One year into a new, more aggressive White House administration, the United States finds itself navigating a reality that once occupied the fringes of political discourse: a president openly declaring his actions bound only by his own morality, a military unleashed on sovereign nations without congressional consent, and federal agents engaged in fatal, violent confrontations with American citizens on U.S. soil.

In a solemn comedy fit for our times, the great political machines of New Jersey and one of Washington’s most formidable lobbying groups have been handed a stinging and unexpected rebuke. What was declared settled is now unsettled; what was counted as certain is now a cliffhanger. The race to succeed Governor Mikie Sherrill in her former congressional district has become a spectacle, a late-night drama unfolding on a rare Thursday in February, proving once again that the only thing predictable about democracy is its glorious unpredictability.

Tens of thousands of men who were sexually abused as children in the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) are poised to receive mere pennies for every dollar of compensation they were promised, a lead attorney in the historic bankruptcy case recently told clients, revealing a settlement now described as a catastrophic mathematical failure that has left survivors feeling revictimized. In a stark and emotionally charged virtual town hall, attorney Michael T.

In a primary contest that laid bare the Democratic Party’s deepening fractures, carpet-bagging former Rep. Tom Malinowski has emerged as his party’s nominee for a New Jersey House seat, a victory that reads less as an endorsement and more as a desperate gamble. Democrats, facing a formidable and well-financed assault from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, chose to rally behind a candidate carrying the twin burdens of serious ethical censure and a position on Israel that managed to alienate both the powerful lobby and a significant portion of his own party’s base.

In a digital echo of a town hall door slamming shut, a decorated Marine veteran in Wayne finds his emails to the mayor returned unopened, stamped with a "permanent failure." The error message, a cold and mechanical rejection, has ignited a fundamental question about the First Amendment in an era where a public official’s inbox is the new public square.

William Ahle, the 70-year-old neighbor celebrated as a selfless savior several months ago, is scheduled for a plea disposition conference in court today, charged with first-degree murder and aggravated arson that claimed the life of 82-year-old Virginia Cranwell. This is not merely a crime story; it is a fable of American trust turned inside out, where the friendly face next door now stares back from a jail cell, and the official narrative of a tragic accident has been consumed by a fire of deliberate malice.

In a decisive vote that laid bare the fractures within his own party, Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey’s 5th District stood alone among the state’s House Democrats to support a Republican-led spending bill that reopened the federal government Tuesday night. The measure passed 217-214, ending a four-day partial shutdown, the latest in a record-shattering series of federal closures under President Donald Trump.

by Heather Vogell and Agnel Philip | ProPublica  The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a sharp warning that rocket launches could “significantly reduce safety” for airplanes, urging pilots to prepare for the possibility that “catastrophic failures” could create dangerous debris fields. The official notice, known as a safety alert for operators, was dated Jan. 8, the same day that ProPublica published…

As the second Trump administration accelerates what critics label a deliberate dismantling of federal protections, celebrity Senator Cory Booker is embarking on a national tour Monday to promote his forthcoming book, “Stand,” drawing immediate scorn from a primary opponent who called the venture a distracting vanity project amid a constitutional crisis. The New Jersey Democrat’s tour will begin at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center here on March 22, featuring what his announcement calls “a timely and hopeful conversation on reclaiming America’s shared ideals.” …

In the cavernous auditorium of the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth stood before a crowd of uniformed service members and proclaimed the nation’s need to be “on bended knee, recognizing the providence of our lord and savior Jesus Christ.” It was not a Sunday sermon but a mandatory‑hours prayer service, led by Hegseth’s personal pastor from a Tennessee church founded by a theologian who openly advocates for a “Christian theocracy.”

In a development that casts a long and troubling shadow over the independence of federal law enforcement, President Trump has taken the extraordinary step of personally contacting the F.B.I. agents who conducted last week’s raid on an election center in Fulton County, Georgia. According to sources familiar with the matter, the neofascist President praised the agents and thanked them for their work, a gesture of peculiar intimacy between the nation’s chief executive and those tasked with investigating matters in which he remains a profoundly interested party.

by Nikita Biryukov, New Jersey Monitor The Gateway Development Commission sued the federal government this week in an attempt to restart frozen federal funding that will soon halt construction on the new rail tunnels beneath the Hudson River. In its 75-page complaint, the bi-state commission argues the federal government is in breach of contract after withholding more than $205 million in federal funding that the Hudson Tunnel projects are entitled to under grant or loan agreements.

by J. David McSwane | ProPublica The two federal immigration agents who shot and killed Minnesota ICU nurse Alex Pretti have been identified in government records as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez. The records viewed by ProPublica list Ochoa, 43, and Gutierrez, 35, as the shooters during the deadly encounter last weekend that left Pretti dead and ignited massive protests and calls for criminal investigations.

President Donald Trump is asking Congress for a $1.5 trillion defense budget next year. This represents an increase of $500 billion in a single fiscal year, a sum that adds half again to the entire current Pentagon budget or enough to finance universal health insurance for every American, with some to spare. The scale of the proposal, delivered through a social media platform, would mark a peacetime mobilization of treasury unseen in generations, redirecting the nation's resources toward an as-yet undefined military ambition.

The Democratic primary in New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District presents voters with a spectacle of political machinery, a contest where the appearance of choice masks a more stubborn reality. While eleven names will appear on the ballot Feb. 5, the true struggle for the seat in Congress vacated by now-Gov. Mikie Sherrill has narrowed to a clash of three distinct political forces, each representing a deep-rooted faction of party power.

by Nikita Biryukov, New Jersey Monitor Acting Attorney General Jen Davenport sailed through a confirmation hearing to bipartisan praise Monday, becoming the first of Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s nominees to clear that hurdle. The Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously advanced Davenport’s nomination as the state’s top law enforcement official, with members on both sides of the aisle praising her candor and qualifications during a nearly three-hour hearing.

by Ariana Figueroa, New Jersey Monitor A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked a Trump administration policy that prevented members of Congress from making unannounced oversight visits at facilities that hold immigrants. Thetemporary restraining order from U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb of District of Columbia federal court blocked a seven-day notice requirement that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem established earlier this month.

In a state that has learned, through painful and protracted scandal, to listen to those who come forward with whispers of old wounds, a veteran lawmaker is demanding the country now heed a most disturbing allegation. State Senator Joe Vitale, a Democrat from Middlesex who has spent years shepherding laws to lift the statute of limitations for victims of childhood sexual abuse, called Tuesday for an immediate investigation into allegations that President Donald Trump raped and abused minors.

In the grand, gilded ledger of American power, the names are often written in ink that refuses to dry. The latest installment of the Jeffrey Epstein files, a sprawling monument to human corruption, offers not a smoking gun but a lingering, sulfurous haze. It is a fog that obscures the faces of the powerful while the rest of us are asked to simply breathe it in and move along.

There is a lie festering at the heart of American law enforcement, a phantom menace that has been granted the power of life and death. It is the unshakable belief, drilled into the minds of those who carry a badge and a gun, that every traffic stop is a potential ambush, that a broken taillight can be a prelude to a firefight.

The Hunterdon County Democratic Committee hosted a forum for candidates seeking the party’s nomination in New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District on Sunday. The forum, held at the Stangle Factory, featured a roster of contenders vying to replace Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr. The moderator set a tone of inevitable succession, telling the crowd, “On this stage sits the next congressperson for the 7th District,” a statement met with applause.

In the grand and gilded circus of American politics, there is a particular performance that plays out with metronomic regularity. It is the spectacle of a reformer entering the ring with a flourish, only to discover that the ringmaster’s wallet is fuller than his convictions. And in the 2026 act unfolding here, two characters are dominating the marquee: the billionaire who bought an oil empire, and the senator who may have provided the moral lubrication for the deal.

What follows is not a scene from a grim novel or a satirical play, but witness accounts according to numerous citizens who see it as the regular business of governance in Roselle, New Jersey. The council chamber in Borough Hall—meant for calm deliberation of the public’s interests—has been described by those who attend as something more like a prison yard where the inmates have taken control.

For over three decades, the state of New Jersey and its residents have been party to an extraordinary and costly bargain that now reads like fiction. It was a contract for the future—a statewide fiber optic network paid for by the public and promised by one of the world's largest telecommunications giants. The evidence suggests that this future was not merely delayed, but deliberately abandoned, with billions in customer funds diverted and the state's digital landscape left scarred by a preventable divide.

Cuba has declared an “international emergency” in response to President Donald Trump’s decision to impose tariffs on countries that send oil to the island. “The people of Cuba, with the solidarity of the international community, conclude that the situation with respect to the government of the United States constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat, which comes totally or substantially from the anti-Cuban, neo-fascist right wing of the United States,” Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez wrote on social media.