in the state, while 40% said that they somewhat or strongly support it.

Jonathan Schaeffer is a distinguished professor emeritus at the University of Alberta. He says it’s healthy for local communities to hold public discussions around housing data centers, but people need to know the benefits and potential downfalls of building one in their neighborhoods.

“We are an information technology-rich society,” he said. “Data centers are the reality. We want the internet. We want cloud computing. We want e-commerce. We want lots of things that these data centers provide. Not just AI. The real issue only comes into focus when you talk about one of these hyperscale centers because of their enormous size and impact.”

Donalds is hardly the only public official who has curbed his enthusiasm for data centers. Both Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro also have made notable pullbacks from their previous support.

Donalds was attacked for his stance on data centers during the GOP primary campaign by his opponents. In July, he responded by introducing federal legislation called the “Protecting the Ratepayers Act,” to ensure entities that build, own, or operate data centers obtain all their energy and water from alternative sources that don’t use or interfere with the electric grid or public water systems.

Plantan warns of unintended consequences from such legislation, however, because it doesn’t regulate how those companies obtain their energy or water resources.

A case in point is Elon Musk’s supercomputer facility called xAI in Memphis. Since breaking ground last year, the company has operated dozens of unpermitted methane gas turbines without public notice, permits, or air pollution controls. In response to growing community outrage, SpaceX agreed to remove all 69 gas turbines by July 2027.

Donalds “is shifting his positions because they’re politically unpopular,” Jolly argues.

“He went through the framing of ratepayer protection that you can plunder our state as long as you pay us for it,” he told the Phoenix during a Labor Day event last week in Tampa.

“Now he’s saying local control, but when he had a chance to stand up for local control, he voted against it. The Big Beautiful Bill, the House version, said that they were going to preempt local control of data center decisions. He named a running mate that actually tried to hide [via his proposed NDA legislation] from residents when AI data centers were being contemplated or being planned. We know what he’s doing. He’s doing everything but saying, ‘We should keep data centers out of the state,’ because he’s furthering the special interests of people who are benefitting from them.”

Donalds told the Phoenix earlier this month the state’s law is “a really strong step in the right direction. … It starts with local control. If local governments don’t want them, they won’t build them, and that’s just the way it is.”

Perhaps complicating Donalds’ stance is the attitude of the president of the United States, who has been dismissive of concerns about data centers.

“AI and Data Centers, will be the Greatest Economic Development Engine in History — Bigger than Oil, Gold, Diamonds or even the Internet,” Trump said Monday on his Truth Social page. “It will not be stopped by brilliantly run Destructive Forces during the Term of President DONALD J TRUMP!”

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Editor’s Note:

As Mitch Perry notes in the above article, Trump is a booster of hyperscale data centers and dismisses their threat.

“AI taking over the World, destroying Humanity, and all other things bad, is a HOAX,” Trump posted on social media.

He added:

“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!”

Not to be too snarky about this, but what “High IQ” person Trump was referring to remains a mystery.

JCB

Tropic Press now has an official new mascot

I get a fair amount of mail here at Tropic Press, but I have to say this was one of the most welcome I’ve received in a long time.

It came in a box with an actual return address from a reader identified as Silens DoGood, so I was fairly confident it must be legit and not, oh, I don’t know, something dreadful—I’ll let you use your own imagination. I certainly don’t want to put any ideas in people’s heads.

Nope. It was this amazing flamingo statuette, which I have now adopted as the official Tropic Press mascot. (I wonder if this will make Miss Mingo jealous?)

Thank you so much, Silens DoGood. This was very thoughtful and generous of you.

I’ve placed this mini mingo right in front of my main computer monitor, where I’m sure it will provide inspiration to do my very best to do good every day in your good name.

The original Silence Dogood, btw, was the pen name that Benjamin Franklin adopted when he was a teenager so he could get his letters into his brother’s newspaper, The New England Courant. The 14 Mrs. Silence Dogood letters were first printed in 1722.

Franklin concocted an elaborate fictional backstory for Mrs. Dogood, describing her as “an Enemy to Vice, and a Friend to Vertue.” Which, come to think of it, does sound a bit like Miss Mingo

Could Miss Mingo be a copycat?

LOL.

You can catch her columns every Saturday here on Tropic Press.

It’s that time of year for the great seasonal debate

J.C. Bruce — Wed, 16 Sep 2026 18:47:00 GMT

In a few days, summer will give way to fall as the autumnal equinox arrives on Sept. 22, launching, as it does every year, the Great Debate about when the seasons really change.

It’s the battle of the astronomers versus the meteorologists, with the calendar-makers caught in the middle.

But don’t feel too sorry for the hemerologists. They’re just stuck in …

BREAKING NEWS: House members told to go home to avoid Hegseth impeachment vote

J.C. Bruce — Wed, 16 Sep 2026 17:45:49 GMT

Speaker Mike Johnson heads out the door

UPDATE: Since this post was published earlier today, House Speaker Mike Johnson adjourned the House of Representatives prematurely rather than allow a vote on impeaching Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to go to the floor.

This was in the wake of the House last night voting for the fourth time to block President Trump from taking further military action against Iran. The vote was 220 to 204, with a handful of Republicans crossing over to join Democrats in the condemnation of the illegal war.

Rather than risk a similar embarrassment on the Hegseth impeachment vote, Johnson threw in the towel and is sending Congress home a day early.

“I think it shows the cowardice of the Republican Party,” Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal said. “They are canceling votes to do business for the American people because they are afraid that that impeachment resolution of Pete Hegseth would pass on a bipartisan basis.”

House votes to limit Trump’s power to strike Iran for 3rd time, as 7 Republicans defect

By J.C. Bruce

Will Donald Trump be impeached before the House of Representatives shuts down at the end of this week?

How about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth?

We have a definitive answer to the first question, and the second is up in the air.

Yesterday, a resolution to impeach Trump sponsored by Democrat Rep. Al Green of Texas—his second in two years—failed by a 232-147 vote.

So, no, Trump’s job is safe for the time being. By the end of this week, House members will be flying home and are not scheduled to return until after the Nov. 3 election.

The outcome was interesting, though, if not unexpected. The last time Green tried this—in June of 2025— it was shot down by a bigger margin, with 128 Democrats joining 216 Republicans.

This time, only 18 Democrats added their votes to the Republican majority, with 46 Dems merely voting “present,” among them Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

It wasn’t just Democrats who voted present. Another was Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie, who yesterday also introduced a separate resolution calling for Hegseth’s impeachment.

In a 67-minute floor speech, Massie, in part, said:

“Secretary Hegseth has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as Secretary of Defense and subversive of constitutional government, to the great prejudice of the cause of law and justice, and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States of America. (He) will remain a threat to civilians and the laws of war, the integrity of United States diplomacy, and the Constitution if allowed to remain in office, and has acted in a manner grossly incompatible with his duties and the rule of law.”

As ABC News notes:

Unless GOP leaders change the floor schedule, the House must hold a vote on the resolution within two legislative days -- by Thursday, which would force Republicans to go on the record defending Hegseth ahead of the high-stakes midterm elections. GOP leaders could offer a motion to table the resolution or cancel the legislative session scheduled for Thursday to avoid the vote.

It’s all political theater, of course, and even if a vote is held, Republicans likely have the votes to defeat the resolution.

Still, it shows how wobbly things are becoming in Congress, with polls showing that Democrats are likely to win enough seats in the midterm election to take over.

Which is why Trump is so desperate to interfere with this election.

Al Green’s resolution may not have had the traction it needed this time. But it could be a different story come January when a new Congress is seated.

News 2 Use

Andy Rock asked a pertinent question in response to yesterday’s post announcing the new News 2 Use section on the Tropic Press website, where we are compiling a library of reference articles on commonly asked questions.

I have searched everywhere but can’t find the answer to this question. If I have requested a mail-in ballot, can I still vote in person if I don’t have the mail-in ballot with me? I know I can just hand in my mail ballot at the polling place, but what if I don’t have the ballot with me? Can I still just go ahead and cast my vote in person?

Here’s the answer I got from my local elections office:

A registered voter who requested a Vote-by-Mail ballot but decides to vote at the polls should surrender the Vote-by-Mail ballot at the polls so it may be cancelled.
A registered voter who requested a Vote-by-Mail ballot but cannot surrender the Vote-by-Mail ballot will be allowed to vote a regular ballot. After voting in person, we request that the voter destroy their original Vote-by-Mail ballot if they left it at home or if they come across it in the future.
A person who requested and returned a Vote-by-Mail ballot to the Supervisor of Elections office may not go to the polls to vote. Voters who vote more than once in the same election commit a felony and will be turned over to the appropriate authorities for prosecution.

This was from Collier County, but rules regarding mail-in voting are generally applicable throughout Florida.

For more localized information, you need to check with your local office depending on where you live in the state.

There is a handy link on the News 2 Use page where you can find your local office. You can check it out here.

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

House considers impeachments of Trump and Hegseth -- one down, one to go

Wed, 16 Sep 2026 14:56:14 GMT

By J.C. Bruce

Will Donald Trump be impeached before the House of Representatives shuts down at the end of this week?

How about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth?

We have a definitive answer to the first question, and the second is up in the air.

Yesterday, a resolution to impeach Trump sponsored by Democrat Rep. Al Green of Texas—his second in two years—failed by a 232-147 vote.

So, no, Trump’s job is safe for the time being. By the end of this week, House members will be flying home and are not scheduled to return until after the Nov. 3 election.

The outcome was interesting, though, if not unexpected. The last time Green tried this—in June of 2025— it was shot down by a bigger margin, with 128 Democrats joining 216 Republicans.

This time, only 18 Democrats added their votes to the Republican majority, with 46 Dems merely voting “present,” among them Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

It wasn’t just Democrats who voted present. Another was Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie, who yesterday also introduced a separate resolution calling for Hegseth’s impeachment.

In a 67-minute floor speech, Massie, in part, said:

As ABC News notes:

Unless GOP leaders change the floor schedule, the House must hold a vote on the resolution within two legislative days -- by Thursday, which would force Republicans to go on the record defending Hegseth ahead of the high-stakes midterm elections. GOP leaders could offer a motion to table the resolution or cancel the legislative session scheduled for Thursday to avoid the vote.

It’s all political theater, of course, and even if a vote is held, Republicans likely have the votes to defeat the resolution.

Still, it shows how wobbly things are becoming in Congress, with polls showing that Democrats are likely to win enough seats in the midterm election to take over.

Which is why Trump is so desperate to interfere with this election.

Al Green’s resolution may not have had the traction it needed this time. But it could be a different story come January when a new Congress is seated.

News 2 Use

Here’s the answer I got from my local elections office:

A registered voter who requested a Vote-by-Mail ballot but decides to vote at the polls should surrender the Vote-by-Mail ballot at the polls so it may be cancelled.
A registered voter who requested a Vote-by-Mail ballot but cannot surrender the Vote-by-Mail ballot will be allowed to vote a regular ballot. After voting in person, we request that the voter destroy their original Vote-by-Mail ballot if they left it at home or if they come across it in the future.
A person who requested and returned a Vote-by-Mail ballot to the Supervisor of Elections office may not go to the polls to vote. Voters who vote more than once in the same election commit a felony and will be turned over to the appropriate authorities for prosecution.

This was from Collier County, but rules regarding mail-in voting are generally applicable throughout Florida.

For more localized information, you need to check with your local office depending on where you live in the state.

There is a handy link on the News 2 Use page where you can find your local office. You can check it out here.

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

In honor of National Voter Registration Day, we’ve created a new section on Tropic Press

J.C. Bruce — Tue, 15 Sep 2026 20:37:42 GMT

Today is National Voter Registration Day, and if you live in Florida and you haven’t registered to vote yet in the Nov. 3 general election, there’s good news:

It’s not too late.

The deadline isn’t until Oct. 5.

There’s also still time to request a vote-by-mail ballot from your local Supervisor of Elections Office now that the U.S. Supreme Court has blocked Donald Trump’s illegal scheme to disrupt this popular voting method (about one-third of all Americans vote this way).

You can find your local Elections Office in a new section I’ve just created here on the Tropic Press website. It’s called NEWS2USE.

For some time now, I have been planning to create this new feature, the goal of which is to collect the kinds of useful information we all need from time to time in one handy, one-stop information section of the website.

Today seemed like as good a day as any to launch it.

If you navigate to www.Tropic.Press, this newsletter’s website, you’ll find this new section in the menu bar. Or you can go there directly by clicking this link:

NEWS2USE

I’m just now starting to populate it with helpful data, and in honor of National Voter Registration Day, I thought I’d start with election information, as you will see if you navigate to it.

Need to know all the ins and outs of mail-in voting? It’s there.

Need help figuring out how to contact your local Elections Office? There’s a helpful link there.

And so forth.

If you look, you will see it is just in its beginning stages. There are only a few items at the moment. But we will be adding to it.

If you have suggestions for more things you’d like to see there, just drop me a note and let me know.

When I started this newsletter a year ago, one of my goals—a phrase I use from time to time— was to help readers become the smartest people in the room—or the Zoom.

I liked it especially because it rhymed, and that’s about the extent of my poetry skills.

But the underlying sentiment remains.

This is part of fulfilling that goal. And, honestly, it’s as much for my benefit as yours. I’m constantly hunting around the internet for info I need, and this will streamline my own work process as well. I hope you find it as helpful as I will.

Thanks for your attention to this matter.

J.C. Bruce

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and,hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

Supreme Court slaps down Trump’s illegal scheme to disrupt mail-in voting

Tue, 15 Sep 2026 10:03:38 GMT

By J.C. Bruce

President Donald Trump’s absurd scheme to use the U.S. Postal Service as a tool to disrupt mail-in voting in the midterm election has been shot down by the U.S. Supreme Court.

This means that mail-in ballots for the Nov. 3 election can proceed as usual, a crucial win for voting rights as a full third of all American voters choose to use the mail to cast their votes.

Trump had urged the high court to overturn a Boston District Court Judge’s injunction that halted the implementation of Postal Service rules that would have created chaos in the election, now only seven weeks away.

Trump’s scheme would have required states to turn over their lists of eligible voters to the federal government, redesign the envelopes for mail-in ballots with new bar codes, and allow the Postal Service to reject potentially tens of thousands of ballots for any glitches in this last-minute proposal.

Massachusetts Federal Judge Indira Talwani was not having any of that when she told the government:

“Having considered this series of hurdles for officials against the backdrop of an impending election, and mindful of the fact that any minor malfunction will result in the denial of mail ballots, the court concludes that disenfranchisement for plaintiff organizations’ members, regardless of residence, is practically inevitable.”

In an unsigned opinion, the Supreme Court agreed.

To a certain degree, though, Trump may have accomplished part of his aim to suppress voter turnout just by casting doubt about the integrity of voting by mail, despite numerous studies showing it is safe.

But it was always clear that there was a huge constitutional hurdle Trump faced in trying to inject the federal government into elections which, clearly, are spelled out in the Constitution as the duty of the states.

Solicitor General Dean John Sauer’s absurd arguments to the contrary apparently did not pass muster with the Supremes. He had claimed that unless the Post Office was given the right to play hall monitor in the election the “federal mails will be used to perpetrate voter fraud—a particularly pernicious species of fraud that dilutes the votes of lawful voters, prevents election results from reflecting the will of the American people, and undermines ‘public confidence in the integrity of the electoral process.’”

A lot of gall there, given the only party trying to commit fraud in this election was Trump and his flunkies like Sauer.

The court majority offered a terse view of that line of reasoning:

The government, it said, was “unlikely to succeed on the merits.”

Reaction among Democrats was immediate:

California Gov. Gavin Newsom hailed the court’s rejection of Trump’s attempt to “rig the election” and urged voters: “Let’s show up this November and take Congress back!”

Trump still tries to disrupt mail-in voting. Will the Supreme Court let him get away with it?

Previous stories:

Curses! Foiled again! Federal judge--one more time--blocks Trump mail-in ballot scheme

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and,hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

BREAKING NEWS: Alligator Alcatraz violated federal standards for humane treatment of prisoners

J.C. Bruce — Mon, 14 Sep 2026 16:17:06 GMT

Prisoner cages at Alligator Alcatraz

President Donald Trump bragged that prisoners would have to run away from alligators if they wanted to escape Florida’s Everglades concentration camp.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis thought it was oh so clever to dub it Alligator Alcatraz.

But now the Inspector General from the Department of Homeland Security has issued a report that doesn’t use the word clever to describe the conditions prisoners endured, especially the closet-sized wired cages prisoners were held in to “calm them down.”

“The use of such restrictive spaces is highly unconventional and does not align with standards for humane treatment.”

So, not only was DeSantis’ hastily erected publicity stunt in the Everglades a huge financial boondoggle (costing Florida taxpayers more than a billion dollars), it also failed to comply with a host of federal detention standards.

According to reporting from The New York Times:

The report said the use of the enclosures was unprecedented among facilities the watchdog, the department’s Office of Inspector General, has previously inspected and presented “significant risks” to detainees’ health and safety.
The report raised further questions about a facility that became synonymous with the Trump administration’s harsh treatment of immigration detainees.
Federal investigators found that the metal enclosures — each providing only about 18 square feet of floor space — were used as “calming areas,” where detainees were held for periods ranging from several minutes to nearly two hours. Although facility staff said that detainees asked to spend time in the enclosures, federal investigators found at least one instance in which the enclosures were used to discipline a detainee who “failed to comply with a lawful command.”
The report said the facility’s staff failed to provide detainees with sufficient living space. National standards require detainees to be given at least 75 square feet of floor space per person. But at maximum capacity, the facility's housing units provided only 28 square feet per detainee, according to the report.

There had been no comment from the Governor’s office at the time this report was filed.

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

Donald Trump Jr.’s Bahamas wedding was secretly bankrolled by Russian oligarch close to Putin

Mon, 14 Sep 2026 13:50:39 GMT

In this special report from Pro Publica, an exclusive look at how the Trump family is benefitting from its connections to Russia. For a decade, Vladimir Putin’s government, regarded as a chief adversary of the U.S., has been accused of efforts to influence American elections. Attempts by Russia to make inroads with the Trumps before the 2016 election exploded into controversy that dogged much of the president’s first term. Now this…

By Justin Elliott, Brett Murphy, Joshua Kaplan and Alex Mierjeski

This story was originally published by Pro Publica

On May 24, Donald Trump Jr. was celebrating in the Bahamas, as scantily clad dancers in stilettos and sailor caps performed for him and his guests. It was the last night of his wedding, a lavish, three-day party held across a pair of ultra-exclusive private islands. A five-tier funfetti cake had been airlifted in from Florida, and helicopters and seaplanes descended on the islands before guests settled into their oceanfront villas. That night on the beach, Trump Jr. lifted his bride into the air while fireworks launched from a barge over the sea.

“It was everything we dreamed of and more,” his wife later wrote on Instagram.

That dream was heavily funded by a secret benefactor: Umar Kremlev, a Russian oligarch close to President Vladimir Putin.

Kremlev footed the bill for hundreds of thousands of dollars of wedding expenses, according to records reviewed by ProPublica and interviews with three people familiar with the event. The oligarch paid to rent out one of the private islands, where a reception was held and where guests slept. He also covered other big-ticket items, like the fireworks show, and his team helped plan the event. Kremlev is the head of the International Boxing Association, a scandal-plagued sports group that has been financed by the Russian state-owned energy giant Gazprom. The wedding payments came from an IBA-affiliated entity in Dubai that the boxing association uses for financial transactions.

The guest list numbered around 50. It included Trump Jr.’s brother-in-law Jared Kushner, Eric Trump — and Kremlev, an imposing man with a shaved head who speaks limited English. The oligarch was part of a large group whose presence puzzled other attendees. They sometimes stood off by themselves, speaking Russian.

“It was really small, like, just really close friends,” Trump Jr. later said on his podcast. “Tried to keep it really tight. And it was just awesome.”

Kremlev’s previously unreported relationship with Trump Jr. represents an extraordinary development: a member of Putin’s circle financially supporting the president’s son and gaining intimate access to the Trump family. For a decade, Putin’s government, regarded as a chief adversary of the U.S., has been accused of efforts to influence American elections. Attempts by Russia to make inroads with the Trumps before the 2016 election exploded into controversy that dogged much of the president’s first term.

National security experts expressed alarm at Trump Jr. accepting the oligarch’s largesse, saying it raised an urgent question: What motivated Kremlev to spend a fortune cultivating the connection?

“If I’m paying for your wedding, at some point, you’re going to owe me something,” said Frank Montoya Jr., a retired career FBI official who held senior counterintelligence roles. Oligarchs like Kremlev often act in coordination with the Russian government. While it’s unclear if that happened here, Trump Jr. put himself in a precarious position, Montoya said. “This should be unthinkable for the son of the president. End of story.”

Holden Triplett, who served as Trump’s counterintelligence director on the National Security Council during his first term, said Russian intelligence frequently seeks to build ties with U.S. government officials and their family members. “Money is a tried-and-true method to gain access,” said Triplett, who also worked for the FBI in Moscow.

In the days leading up to Trump Jr.’s wedding, Kremlev was in China as part of the delegation accompanying Putin, according to Chinese state media. The month before, Putin had bestowed him with a state honor, the Order of Friendship. The Ukrainian government has imposed sanctions on Kremlev personally, citing his closeness to Putin and Russian security services.

It’s not clear why Kremlev helped pay for Trump Jr.’s wedding. The men appear to have met only recently. Public reporting suggests Trump Jr. could have afforded it himself, with Forbes recently estimating his net worth at roughly $300 million.

In response to detailed questions, a spokesperson for Trump Jr. did not dispute the wedding payments from Kremlev. “Umar is a personal friend of Don,” he said. The spokesman said that Kremlev is “not someone he has a business relationship with” and that the men met through a mutual friend in the hunting world and bonded over their love of boxing and the outdoors.

A spokesperson for Trump Jr.’s brother Eric said of Kremlev: “Eric has absolutely no clue who this person is, nor has never heard his name.”

In a statement, Kremlev’s press office said, “Mr. Kremlev and Mr. Trump Jr have a friendly relationship” and they first met “a couple of years ago.”

The press office described Kremlev as a businessman and philanthropist, adding, “Mr. Kremlev has never discussed political matters with any of his American friends and acquaintances,” including Trump Jr. They said the boxing organization itself did not incur expenses for the wedding but did not comment on the payments from the Dubai entity. The press office also said that when Putin and Kremlev were in China recently, Kremlev was not part of Putin’s “official delegation.”

Kushner, who has been helping lead the U.S. government’s negotiations with Russia over Ukraine, did not respond to requests for comment. The White House and the Russian government did not respond either.

The revelations come as Trump Jr. has emerged as a political power center in his own right. Beloved by the MAGA base, he reportedly played an active role in vetting White House cabinet picks for Trump’s second term and was dubbed his father’s “most essential political adviser” by The Wall Street Journal. “I certainly don’t think I’d be sitting here as the VP nominee without Don’s help,” Vice President JD Vance told the outlet in late 2024.

This account is based on records and interviews with dozens of current and former IBA officials and contractors, wedding attendees and other people in Trump Jr.’s and Kremlev’s circles.

Trump Jr. exchanged vows with socialite Bettina Anderson on a private island that was featured in “Pirates of the Caribbean” and the 2006 James Bond movie “Casino Royale.” They had their first dance on a second private island nearby that can rent for around $100,000 a night, paid for by Kremlev. The company that put on the fireworks display charges around $70,000 for such shows. (Kremlev did not attend the ceremony itself, which was held on the first day and had just 18 guests, Trump Jr.’s spokesperson said.)

The atmosphere was Monte Carlo meets frat party — helicopters in and out, a beachside DJ set, beer pong tournaments. One day, the men went spearfishing. Artisans at the London fashion house Safiyaa spent 150 hours embroidering Anderson’s bespoke silk reception outfit. The president’s son had undergone treatment to better define his jawline for the occasion.

Some longtime friends of Trump Jr. told associates they were disappointed not to be invited, though a few of his closest business partners — executives at the Trump family crypto company, World Liberty Financial, and the venture capital firm 1789 Capital — did make the cut. President Trump himself skipped it. (“He’d like me to go, but it’s going to be just a small, little private affair,” the president told reporters beforehand. “I said, you know, this is not good timing for me.”) But many of the guests were immediate family of the bride and groom.

That made the large contingent of Russians all the more conspicuous. “What are they doing here?” one person recalled thinking. At least one of the Russian guests had been with Kremlev on his China trip: Alexander Lagutin, a businessperson who has served in senior roles at a Russian defense contractor and a state-backed energy company. Kremlev’s right hand at the IBA, Elena Sobol, attended the wedding too.

Since the wedding, the Trumps have released scores of photos and videos of the festivities. While they show many of the guests, the Russians have been absent from all of them. (The top of Kremlev’s head is visible in the back of one group photo posted on Instagram by a friend of the bride.) After the party was over, on his “Triggered” podcast, Trump Jr. emphasized the event’s privacy: “The people that were there — if you’re on that list, you weren’t talking.”

In 2009, Umar Kremlev did not yet exist.

He was in his late 20s, with a criminal record for extortion and battery, still going by his birth name, Umar Lutfulloyev, according to the Russian independent news outlet Proekt. But he was about to rapidly ascend in Russia to a position of wealth and influence, with the help of a powerful friend. (“Mr. Kremlev has a completely clean legal record,” his press office said.)

In 2010, he changed his name to Kremlev. He soon joined a Russian government-backed biker gang called the Night Wolves, eventually taking a leadership role, according to news reports. That is what first brought him close to Alexei Rubezhnoi, who now leads Putin’s presidential security service, Proekt reported. In 2017, Kremlev took over the Russian Boxing Federation, after Rubezhnoi personally intervened to put him at the helm.

In 2020, Kremlev became president of the IBA. The association was something akin to FIFA but for boxing and had long overseen the sport in the Olympics. But it had been beset by corruption allegations and was on the brink of insolvency. Kremlev brought money to the table from Gazprom, the state-owned company that operates as an arm of Putin’s government. Gazprom publicly became the IBA’s financial backer, filling its coffers with tens of millions of dollars.

Former high-level IBA officials said that Kremlev had a clear political agenda. “Umar is guided by Putin. It was using the sport for soft political power,” a former IBA board member told ProPublica. “It’s geopolitics. That it’s boxing is just happenstance.” Kremlev, 43, is also heavily involved in an organization called Healthy Fatherland, run by his 23-year-old wife’s twin sister. The group — which promotes healthy eating and youth sports — is under Ukrainian sanctions for its alleged role in a program of abducting Ukrainian children from occupied territories and relocating them under the guise of “rehabilitation.” (Healthy Fatherland did not respond to a request for comment.)

Kremlev’s cozy relationship with the government has made him rich. Putin used the levers of the state to make Kremlev a dominant player in the Russian sports betting industry, according to Proekt, and one of his companies was chosen to operate the national lottery. After Putin nationalized Russia’s largest car dealership company in 2023, Kremlev became the owner of that too.

He now flaunts that wealth through his boisterous public persona. In one video Kremlev posted on social media, he surprises a young mother by giving her a free car. In another, he criticizes his young female aide’s outfit as not feminine enough and makes her change. He shadowboxes with ostriches and brings in celebrities like Rick Ross and Naomi Campbell for IBA events; he praises Stalin and rides private jets.

Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the U.S. began to indict Russian oligarchs and seize yachts and other assets. Kremlev repeatedly told associates he was worried about being targeted by a U.S. government probe, according to a person close to IBA leadership. “He was very afraid of American sanctions,” the person added. (Kremlev does not appear on public U.S. sanction lists.)

With the business environment in Europe growing more hostile to Russia, Kremlev moved much of the IBA’s operations from Switzerland to the United Arab Emirates. A new Dubai entity, IB Challenger, would later pay wedding expenses for Trump Jr. The current sources of the IBA’s funds are murky, and, in recent years, top executives have given conflicting accounts of the status of its relationship with Gazprom. (Kremlev’s press office told ProPublica the IBA’s sponsorship contract with Gazprom “expired long ago.”) People close to the organization said they understood that its money still comes from Russia.

In 2023, the International Olympic Committee stripped Kremlev’s IBA of its role organizing Olympic boxing. It has cited a host of governance issues and the group’s refusal to “transparently explain the sources of its financing or to explain its full financial dependency, at the time, on a single state-owned company.”

It was a major setback that deprived the IBA of a key source of its international influence. Kremlev has raged against the Olympic committee ever since and has said that his IBA predecessor, who he blames for the problems, “must be shot.”

Kremlev saw a potential ally in President Trump. After Trump’s second inauguration, in January 2025, Kremlev sent an open letter to the president asking him to look into the Olympic committee’s actions in advance of the 2028 Los Angeles Games. “We look forward with great optimism to the possibility of working together to make the Olympic movement great again,” he wrote.

In September 2025, the IBA brought in Trump Jr. for a panel discussion in Istanbul about boxing. With his then-girlfriend, Anderson, sitting offstage, he criticized transgender women competing in women’s sports and reminisced about watching Saturday night fights as a child. Trump Jr. shared the stage with Kremlev, the boxer Manny Pacquiao and Muhammad Ali’s daughter Rasheda. (Trump Jr.’s spokesperson said he was not paid for the appearance and was already in Turkey for an unrelated event.)

The president’s son had reason to be attuned to the sensitivity of cozying up with a Putin associate, especially while his father navigates the Russia-Ukraine war. Trump Jr.’s June 2016 meeting with a Russian attorney in Trump Tower became a major focus of the Robert Mueller investigation.

The Trump Tower meeting was arranged after an email offering Trump Jr. damaging information about Hillary Clinton as “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.” Trump Jr. famously responded, “If it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer.” Trump Jr. later dismissed the matter as a “witch hunt,” and the Mueller report concluded that there was not enough evidence to convict him of a crime.

Recently, Kremlev has been working to expand into the U.S. market. In July, his group hosted a bare-knuckle boxing event in Miami, a chance to showcase a particularly bloody form of the sport in which contenders fight without gloves. But the debut was overshadowed when manosphere influencer Andrew Tate, who the IBA had brought in to host, was arrested by U.S. Marshals outside the arena. (Tate is facing rape and sex trafficking charges in the United Kingdom, which he has denied.)

Much about Kremlev’s relationship with Trump Jr., and where it is headed, remains unknown. In a press release after the Istanbul panel, the IBA hinted there was more to come.

“President Kremlev and Donald Trump Jr made it clear – this alliance will not remain symbolic,” the press release read. “More joint initiatives will follow.”

ProPublica exists to hold power accountable, expose injustices and drive real-world change. Over the years, ProPublica’s reporting has led to new laws being passed, vulnerable communities getting expanded protections and people in power resigning. Tropic Press is pleased to share their work in today’s newsletter. To support this independent journalism you can donate here:

ProPublica

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November. That includes original reporting and commentary as well as sharing articles such as today’s report from Pro Publica.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

WEEKLY WRAP: We’re in the midst of a hurricane drought. Good thing. Because our emergency funds are underwater

Sun, 13 Sep 2026 10:01:30 GMT

Photo courtesy of the Miami Herald

By J.C. Bruce

Knock on wood, but will we have any hurricanes at all this year?

On Saturday, we set a record for the longest hurricane-free stretch in modern record-keeping. Heretofore, Sept. 11 was the latest date in hurricane season that our first hurricane spooled up. And every day since then, including today, extends that record.

Mid-September is typically the peak of the Atlantic hurricane season, but as we have discussed here before, a Super El Niño in the Pacific—unusually hot because of global warming—is disrupting normal weather patterns.

The upshot has been that we have had only five weak and short-lived tropical storms this year, and no hurricanes at all.

As Miami hurricane expert Bryan Norcross reports on his Hurricane Intel website, “The hostile environment persists, and there is no sign of tropical development in the foreseeable future.”

This week

The 78th Primetime Emmy Awards will be presented Monday at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles starting at 8 p.m. EDT on NBC. Shows with the largest number of nominations across numerous categories include The Pitt, Hacks, Widow’s Bay, Pluribus and Beef. You can catch up on the (very long) list of nominations here:

Emmy Nominees

Speaking of television, the fall lineup of returning and new shows is underway. TV Insider has a comprehensive lineup that you can view here:

Fall TV Lineup

Hispanic Heritage Month begins Sept. 15 and runs through Oct. 15, honoring the history, culture, and contributions of Hispanic and Latino Americans.

The U.S. Supreme Court has in hand an appeal from President Donald Trump to overturn a lower-court ruling that forbids him from implementing his mail-in voter suppression scheme. At this writing, it is unknown if the court will rule this week, but it will be one of the most important issues in the news that we will be tracking.

For more about the week ahead, check out the Onward Thru the Fog feature below.

That Was The Week That Was

What price deportation?

Gov. Ron DeSantis likes to brag about Florida’s deportation record—and he still insists that Alligator Alcatraz was not just a cheap publicity stunt to make him look tough on immigrants.

The state still owes contractors who serviced the Everglades concentration camp millions, all coming from funds originally created to respond to natural disasters such as hurricanes, which, as noted earlier, we’ve not had to worry too much about this year— so far.

As the South Florida Sun Sentinel notes, the state has a pay-first, appropriate-later budget system for emergencies, designed to allow speedier response to disasters, which actually makes a lot of sense.

For real emergencies.

Unfortunately, that also allowed DeSantis to rack up eye-popping costs for his prison camps, a tab that, in the worst-case scenario, could show a $1.5 billion deficit by next summer, it was reported last week.

So, he’s gone to the Legislature to get some money to keep the bill collectors off his back, and on Friday a Republican-dominated committee in charge of these appropriations gave him the $250 million he needed to pay off overdue bills—but more will be needed.

So much for fiscal conservatism.

Hispanic voters leaning Democratic

The Cook Political Report released a survey of Hispanic voters that, while focused on Texas, may portend shifts elsewhere, including Florida.

The poll found that Democratic candidates in the Texas Senate and gubernatorial contests are leading their GOP opponents by a 2-1 margin as Trump’s job approval rating has sunk to just 33% among a demographic group that swung hard in his direction in 2024.

The survey also noted that Hispanic voters understand the important role they play in Texas elections. Seven in ten said they think Hispanics in the state have a lot or some political influence, including 41% who said they have “real political power.”

And we know that is also true in Florida.

Donalds: Too soon for more abortion laws

Republican gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds says it’s too soon to add more abortion restrictions in Florida, not that he isn’t in favor of the idea, Florida Politics reported.

At a chapter of Turning Point USA—Charlie Kirk’s outfit—at the University of Central Florida, Donalds said the state’s Heartbeat Protection Act, which bans abortion after the sixth week of pregnancy, was the “right move.”

But he said it’s too soon to pile on.

“I do understand where people will say, ‘Well, let’s move to the next legislative step.’ But what my view is, is that you have a legislative step, you implement that step. That’s what’s happening right now. You provide more information and you educate the public around what the nuance is, and then you make the next legislative step.”

The real takeaway from that mumbo jumbo: The MAGA zealots who want to continue to restrict women’s reproductive rights, having already created one of the most repressive environments in the United States, actually want to make it even more severe.

And Donalds is sympathetic to that.

Jimmy Kimmel’s Talarico interview trumps convention speech.

Jimmy Kimmel’s interview with Texas Senate candidate James Talarico drew more than 5.8 million views on YouTube, easily surpassing the audience for Trump’s own convention livestream, Aaron Parnas reported.

It was on YouTube and not TV because of Trump’s threats of retaliation against ABC through the Federal Communications Commission.

Trump wants to make election all about him. With his poll numbers tanking, Dems couldn’t agree more

Meme of the Week

Quote of the Week

“I am asking you to pretend I’m on the ballot. I’m on the ballot. I’m on the ballot. Just one more time.”

— Donald Trump at his midterm convention

Letter of the Week

If I was a Republican running for re-election I would be trying really hard to have some exotic disease to keep from having to attend the mid-term convention. Thinking about it, maybe having Trump’s name associated with a candidate could be considered a disease in itself.

— Jim Hunter

Onward Thru the Fog

Today. The NFL’s regular Sunday games begin with the Buccaneers taking on the Cincinnati Bengals; the Jaguars facing the Cleveland Browns; and the Dolphins facing the Las Vegas Raiders.

September 14. National Sober Day. After a full day of football watching, yeah, maybe a good idea.

September 15. International Day of Democracy. If we can keep it.

Sept. 16. Happy birthday, Marvin Middlemark. Born on this date in 1919, he was a failing inventor who thought water-powered potato peelers would be a hit. Then he created the rabbit-ear TV antenna, an essential broadcast television device for many decades. In fact, they’re still in use. Some people may be using them to watch the Emmys.

Sept. 17. It’s Constitution Day and Citizenship Day, commemorating the signing of the U.S. Constitution in 1787.

Sept. 18. Today is National Cheeseburger Day, a time to start arguments with friends over who makes the best burger, which is silly since it is served in Longview, Tx., at a joint named Jucys. Opinions on this matter vary, of course.

Sept. 19. Talk Like a Pirate Day is celebrated today. We have consulted Capt. Jack Sparrow, and these are the key terms to use today. Bonus points for combining them all in one sentence.

Ahoy: Hello.

Matey: A friend or crew member.

Me Hearties: Plural of matey.

Avast: A command to pay attention.

Arrrgh: Just what it sounds like.

Shiver me timbers: Shocking!

Blimey: Also shocking.

Last Week’s Tropic Press headlines

In case you missed it, here are some of the stories that headlined Tropic Press this past week. Click on the headlines to read the stories.

So much has changed in the past 25 years, but we should recall the lesson of 9/11

Trump still tries to disrupt mail-in voting. Will the Supreme Court let him get away with it?

It may not be bribery, but Trump’s $5,000 promise rings hollow based on his history of lies

Trump’s Misguided Midterm Strategy: Total Control

You’re an ICE agent with Cubans on your hands. Which country should you send them to?

Guess what story you haven’t read so far in this year’s news cycle

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

ASK THE BIRD: Is it possible to actually be allergic to those red hat people?

Sat, 12 Sep 2026 10:02:21 GMT

Illustration by Tropic Press and Imagen

DEAR MISS MINGO:

Okay, I need to tell someone about this because I’ve been thinking about it for a day straight.

Yesterday, I was dead asleep, mid-nap, the kind where you wake up not knowing your own name, and the doorbell rings. I stumble over and open the door still basically unconscious, and there’s a guy standing there for the Byron Donalds campaign. Red hat and everything.

It took me a second. Like, my brain needed a beat to catch up and realize this wasn’t just a bad dream.

And then it clicked, and I just went off:

“Noooo. Noooooo. Get out of here. No way. Get.”

Not my most articulate moment. I’m a registered Dem; he clearly figured that out fast, because he didn’t even argue — he just said he wasn’t there for me; he had another name on his list. My partner’s, as it turns out.

Which, fine, technically true: My partner’s a registered independent. But my partner also thinks the Orange Toddler-in-chief is insane and Donalds is a moron. Same as I do, so I told him, “He doesn’t want your bullshit either,” and shut the door as he tried to argue he needed to speak to him.

I don’t feel bad about it exactly. I don’t feel great about it either. Mostly I just keep replaying the look on his face when a woman fresh off a nap started yelling a guttural “no” at him before he’d finished a sentence.

Here’s what’s actually bugging me, though: it wasn’t a decision. There was no moment where I weighed my options and chose “get out of here.” My body reacted to that red hat like it was the antichrist.

So, Miss Mingo, at what point does this stop being political passion and start being an honest-to-god physical allergy to red hat army people? And is there a cure, or do I just keep living like this?

Still not over it in Palm Harbor

Dear Still:

Are you sure you were actually awake and this wasn’t some terribly vivid nightmare?

It is common for dreams of monsters and demons to seem so real they distort our sense of reality and linger on into consciousness. And it’s hard to imagine conjuring a more disagreeable ogre than a Donalds supporter.

Well, of course, there’s Donalds himself.

But assuming this was real, and your reaction was genuine, it most likely has less to do with an allergic reaction than a perfectly normal fight-or-flight response.

It’s our bodies’ natural self-defense mechanism to protect us from danger. So, it seems perfectly normal to me that you might have become agitated by the presence of someone posing a direct threat to your well-being—and, for that matter, the entire state and country. You know, a Republican.

Especially such an egregious, double-talking, Trump-loving, ring-kissing Republican like Donalds.

So, no, you don’t have to continue to live with this aversion you’ve discovered.

Just vote.

DEAR MISS MINGO:

That answer seemed awfully partisan, if you ask me. Aren’t journalists supposed to be fair and objective? So, what’s that say about you?

Red in Redington Beach

Dear Red:

Yes, journalists strive to be fair, balanced, objective, even-handed, and truth-telling.

But this is not a news report. This is an opinion column, disguised as an advice column, disguised as a column written by a talking bird.

Which gives me a chance to get a lot off my feathered chest that I’ve held back all those many years I spent in the newsroom, where I did, indeed, practice all those aforementioned journalistic virtues no matter how constraining and how much it pained me.

I would paraphrase one of your own tribe, Barry Goldwater:

“Snarkiness in the defense of sanity is no vice.”

I would also add this…

My friend Ted Lund, who is Key West’s most amazing reporter—really, he’s a journalistic army of one—recently posted this meme on his Above the Fold website:

(Note to those triggered by casual vulgarities, the following meme contains a nasty word that journalists commonly use—certainly not me in this column, though. Until now.)

And while I’m not sure Ben Bradlee, the former editor of the Washington Post who is pictured here, actually ever said that, per se, you get the sentiment, right?

Reporters bend themselves into pretzels trying to be fair, to quote all sides in civic arguments, but at some point, a liar is a liar, and it needs to be said. Easier for me to do that than for news reporters, so that’s what I do.

No apologies.

DEAR MISS MINGO:

Donald Trump says he will give $5,000 to everyone if we keep Republicans in control of Congress.

Why isn’t this against the law? Isn’t this trying to buy votes?

Concerned in Clearwater

Dear Concerned:

Of course it is. It’s also a load of nonsense. It would take $1.3 trillion to give every adult in America a check that big. And Trump doesn’t have the authority to do that, even if he had the money, which he doesn’t.

Of course, he’s counting on people being too naive and greedy to understand it’s a scam. It’s his modus operandi.

So, here’s my idea.

To all you idiots out there who believe Trump really will write you a check:

Trump actually is going to transfer that $1.3 trillion to my bank account, and I will be distributing these funds on Duval Street, first come, first served, the morning after the election.

So, if you are a Republican, skip voting, come on down here to Key West, and be first in line. See you on Nov. 4.

DEAR MISS MINGO:

Why do you writers always throw out terms like modus whatever instead of just using plain English? Isn’t that just you trying to preen before your audience?

Irritated in Immokalee

Dear Irritated:

Absolutely.

Meet Miss Mingo

Got a question for Miss Mingo? About life, the news, or clever ways to avoid paying bar tabs? Write to her at MissMingo@Tropic.Press

ASK MISS MINGO

And now, some shameless advertising…

The official Tropic Press Store is now open and ready for business. You can order your very own Miss Mingo merch online. All sales are final. Check out the store here:

Tropic Press Store

Editor’s Note:

Congratulations to Miss Mingo, who recently won the Florida Society of Professional Journalists’ Sunshine State Award for Best Blog and Newsletter.

You can support her work by subscribing to the Tropic Press newsletter (and, honestly, we need the help if you choose to become a paid subscriber, because her bar tab is killing us).

So much has changed in the past 25 years, but we should recall the lesson of 9/11

Fri, 11 Sep 2026 10:03:20 GMT

By J.C. Bruce

Tropic Press

Today is the 600th day of Donald Trump’s second term and the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Two unforgettable tragedies on the same day.

But let’s not make today about Trump, despite all his efforts to interject himself into the history of that awful day by suggesting he had to be rescued by first responders from Ground Zero.

Remember, he also claimed to have seen thousands of Islamic people celebrating the collapse of the Twin Towers in New Jersey, which was a complete fabrication.

And, in a typical show of his lack of class, he also offered this about his major downtown property:

“40 Wall Street actually was the second-tallest building in downtown Manhattan, and it was actually, before the World Trade Center, was the tallest—and then, when they built the World Trade Center, it became known as the second-tallest. And now it’s the tallest.”

For Trump, it’s always about him.

But about 9/11:

If you are at all like me, you may find it hard to believe it's been 25 years since that shocking day.

It seems like yesterday that I was in the newsroom in Dayton, Ohio, watching the second hijacked jet slam into the Twin Towers, and Tim Gaffney, a reporter who covered the sprawling Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, turned to me and said, “We’re at war.”

And he was right.

And unfortunately, so were the people who said, “This changes everything.”

I remember writing at the time that if that prediction for the future of our country were true, then the terrorists had won.

And to the degree that this disaster ushered in—or at least accelerated—the surveillance state we live in now, and paved the way for xenophobic ICE thuggery, I stand by that prediction.

Our children were teenagers at the time, and for them, 9/11 was a horror that disrupted their childhood and altered their worldview forever, much like the assassination of President John F. Kennedy distorted ours.

It was transformative in other ways, too. At least for a short while.

For a brief time, America felt united.

Nothing like a common enemy to pull a tribe together.

As New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani said at the time:

“The attacks of September 11th were intended to break our spirit. Instead, we have emerged stronger and more unified. We feel renewed devotion to the principles of political, economic and religious freedom, the rule of law and respect for human life. We are more determined than ever to live our lives in freedom.”

Hard to remember that spirit, given the venomous atmosphere of division that clouds our contemporary culture.

I’m in Delaware as I write this, just a mile or so away from former President Joe Biden’s house.

And while we all may wish Biden had played his decision to run for a second term differently, one of his recurring messages still resonates today:

“There is more that unites us than divides us.”

Today is a great time to reflect on that, and how we can use our power as voters to change our country's trajectory for the better.

Update on the news: Federal appeals court upholds ban on Trump’s mail-in voting suppression scheme

A federal appeals court has shot down the Trump administration’s scheme to disrupt mail-in voting for the midterm election.

An appeal before the Supreme Court is still pending, however.

A three-judge panel on the First Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously rejected the White House’s request to reverse a lower court’s block on new Postal Service rules for mail-in ballots, which would have given USPS the authority to reject and return ballot mailings.

The judges’ ruling was direct:

They said there is “no record evidence of past fraud or a likelihood of impending fraud” tied to the November election, and agreed with the district court that the rule may violate the Constitution’s Elections Clause by allowing an executive agency to regulate elections in a way reserved for states and Congress.

Here’s the exact text:

About a week before the States were to begin mailing ballots for the upcoming federal election on November 3, 2026, the United States Postal Service (the "Postal Service" or "USPS") issued a new rule regulating voting by mail that could prevent millions of Americans from obtaining and returning their ballots for that election. See Ballot Mail for Federal Elections, 91 Fed. Reg. 54966 (Aug. 26, 2026) (to be codified at 39 C.F.R. pt. 111) (the "Final Rule"). Litigation ensued that resulted in a preliminary injunction preventing parts of the Final Rule from taking effect. The district court concluded that the Final Rule was likely unconstitutional because the United States Constitution assigns to the States the authority to administer elections subject to alterations imposed by Congress. The court determined that Congress had provided no authority for the Postal Service to promulgate a rule that regulates the manner of elections. It also found that, as a practical matter, it would be impossible for States to comply with the Final Rule's detailed requirements in the time remaining before the November 3 election, thus resulting in the potential disenfranchisement of millions of voters across the country. Appellants, various federal officials and entities as well as Intervenor States, have filed motions to stay the preliminary injunction. The Postal Service also requests an administrative stay. The motions are denied.

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal is to reach as many voters as possible to increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

It may not be bribery, but Trump’s $5,000 promise rings hollow based on his history of lies

Thu, 10 Sep 2026 14:07:26 GMT

Courtesy of the Financial Times

By J.C. Bruce

Republicans supporting Herbert Hoover for president nearly a century ago promised voters “a chicken in every pot” if Hoover won the election.

Instead of a chicken dinner, his 1928 election marked the start of the Great Depression.

Now comes Donald Trump promising $5,000 for every adult in the United States if voters return enough Republicans to Congress so the G.O.P. can retain control.

“So if the Republicans win, you win with us, and you get $5,000,” Trump said at his “Trump-a-palooza” pep rally in Dallas last night.

“It will be called the Trump Dividend.”

Trump isn’t the least bit embarrassed about this shameless attempt to buy votes. He’s desperate. Democrats are leading in the polls, and if they take over—at a minimum—the House, the investigations into Trump’s criminal conduct will begin with vigor.

Unsaid, of course, is exactly how Trump’s promised largesse would be paid for. There are about 250 million adult citizens in the U.S. If the federal government wrote each a $5,000 check, that would come to $1.3 trillion.

It’s money the government would have to borrow, adding to every single American’s share of the national debt, which now tops $40 trillion, $11 trillion of which has been accumulated during Trump’s two terms—so far.

Can you imagine how Republicans would react if a Democrat promised this kind of giveaway?

Certainly sounds like Trump’s mouth is writing checks his bank account can’t cash. Certainly not his personal bank account.

It’s outrageous, of course. But is it illegal?

Probably not.

While federal laws like 18 U.S.C. § 597 make it strictly illegal to pay people how to vote, legal experts say there’s a crucial difference between illegal vote-buying and campaign promises.

Put another way, it’s not illegal for politicians to make promises they can’t — or don’t even intend to — keep.

And by now we’re used to Trump’s dishonesty.

He’s the guy who promised Mexico would pay for the wall.
He continues to lie about how the 2020 presidential election was “stolen.”
He bragged that the Iran war would be over in a week.
He lied to Americans about the severity of the COVID-19 outbreak, claiming it would be “over like a miracle.”
And he continues to boast that he’s created the “greatest economy in the world” when, in fact, the numbers show the economy was stronger under both the Clinton and Obama administrations.

And, speaking of the economy, it certainly wouldn’t be stronger with yet another $1.3 trillion in debt layered on top of the trillions in red ink from his atrocious giveaway to billionaires in his Big Beautiful Budget Bill.

It’s tempting to suggest that if he’s going to bribe voters, he should have stuck with chickens. Or Big Macs.

After all, Americans are way too smart to fall for something like this, right? Right?

What do you think?

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal is to reach as many voters as possible to increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

Trump wants to make election all about him. With his poll numbers tanking, Dems couldn’t agree more

Thu, 10 Sep 2026 10:03:42 GMT

By J.C. Bruce

Republican candidates facing strong headwinds in the upcoming midterms have been urged by their party’s leader—Donald Trump—to make the election all about him.

“I’m not on the ballot, but in a certain way I’m on the ballot, so please go out and vote,” Trump exhorted MAGA faithful at a recent rally.

He’s trying to resurrect his election victory in 2024, but that only works if he’s able to draw to the polls the marginal—often under-informed and infrequent — voters who supplied that margin of victory.

It’s not a great strategy.

Imagine you are a Republican candidate for Congress or a statewide office. Why would you want to link your candidacy to Trump when his ratings in the polls are so far underwater you’d need a submarine to find them?

It would be like tying your political dinghy to Trump’s Titanic and praying for no icebergs.

Which is why many GOP candidates have been revising their websites to minimize Trump, and why at this week’s "Trump-a-Palooza" midterm pep rally in Dallas, many Republicans realized they'd better stay home and campaign instead.

The price tag is more than a little daunting, too. It’s $25,000 a head for congressional candidates. Then there are add-ons:

Roundtable with Donald Trump: Priced at $250,000.
Photograph with Donald Trump: Priced at $88,600.
Meeting with JD Vance: Priced at $75,000.
Photograph with JD Vance: Priced at $35,000

And where will all that cash go? Ummm. Trump’s not saying.

So, what are the odds Trump’s self-centered strategy will work?

Don’t bet on it.

As political prognosticator Charlie Cook put it:

“…Republicans should brace themselves: The three most plausible outcomes are that it will be bad, really bad, or truly horrible. Conversely, a Democrat should at least briefly consider that the good fortune they may have in November will come compliments of the president, not as a result of much that they have done.”

And as Florida pollster Mark Schulman notes:

Trump is also battling midterm history. Even overlooking Trump’s mistaken strategy of making the midterms orbit around him, only three presidents since World War II have seen their party gain House seats in a midterm. Very few have maintained full control of Congress. The historical pattern is overwhelmingly one of losses, not retention.

According to Gallup, incumbent presidential parties lose an average of 26 House seats post-WWII. That figure increases to an average loss of 35–37 House seats when the president’s job approval rating remains under 50%.

You can read Schulman’s full report on his Substack site. It is entitled: Trump’s Misguided Midterm Strategy: Total Control. I’ve also republished it on the Tropic Press website. It’s data-rich and filled with smart analysis.

Mark Schulman

As Schulman also notes, independent voters will play a huge role in this year’s elections, and that’s especially important in Florida. While Republicans have a commanding 1.5 million more registered voters than Democrats, there are a whopping 3.3 million voters registered as No Party Affiliation. How they turn out and vote will be crucial.

Here are the numbers:

National polling shows independents are leaning Democratic. This is from Schulman’s post:

As you can see, these independents favor Democrats 2-1. Couple that with what could be a lower-than-usual Republican turnout, and unexpected things could happen on Nov. 3.

Maybe making it all about Trump will help.

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

No lion: It’s time to kick off football season

J.C. Bruce — Wed, 09 Sep 2026 18:44:00 GMT

College football season is now well underway, so it’s time for the pros to begin play, too, as the NFL launches its 2026 season this week.

Trump still tries to disrupt mail-in voting. Will the Supreme Court let him get away with it?

J.C. Bruce — Wed, 09 Sep 2026 12:44:00 GMT

Dean John Sauer

By J.C. Bruce

It’s amazing how Trump administration officials can say the most absurd and outrageous things with a perfectly straight face.

Exhibit A: Solicitor General Dean John Sauer.

It’s his job to present the government’s side of things in disputes before the U.S. Supreme Court. And that’s just what he did this weekend as he hurried off an appeal to keep Trump’s hopes alive of disrupting the midterm elections.

This emergency pleading arose in the wake of a decision by a Massachusetts federal judge blocking the president’s scheme that would require states to turn over their lists of registered voters for federal review. It would also require states to redo their mail-in ballot envelopes to add special barcodes that would allow the Postal Service to toss out ballots, usurping the role of state election officials.

This is illegal and unconstitutional. The states, not the federal government, run elections. Which is why U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani issued an injunction last week blocking this scheme — her third time doing so — that is now being appealed.

Here’s where it gets darkly amusing. In arguing that the Supreme Court must urgently step in and overturn Talwani’s decision, this is what Sauer argued. He said Talwani's injunction:

“…nullifies the Postal Service’s efforts to address the risk that the federal mails will be used to perpetrate voter fraud—a particularly pernicious species of fraud that dilutes the votes of lawful voters, prevents election results from reflecting the will of the American people, and undermines ‘public confidence in the integrity of the electoral process.’”

How he could address the highest court in the land with this blather while keeping a straight face is incredible. Here’s the truth:

There is no widespread or meaningful voter fraud in the United States. Numerous reviews have established this. This is not a sincere effort to safeguard elections.

The only fraud that is being attempted here is Trump’s illegal and unAmerican efforts at voter suppression. By casting doubt on the security of mail-in voting, and by disrupting it through lawsuits like this, he hopes to discourage voting in the midterms. In his mind, lower turnout means less risk of losing Republican control of Congress.

When Sauer refers to “diluting” the vote, the real effort at watering down the vote is being perpetrated by Trump.

When he refers to the “will of the American people,” that is best expressed by high voter turnout, not lower.

And the cherry on top is his heartfelt expression of concern that unless the court steps in that public confidence in elections will be undermined.

Give me a break. The only efforts at undermining confidence in our elections are being perpetrated by Trump and his flunkies like Sauer.

This is all a bunch of deceptive Orwellian doublespeak.

Now, the Supremes have this test before them. Will they uphold the Constitution—which is their duty—or will they turn the country’s elections over to a would-be dictator?

Not much at stake here, just the future of our democracy. And I’m writing that with a straight face.

Trump administration again appeals mail-in ballot dispute to the Supreme Court

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who has initial responsibility for emergency appeals from Massachusetts, directed the challengers to file their response by 4 p.m. EDT today. Stay tuned.

For more background on this, check out this excellent report from Amy Howe of SCOTUSblog:

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

You’re an ICE agent with Cubans on your hands. Which country should you send them to?

Tue, 08 Sep 2026 10:02:19 GMT

Aristides Fernandez Garcia — Photo Credit: CBS Miami/YouTube

News item: Aristides Fernandez Garcia is among a group of Cubans captured by ICE, held at Alligator Alcatraz, then shipped across the Atlantic Ocean to a country he had never heard of before—the Central African Republic, a nation so dangerous that the U.S. State Department warns against travel there. Does this make sense?

By J.C. Bruce

Is dumping a Cuban person in Africa ‘deportation’?

Imagine you’re an ICE agent.

Yeah, I know, an unpleasant thought, but bear with me.

You’ve rounded up some undocumented people from—say—Cuba, and now you have to load them on a plane and ship them out of the country because they don’t belong here, never mind all that blather on the Statue of Liberty about the “huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

So, based on that geography class you endured back in the sixth grade, which destination would make the least sense:

Havana, Cuba
Mexico City
Guatemala
Costa Rica
Africa

If you picked Number 1, I would redirect you to the question where I said “least” sense. So, try again.

Hint: Cuba, Mexico, Guatemala and Costa Rica are close by and all speak Spanish.

OK, you’re not an ICE agent, so you know the correct answer is Africa, which would be an absurd place to send a Spanish-speaking person who didn’t know a single soul on a continent clear across the Atlantic Ocean.

What would they do with themselves when they arrived? Where would they turn for assistance? Who could they call?

Talk about hopeless and helpless.

So, of course, that’s just what American immigration officials are doing, as chronicled in numerous news stories in the past few weeks, including those of Cuban ex-pats in Florida, herded aboard planes in chains and dumped off on the other side of the world.

Why would we do such a thing to anyone? Is this someone’s idea of a cruel, sadistic joke?

The official explanations usually center on several points:

Sometimes “illegals” can’t be returned to their homelands because they might be endangered if they showed up there again. And there are laws that prevent that.
Sometimes their countries of origin won’t take them back.
We have deals with other nations to take refugees off our hands, so it’s all hunky-dory.

On that last point, it can’t be overemphasized that we’re the ones who drew up those deals. You can’t cook up schemes like this and then justify mistreating people because you have deals you, yourself, manufactured.

Sure, it’s not hard to imagine why a refugee from Cuba (or Venezuela or Iran or wherever) might be endangered returning home. We all get that.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but we should at least consider the possibility for at least some of these people THAT’S WHY THEY RAN AWAY IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Which is why we have all those words on the Statue of Liberty:

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Because that’s what America is: A sanctuary for desperate people yearning for a better life.

Message to all you ICE agents. Unless you are of Native American heritage, you are either an illegal immigrant yourself or the offspring of illegal immigrants because there never was a Customs Office processing passports and visas set up by the original inhabitants of this land.

Our ancestors just barged their way in, unannounced, unauthorized. Because they could. And they showed up here for the same reasons as those people you are now deporting.

Which is not to say there isn’t an issue here with illegal immigration, nor that there shouldn’t be a strategy in place to resolve it.

But scooping up people like roadside litter, and using the rest of the world as America’s dumpster, is as thoughtless as it is inhumane.

We’re supposed to be better than this.

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal here is to reach as many voters as possible, so that we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

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Thanks.

J.C. Bruce

Guess what story you haven’t read so far in this year’s news cycle

Mon, 07 Sep 2026 10:04:08 GMT

By J.C. Bruce

The doldrums of summer are over, and with Labor Day we bolt into the busy autumn news season, the frequent topic of which will be the upcoming elections. But there is much, much more that we will be covering.

Let’s get it started with a quiz.

Which of these stories have you NOT seen in the news recently:

Mitch McConnell makes miraculous recovery.
Donald Trump admits he lost the 2020 election.
Gasoline drops to $3 a gallon.
Hurricanes rake Florida.
All of the above.

I’m sure you guessed Number 5, and that’s what we will talk about briefly today because we are on the verge of setting a new record.

Despite having had five named tropical storms this hurricane season, we’ve had no hurricanes. If this continues through the end of the week, it will mean that whenever—if ever—the first hurricane spins up, it will be the latest in the modern satellite era.

And as you can see in the above map from the National Hurricane Center, the Gulf and Atlantic are currently storm-free.

Meteorologists began discovering and tracking hurricanes using satellites in 1966, and the latest dates hurricanes formed in that time were on Sept. 11 — in 2002 with Hurricane Gustav, and Hurricane Humberto in 2013.

If the Atlantic and Gulf remain completely free of hurricanes through Saturday (Sept. 12), this year will officially shatter the modern record for the quietest start to any hurricane season.

This is primarily driven by a powerful El Niño pattern in the Pacific Ocean, as we have written about here before.

Numerous sources explain that El Niños create extremely strong wind shear across the Caribbean and tropical Atlantic that tears weather patterns apart before they can strengthen into full-blown hurricanes.

And, yes, this year’s El Niño is more intense because of global warming.

A question you might ask is: Has there ever been a year with no hurricanes whatsoever?

The answer is: Nobody knows. Because before deploying satellites in low Earth orbit 60 years ago, there easily could have been storms that nobody ever noticed.

That said, there were no hurricanes reported in 1907 and 1914, according to the never-wrong internet, but that was before eyes in the sky, so who knows? They easily could have been in the middle of the ocean, and we would have been none the wiser.

The hurricane experts at Colorado State University have been predicting a below-average season, and so far they have been right. Their updated forecast is for a total of 4 hurricanes by the end of the season on Nov. 30, with one of them possibly becoming a Cat 3 or greater.

As noted many times, though, it only takes one Cat 5 in your backyard to ruin your picnic, so we will continue to pay close attention.

As for Mitch McConnell’s surprising recovery and lower gas prices, they could happen, I suppose. Trump acknowledging he’s been lying all along about the 2020 election? That’s definitely not in the forecast.

Good news on the storm front as fewer hurricanes are expected this season

Further Reading:

‘An Inconvenient Truth’ 20 years later: Inconveniently, too many people still in denial

Welcome to hurricane season. Because of a Super El Niño, there should be fewer storms--unless there aren’t

Thanks for your support

Since this newsletter was launched a year ago, hundreds of thousands of subscribers have joined the Tropic Press community, making this one of the fastest-growing publications of its kind.

Our goal is to reach as many voters as possible so we can increase engagement in the political process and, hopefully, raise interest in voting this coming November.

If you are encountering this newsletter for the first time, please consider subscribing. If you are already a subscriber, consider upgrading your subscription to help this work continue.

Regardless, every person you share this with is one more potential vote for change.

Please share and help us make Florida — and America — better for all of us.

Thanks.

J.C. Bruce