Happy Friday 🍸 pic.twitter.com/MIGVeTcM99

— RNC Election Integrity (@RNCVoteProtect) May 15, 2026

It doesn’t show up on the above embed but on Twitter proper there’s a little “Made with AI” asterisk under the image, a still from the 2013 version of The Great Gatsby. It probably took them longer to prompt Grok to add the text to the time-honored meme image than it would have to simply type and set the text in Photoshop, so shave a few point off the larger achievement, which is notable.

You do have to give the un-Photoshop-trained Zoomers on the team some credit for actually citing a real, plausible use case for being carded rather than just saying and then doubling down on stupid shit like Auditioning Attorney General Todd Blanche’s inane “showing ID to vote is like showing ID when you go into a restaurant,” from earlier this month. That dumbassery itself was a shout out as well as a slightly less deranged version of convicted felon President Trump’s longtime dedication to undermining the purportedly dire seriousness of the policy objective by saying variously that Americans need to show ID to buy a “loaf of bread,” “a box of cereal,” and just “groceries.”

Really the only issues with the tweet from the “Election Integrity” propaganda squad are the aforementioned laziness on the part of the non-Photoshop-trained zoomers slapping this together, the invocation of “Bottomless Brunch” on a Friday since “Happy Hour” would’ve been more appropriate (or it could’ve waited until Saturday or Sunday when such brunch specials are actually offered), and the implied mockery of a weekend ritual favored by urbane liberal constituencies at effete establishments that never actually bother to card patrons for their $35 bottomless mimosa specials. Oh and the whole thing about how Dems aren’t really resisting any voter ID requirement on “principle” anymore so much as holding onto it as a bargaining chip for when Republicans show a willingness to compromise on other national election legislation. Which will be never.

In a five second-long clip by clip guy Aaron Rupar that’s too brief to justify ripping and putting up on YouTube, Energy Suckretary Chris Wright on Friday told CNBC that something something “…now our oil goes out of the Gulf of Mexico we’ll see more of that going over to China.” Emphasis added on the non-official name for the body of water bounded by five US states totaling 1,700 miles of coastline, northwestern Cuba, and six Mexican states totaling 1,400 miles of coastline. The name “Gulf of Mexico” first appeared on maps in 1550 and by 1672 became the most widely-internationally recognized usage for it when the Spanish Viceroyalty of Mexico was the dominant territorial arc.

The snippet of Wright’s bit separately appeared to be the fruit of a broader fuckup in the boast that American oil is now being sold to China. That’s not actually good for gas prices.

Convicted felon President Trump’s regime is moving to indict 94 year-old former Cuban President Raul Castro over a few planes that got shot down back in the 1990s, CBS News reports.

What this is actually supposed to accomplish is unclear but yeah, they want to indict him.

“Advance estimates of US retail and food services sales for April 2026, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $757.1 billion, up 0.5 percent (±0.4 percent) from the previous month, and up 4.9 percent (±0.5 percent) from April 2025. Total sales for the February 2026 through April 2026 period were up 4.4 percent (±0.4 percent) from the same period a year ago. The February 2026 to March 2026 percent change was revised from up 1.7 percent (±0.4 percent) to up 1.6 percent (±0.2 percent). Retail trade sales were up 0.5 percent (±0.4 percent) from March 2026, and up 5.2 percent (±0.5 percent) from last year.”

“Nonstore retailers were up 11.1 percent (±1.8 percent) from last year, while food services and drinking places were up 2.7 percent (±1.8 percent) from April 2025,” says the monthly US Commerce Department report with zero mention of the… underlying environment that caused “sales” to jump.

“UraniumX Discovery Corp confirms with profound sadness that one independent contractor passed away on May 8, 2026, following a wildlife encounter at the Company’s Zoo Bay property in Saskatchewan’s Athabasca Basin. The Company is cooperating fully with local authorities, wildlife officials, and government agencies in their investigation. As a precaution, all field activities at the Zoo Bay property have been temporarily halted while the review is completed. Exploration and development work at the Company’s other projects, including the flagship Murphy Lake Uranium Property, continue as planned and remain unaffected,” says a UraniumX press release

“Esen Boldkhuu, CEO, stated: ‘We are deeply saddened by this tragic loss. Our thoughts and deepest condolences go out to the family, friends, and colleagues of the deceased. The safety and well-being of our employees, contractors, and all personnel working on our projects is, and will always remain, our highest priority. We commend the rapid response of our on-site team, service providers, and emergency responders who attended the scene,'” the release continued and sure, it LOOKS like a random incident. Probably is. People unfortunately get killed by wild bears all the time.

Still… Gotta wonder if anyone with the company is at least considering that the bear knew what it was doing. Or whether the bear was even in control of its own territorial impulses at all.

Border Patrol Chief Michael Banks tells Fox News he’s quitting, effective immediately, without citing a reason. “It’s just time,” Banks said, adding “I feel like I got the ship back on course from the least secure disastrous chaotic border to the most secure border this country has ever seen. Time to pass the reigns, 37 years, it’s time to enjoy the family and life.” The above is roughly as long as the Fox News “exclusive” which they say will be updated when they have more information.

Last month the Washington Examiner picked up a possible cause for the exit as well as a reason to LOL at the part where the fucking asshole said “it’s time to enjoy the family and life”: Banks’s love of sex tourism in South America and Southeast Asia, “vacations” he regularly bragged about to other top officials in the agency and repeatedly nagged them to join him on his foreign adventures.

“I don’t know how he became the chief of the Border Patrol with his character. He’s going to third-world countries to take advantage of poor fucking women, which disgusts the hell out of me,” a source told the Examiner. “Women” was doing a lot of work there and it’s worth raising whether Banks – a diehard Trump fanboy who’s supposed to be combatting sex trafficking – went out of his way to make sure that every establishment he patronized in those countries had all 18+ staff.

“UKMTO has received a report of an incident 38NM northeast of Fujairah, United Arab Emirates. The CSO has reported that the vessel has been taken by unauthorised personnel whist at anchor and is now bound for Iranian Territorial Waters. UKMTO continue to investigate,” says an incident report brief from the UK Maritime Trade Office. Not clear what “CSO” means in this context but it sure sounds like the waters of the region aren’t nearly as secure as the Trump Regime wants you think.

A day after Popular.Info’s Judd Legum printed a story that the “Trump Mobile” scam operation had still yet to deliver on the $500 Trump T1 phone nearly nine months after the September 2025 ship date promised last June – and that they had recently changed the preorder deposit terms to “a conditional opportunity if Trump Mobile later elects, in its sole discretion, to offer the Device for sale,” lol – USA Today reports that the T1 will finally start shipping to customers this week.

“The TI Phone isn’t just powerful, it’s shaped by American innovation,” the Trump Mobile website reads. “With American teams helping guide design and quality, we focus on delivering a device built with care and precision,” even though it’s just a reskin of some cheap piece of shit Android phone.

UK Health Secretary Wes Streeting has resigned from Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s cabinet, Sky News reports on a move that in British politics means Streeting is very likely to mount some kind of internal challenge for the premiership as the Labour party faces an electoral cataclysm.

“As you know from our conversation earlier this week, having lost confidence in your leadership, I have concluded that it would be dishonourable and unprincipled to do so,” Streeting wrote in his resignation letter. “It is now clear that you will not lead the Labour Party into the next general election and that Labour MPs and Labour unions want the debate about what comes next to be a battle of ideas, not of personalities or petty factionalism. It needs to be broad, and it needs to be the best possible field of candidates. I support that approach and I hope you will continue to facilitate it.”

The closest analogue in American politics would be the House Speakership though, say, Steve Scalise wouldn’t resign his post as Majority Leader to challenge Mike Johnson. He would just gather enough support for a motion to vacate and then make a run for the gavel. Without going further down the rabbit hole of differences, Labour is right and truly fucked and it’s worth asking what the hell new leadership is going to do. It’s not like it saved the Tories after Boris Johnson quit.

Perfectly timestamped to start at the point where Neckbeard denies that convicted felon President Trump ever said he doesn’t care about Americans’ financial situations. Even though he did.

“In full view of this NOTUS reporter,” writes NOTUS reporter Reese Gorman describing the sourcing for this story, which none of the parties involved denied when Gorman followed up with their respective offices to ask for comment. He got none, but there was no denial either.

With that out of the way, Gorman writes that he was in a DC restaurant on Tuesday evening speaking to douchey Michael Jackson fan Congressman Mike Lawler when an inebriated man interrupted and introduced himself as William Paul, the son of the junior Kentucky Senator Rand, ranting to Lawler that if other Blue Grass State libertarian Thomas Massie loses his primary next week to Trump-backed MAGA droid challenger Ed Gallrein, it’ll be because of “your people.”

“My people?” Lawler then asked. “Yeah, you Jews,” William responded. “Do you think I’m Jewish? I’m not,” Lawler then said to which William said “Oh wow, I’m so sorry for calling you a Jew.” Seems to be sarcastic, as William then went on about how Jews are “anti-American” and how Lawler and his “Jewish supporters” were Israeli pawns. “Paul Singer serves Israeli interests, not American interests,” William continued, referring to some rich asshole backing an anti-Massie PAC.

“Well, you just seem to hate Jews, so there’s no point arguing anymore,” Lawler then said, prompting William to shove a finger in Lawler’s face, saying, “Don’t put words in my mouth, Mike Lawler, I never said that.” William then ranted about the SALT cap for a bit before Lawler told him “Please leave us alone.” William walked away and flipped Lawler off. “Did you just give me the middle finger?” Lawler then asked. “I’m sorry, yeah, I did. I’m just really drunk. I’m going to leave,” William said before he paid his tab and knocked over a bar stool on his way out the door of the unnamed establishment.

In related news, Meidas Touch reports Gallrein’s political director Tris Lehner’s YouTube account is a long paper trail of antisemitic propaganda, lowlights of which include a video titled “Billy Graham to Richard Nixon: Hitler went about it wrong but this stranglehold has got to be broken.”

The South Carolina State Supreme Court on Wednesday overturned the murder convictions and life sentence of prominent South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh, who was allegedly shot in the head on a desolate highway on September 4th, 2020 (but wasn’t actually shot, per a police report), the day after he quit his law firm to enter rehab under suspicion of having embezzled money, two months after his wife Margaret Murdaugh and son Paul Murdaugh were found dead on one of the family’s properties shot with an assault rifle and a shotgun, respectively, three years after Paul drunkenly crashed a boat into a bridge pylon, killing a 19-year-old female acquaintance and had been facing trial for felony charges related to her death, and six years after his other son Buster Murdaugh might have also kind of murdered another kid… Yeah the justice unanimously tossed the verdict and his life sentences for killing his son and wife due to comments by the court clerk, FITSNews reports.

Murdaugh’s still in the joint for a long ass time after he pleaded guilty to a shit ton of other crimes.

By order of Speaker Cameron Sexton, every Democrat in the Tennessee state House was removed from their committee assignments on Tuesday as punishment for “instigating and encouraging” disruptions and “disorder on the House floor” during last Thursday’s vote to gerrymander out the sole Dem-leaning district in the Volunteer State, CNN reports on more Putin-zation in Red States.

GROCERY GRIEF: Speaker Johnson reacts to the latest inflation data showing prices pushing higher for American families.

"Not good news and real families are feeling that. And we're keenly aware of it, very sensitive to it here in Congress."

"We put together all the pro-growth… pic.twitter.com/ipTt6x5cAC

— FOX & Friends (@foxandfriends) May 13, 2026

“In the final weeks of Joe Biden’s presidency, FBI agents tied to Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation memorialized anew their belief that President Donald Trump broke the law in contesting the 2020 election and secretly arranged to preserve their evidence until 2030 in memos that raise alarm they could revive their prosecution after Trump leaves office,” writes shitbag propagandist John Solomon in the lede to his story headlined “Biden FBI secretly set up Trump to be indicted after he leaves office, Arctic Frost memos suggest.” Yeah John, we’d love it.